amateur of the day: anti-clockwise (and counter-clockwise)

[Wilson Gray]

On Fri, Aug 26, 2011 at 11:12 PM, Laurence Horn <laurence.horn at yale.edu> wrote:
> No mention of the opposite of withershins/widdershins in any of the below, viz. "deasil" (= 'with the apparent direction of the sun', i.e. clockwise in the Northern Hemisphere). Â Note that "widdershins" and "deasil" are respectively clockwise and counter-clockwise in the Southern Hemisphere, assuming that one's analog clocks go in the same direction there as they do here. Â In another generation, nobody will know what counter- (or anti-)clockwise refers to.
>

I've been familiar with "withershins"/"widdershins" from earliest
childhood. It occurs in fairy tales, e.g. East of the Sun and West of
the Moon. But _anti-clockwise_, _deasil_?

This is my first encounter with either of them.

--
-Wilson
-----
All say, "How hard it is that we have to die!"---a strange complaint
to come from the mouths of people who have had to live.
-Mark Twain

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