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Posts Tagged ‘brewer’s’

Brewer’s Dictionary: G-M

October 27th, 2014 by pladd

Okay, so I’ve been really falling behind on posting about Brewer’s. And reading it. I just finished M this morning and it’s already October 27th. Whatever, more than halfway there, I can do this!!! Anyway, here’s what you missed while you were not spending your 2014 reading a reference book:

Giotto’s O.The old story goes that the pope, wishing to employ artists from all over Italy, sent a messenger to collect specimens of their work. When the man visited Giotto (c. 1267-1337), the artist paused for a moment from the picture he was working on and with his brush drew a perfect circle on a piece of paper. In some surprise the man returned to the pope, who, appreciating the perfection of Giotto’s artistry and skill by his unerring circle, employed him forthwith.

Goddam. A name given by the French to the English at least as early as the 15th century on account of the favourite oath of the English soldiers. Joan of Arc is reported to have used the word on a number of occasions in contemptuous reference to her enemies.

Grammar. Suetonius writes that Tiberius was rebuked by a grammarian for some verbal slip, and upon a courtier remarking that if the word was not good Latin it would be in future, now that it had received imperial recognition, he was rebuked with the words, Tu enim Caesar civitatem dare potes hominibus, verbis non potes (‘Caesar, you can grant citizenship to men, but not to words’).

Great Bed of Ware. A fourposter bed 11ft square and capable of holding 12 people. It dates from the late 16th century and was formerly at the Saracen’s Head Inn, Ware, Hertfordshire.

Sleeping in style

Haha. A type of ditch found in the grounds of country houses and perhaps so called from the exclamation of surprise when coming across it or of malicious pleasure when another is seen to fall into it.

I knew what hahas are, but am really gratified to learn that the origin of the name is as silly as you think.

Hats It was a point of principle with the early Quakers not to remove their hat, the usual mark of respect, even in the presence of royalty. The story goes that William Penn once entered the presence of Charles II and kept his hat on, whereupon Charles removed his own hat. ‘Friend Charles,’ said Penn, ‘Why dost thou uncover thy head?’ ‘Friend Penn,’ answered Charles with a smile, ‘it is the custom here that only one person wears his hat in the king’s presence.’

I guess there were no standouts under I? I didn’t write anything down.

Ditto J. In reality, I think I lost my Brewer’s notebook for a while.

I must have found it in time to record this gem of Brewer’s understated sass:

You know something (or) what? I am going to tell you something.

One of the best things about Brewer’s is learning interesting word origin stories, like:

Lady: Literally ‘bread kneader’, from Old English.

Or:

in-laws A way of referring to one’s relations by marriage: mother-in-law, brothers-in-law and so on. The law is that of canon law, and it refers to the degrees of affinity within which marriage is allowed or prohibited.

And other times there’s an entry that shows slang has always been cray. I mean, wtf:

Lead apes in hell. The depressing consequence of dying an old maid. Hence ape-leader, an old maid.

Also, folk beliefs are always amazing:

Lick into shape. To make presentable; to mould into a satisfactory condition. The expression derives from the widespread medieval belief that bear cubs are born shapeless and have to be licked into shape by their mothers.

Love spoons. The giving of elaborately carved love spoons by a lover to his lady as a token during courtship was common in 18th-century Wales.

Get with the program, Steven

Apparently Magenta is named after a battle!

Magenta. A brilliant red aniline dye derived from coal tar, named in commemoration of the bloody Battle of Magenta (1859), when the Austrians were defeated by the French and Sardinians. This was just before the dye was discovered.

Milo. A celebrated Greek athlete of Crotona in the late 6th century BC. It is said that he carried through the stadium at Olympia a heifer four years old, and ate the whole of it afterwards. When he was old, he attempted to tear in two an oak tree, but the parts closed upon his hands, and while he was thus held fast he was devoured by wolves.

That escalated quickly.

Mohocks. A class of ruffians who in the 18th century infested the streets of London. They were so called from the Mohawk Indians. One of their ‘new inventions’ was to roll people down Snow Hill in a tub. Another was to overturn coaches on rubbish heaps.

I’m on page 805 of 1298, so only 493 more to go! I can do it!! I’ve just got to believe in myself.

