Not Politically Correct

A few will be aware I have been known to speak on various subjects over the years. Fundamentally these all revolve around my favourite subject of etymology. Have always enjoyed bringing this fascinating subject to others. It’s not for me to say whether the audiences have, although many have asked me to return.

Thought it might be worthwhile sharing a snippet or two from these etymological presentations, continuing with Not Politically Correct. Few will not have heard the phrase "Sticks and stones may break my bones but words will never hurt me." In the modern world of political correctness many words and phrases are considered hurtful in the extreme. Curses and more base language are heard described as 'Anglo-Saxon'. In truth these more than likely began in this Old English language but had quite innocent meanings. Here the origins and original use of the words are examined and analysed to show how these terms began quite innocently. This talk is intended for an adult audience and some may find some parts offensive. There is a PowerPoint presentation to accompany this talk if required.

Now the most common no-no is the unacceptable terms for those of a different nationality. And why not start with those across the channel, the French. The French have been known as Frogs – and as we all know this is down to the French delicacy of frog’s legs. But it isn’t. And it was coined by the English. But it wasn’t. And it’s a racist comment. But it isn’t. This dates from the 16th or 17th century when the city of Paris had on its coat of arms toads. As with all capital cities the residents and officials thought themselves above the rest of the nation and thus it was originally the rest of France who referred to the Parisians as ‘Frogs’ (when it should have been ‘toads’). This caught on and by the 18th century the Belgians, who did not like the French, were certainly using it and it seems we got it from the Belgians.

British have been called Limies ever since naval men were given a ration of citrus fruit to ward off scurvy. Limes would have been eaten but only because these citrus fruit had a longer shelf life. I’m sure the ratings would have loved to have them replaced by a nice ripe avocado – incidentally the Aztec word ‘avocado’ meant ‘testicle’, as they saw it as an aphrodisiac and thought the fruit resembled the testicle. No wonder they died out. Australians call us Poms or Pommies, apparently they are convinced we dine on pomegranates a lot. Can’t say I’ve ever knowingly eaten a single pomegranate. It is NOT an acronym for Prisoner of Her (or His) Majesty nor is it Permit Of Migration.

Enough of the race words and off to insults. To me this is where political correctness goes completely insane. As we have already shown so-called racial slurs have, for the most part, quite innocent beginnings – now surely to describe someone as ‘bald’, ‘short’, ‘fat’ (all used to describe kings of France named Charles, please note) is simply true. Whilst I accept they shouldn’t be the sole identifying feature, if you have three people named Charles who were all French monarchs, how would you know which one was which without the additional information? So let’s have a look at the origins of some of these words. And we’ll start with ‘fat’. Now clearly any insult is using the word as an adjective, while the word began as a noun. Not so, it began as an adjective, then used as a verb ‘to fatten’ and finally as a noun. The word is ultimately from Proto-Indo-European poid which meant ‘fat, swell, grow’ particularly with milk, fat or water. Now I could be wrong here but I can’t see milk or water ever being insulting and fat in this context is surely a bonus. Thin – is unacceptable while ‘slim’ is a compliment. Now historically this might be more of an insult for it began as ‘stretched out, diluted, lacking body’ – much as we describe gravy, soup or sauce.

If not yet appalled and might want to hear me take the etymologist’s view of these terms, drop me a line. Note the words are not the problem, it’s the usage. If you think you know someone who would like to hear me speak on this subject, drop me a line.

The Letter H

A few will be aware I have been known to speak on various subjects over the years. Fundamentally these all revolve around my favourite subject of etymology. Have always enjoyed bringing this fascinating subject to others. It’s not for me to say whether the audiences have, although many have asked me to return.

Thought it might be worthwhile sharing a snippet or two from these etymological presentations, continuing with The Letter H. The eighth letter of the English alphabet has the distinction of being the first letter to have its own listing in the dictionary, doing so many years before the second. Look up 'H' and discover the recommended pronunciation is 'aitch' although the dictionary concedes the increased use of 'haitch' is an alternative. Hear, too, how the letter came to English, of its changing usage throughout history and just how the letter's upper case rugby posts-like image and corresponding lower case form came about. Yet this is not just a talk about a single letter but a look at the development, changing usage and beginnings of our all-too familiar alphabet.

The letter ‘H’, the eighth letter of the alphabet, is also listed in the OED under the first letter of the alphabet – ie ‘A’. This is because the letter ‘H’ is unique as it is the only letter in the OED to be listed as a word. Why on earth would this be I hear you cry – well no, I don’t but you’re finding out anyway. It is because of the plural, a plural found in the phrase (sadly not used anywhere near enough these days) “to drop one’s aitches”.

