We say that something is cheesyin English to mean that it is inferior, cheap or possibly embarrassing due to its lack of quality. (Obviously, this does not apply to its other definition, i.e. a large amount of cheese on our food, as above!)
Examples:
He bought some cheesy (tacky) souvenirs from the local shop.
We didn’t like the show, the actors were really cheesy. (phoney)
But this was not always the case. In the 1850s, when the word was first used, if something was cheesy it was considered to be of top quality. Cheesy as the idea of something pleasant and important crossed the Atlantic where the concept of cheese meant celebrity or big money and gave us the expression ” the big cheese” to signify a person of importance. Over time, the word cheesy began to be used ironically, and this is the meaning that we have been left with today.
Small Potatoes/Chickenfeed
Small potatoes are the opposite of important, something, not very imposing and insignificant. First recorded in the 19th century, it came from the idea of small potatoes not being worth the bother if they were being picked or sold.
Chickenfeed, another U.S. expression, is along the same lines. Chickens were readily available in the 18th and 19th centuries whereas cattle and horses were more expensive and needed a bigger supply of food.
Chickens, being lower down the pecking order (see what I did just there?) were fed on leftovers and grain, hence chickenfeed coming to mean something trivial, often a small amount of money.
Examples:
I’m not interested in their money – it’s small potatoes/chickenfeed.
Sour grapes
If you suffer from sour grapes, it means you speak badly of something you cannot have. This is an expression from one of Aesop’s Fables.
Aesop was a slave who lived in Greece around 600 B.C.E. He was a storyteller who told fables – short stories with a moral at the end. These fables were not recorded until 300 years after his death, so Aesop’s Fables, the collection of his stories, may or may not be all his own work, as the stories have been recorded, translated and rewritten over hundreds of years.
However, one of the best-known tales is “The Fox and The Grapes”, in which a fox is unable to reach a juicy bunch of grapes. Disappointed by failure, she salvages her pride by saying that they must have been sour.
I’m sure you can all think of someone who disparages something they once wanted. This is a case of sour grapes.
Salad Days
This saying refers to a carefree time with no worries, generally when we are young, and it was first recorded in William Shakespeare’s play Anthony and Cleopatra.
Cleopatra calls her salad days the time when she was “green in judgement“, in other words, she was naive with not much knowledge of the world.
For a time this was also what people meant when they referred to salad days but the meaning has now shifted to mean the prime of youth, a time of happiness and optimism.
Example:
He did lots of crazy things in his salad days, but now he’s turned into a typical family man.
Thanks for reading the post! Can you think of any more foodstuffs used in English expressions? Write them in the comments below!
Yes, the Canary Islands are famous for their sub-tropical climate, with mild winters and pleasant, not boiling, summers. They are an all-year-round holiday destination for tourists looking to enjoy the sun. So we were looking forward to mild temperatures and some warmth on our arrival.
But 2023 has brought us winter in February. Unprecedented hailstones with rainy days and lower temperatures than the norm. And winds. Lanzarote is windy at the best of times, although a breeze in summer can be a welcome addition that creates a comfortable temperature of around 25 degrees centigrade. But recently the wind in Lanzarote has made its presence known in no small measure. You would probably guess this right now by the windswept look of both locals and tourists.
The surfing scene
The winds are part of life on the island. The North East Trade winds blow consistently throughout the year and create the types of waves much loved by surfers. I’m told that Lanzarote is also known as the Hawaii ofEurope in surfing circles, with plenty of opportunities for surfers of all levels.
Surfer in action, courtesy of Openverse.
Calima
Another facet of these strong winds is the calima effect. Calima translates as haze, produced when particles of dust and/or smoke are suspended in the air, obscuring the sky and turning it a deathly shade of white. If it rains during the hazy period, then those layers of red dust appear everywhere, and this does mean in every nook and cranny far and wide…
Damp cloths and elbow grease must be out in force to clean it away. As the Canary Islands are so near to Africa, dust clouds from the Sahara are a common phenomenon, but it has been known for the calima to travel as far as the Caribbean.
The neighbouring island of Gran Canaria, during a period of calima. Photo courtesy of El Independiente.
Yet despite the lower-than-usual temperatures, the wind and the calima, we still cannot complain too much. Much of Europe is still in the grip of a cold weather front and it is still winter.
Yet today, 27th February, the sun is back and spring seems to be in the air. Will it last, I wonder?
Like all new adventures, these past few weeks have brought me stress and pleasant surprises. I have island-hopped. From 30 years of living in the bustling capital city of Mallorca to the volcanic landscapes and cacti of Lanzarote in the Canary Islands.
Palma will always have a piece of my heart, but it has changed immensely over the period I lived there. Mallorca is indeed a stunning island – please don’t write it off if you have seen the rowdy streets of Magalluf in the media, there is so much more to the island; a wide variety of picturesque coves and magnificent beaches, quaint fishing ports, beautiful scenery throughout the rural interior which is incredibly green and fertile, not to mention the bustling capital city of Palma with its famous cathedral facing out to the sea. The iconic cathedral, a magnificent piece of architecture, was one of my first glimpses of Palma when I first fell in love with this place.
But Palma has moved on with the times. It is still, of course, an attractive city for visitors and I hope, always will be. But for residents, there is constant traffic congestion and cruise ship arrivals on various days of the week in the summer, with their humongous outpourings of tourists adding to the crowds. The climate is becoming progressively hotter and more humid. So my other half and I have taken the plunge and moved to a cooler (and definitely windier) climate where the population is smaller.
Will we stay here forever? I don’t know. But I hope that we will be happy here. More updates soon…
Throughout the 1800’s there was a push towards literacy and education for everyone, leading to the Elementary Education Act of 1870. Times were changing, with industrialisation and scientific innovation leading the way. People were leaving the old, rural lifestyle behind them, flocking to the cities in droves, in search of better lives. This upheaval also meant that people needed more education or training in order to find better paid jobs.
Prior to the 1870’s, education had always been at best, patchy and certainly not widely available to all and sundry. There were some independent voluntary schools, usually managed by the Church or a charity, with the emphasis onreligious education. The first of these was set up in 597 and known as the King’s School, Canterbury, and still exists today. Part of the impressive modern school campus is shown below.
The official educational establishments that existed were known as public schools, as opposed to private tuition, both systems only available to the wealthy. In time these schools would evolve into institutions that were and still are exclusive to the public at large – for example, today, public schools for the very wealthy include Eton, Westminster or Rugby. So confusingly, a public school in England is not for the public at all, in fact it is a highly expensive private school.
Of course, it should be noted that before the mid 1800’s education at school was for boys only. If girls received any type of academic education at all, it would be at home via a nanny or a governess. Today, of course, the vast majority of British boys and girls go to state schools, that is, those funded by the government.
Ragged Schools
The type of education a child would receive (or not) depended, of course, on their family’s place in society.
In the 1840’s voluntary schools which came to be known as Ragged Schools began to appear in the poorest areas of the country, and provided food, shelter and the rudiments of an education. These were for children at the opposite extreme from the public school students, minors who were extremely poor or destitute and often excluded from Sunday or voluntary schools because of their behaviour and/or appearance.
These schools were maintained by philanthropists, notably Charles Dickens amongst others, and staffed by volunteers, and newspapers spread the word about their existence. Not everyone liked the idea – common opinions were the schools were a waste of time, the children were too stupid or lazy to learn, or they would just learn how to become better criminals. Take your pick.
But there was a genuine feeling in Victorian society that the poor should be helped and the ragged schools established themselves, proving that the not only the well-heeled had a desire for education. In poor inner city ragged schools there could be between 50 to 70 children in a class. It is estimated there were about 350 schools of this type by the time the Elementary Education Act was passed in 1870.
The beginnings of education for all
Even so, many of the working class were unable to read and write. Child labour was also normal, with kids of school age working in factories for a pittance.
With the implementation of the Education Act in 1870 school boards were created and could use ratepayers’ funds to improve or set up schools, universal education finally becoming a government concern. The boards also laid down the priorities of education. By 1876 it became mandatory for all children between 5 and 10 years of age to attend school, considerably lower than the leaving age nowadays.
Yet again there was opposition; some of the upper classes opposed the idea of educating the working classes for fear it would cause a revolution, while a section of the lower classes feared their children would be indoctrinated by propaganda. The Church, who still provided voluntary schooling and Sunday schools, also did not want to lose its influence on young people. Sometimes the parents needed the small amount of money that their children earned at work and therefore prevented them from going to school.
However, it was also clear that an educated workforce would enhance Britain’s competitive status at large. By 1902, school boards were abolished in favour of local education authorities, which were responsible for education within their designated area, and the basis for our modern education system was created.
Let’s look at the mainstream schools during this time.
Miss Bowls’s class in an unidentified girls’ school Date: circa 1905 Source: postcard
What was taught?
Lessons were fairly basic and monotonous, with a huge focus on reading, writing and arithmetic. The pupils would copy what the teacher had written on the blackboard and a lot of attention was given to copperplate handwriting and learning by heart. Numeracy was also essential and usually involved the children chanting times tables until they all did it perfectly. There was no creativity and teaching through fun activities and games were an alien concept far off in the future.
However, depending on the school and the teacher, other things were taught. Religion was almost always included and sometimes history and geography. There were object lessons where a picture, model or artefact would be observed by the pupils.
If it was a mixed gender school, sometimes pupils were separated by gender into different classes – the boys might do woodwork or gardening, and the girls cooking or embroidery.
The classrooms
The classroom was generally called the schoolroom. The windows were situated high up to avoid distractions and as a result, it was often airless and stuffy. If there were more than one classroom, they were divided only by a curtain. As you can see in the photo below, the desks were bolted to the floor and the classroom often had tiers so all the children could see the blackboard, and the teacher, in turn, could see them.
The children wrote on slates which were rubbed out and re-used. The older students might have used ink pens that dipped into ink wells to produce their written work.
A Victorian classroom with high windows and tiered desks. Photo courtesy of edufirst.ng
The teachers
There were far more female teachers than males – the pay was low and therefore the profession did not attract many men. Schoolmistresses tended to be unmarried females, who gave up the job when they gained a husband.
The better establishments had teachers who had received certification in various subjects. The poorer schools could not afford to be so choosy. These teachers probably learnt their profession from day one at school.
Boy in dunce cap sitting on dunce stool. Origin unknown (but probably not Victorian.)
The teachers were generally very strict and expected all the children, even the youngest, to pay attention at all times. Poor work, speaking out of turn, answering back or any misdeeds from the pupils meant they could receive blows from either the teacher or a cane.
There was practically no understanding of slow learners, and pupils who did not keep up with the class could be made to sit or stand on a dunce’s stool wearing a dunce’s hat for up to an hour, Conformity was the name of the game, and the left-handed were forced to use their right hand for writing tasks.
With time, society has gained more knowledge about the learning process and our schools today have moved on in several aspects. New technology and not least, the recent coronavirus pandemic have introduced different ways of teaching – online, or encouraging more self-study for example. Nevertheless, the Victorians were responsible for thefoundation of our modern educational system.
Some questions for you:
Do you think schooling helped children in Victorian times?
Do you think our contemporary schools help students to face the working world today ?
Bread is one of the oldest human-made foods in our world and remains one of our most highly consumed foodstuffs today. There is evidence that bread has been around for a staggering 30,000 years.
The ancient Greeks, Romans and Egyptians ate leavened bread, which is generally what we tend to eat in England today. Leavened bread means that yeast has been added to the dough mixture, making the bread airy with a lighter texture.
Bread. is, of course, a basic food product in the U.K. Nowadays we consume bread as toast, in sandwiches, or to accompany a meal, but in theMiddle Ages, the bread itself was the plate for the meal, and known as a “trencher”.
The word “trencher” is derived from Old French “tranchier”, meaning to cut. The heavy coarse bread was cut into slices and became edible tableware. As time passed, the trencher was no longer made of bread but evolved into a circular wooden plate, similar to, say, a cheeseboard.
Cheeseboard courtesy of Freepix.com
After the meal was over, the usually stale and hard bread was generally used as livestock feed although it was sometimes eaten as well, or sadly, donated to the poor. No waste, unlike today. And obviously we are not talking sliced white bread with fluffy air pockets here. This no doubt, would have significantly decreased the enjoyment of your food as well as the state of your attire…..
Sliced bread was still far away in the future at this point. Everyday bread for the peasants was rough, grainy, hard and not always easily digested. It was, however, considered to be a step above the wholegrain “trencher” bread used as plates, which was commonly given to animals after the meal was finished.
The financially better off consumed bread which was made from milled wheat, or oats, or both. The ingredients were either processed at home or a local miller would grind them in return for a small portion of the goods. Breadmakers and millers prospered as few people had ovens and it was difficult to conserve flour. By the 16th century, the terminology of bread reflected not only the ingredients, but was linked to social class. The whiter the bread, the finer it was considered, reflecting on your place in the social hierarchy.
Brown bread was handed out to the Irish during the Great Famine of the 18th century. Fibrous, rough brown bread was strictly for the lower classes and the poor.
When England became more industrialised in the 18th century, more factories started to manufacture white bread and the working classes, after being denied this item for so long, were more than willing customers. It made sense – people could afford it, it was easier to chew and digest than its wholegrain counterpart, particularly important at a time where teeth were often sadly neglected.
White bread was filling and therefore value for money. It was often suspected that brown bread had been adulterated but it was thought that as white bread was …well, white … additives would be easily detected. Not actually so, as bread manufacturers in the 1930’s actually used chlorine and peroxide to make their bread even whiter. Don’t worry, these additives are banned today in the U.K………at least for the moment….
The Aerated Bread Company (also known as A.B.C.) was established in London in 1862 by John Dauglish, who used his medical studies to replace yeast with carbon dioxide, removing the requirement to knead the bread. This, together with mechanical processes, made the procedure more hygenic and quicker as there was no longer a yeast fermentation period.
The kneading process was no longer necessary at the A.B.C. Bread Company Photo by Ron Lach on Pexels.com
In 1967 the Chorleywood bread process, developed in, yes, you guessed it, Chorleywood in Buckinghamshire, reduced breadmaking time even further, and according to Wikipedia, “As of 2009, 80% of bread made in the United Kingdom, Australia, New Zealand, and India, used the process.”
And in 1928, across the Atlantic, the Chillicothe Baking Company in Missouri sold the very first sliced loaf. In England, the delights of the sliced loaf arrived in 1937, courtesy of the Wonderloaf Bakery in Tottenham, London. By the 1950’s, the majority of bread sales were both pre-sliced and pre-packaged.
The tide had certainly turned for the working classes with widely available and affordablesliced white bread in all its sandwichy glory and convenience.
But even as white bread began its journey into everyone’s homes, slowly but surely a section of educated people in England were beginning to turn their backs on white bread and recognise the nutritional value of brown bread.
As early as 1800, George III ate brown bread in an attempt to convert people to its value, but the crowds responded to his iniative by simply nicknaming him ” Brown George”.
But in 1865 the discovery of the advantages of bran on health meant that brown bread had commenced its comeback. From its lowly beginnings, brown bread slowly shrugged off its negative image and rose again in popularity as the public gained more knowledge and information on food and nutrition. Food could be questioned once people did not have to worry where it was coming from and had options, unlike previous eras.
We all have our preferences for types of bread but today it is generally held that brown bread is indeed of a higher nutritional value than white, and certainly more so than pre-packaged sliced white bread. The wheel has come full circle.
Many different languages have influenced modern English, due to overseas trade and a number of invasions in the British Isles prior to and including the Norman invasion of 1066. The Angles, the Jutes and the Saxons were Germanic tribes who settled in Britain alongside Celtic language speakers and laid the basis for the Anglo-Saxon language. However, the great majority of English speakers would struggle to understand Anglo-Saxon today.
There are also innumerable words we use in the English language which have arrived via a different language. Unlike nations such as France, for example, which does not encourage the borrowing of Anglicisms, (even though this certainly happens and will no doubt continue to do so) the English language seems to have happily stolen or accomodated any word or grammar pattern that took its fancy at the time.
Latin
The Roman conquest of Britain meant that Latin was now fair game for absortion into the English language. Whilst the Celtic and Anglo-Saxon poulation at large still retained their native languages, little by little words used in Roman administration worked their way into our language and some are still used today.
A few examples : agenda, etcetera, interim, item, memorandum, P.S.,(postscript) a.m. p.m., (ante and post meridian)and the symbol &.
In the 1600’s, there was a tendency to reflect the Latin origin of words by introducing silent letters to the common spelling – for instance, anchor, debt, doubt, island, scissors, receipt. Students of the English language take note! (more about silent letters here if you are interested):
Norsemen and Vikings raided England several times during the early Middle Ages. In 866 they captured the city of York and during this period various areas in the the east and the north capitulated to Viking rule. Danelaw overrode Anglo-Saxon administration in these areas and a language now known as Anglo-Norse began to be spoken. Modern English inherited a lot of vocabulary from the Vikings, not only words of war such as ransack, slaughter, berserk, but also a great deal of everyday vocabulary, such as bag, ball, call, cake, crawl, egg, get, give, happy, husband, kid, lad, leg, loan, take, seem, skill, ugly, want, weak ….
Apart from vocabulary, the Vikings also influenced English grammar. The way we construct sentences grammatically in modern English is much more similar to Scandinavian languages than old English. Some experts say that English has more in common with Swedish, Danish and Norwegian than German, even though we have long considered English to have Germanic roots.
German
The Germanic tribes known as the Angles, Jutes and Saxons invaded British shores around the 5th century and their dialects forged the Anglo-Saxon language. But German has also left us left us with these lovely words in modern English : delicatessen, hamster, iceberg, lager, poodle, rucksack and spiel. And let’s not forget hamburger.
Here’s a tiny selection of words we have inherited from French : café, paté, cliché, fiancé(e), bouquet, ballet, brusque, chef, garage, gourmet, souvenir, vintage… there are many, many more. Interestingly, words borrowed from French pre- 17th century have modified pronunciation. Ch- words such as chimney and change begin with a harder -tch sound. But later borrowings conserve the same ch-sound as in French…champagne and chivalrous, for example.
Numerous words which came specifically from the Normans – justice, jury,felon, traitor, damage, sovereign, parliament, government give us an insight of William the Conqueror’s iron fist and the stringent Norman administration of England.
Here are ten random examples, in no particular order.
Chocolate – Originally xocolatl, this word was translated from Spanish via Nahuatl, the language spoken in central Mexico at the time of the Spanish conquest. A welcome addition for most people, I would say.
