Only one child in ten in Britain believes that the queen invented the telephone. Apparently the other nine had bizarre explanations: some said it was invented by “a Scotsman”. This is according to a survey of primary and secondary school children in the UK cited by the BBC. I am shocked.
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A Bad Guide 
9 in 10 American schoolchildren know that Al Gore invented the internet. Though they are rather baffled that www occurs so often; the tenth suspects that it’s because W really invented it.
I too am shocked. The queen is neither Scottish nor a man.
I think those “some” children who said it wwas invented by a Scotsman were the clever ones – if Alexander Graham Bell isn’t a Scots name, I’m a Norwegian.
The Queen is not Scottish ? The Queen Mum must be turning in her grave …
I think those “some” children who said it wwas invented by a Scotsman were the clever ones
Calm down, it was merely a feeble joke of mine. But you should read the BBC piece.
Every time I read this sort of story and think it’s the end of the world, I reread Mark Twain’s English as She is Taught, a hillarious commentary on a little collection of schoolchildren’s unbelievably funny gaffes. Things like “Abraham Lincoln was born in Wales in 1599.” Somehow some of us turn out all right.
I just thought it was an interesting idea that the queen might have invented the telephone. Maybe she would enjoy it herself.
She could call an emergency session of parliament. But that doesn’t ensure that someone would answer.
The logic is simple. Pigeons were used to carry messages. What if the message is too big? Obviously, use swans. But every British schoolchild knows that the Queen owns all the swans. So the Queen is in charge of long messages. So to spare all those poor swans so much flying hither and thither, she invented the telephone. Simples.
Of course, we don’t instruct the kiddywinks in subtleties involving swans in the Norse corner of the Kingdom.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/scotland/4361079.stm
Yes, it’s the Royal Mail.
That’s shocking too about Peter Maxwell Davis. Who would have thought they had swans in Iceland?
The Queen is not Scottish ?
Absolutely not, she’s a kraut. House of Saxe-Coburg-Gotha and all that. Don’t mention the war!
LH: Not on her mother’s side.
Elizabeth Bowes-Lyon [the Queen Mum] was the youngest daughter and the ninth of ten children of Claude George Bowes-Lyon, Lord Glamis, (later 14th Earl of Strathmore and Kinghorne), and his wife, Cecilia Nina Cavendish-Bentinck. Her mother was descended from British Prime Minister William Cavendish-Bentinck, 3rd Duke of Portland, and Governor-General of India Richard Wellesley, 1st Marquess Wellesley, who was the elder brother of another Prime Minister, Arthur Wellesley, 1st Duke of Wellington.
Not a lot of kraut there …
The Bentincks are Kraut–well, Dutch. Otherwise, she’s got more German blood than a Blutwurst.
When police called at his home he offered them swan terrine.
How deliciously fin-de-siècle ! I mean the penultimate siècle, of course, which persists still in memory. When the most recent one came to an end, it was good riddance all round.
You’re thinking of the other Swann.
Which brings us by a commodius vicus of recirculation back to the topic of “swanning”, at about the same time last year.
Actually, more in my mind were Firbank, the Yellow Book crowd etc. All those décadents eating swan terrine out of tins.
Ah, the taste of swan reminds me of this time last year…
And as soon as I had recognised the taste of the piece of swan soaked in her decoction of pondwater which my aunt used to give me (although I did not yet know and must long postpone the discovery of why this memory made me so happy) immediately the old grey house in Bloomsbury, where her room was, rose up like a stage set…
LOL
“swan soaked in her decoction of pondwater”
What a perfect portrayal of English cooking… (nada que envidiarle a la pastelería francesa, ¿no?)
Swan trapping ceased to provide sunday lunch for our extended family after my aunt drowned. For the duration of the War, cold pondwater was but a pipedream…
The best we could manage was to suck on a piece of damp cloth.
“Luxury!”
And my husband insists on referring to Prince Philip as “Phil the Greek” and I keep insisting he’s a Viking/Danish (not that my husband has any respect for Danes – for both generic and personal reasons); nonetheless, I thought only HALF the swans were the property of Her Majesty and the other half were the property of … was it the Worshipful Company of Vintners?
Now, may I ask you all, short of flying to Patagonia, where can we go (or order from) to eat swan? Any advice?
Luxury – yes, this very afternoon we sucked the muck off our dogs’ feet. Very sustaining.
