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<div align="left"><font face="Calibri" color="#008000" size="6"><span style=" font-size:24pt"><b>World Wide Words</b></span></font></div>
<p style="margin-left:0mm; margin-right:0mm; text-indent:0mm; margin-top:0.00mm; margin-bottom:2.11mm;"><font face="Arial" color="#008000">
<span style=" font-size:12pt"><i>Saturday 1 August 2015.</i></span></font></p>
<p style="margin-left:0mm; margin-right:0mm; text-indent:0mm; margin-top:0.00mm; margin-bottom:6.33mm;"><font face="Calibri" color="#008000">
<span style=" font-size:12pt"><b>This newsletter is also available online at </b></span></font><a href="http://wwwords.org/nwiv"><font face="Calibri" color="#0000ff">
<span style=" font-size:12pt"><b><u>http://wwwords.org/nwiv</u></b></span></font></a><font face="Calibri" color="#008000"><span style=" font-size:12pt">
<b> <br />
and is attached as a PDF file containing illustrations.</b></span></font></p>
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<span style=" font-size:14pt"><b>Feedback, Notes and Comments</b></span></font></div>
<p style="margin-left:0mm; margin-right:0mm; text-indent:0mm; margin-top:2.11mm; margin-bottom:0.00mm;"><font face="Georgia"><span style=" font-size:12pt">
<b>Vigintillion.</b></span><span style=" font-size:12pt"> Following my piece on this and other words for big numbers, all ending
in </span><span style=" font-size:12pt"><i>-illion</i></span><span style=" font-size:12pt">, Steven Burkeman wrote, “Your piece calls to mind the (sadly, probably
apocryphal) story about President George W Bush who, on being told by Donald
Rumsfeld that three Brazilian soldiers had been killed in Iraq, looked shocked and
close to collapse, then pulled himself round, and nervously asked ‘How many millions
in a brazillion?’”</span></font></p>
<p style="margin-left:0mm; margin-right:0mm; text-indent:0mm; margin-top:2.11mm; margin-bottom:0.00mm;"><font face="Georgia"><span style=" font-size:12pt">Richard Friedberg noted that in discussions of computer storage capacity the terms
for big numbers don’t stop with the </span><span style=" font-size:12pt"><i>yotta-</i></span><span style=" font-size:12pt"> prefix (10</span>
<span style=" font-size:12pt"><sup>24</sup></span><span style=" font-size:12pt">). Some sites list </span><span style=" font-size:12pt">
<i>xenottabyte</i></span><span style=" font-size:12pt">
(10</span><span style=" font-size:12pt"><sup>27</sup></span><span style=" font-size:12pt">), </span><span style=" font-size:12pt"><i>shilentnobyte</i></span>
<span style=" font-size:12pt"> (10</span><span style=" font-size:12pt"><sup>30</sup></span><span style=" font-size:12pt">), </span>
<span style=" font-size:12pt"><i>domegemegrottebyte</i></span><span style=" font-size:12pt"> (10</span><span style=" font-size:12pt">
<sup>33</sup></span><span style=" font-size:12pt">), </span><span style=" font-size:12pt"><i>icosebyte</i></span><span style=" font-size:12pt"> (10</span>
<span style=" font-size:12pt"><sup>36</sup></span><span style=" font-size:12pt">) and
</span><span style=" font-size:12pt"><i>monicosebyte</i></span><span style=" font-size:12pt"> (10</span><span style=" font-size:12pt">
<sup>39</sup></span><span style=" font-size:12pt">) as continuations of the established set. I can’t find out who
invented these, nor anything about their etymology. They appear rarely, either in lists
of numbers big enough to boggle the mind or as indications of numbers that are likely
to be needed if data storage continues to increase at its current rate. All appearances
are within the past six years, though one source claims to have obtained it from a
1996 webpage.</span></font></p>
<p style="margin-left:0mm; margin-right:0mm; text-indent:0mm; margin-top:2.11mm; margin-bottom:0.00mm;"><font face="Georgia"><span style=" font-size:12pt">My school maths teacher would be saddened to see me describe </span>
<span style=" font-size:12pt"><i>vigintillion</i></span><span style=" font-size:12pt"> as 10
followed by 120 zeros (10</span><span style=" font-size:12pt"><sup>120</sup></span><span style=" font-size:12pt">). It should of course be 1 followed by 120 zeros. Similarly
for all other numbers expressed as powers of 10. Thanks to all the numerate readers
who pointed that out.</span></font></p>
<p style="margin-left:0mm; margin-right:0mm; text-indent:0mm; margin-top:2.11mm; margin-bottom:0.00mm;"><font face="Georgia"><span style=" font-size:12pt">
<b>Vertical file.</b></span><span style=" font-size:12pt"> Many readers told me, following my snippet about this term used by
the Mayor of London, Boris Johnson, that it is well known to them, but most often for
a standard method of storing documents in a filing cabinet. However, Pete Jones
wrote, “I was a European Commission official from 1974 to 2005 and can assure you
that </span><span style=" font-size:12pt"><i>vertical filing</i></span><span style=" font-size:12pt"> as a euphemism for binning something was in use then. Boris
Johnson’s dad worked at the Commission for a while, so might have passed the
expression on.” Anneli Kavald and several other readers suggested: “One possible
source is that it’s a word-by-word translation of the French </span><span style=" font-size:12pt"><i>classement vertical</i></span>
<span style=" font-size:12pt">,
meaning to put something directly in the dustbin.” I had asked Boris Johnson about
his usage when writing the original piece; a reply eventually came from his executive
assistant, who said that the mayor meant “the report won’t be acted upon and will
languish on some dusty shelf for years to come”. </span></font></p>