Now dropping one’s aitches is the reason why some refer not to AITCH but to HAITCH. Remember Parker the chauffeur in Thunderbirds? He was your archetypal cockney, his speech saw him drop the aitch at the beginning of words such as ‘appy, ‘elp, ‘erring, and ‘enry, but include an erroneous ‘h’ at the beginning of words such as h’easter, h’avenue, h’artist, and h’England. Now somewhere along the way someone thought the letter ‘aitch’ began with an ‘aitch’ when it doesn’t but it does end in an ‘aitch’

Now the OED base their rules very much on usage. Thus the more people get it wrong and say HAITCH the more likely it will be that HAITCH will lose its listing under ‘A’. Indeed the OED already recognise both forms, so the rot has probably already set in so far it is impossible to reverse

Not only do we add an ‘h’ at the beginning when none is present, but we also pronounce the ‘h’ at the beginning of words where the ‘h’ is present but accepted pronunciation is without. Perhaps the best known of these is ‘hotel’ which, being of French derivation, should be said to be ‘otel and thus we should say ‘an hotel’ not ‘a hotel’. There are others: such as ‘hour’, ‘heir’ and ‘honest’ which have also come to English from French.

We also need to look at the origin of the letter for, like all letters and symbols, they were not simply invented but developed. To do so it is probably easier to work back from the present era rather than forward from the beginning of writing. During the last thousand years the letter has become harsher in languages such as Portuguese and Spanish; while Romance languages, such as Romanian, had lost the sound completely until re-borrowed from neighbouring Slavic languages. All these come from Etruscan ‘H’ and this comes, in turn, from archaic Greek alphabets the letter became a long vowel, borrowed directly from the earliest known form as a letter. While the Greek version is eta early forms give this as heta, itself also seen in the Phoenician heth. The Phoenician alphabet had two forms, one clearly very similar to a modern capital ‘H’ and the other related to Old Semitic which appears as the ‘H’ but with a bar at both top and bottom. This in turn clearly represents a part of the Egyptian hieroglyph known as ‘fence’. Both of these are referred to as a ‘voiceless pharyngeal fricative’ and undoubtedly stood for a fence or posts.

If you think you know someone who would like to hear me speak on this subject, drop me a line.

Gobbledegook

A few will be aware I have been known to speak on various subjects over the years. Fundamentally these all revolve around my favourite subject of etymology. Have always enjoyed bringing this fascinating subject to others. It’s not for me to say whether the audiences have, although many have asked me to return.

Thought it might be worthwhile sharing a snippet or two from these etymological presentations, continuing with Gobbledegook. Gobbledegook describes speech which is not clear and a term coined around the 16th century when said to be imitative of the turkey. Gobbledegook from yesteryear is not readily seen for the terminology has become ingrained in the English language. Those featured may not be realised as having been created to describe something in an unusual way. The focus is on those words we are less likely to understand, the modern terms coined to be 'buzz words' and the so-called 'new speak' featured in offices across the country.

Balderdash – first seen in the 1590s the origin is officially said to be ‘unknown’. This early use was quite different in referring to ‘a jumbled mix of liquors’ and not until the 1670s was the modern meaning first seen.

Hogwash – first seen in the middle of the 15th century as two Middle English words hogges and wash. At the time it referred to slops fed to pigs, be it refuse from the kitchen or from a brewery. By 1712 this referred to ‘cheap alcoholic drink’ and fifty years later to ‘inferior writing’. At the time the term was coined, ‘hog’ referred to a castrated male, hence one reared for slaughter and encouraged to eat anything it could to fatten it up; while ‘wash’ was used here to refer more to that skimmed off, such as the cuttings from vegetables or the waste left over from brewing.

Poppycock – is seen as so very twee isn’t it? Almost has to be followed by some chinless wonder asking “anyone for tennis?” Yet the origin is anything but innocent. It comes from the Dutch dialect pappekak where pappe means ‘soft food’ and kak ‘dung’.

Tosh – as British slang it meant ‘rubbish, nonsense’ and there is no known earlier form and thus the origins are unknown. However, it could be a loan word for there is also an earlier Scottish word ‘tosh’ from 1776 and used to mean ‘neat, clean, trim’. We also find another English use dating from 1852 and slang used very much in the capital from 1852 to speak of, somewhat extraordinarily, ‘valuables collected from drains’.

Mullet – now nobody uses mullet-head any more, even though the Beastie Boys recorded Mullet Head – of which we all recall the wonderful lyric “Number one on the side and don’t touch the back; number six on the top and don’t cut it wack, Jack.” However the insult ‘mullet-head’ existed from 1866 (130 years before the haircut) and even nine years before the fish is first recorded (although doubtless the name was in use at least at the same time and probably before). Hence ‘mullet’ originally meant something or someone stupid.

If you think you know someone who would like to hear me speak on this subject, drop me a line.

Foreign Words in English

A few will be aware I have been known to speak on various subjects over the years. Fundamentally these all revolve around my favourite subject of etymology. Have always enjoyed bringing this fascinating subject to others. It’s not for me to say whether the audiences have, although many have asked me to return.

Thought it might be worthwhile sharing a snippet or two from these etymological presentations, continuing with Foreign Words in English. English has more words than any other language. This is, in part, due to the once vast British Empire and the many languages spoken in the outposts. Yet there are at least as many words which have been borrowed from other tongues. Often these loan words have retained the original meaning, but others have changed completely. While Latin and even French phrases are easily recognised, here we concentrate on the less obvious and the words more ingrained in English. Learn how words such as 'trek', 'yacht', 'beige', 'bandanna', 'bangle' and 'bungalow' were never truly English.

