Scribbling larks, Nebuchadnezzars and XYZs |
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MOST POPULAR THIS WEEK LARKING ABOUT Most popular on HH this week was the fact that the yellowhammer, a finch-like member of the bunting family, was also once known as the scribbling-lark because its eggs have extraordinarily ink-like markings on them. Bird names are an untapped goldmine of linguistic peculiarities, and as a result pop up on HH fairly regularly . So as well as a scribbing-lark or two, take a trip to the countryside with your binoculars and you might well spot a plum-budder, a poke-pudding, a sheldapple, a lady-with-the-twelve-flounces, a cuckoo’s-footman, a twitty-lark and, depending on the time of year of course, a Bohemian chatterer. The name yellowhammer itself, however, isn’t without interest—not least because no one is entirely sure where it comes from. One suggestion is that the “hammer” of yellowhammer is in fact an Old English word, hama, meaning “feathers”. Another claims it might be related to emmer, an old name for a type of wheat that the birds might once have been notorious for feeding on. Perhaps it comes from amore or amer, a word found in a number of Old English texts in reference to a tantalizingly unidentified species of bird. Or perhaps somewhere along the line one or more of these origins have been conflated and confused, so there’s no single explanation here. Alas, no one can quite decide. Elsewhere this week we found out: - to baigle around is to saunter or walk slowly through tiredness
- rum is short for “rumbullion” (which makes you wonder why we shortened it)
- someone who shares your name is your nameling
- “don’t dynamite!” once meant “there’s no need to get angry!”
- a drink so good you down it to the last drop is a supernaculum
- and as group terms go, one of the best was saved for cheetahs.
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POPULAR THIS WEEK THE SLANGING JARGONS OF BABYLON* Slang is always popular on HH, but an odd fact about one of the ancient kings of Babylon really struck a chord this week: in Victorian slang the name of the Babylonian king Nebuchadnezzar could be used to mean both “vegetarian” and “penis”. A great many baffled emails and questions followed this tweet. Far too many, indeed, to let this go unexplained. So how—seriously, how—did all that come about? Brace yourselves... It all begins with a tale from the Old Testament Book of Daniel, in which the eponymous prophet interprets a dream King Nebuchadnezzar has had of an enormous tree being brought to the ground. Daniel explains that the dream foretells of Nebuchadnezzar’s own downfall, which will see him driven from the world of men and out into the wilds. There he will be left to “eat grass as oxen” for the remainder of his dwindling days. A year later, the prophesy comes true, and Nebuchadnezzar ends up out in the fields eating a purely plant-based diet. That might explain the “vegetarian” meaning here, but what about the—shall we say, anatomical one? Well, the word grass has been coarse slang for, er, how can we put this... a lady’s intimate hair... since the late eighteenth century, at least. Ultimately, among those pun-loving Victorians, “taking Nebuchadnezzar out to grass” became a none-too-subtle euphemism for sex in the mid 1800s, and from there the name of the unfortunate king became a slang term for the male member. Hey, you wanted to know... _________________ * Btw, this is the best strapline in HH history. That is all. |
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POPULAR THIS WEEK XTRA, XTRA You might have spotted another bit of nineteenth century slang on HH recently: an XYZ was once a hack journalist, who would take on any work they could find so long as they were paid. If you’ve got the latest HH book, The Cabinet of Linguistic Curiosities, you might have come across the story behind this one already. In the late 1800s, a freelancer posted an add in the back pages of The Times, offering, according to an 1889 Dictionary of Slang, Jargon and Cant, “to perform all descriptions of literary work at very moderate and unprofessional prices.” The advertisement was placed by a writer known only by the pseudonym “XYZ”—which soon caught the attention of enough people to lodge the name in the Victorian vernacular. |
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AND FINALLY... ANAGRAMS 35 Four more tricky anagrams to round things off this week: each of the words below can be rearranged to spell another dictionary word. What are they? NONE NONUSER NONINSECT NONSECRETOR Last week’s solution: CAULDRON, DIABOLIC, PIEBALD, IDOLATOR |
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