<p style="margin-left:0mm; margin-right:0mm; text-indent:0mm; margin-top:2.11mm; margin-bottom:0.00mm;"><font face="Georgia"><span style=" font-size:12pt">Some who wrote mentioned that the wastepaper basket was known to them as the
</span><span style=" font-size:12pt"><i>round file</i></span><span style=" font-size:12pt"> or the </span><span style=" font-size:12pt">
<i>circular file</i></span><span style=" font-size:12pt"> and others that dropping a document in it was </span><span style=" font-size:12pt">
<i>filing it
in bin 13</i></span><span style=" font-size:12pt">. Why 13? Was it superstition that led to its use?</span></font></p>
<p style="margin-left:0mm; margin-right:0mm; text-indent:0mm; margin-top:2.11mm; margin-bottom:0.00mm;"><font face="Georgia"><span style=" font-size:12pt">
<b>Hingle.</b></span><span style=" font-size:12pt"> Tony Long, who mentioned his foster father had been a professional
poacher, commented, “To us in East Sussex, a </span><span style=" font-size:12pt"><i>hingle</i></span><span style=" font-size:12pt"> was a snare that lifted the victim
out of the reach of passing stoats and foxes. Some locals used it for any kind of trap
involving a trigger. None of us would have called an ordinary loop-prop-and-peg
snare a hingle. This seems to fit with the ‘hinge’ link quite well.”</span></font></p>
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<span style=" font-size:14pt"><b>Latrinalia</b></span></font></div>
<p style="margin-left:0mm; margin-right:0mm; text-indent:0mm; margin-top:2.11mm; margin-bottom:0.00mm;"><font face="Georgia"><span style=" font-size:12pt">A newspaper report in July 2015 about the reopening of long abandoned and
forgotten Second World War tunnels in the white cliffs of Dover mentioned the
</span><span style=" font-size:12pt"><i>latrinalia</i></span><span style=" font-size:12pt"> that had been found there.</span></font></p>
<p style="margin-left:0mm; margin-right:0mm; text-indent:0mm; margin-top:2.11mm; margin-bottom:0.00mm;"><font face="Georgia"><span style=" font-size:12pt">We may correctly surmise that the word is linked to </span>
<span style=" font-size:12pt"><i>latrine</i></span><span style=" font-size:12pt">. The </span><span style=" font-size:12pt"><i>-alia</i></span>
<span style=" font-size:12pt"> suffix indicates
a collection, often implying triviality — a good example is </span><span style=" font-size:12pt"><i>marginalia </i></span><span style=" font-size:12pt">and</span>
<span style=" font-size:12pt"><i> </i></span><span style=" font-size:12pt"> </span><span style=" font-size:12pt"><i>latrinalia</i></span>
<span style=" font-size:12pt">
was presumably created by analogy with it. </span><span style=" font-size:12pt"><i>Latrinalia</i></span><span style=" font-size:12pt"> is graffiti on lavatory walls. </span></font></p>
<p style="margin-left:0mm; margin-right:0mm; text-indent:0mm; margin-top:2.11mm; margin-bottom:0.00mm;"><font face="Georgia"><span style=" font-size:12pt">
<i>Latrine</i></span><span style=" font-size:12pt"> is from Latin. The Romans have bequeathed us much scatological or bawdy
text on lavatory or brothel walls. Many have been recorded in Pompeii and
Herculaneum, preserved by the eruption of Vesuvius in AD79 that buried the towns
in ash. Most are too rude for this column but this one is in the Casa della Gemma (the
House of the Gem) in Herculaneum: “Apollinaris, medicus Titi Imperatoris hic
cacavit bene.” (“Apollinaris, doctor to the emperor Titus, had a good crap here.”) </span></font></p>
<p style="margin-left:0mm; margin-right:0mm; text-indent:0mm; margin-top:2.11mm; margin-bottom:0.00mm;"><font face="Georgia"><span style=" font-size:12pt">Despite their seeming fondness for graffiti, I’m told the Romans didn’t have a specific
word for writings on walls, but called them just writings, sometimes trivial or
offensive writings (Latin </span><span style=" font-size:12pt"><i>taedia</i></span><span style=" font-size:12pt">; we get </span><span style=" font-size:12pt">
<i>tedium</i></span><span style=" font-size:12pt"> from the same source, though in
classical Latin </span><span style=" font-size:12pt"><i>taedium</i></span><span style=" font-size:12pt"> could also mean an object of loathing or disgust).</span></font></p>
<p style="margin-left:0mm; margin-right:0mm; text-indent:0mm; margin-top:2.11mm; margin-bottom:0.00mm;"><font face="Georgia"><span style=" font-size:12pt">So </span>
<span style=" font-size:12pt"><i>latrinalia</i></span><span style=" font-size:12pt"> is modern. It was coined by the late Alan Dundes, a pioneering academic
folklorist at the University of California, Berkeley. He wrote — among much else —
about the homosexual symbolism of American football, the Bible as folklore and the
social significance of jokes. He showed that folklore isn’t found only in ancient ritual,
fables and superstitions but in contemporary cartoons, poems and lore such as urban
legends.</span></font></p>
<p style="margin-left:0mm; margin-right:0mm; text-indent:0mm; margin-top:2.11mm; margin-bottom:0.00mm;"><font face="Georgia"><span style=" font-size:12pt">Dundas coined </span>
<span style=" font-size:12pt"><i>latrinalia</i></span><span style=" font-size:12pt"> in his 1966 paper </span><span style=" font-size:12pt">
<i>Here I Sit — A Study of American
Latrinalia</i></span><span style=" font-size:12pt">. Archaeologists and folklorists use it for this subset of graffiti, though the
general public hardly knows it.</span></font></p>
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<span style=" font-size:14pt"><b>How are you saying that?</b></span></font></div>