Previously: E and F

Tagged: brewer's

Posted in 2014 League of Six |

Brewer’s E and F

June 9th, 2014 by pladd

My enthusiasm for reading all of Brewer’s Dictionary of Phrase and Fable has flagged a little bit in the last few months, possibly inevitably. I’m still trying to soldier through. Right now I’m on page 490, in G, and I thought I’d combine my entries on E and F, since E was quite short on its own. Right now I’m 37.75% done with this project, with 808 pages to go. I need to work harder in June to be at 50% by the halfway mark!

Here are some interesting things I read about this time:

The Eagle and the Child: The crest of the Stanley family and the Earls of Derby. The legend is that Sir Thomas Latham, an ancestor of the house, caused his illegitimate son to be placed under the foot of a tree in which an eagle had built its nest. When out walking with his wife, they “accidentally” found the child, which he persuaded her to adopt as their heir.

Because wives are not cool with your bastards, but they are strangely accepting of random eagle-foundlings.

Give us back our eleven days: When England adopted the Gregorian calendar in place of the Julian calendar, eleven days were dropped, 2 September 1752 being followed by 14 September. Many people thought that they were being cheated out of eleven days and also eleven days’ pay. Hence the popular cry: “Give us back our eleven days!”

And you bitch about daylight saving time!

The F section has a 3 page long list summarizing famous fakes and forgeries, all of which are really interesting. The ones I like best have motivations other than making money, like:

The Ireland forgeries: William Henry Ireland (1777-1835)… came out with two “lost” Shakespeare plays: Vortigern and Rowena and Henry II… His motive appears to have been a craving to secure the admiration of his father, whose antiquarian interests amounted to an obsession.

Piltdown Skull or Piltdown man: By 1912 Charles Darwin and Sir Arthur Smith Woodward had discovered a whole skull… thought to be that of a new genus of man… The hoax, which duped most experts, was apparently planned by William Sollas, Professor of Geology at Oxford, through his dislike of Woodward

The Vermeer forgeries: Hans (Henri) van Meegeren (1889-1947) began his series of brilliant fakes of Dutch masters in 1937… His intention seems to have been to indulge his contempt and hatred of the art critics by a superlative hoax, but the financial success of his first fake led to others, mostly “Vermeers.” Discovery came only in 1945 when Allied commissioners were seeking to restore to their former owners the art treasures that had found their way to Germany during the war. Among Goering’s collection was an unknown Vermeer, The Woman taken in Adultery, and its original vendor was found to be van Meegeren. Sale of such a work of national importance involved a charge of collaboration with the enemy. To escape the heavy penalty, van Meegeren confessed to faking 14 Dutch masterpieces, 9 of which had been sold for a total of 7,167,000 gulden and to prove his story agreed to paint another “old masterpiece” in prison in the presence of experts.

There’s also an awesome 5 page list of Famous Last Words in even tinier type than the rest of the entries. Here are some favorites:

William Hazlitt (1830; English writer) “Well, I’ve had a good life.”

Heinrich Heine (1856; German poet) “God will pardon me, it i His trade.”

Lady Mary Wortley Montagu (1762; English poet) “It has all been very interesting.”

I was particularly pleased to read this entry about the phrase “Dinna fash yourself,” a favorite of Highland romance novelists:

Dinna fash yerself’! Don’t get excited; don’t get into a state about it. The word is not of Scottish origin, but comes from obsolete French fascher, “to anger.”

Also, a phrase you might use casually has dirty origins:

To fill someone in: To provide them with information… The expression probably derives from the earlier low sense of making a woman pregnant.

Brewer’s is judging you for your slang terms and your knocking people up.

Previously: D
Next: G

Tagged: brewer's

Posted in 2014 League of Six |

Brewer’s Dictionary: D

March 21st, 2014 by pladd

I finally finished the D chapter in Brewer’s Dictionary of Phrase and Fable yesterday! There’s no reason it should have taken me that long. It’s only 63 pages (the 10th longest chapter), but, for the first time since starting this project on January 1st, I had a week where I didn’t read anything! I know, what a slacker.