You can take a bite out of one in Regent’s Park. Make sure no one is looking, though.
Both Prince Philip’s sisters were married to nazis. We know a lot about the Queen Mother’s ancestors and Princess Di’s siblings, but we never hear much about Prince Philip’s sisters. I wonder why not?
Or you can try here…
http://www.patagonia.com.ar/album_fotos/784+Cisnes+de+cuello+negro+en+Paso+Cordova.html
Yes. Perhaps you would be less likely to be spotted by people you know, in Patagonia. It’s a long way to go to eat a swan, though. I’d stick to Regent’s Park or St. James’s Park or even the Serpentine, but wear sunglasses and a hat.
I seem to remember Charlie Mortdecai strolling through Regent’s Park, saying unforgiveable things to his friend the pinguin. But it may have been St. James’ and a swan.
Oops, that was the German spelling of penguin.
you would be less likely to be spotted by people you know
Maybe what matters more is whether the swan is spotted. What does “unmarked” mean in the following passage from WiPe?
“In the United Kingdom there is a popular belief that all swans are the property of the reigning Monarch. In fact their [sic] right to ownership of swans is restricted to unmarked Mute Swans on open water, and this right is exercised only on certain stretches of the River Thames and some of its tributaries between Windsor and Abingdon.”
But no, the very next sentence contradicts this:
“However, strictly speaking the British swans are the property of the Queen, except for the Swans of Orkney. This [sic] is because of an old Udal Viking law […] ”
By the way, I just learned that the word swan is from the same PIE root as song. Presumably swans were so called because they sing. Although nowadays they are known for singing only in extremis.
empty: I just learned that the word swan is from the same PIE root as song.
Where did you learn it from?
And as soon as I had recognised the taste of the piece of swan soaked in her decoction of pondwater which my aunt used to give me (although I did not yet know and must long postpone the discovery of why this memory made me so happy) immediately the old grey house in Bloomsbury, where her room was, rose up like a stage set…
Sounds like a quotation, especially with the British spellings, but it doesn’t google. Can you really eat swan? How do you catch them? No wonder that swan over on Wolf Lake was giving me the evil eye the other day.
empty: I just learned that the word swan is from the same PIE root as song.
m-l: Where did you learn it from?
Come on, marie-lucie. Cygne is obviously related to “sing”. The original form must have been cynge”, as in Olde Englysshe. Then some carless Frenchman once misspelled it centuries ago, and it stuck. Like “grammar” and “glamour”, or “biscuit” and “basket”.
Nijma: it’s a take-off on the section introducing the Madeleine motif in Remembrance of Things Past. Not that I’ve read the whole ham (Ger.loc.), by any means. To recognize this allusion is just one of those cocktail-party feats that one learns over the years.
I didn’t know you could “learn” to have cocktail party feet; pinguins* are born with them.
*a better spelling
To save people the trouble of asking me what the connection is between “biscuit” and “basket”, I’ll explain it now. As far as I have been able to determine, one line of influence goes back to Red Riding hood, carrying cookies through the forest to her grandmother:
“Bosket” is the French bosquet = forest. This was one of those economic watersheds. Previously, due to limited resources, one could only afford one biscuit. Then some people learned that you could carry more than one biscuit in a basket through the bosket.
Is that true about cygne & sing, grammar & glamour, or are you having us on?
My, Grumbly, you’re frisky these days. Is spring sprung in your part of the world? Or just general joie de vivre that results in puns upon puns?
By the way, I was the one who did the cocktail party madelaine introduction. Language Hat’s response was better than anything you’d hear at a cocktail party I’d be invited to.
I wouldn’t touch any of those swans if I were you, Empty. You’ll end up in the Tower. If you’re dying for a swan sandwich, you’d better go to Orkney.
Where did you learn it from?
A glorious swan announced it to me in a vision. But since it was a mute inglorious swan I couldn’t be sure of what it trying to say, so then I took a look at Wordnik and the Online Etym. Dictionary, too.
Dammit, I messed up: meant “mute and glorious”. But I was hurrying. Don’t like to be late for work and the kids late for school because I’m too busy swanning around with you all.
You and Julia both get up awfully early.
Summer time (“daylight saving”) has just begun here, so I am not 100% sure what time it is.
Is that true about cygne & sing, grammar & glamour, or are you having us on?
Everything is a joke except for grammar and grammar. I myself have never believed that these two are related, even though the whole world of lexicography says they are.