Bete noire – (French) a person or thing one particularly dislikes (literally ‘black beast’)

Cosa Nostra – (Italian) a US criminal organization related to the Mafia (literally ‘our thing’)

Doppelganger – (German) an apparition or double of a living person (literally ‘literally double-goer’)

Ex officio – (Latin) by virtue of one’s position or status (literally ‘out of duty’)

Katzenjammer – (German) a hangover or a severe headache accompanying a hangover (literally ‘cat’s wailing’)

If you think you know someone who would like to hear me speak on this subject, drop me a line.

Etymology of Unusual Surnames

A few will be aware I have been known to speak on various subjects over the years. Fundamentally these all revolve around my favourite subject of etymology. Have always enjoyed bringing this fascinating subject to others. It’s not for me to say whether the audiences have, although many have asked me to return.

Thought it might be worthwhile sharing a snippet or two from these etymological presentations, continuing with Etymology of Unusual Surnames. The concept of the hereditary surname came to Britain with the Normans. As people were less likely to move about, and there were less of them, given names were followed by a point of origin, a paternal name, a trade or a nickname. The same is true today although, as we now take the names of our parent or parents, the meaning and the reason they were chosen are not altogether so obvious. So where does your name originate? Does it reveal anything about your ancestors? Who else shares or once shared your name? And why are names such as Cholmondley and Featherstonehaugh pronounced so oddly?

Cholmondley is a Cheshire place name - this the reason why it has become pronounced ‘chum-lee’. It is ‘the woodland clearing of a man named Ceolmund’.

Snodgrass - another place name, it stands – at a bend of the River Garnock at Irvine, Ayrshire and comes from Old English snod graesse or ‘smooth grass’. Here ‘smooth’ doubtless refers to the level land rather than the grass itself.

When it comes to the most common names in English, and I’m discounting imported names such as ‘Singh’ and ‘Khan’ on the basis they aren’t from our shores and this is an English etymological talk, Smith is still the most common but only at 1.15% of the population; Jones amounts to 0.94%, Williams at 0.66%, and Taylor at 0.53%

If you think you know someone who would like to hear me speak on this subject, drop me a line.

Etymology of Transport

A few will be aware I have been known to speak on various subjects over the years. Fundamentally these all revolve around my favourite subject of etymology. Have always enjoyed bringing this fascinating subject to others. It’s not for me to say whether the audiences have, although many have asked me to return.

Thought it might be worthwhile sharing a snippet or two from these etymological presentations, continuing with Etymology of Transport. Not so much a history of transport in an engineering sense but a look at the terminology and how the names developed. See how the names of the 'car', 'bus', 'train', 'cycle', 'boat' and others. And it is not only the transport but learn how the distance between the rails for both the railways and the trams came about. Hear how quite familiar terms have the most surprising origins, and discover some quite extraordinary facts and figures for the modes of transport with which we are so familiar. There is a PowerPoint presentation to accompany this talk if required.

When associated with the transport of goods we use ‘cart’, today as a verb as well as the original noun. It comes from the same root as ‘chariot’ and also gave us ‘crate’. This last word is worthwhile examining further, for the original carts and chariots were made to contain goods and were produced with a body made of wickerwork, this can still be seen in the Dutch words crate ‘woven mat, hamper’ and krat ‘a basket’

Coach is named from the place where it was first produced, the village of Kocs in Hungary. Today the Hungarian word for ‘car’ is kosci

Truck shares an origin with ‘truckle’, although not used in the vehicle sense until 1610s. The term ‘truckle’ spoke of the ‘small wheel’, it derived Proto-Indo-European dhregh ‘to run’.

Glider is the name of the motorless aircraft seen from 1898, this agent noun from ‘glide’ itself changed little over several millennia until Proto-Germanic gave us a number of words from the same root but with different meanings such as ‘glide’, ‘shining’ and also ‘joyful’ – these are all based on the Proto-Indo-European ghel ‘to shine’ and the general idea is a smooth and reflective surface.

Thought it might be of interest to add a different mode of transport – and thus let’s look at the humble ski. Now the modern ski is misleading, for it smacks of MODERN in large and very loud letters. This is only some 150 years of history, while the history of the ski goes back at least 10,000 years and is one of the earliest man-made modes of transport. Today we skid along on skis, historically they were used mostly as a snow-shoe, to spread the weight of the wearer and prevent singing into the snow. This is why the Old Norse word of skith not only gave us ‘ski’ but also ‘skid’ but was originally coined to describe ‘a stick of wood’. Taking it further back we find Proto-Germanic skid meaning ‘to divide, split’ and also seen in Proto-Indo-European skei ‘also meaning ‘to cut, split’ and clearly how the original skis were produced, by driving pegs into a log along the grain and using that to splinter off a piece which would naturally be quite flat. It is thought the idea of may have developed twice – for some use of a ski in the eastern European regions required the user to have a bigger ski and would lie prone upon it and scoot up closer to seals and other prey on the ice and thus get a clearer shot with harpoon or bow and arrow. As an unrelated addition note this Proto-Indo-European skei ‘split’ is also the basis for the prefix of ‘schizophrenic’, which came to us through Greek; it is also the root of Old Church Slavonic cediti ‘to strain’; Old Irish sceid ‘to vomit’ or ‘spit’; and Old Norse skita ‘to shit’

If you think you know someone who would like to hear me speak on this subject, drop me a line.