Sofa – from Turkish via Arabic. The Arabic word suffah signified bench.
Glitch – although the jury is still out on this one, some experts believe that this word comes from the Yiddish word glitsh , a slippery place.
Yacht – derived from the Dutch word jacht, which originally signified a hunting ship.
Shampoo – originates from Hindi and Urdu. The word cā̃po means to massage, precisely what we do with shampoo in our hair.
Ketchup – from the Hokkien Chinese word kê-tsiap, a word for a sauce made from fermented fish. Hmm, not what we bargain for with today’s ketchup.
-ology – Anything ending in -ology comes from Greek, where -ology means the branch of study. Physiology, physcology, biology, pharmacology, zoology…. the list goes on.
Sabbatical – from the Hebrew word shabbat , meaning day of rest.
Robot – the word robot as we know it, to describe a humanoid machine, was first used in 1920 in a Czech play called R.U.R ((Rossumovi Univerzální Roboti – Rossum’sUniversal Robots) by Karel Čapek.
Vendetta – concluding the list is vendetta , the Italian word for revenge.
The second image in this blog jokingly depicts the English language as some type of criminal, stealing words from here and there. I prefer to think of the English language as a welcoming home for any words which care to stick around. These not-so-foreign words should be received with joy for enchriching our language.
This is a very brief summary of words we use in English with their roots in foreign languages. You probably know others and can easily find hundreds more. If you know any more, feel free to write them in the comments below.
Christmas as an event has been around for a long long time, admittedly in various guises. There is a consensus that the pagan midwinter festivals such as Yule, or the Winter Solstice, were amalgamated with Christmas as the Church imposed liturgical days in the calendar. The word Christmas comes directly from Christ’s mass, and actually existed as Christenmass in Middle English, until the “en” syllable was lost.
Victorian era
There is little doubt that Christmas as we know it today is largely down to the Victorians, who began to treat Christmas as a family celebration feast with time off work. Increased prosperity allowed the middle classes to include special cuisine, present giving and decorations in their homes during the holiday period. You can find more info on how the Victorians influenced our modern day Christmas festivities here.
Christmas dinner
Christmas is synoymous with food. Abundant food, and the possibility of indigestion, to say the least. The pagan celebrations were indulgent feasts to brighten the darkest days of winter. Renamed Christmas, it became an amalgamation of the old customs and a religious event – although days off work and Christmas cards and trees were still to become a part of the holiday.
Rowdy behaviour has always been a part of Christmas too. In the 1600’s, Oliver Cromwell, as head of the Puritan government, banned the celebration of Christmas in England as a frivolous event which produced frowned-upon excesses. Although the ban was policed, it was not entirely successful and Christmas not only survived, but was reinstated in 1660 at the end of the Puritan reign. If we fast forward to the end of the Victorian period, Christmas had become a family and culinary event which has highly influenced the way we celebrate it today.
Menu card from Queen Victoria, Christmas Day 1899. Courtesy of The Royal Archives.
Royal influence
As you would expect, Queen Victoria and her family had a sumptuousChristmas menu, seen above in the example from 1899, with a wide variety of culinary offerings.
Starters and Appetisers
Consommé, sole fillets á la Vassant (answers on a postcard if anyone knows what à la Vassant means) fried whitebait, chicken cutlets
Main Dishes
Turkey with chipolatas, roast beef, spare pork ribs
Desserts
Asparagus, Hollandaise sauce (interestingly, the Victorians sometimes ate salad ingredients after the main course ) mince pies, plum pudding, orange jelly
Buffet
Beef joint, boar’s head, game pie, Woodcock pie, roast fowl, brawn and tongue. The Victorians were of course, much less squeamish than we are nowadays about animal heads and offal.
So the rich lacked for nothing, no surprise there.
The Middle Classes
The middle class grew enormously in the Victorian era due to an array of new industries, improved transport and better wages. The domestic goddess of the age was Mrs Beeton, who with her Book of Household Management guided middle class housewives towards success in culinary delights and entertaininment of visitors at home.
Roast turkey was first documented in 1541 in Britain (as a meal for the clergy, no less) but it was not until Queen Victoria’s reign that turkey became the meat of choice at Christmas dinner. Traditionally, before this point, roast meat for those who could afford it at Christmas would have been roast goose, beef or pheasant. But Mrs Beeton famously commented:
” A noble dish is a turkey, roast or boiled. A Christmas dinner with the middle classes of this empire, would scarcely be a Christmas dinner without its turkey “
Poultry: Roast Fowls, Roast Goose, Roast Turkey with Savoury Balls, Roast Duck, and Boiled Chicken from Mrs. Beeton’s Book of Household Management. Digitally enhanced from our own 1923 edition. Image by rawpixel.com
Turkey also had the advantage of being a large bird, meaning more people could be invited to the Christmas dinner. In the illustration above we can see other poultry dishes which may have been offered in place of, or as well as turkey or beef in line with household income.
The less well-off
Of course, there were many families who were struggling financially, just like today. The poor may have celebrated Christmas but in a much more frugal fashion. They might have been able to save something from their meagre wages for a festive treat, such as rabbit, but for those on the lowest pay scale, for example, agricultural workers, it generally would have beenimpossible to save anything.
With this in mind, Charles Dickens wrote A Christmas Carol , published in 1843. It told the story of Ebenezer Scrooge, who reformed his miserly behaviour and became a kind, generous soul, giving presents and treating other people well at Christmas. Dickens’ tale was popular and did in fact encourage the richer Victorians to donate money and gifts to servants, workers and the needy at Christmas.
This tradition of helping those less well off had always existed at Christmas, but was popularised and cemented during this time. These gifts were usually money and were given in boxes on, yes, you guessed it, Boxing Day, which was a day on which people were not required to work. The newly invented railways also offered cheap fares during Christmas, which allowed workers to see their families more easily during this family- oriented season.
Those in the workhouse, who were desperately poor, were generally given some type of Christmas dinner, despite the fact that the Poor Laws had ruled against this. It would seem that the guardians of the workhouse were more humane than the government (parallels with today anyone ?)
These Christmas dinners contained contain some type of meat, which was a treat in itself for the inmates, and some of the workhouses even managed to provide Christmas pudding, (known then as plum pudding) as a dessert.
Vintage Christmas Plum Pudding, courtesy of thegraphicsfairy.com
So many of the elements of our modern day Christmas celebrations have been handed down to us from the Victorian generation – the idea that is a family gathering, the turkey, the lavish food on offer, Boxing Day….
Sadly, there are also plenty of reminders that others are not so fortunate.
It was in the Victorian era that the idea of domestic animals as pets, purely for companionship and/or entertainment, began to take root. In the past, animals such as horses and dogs were considered as working animals, with their skills used as a contribution to the family household. The animals were destined, amongst other things, as hunting dogs, sheepdogs, and guard dogs, cats caught mice and other vermin, and horses were a means of transport. In the 1880’s dogs were also used to collect money for charitable organisations, and were licensed to move around trains and railway stations.
This does not mean that people did not love or look after their animals, but these creatures were expected to earn their keep.
Photo by David Jakab on Pexels.com Horses are still used today in ceremonial parades, and for crowd control by the police.
Queen Victoria’s pets
During the eighteenth and early nineteenth century, relationships between animals and humans began to change. A great example of this was Queen Victoria and her family, who were closely monitored and copied by the British public who could afford to do so.
Victoria appears to have been a great animal lover with various species of dogs, a donkey, goats and a number of pet parrots forming part of the royal household throughout her reign. It would seem that the queen was not enamoured of cats, although she was gifted a kitten shortly before her coronation.Not only did she accept the feline, but also sent two five pound notes to its previous owner as a way of thanks. Victoria’s love for these creatures and their status as family members to be cossetted and petted undoubtedly influenced the fate of many other animals owned by well-heeled families.
During Victoria’s reign, dogs were by far the most popular animals, and Victoria herself had several canine pets during her monarchy.
Both the aristocracy and the newly wealthy middle class were eager to emulate the Royal Household and dogs were placed into the heart of a family with no strings attached, as opposed to having a function within the house. In addition, dogs were seen as a status symbol and there were were many sentimental stories and anecdotes about canine feats.
Every dog has its day
Dogs also became a fashion item.
Young lady with a King Charles spaniel Image: Library of Congress #LC-DIG-ggbain-06537
Any Victorian lady who aspired to be fashionable and show off their status would have their lapdog in tow and these dogs would accompany their mistresses everywhere. Lapdogs, as the name indicates, were small enough to sit in a lady’s lap and were the only type of dogs to be allowed in a parlour at visiting time. The poor dogs were often deprived of exercise, and sometimes even dressed in miniature gowns and bonnets to be caressed and tickled. Many veterinarians of the era were concerned that this was no way to treat a dog.
Photographs were costly at the time. However, many dog owners were photographed with their furry friends, confirmimg the high importance of their dogs in their lives.
The first modern dog show was held in Newcastle-upon-Tyne in 1859. It was a low key event which focused on working country dogs. But the world of dog shows was to grow rapidly, focusing on all types of breeds and competitions began to be held throughout the country. Although Mr Cruft had always been involved in the dog trading business, it was in 1891 that the Cruft`s Dog Show as we know it today was born.
Dogs were now being bred purely for aesthetic reasons and these shows developed a public preference for pedigree dogs over mongrels although all types of dogs were included ; a reflection of Victorian hierarchy in society. . There were still dogs for every taste and budget, and these exhibitions contributed to dog ownership becoming widespread as people’s lot improved economically and the expense of a dog became more affordable.
Two small Maltese dogs and trophy cups. Image: Library of Congress #LC-USZ62-55845
Care for dogs
The RSPCA (Royal Society for the Protection of Cruelty to Animals) was founded in 1824, the first animal welfare organisation in the world, and still active today. The NSPCC ( National Society for the Protection of Cruelty to Children ) was established in 1895. I’ll let you draw your own conclusions on that.
But back to the matter in hand, it was recognised that animals should be treated with care and kindness.
Dash with Princess Victoria, by Sir George Hayter, 1833
When Queen Victoria’s beloved dog Dash died in 1840, she had a marble image of the dog placed over his grave.
The first pet cemetary in Western Europe appeared in Hyde Park in 1881, where about 1,000 animas were buried. It was closed in the 1910’s and is no longer open to the public. The epitaphs on the gravestones reflected fidelity and obedience – both highly valued traits by the Victorians. The pet cemetary was controversial – at the time society was not too comfortable with the religious connotations of giving animals a Christian burial, also bearing in mind that a lot of people were still destined for a pauper’s grave.
Wild animals
The Victorian age was a time of travel, discovery and exploration. This meant there were opportunities in Victorian Britain to see exotic animals too. Regent’s Park Zoo opened in 1828 and there was another short-lived zoo, the Surrey Zoological Gardens, in today’s Southwark, which opened in 1832 to around 1856, housing the menagerie of Edward Cross.
This collection of animals included lions, tigers, a rhinoceros, giraffes, monkeys, elephants, camels, zebras, llamas and an aviary with exotic birds such as ostriches and pelicans. Queen Victoria and her family were also frequent visitors to the St. Regent’s Park Zoo which has survived until the present day – now known as London Zoo.
Group of Animals lately received at the Gardens of the Zoological Society, Regent’s Park. Illustration for The Illustrated London News, 6 July 1861. (Public Domain)
The Victorians may not have shared contemporary thinking on zoos and over-cosseted lapdogs, but they did set us firmly on the road to keeping house pets and enjoying their companionship for its own sake. Dogs and cats and whatever other pets you may have) were, are and will continue to be man’s best friend.
The word okay, or O.K. or ok or simply just ‘k is used in several languages apart from English and is said to be one of the most used words in the world.
Where did the word okay come from? There are several theories on when and where this word became part of our vocabulary. Get yourself comfortable and read on…..
Choctaw
The Choctaw language was used by Native Americans and is still in use today, although it is an endangered language with approx only 9,500 speakers in 2015, according to Wikipedia. It is mainly spoken in an American Indian territory in Oklahoma, known as the Choctaw Nation. Their language comes from the Muskogean family of languages (more about this in the next section).”It is so” is expressed in Choctaw as oke or okeh.
Greek
Would it surprise you to learn that Greek is also a Muskogean language? Muskogean is a type of proto language from which other languages are descended. And όλα καλά (óla kalá) is translated as “it is good“.
Scots
There were great numbers of Scottish and Scots-Irish immigrants into North America. There is a theory that the words och aye, meaning oh yes and pronounced oc eye, could have been the origin of our okay.
French
Another idea is that the word okay has its roots in the French speaking cotton growers of Louisiana calling “au quai” when the cotton was ready to be transported from the docks. In this context, au quai could be translated as everything is fine or good to go.
Or….
There are even more possibilities. Some people have claimed okay was descended from one Obadiah Kelly, who stamped his initials on documents for railway cargo. Or it came from Orrin Kendall biscuits in the Civil War. Talking of the Civil War, did the word okay come from an abbreviation that meant nobody was killed, in other words, 0 k ?
It has also been said is that it was invented by Martin Van Buren, whose nickname was Old Kinderhook, and who used the word ok in the presidential election of 1840, with the slogan “Vote for OK“. Sadly it wasn’t okay for Old Kinderhook as he failed to secure the presidency.
Or is okay a phrase from the past used by West Africans in slavery, to signify “everything’s okay“? Although if you were a human slave, then it’s highly probable everything was very much not okay.
Theories abound and you can pretty much well choose whichever one you like. But nowadays most experts tend to believe that the word okay was born in Boston, in the nineteenth century.
Up to the early 1960’s, there was quite a strong preference for the Choctaw origin of okay. However in 1963 and 64, a guy called Allen Walker Read investigated the source of the word.
What he found was there was a trend in the U.S. in the mid nineteenth century for acronyms along with deliberate, jokey misspellings – such as NG for no go, SP for small potatoes, OW for orl wright and you guessed it, all correct being spelt as orl korrekt…. otherwise OK.
This type of language was probably used in verbal language about ten years or so before it hit the press and written documents. It is now generally agreed that the first recorded instance of okay in writing was in 1839, when Charles Gordon Greene wrote in the Boston Morning Post:
The “Chairman of the Committee on Charity Lecture Bells,” is one of the deputation, and perhaps if he should return to Boston, via Providence, he of the Journal, and his train-band, would have his “contribution box,” et ceteras, o.k.—all correct—and cause the corks to fly, like sparks, upward.
And Allen Read Walker discovered that there were further occurences of the word okay or o.k., sometimes without a definition, which implies that the population at large knew perfectly well what it meant.
The A-OK sign Photo by cottonbro CGI on Pexels.com
A-Okay
In the 1960’s the expression A-Okay came into circulation. It was heard in the 50’s but became popular as it was used by NASA in astronaut missions and the moon landing in the 60’s. Apparently it came about as the sound of A was easier to understand through the static than an O sound.
So there you have it, the various stories behind a highly popular word. Do you know any more? If you do, post them in the comments, okay ?
Did you know that the name Big Ben, strictly speaking, only designates the bell that strikes the hour from inside the tower? The tower itself was named the Clock Tower, and then renamed the Elizabeth Tower in 2012, the year of Queen Elizabeth’s diamond jubilee. That said, most of us refer to the whole structure as Big Ben, probably because it trips off the tongue much more easily.
How old is Big Ben ?
The Palace of Westminster (a.k.a The Houses of Parliament) was badly damaged by a fire in 1834. The following year a Royal Commission was established to find an architect who could design a new palace in line with the surviving buildings of Westminster Abbey and Westminster Hall. Yes, you may remember that a time existed when projects were not just given to government cronies……
Anyway, the committee appointed a guy called Charles Barry and his collaborator, Augustus Pugin. Barry had included a clock tower in his plans, but it did not yet resemble the Big Ben we know and love today. Augustus Pugin was a Gothic revivalist and already had plans to redesign Scarisbrick Hall in Lancashire, including a 100 foot tower.
Scarisbrick Hall. Remodelled by A.W. N. Pugin. c. 1837-45; altered by Edward Pugin, 1860 onwards. Near Southport, Lancashire. Photo by Rob Scarisbrick.
Pugin’s influence
Although Charles Barry was the chief architect, it was Augustin Pugin who was mainly responsible for the design of the clock tower in London. Wikipedia quotes Pugin as saying “”I never worked so hard in my life [as] for Mr Barry for tomorrow I render all the designs for finishing his bell tower & it is beautiful & I am the whole machinery of the clock.”[
Mr Barry, however, did not deign to give any credit to Augustus for his undoubted contribution to both Big Ben and the interior design of The Houses of Parliament. Pugin’s son, Edward, (who incidentally would carry out his father’s project for Scarisbrick Hall) issued a statement in 1867 after both men had died , affirming that the “true” architect had in fact been his father, and not Charles Barry.
Augustus had re-designed the clock tower to be taller and more imposing, dominating the Parliamentary skyline. He added the symbols of the four nations of the British Isles – the rose, the leek, the thistle and the shamrock, as well as the portcullis which is the symbol of the House of Commons and the House of Lords. seen below.
Sadly, Augustus died at the age of 40, and never saw the clock tower completed.
Big Ben is known to be an extremely accurate clock and its mechanisms have been copied in many high tower clocks. It is reliable to within a few seconds a week.
Since 1859, the pendulum was controlled by a pile of pre-decimal penny coins which were added or removed as necessary to keep time-keeping punctual. In 2009 some of the pennies were replaced by 5 pound coins, specially produced for the London Olympics in 2012, and depicting, you guessed it, Big Ben.
Big Ben has stopped at various times due to heavy snow, including at New Year of 1962/3 when the New Year was chimed in nine minutes late.
The clock faces were not illuminated during some periods of World War I and the whole of World War II in order not to guide German bomber pilots. A German bomber did actually damage two of the clock dials in 1941.
Big Ben leans around 0.26 degrees to the north-west, but experts say this will not be a problem for thousands of years. ( 0.26 degrees is around one sixteenth of the tilt of the Tower of Pisa. )
A flock of starlings decided to sit on a clock hand in 1949, making it slow down by four and a half minutes. I would make a joke about a bird on the hand, but then again, maybe not…
In 2005 one of Big Ben’s clock faces stopped for a short period of time, possibly due to the high temperatures of 31.5 degrees C ( 90 degrees F). Global warming is real, people.
The London Olympics in 2012 were celebrated Big Ben chiming 30 times – it was the 30th Olympìc event.