I left hints so that you guys would guess what was going on: “carless Frenchman”, for instance.
Is Cygne the name of a French car? There’s a new mini Aston Martin called the Cygnet. By “grammar & grammar”, you mean grammar & glamour. I don’t believe they could be related.
Empty, you should have killed the swan in order to learn the TRUTH.
Or threatened to kill it. They only “sing” until they die, you know.
AJP, when I wake up is almost lunch time in (at?) your part of the world, I think…
Sorry, I mean : “don’t sing until…”
Ufff I don’t know how to say it!
“no canta hasta que muere”
The thing is, in Spanish the most common translation of The Thorn Bird (remember the book and the miniseries?) is a “mexicanism” “El pájaro canta hasta morir” meaning of course for the rest of the Spanish speakers “El pájaro NO canta hasta que muere”. I always remember that title when I hear something about swans and their symbolization as poets…
And of course, I made that mistake because I can’t speak English… so what am I doing here!!
Oh, that Swann. That one didn’t google either. But a good rendition of the Proust style, he certainly couldn’t finish a sentence in one page.
I just reset my blog for daylight savings time. It was complicated. No wonder they can’t do it automatically, although they keep promising an upgrade.
Ufff I don’t know how to say it!
They say “Uff” in Argentina? “Uff-da” is a huge Norwegian-American meme. There are entire books written about “Uff-da”, not to mention the time capsules and t-shirts.
Itr’s only wikipedia, but it claims:-
“Fellows of St John’s College [Cambridge] are the only people outside the Royal Family legally allowed to eat unmarked mute swans. Swan traps were originally built into the walls of the college alongside the river, but these are no longer used.[17] The Crown (the British monarch) retains the right to ownership of all unmarked mute swans in open water, but the Queen only exercises her ownership on certain stretches of the Thames and its surrounding tributaries. This ownership is shared with the Vintners’ and Dyers’ Companies, who were granted rights of ownership by the Crown in the fifteenth century, and was extended to the College via ancient Royalist ties.”
You’ll have to forgive the writer for thinking that The Crown is identical to The Monarch.
Yes, of course, we use it all the time.
“¡UFA!” is the most common way to say it. But I don’t know if is the same as “uff-da”
“Ufa” express weariness, annoyance, disgust…
This is from the English Wikipedia about the Norwegian expression (it’s correct):
Uff da (or Huff da) is most often used as a response when hearing something lamentable (but not too serious), and could often be translated as “Oh, I’m sorry to hear that”.
My guess is it’s an imitation of the noise you would make when being punched in the stomach. I don’t know if it’s related to similar exclamations in Spanish or French; they seem to have a slightly different meaning.
Ah, I see BA is only four hours behind Norway, Julia.
I see… No, I think ‘ufa’ is more like ‘bummer’.
We use ‘uy’ for something like ‘uff-da’ or ‘ouch’ as H. Simpson always says.
Four hours, eh? Well then when I wake up you must be having… brunch or a late breakfast if you’re lazy.
Dearieme, what is the distinction between Crown and Monarch?
And shouldn’t we also be distinguishing more closely between ownership of X and the right to eat X? Can a Fellow of St. John’s legally offer swan to a guest at High Table who is not a Fellow? Or even to a lowly undergraduate?
The bit about “unmarked” is making more sense to me, now that I know about swan-upping.
Swan-upping link
mab: My, Grumbly, you’re frisky these days. Is spring sprung in your part of the world?
Ah, spring ! When neurodermatitis yields to conjunctivitis.
One of Kyril Bonfiglioli’s characters, an older man, described certain moments with his girlfriend as resembling an attempt to stuff a marshmallow into the slot of a charity collection box.
I see BA is only four hours behind Norway
!! That means that in terms of time zones, Buenos Aires is closer to Norway than New York is. Most of North America must be to the west of South America. And to think I had assumed that North America was above everything !
Yes, we prefer Europe than USA, so we try to get closer…
It’s 3,35 pm, right now in BA.
(here you are some of ours exclamation marks, Grumbly, in case you need them: ¡¡¡¡ :-)
The secret truth is, my mother-in-law lives near some ponds – both natural and artificial (in Zomerzet) and we freely harvest swan quills, unless the local children get them first); but so far we’ve been a little shy about just grabbing a young cygnet by the neck and giving it that flick…Who might be watching? I doubt sunglasses would suffice in that lacecurtain-twitching part of the world. As the Eastern European immigrants are apparently eating century-old carp meant for coarse fishing and re-fishing and… in London; maybe we’ll have to get a move on before they do.