Etymology of Railways

A few will be aware I have been known to speak on various subjects over the years. Fundamentally these all revolve around my favourite subject of etymology. Have always enjoyed bringing this fascinating subject to others. It’s not for me to say whether the audiences have, although many have asked me to return.

Thought it might be worthwhile sharing a snippet or two from these etymological presentations, continuing with Etymology of Railways. Not the normal look at railways past or present. Here we look at the engineering but through the eyes of the etymologist. Discover how an engine became known as such. Hear how the boiler, the gasket, the valve, the station and even the train have origins further back in history than you could ever imagine - and with rather different meanings

Gasket – in modern times this is a rather antiquated item, although this piece of equipment is by no means obsolete. A gasket is essentially a seal, one which originally would have provided the seal between two castings and one which, when oiled and crushed between the two halves, created a seal which was essentially both air-tight and water-tight. The early gasket was little more than a length of oiled rope, Flexible enough to be adjusted to fit whatever shape was required, the use meant these were not going to be overly thick pieces and also not very long. The approximate length likened to pieces of rope already in use, these were used to secure the furled sails on sailing ships, giving them the instantly recognisable curves of the sail. These pieces of rope were also known as gaskets, derived from a term which was originally the feminine form of the French garcon ‘boy’. However it did not refer to just any girl, but to a girl who wore her hair in a plait, a plait coming from the side of the head and secured with a short length of rope – another gasket. However, just as a chain around the ankle once signified something here, this also marked out a lady of the night. Several completely different uses and yet all marked by a short length of rope.

Train – the verb, meaning ‘to instruct’, came from the noun. Originally looking at the ‘drawing out’ of a trailing part of a skirt, gown or cloak. This is all from the Latin tragere ‘to pull’ and shares a root with ‘tract’.

Station – seen in a railway sense from 1830, the noun had existed in English since the 13th century in the sense ‘place normally occupied’ and is related to the Latin stare ‘to stand’, ultimately from Proto-Indo-European sta ‘to stand, make firm’.

Express – the railway noun is from the early use of the noun (1610s) to mean ‘a special messenger’ – one assumes no special messenger would be slower or the same speed as an ordinary messenger. Now the use of ‘express’ to mean ‘state explicitly’ is derived from the ‘rapid’ and is easier to see as ‘ex-press’, two words suggesting something seen having been pressed and that is how the word developed. These, and other senses, are all from the Latin premere meaning ‘to press, push’ and ultimately from Proto-Indo-European per ‘to strike’.

If you think you know someone who would like to hear me speak on this subject, drop me a line.

Medals and Awards

A few will be aware I have been known to speak on various subjects over the years. Fundamentally these all revolve around my favourite subject of etymology. Have always enjoyed bringing this fascinating subject to others. It’s not for me to say whether the audiences have, although many have asked me to return.

Thought it might be worthwhile sharing a snippet or two from these etymological presentations, continuing with Medals and Awards. For most the list of awards making the headlines at New Year and the King’s Birthday List are simply a list of people, many of whom we have never heard of and probably will never hear of again. Those awarded medals in times of conflict are more likely to be remembered, if only because the recipients have become a part of history. As numismatists - those associated with coins as well as medals - will confirm, medals and awards all have a beginning, were created for a specific reason. While we often hear the narrative of the recipient, we rarely if ever hear of the story behind the award itself. Here is a talk giving a different historical view. An examination of the award, its beginnings and event the recipients, albeit a rather different look.

Order of the Garter – or correctly the Most Noble Order of the Garter was founded in 1348 by Edward II, it is limited to just 24 members at any one time, effectively 23 as the monarch is automatically one, and is made at the reigning monarch’s pleasure. New appointments are always made on St George’s Day, although there is no reason to believe this was the date of its inception, this is merely a much later idea of nationalist pride and not a true ‘tradition’. The emblem’s motto is famously Honi soit qui mal y pense or ‘Shame on him who thinks evil of it. Now nobody really knows why Edward III started this but there is a story and we should cover same. It seems the Countess of Salisbury was dancing at court in Calais when a garter slipped from her leg, to save her blushes and put a stop to the giggles from courtiers, the kind slipped it on his own leg and uttered the immortal words Honi soit qui mal y pense. This is simply the most popular of the stories. Another speaks of King Richard I who, while on the crusade to the Holy Land, ordered his knights to tie garters around their legs and when they won Edward III subsequently marked this with the order of the garter. The motto actually refers to Edward’s claim to the French throne, the order created to help pursue this claim. ETYMOLOGICALLY the four words have rather different roots giving a somewhat different meaning if we see Order as ‘to fit together’, which seems quite logical; ‘of’ was originally ‘off, away’; ‘the’ confusingly used to be ‘this,that’; and ‘garter’ is derived from an unknown root leading to the Old Welsh garr ‘leg’ and Old French jartier ‘bend of the knee’.