Big Ben is currently undergoing a long period of maintenance which began in 2017 and is scheduled to finish in March 2022, athough this date currently appears to be in question. The original designs for the clock face have been sourced and the details on the clock face will be repainted to their orginal Prussian blue, replacing the black that we have always seen before, which was actually used to disguise pollution. The heraldic shields of each nation will be restored to their original colours, along with the roof and stonework.
A vindication of Augustus Pugin? I like to think so.
The ploughman’s lunch, shown above, has been around for hundreds of years in England. It typically consists of crusty bread and a couple of hunks of cheese and a variety of items may or may not be added : pickles, chutneys, pies, salad, sliced meat, hard-boiled eggs or even an apple or grapes. It is often presented on a wooden platter, as in the photo above.
Probably no two ploughman’s lunches are ever quite exactly the same. And of course, it needs to be washed down with an ice-cold beer or cider.
Origins
Bread, cheese and beer have existed in England since its beginning, and the phrase “a ploughman’s lunch” was first recorded around the end of the 14th century in a medieval poem called Pierce the Ploughman’s Crede. It is not difficult to imagine that these three items would be easy to pack for a farm labourer who needed an economical but hearty packed lunch after a morning working in the fields. Cheese was a good source of protein in this midday sustenance.
This type of cold, easily prepared meal has also been on offer in inns or other establishments for centuries. At times it may have been all they had to offer, especially throughout rationing at the time of the second world war, and afterwards. But it remained a popular combination.
Bread and cheese Photo by NastyaSensei on Pexels.com
Ploughman’s lunch hits the big time
There is some argument over whether “a ploughman’s lunch” always referred to the bread and cheese combo, or if it meant whatever the ploughman had in his lunch box for his midday meal that particular day.
But by the 1950’s it definitely had the meaning of the meal pictured above. The Cheese Board began promoting the sale of cheese when rationing ended and in the 60’s and 70’s the Milk Marketing Board began a campaign to promote the ploughman’s lunch itself. It was also a dream for caterers as the ingredients were flexible and the meal was so easy and quick to prepare. So understandably, it was always on the menu for the pubgrub of this period, and maybe brought with it the nostalgia of a less complicated, rural England.
Nowadays chefs and gastropubs have added their own twists to the ploughman – and it has become a lunch that can stand up to most occasions. Scotch eggs, olives, paté, fancy meats and even fish can all adorn a contemporary ploughman’s lunch – but the cheese, unlike the substantial slices of bread, remains a staple ingredient, whatever variety it may be.
A relatively simple, timeless dish. Arrange the foodstuffs of your choice on a plate or platter or in a tray or a bowl. And off you go. Bon appetit!
Victorian style room, early 1900’s – source wikipedia/commons (family member of JGKlein)
The Victorian era
The Victorian period ushered in a period of great change and upheaval. The Industrial Revolution meant there was a great population shift to cities, and it was a time of great innovation and prosperity for those who had opportunities.
Nonetheless, it hardly needs to be said that the poor were never far from danger – malnutriton, filthy surroundings, and dangerous jobs just for a start. But it is also fair to say that some level of danger hovered in several areas of life, not just for the poor (who undoubtedly suffered the most), but for all members of society. These dangers also contributed to the high level of infant mortality during this period.
Dangerous additives
It’s difficult to imagine a kitchen without all our contemporary domestic appliances – but that’s exactly what a Victorian kitchen was like. Fridges would not be in common use for the wealthy until the following Edwardian era, and despite the Victorian claim of prizing cleanliness, there were no health and safety regulations or standards. As you might imagine, food poisoning was quite common, and was usually referred to as a bilious attack.
A substance known as boracic acid, which today is a component of insectides, was used by Victorian milk sellers to “purify” milk that had gone off, removing the sour taste and smell. As you may well imagine, consuming boracic acid is not the best of ideas. Not only can it cause vomiting and diarrhoea, but even worse, it masked the presence of bovine tuberculosis, an infectious disease that thrived in unpasteurised milk – remember mass produced pasteurised milk was still in the future – and this caused deformity and death. The estimation of deaths of Victorian children from this disease stands at approximately half a million.
Health and safety standards were sadly lacking in Victorian times. Photo by Los Muertos Crew on Pexels.com
Another food staple, bread, was also adulterated with alum, an aluminium based compund, used today in detergent. It’s already not sounding like a great idea, is it ? Alum was a bulking agent used to make bread whiter and heavier, and therefore more appealing. However, it led to health deficiencies and more importantly, caused bowel issues such as constipation or diarrhoea, the latter frequently fatal for children.
Feeding bottles for young children have been around for thousands of years, made from animal horns or pewter or even leather. The Victorian version was made of glass or earthenware, with a rubber tube inside fitted with a teat. The bottles were cleverly marketed with names such as “LittleCherub” or “Princess” and were a great hit with mothers.
Nevertheless, the bottle was highly dangerous. The tubing was difficult to clean and the general thinking was that it only needed cleaning once in a while. The tube, in conjunction with warm milk, created a very effective place to breed bacteria. Doctors condemned the feeding bottles, which began to be known as killers or murderbottles in medical circles, but sadly, many women were unaware of this and still bought them. Little wonder that infant mortality was so high.
Much as it may surprise us today, the Victorians were happy for arsenic to be used in small doses in their medicine, their clothing, their face powder, their wallpaper and even their food…..and poisonous stuffs such as caustic soda or carbolic acid were often sold in the same packaging as other harmless foodstuffs, paving the way for fatal errors.
But back to wallpaper. Home design having recently become a thing for the Victorian middle classes, one of the most popular colours to be used in the home was Scheele’s Green (named after Swedish chemist Carl Wilhelm Scheele, who invented green arsenic pigment in 1775.) You can guess where this is heading, can’t you?
And indeed, people were affected by the arsenic in the green dye that flaked off the wallpaper. Heat and/or moisture could provoke a toxic atmosphere making the whole family ill, or worse. Around the 1860’s doctors began to realise that these so-called mystery illnesses were due to the toxic fumes from the arsenic in wallpaper, although health experts were ridiculed for suggesting such a thing, not least by the companies who actually manufactured wallpaper. Eventually the use of arsenic began to be regulated by the government around the 1880’s.
Lead piping was used to transport water so drinking water could be tainted by lead it had picked up from the piping. As if that wasn’t enough, lead was used in paint to stop it from flaking. Furniture, cots and children’s toys would all be painted using this deadly substance. We all know young children tend to put their toys in their mouths, and in this way, they could poison themselves simply by playing.
Gas lights
Abstract smoke background – image by Brigitte, free Pixabay photos
If you had only ever known light sourced from fire and candles, the introduction of gas lights during the Victorian era must have been unbelievable. Being able to control the number of hours of light in a day was a whole new ball game. The Victorian passion for ornate decoration meant that a huge range of stunning lamps were manufactured, and many of these have survived to date.
But the drawbacks existed. There were two types of gas available – gas from coal which was highly flammable and which ran the risk of intoxication from carbon monoxide fumes. Natural gas could give off large flames, which was extremely hazardous next to the flowing drapes and curtains in favour at the time. Furthermore, due to the lack of regulations, workmanship could be shoddy with pipes fracturing, flames. fires and explosions. The impure gas could give off sulphuric acid, not only causing foul smells but also causing suffocation.
Most of these dangers within the home were present for all the members of the family, but it was children who suffered the most. Infant mortality was extremely high in Victorian England, reaching as much as 33% in some areas of London in 1849. Not only was this due to the toxic quality of the air in industrialised areas. lack of medical knowledge and health and safety regulations, but also the hidden dangers within the home itself.
The pandemic may have taught us that we can’t take life for granted- still, how lucky we are today to live in an age with both safety regulations and greater medical knowledge.
In my last post, we looked at expressions that refer to our feline friends – see https://english-stuff.com/2021/07/18/cats/ But today it’s time to focus on our other four-legged friends, in other words, dogs.
The dog-human connection has been around for a long time. Initially dogs hunted food for humans, and in return they received food and shelter. When people began to move into cities in the Victorian age, there was less of a demand for working dogs. However, dogs have remained in our households with the status of family members, due to the intense emotional connection between dog owners and their pets. Man’s best friend, indeed.
Dogs in idiomatic expressions
“All bark and no bite “
You know those dogs that wouldn’t harm a flea but they bark excitedly when they see something is going on? That’s exactly the type of dog that inspired this expression.
When we use this phrase to refer to humans, we mean they may sound threatening, but in fact they are pretty harmless. Their so-called aggression is only an act, as they are not actually going to do you any harm at all.
Adorable little pups aren’t they ? But as they get older, they will grow into independent adult dogs and their relationship will not be quite as close as the intense bond they feel for each other now.
We use this idiom to refer to adolescent couples who are infatuated with each other, and whose feelings will generally cool after a while.
” You can’t teach an old dog new tricks”
This is considered to be one of the oldest idioms in the English language, first documented in 1523 in John Fitzherbert’s Book of Husbandry, where it used literally to describe the behaviour of an aged dog.
Nowadays this is used to describe a situation where an older person is unwilling or unable to learn new skills, or to change their longstanding habits.
This is another idiom that has been around for thousands of years, albeit with slightly different wordings. Queen Elizabeth I wrote it in a letter, Shakespeare used it in Hamlet, and Erasmus traced the idea back to a Macedonian proverb in 406B.C. when Euripedes was attacked and killed by dogs.
It means that everyone will get their chance, no matter how lowly their status in life.
“Gone to the dogs”
If something has gone to the dogs, then it is in a very bad way. One theory is that any food that had rotted or gone off was given to the dogs, as it was no longer fit for human consumption, giving rise to our idiom.
Another variation on this is “gone to pot“, also still used today, and with the same meaning, not in the best of situations. The Phrase Finder suggests that this expression came about because anything that was placed in a pot to be cooked was never going to come back.
This one comes from the idea that watchdogs can behave aggressively and unpredictably if they are suddenly woken from a deep sleep (and a lot of humans too, I dare say). This idea has been with us since at least medieval times – in 1380 Geoffrey Chaucer wrote “”It is nought good a slepyng hound to wake.“
The idea has morphed into ” Don’t mess around with something if it isn’t necessary” or ” If it ain’t broken, then don’t fix it .”
Let’s finish with an expression that orginated in the States, but is used and understood on both sides of the Atlantic. Let’s not bark up the wrong tree here – a dog communicates by wagging its tail, not the tail controlling the dog, right ?
Seen in print since the late 1800’s, this idiom means that a more powerful person or organisation is being controlled by someone or something less important.
As dogs are part of our lives, they are inevitably part of our language.
Cats and dogs are our treasured companions, generally regarded as family members not only in England, but in many countries across the world. They have been of service and company to humans since the world began. Hardly surprising then, that cats and dogs appear so many times in idioms in the English language.
Let’s start with furry felines and how their behaviour is reflected in English expressions.
” Like the cat who ate the cream” ( or the canary, in another version).
Anyone who knows cats has seen that satisfied expression after they have enjoyed a good meal, especially when it consisted of something they weren’t supposed to eat……humans have been known to wear rhis expression too.
“Look what the cat dragged in”
And to the chagrin of their owners, cats are wont to bring them little “gifts” that they have hunted – generally small creatures in a not very salubrious condition. And the expression is used to denote someone who is not welcome, and/or in a pitiful state.
Reynold Brown, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons
“Like a cat on hot bricks” (or a hot tin roof)
A cat on walking on bricks or a hot tin roof would be agitated and jumpy. This expression is said to date back to the 14th century, when the expression had the cat walking on a bakestone, a large stone which was heated to cook bread. And some of you will immediately think of the Tennessee Williams play pictured above, which was made into a film in 1958 starring Elizabeth Taylor and Paul Newman who played. yes you guessed it, agitated and jumpy characters.
According to the Merriam -Webster dictionary, the word catty was first used in 1598 and has come to mean spiteful or malicious. But I can understand why a cat might be upset if it found itself in the followng situation
“Not enough room to swing a cat “
This is used to talk about a small confined space, so why would anyone in their right mind swing a cat in it?? One theory is that it actually refers to a cat o’nine tails whip, which was used to punish sailors in the Royal Navy in the 1600’s. There was no room to swing the nine-tailed whip in the tiny cabins so the flogging would take place on deck.
“Cat got your tongue?”
This is a popular expression from the 1960’s and 70’s, usually addressed to someone who is inexplicably silent. But why are cats blamed for someone’s loss of speech? The first theory goes back to the cat o’ nine tails in the 17th century, on the premise that someone who had been whipped with this nasty instrument would not be much inclined to speak. Hmmm. Or you could choose to believe that witches’ cats had the power of removing someone’s powers of speech, so that they could not report the offending witch to the authorities. And yet another theory harks back to the Ancient Egyptians who are said to have fed the tongues of delinquents to cats.
As “cat gotyour tongue?” was first seen in print around the beginning of the 20th century, all of these theories are pretty unlikely. Don’t believe everything I tell you.
These are just a handful of phrases that involve our feline friends- there are more. But my personal favourite is the the cat’s pyjamas.
This expression dates back to the Roaring Twenties when there was a trend for inventing nonsense expressions using animals and anatomy – the bee’sknees, the fleas’s eyebrows, the pig’s wings, the elephant’s instep……. Only a few of these expressions have survived until today, and all of them are used to mean something outstanding. The “bee’s knees” is used more in the U.K., whereas “the cat’s whiskers,” “the cat’s meow” and the marvellous idea of the cat’s pyjamas became more popular in the States.
Mrs Beeton’sBook of Household Management was a respected source of authority on culinary and domestic matters and a hugely influential force on shaping the burgeoning middle class. The book is still on sale today– check it out on Amazon or in other bookstores. You can even download it to your Kindle.
So here she is, the lady herself. You may have imagined the writer of a the Victorian domestic bible to be a middle aged or older lady, rigourously dressed in black. But Isabella was only 25 years old when Household Mangement was published in 1861. And shockingly, 3 years later, she was dead.
Isabella packed a lot into her short but intense life. Born in London in 1836, she was sent to live with relatives in Cumberland in north west England after her father died, at just four years old. When Isabella’s mother married again a few years later, the family moved to Surrey including Isabella, her two sisters and a further thirteen half siblings. As one of the elder children, Isabella was called upon to take care of the rest and this undoubtedly gave her valuable lessons in how to run a large household.
Portrait of Samuel Orchart Beeton by Julian Portch – National Portrait Gallery, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org
At the age of 20, Isabella married Samuel Beeton, a publisher, who encouraged her to contribute to The Englishwoman’s Domestic Magazine – a publication focused on cuisine, fashion and fiction, to keep nice middle class ladies occupied at home. Isabella began work at the publication as a translator of French short stories (having learnt both French and German at a boarding school in Germany) but soon became the editor of a supplement which was, in effect, the cookery and household section.
The collation of these 24 supplements were to become the renowned Mrs Beeton’sBook of Household Management . Isabella copied recipes from other books or requested that readers write in with their favourite recipes, which were copied and/or edited by the Beetons without naming any of their sources. Unthinkable by contemporary standards, but these were different times. Isabella did test runs with the recipes at home to ensure their reliability before they were printed. The only contribution actually from Isabella herself was a recipe for soup that she distributed to the needy in 1858 and 1859.
The culinary delights you can see here on page 547 of Household Mangement shows a selection of starters – namely :
1. Toulouse Pastry 2. Fillets of Beef 3. Beef Galantine 4. Zéphires of Duck 5. Mutton Cutlets in Aspic 6. Sauté of Veal 7. Chartreuese of Pheasant 8. Curried Veal 9. Chicken Médaillons 10.Veal Stew
These meals may sound strange to us now, but all in all the recipes in the book are a pretty clear reflection of a what a well-heeled Victorian familygenerally ate. And in case you were wondering (because I did too), galantine is a French word for de-boned stuffed meat, a zéphire is a mousse, and a chartreuse is a dish that includes vegetables such as carrots and cabbage and sometimes meat, wrapped in salad or leaves and presented in a dome. Let’s move on before you ask me anything I can’t answer….
Isabella’s book was not just a cookery book. Managing a wealthy middlle class Victorian household was practically the same as running a small business, albeit a non-profitable one. The recipes were the main part of the book although other domestic issues such as finance management, supervising servants, entertaining visitors, child care, fashion and decoration were also included. The Domestic Magazine was compiled into her famous book, which was a major publishing event when it was launched on 1st October 1861.
Popularity
Sixty thousand copies of Mrs Beeton’sBook of Household Management were sold in just the first twelve months after its publication. The Oxford English Dictionary stated that the wordsMrs Beeton were “a term for an authority on all thingsdomestic and culinary”. By 1868, almost two million copies had been sold. But why was it so popular ?
In Victorian England, crowds of people were flocking to the cities in the wake of the Industrial Revolution, in search of a more financially stable lifestyle. As the middle class increased in size, women were often left to deal with the business of managing the household affairs while their husbands were out all day at work. The book was aimed at giving women control over domestic matters and keeping them centred on the home. It is only fair to say that up to this point in history, women had had very little say in anything. This was probably the next best thing to a career, owing to the fact that female presence in the workplace was still an event waiting to happen.
Household management was undoubtedly a book that could guide its readers through the pitfalls of being left in charge of their staff, children and homes. It also struck a note with those who wished to be thrifty and cut costs. We should also remember that in the throes of the Industrial Revolution, the differing lifestyle imposed by the flow of people from rural areas to the cities meant that many young women had received little or no training in how to run a household.And that families often had numerous children.
A later addition to Isabella’s work. Note the publisher is Ward, Lock & Co, who bought the rights to Household Management after Isabella’s death. Photo in public domain.
Isabella was atypical of her generation. Despite writing a book that focused on what was considered to be women’s work in the home, she went to the publisher’s office every day. It was also very unusual for a book to be published with a female writer’s name – it is highly likely this was due to her connections in the publishing world. She even edited her husband’s magazine for two years.
But sadly, in 1865, at the age of just 28, she died a day after giving birth to her third child, probably from puerperal fever, a bacterial infection contracted after giving birth. Antibiotics had yet to be invented and the level of hygiene during the delivery of a baby in the 1800’s was certainly not up to our modern standards. How lucky we are today. How ironic that Isabella should die giving birth, when she was dedicated to improving family life.
Her legacy
A few editions of Household Management after Isabellas’s death included an obituary, but the publishing house – no longer Samuel Beeton as he had sold the rights to the book to cover his debts – preferred to omit any reference to Isabella’s death, and the bestselling book continued to be revised and extended, giving the impression that Mrs Beeton was personally writing every word. The first edition had 44 chapters, by 1906 it had 74 chapters and over 2,000 pages.