Of course you can eat swan. There was a famous dinner – I forget precisely when – for the enthronement of an Archbishop of York at which 400 swans were consumed, among many, many other courses. Probably puffins, seal… I’m too lazy to Google it, but it’s probably there…
Maybe the law is different in Jersey.
You’re all so brilliant here, do you know whether BOTH Jersey AND Guernsey are corruptions of Caesar? Maybe I’ve asked this somewhere before…
I know, I know: Laziness must not be countenanced.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_Neville_%28archbishop%29
“Dearieme, what is the distinction between Crown and Monarch?”
When the newspapers say that the Queen is the richest person in the country, they are muddling The Crown Estate – which belongs to us, the nation, mediated through the government – with her personal wealth. Even with swan-eating, I imagine that the swans belong to The Crown so that the Queen may, in principle, treat them as her own only on the advice of her ministers. (It would be a bloody foolish minister who interfered, but there’s rarely a shortage of them.) Similarly, she doesn’t own Windsor Castle, nor Buckingham Palace, nor Holyroodhouse – they belong to the Crown, i.e. they’re ours. But she does own the Sandringham and Balmoral estates (or, perhaps they’re owned by a Windsor family trust, but anyway its hers/theirs, not ours). It’s not really very different from working out what’s owned by Mr Obama and what’s owned by the USA.
“Can a Fellow of St. John’s legally offer swan to a guest at High Table who is not a Fellow?” Dunno. I’ve never been to a Feast at John’s, but if I did go I’d hope to have, say, swan stuffed with ptarmigan stuffed with larks’ tongues. I have been to Feasts at Trinity and at King’s – comparably full-of-themselves joints – and found that (1) the guests got the same nosh as the Fellows, and (2) the food at Trinity was resolutely unexotic, and not very good, while the wine at Kings’s (a ’45 claret, for heaven’s sake, in about 1984) was a disappointment; it wasn’t ready.
Together with the archbishop’s own family and servants there were about 2500 to be fed at each meal. They consumed 4000 pigeons and 4000 crays, 2000 chickens, 204 cranes, 104 peacocks, 100 dozen quails, 400 swans and 400 herons, … 4000 dishes of jelly, …
I can’t make out whether that much was consumed at each meal, or in all the meals together. That makes only 1/6*n of a swan per person, where n is the number of meals. However you figure it, nobody got more than 1/6 of a swan. Pretty stingy, don’t you think ?
Occasionally, in novels of the 19th century, I encounter mention of “jellies” being served. What is to be understood by this term ? “Jelly” doesn’t have to be sweet, right ? (thanks for the ¡¡¡¡, Julia, but I need some ???? patas arriba as well). What exactly is a “dish” of jelly ? A small plate, or something like a finger bowl, or either one ?
I BELIEVE that “jellies” in this instance are rather more like savoury aspics, probably in wild shapes. Calves-foot type jelly. A rich jellied stock.
Savoury aspics: now there’s something I’m very partial to. I wonder why aspics like “headcheese” (Kopfsülze) went out of fashion in Germany ? You find them more in the south, but even in the Rheinland and Cologne they were more common in the past. Today’s readily available Sülze from the supermarket is disgusting. You have to pay a deal of money for the good stuff.
Sülze from the supermarket = rubbery and tasteless, like Gummibärchen without the chemicals.
¿¿¿Para qué los podrás necesitar, Grumbly??
It doesn’t matter, here you are…
It’s not difficult to make savoury jelly, my mother do it frequently.
(I’m loving all the Queen/Crown/swan stuff, I had no idea!)
Grácias, Julia. Los necesito porque soy preguntámano retórico.
I liked the swan-upping video. Did the queen dye her skin orange just for the ceremony?
Nip over here, if you wish,
http://www.culinate.com/books/book_excerpts/Taste
and then search down for “jellies” – how sweet or savoury is unclear here…
On the other hand, having done some medieval cooking and recipe research, I think Ms Colquhoun is more journalist than historian or medievalist. She’s going for sensationalism there.
Waverly Root, in his wonderful Food (which I recommend highly, as I do all his books), says “we must suppose that the permission of the Crown had to be obtained when swans were eaten in England in the fifteenth century, which is perhaps why swans there cost as much as pigs, though they were cheaper in France, where they were raised in great quantities for mass consumption.”