<p style="margin-left:0mm; margin-right:0mm; text-indent:0mm; margin-top:2.11mm; margin-bottom:0.00mm;"><font face="Georgia"><span style=" font-size:12pt">Widespread broadcast coverage of the flyby of Pluto by the New Horizons spacecraft
led to criticism of the pronunciation of the name of the planet’s largest and innermost
moon, Charon. Officially, it’s from Greek mythology, the name of the ferryman who
conveyed the souls of the departed across the river Styx into the underworld, whose
god, Hades, was often euphemistically called Pluto, the rich one (hence </span></font><font face="Georgia"><span style=" font-size:12pt">
<i>plutocracy</i></span></font><font face="Georgia"><span style=" font-size:12pt">)
because of all the good stuff that comes from the earth. So Charon ought to have an
initial </span><span style=" font-size:12pt"><i>k</i></span><span style=" font-size:12pt"> sound, as the dictionaries firmly say. But some astronomers pronounce it
with an initial </span><span style=" font-size:12pt"><i>sh</i></span><span style=" font-size:12pt">. </span></font></p>
<p style="margin-left:0mm; margin-right:0mm; text-indent:0mm; margin-top:2.11mm; margin-bottom:0.00mm;"><font face="Georgia"><span style=" font-size:12pt">The reason lies in the story behind its naming by the American astronomer James
Christy, who discovered the moon in 1978. He suggested modifying his wife’s name,
Charlene, by adding </span><span style=" font-size:12pt"><i>-on</i></span><span style=" font-size:12pt"> to its first element to match the names of elementary
particles like </span><span style=" font-size:12pt"><i>proton</i></span><span style=" font-size:12pt"> and </span><span style=" font-size:12pt">
<i>meson</i></span><span style=" font-size:12pt">. Hence, </span><span style=" font-size:12pt"><i>Charon</i></span><span style=" font-size:12pt">. He wasn’t well up on Greek
mythology and was surprised and pleased to find that it fitted neatly. The
International Astronomical Union (IAU), arbiter of celestial nomenclature, preferred
the Greek mythological origin to the personal one and so implied the word should
have an initial </span><span style=" font-size:12pt"><i>k</i></span><span style=" font-size:12pt"> sound. But many American astronomers, those in the New Horizon
team especially, know where the name really came from and say it with initial </span><span style=" font-size:12pt"><i>sh</i></span>
<span style=" font-size:12pt"> as an
in-joke, to the annoyance of classically aware listeners unaware of the story.</span></font></p>
<p style="margin-left:0mm; margin-right:0mm; text-indent:0mm; margin-top:2.11mm; margin-bottom:0.00mm;"><font face="Georgia"><span style=" font-size:12pt">Pluto has five known moons, the others being Styx, Nix, Kerberos and Hydra. Nix is
also spelled Nyx, the Greek goddess of the night, the mother of Charon. Hydra is the
nine-headed monster slain by Hercules, the nine referring to Pluto being the ninth
planet in the solar system. A related beast guarded the entrance to the underworld,
the three-headed watchdog whose name is spelled in English as </span><span style=" font-size:12pt"><i>Cerberus</i></span><span style=" font-size:12pt"> and said
with an initial </span><span style=" font-size:12pt"><i>s</i></span><span style=" font-size:12pt">. In that spelling, it came second in a public poll in 2013 to name the
moons. But the IAU prefers the classical </span><span style=" font-size:12pt"><i>Kerberos</i></span><span style=" font-size:12pt"> so it’s always pronounced with an
initial </span><span style=" font-size:12pt"><i>k</i></span><span style=" font-size:12pt">.</span></font></p>
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<span style=" font-size:14pt"><b>Gulled?</b></span></font></div>
<p style="margin-left:0mm; margin-right:0mm; text-indent:0mm; margin-top:2.11mm; margin-bottom:0.00mm;"><font face="Georgia"><span style=" font-size:12pt">Reports in British newspapers these past few days have featured the menace from
seagulls, particularly in Cornwall. Earlier this month a </span></font><a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-cornwall-33534181">
<font face="Georgia"><span style=" font-size:12pt">dog was killed</span></font></a><font face="Georgia"><span style=" font-size:12pt"> by a seagull in
that county and a </span></font><a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-cornwall-33547126"><font face="Georgia"><span style=" font-size:12pt">tortoise died</span></font></a>
<font face="Georgia"><span style=" font-size:12pt"> after being flipped over and pecked to death. The birds
are brazen in grabbing food from visitors and in doing so have caused injuries. Young
people have taken advantage by inventing a game called </span><span style=" font-size:12pt"><i>gull running</i></span><span style=" font-size:12pt">. It’s said to
have started in Whitby but has since spread to other seaside towns. One person holds
food above their head — usually fish and chips — and runs a set course. The winner is
whoever can run the furthest without a seagull grabbing the food.</span></font></p>
<p style="margin-left:0mm; margin-right:0mm; text-indent:0mm; margin-top:2.11mm; margin-bottom:0.00mm;"><font face="Georgia"><span style=" font-size:12pt">One correspondent to my newspaper was less concerned about the physical injuries
the birds can cause than about the purity of language. There are no such things as
seagulls, he argued. In the UK there are herring, great black-backed, lesser
black-backed, black-headed and common gulls and the kittiwake, but something
called a seagull doesn’t exist. A touch pedantic, perhaps? We may be sure it won’t
change his view to be told that English has had </span><span style=" font-size:12pt"><i>seagull</i></span><span style=" font-size:12pt"> as a popular collective term