Order of the Bath – this began as the Most Honourable Military Order of the Bath and was founded by George I on May 18th 1725. Its name comes from the elaborate ceremony involving bathing of a knight when appointed to this order of chivalry – the bath symbolised purification. It is often said George I revived the Order of the Bath but this is not possible as it never existed prior to then. It is awarded for service and is at the monarch’s pleasure. The award bears two mottos: TRIA IUNCTA IN UNO Latin for ‘THREE JOINED IN ONE’ and the German ICH DIEN ‘I serve’. ETYMOLOGICALLY the four words have rather different roots giving a somewhat different meaning if we see Order as ‘to fit together’, which seems quite logical; ‘of’ was originally ‘off, away’; ‘the’ confusingly used to be ‘this,that’; and ‘bath’ or ‘to warm’, is a little easier to see for no one wants to be immersed in cold water.

Distinguished Service Cross – renamed from the earlier Conspicuous Service Cross in October 1914, it was awarded to those of the British Armed Forces, Royal Fleet Auxiliary, and British Merchant Navy for “…gallantry during active operations against the enemy.” ETYMOLOGICALLY ‘distinguished’ is used in the ‘celebratory’ sense from 1714, coming to English through French from Latin where disinguere literally means ‘to separate between’ and is ultimately from a Proto-Indo-European root ‘to push, thrust’; ‘service’ in a military sense is seen from the end of the 13th century, this from ‘serve’ and originally meant ‘to be a slave’; ‘cross’ is a strange word and may well have two quite separate etymologies, although no proof of same has ever been found - for the sense of the ‘X’ image, the religious image, and even the ‘irate’ sense, all seem to stem from a root meaning ‘thwart, hinder, oppose’ and quite literally as ‘cross purposes’, while there is undoubtedly a quite different sense in the Germanic languages epitomised by the Saxon ‘cross’ which was simply a marker and did not even have a cross piece until Christianity arrived in Britain.

Etymologies for the Engineer

A few will be aware I have been known to speak on various subjects over the years. Fundamentally these all revolve around my favourite subject of etymology. Have always enjoyed bringing this fascinating subject to others. It’s not for me to say whether the audiences have, although many have asked me to return.

Thought it might be worthwhile sharing a snippet or two from these etymological presentations, continuing with Etymologies for the Engineer. For many what is found under the bonnet of the car, hidden inside the casing of the white goods in your kitchen, inside the radio, television, DVD player, laptop, tablet, phone or computer is a mystery. Yet we have all heard the terminology, even if we have no notion of what these are for or of what they do, these are names of which we are at the very least vaguely familiar. Here the talk reverse engineers each and every technology, not to recreate how the inventions were designed but how and, more importantly, why they were named. Learn the surprising beginnings of 'gasket', 'wire', 'oil', 'engine' and many, many others. These insights enable everyone to understand how technologies developed to give a very different look at history.

History can be viewed in any number of ways: the archaeologist looks at artefacts, the archivist at documents, and the etymologist at words. All these and indeed others have one thing in common, history means looking backwards – and with so much history to examine it is often difficult to realise just how much history there is. For example the use of a word today may be quite different from the traditional understanding. Perhaps the word ‘cool’ is a good example – only since 1940 has it been used as a term of approval, yet to mean ‘lacking warmth’ it has the same origins as ‘cold’ and that, rather ironically, has its origins as far back as the end of the last Ice Age. Thus while ‘machine’ may be seen as simply something which does work, a device or contrivance, originally this had a rather different meaning. Tracing the word back to the Greek makhos or ‘means, contrivance’, and earlier to the Proto-Indo-European maghana ‘that which enables’ and from the root magh ‘to be able’, we find the modern use only from the late 17th century. Prior to this any man-made device could be referred to as a ‘machine’. Interestingly 19th century slang used ‘machine’ to describe human sex organs, indeed it is virtually unique in referring to both the male and female parts. Why? Because this is a slang term retaining its original age-old usage in ‘that which enables’.

Look up ‘engine’ in the dictionary and it is defined as ‘a device that converts energy into mechanical power’. Thus there were no engines before the eighteenth century and the birth of industry. Yet there are records of by 1300 and used to refer to ‘a mechanical device’ and particularly one used for warfare. We also find the term used at least a century earlier. These earlier references use these in a variety of senses, including ‘skill’, ‘craft’, ‘innate ability’, and also ‘deceitfulness’ or ‘trickery’. The earlier references are the original usages, all derived from Old French engin meaning ‘skill, wit, cleverness’ in some instances and yet more often as ‘trick, deceit, stratagem’. Further back we find Late Latin ingenium ‘war machine’ and earlier still ‘inborn qualities, talent’. It is the earlier use of ingenium which most interests us as this has also resulted in the word ‘ingenuity’. When we hear both words the link is clearer than seeing it in writing. And I know of no engineer who will not be delighted to learn his job title is, at least etymologically speaking, akin to that of a genius .