Alan Davidson, in his Penguin Companion to Food, has a considerably longer entry, in which he says: “Less familiar is the idea of eating swans. However, evidence marshalled by Witteveen (1986-7) shows that the practice was widespread in Europe from the 8th century AD until the 17th (and in some places even the 18th) century. The French naturalist Belon (1555) summarized the general opinion: ‘the swan is an exquisite bird and a French delicacy, eaten at public feasts and in the houses of lords.’ ”
He has a good deal more to say, which perhaps (if the Google gods permit) you can read here.
do you know whether BOTH Jersey AND Guernsey are corruptions of Caesar?
No. Neither name has a clear etymology, but they’re certainly different. Jersey is sometimes said to be from Caesarea, but it’s more likely to be from either a personal name, Geirr, or Old Frisian gers ‘grass.’ Guernsey is probably from either Old Norse gron(s) ‘green’ or Breton guern ‘alder wood.’ In any case, the last element in both names is Old Norse ey ‘island.’
How spooky, Hat ! That page also describes the preparation of “Sussex pond pudding”. And something called “susumber”, which looks like baby-talk for cucumber.
I can see the menu now: “Swan in Sussex pond pudding surrounded by susumber”. Ssssssssss !
Have you any idea why they cannot be found in France NOW? I’ve hunted a lot at online vendors of game, &c. (But not today – usually just before Christmas – so somebody’ll surprise me!) After all, plenty of goose is eaten. Yum.
Might “jelly” be like the redcurrant jelly that we eat on lamb?
I remember having, in England, a sort of fisherman’s sweater called a Guernsey, but pronounced “Ganzer”, which is very similar to the Norwegian word for sweater, genser. It’s in Wikipedia (though not the pronunciation), where I found this:
It also mentions, in the “Talk” section, a word possibly derived from the Irish (Gaelic) word “geansaí” meaning “sweater”, but that it might be a false etymology.
They consumed 4000 pigeons and 4000 crays, 2000 chickens, 204 cranes, […]
What are these crays? Crows?
Preserving the old ways.
I remember having, in England, a sort of fisherman’s sweater called a Guernsey, but pronounced “Ganzer”, which is very similar to the Norwegian word for sweater, genser.
Quite right, Norw. genser is explained as a loan from Eng. ‘guernsey’. It’s easier to understand when the English word is pronounced as you say.
I thought it would have been the other way round, Norwegian being loaned to English.
It struck me afterwards as odd that we have two words for sweater that are channel islands, Jersey & Guernsey.
I like striped effect in the wall at the head-cheese reenactment.
Cray is a colloquial name for crayfish, according to Wikipedia. You are confused because it landed, or popped up, in the set “boids”.
Our Guernseywoman friend always says “guernsey” whenever anybody else would say “jersey” (referring to pullovers). There may be speicial qualities of each item of knitwear which once identified them, but I don’t know. I’ll ask her.
(Another slightly-upper-crust friend says “Have you seen my Guernsey jersey?” – this is overkill, I think. But maybe she bought it there.)
I was thinking of German Krähe, and I suppose the song “Three craws sat upon a wa'”.
So I’ll have to eat the crow if nobody else will.though it will stick in my craw.
I didn’t think this could have anything to do with it:
1. Another form of crare.
2. An elevation or structure extended into a stream to break the force of the water, or to prevent it from encroaching on the shore; a breakwater.
3. A disease of hawks, proceeding from cold and a bad diet. With mysfedynge she [the hawk] shall haue the Fronse, the Rye, the Cray, and many other syknesses that bring theym to the Sowse. Juliana Berners, Treatyse of Fysshynge wyth an Angle, [fol. 2.
striped effect in the wall
Are you telling us that’s not a real log cabin ??
All Waverly Root has to say about crow is that Alexandre Dumas said it “worked wonders” in pot-au-feu, “and no doubt it did” (he adds).
Well, it’s logs plus something.
Crows are very intelligent birds, it would be like eating a parrot.
At last, a coded reference to the Norwegian Blue.
Norwegian blue is in fact a kind of cheese, not a parrot.
head cheese reenactment
I finally find a moment to cry out against that stoopid foto title. It’s the making of head cheese that is being reenacted, against a background of striped wall, as Crown astutely pointed out. One doesn’t act, enact, or reenact head cheese. One eats it, or reacts to it negatively.