since medieval times.</span></font></p>
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<span style=" font-size:14pt"><b>True blue</b></span></font></div>
<p style="margin-left:0mm; margin-right:0mm; text-indent:0mm; margin-top:2.11mm; margin-bottom:0.00mm;"><font face="Arial Black" color="#008000">
<span style=" font-size:12pt"><b>Q.</b></span></font><font face="Georgia"><span style=" font-size:12pt"> </span><span style=" font-size:12pt">
<i>From Rob Nachum</i></span><span style=" font-size:12pt">: I am in lexicological heaven for having found your site. Thank
you. For random curiosity, I clicked on </span></font><a href="http://wwwords.org/smtrm"><font face="Georgia" color="#0000ff"><span style=" font-size:12pt">
<i><u>smithereens</u></i></span></font></a><font face="Georgia"><span style=" font-size:12pt">. Within the piece is a quote from
an Irish Catholic signed as “True Blue”. As an Australian, </span><span style=" font-size:12pt"><i>true blue</i></span>
<span style=" font-size:12pt"> is equivalent to
</span><span style=" font-size:12pt"><i>dinkum</i></span><span style=" font-size:12pt"> or </span><span style=" font-size:12pt"><i>dinky di</i></span>
<span style=" font-size:12pt">, meaning honest or genuine. But would it be a stretch to
hypothesise that your quoted “True Blue” refers to an Irish-Catholic symbolism that
was transported literally and figuratively to Australia by the convicts in the late 1700s
to early 1800s? Is to be </span><span style=" font-size:12pt"><i>true blue Australian</i></span><span style=" font-size:12pt"> nothing more than a convict
Catholic-Irish relic? </span></font></p>
<p style="margin-left:0mm; margin-right:0mm; text-indent:0mm; margin-top:2.11mm; margin-bottom:0.00mm;"><font face="Arial Black" color="#008000">
<span style=" font-size:12pt"><b>A.</b></span></font><font face="Georgia"><span style=" font-size:12pt"> There are connections between the two usages, but Australian English has much
modified the usual British English sense. In Britain (as it has for the past two
centuries), the term means a staunch supporter of the Conservative Party, a person of
right-wing views. In Canada, it also suggests conservative opinions. In Australia,
however, it instead became associated with the working class and the Labor Party and
has developed from there.</span></font></p>
<p style="margin-left:0mm; margin-right:0mm; text-indent:0mm; margin-top:2.11mm; margin-bottom:0.00mm;"><font face="Georgia"><span style=" font-size:12pt">The link is loyalty. </span></font></p>
<p style="margin-left:0mm; margin-right:0mm; text-indent:0mm; margin-top:2.11mm; margin-bottom:0.00mm;"><font face="Georgia"><span style=" font-size:12pt">In medieval Europe blue was the colour of faithfulness or constancy, whose opposite
was green. A poem of about 1450, </span><span style=" font-size:12pt"><i>Against Women Unconstant</i></span><span style=" font-size:12pt"> — some claim it was
written by Geoffrey Chaucer — criticises an unsteadfast woman for being like a
weathercock, that turns its face with every wind; it says, “In stede of blew, thus may
ye were al greene.” </span></font></p>
<p style="margin-left:0mm; margin-right:0mm; text-indent:0mm; margin-top:2.11mm; margin-bottom:0.00mm;"><font face="Georgia"><span style=" font-size:12pt">
<i>True blue</i></span><span style=" font-size:12pt"> starts to be recorded in the 1630s. The story used to be told that the city of
Coventry in the English midlands was famous for dyeing a blue that would neither
change colour nor fade in washing, and that </span><span style=" font-size:12pt"><i>true blue</i></span><span style=" font-size:12pt"> was coined to indicate a person
who would likewise never alter their principles nor their allegiances. We may prefer
to think that Coventry had nothing to do with the matter but that </span><span style=" font-size:12pt"><i>true blue</i></span><span style=" font-size:12pt"> was
simply an almost inevitable rhyming extension whose meaning was based on the
ancient associations of the colour. A proverb, first recorded around 1630, “True blue
will never stain”, embodied the ideal of constancy in the figurative </span><span style=" font-size:12pt"><i>stain</i></span>
<span style=" font-size:12pt"> but that may
have been prompted by the blue aprons traditionally worn by butchers in order not to
show bloodstains.</span></font></p>
<p style="margin-left:0mm; margin-right:0mm; text-indent:0mm; margin-top:2.11mm; margin-bottom:0.00mm;"><font face="Georgia"><span style=" font-size:12pt">
<i>Blue</i></span><span style=" font-size:12pt"> began to be associated with politics in Scotland in the seventeenth century
through Scottish Presbyterians who formed the Whig party, notably to oppose
Charles II being succeeded by his brother James in 1688. Their equivalents in
England were the Tories, originally a term for dispossessed Irish people who became
outlaws but which became a nickname for English conservatives in the following
century (and, of course, is still much used). The 1810 quotation you mention places it
in this context.</span></font></p>
<p style="margin-left:0mm; margin-right:0mm; text-indent:0mm; margin-top:2.11mm; margin-bottom:0.00mm;"><font face="Georgia"><span style=" font-size:12pt">In Australia, the first meaning was the British one — many letters to newspapers in
the nineteenth century advocating conservative views are signed </span><span style=" font-size:12pt"><i>True Blue</i></span><span style=" font-size:12pt">. (The term
was used later in the century for abstainers who joined temperance organisations.)