Anyway, here are some interesting things that start with D:

I always think of jeans as being super American, but it turns out denim is from France:

Denims–Coloured twilled cotton material used for overalls and, especially, jeans. Its name is a contraction of French serge de Nimes (‘serge of Nimes’), from the town in the south of France where it was originally made.

Tres chic!

I read a book once about animal trials, where olde timey law courts would try animals for murder. Once even a swarm of flies! Apparently, even if you weren’t going to seek punishment for some animal or inanimate object killing a relative, that thing was still considered cursed, and you had to sell it:

Deodand–Literally, something that should be given to God (Latin, Deo dandum). In former English law a personal possession that was responsible for the death of an individual was forfeited to the crown for some pious use. For example, if a man met his death from the fall of a ladder or the kick of a horse, the cause of death (the ladder or the horse) was sold and the proceeds given to the church. It originated from the idea that, as the victim met his death without the sacrament of extreme unction, the money could serve to pay for masses for his repose. Deodands were abolished in 1862.

Also, some bad news:

Devil’s livery–Black and yellow: black for death, yellow for quarantine.

Sorry Steelers fans, Wiessmen, and Hufflepuffs

I like learning word origins from Brewer’s, especially when the word has changed meaning pretty dramatically:

Double-cross–Properly, to cheat or cross each of two parties, to betray both sides

Of course, this original meaning makes way more sense!

And another ridiculous story brought to you by history’s first troll:

The Druid’s egg–According to Pliny, who claimed to possess one, this wonderful egg was hatched by the joint labour of several serpents and was buoyed in the air by their hissing. The person who caught it had to escape at full speed to avoid being stung to death, but the possessor was sure to prevail in every contest and to be courted by those in power

Okay, Pliny, whatever you say

And finally:

The Drunk Parliament–The Parliament assembled at Edinburgh in January 1661, of which Burnet says the members ‘were almost perpetually drunk’.

Previously: C
Next: E

Tagged: brewer's

Posted in 2014 League of Six |

C

February 23rd, 2014 by pladd

Yay! I finally finished the C section in Brewer’s Dictionary of Phrase and Fable. At 127 pages, it’s the longest letter. I’m still only about 23% of the way to completion, but that’s pretty good for February! Here are some interesting things I encountered in C:

Candidate: … Those who solicited a high office among the Romans, such as that of consul, dressed themselves in a loose white robe. It was loose so that they could show the people their scars…

Elections would be a whole lot more exciting if it was all about comparing scars! Although I guess they’re already like that, metaphorically.

That’s right! This hot fashion item was named after a dude!

Cardigan: A knitted jacket or sweater with buttons up the front, named after the 7th Earl of Cardigan (1797-1868), who led the Light Brigade in the charge of Balaclava.

What a way to be remembered.

Brewer’s sometimes likes to tell you etymology, although it’s not the OED. I assume the editors only include word origins when they think they’re poetic and interesting, like:

Cemetery: The proper name of the word is “sleeping place” from the Greek Koimeterion, “dormitory.” The Persians call their cemeteries “the cities of the silent.”

“Sleeping Place” makes it less creepy, “city of the silent” makes it more

Cento: (Latin, ‘patchwork’) Poetry made up of lines borrowed from established authors, an art freely practiced in the decadent days of Greece and Rome… An example of a stanza from a modern cento, with lines taken from 19th-century poets, is the following:

I only knew she came and went (Lowell)
Like troutlets in a pool; (Hood)
She was a phantom of delight (Wordsworth)
And I was like a fool. (Eastman)

Basically, I’ve discovered ancient sampling.

Chamberisms: Such may be called the idiosyncratic definitions that have regularly appeared in the various editions of Chambers Dictionary… the following remain in the 1998 edition:

he-man: a man of exaggerated virility, or what some women consider to be virility
jaywalker: a careless pedestrian whom motorists are expected to avoid running down
middle-aged: between youth and old age, variously reckoned to suit the reckoner

Judgmental reference sources are the best! Brewers can be pretty judgey itself sometimes.

Charivari: A French term for an uproar caused by banging pans and kettles and accompanied by hissing, shouting, and the like to express disapproval, especially at an unpopular wedding

The emphasis is mine because what??