Some critics of Household Management say that it reinforced the gender stereotypes that women have fought against for so long, plus many of the recipes were little more than plagiarism. But we have to understand the Beeton phenomenon within its historical context. Her book allowed women to feel that they had some authority over what happened in their homes in an era when they had practically no control over anything else.
The book also empowered women with a wealth of information on domestic matters, and Isabella herself never claimed that the recipes were her own. Besides, she tested out the recipes and developed an easy-to-read format with the ingredients listed first and the method step by step, along with the cost and the estimated cooking time, similar to what we expect to see in a cookery book today. In contrast to earlier, more highbrow cookbooks, it made the art of cuisine accessible, at a time when people had turned their backs on a rural way of life and the culinary skills they might have acquired in the countryside.
Household management is a clear reflection of Victorian values such as thrift, tidiness and cleanliness. Whilst many of the recipes would not appeal to us today, and some of her domestic advice would be out of step with the times, thanks to Isabella’s book we have a vivid insight into the way the Victorian middle classes lived at home, providing valuable information for sociologists and historians. Isabella was a key figure in shaping this middle-class identity and was without a doubt, a strong woman who gave other women both aspirations and empowerment in their lives, the Victorian forerunner of a life coach. The first ever domestic goddess.
Beeton recipes on video
I can’t help but feel that Isabella would love the fact that recipes from her book are still used today and she surely would have embraced our communications technology as a means to reach her audience. On youtube you can find quite a few dishes from Household Management still being cooked and shown today. As a finale to this post I have chosen this scone recipe.
A pile of pears Photo by Stella Schafer on Pexels.com
Pears, Croppers and Lead Balloons
When something goes wrong, we have some interesting idioms in English to describe the situation. Let’s look at three of my favourites and the stories behind them.
It ‘s all gone pear-shaped
We say this when a situation has not lived up to our expectations. And a pear is the embodiment of a bottom heavy, unbalanced shape, unlike the spherical form of say, an orange. But where did this expression come from?
A plane looping the loop Photo by Alex Powell on Pexels.com
As usual with these things, there is more than one story about its origin. Some sources say it came from the art of glass blowing when, if the glass is overheated, the end result is pear-shaped object rather than round.
There is another school of thought that this expression dates back to the the 1940’s and was first heard in in the British airforce. It may have been used to describe a disaster such as a plane crash, but I prefer the other idea in circulation – that it was used to talk about pilots in training who didn’t manage to fly their planes in a perfect loop, a notoriously difficult task. Without the relevant practice, a trainee would produce a pear-shaped effort, rather than an oval or circle. The Oxford English Dictionary refers to this expression as “Royal Airforce slang“ but does not venture any further explanation. If anyone has further evidence, then please let us know….
To come a cropper
We say that someone has come a cropperwhen they fall, or have failed at something. But what on earth is a cropper?
A dangerous fall from a horse Photo by Pixabay on Pexels.com
This British expression derives from the word kropp, an Old Norse word which meant a swollen lump or bump. The logic seems to have been that you had a bump and therefore developed a lump on your injured person. A common cause of falls and subsequent injuries when people actually spoke Old Norse would have been falling from your horse.
By the 16th century, a serious fall from a horse was described as falling neck and crop. Hunting and riding were popular pastimes so the expression came to be used amongst the general poulation, having morphed into “to come a cropper”, to signify someone who had fallen headlong from their steed. The hindquarters of a horse are still known as the croup today.
Over time, the meaning was extended to include suffering a misfortune or failing in some way.
For example, ” The prime minister came a cropper when his lies were dicovered.” (No-one in mind here, honestly).
To go down like a lead balloon
The first two idioms are used in British English, but this one is also used in the States, although the expression is slightly different – ” to go over likealead balloon.”
Of course, a balloon made of lead is totally impossible as it would not be able to fly. So this phrase is used to describe something that has gone down very badly with its audience.
When this expression first appeared in the States in the 1920’s. it actually went down like a lead balloon itself ….. until it was revived in the 40’s, when it became part of our everyday langauge on both sides of the Atlantic, and is still in use today.
An interesting anecdote about this idiom is that in the 60’s, Keith Moon and John Entwhiste left their band, The Who, to join Robert Plant and Jimmy Page, and called themselves Led Zeppelin. The story goes that Keith Moon said, with reference to their departure from The Who, “This isgonna go down like a Lead Zeppelin“. The spelling was changed from Lead to Led to avoid misunderstandings with the pronunciation. They didn’t aspire to be the chief leader, it was just heavy material…..
One thing we can be sure of that Led Zeppellin certainly did not go down like a lead balloon with their intended audience.
So, wishing you all a happy weekend. Hope nothing goes pear-shaped, nobody comes a cropper and nothing goes down like a lead balloon for you.
A carton of eggs Photo by Polina Tankilevitch on Pexels.com
Eggs in English idioms
A lot of English idioms – that is, expressions that have a culturally different meaning from their direct translation – have withstood the test of time and are hundreds of years old. Language reflects our way of life, and many of our older idioms link back to a rural way of life, before the urbanisation of Britain.
Chickens
Chicken and egg Photo by Alison Burrell on Pexels.com
Chickens have long been domesticated and used as a food source as well as their eggs. It is thought they have existed in Britain since the Iron Age, although archeologists affirm that in this period chickens were worshipped rather than eaten, due to the fact chickens were buried undamaged and with great delicacy during this period.
When the Romans arrived in England it was a whole different kettle of fish ( or should I say chickens?) The Romans bred chickens for food, and so the chicken’s fate was sealed. They became part of our diet and remain a popular ingredient today.
Not only are chickens a source of white meat, but they also supply us with the protein packed and versatile egg, which you can boil, fry, scramble, poach and pickle and use in hundreds of different recipes.
So the humble egg has been a familiar object for a long, long time. Little wonder it appears in many English idioms. Here are a just a few that I have chosen:
A good egg /a rotten egg
Meaning : used to describe people’s character.
Example : He was a rotten egg, stealing and cheating wherever he could.
I think this one is pretty straightforward, don’t you?
Don’t teach your grandmother to suck eggs
Meaning : you don’t need to offer advice to people who are older and more experienced than yourself.
Example : Your grandma knows how to play bridge perfectly well, so she doesn’t need your help. Don’t teach her to suck eggs.
Where did this rather bizarre expression originate? Well, in past times, the dental care industry was yet to appear. It was common for elderly people to have lost some or most of their teeth so eating meat could be difficult for them. So by making a pinprick in an eggshell, they could easily suck out the rich, protein-high contents of the egg itself. So yes, grandmothers (and grandfathers) really did suck eggs.
To have egg on your face
Meaning : to be embarrassed by making a mistake in front of other people.
Example : After his disastrous presentation, the mayor certainly had egg on his face.
Let’s face it, no-one wants egg on their face, literally or figuratively.
Don’t put all your eggs in one basket
Meaning : don’t limit yourself to a single option; if it fails you will lose everything.
Example : He put all his eggs in one basket so when his business failed, he was left with nothing.
So take note. Keep your options open.
To walk on eggshells
Meaning : walking on eggshells without breaking them would be nearly impossible and you would need to tread very carefully, right?
Example : She was very sensitive that day and her friend felt she was walking on eggshells when she raised the subject.
Walking on eggshells is probably something we all have to do at some point in our lives i.e. choose our words with great care.
You can’t make an omelette without breaking eggs
Meaning : you can have problems or unpleasant things to do in order to fulfill a bigger task.
Example : Even though the staff won’t like it, we need to get rid of all the out-dated equipment, to create a more modern office space.
That’s life, people.
To egg someone on
Meaning : to urge someone to do something that breaks convention or the rules.
Example : Don’t egg him on any more, he has already received a warning this morning.
Interestingly, despite being an “egg” idiom, this one really isn´t anything to do with eggs. The word egg here is derived from the old Norse eddja meaning edge. so you push someone nearer the edge, in other words. It usually means that the person who is egged on will fall foul of somebody.
A tough egg to crack
Meaning : a difficult problem or situation to solve. Also a person who is not communicative.
Example : The suspect hasn’t said much. He’ll be a tough egg to crack.
Tough eggs can be hard work.
As sure as eggs is eggs
Meaning : it’s definitely going to happen.
Example : It’s going to rain tomorrow, as sure as eggs is eggs.
It is also said that this expression could be a corruption of ” as sure as x is x “. It would certainly explain why we say eggs is eggs instead of the more gramatically correct eggs are eggs. But I like to think that eggs have been providing us with sustenance for centuries and will remain with us for a long time into the future. Sure as eggs is eggs.
And by the way, if anyone knows if the chicken or the egg came first, can you let me know?
How did people buy and sell in the Medieval England?
The Middle Ages
The Middle Ages are often depicted as a dark period in time with few amenitites for ordinary people. No mobile phones !! No cars !! No supermarkets !! But despite the fact there was none of the technology that keeps business running today, the wheels of medieval society were kept turning as people relied on each other to provide their services.
A medieval community was generally split into three groups : fighters such as knights and soldiers, thosewho provided spiritual welfare namely, monks and nuns, and workerswho provided goods and services. Let’s look at the thitd group, the tradesmen and find out what was on offer in medieval shops……
Medieval shops and guilds
Medieval tradesmen worked from their houses. Downstairs their workshops were open to the public, and their residence was situated separately on the higher floor. As the great majority of people were illiterate, the shop sign would be a model or an object that indicated their trade.
Within a town, neighbours would trade with each other. Skilled tradesmen would pay a fee to become a member of a guild, and in turn the guild provided a guarantee that all products were of the required quality, standardised prices to avoid unfair competetion and provided assistance if one of their tradesmen were ill or died. Of course I say tradesmen as opposed to tradespeople, because predictably, it was generally always men, not women. There were a minuscule amount of cases where a widow was allowed to continue with her deceased husband’s business.
There were two type of guilds – merchants’ guilds for those who traded and travelled with their goods, and from which the financially stable middle classes would begin to emerge. But the workers in local trade belonged to crafts guilds. which encompassed many more professions that you might imagine – for example, brewers, butchers, bakers and fishmongers. Baking, for example, was a well-established industry where you would find both master bakers and apprentices, and was held in high regard as a skilled profession.
A selection of guilds, from London Livery Companies, with their coat of arms and date of establishment. Some of these were created at a later date from the Middle Ages.
Apart from those who provided food, there were locksmiths, blacksmiths, saddlers, carpenters, joiners, bricklayers…..and for sartorial needs, weavers, dyers, drapers, knitters, embroiderers, jewellers, glovers, and cordwainers, (who made new shoes, as opposed to cobblers who repaired old ones).
Medieval people didn’t have much of a life ? There were undoubtedly hard times for the poorest members of society, the same as in any era, but it doesn’t sound like everyone was dressed in sackckloth only eating plants and rotten vegetables, does it ?
The Medieval Market
Market activity had been in place in England since the time of the Romans; Colchester is generally ecognised as the oldest market town in England. Many of the names of market towns reflect the fact that trade played a important role in their origins : Market Drayton and Market Harborough, for example. The word “chipping” came from an old Anglo-Saxon verb meaning to buy and is preserved in town names like Chipping Ongar and Chipping Sodbury.
From the 12th century, towns and villages could pay a yearly fee to the monarch who would then grant them a charter to hold markets and trade fairs. Market day was once or twice a week in smaller towns and villages, and in some of the largest cities, it could even take place every day. It was held in the town square, and there were market stalls for the customer to buy fresh food, dairy produce, cereals, and items of necessity such as candlesticks, cloth or kitechen utensils.
There were regulations in place to avoid short measure, overpricing and quality control, to attract buyers and provide them with peace of mind that they would not be shortchanged in some way. The Statute of Winchester from 1285 enforced collective responsibility from market traders if one of them was found guilty of improper behaviour. After all, the town was dependent on its good reputation to attract shoppers.
The stocks at Belstone in Dartmoor. Now a grade II listed monument. By Ethan Doyle White, CC BY-SA 4.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org
The stocks and the pillories were two devices that were in use for both sellers who violated the rules of fair play, and for petty thieves, drunkards and other wrongdoers. The stocks restrained offenders by their feet whilst the pillory restrained a person’s head and hands, and therefore was much more uncomfortable than the stocks, (which were also probably not a lot of fun after a while). The townsfolk would humiliate the trapped delinquents with verbal abuse and/or by throwing rotten food and other delights at them. Not a pretty sight. But probably effective as a deterrent.
The pillory, although thankfully no longer in use, left its mark on the English language by becoming a verb meaning to pour scorn on and ridicule in public.
And you know what ? A medieval market was probably noisy and smelly but a great source of entertainment to all those involved. It was a social event as well as a trading place. Town cryers would make their announcements in the market place as it was a central point for the community. Information was exchanged in addition to the products. It was a day that the citizens of the town probably looked forward to and enjoyed.
So markets would be held on designated days but a chartered fair was a special event generally held annually and lasted for days or weeks.. Whereas markets sold the stuff of daily life, in a fair the trade was based on items that were of higher value such as furniture or farm equipment or cattle, or more expensive items from afar, such as spices or furs. And the fair usually included entertainment such as tournaments or singing and dancing to attract the crowds.
One of most famous of these was Scarborough Fair – yes, the one in the song. Scarborough was given a charter in 1253 and the annual fair was celebrated until 1788. The fair started on 15th Ausgust and lasted 45 days, attracting vendors, tradesmen, merchants, entertainers and visitors from all over the country, and providing plenty of business for local suppliers.
Like many other fairs, over time it lost importance for various reasons and by the 19th century, the location of the old chartered trade fairs had often became the site for a funfair – still providing entertainment for the masses.
We may have more technology these days, but our need to socialise and be entertained is still a basic human necessity. And to go to the shops of course !
There is nothing like a gin and tonic Photo by Toni Cuenca on Pexels.com
When did we start drinking gin?
It may come as a surprise to you that gin, which we think of as a quintessentially British product, was first documented as a medicinal drink in the Netherlands, Flanders, Italy and the south of France in medieval times, But it probably existed even before then, although we have no record of it.
In the Middle Ages, alcohol was not intended for pleasure or partying; it was generally distilled in monasteries for health purposes. The forerunner of what we call gin was a fiery concoction made from malt wine or spirit and flavoured with juniper berries, well-known for their diuretic properties. It seems highly improbable that nowadays we would find this beverage very palatable.
Gin’s name comes from jenever (Dutch) or genièvre (French) which mean juniper. Juinperis Communis is still a popular flavour in gin nowadays. You need to make sure you have the right junipers though, as there are a few poisonous strains of this berry…….and that ‘s definitely not the type of intoxication you are looking for.
It is claimed that the expression dutch courage comes from gin-drinking British soldiers fighting in Antwerp against the Spanish Empire. The fighters would fuel their courage with a shot of jenever before a battle. Dutch courage is still in use and refers to the (often false) confidence that drinking alcohol can provide.
But why were the British soldiers fighting ? They were embroiled in what became known as the Eighty Years War (1568–1648), also known as the Dutch War of Independence. This was a political and religious conflict, where the British soldiers were a Protestant ally fighting alongside Protestant Netherlands, Belgium and Luxembourg set against the huge and powerful Catholic Spanish Empire.
King William III of England, also known as William of Orange Photo via Good Free Photos under the CC0 / Public Domain License
Gin takes over
So why is this relevant to gin? To cut a long story short, the Dutch William of Orange eventually became King William III of England (also known as William II in Scotland, don’t ask.) The Catholic King James II had antagonised his subjects so much that he was deposed in 1688 and the Protestant William of Orange was invited to take the throne.
And William brought us gin. In a big way.
In the 17th century a precursor of our modern gin was already being sold in Dutch and Flemish chemists. For medicinal purposes only, generally aimed at gout, or kidney and stomach problems.
But gin had other connotations. It was promoted as a “Protestant” drink, not only for fuelling soldiers in battle, but as an alternative to “Catholic” French wine and cognac, which were heavily taxed to dissuade consumption. Furthermore, the goverment encouraged gin drinking as no licence was required for its production. Basically, anyone with access to the ingredients and the know-how was able to produce and sell it. Gin drinking became hugely popular, especially in London, leading to what is now known as the Gin Craze.
Mother’s ruin
We need to remember that what is referred to as “gin” in the eighteenth century was really a blanket term for any type of alcohol distilled from grain. Royalty and the aristrocracy drank high quality gin as a fashion statement; the poor drank the cheapest “gin” on offer because it was a cheap means of release from their squalid surroundings. It also has to be said that a pint of this type of gin was cheaper than a pint of beer, and even potentially safer than water, as the drinking water supply, especially in cities, could be polluted.
But as often happens with these things, it all got out of hand. Gin shops appeared all over England, and gin was also often sold by street vendors. London in particular had a gin drinking problem of epic proportions, resulting in drunken chaos on the streets. In deprived areas, gin was a cheap and readily available drug that would help someone forget their hardship. Unsurprisingly, the number of alcoholics soared and shockingly, large numbers of children died of alcoholic poisoning.
The government found themselves obliged to pass five different Gin Acts in the space of twenty years in order to control the gin drinking they had actively promoted earlier. As the measures got tighter, the illegal distillation of gin proliferated, often with toxic ingredients such as turpentine added to the mix. Lovely.
William Hogarth’s Beer-street-and-Gin-lane.jpg Wikipedia Commons (public domain)
To warn against the consequence of uncontrolled gin drinking in 1751 William Hogarth created the prints Gin Lane and BeerStreet – see above. Beer Street shows happy, prosperous people. Gin Lane shows madness, violence, drunkenness, starvation and infanticide. There was, in fact, a real life case of a mother who killed her infant daughter in order to sell the child’s clothing for money to buy gin. This gave rise to the expression mother’s ruin in relation to gin, an expression still with us today.
However, if you think about it, it was actually the elite of Beer Street who had set the gin drinking in motion in the first place.
In conjunction with the last Gin Act of 1751 and the increasing cost of grain, the Gin Craze was finally over by the late 1700’s.
In 1830 Aeneas Coffey revolutionised the distillation of spririts with the invention of the column, continuous or Coffey still. This allowed for a much cleaner, purer tasting alcohol to be produced. It became popular in Scotland for making whisky, and England used the still for manufacturing gin. This created a dry style of gin, known as London gin, still popular today. During this time, gin became gentrified, and the madness of the Gin Craze was practically forgotten.