Near the end of the century, it began to be applied to striking workers who were loyal
to their comrades and steadfast in resistance. </span><span style=" font-size:12pt"><i>The Advertiser</i></span><span style=" font-size:12pt"> of Adelaide, reporting
on 29 September 1890 about a strike of sheep shearers in New South Wales, quoted a
telegram sent to the Shearers’ Union: “The men are true blue, and will rather be
imprisoned than yield.”</span></font></p>
<p style="margin-left:0mm; margin-right:0mm; text-indent:0mm; margin-top:2.11mm; margin-bottom:0.00mm;"><font face="Georgia"><span style=" font-size:12pt">The working-class associations remain (and occur also in </span>
<span style=" font-size:12pt"><i>blue-collar </i></span><span style=" font-size:12pt">from the US
with a different origin) but from early in the twentieth century </span><span style=" font-size:12pt"><i>true blue</i></span><span style=" font-size:12pt">, especially in
</span><span style=" font-size:12pt"><i>true blue Australian</i></span><span style=" font-size:12pt"> and </span><span style=" font-size:12pt">
<i>true-blue Aussie</i></span><span style=" font-size:12pt">, came also to refer to a quintessential
Australian, straightforward, loyal and supportive of his mates.</span></font></p>
<p style="margin-left:0mm; margin-right:0mm; text-indent:0mm; margin-top:2.11mm; margin-bottom:0.00mm;"><font face="Georgia"><span style=" font-size:12pt">These phrases are so widely known that they have become clichés. They’ve been
shortened again to </span><span style=" font-size:12pt"><i>true-blue</i></span><span style=" font-size:12pt"> in the same sense as the originals for something
characteristically Australian (“Christmas in Australia: Howzat for a true-blue
celebration”, headlined </span><span style=" font-size:12pt"><i>The Australian</i></span><span style=" font-size:12pt"> in December 2014). It has also borrowed a
sense from another attribute of a classical Australian — a genuine person or thing
(just like </span><span style=" font-size:12pt"><i>dinkum</i></span><span style=" font-size:12pt">, explicitly equated here in the same newspaper in May 2015:
“There’s plenty of support for the true blue, fair dinkum idea”.) </span></font></p>
<p style="margin-left:0mm; margin-right:0mm; text-indent:0mm; margin-top:2.11mm; margin-bottom:0.00mm;"><font face="Georgia"><span style=" font-size:12pt">American readers will be poised to tell me that </span>
<span style=" font-size:12pt"><i>true blue</i></span><span style=" font-size:12pt"> is common in their country,
too. It describes a committed supporter of some cause or a loyal fan. In the political
sense it’s often applied to the Democrats but a person can also be a true-blue
Republican, loyalty being more significant than conventional party colours.</span></font></p>
<div align="left" style="margin-left:0mm; margin-right:0mm; text-indent:0mm; margin-top:6.33mm; margin-bottom:0.00mm;"><font face="Calibri" color="#008000" size="4">
<span style=" font-size:14pt"><b>Clothing optional</b></span></font></div>
<p style="margin-left:0mm; margin-right:0mm; text-indent:0mm; margin-top:2.11mm; margin-bottom:0.00mm;"><font face="Georgia"><span style=" font-size:12pt">My daily newspaper doesn’t often feature naked bodies — it’s not that kind of journal
— so on opening it a few days ago I was mildly surprised to be faced, if that’s the right
word, with a large photo of a naked guy’s bottom.</span></font></p>
<p style="margin-left:0mm; margin-right:0mm; text-indent:0mm; margin-top:2.11mm; margin-bottom:0.00mm;"><font face="Georgia"><span style=" font-size:12pt">The male in the pic had been snapped while protesting against a ban on nudity in San
Francisco in 2013. But the text alongside was a review of Mark Haskell Smith’s new
book, </span><span style=" font-size:12pt"><i>Naked at Lunch: The Adventures of a Reluctant Nudist</i></span><span style=" font-size:12pt">, in which he
investigates non-sexual social nudism, as he is careful to describe it.</span></font></p>
<p style="margin-left:0mm; margin-right:0mm; text-indent:0mm; margin-top:2.11mm; margin-bottom:0.00mm;"><font face="Georgia"><span style=" font-size:12pt">The most striking part of the review, ignoring the cheeky pic, were the words
</span><span style=" font-size:12pt"><i>nakation</i></span><span style=" font-size:12pt"> and </span><span style=" font-size:12pt">
<i>nakationing</i></span><span style=" font-size:12pt">, both new to Brits. In context, it was obvious the words
were an amalgamation of </span><span style=" font-size:12pt"><i>naked</i></span><span style=" font-size:12pt"> and </span><span style=" font-size:12pt">
<i>vacation</i></span><span style=" font-size:12pt">. That had to make it an American
word; despite the increasing popularity of </span><span style=" font-size:12pt"><i>staycation</i></span><span style=" font-size:12pt"> in the UK, </span>
<span style=" font-size:12pt"><i>vacation</i></span><span style=" font-size:12pt"> is not the
usual term for a break from work. We take holidays. (A uniregional version might
help transatlantic communication. Anyone up for trying </span><span style=" font-size:12pt"><i>holication</i></span><span style=" font-size:12pt">? We may reject