I’m picturing bored villagers going to weddings to heckle

Also, there’s this list, of everything bad that’s ever happened to a king named Charles. Thanks, Brewers.

Charles: Many rulers bearing this name have been afflicted with misfortune:

England:
Charles I was beheaded
Charles II lived long in exile
Charles Edward Stuart, the Young Pretender, died in poverty

France:
Charles II, the Fat, reigned wretchedly, was deposed, and died in poverty
Charles III, the Simple, died a prisoner
Charles IV, the Fair, reigned six years, married three times, and outlived all his children except one daughter, who was forbidden by the Salic Law to succeed to the crown
Charles VI, the Foolish, went mad
Charles VII starved himself to death, partly through fear of being poisoned and partly because of a painful and incurable abscess in the mouth
Charles VIII, the Affable, accidentally smashed his head against the lintel of a doorway and died in agony at the age of 28, leaving no issue
Charles IX died at the age of 24, stricken with remorse for the part he had taken in the St. Bartholomew’s Day Massacre
Charles X spent a quarter of a century in exile, and after less than six years on the throne, fled for his life and died in exile
Charles the Bold of Burgundy lost his life at Nancy when he was routed by the Swiss

Naples:
Charles I lost Sicily and experienced many disasters
Charles II, the Lame, was in captivity at the time of his father’s death
Charles III, his great-grandson, was assassinated at the age of 41

I guess it’s the price you pay to look this fabulous

Also, apparently 18th-century Italy decided that husbands were necessary but so not fashionable.

Cicisbeo: The escort or lover of a married woman, especially in 18th-century Italy. At that time, it was unfashionable for a husband to associate with his wife in society or in public, and she was therefore accompanied by her cicisbeo.

I knew about the claque, which is basically the theater version of a laugh track, but I didn’t know there were so many specialties within it:

Claque: A body of hired applauders, as at a theater… The manager ordered the required number of claqueurs and divided them into groups. There were the commissaires, who committed the play to memory and noisily pointed out its merits, the rieurs, who laughed uproariously at the jokes, the pleureurs, mainly women, who held their handkerchiefs to their eyes during the emotional scenes, the chatouilleurs, who kept the audience in good humor with their quips and gestures, and the bisseurs, who cried bis (encore).

How great a job would this be? Anyone wanting to pay me to attend their show and react dramatically, just give me a call.

Plus, it turns out, everyone afraid of clowns is completely justified:

Clown: … [the standard appearance] is probably a relic of the Devil as he appeared in medieval miracle plays.

I always suspected this was the true face of evil

Also, very occasionally, Brewer’s will have illustrations:

Here’s one for the entry on different kinds of crosses

I’ve already made a start on D! It’s only the 10th longest letter, with 63 pages, so I’m hoping it won’t take me as long!

Previously: B
Next: D

Tagged: 2014 goals, brewer's

Posted in 2014 League of Six |

B

February 4th, 2014 by pladd

I finally finished the B section of Brewer’s Dictionary of Phrase and Fable! It’s okay that it took me a little while–B is the third longest chapter, after C and S. I guess theoretically this means I’m 1/13 (about 8%) of the way through this project, but really it’s more like 14% if you’re actually counting page numbers. You can’t really compare X (2 pages) and C (127 pages) and say that they’re both 1/26 of the whole.

Anyway, here are the best things I read about that start with B:

Babar. The elegantly dressed African elephant in the books for young children by the French writer and illustrator Jean de Brunhoff … His name, perversely enough, appears to derive from Hindi babar, ‘lion’.

So I guess he’s suffering from species dysmorphic disorder. In more ways than one.

Remember the rule that if the Professor is more than 10 minutes late, you can leave class? There’s definitely a better way:

Barring out. In former days, a schoolboys’ practice of barricading masters out of the classroom or the school. In 1818 soldiers were called in to deal with a rebellious outbreak at Winchester College.

Someone really didn’t want to take a midterm, I guess.

Bark. Dogs in their wild state never bark, but howl, whine, and growl. Barking is an acquired habit.

I really wish my neighbor’s dog hadn’t acquired this habit, at least at 7 in the morning.