In the nineteenth century, when British army officers were stationed in India to defend the now defunct British Empire. Malaria was a constant threat and the officers were issued with quinine to prevent them from it. The only problem was, the quinine tasted bitter and unpleasant when the powder was mixed with their carbonated water.
Some bright spark (to whom, if you are a gin and tonic drinker like me, we should be immensely grateful) had the idea of mixing the quinine and tonic water along with his gin ration and sugar and lime. And so the gin and tonic was finally born.
Today gin is a multi-million pound industry with an immense range of different brands and styles. A wide variety of flavours can be added to both the gin and the accompanying tonic.
The history of gin may have had its ups and downs, but it has never had a dull moment.
Finding the right word is sometimes a remarkable feat. Photo by Andrea Piacquadio on Pexels.com
Good isn’t always good
Experienced writers know that they need to keep their readers hooked. And one of these ways is using a wide range of interesting vocabulary.
Even if you are just writing an email, an essay, a report or anything else at all in English, chances are that you will use the word goodsooner or later. Now, there is nothing wrong with the word good in itself. But it’s boring, very, very boring. And over-used. And there is a huge variety of more attractive substitutes. If you are an English language student, getting away from basic vocabulary and using more unusual words is a step towards a high mark in a writing or speaking exam.
Good is multi-functional
Think about the way we use good as an adjective. Part of the reason it is so commonplace is because we use it to describe such a wide range of different scenarios – a book, a hotel, the weather, our state of health or mind, a behaviour, a skill, and several zillion other situations. If you look in any English dictionary, there will be a good long entry devoted to this word. (See what I did just now ?)
Suggestions
Please note that these are only a tiny fraction of possible replacement words or phrases for good. I have chosen them mainly because they have a some history attached, and even then it may not be 100% exact…….who knows when it comes to the often long-forgotten history of language? But a story which comes attached to that piece of vocabulary will help that word or expression stick in your memory. So here goes.
In answer to this you might say – well, good, great, fine, okay, thanks.
Or:
As fit as a fiddle
Fiddle is a colloquial term for a violin and fit originally meant fit for purpose, in that the violin was a very suitable instrument for making music. Its meaning has shifted along with the word fit so that it now describes someone in very good health. The expression is at least 400 years old, first documented in 1616.
“Is your grandad ok after his bout of flu ?” “Yes, he’s as fit as a fiddle.”
In fine fettle
Another option is in fine fettle. To be in fine fettle means you are in great spirits and /or health. Fettle is a fossil word, that is, a word still used in a certain expression, but otherwise it has fallen out of use. It derives from Old English and was used as a verb to prepare a horse for riding.
“Are you in fine fettle today ?”
Hunky dory
This one comes from American English, specifically from New York. Hunky dory appears to have evolved from the Middle Dutch word hunkey, meaning satisfactory and secure. Nowadays we use it to say something or someone is doing well.
“How’s your latest project coming along ?” “Everything’s hunky dory, thanks.”
As right as rain
We say this after someone has been ill, to say they are now back in good health. It is tempting to think that rain in England is the usual state of the weather, and that’s why we say as right as rain. However, there were many different versions of this expression, which have now, sadly, fallen into disuse. As right as a book, as right as nails, as right as ninepence, as right as a trivet, as right as a gun and as right as my leg have all been documented in the past. Theories, anyone ?
“Are you feeling better now ?” “Yes, as right as rain, thanks.”
Situations
Shipping containers in ship shape and Bristol fashion Photo by Pixabay on Pexels.com
Ship shape and Bristol fashion
This phrase is used to affirm that something is well-organised. Like many other idioms in English, it has a nautical origin, referring as you may have guessed, to the early 19th century port of Bristol, a city which was not only prosperous, but had developed a Floating Harbour in order to prevent ships from running aground due to extreme variations in water levels.
The expression ship shape is about 200 years older, originally ship shapen. It meant securing all the cargo on a ship correctly to stop it from being spoilt, something which could occur if the ship was beached, for example. Eventually the two expressions were joined together to signify that an operation was working efficiently and in perfect order.
“The warehouse is well organised with everything stored ship shape andBristol fashion.”
What’s in your top drawer? Photo by Karolina Grabowska on Pexels.com
Top drawer
Not only in the past, but still to date people tend to keep their essential items in their top drawer so they can find them easily. So therefore the top drawer is a container for our useful and therefore valuable objects. So if something is top drawer, it is indeed something worth having.
“My smartphone is top drawer, with all the functions I could ever need.”
Amazing sliced bread Photo by Buenosia Carol on Pexels.com
It’s the best thing since sliced bread
I imagine, that like me, you can think of approximately a million things that are better than sliced bread, but pre-packed and sliced bread was a pretty revolutionary idea at the beginning of the 20th century. This phrase is used to describe an excellent and/or innovative idea that makes our lives easier.
“That new addition to the computer programme is the best thing since sliced bread.”
A dab hand
If you are a dab hand at something, it means you are an expert or highly skilled. The phrase – a dab hand – was first recorded in the early 17th century but nobody really knows the origin of this expression for sure. To add to the confusion, to dab actually had two meanings in the 16th century – it meant both to strike heavily or to touch lightly. If you are a dab hand at unravelling mysteries, the origin of this phrase is something you could investigate …….
“My cousin is a dab hand at making lasagne.”
So there you have a tiny fraction of some words and expressions to replace good. If you would like to improve your English, start using an online dictionary and with practice, you’ll become a dab hand.
A Merry Christmas (1903) from The Miriam And Ira D. Wallach Division Of Art, Prints and Photographs: Digitally enhanced by rawpixel. (Image in public domain).
Christmas past
Christmas has been celebrated in many guises during history, melded from a pagan rite and a liturgical feast to celebrate the birth of Jesus Christ. So how did it morph into the activities and festivities that we associate with a contemporary Christmas?
In short, we owe a lot of our modern day secular Yuletide traditions to the Victorians. At the start of the Victorian period, Christmas was not a recognised event as such, but by the end of the nineteenth century, it had evolved into a significant occasion with a strong resemblance to the way we celebrate it today.
Illustrated London News, Public domain, via Wikimedia
Christmas trees
Tree worship goes as far back as the pagan era, and bringing greenery into the house for decoration seems logical when faced with a long, dark winter. But it was Queen Victoria’s husband, Prince Albert, who made Christmas trees popular when he installed one in Windsor Castle for the royal family’s festivities in the 1841. Once the royal household were pictured in the press with a decorated Christmas tree, the tradition quickly spread throughout Britain.
The old custom of giving gifts on New Year’s Day gradually moved to 25th December as Christmas grew in importance during the Victorian age. Due to the industrial revolution, the wealth of the middle classes increased and they were allowed time off work to make the most of Christmas and Boxing Day holidays. Gifts which were originally small items hung from the branches of the Christmas tree – nuts, fruit or handicrafts- became bigger, more costly presents, which had to be left under the Christmas tree, due to their size. Needless to say, children from poorer families would still receive a stocking with fruit and/or nuts, whilst rich families could afford expensive handmade toys for their offspring.
Boxing Day was the day when the working class would open their boxes of donations or presents from their employers and for servants in large houses in particular, it would be their chance to relax a little from their household duties.
Image courtesy of zazzle.com
Father Christmas
The Father Chrismas we know these days is very much an invention of the Victorian age. The concept of Christmas personified has been around since the Middle Ages, in various incarnations as Old Christmas, Captain Christmas or Prince Christmas. But Captain Christmas et al were more concerned with feasting, drinking and partying than sliding down chimneys with toys for the kids. As the Victorian Christmas gradually became more child focused, and with the arrival of the Santa Claus story from the United States in the 1880’s, the idea of Father Christmas morphed with Santa and they became synonymous with each other, benevolent bringers of gifts for well-behaved children.
And this new Father Christmas was not always portrayed in his typically red outfit at first. His outfit could be green -see illustration above – blue, white or brown. In 1931 a Coca-Cola marketing campaign firmly established the tradition that Father Christmas/Santa Claus unequivocally dresses in red. The oldest letter that exists from a child writing to Father Christmas with requests for presents dates back to 1895.
The world’s first commercially produced Christmas card, designed by John Callcott Horsley for Henry Cole in 1843. https://commons.wikimedia.org (Image in public domain).
Christmas cards
The very first English Christmas card was actually a decorated manuscript sent to James I of England in 1611. Ornate scripts being beyond the reach of most people, the tradition of sending Christmas cards did not resurface until 1843. Henry Cole was a savvy guy who was involved in the creation of the Penny Post, the newly reformed postal service in 1840. Together with John Callcott Horsley, he invented the first series of commercially produced Christmas cards. This first Christmas card, pictured above, caused some controversy as the youngest member of the family is shown drinking wine, but the seeds of a new industry had been planted and Christmas cards became a profitable business.
My last post centred around what Victorians ate, and the huge difference between the financially stable and the less well off. Find it here:
Christmas, of course, was no different. Monied families could look forward to a lavish meal of several courses, the main course consisting generally of roasted meat, maybe beef, goose or turkey. Other delights included quail, oysters and truffles, Those who were not so lucky either ate something more humble, such as rabbit, or simply did not partipate in Christmas festivities. Many families lived in poverty, and Charles Dickens’s tale of Scrooge, “A Christmas Carol”, encouraged the wealthy to give gifts or donations to the poor at Christmas – a tradition which already existed but was made popular to a certain extent during Victorian times. Newspapers printed appeals for the poor and charitable organisations arranged Christmas dinners for some of those in need.
Christmas 2020
So what we can see is that a typical twenty- first century Christmas is basically a product of the Victorian era, brought about by industrialisation and greater buying power for the middle classes. Yet in 2020, the year of COVID-19, many of us are going to have a different Chistmas experience.
Will it change the way we live Christmas in the future, I wonder ?
Similar to the Victorian era, we live in an age of great social inequality, of haves and have nots. Fortunately these days, the State has certain obligations to its citizens to provide social welfare, although in England it has been cut back, reduced and generally made less available to the needy over recent years.
Going back in time
A slum in Market Court, Kensington,London,1860s.
The Victorian era, in a similar way to the present, was a period of great change. By the end of the era, there had been significant advances in industrialisation, communications, and great innovations in science and technology. All of this brought great wealth to the country and the moneyed classes increased their fortunes.
But the poor often paid the price of these changes. The wealth generated in cities hastened an agricultural depression, with people flocking to increasingly urbanised areas where large houses were converted into overcrowded tenements, neglected by the landlords, and ending up as slums. In an age where there was little sanitisation, and long hours of manual and child labour were the norm, the poor were trapped and vulnerable to exploitation.
Victorian food
The needy
Frontispiece from First edition Oliver Twist, 1838. Richard Bentley – Heritage Auction Galleries, Public Domain, Wikimedia Commons.
Unsurprisingly, what and how you ate in Victorian times depended on your financial status. At the bottom of the scale were the people in workhouses, who had no means of supporting themselves. In return for long hours of labour, the workhouses provided very basic food and shelter.
However, the conditions were often rough and undignified, and the workhouses often resembled prisons more than anything else. Charles Dickens’ harsh depiction of the workhouse and the brutal treatment of the inmates in Oliver Twist was in fact, a pretty realistic representation, intended to raise awareness of the unacceptable cruelties within the workhouse system.
Boys at Crumpsall Workhouse, circa 1895-1897, source Wikimedia Commons
Gruel – a cereal such as wheat or oats, boiled in water or milk- was a common breakfast in the workhouses . A version existed using only flour and water, so gruel could vary in consistency from porridge to……basically, slop. And Oliver Twist had the temerity to ask for more.
Lunch, known as dinner, varied from cooked or pickled meat with potatoes and vegetables in the best of cases to a watery broth in the worst scenario, The evening meal, called supper, was generally around 6pm and consisted of bread and broth, and maybe a small piece of cheese if you were lucky. The workhouse was not a solution for anything. Towards the end of the 19th century, the idea began to take root that the State should take some responsibility for the more vulnerable members of society.
The working class
The Victorians had a strict class system and even the working class was divided into three tiers – firstly manual labourers, followed by artisans, and the top level, the “educated working man”. Manual labourers, at the bottom of the hierarchy , were paid very low wages and could only afford very basic foodstuffs, let alone kitchen utensils.
One of the cheaper items on offer at the butchers’ was broxy, which referred to spoiled meat from animals which had died from disease. If you didn’t fancy food posioning or death from broxy, boiled or fried sheeps’ trotters were also a popular dish. Yes, I’m feeling queasy at this point as well….
Slum residents generally existed on a diet of bread, dripping, tea and broth. The worst off also ate potato peelings and rotten vegetables. Inevitably, this dreadful diet had effects on people’s health and harmed the healthy development of growing children.
The moneyed classes
With the invention of railways and better transport systems during the Victorian period, food produce could be transported more easily across the country, providing a better choice of fresh food for those who could afford it.
Although the middle classes could not afford to be as extravagant as the wealthy, the financially stable also had a variety of foods available to them. Meat, fish, cheese, eggs and bacon were staples along with porridge, and the traditional Sunday roast dinner. Meat was an expensive commodity so was generally out of reach for the less well off, although it could be substituted with offal, or a nice sheep or calf head. Eurgh. Please note I have spared you (and myself) the images.
Beyond Britain, Victorian cuisine had a reputation for being tasteless and unappetising , with all foodstuffs basically being boiled to death. This is justified to a certain extent, but there was also a trend towards culinary creativity. It goes without saying of course, that you would need to be wealthy in order to indulge this creative vein.
For the well-off, it became fashionable to host elaborate dinner parties, showing off expensive china and silverware and with highly decorated tables. The menus would generally consist of soup and fish as a starter, followed by meat or stew, game or poultry and conclude with dessert, cheese and liquor. Certainly there were no poisoned meats or rotten vegetables on offer in these fine displays of prosperity.
The table is set in the centre of an elegant Victorian dining room. The illustration is from Hill’s Manual of Social and Business Forms, by Thos. E. Hill, 1886.
Large Victorian properties would possess huge kitchens including a scullery for cleaning and storing crockery and kitchen utensils, a pantry for food storage prior to use, and a larder for meat preparation as well as ample kitchen space for the actual cooking. . Not to mention the the members of staff employed to deal with all the culinary preparation of the menu.
It has been noted that upper and middle class women did sometimes join in with the menu preparation. Elizabeth Robins Pennell was an art-turned-food critic who considered that food could be a high form of art, and encouraged women to use their creative gifts rather than consider cooking to be a household chore.
Illustration of creative dishes from Mrs Beeton’s Book of Household Management, 1907
Although we would be familiar with many of the foodstuffs that Victorians ate, there are several dishes that would definitely not appeal to modern tastes. An example of this is the Brown Windsor Soup, which sounds pretty sinister to me already. It was a concoction of meat in its gravy, vegetables, vinegar, dried fruit, and for those who could afford it, a dash of Madeira wine. Still not liking it? Me neither. But it was “reputed to have built the British Empire.” Yikes.
Although it was orginally a chef’s gourmet recipe, by the 1920’s poor old Windsor soup had became a synonym for the worst of English cuisine.
Other delights included bone marrow on toast, heron pudding, haggis, and a popular breakfast was kedgeree – an Anglo-Indian dish consisting of smoked haddock, rice, milk, hard-boiled eggs and seasoned with coriander, curry and/or turmeric. Those who could afford it believed in hearty breakfasts, but I think I’ll stick to my cup of coffee and piece of toast, thanks very much.
It is obvious that the abysmal quality of diet was detrimental to the poor and could even kill them. The rich however, did not suffer from the same diet-related problems as we do today.
For a start, convenience foods high in fat or sugar content were yet to be invented. The population was, on the whole, much more active than we are today. The Victorians ate plenty of seasonal vegetables and fruit due to the development of new transport systems. Their intake of nuts, whole grains and omega rich foods all meant that the chronic and degenerative diseases which are common in today’s society hardly existed. Diabetes type 2, for example, which is rife in our modern world, was practically non-existent.
What can we learn ?
Our modern society is generally aware, that with the rise of largely sedentary jobs, people who have access to plenty of food need to exercise and eat healthily to help ward off disease. And secondly, maybe we (and especially the 331 Members of Parliament that voted against a food supply for kids in need) should be a little more inclined to believe that poorer people may not have money to feed their children through no fault of their own. We may no longer suffer some of the barbaric incidents of the Victorian era, but the financial gap between the well-heeled and the less fortunate seems to be, very sadly, on the increase.
I teach English as a second language. I see the learners’ struggles and triumphs with the vagaries of the English language. And when I started in this profession, I sometimes had to research the reason why we say certain phrases in the way that we do – in other words, grammar. There are many things that, as a native speaker, you have assimilated into your speech patterns without even thinking about it.
Our brains are amazing
A child’s brain is like a sponge. Think about the fact that any child learns their own language simply by imitating the other members of their family. But not only do children copy words, there are any number of grammatical formats automatically incorporated into their language patterns without ever having to learn the “rules” in a way that a non-native speaker does. And they assimilate these things with very little effort on their part.
This is also why being a native speaker of any language is not necessarily enough to be able to teach it. You may know the correct answer but often your students will ask youthe reason why. I cannot deny that there are some things in the English language that are not terribly logical. I do apologise for my unruly language. However, there are many logical grammar rules which can be explained clearly to learners, and which reassure them that the English language is not just a crazy hodge-podge of madness,
Pesky irregular verbs
You may or may not know that English as a second language learners are often given long lists of irregular verbs to learn which is the most horrifically boring task. English teachers have invented a myriad of activities to make the task more palatable. Think be-was/were, drink- drank, eat-ate, go-went. Absolutely all over the place, right ? But as a native speaker you just learnt these terms as you heard them, started including them in your speech, and carried on.
Countables and Uncountables
Another thing you may not know if English is your first language is why we have two different ways to ask about quantity, using “How many?” or How much?”. The basic grammar rule is that “many” is used with things we can count – people, chairs, turnips, shoes. And “much” is used for things we can’t count – happiness, incompetence, wine, petrol, noodles ( ok, you can, in fact, count noodles, or spaghetti, or cereal but surely no-one in their right mind would want to ).
But as often happens, there is an exception. Any noun which is composed of a mixture of things such as traffic, fruit, furniture is classed as uncountable and therefore uses the word much. But not vegetables. We say There aren’t many vegetables. Why and who decided this, no-one knows. Most languages completely ignore whether something can actually be counted or not and have one word or phrase for all cases. This grammar rule for non-native speakers is pretty mind-blowing the first time they encounter it. Don’t you feel sorry for them trying to figure this out?
