The Court of Cassation found that a manager cannot use the word to swear at underlings, the Italian news agency ANSA reports. The court rejected a claim by a supervisor at a company in Catania that the word is now socially acceptable.

''The hierarchical relationship linking the manager to the employee ought to have led the former to a more careful expressive control,'' the court said.

The manager, a company director identified only as Sebastian C., told a worker he did not know a "f---ing thing."

In May, the court ruled that mayors can use the f-word to describe the work of contractors, apparently finding either no hierarchical relationship or one that goes the other way.

In the case heard Friday, a lower court had thrown out an employee's complaint on the technical grounds that he waited too long to go to court. But the court allowed the case to remain on file, so the manager, not content to leave well enough alone, sued to have it removed.