To beat the bounds.An old custom … of going around the parish boundaries on Ascension Day. The schoolchildren, accompanied by the clergyman and parish officers, walk round the boundaries, which the boys ‘beat’ with peeled willow-wands. The boys were originally themselves sometimes beaten at the limits of the boundaries to make them remember the place.

A civics lesson at its best

Belle laide. (French, ‘beautiful ugly one’) An intriguingly unattractive woman.

Also sometimes you learn supposedly American slang you’ve never heard before:

Booby hatch. An American slang expression for a psychiatric hospital.

Or the strange origins of common words:

Bully. The original meaning of the noun was “sweetheart” as in:

“I kiss his dirty shoe, and from my heart-strings
I love the lovely bully.”
Shakespeare: Henry V, IV, i (1598)

Its origin is probably in Middle Dutch boele, ‘lover’. The sense development seems to have gone as follows: (1) lover, (2) fine fellow, (3) blusterer, (4) bully.

C is probably going to take me awhile! It’s the longest chapter in the book!

Next: C
Previously: A

Tagged: 2014 goals, brewer's

Posted in 2014 League of Six, Project Series |

Brewer’s: A

January 14th, 2014 by pladd

The 79 pages of A in Brewer’s Dictionary of Phrase and Fable went even faster than I thought. As promised, I took notes of the most interesting things I read about, and here they are:

Adamites: One of a number of small Christian sects, which aimed to revert to man’s primitive state in the Garden of Eden by adopting nudity.

Give me some of that olde tyme religion!

My favorite history is the kind that’s just ridiculous stories, and Brewer’s actually has a lot of that, so get pumped. Another thing I enjoy are explanations for common phrases or sometimes names for things I didn’t know had names:

Addisonian termination: The name given by Richard Hurd, bishop of Worcester (1720-1808), to the construction, frequently employed by the essayist Joseph Addison (1672-1719), which closes a sentence with a preposition, e.g. ‘which the prophet took a distinct view of.’

How many of these have I corrected at work without knowing they had a name? Look out, Korea, I’m about to get even more pretentious about grammar, and it’s all thanks to Brewer’s.

AEIOU: The device adopted by Frederick V, Archduke of Austria, on becoming the Emperor Frederick III in 1440. The letters, used by his predecessor, Albert II, stood for:

Albertus Electus Imperator Optimus Vivat. (Long live Albert, the best elected emperor.)

Frederick interpreted them thus:

Archidux Electus Imperator Optime Vivat. (Long live the Archduke, elected emperor for the best.)

Among other versions are:

Austriae Est Imperare Orbi Universo (It is given to Austria to rule the whole world)
Alles Erdreich Ist Oesterreich Unterthan. (All earth is subject to Austria)

To which wags added after the defeat of Prussia in 1866:

Austria’s Empire Is Ousted Utterly.

I have to start thinking up some Latin phrases to acronym after my name like that! Speaking of really good role models in Brewer’s:

Aetherius: In 1954 His Eminence Sir George King (b.1919) claimed to have been contacted by the Master Aetherius, a power from the planet Venus, who told him to become the Voice of Interplanetary Parliament. The result was the formation of the Aetherius Society, which now has branches worldwide. King, whose titles have not been verified, maintains he has met Jesus Christ, the Buddha, and St. Peter, who all now speak to him and through him. The Society teaches that a race of wise fish on the distant planet Garouche are trying to suck the air away from Earth, so killing all terrestrial life except marine creatures, which supposedly obtain their oxygen from the water. Members of the Society charge up devices known as spiritual batteries by spending a fixed number of hours in prayer.

So there that is

Pretty much every sentence of this entry alone would be cause for inclusion in my “Best of Brewer’s” list, and, with them all there together, it’s going to be hard for any further entry to top this one. I know I have a long way to go (25 more letters!), but this is the standard I’m holding you up to now, Brewer’s, so bring your A-game.

Alexandra limp: In the 1860s Queen Alexandra (then Princess of Wales), after a painful attack of rheumatism in the knee, developed a limp, which was imitated in sycophantic fashion by many women about the court. Hence the ‘Alexandra limp’.

“Stop limping!” “But Mom! All the cool courtiers are doing it!” I love that this is the world I live in.