Norwegian blue is in fact a kind of cheese
You put up a picture of Norwegian brown a few months ago. They’re both very much down my alley.
I met Norwegian Brown when I was a fresher. It was, um, exotic.
stoopid foto title
I dunno, Stu. I think I can charitably say that ‘head cheese’ is allowed to modify ‘re-enactment’ without any suggestion that anyone is ‘re-enacting head cheese’. By analogy, ’emergency’ is allowed to modify ‘session’ without any suggestion that anyone is seating an emergency.
Say that some people are working at a place devoted to educating the public about history. They dress in period costume (striped vests and such) and carry on in and around old-style buildings (striped cabins and such), perhaps conversing with the visitors in quaint old-fashioned language, doing what is called ‘historical re-enactment’. Or briefly ‘re-enactment’.
“Hey, I took a picture of you doing that re-enactment the other day. ”
“Which re-enactment?”
“The head cheese re-enactment.”
It struck me afterwards as odd that we have two words for sweater that are channel islands, Jersey & Guernsey.
They share the sweater between them. That’s why they’re called the channel islands.
One island originated the sweater and the other one got jealous and made a slight modification to the original design, justifying calling it by its own name.
Oh, come on, the real place for sweaters is Fair Isle.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fair_Isle_(technique)
I didn’t mean “sweaters” in general, but a particular type of sweater, or a particular knitting technique for sweaters.
In French, the “stockinette” type of knitting stitch (which alternates rows of ‘knit’ and ‘purl’ in order to produce the flattest result) is called “point de jersey”.
Goodness that’s interesting, m-l. I must tell my mother, who taught me that knitting tactic when I was a child. Is it named after the island or the clothing? Probably the clothing, because the French wouldn’t use an English name for the island, would they? Now I come to think of it, it’s quite funny that Jersey & Guernsey are lying in a body of water known in French as “the sleeve”.
Fair Isle isn’t very fair if you happen to be a swan.
Jersey can also mean everyday T-shirt or similar upper garment*, from the name from the fabric used: machine-knitted, from thin cotton thread (or is it called yarn in this context) — a far cry from a bulky hand-knitted wool sweater!
* these days heard more often in reference to athletic uniforms than civilian life
Yes. Except apparently when playing Australian Rules where, as I noted, a jersey is called a guernsey.
Jersey cows don’t wear jerseys at all, to my knowledge.
Which gets us back to the joke about Mrs Astor, or some other fabulously wealthy American of the golden age. A journalist visits for an interview. She offers him
“Tea or coffee?”
“Tea, please.”
“China or Indian?”
“Indian, please.”
“Lemon or milk?”
“Milk, please.”
“Jersey or Guernsey?”
And our Guernsey friends would find that quite an acceptable exchange, as they were dairy farmers.
empty: By analogy, ‘emergency’ is allowed to modify ’session’ without any suggestion that anyone is seating an emergency.
“Emergency session” suggests that people are sitting in an emergency. Which is true. They are sitting in an emergency situation, meaning that where they sit is a site where there is an emergency. All these formulations are above-board, straightforward and unexceptionable.
“Hey, I took a picture of you doing that re-enactment the other day. ”
“Which re-enactment?”
“The head cheese re-enactment.”
Hmpf. If you’re going to get vernacular on me, then I have to admit the expression works OK in that dialog. I still think the picture caption sounds strange. Better would have been something like: “head being chopped for cheese”.
Head cheese isn’t cheese, it’s a type of mystery meat:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Head_cheese
from back in the days when they could afford to let no part of the animal go to waste. The Whole Earth Catalog used to have pictures of how to do stuff like locate all the edible parts in the animals skull.
And it’s not a ‘striped” building, it’s a log cabin, the cracks between the logs being filled with something to keep out the drafts. Didn’t they used to use moss for that? There’s something about it that doesn’t look right either. I wonder if it’s a Finnish style rather than Swedish. Didn’t a Finnish style log cabin have flattened logs? The interlocking joints were different too.
And sweaters…when I was in London they called them “jumpers”, and the things were long enough to cover your butt. Our jumpers are a type of sleeveless dress with a low neckline meant to be worn over a sweater or blouse;
http://images.google.com/images?q=jumper%20blouse&hl=en&sa=N&tab=fi
I wonder if the Brits even have those.
