Five Families
The Five Families are the major crime families of the Italian-American Mafia based in New York City which have dominated traditional organized crime in New York. The Five Families, under the suggestion of Lucky Luciano, were responsible for the establishment of The Commission, a council which demarcated territory between the previously warring factions and governs Cosa Nostra activities in the United States.
The five families are:
Some of the families may be known by alternative names. For example, the Colombo family is sometimes called the Profaci family (after Joe Profaci, its long-time boss).
In the 1972 mafia-centered movie The Godfather, five crime families dominate the Cosa Nostra of New York, but the families have different names than their real life counterparts above. The most notable of the film version's families include the Corleones, the Tattaglias, and the Barzinis (the other two being the Cuneos and the Straccis).