The word ‘bolt’ is used in several senses: ‘make a quick start’, ‘leave suddenly’, ‘eat quickly’ and ‘crossbow arrow’ among them. Each of these came into general usage at different times – the diner unknown until the 19th century; sprint start and escape both of the early 13th century. This leaves the short arrow, itself from the Proto-Germanic bultas with the same meaning. Tracing the clues back further we get to Proto-Indo-European bheld which had the same meaning as Lithuanian beldu meaning ‘I knock’ or as beldas ‘pole for striking’. Thus the original ‘bolt’ should be seen more as a nail or peg, one struck to pin two or more pieces together – just the same function as a modern forged fastener with a rolled thread. Later the crossbow weapon would be named as such as it resembled the fastener, then ‘bolt’ became associated with speed, giving the other two uses. In an engineering sense the ‘bolt’ has come full circle, first a simple peg, today an item engineered to fine tolerances and exacting specifications but essentially the same thing.

Having looked at the story behind the bolt recently, it seemed remiss of me not to look at the nut which invariably accompanies same. It will come as absolutely no surprise to discover that initially the engineering nut was compared to the hard seed and its shell. Thus the term comes from the Proto-Germanic hnut and earlier from Proto-Indo-European kneu, the latter also the origin of the Latin nux which has come to us as 'nucleus' and thus ultimately 'nuclear'! As the mating part for the bolt the earliest record dates from 1610. Yet the term had been used for any small mechanical part for at least two centuries and thus the earliest 'nut' could have been any of the items heard today being described as a 'widget'.

If you think you know someone who would like to hear me speak on this subject, drop me a line.

Etymology for the Writer or Artist

A few will be aware I have been known to speak on various subjects over the years. Fundamentally these all revolve around my favourite subject of etymology. Have always enjoyed bringing this fascinating subject to others. It’s not for me to say whether the audiences have, although many have asked me to return.

Thought it might be worthwhile sharing a snippet or two from these etymological presentations, continuing with Etymology for the Writer or Artist. Every artist knows the names of the techniques and methods used to produce that painting, sculpture, or moulding, while writers are well-acquainted with parts of speech, tenses and grammar. But how many artists really know how a technique, style, or even a colour got its name? Are writers aware of why a noun, verb, or adjective is known as such? And very few will understand just why tenses are known as they are - I mean who ever though the 'pluperfect' sounded remotely useful as a term? Not simply a lesson in etymology this is a very different way of looking at history and how the English language developed over several centuries.

Created for the many writing groups I have spoke to, it made a change for them from the usual guests who either tell them about themselves or attempt to inspire their writing. A couple of examples from the origins of our alphabet.

A – derived from the Greek alpha. Used in the modern sense to mean ‘the first’ dates from the 17th century. The Greeks got it from the Hebrew and/or Phoenician aleph (greek not permitting the use of consonants at the end of words so they added the ‘a’) and this, in turn, from the Semitic group of languages where eleph literally meant ‘ox’. It is thought the character represents the head of an ox.

O – from the Greek omicron and a meaning of ‘small o’, this from the Proto-Indo-European word smik or ‘small’ as this is a notably small vowel. As a letter it is derived from the Phoenician ayn or ‘eye’, itself taken from the Egyptian hieroglyph of an eye. O is also represented by omega, a comparatively late addition to the Greek alphabet and not seen until around 2,800 years ago. It is related to omicron and means ‘great o’ as in literally ‘o - mega’. If you want to know the diffidence between omicron and omega simply look at the word ‘lotto’, where the short version is near the beginning and the longer at the end.

P – comes from the Greek pi and itself from the Phoenician pe which, in turn, comes from the pictogram of a mouth.

Z – comes from the sixth letter of the Greek alphabet zeta and it is also the basis for our modern letter Z. Derived from the Hebrew zayin, literally meaning ‘weapon’ and likely a reference to its shape resembling a jagged edge.

G – if you’ve ever wondered why we have two pronunciations for the letter G – as in Gary and George – it is purely down to source. The hard G in Gary is Germanic, the softer G in George is from Latin and prior to that Greek. In fact the latter G did exist in the Latin alphabet but was written as a Z (try saying George with a Greek accent but spelling it with a Z, it works).

If you think you know someone who would like to hear me speak on this subject, drop me a line.

Defining Heraldry

A few will be aware I have been known to speak on various subjects over the years. Fundamentally these all revolve around my favourite subject of etymology. Have always enjoyed bringing this fascinating subject to others. It’s not for me to say whether the audiences have, although many have asked me to return.

Thought it might be worthwhile sharing a snippet or two from these etymological presentations, continuing with Defining Heraldry. In the days when few could read the use of imagery to carry messages meant heraldry was almost universally understood. Today we most often see these images on letterheads or signs outside public houses, but how much of it do we understand? Is there information to be found simply by unravelling the hidden messages comprising a coat of arms? Could we discover a lineage of our family tree through heraldry? And are we entitled to produce our own heraldic images in the 21st century? Find the answers to all these questions and more in this talk. Furthermore, send through examples of local heraldry at the time of booking the talk and learn how it came into existence and just what it tells us.

Difficult to give a taster as each talk is tailored to the region where I’m speaking. But we can give some general ideas beginning with….

Colours and orange – pointing to worthy ambition

Oak tree or leaves points to great age and strength

Lions represent dauntless courage.

A mermaid points to eloquence.