</span><span style=" font-size:12pt"><i>vacaday</i></span><span style=" font-size:12pt"> as being silly.)</span></font></p>
<p style="margin-left:0mm; margin-right:0mm; text-indent:0mm; margin-top:2.11mm; margin-bottom:0.00mm;"><font face="Georgia"><span style=" font-size:12pt">
<i>Nakation</i></span><span style=" font-size:12pt"> hasn’t achieved even the same small popularity as </span><span style=" font-size:12pt">
<i>staycation</i></span><span style=" font-size:12pt">, though it
pops up from time to time. It seems to have appeared first in the </span><span style=" font-size:12pt"><i>Washington Post</i></span>
<span style=" font-size:12pt"> in
February 2008. A piece about words for holidays cited a press release from the
American Association for Nude Recreation (newsletter </span><span style=" font-size:12pt"><i>The Undressed Press</i></span><span style=" font-size:12pt">). Their
website attaches an R in a circle for a registered trademark to it wherever it appears,
so presumably they invented it, though if they were hoping for big things from it
they’ve been disappointed.</span></font></p>
<p style="margin-left:0mm; margin-right:0mm; text-indent:0mm; margin-top:2.11mm; margin-bottom:0.00mm;"><font face="Georgia"><span style=" font-size:12pt">I also learn from the site that I’ve missed this year’s World Naked Gardening Day. Not
in my rose garden, thank you.</span></font></p>
<div align="left" style="margin-left:0mm; margin-right:0mm; text-indent:0mm; margin-top:6.33mm; margin-bottom:0.00mm;"><font face="Calibri" color="#008000" size="4">
<span style=" font-size:14pt"><b>Hands off?</b></span></font></div>
<p style="margin-left:0mm; margin-right:0mm; text-indent:0mm; margin-top:2.11mm; margin-bottom:0.00mm;"><font face="Georgia"><span style=" font-size:12pt">A contributor to another language mailing list mentioned an announcement from
Subaru about the failure of a device designed to stop the car if a frontal collision was
imminent. In the light of this defect, Subaru wrote, the driver will now have to
“manually apply the brake pedal”. Did this mean, the contributor asked, that
</span><span style=" font-size:12pt"><i>manually</i></span><span style=" font-size:12pt"> can now also mean performed by the foot? </span></font></p>
<p style="margin-left:0mm; margin-right:0mm; text-indent:0mm; margin-top:2.11mm; margin-bottom:0.00mm;"><font face="Georgia"><span style=" font-size:12pt">What was surely in the contributor’s mind was that </span>
<span style=" font-size:12pt"><i>manual</i></span><span style=" font-size:12pt"> and </span><span style=" font-size:12pt"><i>manually</i></span>
<span style=" font-size:12pt"> ultimately
derive from Latin </span><span style=" font-size:12pt"><i>manus</i></span><span style=" font-size:12pt">, hand. But as almost always there’s more to it than an
argument from etymology.</span></font></p>
<p style="margin-left:0mm; margin-right:0mm; text-indent:0mm; margin-top:2.11mm; margin-bottom:0.00mm;"><font face="Georgia"><span style=" font-size:12pt">As it happens, classical Latin seems not to have had a specific word for doing
something by hand. The direct ancestor of our </span><span style=" font-size:12pt"><i>manual</i></span><span style=" font-size:12pt"> is Latin </span>
<span style=" font-size:12pt"><i>manuālis</i></span><span style=" font-size:12pt">, something
held in the hand or of a size to fill the hand. The ideas of “worked by hand” and
“working with his hands” come into English a thousand years ago via Anglo-Norman
French, in which </span><span style=" font-size:12pt"><i>manuel</i></span><span style=" font-size:12pt"> meant doing something with the hands but particularly
physical labour rather than mental activity.</span></font></p>
<p style="margin-left:0mm; margin-right:0mm; text-indent:0mm; margin-top:2.11mm; margin-bottom:0.00mm;"><font face="Georgia"><span style=" font-size:12pt">This distinction remains fundamental. As manual labour necessarily involved the
hands through wielding tools, this allowed the ancient link with the source of the
word to remain at the back of the mind.</span></font></p>
<p style="margin-left:0mm; margin-right:0mm; text-indent:0mm; margin-top:2.11mm; margin-bottom:0.00mm;"><font face="Georgia"><span style=" font-size:12pt">The development of self-executing machinery in the past hundred years or so has led
to a new sense for manually — we now contrast it with automatically. We meet this
most often as a choice between automatic or manual gearboxes in cars but from as
early as the late nineteenth century telephone exchanges could be automatic or
manual. These days, computers often do jobs without requiring human intervention,
so a sentence from </span><span style=" font-size:12pt"><i>What Personal Computer</i></span><span style=" font-size:12pt"> in 1991 makes sense: “The
computer-generated statement of accounts couldn’t be used, and had to be
recalculated manually.”</span></font></p>
<p style="margin-left:0mm; margin-right:0mm; text-indent:0mm; margin-top:2.11mm; margin-bottom:0.00mm;"><font face="Georgia"><span style=" font-size:12pt">Conflict between this new sense and the traditional one does sometimes lead to odd