Brewer’s can also be oddly judgmental for a reference book, but that’s just part of its charm:

Aloha: [a real definition was here]… the spirit of the word can also be visually, if vulgarly, expressed in an ‘aloha shirt’, a loose and brightly colored sports shirt

Vulgar? This guy?

I guess I won’t be getting Brewer’s a Hawaiian shirt for its birthday. Other times, it just gets weirdly specific. For instance, at the end of the April Fool’s definition:

April Fool’s:… Children generally accept that their licence to play tricks expires at noon, but adults take the whole day and may mark the occasion by arranging the delivery of a kissogram or some similar embarrassment.

Have any of you ever once arranged for the delivery of a kissogram? We’ve all been doing April Fool’s wrong and 2014 is the year we have to shape up. Thanks, Brewer’s!

After the word “As” was a four and a half page list of all the common similes that start with the word, such as “as deaf as a post” or:

As deaf as a white cat: It is said that white cats are deaf and stupid.

Pictured: a deaf idiot

As drunk as Davy’s sow: According to Francis Grose’s Classical Dictionary of the Vulgar Tongue (1785), one David Lloyd, a Welshman who kept an alehouse at Hereford, had a sow with six legs, which was an object of great curiosity. One day David’s wife, having indulged too freely, lay down in the sty to sleep, and a group came to see the sow. David led them to the sty saying as usual, “There is a sow for you! Did you ever see the like?” One of the visitors replied: “Well, it is the drunkenest sow I ever beheld.” The woman was ever after called “Davy’s sow”.

God bless you, random drunk woman, preserved through time for all to behold. Thank you, Brewer’s, for being the keeper of such vital information for ages to come.

Looking forward to B!

Next: B
Previously: Intro

Tagged: 2014 goals, brewer's

Posted in 2014 League of Six |

Brewer’s Dictionary of Phrase and Fable in a Year

January 7th, 2014 by pladd

I wrote about my 6 goals for 2014 last week, and the one I’ve been most looking forward to is reading all of Brewer’s Dictionary of Phrase and Fable. It’s been around since 1870, though you may not have heard of it because it’s more idiosyncratic than a typical reference book. I have the 16th edition, which was first published in 1999, although this printing is from 2003.

I got it for my birthday that year, actually

I got it for Christmas that year, actually

So I’ve owned this book for about 10 years now, and I’ve only ever read snippets of it. That all changes now, and I’m pretty excited to bring you updates on each letter. But for now, I’ll just start with the prefaces, introductions, and forewords. The latest one is written by Terry Pratchett, so you know we’re talking about something quality, even if you don’t yet know what it is. He describes Brewer’s as “a serendipitous book” because “you might not find what you’re looking for, but you will find three completely unexpected things that are probably more interesting.” Basically, it started as the Wikipedia of the 1870s, full of idioms, Norse gods, and peculiar stories about historical minutia. According to the introduction in my edition (by John Buchanan-Brown), it was instantly popular due to the 19th-century’s Romantic movement and the fact that a surge in literacy had created an intellectually curious public who lacked serious education. In his reference book, Dr. Ebenezer Cobham Brewer presented the results of academic scholarship (particularly about ancient folk customs, language, and beliefs–popular topics in the 1800s) in a simple, easily-accessible format for the general public. Of course, in the subsequent 15 editions, much has been edited, added, and cut. Pratchett writes that the 16th edition includes Gandalf but not “some of the duller nymphs,” which seems like a good compromise. I guess we’ll both learn more about the content as the year goes on!

Here’s the side view, with my pen marking how far I read yesterday

This edition is 1298 pages, which means I need to read about 3.5 pages a day, so my first update (about the letter A, naturally) will have to appear before the end of the month (there are 79 pages in A). Here’s a list of how many pages each letter stretches, from greatest to least:

I definitely wouldn’t have guessed C to have the most

Though, of course, X being the least makes sense. Yesterday I read 15 pages because I didn’t have much to do and knew I’d be grateful later for a buffer. According to my spreadsheet, that means I’m 1.16% finished already! See? This year is going to be a cinch.

Tagged: 2014 goals, brewer's

Posted in 2014 League of Six |