Order of adjectives
Another issue was explained in my post of 10th Sept 2019, “Order of Adjectives in English”. Check it out if you want to see why we say “lucky black cat” and “black lucky cat” sounds so horribly wrong….. http://order-of-adjectives-in-english
There’s a lot of negative news out there and coronavirus lockdown restrictions haven’t been exactly a bundle of fun. Some of us have had to develop our culinary skills a little further than usual in these trying times. Some of us may have turned to the comfort food we crave. It got me thinking about the food of my childhood. I was born and grew up in the north of England. In the 80’s, when globalisation was beginning to take place, and people began to travel further afield on holiday, the range of foodstuffs on offer gradually began to increase. Nowadays any reasonably sized supermarket has a huge variety of goods, much of it imported from abroad, as our culinary tastes have broadened. But what about food we consider to be quintessentially English ?
In no particular order, here are some of my favourite typically English foodstuffs from my childhood. Maybe I should warn you first that this post is not for anyone strictly controlling their calorie intake. But it makes for divine comfort food.
I know it’s a cliché but I have the best memories of steaming hot battered fish and chips with lashings of malt vinegar, brought home by Mum or Dad as a treat . The first takeaway I ever sampled – before takeaway was even a thing. Or as an adult, buying this tasty comforting fare, best eaten out of the wrapping paper on the way home after a few drinks in the pub. Pure bliss.
Selection of English Cheese Photo by Polina Tankilevitch on Pexels.com
Cheese – my personal favoutite is tangy, crumbly Cheshire cheese. But there’s an immense range of around 700 English cheeses you can sample …..it’s not all about Cheddar. And there are some great names ….CornishYarg, Dorset Drum, Fine Fettle Yorkshire and the marvellously named Stinking Bishop, whose name orginates from Stinking Bishop pears, which are used to make an alcoholic drink known as perry, in which the cheese is steeped while it matures. In turn, Stinking Bishop Pears are named after Mr. Frederick Bishop, who first cultivated them. Mr Bishop is said to have once shot at his kettle when it did not heat water quickly enough for his liking. Interesting guy.
Ok, English weather in general can be pretty dismal but when conditions are right and it’s sunny, the sky is blue, it’s around 24 degrees and there is no more than a gentle breeze, an Englishsummer’s dayis not far from perfect. And top it off with a 99 from the ice-cream van. A 99, for those of you not in the know, is a soft ice-cream cone with a Cadbury’s chocolate flake. Heaven.
The full English breakfast. Typically consists of bacon, sausages, fried eggs, baked beans, fried tomatoes, hash browns, fried bread, black pudding and any thing else you care to throw in. Yes, it involves a lot of frying. That’s why it’s also known as a fry-up. It also contains a huge amount of calories. But it is a tried and tested hangover cure, possibly because you are unable to move anyway if you scoff the lot. Variations include the Full Scottish, Full Irish and Full Welsh breakfast.
Plate of delicious freshly baked Xmas mince pies with one broken open to reveal the rich fruity filling. (Stockarch Free Stock Photos )
Mince pies. These are a Christmas delicacy and if you are unfamiliar with them, you would probably assume they are savoury….but no, they are made with sweet mincemeat consisting of dried fruit with spices. Orginally, however, in the 13th century mince pies were much bigger, generally rectangular in shape and surprise, surprise, they did contain meat well as fruit and spice. By the time of Queen Victoria, the mince pie had evolved into the the sweet- flavoured individually sized pie that we know and love today…. the mouthwatering taste of a traditional English Christmas.
So there you have some of my favourite food treats from my country of birth.
Anything else you would add to the list ? Tell me your thoughts ….
It is truly amazing how snippets of information, no matter whether they are based on fact or fiction, can filter through hundreds of generations and become part of our traditions and culture. Such is the case of Saint Swithin (or Swithun, if you prefer), who was the bishop of Winchester in the 9th century. Despite the fact that not much has been recorded about his life, it is the events after his death that have earned him a place in history.
What we do know for sure is that Swithin was the bishop of Winchester from October 852 until July 853, and that on his deathbed, he requested to be buried in the cathedral grounds where the rain could fall on his grave.
But after a church reform, on 15th July in the 970’s, Swithin’s remains were transferred from his burial place in the grounds to a new shrine in the Old Minster in Winchester. The removal of the remains were carried out in heavy rain storms, which were said to last 40 days and 40 nights. Swithin was evidently not amused.
As we do not have access to weather records from the 10th century, the 40 day downpour has never been confirmed. But the legacy of Swithin has endured. He is the patron saint of Winchester. He is the saint we should address if we are in need of water in the event of a drought. He is also remembered in this verse:
St. Swithin’s day if thou dost rain For forty days it will remain St. Swithin’s day if thou be fair For forty days ’twill rain nae mair.
And translated into contemporary English – if it rains on 15th July, now known as Saint Swithin’s day, you are going to see a lot more rain. 40 days and nights’ worth, to be exact. But should the opposite be true, that is, the sun deigns to make an appearance, then you will enjoy 40 days of fine weather.
Sadly , I am obliged to admit that there are no years on record when this prediction actually came true. A meterologist would tell you that the weather can often change mid-summer in England and this is a phenomenon dependent on jet streams. But I would stake a guess that numerous people in England will look at the sky on 15th July 2020 and remember Saint Swithin.
There are many locations in England with outlandish names. Some are rude, some are funny and some are just, well, really silly.
Here are are some of my favourites :
Beer
Beer is a picturesque little village on the coast of Devon. I am sure you can have a beer in Beer, but its name isn’t related to the drink. It is from the Old English bearu which meant grove, and this referred to the vegetation that originally surrounded the village.
Bell End
This village in Worcerstershire shares its name with the British slang for part of the male genitalia, and has a secondary meaning, also slang, which applies to someone who is annoying. Not to be used in polite company, unless you are referring to the location, of course. Bell End won a competition in 2016 when it was voted the most hilarious place name in Britain.
Crackpot
Crackpot, a perjorative word for someone with irrational ideas, is also the name of a village in Yorkshire. It is believed to be the amalgation of an old English word, kranka, meaning crow, and the word pot from Viking, which referred to a rift or a cavity. As is the case with many other place names, it describes what the settlers first spotted when they arrived at the location.
Giggleswick
Well, first of all, the name Giggleswick just makes me want to giggle. This town in the Yorkshire dales has the classic Anglo-Saxon ending – wick, (also appearing as –wich and -wyke in other place names) which meant dwelling or settlement. The giggles bit doesn’t have anything to do with laughing though. It’s because the particular site in question belonged to Gichel, according to A Dictionary of British Place Names.
Pant
There are three places called Pant in Wales and one in England, namely in Shropshire, near the Welsh border. In the Welsh language, a pant is a valley, a dip or a hollow. Pant in Shropshire is , unsurprisingly, located in a dip directly below Llanymynech Rocks Nature Reserve. In the same way I would like to have a beer in Beer, I would also like to pant in Pant. Obvious I know, but having a beer in Pant or panting in Beer just wouldn’t be the same.
Sandy Balls
Sandy Balls, close to the River Avon and the New Forest in Hampshire, is comprised of woods and parklands which are now managed as a holiday centre. It was originally called Sandyballas, which referred to the sand dunes, and the name Sandyballas appears on documents from Henry VII’s time. By 1939, the name Sandy Balls was in use for the promotion of the location as a holiday spot, with a possibly unintentional play on words.
Ugley and Nasty
Ugley is located in the Essex countryside and was registered in the Domesday Book as Ugghelea. The theory is that someone called something like Ugga owned the original land which was a leah (Old English for a meadow or open field). Nothing to do with Ugley being ugly – in fact it is said to be very pretty. Ugley is not that far away from Nasty, in Hertfordshire. According to Wikipedia, the name Nasty is derived from Anglo-Saxon,æt þǽm éastan hæge, meaning “at the eastern hedged enclosure” or similar. And no, I don’t understand how the name evolved into Nasty, either.
Westward Ho!
The only place in the British Isles that includes an exclamation mark in its name, Westward Ho! can be found on the North Devon coast. Its attention grabbing name comes from the novel of the same name, by Charles Kingsley, published in 1855. His novel would not fare well in contemporary times due to its imperialist bias, but in its day, it was a bestseller. Ten years after publication, some local businessmen from Bideford (where the storyline begins) set up a holiday village in close proximity, christening it Westward Ho! and cashing in on the novel’s success and the Victorians’ love for seaside breaks.
And finally ….. all the Bottoms
Forgive my puerile sense of humour, but I just love all those place names that include the word bottom (which, incidentally is derived from Old English botm , meaning the lowest part of something). Too many to mention here but thank you to Bottom’s Fold in Lancashire, Broadbottom in Greater Manchester, Clay Bottom in Bristol, and the marvellously named Scratchy Bottom in Dorset, for making us laugh.
Feel free to tell me about any other place names that make you laugh – in England or anywhere else…..hope you enjoyed reading this post as much as I have in creating it.
Photo by bach hanzo on Pexels.com A white bridal gown
Why are wedding dresses white?
One of the first images that springs to mind when we think about weddings is the white bridal dress. Although our society is no longer son strictly bound by cultural norms, the traditional white wedding dress is still overwhelmingly chosen by many Western brides. But where and when did brides start wearing white ?
Before the white wedding dress
Before the white wedding dress, that is, prior to the 1840’s, there was no predominant colour for a wedding dress. Brides wore coloured dresses, or even black, as the dress would probably have been used afterwards for social gatherings, and white would not have been a practical choice. Even royal brides wore coloured wedding gowns, although with the addition of luxurious furs and expensive jewellery.
Until Queen Victoria’s wedding.
Queen Victoria married Prince Albert on 10th February, 1840. She made an unusual choice to get married in a white silk-satin dress, trimmed with lace. She chose British fabric in order to boost the ailing lace industry and the fabric manufacturing trade. The silk was from Spitalfields and the lace from Honiton and Beer, in Devon. Instead of a donning the heavy robes of a monarch, she attached a white satin train to her dress and held an orange blossom and myrtle wreath , along with orange blossom in her hair instead of a crown. The image below shows Victoria and Albert’s wedding ceremony , in a part of a painting by George Hayter.
A section of George Hayter’s portrait of Victoria and Albert’s wedding.
Victoria’s choice of attire was groundbreaking. The fashionable colour for wedding dresses at the time was actually red and a royal bride was expected to be decked out in a heavy, brocaded robes of state that showed status and wealth. A comparable event today would be a royal bride walking down the aisle in a blue or red wedding dress, for example. Some members of the court criticised Victoria’s sartorial choice as insipid and excessively simple, expecting to see much more lavish jewelley and expensive materials. However, Victoria had her reasons. It is thought that the lack of pomp and circumstance served to show her reign would not be flamboyant but based on simplicity and good sense, along with the promotion of national craftsmanship in the dress itself.
Of course, reports and pictures of Victoria’s wedding and her dress were widespread for several months after the event. Before long, wealthy brides were getting married in white dresses with orange blossom additions. In 1849, Godey’s Lady Book, a forerunner of a modern fashion magazine, declared that white was the best colour for a bride, “as an emblem of the purity and innocence of girlhood.” In addition, the publication incorrectly claimed that a white wedding dress was an ancient tradition that represented virginity, something that resonated with the public, even though it was not true.
And so began the association of the colour white with the virginal bride, although the choice of white also denoted that the bride’s family had the financial means to afford a dress in an impractical colour which could not be easily cleaned. The same went for the fabrics used in the bridal gown – the more luxurious the fabric, the wealthier the family. By the end of the 19th century white wedding dresses were the norm for brides who had money, whereas the less financially well-off would simply wear their best dress or suit in whatever colour they had. During the Second World War some brides actually wore wedding dresses made from parachute silk. But when better times arrived after the war and with white weddings portrayed on the silver screen, the whole concept of a white wedding became part and parcel of Western culture.
April 2011
Catherine Middleton on her wedding day in April, 2011
When Kate Middleton married Prince William on April 29th, 2011, there were several nods to the precedents set by Queen Victoria. Kate’s dress in itself had a Victorian line, with a tight bodice and long, full skirt. The lacework on the silk was created by needlewomen, not machines. The dress was made completely from British fabric, with only one exception which was French Chantilly lace. Myrtle was used in Kate’s bouquet, just like Victoria’s.
Victoria’s legacy
The Royal Family have access to great wealth and privilege, but a white wedding is something that many of us are familiar with. Nowadays we have access to a huge variety of options for wedding ceremonies – under the sea, in a hot air balloon – where a flowing wedding dress is not exactly practical. We can dress in any way or any colour we like. But a huge majority of women still opt for the white wedding dress – or ivory or cream or ecru or eggshell. Although other royals may have worn white for their wedding ceremonies before Victoria, it is her influence that has given us the modern white wedding dress. I wonder what she would make of the backless, strapless and off the shoulder versions ?
An oxymoron is a figure of speech where there appears to be a contradiction. For example, “accidentally on purpose”, where we know that an action was intentionally carried out but devised to look as though it was purely by chance – or what about a “deafening silence”, or an “honest crook” or a “definite maybe” ?
Etymology
The term oxymoron itself can be traced back to a Latinized Greek word, oxymōrum, meaning “sharp-foolish”, so the word oxymoron is itself an oxymoron. It can comprise two words or it can be a longer phrase. However, an oxymoron is not just two words which contrast each other, such as light and dark or good and evil, because the two ideas do not overlap. In an oxymoron there needs to be a clash of two seemingly different meanings in one phrase, which make the reader stop and think. The Merriam -Webster dictionary broad definition is ” something (such as a concept) that is made up of contradictory or incongruous elements.” For example, an “open secret” or “friendly fire”.
Literary Oxymorons
Oxymorons have been used in English literature for centuries, generally for dramatic effect, and to show that two opposing ideas can often paint the picture of a deeper truth. Shakespeare used a whole string of 13 oxymorons to great effect in Romeo and Juliet, to express the complicated nature of love , amongst which are ” brawling love”, “loving hate” and “heavy lightness“. And remember the famous line ” parting is such sweet sorrow ” from the same play? John Milton wrote about “darkness visible” in Book 1 of Paradise Lost. The idea of ” warm, scalding coolness” was used by Ernest Hemingway in For Whom the Bell Tolls.
Still used today
But don’t make the mistake of thinking that oxymorons are a dusty relic of the past. Moving on into the twentieth century, remember Simon and Garfunkel’s number one hit The Sound of Silence? Or the Verves’ Bitter Sweet Symphony, from 1997?
Oxymorons are also used to introduce new concepts such as virtual reality and working holiday. They can be used ironically to gain laughs, for example, happily married,affordable caviar, corporate responsibility. And sometimes they can be produced by accident ; see if you can spot the unintended example in the expressions below….
And finally…
Let’s look at at some funny phrases usisng oxymorons which have gained their place in history.
” I can resist anything, except temptation. ” Oscar Wilde
” It takes a lot of time and money to look this cheap.” Dolly Parton
” A joke is a very serious thing.” Winston Churchill
” If I could drop dead right now, I’d be the happiest man alive.” Samuel Goldwyn
” The budget was unlimited, but I exceeded it.” Donald Trump
King Edward VIII and Mrs Simpson on holiday in Yugoslavia, 1936. By National Media Museum from UK . No restrictions, https://commons.wikimedia.org
I have always been fascinated by the the story of Edward VIII and Wallis Simpson, the king who abdicated with these famous words : “I have found it impossible to carry the heavy burden of responsibility and to discharge my duties as king as I would wish to do without the help and support of the woman I love.”
It goes without saying that times were very different in the 1930’s, and people held ideas that are difficult for modern sensibilities to comprehend. Divorce was not widespread and carried a significant social stigma, many of the British upper class were immersed in snobbery, and the British press protected the Royal Family from scandal. How times have changed.
Edward, the heir to the throne did as he pleased. He was originally a golden boy who enjoyed popularity in the press, he partied, he had affairs with married women and lived a hedonsitic life. But then he fell in love with his twice divorced American mistress, Wallis Simpson. In those times of harsh social judgement Wallis was never going to make the cut as a member of the British Royals. She was openly ambitious and relished power, she was outspoken and did not show deference, and furthermore. she was a twice-divorced American…….
I believe that Edward and Wallis were spurred on by the idea of rebelling against their detractors. Tied up in their relationship were their own desires and expectations of life. Edward did not have much time for court protocol and Wallis gave him escape from the constraints of the less exciting and intellectual royal duties, tasks where he fell considerably short. Wallis was charismatic with an irreverent wit. She was also a social climber who was undoubtedly attracted to the wealth, status and glamour afforded by being Edward’s love interest. Edward was determined to marry Wallis despite the fact that she had two ex-husbands and would be deemed both socially and politically unacceptable as a royal consort.
We already know how this ended, don’t we ? On 10 December 1936 Edward abdicated, and he and Wallis married in France and lived a life in exile. Edward may well have imagined he would be able to return to Britain and still retain some influence within the royal family, but he was finally told he would be cut off financially if they returned. Meanwhile, George VI and the late Queen Mother gained the public’s respect and affection during World War II in a way that may well have been impossible for Edward and Wallis. Furthermore, it was discovered that Edward had lied about his personal finances in order to gain a more profitable financial settlement from the royal family, who paid his post- abdication allowance as he was no longer on the Civil List. He further disgraced himself by his association with the Nazi regime. The Duke and Duchess of Windsor, as they were now known, were sent to Bermuda in 1940 where they could do less damage to the British war effort.
After the war, the couple lived in Paris as socialites. Edward had finally understood that his role as a functioning royal was over. There was still a lot of bitterness over his actions. And what of Wallis? She had gained an affluent lifestyle but would be permanently denied her royal title, despite the fact her husband was still a styled as a royal highness. She remained at Edward’s side and was always ready to publicly support the Duke. But were they really happy behind the scenes ? After the war ended, the Windsors shuttled between Paris and New York as minor celebrities, forced to stick with their fairytale ending. Wallis is reported to have said “You you have no idea how hard it is to live out a great romance.”
Edward died in 1972. He is buried in Frognore, near Windsor. Wallis died fourteen years later. She had dementia and was living as a recluse. She was given a simple funeral on 29th April 1986 at Saint George’s Chapel in Windsor and buried next to Edward. Despite her husband’s persistence in the matter, she was prevented by exceptional legal measures from using the title of royal highness although Edward insisted that she was addressed as such in their household. The late Queen Mother is known to have had a strong dislike for Wallis, and considered that she was to blame for George VI’s untimely death due to the stress of a of royal role for which he had not been prepared.
