h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Indeed, about five hundred years ago the litterati in Auld Reekie would most certainly have looked down upon those southern manglers of the language. My point about Scots is that it developed from the same root as English but, due to having its own navy and army for a while, developed its own character, grammer and vocabulary. Then of course, along came rule from London and things started to go into reverse. Whither it still constitutes a language today is a subject of much debate up north which, for purely patriotic grounds, I like to think it does. The Peer review conversation about it is hopefully here; http://www.bbc.co.uk/dna/h2g2/classic/F48874?thread=210559 Munchkin, more an English speaker with Scots pretentions than a true speaker of Scots.

>> Munchkin, more an English speaker with Scots pretentions than a true speaker of Scots. <<

Here, m'dears, methinks is proof of the true differences that mark the Scot from other Brits. There is a clarity of mind, a realism that begets modesty and honesty - refusing all delusions, a forthright and bare-fisted ability to come to grips with whate'er needs gripping and a happy tradition of making the best of every bad situation with a laugh in the face of Cosmic doom - all reflected in the tone, vocabulary and syntax of every self-effacing offering, always spoken to, and for, the greater common weal.


~j~

I've not been in for a while so greetings all

Whats the origins of fangled as in "That new fangled Brunel skin"

Believe it or not the phrase 'new fangled' is used in the original 'untranslated' text of Chaucer's 'Canterbury Tales'. I can't specifically point to it, but the shock of seeing it there has never quite worn off in all the years since my reading at Uni, while most other details have long since faded from consciousness. A few smutty bits notwithstanding.

~jwf~

I think a book entitled 'Chaucer's Canterbury Tales: The Smutty Bits' could do rather well.

I too remember some: specifically the Wyff of Bath! A right literary tart, if ever there was one!

Are you calling me modest and honest? I can tell you've never met me in the flesh!
Now then, rude bits in Chaucer, do tell.

The only smutty bit I can remember is that incident with the mooner and the branding iron.

Was it the Miller's Tale that had the student and the bed-swapping in the dark?

I'm not sure about the student, but i'm pretty sure the mooner and the iron were the Miller.

Gentlemen, gentlemen please. We have yet to provide Bald Bloke with any information about the source and meaning of the word fangled.

Fangle is now considered obsolete except prefixed as 'newfangled' (one word, not two as I mis typed earlier) but it once meant 'made', especially newly made.

In a more conservative past (the Middle Ages) people were taught to be distrustful of innovation; 'new' things were considered gaudy, showy, and unnecessary. Humility and poverty were sold to the masses as the only acceptable behaviours. All newfangled notions and gadgets were avoided except by the simple minded or evil persons who are (by contemporary stereotyping) fascinated by novelty. (Although the rudder and the plow did manage to work their way into the hearts of men and alter the course of history.)

Newfangled in Chaucer's day was spelled 'neufanglyd' being a construction of 'neu' meaning 'new' and '-fangle' meaning 'taken'. To take up the new. To be fond of novelty. Something created for the sake of novelty.

But attitudes toward the 'neufanglyd' were not as simple or straightforward as the official clerical policy outlined above. Among the pilgrims on Chaucer's journey, opinions and reactions vary according to their station in life, their Faith, their literacy, their (travel) experience of the world (whether willed or forced upon them) and their intelligence. Chaucer himself was well travelled and well educated; he had visited and traded with Islamic cities in Spain. As an agent of the King he was reasonably well off and could indulge in a few 'neufanglyd' luxuries. The English literary heritage owes all to his 'neufanglyd' notion of writing down his courtly tales as if they were holy script. He was three hundred years ahead of his time.

Now Gentlemen, if you will step this way (to your library) I'll introduce you to the Wife of Bath, whose Tale is considerably more 'sophisticated' than that ruffian Miller's toilet humour.

~jwf~

If you want ancient saucy humour, Rabelais is a much better bet than Chaucer anyway. Or try Boccaccio, whom Chaucer greatly admired and translated.

Our A-level syllabus covered the Wife of Bath's Prologue. Which means that my impression of Chaucer is that it's all very (ahem) "bawdy". With recommendations to read Boccaccio if you wanted the really unadulterated version. Or should that be adulterated. Adult rated?

And where were we? Hi Bald Bloke. Hi Spiff. Glad I got you to come to Freiburg. If you and Holle Polle hadn't been there I would have been rather a gooseberry with all those courting couples. We'll have to do it again some time. Mainly because you still owe me some teabags!! Did you sleep in the car in the end or drive straight home?

Sorry for digressing. Have a cuppa everyone else while I mumble on.

And has no one the meaning of "rag" for me and is it still a tradition? In my impatience I've googled for the answer and find it's common to all universities and is still going and stands for "Raising and Giving".



Will we ever see Kaeori and Nikki D again?

Drove straight home; the road was paved with good intentions!

safe and sound, though. Don't those Deutschfahrer shift?! Amazingly, considering I am only about a mile from the border, that was my first experience driving on the famous Autobahnen (pl?). No wonder there is such a steady flow of 'Herr Schnellster' type articles in the nation's favourite right rivetin' read!

I made my way home at a steady but comparatively leisurely 90mph. no probs.

Besides, it wasn't such a boozy do as all that.

er, what was the name of this thread again?



ah, yes, 'booze'; triffic word, but where on earth did it come from. Is it used over the pond? There was a shop in Whalley Range, M/C when i lived there a few years ago which was just called 'Food 'n' Booze', which was emblazoned in 4ft letters across the top of it's plain, windowless white facade! I think it turned over pretty well.

>> ah, yes, 'booze'; triffic word, but where on earth did it come from. Is it used over the Pond? <<

Yes, very much so.
It is from the Middle Dutch 'busen' meaning 'to drink to excess'

Once again, the courageous Dutch are the source of a word which English did not have (and some will insist they did not need).

Curiously the brand name for the drug disulphrim, which causes violent nauseau if alcohol is consumed, is Antabuse. Often pronounced 'anti-booze' by those on prescription.

Even the term alcohol 'abuse' takes on new meaning when one knows the word 'busen'.

As they used to say on the Radio Nederlands' English Language World Service, "Keep in touch, mit the Dutch!"

~jwf~

Rag is a slang term from the late 1700s which essentially means to annoy, even in the phrase rag week. In university lingo, to rag is to riotously cock a snook at authority, and rag week is in keeping with this: although the purpose is ostensibly to raise money for charity, running amok seems to be the guiding principle in many participants minds, and police involvement is not uncommon. As an illustration from my university days, a self-styled hit squad offered services ranging from the classic pie in the face all the way up to abduction. Unsurprisingly, the lecturer who found himself kidnapped, bound and dumped in a pig-sty wasn't mollified by the knowledge that £100 had been raised in the process and wasn't shy about saying so to the local constabulary.

As for the etymology of rag, no-one seems to know anything useful. The only guess as to a possible root I've seen anyone commit to print is that it may be related to a homonymous old Danish word meaning grudge, so I'll posit another one, which is that it's derived from the phrase 'red rag to a bull'.

And has anyone else heard the words, "They kept ragging him", meaning, 'teasing in a spiteful way' ? Or did I dream this one?
roselin

That's the same word

Thank you Mycroft.

From a secret admirer.

BTW Busen is the German word for bosom.

Which I found amusing. Does this take us back full circle to breast feeding?

If you ever see a derivation for a word from before 1980 which is claims to come from the initials of a phrase, then distrust it. "Raising and Giving" as a derivation for "rag" falls into this category.

Kaeori said hello to me a couple of days back, but apologised that she hadn't been around here recently due to work pressure.