A hand represents pledge of faith, sincerity and justice.

If you think you know someone who would like to hear me speak on this subject, drop me a line. Note I’ll need a few weeks to research specifics.

Colloquialisms

A few will be aware I have been known to speak on various subjects over the years. Fundamentally these all revolve around my favourite subject of etymology. Have always enjoyed bringing this fascinating subject to others. It’s not for me to say whether the audiences have, although many have asked me to return.

Thought it might be worthwhile sharing a snippet or two from these etymological presentations, continuing with Colloquialisms. We use these words and expressions every single day of our lives yet never pay them a second thought. Taken out of context the phrase is meaningless. So where do these come from? How did they start and why do they continue to be used today? In this talk put the speaker in the LIMELIGHT and attempt to CURRY FAVOUR or STEAL MY THUNDER as you hear about that OLD CHESTNUT and why these four colloquialisms and many others have come to be a part of the English language. There is a PowerPoint presentation to accompany this talk if required.

A mere taster starts with:

AT A LOOSE END: a nautical term, and when the rigging relied on checking the ropes regularly the captain, seeing the crew standing around idly instead of checking no ropes had worked loose, asked that question.

BLACK AS NEWGATE’S KNOCKER: refers to gloom and doom, rather than colour. The huge knocker on the door of Newgate Prison in London implied the toughness and darkest experience of the age, a simile suggesting the worst of experiences. That really is the knocker of Newgate Prison.

GET ONE’S GOAT: originated in the USA, first seen in print in 1904, transferring across the Atlantic by 1924 when appearing in John Galsworthy’s White Monkey (yes more animals) when he states: “That had got the chairman’s goat! Got his goat? What expressions they use nowadays!” Nobody really knows why this phrase came to be but, and this positively reeks of folk etymology, it has been said that racehorses, known for being skittish, would be stabled or grazed with goats to keep them calm. Unscrupulous individuals, hoping to make a killing at the bookies, removed the calming influence and the horse performed badly – someone gets my goat.

NOSY PARKER: most often said to refer to Matthew Parker, Archbishop of Canterbury from 1559 to 1575. He attempted to learn certain facts about his fellow clergy using certain inappropriate methods. This, coupled with his large proboscis, earned him the soubriquet Nosy Parker. The problem is, he never made inappropriate enquiries nor did he have a prominent conk. This comes from the end of the 19th century, when novelist Mary Elizabeth Braddon edited the Belgravia Magazine and wrote, in the May 1890 edition, “You’re a askin’ too many questions for me, there’s too much of Mr Nosey Parker about you, an’ I’d ‘ave you to know as I’m a laidee.” Not until the beginning of the 19th century did ‘nosy’ begin to mean ‘inquisitive’, prior to that it was someone with a large nose and until attached to ‘nosy’, the word ‘parker’ only ever referred to a park-keeper. Want to know the real Christian name of Parker from Thunderbirds? It was Aloysius.

If you think you know someone who would like to hear me speak on this subject, drop me a line.

Biology's Etymology

A few will be aware I have been known to speak on various subjects over the years. Fundamentally these all revolve around my favourite subject of etymology. Have always enjoyed bringing this fascinating subject to others. It’s not for me to say whether the audiences have, although many have asked me to return.

Thought it might be worthwhile sharing a snippet or two from these etymological presentations, continuing with Biology’s Etymology. Whether it is when watching, listening or reading that medical drama or a visit to the doctor or hospital, the terminology used can be baffling in the extreme. That they know what they are talking about is all we need to know, for that is not what this talk is about. Here we are looking at the terms used by the majority, those without a medical grounding. This talk examines the parts of the body through the names with which we are so familiar. Who first thought of the term 'head', 'foot', 'finger', 'muscle', 'bone'? Did the heart become known as such because it was seen as central to life, or did this develop the other way around? And what about ailments and diseases? Were chickens really the inspiration of 'chickenpox'? And who thought 'chilblains' an apt description of the ailment? An explanation of where these terms originated, how they developed and why they remain commonplace today. Many of the answers are surprising and more than a few amusing. There is also the opportunity to ask specific examples, especially for those who need to know the origins of those parts not included in the talk. There is a PowerPoint presentation to accompany this talk if required.

Chest – was never used for the thorax until the sixteenth century, prior to that both males and females had a breast (hence why we have a breastbone and armour a breastplate). The term chest came from Old English cest meaning ‘box, casket’, a suggestion the rib cage was a box containing a number of vital organs.

Finger – a Germanic word which can be traced to Proto-Indo-European penkwe meaning ‘five’ and for obvious reasons as there are five digits (the thumb was considered a finger until later).

Spleen – has been known since ancient times, where Proto-Indo-European splegh had the same meaning. Now today we know the spleen’s functions include the control of components of the blood such as platelets and red and blood cells. Traditionally this organ was held to contain an individual’s ill feelings, misery, bad tempers – hence we hear how one is ‘venting their spleen’.

Whooping cough – is an onomatopoeic name referring to its symptoms. Correctly it is called pertussis and coined in the 17th century as Latin per tussis means ‘persistent cough’. My grandmother always used the term chincough which, almost 50 years later, I discovered was Staffordshire dialect for whopping cough – although this doesn’t explain why my grandmother always warned us that sitting on a cold wall could give ‘chincough in your bottom’.