Nobody comes out well in this story. But what we know is that Edward declined to accept his royal destiny at the cost of his adored Wallis. The acrimony that arose from his abdication and his subsequent actions would prevent Edward and Wallis from ever returning permanently to Britain until their deaths.
Negatives and positives Photo by Mohamed Abdelgaffar on Pexels.com
Wordpower
Everyone knows that in English we often add a prefix to the beginning of a word to make it negative, right? A tidy room can become untidy, an honest person can be tempted to act dishonestly.
But do you know there are several words in the English language which only exist in negative form?
Let’s start with this example.
She showed her disdain for the dishevelled and disconsolate boy.
So how about she showed her dain for the shevelled and consolate boy? Nope, that’s incorrect.
Dain, shevelled and consolate simply do not exist in contemporary English vocabulary.
The English language has plenty of negative words without a positive counterpart – probably more than you would think. A few more examples : inertia, ineptitude, immacculate, impeccable, nonchalant, nonplussed, unkempt, uncouth.
We can, however, trace their usage back to the Latin and old French used in the Middle Ages. The etymology of disdain, for example, is rooted in the Latin dignari , meaning “worthy”. The dis was added to convey the opposite and the word disdain came to mean a feeling of aversion and contempt. Dishevelled comes from the amalgamation of dis and the French word for hair – chevel – and later extended its meaning to clothing. The Latin verb consolari – to comfort – provided the linguistic basis for the word disconsolate.
I could write a story here about a macculate and peccable guy who tried to radiate a sense of ertia and eptitude by being chalant and plussed despite the fact that he was neither kempt nor couth.
But sadly, all these antonyms either never existed or are no longer in use in my language.
On the first of April both in the U.K. and several other countries, we celebrate April Fool’s Day. It is a day of practical jokes which are played on unsuspecting victims and the prankster often shouts “April Fool!” at the victim at the end of the joke. This horseplay generally lasts until midday and is frowned upon after this this point.
A battle of calendars
The origins of this day are not entirely clear. However, this story begins in the Middle Ages in Europe, when Pope Gregory XIII introduced the Gregorian calendar in 1582. This was a change from the old Roman calendar imposed by Julius Caesar. The Julian calendar had an extra day in February every 4 years, and was also, in a nutshell, 11 minutes too long. Over a long period of time, this had caused Easter to fall further away from the third week of March, when it was traditionally celebrated. The calendar was also out of sync with astronomical events such as solstices and equinoxes, of great importance in a world where electricity was yet to be invented. To solve these issues, the Gregorian calendar slightly modified the leap year schedule, explained by the U.S. Naval Observatory below:
“Every year that is exactly divisible by four is a leap year, except for years that are exactly divisible by 100, but these centurial years are leap years if they are exactly divisible by 400. For example, the years 1700, 1800, and 1900 are not leap years, but the years 1600 and 2000 are.”
And in addition to this, there was more than one date designated as New Year. The Julian calendar had in fact originally designated January 1st as the beginning of the New Year, but during the Middle Ages European countries had placed more emphasis on days of religious significance, which in turn, had been superimposed on earlier pagan rites. Crazy as it may seem to us now, there were New Year celebrations beginning on March 25th, which was the feast of the Annunciation, (also known as Lady Day, referring to the Virgin Mary) and ending on April 1st. These dates coincided with the vernal equinox, when the length of day and night have equal duration. Ancient cultures such as the Persians/Iranians, still recognise this event around March 21st.
The papal bull which reformed the calendar had no jurisdiction outside the Catholic Church so it was first applied in Catholic nations such as France, Spain, Italy and Portugal amongst others. Protestant countries were much slower to use the Gregorian calendar, as they rejected its papal influence. Germany finally adopted it in 1700 and England followed in 1752. Changing the calendar meant that in 1752 England and the British Dominions went to bed on Wednesday September 2nd and woke up on Thursday September 14th, losing 11 days in the process. But from this point they were at least in line timewise with most of Continental Europe. Greece only began to adhere to the Gregorian calendar in 1923. Orthodox churches have never accepted it, although it is now the civic global standard.
Poisson d’avril Photo by mali maeder on Pexels.com
So back in the European Middle Ages, people who considered that January 1st was the beginning of the New Year made fun of those who still followed the older calendar and finished their New Year festivities at the beginning of April. The earliest reference to these shenanigans dates back to 1508 when the French poet Eloy d’Amerval made reference to a “poisson d’avril”, literally an “April fish.” But why fish? And did you notice that 1508 just happens to predate the Gregorian calendar by 74 years? A possible theory is that it was forbidden to fish in April so jokes were played by throwing dried fish into the river and pretending they were freshly caught. Somehow these pranks got caught up in the battle of the calendars and have endured to date. In today’s France, the translation of April Fool is still poisson d’avril.
April’s Fool’s Day has become an annual custom in many countries around the world. In the Ukraine, for example, it includes a parade through the city, an international clowns’ festival and the city itself is festooned with disguises. Spain is an interesting exception where although the practice of pranking other people is alive and well, it is scheduled on December 28th , el día de los innocentes (Holy Innocents Day) and not on the first day of April.
The media have played some well-known April Fool hoaxes. In England, a famous April Fool’s joke took place in 1957, when the BBC showed a spoof documentary showing spaghetti supposedly being harvested from a tree in Switzerland. The voiceover was provided by Richard Dimbleby, a well-known and respected reporter, which lent gravitas to the spot. Hundred of people rang the BBC afterwards with questions about the “spaghetti tree”. It is only fair to point out that out that in 1957 pasta was not easily available to English people and spaghetti was a fairly unknown foodstuff. And maybe they were just more innocent times. In today’s world, where we have access to information at the touch of a button, it is very doubtful that this type of mass hoax would have the same effect.
An informal word, but all the same ta is used in many areas in England instead of the more conventional thank you. In turn, thank you (or if you prefer it, ta) to Ellen Hawley, author of Notes from the U.K., for asking why we say ta, and therefore providing the inspiration for this post.
Thinking about expressions of gratitude also takes me to my previous post of 25th March, Why do we say cheers ? which looked at the origins of the word cheers as a drinking toast. But in the U.K. we also use cheers as another friendly way of saying thank you. The use of cheers as a synonym of thanks started in the 1970’s. In 1976 P. Howard wrote an article in The Times pointing out ‘By a remarkable transition from the pub to the sober world at large outside cheers has become the colloquialsynonym in British English for “thanks.” ‘
But anyway, back to the humble ta. Toddlers learning how to speak often use ta as a subsititute for thank you – basically it’s just much easier for a young child to pronounce. This childish form of thank you, first documented in the 18th century, has slowly become absorbed into our adult vocabulary.
Ta is also part of Northern English dialect, and is widely used in the North. An interesting theory is that it could have originated from the Scots Gaelic expression for thank you, tapadh leibh. Or possibly from a Scandinavian language in the times of Viking invasions. As is the case with these things, we will never be entirely certain.
And we might as well look at the origins of thank you while we’re here. In Old English the word thank was a noun, meaning thought. Its meaning shifted so that by the Middle Ages it defined thinking favourably of someone in return for their services. And so it evolved into our modern day expression thank you.
There’s only one way I can end this post today. Ta, cheers and thank you for reading.
We raise our glasses, clink them together and say “Cheers.” But do you know why this custom began ?
Across the world, people generally accompany the clinking of glasses with a toast, be it “salud” (Spain), “proost” (the Netherlands), “skál” (Scandinavia) or many others we could add to the list. All these expressions refer to health or happiness or both.
The custom of toasting your companions is thought to originate from the Ancient Greeks and Romans who would toast the gods when feasting and celebrating at their banquets. Bound up with the celebratory toast would be the desire for a long, happy life and since then, humans have expressed the same idea with by raising their glasses upwards and wishing each other well, even if we do this almost without thinking about it today.
The word “cheer” is derived from the Latin “cara” which meant face, but by the Middle Ages, the meaning had evolved and it signified mood or expression. By the late 1500’s, the word began to be linked to positive sentiments, and from there it became a toast to health and happiness.
You might think that English nursery rhymes are just childish songs which have survived from generation to generation. You would be right on the last count – most of our nursery rhymes are hundreds of years old, but not only do they refer to long-forgotten historical facts, they can also hold satire or political messages of the times. Here are a few examples.
Humpty Dumpty sat on the wall, Humpty Dumpty had a great fall; All the king’s horses and all the king’s men Couldn’t put Humpty together again
The Humpty Dumpy rhyme is old. So old that in its earlier versions, it could have been a reference to Richard III who was both allegedly humpbacked, and humiliatingly defeated at Bosworth Field in 1485. It also was once a riddle about an egg and nowadays HD is generally characterised as a type of personified egg in children’s books.
In the fifteenth century, the expression “Humpty Dumpty” referred to a heavy, corpulent person. But maybe HD was not a person at all. The rhyme also appears to have been used in the story of an enormous cannon that was used by the Royalist forces against the Roundheads at the Siege of Colchester during the English Civil War of 1642-1651. During the siege, when the wall beneath the cannon was damaged, the cannon fell to to the ground and could not be repaired by the Royalists a.k.a the King’s men. The rhyme may have existed previously, but this adaptation is the one we are familiar with today.
Mary, Mary, quite contrary How does your garden grow? With silver bells and cockleshells And pretty maids all in a row.
The elder daughter of Henry VIII is known as “Bloody Mary” due to the severe religious persecution practiced under her reign from 1553-1558. The only surviving child of Henry’s marriage to Catherine of Aragon, Mary was a devout Catholic who rejected the annulment of her father’s marriage to Catherine, and on becoming queen, she attempted to reverse the English Reformation and restore Catholicism, burning over 280 religious dissenters at the stake.
The opening line does not need much explanation, as obviously the author held opposing views to Mary. How does your garden grow? is allegedly a reference to Mary’s infertility, although it is also said to refer to Stephen Gardiner, a bishop who was also Mary’s Lord Chancellor. There is a chilling consensus that silver bells and cockle shells could be nicknames for instruments of torture used to make Protestants recant their faith. There are a couple of nterpretations of pretty maids all in a row. It could allude to lines of Protestant matryrs, or refer to yet another type of torture device. Wow.
Photo by pexels.com
Baa Baa Black Sheep
Baa, baa, black sheep, Have you any wool? Yes, sir, yes, sir, Three bags full. One for the master, And one for the dame, And one for the little boy Who lives down the lane.
This one is about money. To be more specific, tax on wool, which was an important commodity in the Middle Ages. Although the song was not published until the 1700s, it refers back to wool tax, first imposed in 1275, by Edward I, a tax which lasted until the fifteenth century. Tellingly, the original last two lines were But none for the little boy who cries down the lane. In other words, the authorities took their cut, leaving the farmer with next to nothing. Presumably when it was published as a children’s song, the ending was altered to make it more suitable.
Nursery rhymes – not quite as sweet as they sound.
Photo by Pixabay on Pexels.com A hare with a look of insanity ?
Why do we say these expressions ?
The expression “as mad as a March hare” alludes to the excited behaviour of hares during their mating season. The phrase was first coined around 1500, and has been in continuous use since then. It was employed by eminent writers such as John Skelton, Thomas More and notably, by Lewis Carroll in Alice’s Adventures of Wonderland in 1865.
Another lighthearted phrase we use to describe deranged antics is “as mad as a hatter.” This expression is thought to have its origins in the hat-making profession of the 18th and 19th century where the use of mercury ultimately poisoned the workers, giving them slurred speech, memory loss and tremors, and sometimes even hallucinations. Again, Lewis Carroll used this idea in his character the Hatter, who interacted with Alice in a nonsensical manner. We generally refer to to this character nowadays as the Mad Hatter, although Lewis Carroll only ever called him the Hatter.
Do you know any other expressions to refer to crazy behaviour?
Pancakes served with fruit Photo by Rama Khandkar on Pexels.com
Why do we celebrate Pancake Tuesday ?
Many English-speaking countries celebrate Pancake Tuesday (also known as Shrove Tuesday). This custom has its roots in Christian liturgical tradition. Shrove Tuesday precedes Ash Wednesday, the first day of Lent – a 40 day stretch when religious followers would fast, or avoid rich and fatty food, and refrain from other vices, as a symbol of penance. The verb “to shrive” meant “to confess” and Christian followers were expected to be “shriven” before the solemn Lenten period.
In other countries this day is usually known as Mardi Gras (which means Fat Tuesday) and is very often a carnival day. Over time, what was once just a day of festivities gradually extended to the previous Sunday up to Shrove Tuesday and this was known as Shrovetide in England. In Medieval England, pancakes were a convenient way of using up rich food such as milk, eggs and butter before embarking on a period of food austerity.
Shrovetide was a half-holiday in England and was announced by church bells at 11 a.m. There were games of mob football, a local football match where many people joined in, using an inflated pig’s bladder as the ball. This custom declined during the 19th century, probably due to fears for public safety. Pancake races were another common sight and they are still organised on Pancake Tuesday in present times. The runners have to cover a specified route, while flipping pancakes in their frying pans. London still holds pancake races – in Leadenhall and Greenwich markets, for example. In recent years there has also been a Parliamentary Pancake Race where teams from the House of Commons and the House of Lords held a relay pancake race in Victoria Tower Gardens in order to raise money for charity. Sadly, this was cancelled in 2019 due to hostile protests related to Brexit, which made the race untenable around the Westminster area.
Will you be eating pancakes today ? Whichever way you are celebrating Pancake Day, enjoy it !
Photo by Hafidz Alifuddin on Pexels.com A typical sign for the “loo”.
History of the word “loo”
We have lots of words we can use as a substitute for toilet – loo, lavatory, w.c., restroom, bathroom, the ladies’/ the gents’ and I am sure that many people can probably add a few more informal or slang words to this list. But why do the British use the word loo?
There are several theories about how this word became part of the English language ……
Gardyloo
The most popular suggestion is based on the idea that before plumbing was invented, servants would empty the contents of a chamber pot into the street with a cry of “gardyloo” – which was a corrupted form of the French “gardez l’eau” meaning “mind the water”. However, the stumbling block to this idea is that the word “loo” first appeared in a dictionary in 1940 and began to be commonly used long after the “gardyloo” warning had disappeared from the streets.
The French term “lieux“
“Lieux” (with a similar pronunciation to “loo”) referred to “lieux d’aisance “, which translates as “places of comfort ” and was a French euphemism for the toilets. During World War 1, English soldiers serving in France would have been aware of this expression. Maybe they brought the term back with them to Britain where it became mainstream ?
Leeward/Looward
Leeward, signifying the side of the ship travelling in the opposite direction to the wind, was often pronounced “looward”, and would be the logical choice for sailors to relieve themselves. But it has to be pointed out that there were places onboard specifically designed for this purpose, and therefore it seems unlikely that the word “loo” originated from here.
Lady Louisa
There is a story that in 1847, Lady Louisa, the Earl of Lichfield’s unpopular wife, was staying with relatives, when the name card on her bedroom door was removed and placed on the bathroom door instead as a joke. The guests then used the phrase “going to Lady Louisa” which later became shortened to “going to the loo”.
Room 100
Yet another theory is that the toilet was often supposedly situated in Room 100 of buildings, and that 100 was misread as the word “loo.”
Waterloo
Waterloo was a trade name which appeared on cast iron cisterns at the beginning of the twentieth century. In 1922, James Joyce in his book Ulysees, appears to make a reference to this : “O yes, mon loup. How much cost? Waterloo. Watercloset.” Waterloo was very much in public awareness due to Wellington’s defeat of Napoleon at the Battle of Waterloo in 1815, and the name lends itself easily to this play on words.
In short, not only are there are several possibilities, but the etymology of the word “loo” is a minefield with little conclusive evidence. It seems that its origins will remain obscure for the time being. Which explanation do you think is the most likely?
It is certainly not impossible to learn English, but our language has certain quirks that often pose problems for learners ; this is true for native speakers when they begin to speak English, as well as those studying it as a foreign language. A young native speaker of English may well mispronounce a word the first time they see it written form, and often this is a result of a silent letter i.e. the letter appears in the written word, but it should not be voiced.
What are common silent letters in English?
How many silent letters are there in the English language ? The letters b, c, g, h, k, l, p,t, and w all make an unvoiced appearance in English vocabulary. Let’s take a quick look at where they appear and the reasons why.
B – is not pronounced at the end of these words : bomb, climb, comb, crumb, lamb, limb. In fact, it is even quite difficult to include the “b” sound. So why is it there ? Well, the word “bomb” came from the Italian “bomba“, where we can clearly hear the b sound. As the word began to be adapted into English , the letter b survived in the written form of the word “bomb”, whilst in the spoken form, we have eliminated its sound. This is the often the reason for those silent b’s at the end of a word.The lexeme originated from a different language and was shortened in its spoken form, although the written form conserved an extra unspoken letter.
B and C– That rogue letter b also appears in debt, doubt and subtle, but we do not include the b sound when we say these words. However, the reason for this is that they were, in fact, added to the original spelling in the Middle Ages. At this time, scholars began to examine Latin texts and the etymology of language. The three words in question are rooted in Old French, without a letter b in sight, but these academics realised that the origin of these words were debitum , dubitare and subtilis, respectively, and therefore thought that the Latin root should be recognised within the spelling. This is also the case with the letter c in the words indict and scissors.
G – There are words such as gnash, gnat, gnome, where the letter g is never pronounced. These are often archaic spellings from the time when the letter g was actually pronounced at the beginning of the word. What is more, if an English word ends in a combination of gn, then the letter g is silent. This includes sign, design, foreign, reign, sovereign. Silent g also occurs in words like bought, light, night, right, thought. There is an explanation for this, as in Old English, the letter h was pronounced even when it was placed halfway through a word. In Middle English, this h was spelt as a gh when it came before a vowel, and although the h sound is no longer voiced, the spelling with its redundant unvoiced letters has survived.
K – knee. knickers, knife, knowledge and more. Why is the letter k there ? Similar to silent g at the beginning of a word, the letter k was actually pronounced in Old and Middle English but has evolved into a silent letter in the English we speak nowadays.
L – for example, could, should, would, half, salmon, talk, yolk . Non-native English language students, particularly those whose maternal language is phonetic, often mispronounce these words by including an l sound. However, in English the letter l can be silent after the vowels a, o and u. But definitely not a rule you can apply across the board.
