Fiasco in Italian literally means bottle.

It is from fiasco that the English words flask and flagon are derived.

However, a fiasco meaning a ludicrous failure or debacle, is thought to come from an Italian theatre saying, far fiasco or ‘make a bottle’, which was slang for a complete breakdown in performance. Make a bottle sounds similar to the English ‘make a botch of’.

Nobody is quite sure how this slang came about, but there are quite a few theories including ones about Venetian glass blowers. One Italian dictionary says that fare il fiasco means to play a game so that the loser pays for the next fiasco, or bottle. This suggests a costly mistake.

The connection between fiasco and bottle could also help explain the English slang to ‘lose your bottle’ meaning to lose courage.