phrasings. A 1942 issue of </span><span style=" font-size:12pt"><i>Diesel Power</i></span><span style=" font-size:12pt"> magazine, found by American researcher
Garson O’Toole, reported: “Auto-Lite Two-Step Starting Motors are available in both
manual (foot-pedal operated) and automatic (push button operated) types.” The
</span><span style=" font-size:12pt"><i>Oakland Tribute </i></span><span style=" font-size:12pt">of California noted in 1960 that “The surrey was originally operated
manually by pedals.” </span></font></p>
<p style="margin-left:0mm; margin-right:0mm; text-indent:0mm; margin-top:2.11mm; margin-bottom:0.00mm;"><font face="Georgia"><span style=" font-size:12pt">However, such confusions are rare (otherwise I suspect </span>
<span style=" font-size:12pt"><i>pedally</i></span><span style=" font-size:12pt"> would be much more
often encountered) and because writers are thankfully well aware of the underlying
incongruity.</span></font></p>
<div align="left" style="margin-left:0mm; margin-right:0mm; text-indent:0mm; margin-top:6.33mm; margin-bottom:0.00mm;"><font face="Calibri" color="#008000" size="4">
<span style=" font-size:14pt"><b>Elsewhere</b></span></font></div>
<ul style="margin-bottom: 0mm; list-style-type: disc; ">
<li style="margin-left: -7pt; margin-right: 0pt; padding-left: 0pt; font-family: Symbol; "><font face="Georgia"><span style=" font-size:12pt; font-family:Georgia; color:#010101; font-weight:Normal; font-style:Normal; font-decoration:Normal">Last Sunday was the hundredth anniversary of the death of Dr James A H Murray,
the first editor of the </span><span style=" font-size:12pt"><i>Oxford English Dictionary</i></span><span style=" font-size:12pt">, a centenary that has gone almost
unmarked, alas. </span></font><a href="http://wwwords.org/drjahm"><font face="Georgia" color="#0000ff"><span style=" font-size:12pt">
<u>Peter Gilliver wrote</u></span></font></a><font face="Georgia"><span style=" font-size:12pt"> about the career of this extraordinary man
two years ago.</span></font></li>
<li style="margin-left: -7pt; margin-right: 0pt; padding-left: 0pt; font-family: Symbol; "><font face="Georgia"><span style=" font-size:12pt; font-family:Georgia; color:#010101; font-weight:Normal; font-style:Normal; font-decoration:Normal">David Bagwell tells us about a </span></font>
<a href="http://wwwords.org/swrus"><font face="Georgia" color="#0000ff"><span style=" font-size:12pt"><u>wonderful collection of maps</u></span></font></a>
<font face="Georgia"><span style=" font-size:12pt"> showing where and
how people swear in the US, based on the analysis of a vast compendium of
geotagged Twitter messages. The maps are the result of research by Jack Grieve of
Aston University in the UK and are hosted on Stan Carey’s blog Strong Language.
Not for the easily offended!</span></font></li>
<li style="margin-left: -7pt; margin-right: 0pt; padding-left: 0pt; font-family: Symbol; "><font face="Georgia"><span style=" font-size:12pt; font-family:Georgia; color:#010101; font-weight:Normal; font-style:Normal; font-decoration:Normal">No swearing in Oxford Dictionaries four quizzes, </span></font>
<a href="http://wwwords.org/queng"><font face="Georgia" color="#0000ff"><span style=" font-size:12pt"><u>How Good is Your British
English</u></span></font></a><font face="Georgia"><span style=" font-size:12pt"> and equivalents for </span></font><a href="http://wwwords.org/qucan">
<font face="Georgia" color="#0000ff"><span style=" font-size:12pt"><u>Canadian</u></span></font></a><font face="Georgia"><span style=" font-size:12pt">, </span></font>
<a href="http://wwwords.org/quam"><font face="Georgia" color="#0000ff"><span style=" font-size:12pt"><u>American</u></span></font></a>
<font face="Georgia"><span style=" font-size:12pt"> and </span></font><a href="http://wwwords.org/quaus"><font face="Georgia" color="#0000ff">
<span style=" font-size:12pt"><u>Australian</u></span></font></a><font face="Georgia"><span style=" font-size:12pt"> Englishes. Once
you’ve tried one or two, have a go at your own variety of the language to see if you
agree with its compilers.</span></font></li>
</ul>
<div align="left" style="margin-left:0mm; margin-right:0mm; text-indent:0mm; margin-top:6.33mm; margin-bottom:0.00mm;"><font face="Calibri" color="#008000" size="4">
<span style=" font-size:14pt"><b>Sic!</b></span></font></div>
<p style="margin-left:0mm; margin-right:0mm; text-indent:0mm; margin-top:2.11mm; margin-bottom:0.00mm;"><font face="Georgia"><span style=" font-size:12pt">A message came from Ron Miller in Cupertino, California, telling us that the title of a
recent lecture in his local public library was “Replace Your Lawn With Stephanie
Morris.”</span></font></p>
<p style="margin-left:0mm; margin-right:0mm; text-indent:0mm; margin-top:2.11mm; margin-bottom:0.00mm;"><font face="Georgia"><span style=" font-size:12pt">Paul Kuppinger reports that he found this sentence in the </span>
<span style=" font-size:12pt"><i>Rochester Democrat and
Chronicle</i></span><span style=" font-size:12pt"> of 11 July about the poet Adelaide Crapsey: “She never did quite receive