P – When the letter p is silent, it is what we call a dummy letter. Similar to silent g and k at the beginning of a word, vocabulary items with a silent p at the start are generally cognates, that is to say, words that have been borrowed from other languages and often reflect the original spelling in the other language, even though we do not actually pronounce the English version of the word in exactly the same way. The p sometimes can be towards the end of the word .Examples include corps, coup, phlebitis, psychotic – the first two from French , the third from Latin and the fourth from Greek. And to complicate matters further, the word receipt has a silent p due to those literary scholars of the past who added the p back into the spelling to show its Latin roots.
T – some spellings consistently produce a silent T in English. The endings – ften , sten, stle generally have a silent t – think about soften, soften, listen , moisten, castle, whistle. And words borrowed from French ending in t imitate French pronunciation – ballet. gourmet, ricochet – and thus the letter t does not sound at the end.
W – why is the w not pronounced in answer or sword and why is it there at all in words like write, wrong, or wrinkle ? Answer and sword are another case of spellings not keeping up with pronunciation. The w was originally vocalised in Old English but was dropped over time, whilst persisting in the written word. The family of words begining with wr has its roots in Old German, and the w stopped being pronounced from 1450 onwards.
This is just a brief look at some of the issues with silent letters in English. It is by no means comprehensive and unfortunately the rule is that there are no rules when it comes to English pronunciation. Modern English is basically a hotch-potch of words from all those different regions who invaded the British Isles in the past, plus lexicology from the now defunct Anglo-Saxon language. This wide range of influences has without doubt, supplied the English language with a rich and immense vocabulary, and a fair sprinkling of silent letters from archaic spellings, which often mislead those learning to speak English.
Photo by Pixabay on Pexels.com Christmas decorations
A short Christmas story with your chosen ending
They were in love and they lived together. She adored Christmas and all its trappings. He really wouldn’t have cared if Christmas never happened again. For this reason, their first Christmas together was proving difficult. One of them was continually wrapped up in Christmas euphoria whilst the other wallowed in disgust at the commercial frenzy around them.
” Let’s go and see the Christmas lights in the city centre” she suggested one December evening. ” I’m tired, it’s cold and I am really not interested in any of this palaver” he replied. “But whyever not?” she pleaded. “It’s such a wonderful time of the year, and it’s soooo pretty……”. He left the room before he had to listen to any more to his love who was becoming more of a deluded Christmas maniac every minute….
She sighed. He would never understand that Christmas for her was an expression of life, that she wanted to enjoy rituals like this with the love of her life. But she understood that Christmas was a difficut time for him, and remembered his harrowed face when he told her about his mother’s fatal accident on Christmas Eve when he was only a teenager…..
He sat down heavily. Why was she so obsessed with all this Christmas crap ? But then he thought about her tragic childhood, the poverty surrounding her as she had grown up, and the way, even now, the smallest things could fill her with delight as there had been so little joy at the beginning of her life.
So what do you think ? Did they go to the Christmas lights? Did they spend many more Christmases together?
Love it or hate it or somewhere inbetween, Christmas. The choice is yours.
Feel free to write your ending to the story in the comments box.
Christmas crackers are a must at any Christmas dinner in the U.K., Ireland and other English speaking countries. These festive decorations are placed on the table, one for each person, and resemble oversized sweets, made from a cardboard tube overlaid with coloured paper.
Origin
Photo by Ella Olsson on Pexels.com Old fashioned sweets
It is no coincidence that a cracker resembles a giant sweet wrapper. Crackers were invented in London in 1847 by Tom Smith, as a promotion to sell his bon-bon sweets. He added the novelty of a tiny explosive sound when the cracker was broken apart, and eventually the sweet came to be replaced by a trinket.
Today
Photo by picjumbo.com on Pexels.com Waiting for the cracker ……
No self-respecting Christmas dinner in the U.K can be without crackers. One is placed next to each table setting, and two people pull them apart from either end. When the cracker breaks, there is a small bang produced by the snapping of the friction slip inside. Inside contemporary crackers, there is a paper crown to be worn throughout the meal, a slip of paper with a riddle or joke to make everyone groan, and a small (usually plastic) gift – typical objects are rings and puzzles, for example. However, the British Royal Family have their Christmas crackers specially made, and luxury versions of crackers also exist, with jewellery and more expensive paraphernalia in their interior.
From humble beginnings as a marketing gimmick, Christmas crackers are now part and parcel of the Yuletide festivities.
The title of this article is a quotation that has become part of our culture, and is generally used to convey the idea that paying taxes is unavoidable. The quote is generally attributed to Benjamin Franklin in 1789 , although in 1716 Christopher Bullock, an English actor, is on record as having said” “Tis impossible to be sure of anything but Death and Taxes.”
Anglo-Saxon England
Photo by Pixabay on Pexels.com A medieval sword and helmet
Not much is known about the financial systems in place in Roman Britain. But a document from 7th or 8th century Anglo-Saxon England, The Tribal Hidage, shows the government used land taxes in order to raise money for their expenses. Land was divided into hides, and this measurement was used in order to evaluate tax payments from the populace. It is unclear exactly how this method was calculated, but we do know that the tax obligations were already in force, and the revenue obtained was officially destined to military service, fortress work and bridge repair. By 1202, a customs tax payment, amounting to 15 % of the the total value, had been introduced to be paid on all imports and exports.
In 1381 the imposition of a third poll tax in the space of 5 years brought years of economic discontent to a head, resulting in the Peasant’s Revolt led by Wat Tyler. Despite its name, this uprising was a widespread revolution throughout England involving not only rural workers, but the urban working class and wealthier artisans. The rebels stormed the Tower of London and beheaded the Lord Chancellor and other instigators of the poll tax. The revolt was eventually neutralised and some 1,500 rebels were killed. Nonetheless, this event did serve as a deterrent for Parliament against further taxes on the people.
Henry VII, the first Tudor monarch, stablised the economy and increased the revenue received by the Crown. He did not, however, collect heavy land taxes in times of peace, and concentrated his efforts on obtaining funds from the nobility. Henry VII also encouraged trade as this meant an increase in revenue from customs tax. During the reign of Henry VIII, Cardinal Thomas Wolsey, the Lord Chancellor, raised heavy taxes through Parliament to fund the English troops fighting against France, which contributed to his unpopularity and caused widespread discontent. Nevertheless, on the whole, Henry VIII was astute enough to suspend or abandon extra tax collection if it seemed likely to be troublesome. His daughter, Elizabeth I, followed this example during her reign and was loathe to tax the public harshly as she feared this would cause public resentment and alienate supporters.
The Petition of Right
Photo by Pixabay on Pexels.com The Houses of Parliament
Fast forwarding to the Stuart period, in 1628, one of England’s most important constitutional bills was passed through Parliament, the Petition of Right. Charles I was demanding huge sums of money to continue with what became known as the Thirty Years War in Europe. The Petition of Right placed limitations on non-parliamentary taxes, amonst other restrictions aimed at the king, and this parliamentary bill played a significant role in the constitutional events leading up to the English Civil War and the subsequent beheading of Charles I. Once England was under Oliver Cromwell’s rule, public taxes were gradually decreased, although if he deemed it necessary, Cromwell saw fit to raise taxes without consent, overriding the Petition of Right which he had helped to create. In 1655 he also introduced Decimation Tax . This tax payment was aimed at his enemies, Royalists or suspected Royalists, and the income received from these charges, although not in force for a long period of time, was used to fund divisions of reserve armies, tasked with keeping order.
Introduction of income tax
At the end of 1798, the incumbent Prime Minister, William Pitt the Younger introduced a progressive income tax, whereby an individual’s wealth was assessed to pay the necessary proportion,the proceeds of which were destined for expenditure on the French Revolutionary War. This is commonly regarded as the beginning of the British income tax system today. Although it was abolished and restored more than once, the Income Tax Act of 1842 firmly re-established the model and it has remained part of British fiscal procedures ever since.
An Anglo-Saxon economy is so-called as it is generally practised in English speaking countries, where governments use low level taxation and few restrictions in order to stimulate economic growth, following a free market model with its orgins in the 1700s. There are supporters and critics of this financial system but, to come full circle, in the words of Benjamin Franklin, “in this world nothing can be said to be certain, except death and taxes.”
Photo by Snapwire on Pexels.com Thanksgiving dinner
Be grateful
When I was growing up in England, Thanksgiving day was an entirely alien concept to me, a festivity that I had seen only in American films and looked a lot like a British Christmas, but without Santa Claus and gifts. And as a Brit, I don’t feel particularly qualified to write about Thanksgiving in depth.
But what I do know is that Thanksgiving is an event that is cherished by my American friends. And the message of Thanksgiving is simple ; be grateful for what you have. Just stop for a moment and think about all the good things in your life today.
As discussed earler in this blog, ( see “English is Alive”, posted Sep 2nd 2019 ) new words come about because a need arises for humans to be able to label a new object or concept. Earlier this month, on a trip to New York, a sign on the subway from the MTA (New York’s public transport company) caught my eye. It prohibited graffiti and scratchiti. To date, scratchiti is not officially a word, meaning that it cannot be found in the recognised leading dictionaries of the English language. But do you instantly understand the meaning of scratchiti ? Of course you do.
Scratchiti and graffiti
This got me thinking about why people feel the need to make their mark by the use of scratchiti. After all, scratchiti is not limited to the twenty-first century. In both schools and jails, scratchiti has always been commonplace. Why ? Undoubtedly, boredom plays a huge role, and possibly the need to reassert a sense of personal identity in institutions where individuality is generally repressed, for example. prisons and schools. Vandalism can never be condoned, but understanding the reasons behind it can be useful .
Photo by Scott Webb on Pexels.com An example of graffiti
And what about graffiti ?
There are multiple motivations for graffiti, scratchiti’s etymological big brother. Again, boredom is obviously one of the causes, although it has been suggested that some graffiti artists are addicted to the adrenalin rush from running the risk of being caught in an illegal activity. Graffiti can also be motivated by anger, or the wish to promote awareness, especially in the case of social and political issues. Sadly, graffiti is sometimes the product of bullying and harassment. And on other occasions, it can be the outlet to showcase artistic ability in a public location, sometimes, (but not always) providing beauty and colour where there was none before. And graffiti is no longer anonymous, as it generally was in the past. Contemporary graffiti artists often tag their works, in other words, their artwork has a type of graffiti signature attached in the same way that traditional artists would sign their artwork. There are even a handful of famous graffiti artists whose works have fetched enormous sums of money.
In conclusion, this post is not an encouragement to damage property or any other type of illegal activity. But it is fascinating how human beings are drawn to express themselves in these ways, within or outside of the law, don’t you agree ?
Photo by Peter Spencer on Pexels.com Fireworks on Guy Fawkes Night
Gunpowder, Treason and Plot
Guy Fawkes was born in Yorkshire in 1570, during a time of great sectarian turbulence between Protestants and Catholics both in England and in Europe. Fawkes became infamous when he was arrested as part of a conspiracy to blow up the Houses of Parliament and assassinate the Protestant King James 1 on 5th November, 1605. The failure of the plot is still celebrated on 5th November and known as Bonfire Night or Guy Fawkes Night.
Who was Guy Fawkes ?
Although Guy Fawkes was born as a Protestant, at the age of eight, his mother remarried a recusant Catholic after Fawkes’ father had died. Recusant Catholics were religious dissenters, who refused to attend Anglican Church services, remaining loyal to their religion and the pope. Protestant England feared that the pope was looking for secular power over England in alliance with France and Spain, and consequently, anyone who was suspected of supporting the Catholic religion was penalised with fines, confiscation of property and even imprisonment. Guy Fawkes converted to Catholicism after his mothers’ remarriage and as an adult, his Catholic beliefs led him to enlist in the Spanish army in 1593 to fight in Flanders against the Dutch Protestant Army. Also known as Guido Fawkes by now, he fought for Spain again in Calais, northern France, in 1595, and these military assignments taught him how to use explosives.
Photo by Pixabay on Pexels.com Houses of Parliament, London
The Gunpowder Plot
On Fawkes’ return to England, he became involved in a plot with Robert Catesby and a small group of fellow Catholics. They planned to overturn the Protestant monarchy by blowing up the Houses of Parliament and placing Princess Elizabeth, James’ daughter, as a Catholic monarch on the throne. The group of conspirators rented an undercroft, a type of cellar, under the House of Lords and began to store barrels of gunpowder there. Their plot was dashed when, in the early hours of 5th November 1605, Guy Fawkes was discovered with the stockpiled explosives in the cellar. There were actually thirteen conspirators in all who were charged with the conspiracy, but Guy Fawkes is the only one whose name is instantly recognizable in regard to the Gunpowder plot. Persecution of religious dissension was already the norm during this period but along with high treason, the plotters could only expect the worst punishment from the state. Guy Fawkes was sentenced to be hung, drawn and quartered, a horrific death. At the last minute he jumped from the gallows, effectively breaking his neck, and as a result, avoided the excruciating agony of the rest of the process.
Photo by Pixabay on Pexels.com Bonfires are lit on Guy Fawkes Night
Celebration of Guy Fawkes Night
On the night of November 5th, 1605, the people of London held bonfires to celebrate the failure of the plot and the King’s escape. Within a context of religious persecution, these celebrations also promoted anti- Catholic feeling. From 1650 fireworks were added to the festivities. In the 1670’s an effigy, usually of the pope, was placed on the bonfire to burn, but in time other unpopular figures were also used. By the end of the 18th century, Guy Fawkes Day or Bonfire Night had finally lost most of its anti-Catholic overtones and children would make effigies of Guy Fawkes and beg for money, typically with the phrase “ a penny for the guy”. During the Victorian period, the festivities began to be held away from small communities and bonfires were lit on their outskirts, resembling the modern day events held today in parks. Victorians were familiar with much older songs that usually started with the words: “Remember, remember, the fifth of November, Gunpowder, Treason and Plot”. The celebration of Guy Fawkes Day, sometimes known as Gunpowder Treason Day, also extended to parts of the British Commonwealth. Early settlers to North America took the tradition with them, where it was sometimes called Pope Day. As the American Revolution drew near and anti-British sentiment increased, the commemoration of the failure of the Gunpowder Plot went into decline.
Photo by Ashutosh Sonwani on Pexels.com A comtemporary Guy Fawkes mask worn by a protestor
Guy Fawkes’ legacy
Bonfire Night in England in the twenty-first century has long been a non-sectarian occasion, generally held in a park or suitably large venue with bonfires and a firework display. Effigies of Guy Fawkes can still be spotted although other unpopular celebrities of the moment are sometimes placed on the bonfire instead. Today there are concerns about public safely and the environmental risk posed by the toxins in the air from the bonfires. From the 1980’s onwards, when an Americanised version of Halloween began to increase in popularity, the story of Guy Fawkes and the Gunpowder Plot has been somewhat overshadowed. Even so, in 2005, when the film V for Vendetta was released, its main character was an anarchist who wore a Guy Fawkes mask. This mask has been adopted by anti-establishment groups, is commonly seen during their protests and is to date the best-selling mask on Amazon. And did you know the Yeoman of the Guard, the famous Beefeaters, still perform a ceremony to this day, when they check the cellars under Westminster before the Opening of Parliament every year?
Photo by Gratisography on Pexels.com Contradictions
Words or expressions that have two contradictory meanings are known as contranyms, or contronyms, antagonyms, autoantonyms or Janus words (Janus being a Roman god who is depicted with two faces). Generally the context provides us with the intended meaning of the word ; however, these contradictions give us plenty of opportunities for word play.
Examples
A selection of contranym verbs :
To bolt: to secure /to flee
She bolted the door and then she bolted.
To buckle: to fasten/to bend and break
He buckled
his belt, even though it was buckling under the strain.
To clip: to connect /to separate
She clipped the papers together and then went to the garden to clip the overgrown plants.
To dust : to remove dust/ to add dust
He dusted
the kitchen while his sister dusted the cake with icing sugar.
To execute: to begin/to kill
He had
executed a plan which would result in his being executed.
To hold up: to support/ to delay
The nurse had
to physically hold up the patient while the doctor was held up in traffic.
To trim: to decorate/ to remove any excess
After
trimming the Christmas tree, he trimmed his beard.
To wind up : to start/to finish
She wound up the old clock and decided to wind up her business.
How do contranyms come about?
These contradictory meanings can happen for various reasons. Sometimes they are literally two different words with a separate etymology, which purely by chance, are spelt in the same way. Or a contranym could owe its double meaning to polysemy, that is, when a word actually does have different meanings. The verb “to bolt” originates from a crossbow bolt (i.e. an arrow) which can both move quickly and immobilize someone. As a result, we use it for both ideas of running away speedily and securing an object, such as a door. Nouns such as dust can become verbs for either adding or removing the said noun. There are probably other reasons for contranyms due to the ongoing evolution of language – for example, the difference between British and American English. All in all, there are many strands to the complexity of the English language.
Photo by Pixabay on Pexels.com Flames and fire were once an integral part of Halloween
The beginnings
Hallowe’en or Halloween is a contraction of the Scottish expression All Saints’ Eve, which falls on 31st October before All Saints’ Day on November 1st. Our modern Halloween celebrations stem from a variety of much older customs, from Celtic rituals and medieval traditions.
Photo by Jens Mahnke on Pexels.com Bonfires were lit during Samhain
Samhain
Celtic occupation of the British Isles can be traced back to the 13th century B.C. In Celtic Ireland, Scotland and the Isle of Man, an important festival called Samhain was celebrated on 31st October/1st November, which was the beginning of a new year in the Celtic calendar. It was believed that on this first day of winter, the dead returned to Earth. The Celts in England, Wales and Brittany had a similar tradition, known as Calan Gaeaf in Welsh, also involving the belief that the ghosts of the dead were roaming amongst the living. On this day, sacred bonfires were lit, crops were burnt and animals were sacrificed. The Celts wore costumes, generally animal skins and heads, in order to ward off evil spirits, and they also told fortunes and made predictions for the coming year. Bowls of food were left out to gain goodwill from malevolent ghosts. These festivals not only marked the beginning of winter when it was thought it would be easier for spirits to enter the world, they also were a means of asking for protection from the evils of a long, dark winter period.
Photo by Mareefe on Pexels.com Apples are a longstanding element of Halloween
Some historians believe that with the advent of the Roman Empire, a Roman festival was added to the Halloween mix. Pomona was the goddess of fruit trees and orchards and was associated with the blossoming of fruit. Her symbol was an apple and as a result, this fruit became incorporated into Halloween activities, still around today in the guise of toffee apples and games such as apple bobbing. However, as Samhain and Calan Gaeaf marked the end of harvest time, it is likely that apples were already used in these festivities during the Celtic period.