Now I come to think of it, it’s quite funny that Jersey & Guernsey are lying in a body of water known in French as “the sleeve”
I tried to say that with the ‘the Channel’ comment, but I’m too cryptic for my own good.
Sort of related: ON fold f. “flat field, wide fjord” and faldr, foldr m. “pleat, edge of cloth;”. Today fald is “hem”. Fold was the old name of Oslofjorden and the districts around it are still named Vestfold, Østfold (although that is a recent coinage) and Follo. Incidentally, there’s an island in Oslofjorden called Jersøya, and I remember reading long ago, in a series A-magasinet (Aftenposten’s weekend magazine) did around 1980 on the heritage of the Vikings, that Jersey may have been named after it.
Grumbly: “Emergency session” suggests that people are sitting in an emergency.
Yes, but “gripe session” doesn’t suggest that they are sitting in a gripe.
I think my real intent (aside from making you say “hmph”) was to claim that “re-enactment” is semantically a bit removed from the verb “re-enact” — far enough that “_____ re-enactment” does not necessarily mean “re-enacting _____”, any more than “equivalence relation” means “relating equivalence”, any more that “travel writing” is “writing travel”.
That reminds me, why do they call it “swan upping”?
Nijma: Of course it’s a striped building. Anybody can see the stripes. Some of the stripes are pieces of wood, and the others are something between to keep out the drafts/draughts.
Goodness. That’s all very interesting, Trond.
There’s swan upping, swanning around, but no swan downing. Yes, of course it’s striped, Nij.
It makes sense that Jersey and Guernesey (in French) are Viking names (even if the Guern part might be more Celtic). The (endangered) native speech of these islands is not English but directly descended from Norman French as taken North by the Normans, who were at least partly descendants of Vikings. The dialect of Jersey is called jersiais or jerriais and there is a website maintained by a local person which is partly written in jerriais. The guernesiais dialect seems to be very similar. Victor Hugo spent years on Guernesey with his family, but they socialized with the English rather than with the Norman dialect speakers.
Let me just put in a plug for G. B. Edwards’ The Book of Ebenezer Le Page, which I wrote about here.
It actually reminds me quite a bit of Proust, except with fewer aristocrats and more farm animals
For both together, you always have P.G. Wodehouse.
Thank you both very much for that. The Channel Islands ought to have been mentioned at school, but they never once were.
I must say, although the quality of comic strips has on the whole declined drastically in the course of the last century (with the obvious honorable exceptions), I’m glad they no longer include captions like this one from May 8, 1904:
“So he kills some goats that are grazing in a field, and eats them, watching Lovekins all the while. But he eats too much and with one goat still in his mouth he falls asleep.”
You can see the shocking scene by clicking on the middle “Enlarge This Image” in this review.
That’s a very imaginative cartoon, I didn’t know they drew upside-down stuff like that in those days. The goat porn is a bit much, but sad to say typical of the treatment of vegetarians in literature–look at Moby Dick.
Sorry to come late to this party, but as has been previously hinted/linked to, the Crown gets all the swans whose beaks are unmarked, the dyers get those with one nick in their beaks and the vintners get all those whose beaks have two nicks, an idea corrupted into the pub name The Swan With Two Necks. The brewers of London once had swans at their annual feast, which so annoyed the then Lord Mayor of London, one Richard Whittington, because he had no swans at his own feast, that he made the brewers sell their ale for one penny a gallon for the whole of the following day.
What’s the good of having a Lord Mayor if he only gets annoyed once every six or seven hundred years? Anyway, it’s good to have a comment from you, Zythophile–there, I even spelt your name right.
Is Mayor Richard Whittington the “Dick Whittington” of the famous British pantomime? or am I confusing him with someone else?
Going back to earlier in the thread: The US “jumpers” that Nijma shows us are, I believe, called “pinafore dresses” in the UK. Whether anybody still wears them, apart from toddlers, I’m not sure.
M-L: Is Mayor Richard Whittington the “Dick Whittington” of the famous British pantomime?
That’s him
Thank you, zythophile! A very interesting character.
I remember this story from childhood, the guy was about to leave London untill he heard the church bells say “Turn again Whittington, thrice Lord Mayor of London”
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dick_Whittington_and_His_Cat
so he turned around and went back, and found out he had gotten rich from his cat.
The “bow bells” must have been different in those days:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oranges_and_Lemons