Buttock – most often seen in the plural, actually comes from the original ‘butt’. While this may be seen as an American term, it actually is a Tudor English term which in turn came from Germanic languages. It is not difficult to see why the rifle butt has the same origin as the rear end, although not used as such before the 14th century, and originally referred to a small piece of land (in Dutch) and as simply ‘short’ in Old Norse.

If you think you know someone who would like to hear me speak on this subject, drop me a line.

Old English to Modern English

A few will be aware I have been known to speak on various subjects over the years. Fundamentally these all revolve around my favourite subject of etymology. Have always enjoyed bringing this fascinating subject to others. It’s not for me to say whether the audiences have, although many have asked me to return.

Thought it might be worthwhile sharing a snippet or two from these etymological presentations, continuing with Old English to Modern English. The Saxons, Angles, Jutes and Frisians arrived on our shores from the fifth century AD. They brought with them the basis of our culture and a language which we refer to as Old English. Over the next 1,500 years influences principally from the Scandinavian and French tongues took this to Middle English and eventually to Modern English. English is the most diverse language and this is not simply down to the number of words adopted from quite unrelated tongues, a remnant of colonial days. There is a reason why English, more than any other, needs a thesaurus - indeed most languages never bother publishing a thesaurus (Japanese is a notable exception). That English has been influenced by so many others has led to such a great number of alternative words. Learn how these came began, where they came from and, most interestingly, how they evolved, how the meanings changed and developed to become the language we know today. There is a PowerPoint presentation to accompany this talk if required.

The letter A is for an used in such things as ‘an egg’ instead of ‘a’ when the following noun begins with a vowel. However, it actually began as ‘one’ hence ‘one egg’ and the use of ‘a’ actually the loss of the following ‘n’. Note it is difficult to say AN LEG, AN HORSE, AN BOTTLE) but Old English would have been pronounced as AYN LEG, AYN HORSE, AYN BOTTLE which is rather easier. The same thing is seen in anfeld which may have been used to mean ‘simple’ but actually comes from ‘one-fold’ as in ‘once’.

The letter C is for ceap meaning ‘market’ and which also gave geceapian ‘to buy’. Now today we look for things on the cheap at the market, where originally they would market things at the cheap. Note we say ‘on the cheap’ to mean ‘cheaply’ – on the cheap meaning ‘on the market’. And this is still seen in place names such as Chipping Norton, Chipping Sodbury and street names such as Cheap Street and Cheapside.

The Letter K is for nothing, no not a silent ‘k’ but a letter coming to modern English from the Scandinavian languages. Incidentally the silent ‘K’ is a modern idea – once we had k-nights, and k-nives, but nobody wore k-nickers as this was originally knickerbockers and even that word unknown before 1859. This was not what you were expecting when I mentioned knickerbockers – admit it.

The letter Q is French and did not appear in Old English. Oddly the word ‘queue’, albeit with a spelling of c-u-e, appeared in English before the Norman invasion. It was used to describe a ‘tail’ (and other long parts of the mammalian anatomy), and first used to refer to a line of people in 1837, some 350 years after the first queues were named as ‘lines of dancers’.

If you think you know someone who would like to hear me speak on this subject, drop me a line.

30 Years of Not Being Published

A few will be aware I have been known to speak on various subjects over the years. Fundamentally these all revolve around my favourite subject of etymology. Have always enjoyed bringing this fascinating subject to others. It’s not for me to say whether the audiences have, although many have asked me to return.

Thought it might be worthwhile sharing a snippet or two from these etymological presentations, continuing with 30 Years of Not Being Published. In over three decades more than ninety published works have appeared on the shelves. This talk is not as negative as it may first seem. During this period I have amassed a vast number of rejection letters, but still managed to average three books a year and more than one article each and every week. Listen to the experiences, the mistakes, the ideas, the tips and advice on how all writers have something to learn and also to contribute to the literary world. There is a PowerPoint presentation to accompany this talk if required.

When it comes to finding a publisher, possibly the best piece of advice I have is simply to find a published book that is as close to yours as possible, then pitch it to that publisher. The reason? Because an editorial department have the job of producing something new, but sales teams want what is selling .

Interesting verbs are seldom very interesting. — Says Jonathan Franzen, who fails to remember ‘very’ is a word which Oscar Wilde advised writers to edit out and replaced with ‘damned’ as the publisher will then cross out every example and thus make the ideal manuscript.

“Write what you know about” – Brilliant advice. Except for the advice on how to check every fact, research every snippet, and all the rest of the baloney. And there’s also the fact that people (yes even writers) are sometimes mistaken and what they “KNOW” is incorrect. If not, nobody would ever get divorced, have unwanted pregnancies, jobs they can’t do, or ever make a mistake. As a little pointer to how stupid this advice is, do some research into all these HOW TO books for writers and look at how many books they’ve had published previously – you’ll be amazed at how often it is their FIRST and perhaps even ONLY book .

If you think you know someone who would like to hear me speak on this subject, drop me a line.