national fame or poetic immorality.” It has, understandably, now been corrected.</span></font></p>
<p style="margin-left:0mm; margin-right:0mm; text-indent:0mm; margin-top:2.11mm; margin-bottom:0.00mm;"><font face="Georgia"><span style=" font-size:12pt">“I wonder if he used one of those circus cannons?” was Loren Myer’s comment on a
headline in the </span><span style=" font-size:12pt"><i>Orlando Sentinel</i></span><span style=" font-size:12pt"> of Florida on 20 July: “Apopka man accused of
shooting stepdaughter’s teen boyfriend out of jail.”</span></font></p>
<p style="margin-left:0mm; margin-right:0mm; text-indent:0mm; margin-top:2.11mm; margin-bottom:0.00mm;"><font face="Georgia"><span style=" font-size:12pt">Thanks to Michael Harvey for telling us about an Australian zombie sighting in the
</span><span style=" font-size:12pt"><i>Sydney Morning Herald</i></span><span style=" font-size:12pt"> of 16 July: “Teens found the woman’s body walking on
north shore.” </span></font></p>
<p style="margin-left:0mm; margin-right:0mm; text-indent:0mm; margin-top:2.11mm; margin-bottom:0.00mm;"><font face="Georgia"><span style=" font-size:12pt">The image of a hysterical currency came to mind on reading a BBC News item of 11
July, seen by Jeremy Evans: “EU President Donald Tusk said [the meeting] would be
a ‘last chance’ for Greece to secure a deal and avoid exciting the euro.”</span></font></p>
<p style="margin-left:0mm; margin-right:0mm; text-indent:0mm; margin-top:2.11mm; margin-bottom:0.00mm;"><font face="Georgia"><span style=" font-size:12pt">The </span>
<span style=" font-size:12pt"><i>Guardian</i></span><span style=" font-size:12pt"> hasn’t yet corrected an error in a report of 5 July about the Greek
financial crisis, spotted by Dennis Felmlee: “There was evidence that large expatriates
were coming back for the referendum and that most leaned towards voting yes.”</span></font></p>
<div align="left" style="margin-left:0mm; margin-right:0mm; text-indent:0mm; margin-top:6.33mm; margin-bottom:0.00mm;"><font face="Calibri" color="#008000" size="4">
<span style=" font-size:14pt"><b>Useful information</b></span></font></div>
<p style="margin-left:0mm; margin-right:0mm; text-indent:0mm; margin-top:2.11mm; margin-bottom:0.00mm;"><font face="Georgia"><span style=" font-size:11pt">
<b>About this newsletter:</b></span><span style=" font-size:12pt"> World Wide Words is researched, written and published by
Michael Quinion in the UK. ISSN 1470-1448. Copyediting and advice are freely
provided by Julane Marx, Robert Waterhouse, John Bagnall and Peter Morris,
though any residual errors are the fault of the author. The linked website is
</span></font><a href="http://www.worldwidewords.org"><font face="Georgia" color="#0000ff"><span style=" font-size:12pt"><u>http://www.worldwidewords.org</u></span></font></a>
<font face="Georgia"><span style=" font-size:12pt">.</span></font></p>
<p style="margin-left:0mm; margin-right:0mm; text-indent:0mm; margin-top:2.11mm; margin-bottom:0.00mm;"><font face="Georgia"><span style=" font-size:11pt">
<b>Support World Wide Words:</b></span><span style=" font-size:11pt"> </span><span style=" font-size:12pt">If you have enjoyed this newsletter and would like to
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<p style="margin-left:0mm; margin-right:0mm; text-indent:0mm; margin-top:2.11mm; margin-bottom:0.00mm;"><font face="Georgia"><span style=" font-size:11pt">
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<p style="margin-left:0mm; margin-right:0mm; text-indent:0mm; margin-top:2.11mm; margin-bottom:0.00mm;"><font face="Georgia"><span style=" font-size:11pt">
<b>Email addresses:</b></span><span style=" font-size:12pt"> Comments on newsletter mailings are always welcome. They
should be sent to me at </span></font><a href="mailto:michael.quinion@worldwidewords.org"><font face="Georgia" color="#0000ff"><span style=" font-size:12pt">
<u>michael.quinion@worldwidewords.org</u></span></font></a><font face="Georgia"><span style=" font-size:12pt">. I try to respond, but
pressures of time often stop me. Items intended for </span><span style=" font-size:12pt"><i>Sic!</i></span><span style=" font-size:12pt"> should be addressed to
</span></font><a href="mailto:sic@worldwidewords.org"><font face="Georgia" color="#0000ff"><span style=" font-size:12pt"><u>sic@worldwidewords.org</u></span></font></a>
<font face="Georgia"><span style=" font-size:12pt">. Questions for the Q&A section should be sent to
</span></font><a href="mailto:questions@worldwidewords.org"><font face="Georgia" color="#0000ff"><span style=" font-size:12pt"><u>questions@worldwidewords.org</u></span></font></a>
<font face="Georgia"><span style=" font-size:12pt">, not to the correspondence address.</span></font></p>
<p style="margin-left:0mm; margin-right:0mm; text-indent:0mm; margin-top:2.11mm; margin-bottom:0.00mm;"><font face="Georgia"><span style=" font-size:11pt">
<b>Copyright:</b></span><span style=" font-size:12pt"> World Wide Words is copyright © Michael Quinion 1996-2015. All rights
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