film "The Godfather" when Don Vito Corleone's son Michael takes over his father's position...

and one of the most unforgettable moments, a severed horses's head lies bloody in a man's bed. It

is this tradition and brutality that characterizes the Mafia, a secret Sicilian society that lives and

functions just as much today on American soil as it did and does still in Italy.

To understand this organized crime, one must begin to understand how it came to be

organized in the first place. During the medieval times in Sicily, Arabs invaded the land and native

Sicilians fled and took refuge in the hills. Some of these refugees formed a secret society that gave

protection to the people in exchange for money. This group took their name, "Mafia" based on

the Arabic word for refuge. In America today, one can hear it also be called "La Cosa Nostra", or

"This Thing of Ours." In the 1700s,Wealthy people would receive a card with a black hand drawn

on and if they did not pay the money, they could expect murder, theft, and violence.

During the time Mussolini was ruling Italy, this secret society was under heavy persecutio

all people in the Mafia are required to maintain certain silence about the workings of the Family, a

Genovese family, for the most part, is low key, whereas the Gambino family is heard all over the

code of silence called "Omerta," different families come to be known for different things. The

United States. The new American Mafia came to power during the Prohibition by organizing the

Some common words found in the essay are:
Godfather Mafia, American Mafia, Vito Corleone's, Puzo's Godfather, Wide Web, Sicily Arabs, Five Families, Anonymous Mafia, Below Caporegime, Colombo Genovese, wide web, online world wide, la cosa nostra, world wide, cosa nostra, online world, 1999 available, june 1999, june 1999 available, gambino family, la cosa, world wide web, web 4, 4 june 1999, american mafia,
Approximate Word count = 1239
Approximate Pages = 5 (250 words per page double spaced)