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

Of course you are geographically accurate, G. I certainly was not trying to exclude anyone at all from the debate, least of all the Irish who have contributed a disproportionately vast amount to ''English' Literature'.

Its just that I thought that we were trying to find words that were peculiarly British (i.e. England, Scotland, Wales & the islands) as opposed to International. The roots of 'British' English are surely Germanic and Latin. Words that come from Gaelic are, by definition, 'International' in this context.

Unless of course they are Welsh, or Scottish, or Cornish.....

Look, why don't I just shut up!

I'm British, okay, and even I don't understand it.

My teacher in year 6 always used to claim the classroom was a dog's dinner when she wanted it cleared up. Seemed useage varies from place to place.

Bee's Knees is more common around Cambridge (in my family, anyway) than Cat's Whiskers or Dog's Bollocks.

Yes, bollocks does mean testicles. It can of course be used as an expletive, as in:

Bollocks!

instead of perhaps ****! or %%*$*&£***$&£*!

(Gee, like Wandrin' gurustar I took a day off, and I'm so far behind in this thread it feels like missing a college semester!)

'Gubbins' is not in my big Random House dictionary, nor is it in my thesaurus (or 'theosaurus', as someone I know always says). I suspect, then, that it is still a delusional notion. That said, peering into my computer's innards reveals what I can only describe as ... gubbins?

I must confess that I still get confused between 'English' and 'British', and between England, Britain, Great Britain and the UK. I am reading history books, but I'm none the wiser. But please don't let that spark off anything politically charged or heated.

BTW, a colleague here delights in using the word 'piffle', which I quite like, and appears to be a real word that I hadn't heard before. I just wish he wasn't using it to describe any point of view I care to express.

Has anyone heard of a "Dog's Grave". This is a type of rockery popular among very bad gardeners. You pile up a load of rocks and soil, stick a few alpine plants in it and call it a rockery.

England is England, the country. Bordered on the left by Wales and on the top by Scotland. The English speak English. (Except a handful of Cornish people who claim to be bilingual)

Britain is short for Great Britain, and includes England Wales and Scotland and, if you feel like it, The Channel Islands and the Isle of Man. The British (Brits) speak English but some in the extremities also speak forms of Gaelic. A very very few splendid citizens only speak Gaelic.

The United Kingdom is all the above, plus Northern Ireland. The residents of the United Kingdom are usually referred to separately as British and 'Northern Irish' or 'Ulstermen', except by the residents of Northern Ireland, who call themselves British. They all speak English, except for the exceptions mentioned above.

The British Isles is all the above plus Eire (Usually called Ireland, but meaning that part of the island of Ireland that is not Ulster, another name for 'Northern Ireland'. The Irish among us may start talking about the '6 counties'.) All citizens of the British Isles speak English, with the exceptions mentioned, plus a form of Gaelic spoken in Ireland.

I have never, until mentioned here, heard 'Great Britain' used to include the vestiges of Empire. They would be classified as 'the dependant Territories' in my way of thinking. Its different from France where the 'overseas territories' are counted as part of France proper.

Then theres Brittany......

Thanks - it's slightly clearer.

BTW, isn't the French throne currently vacant?

Piffle, tosh, codswallop Its all a load of nonsense.

Actually I have a feeling that the adjective at least 'piffling' is generally accepted in International English. I am sure that the Lady Gurustar will enlighten in due course.

I never said that Great Britain included the vestiges of the Empire. What I said was that "British" may have once been used to describe them. Are the Falkland Islands British?

Not all the people in Northern Ireland consider themselves British.

The reason Irish people say the "6 counties" is that Ulster contains 9 counties. Three of these are in the Republic of Ireland (Eire). The other six are "Northern Ireland".

I suppose that flibbertigibbet may not have been considered twee when you used it to describe those office angels who now aspire to the appellation 'Personal Assistant'. I think that the word is now sufficiently archaic that twee is a fair description - but that is just my opinion.
I think that modern English owes as much to the Celtic (Brythonic and Goidelic),Norman French and old Danish languages as it does to Latin and the various Germanic languages which we refer to as Anglo-Saxon.
Gosh! That was a bit serious was it not?

Good to see the doggy thread still surfacing after 700+ postings !

I now have a personal interest in it, as my partner got herself a puppy (German Shepard) last week. It's male and, sure enough, spends some of it's time licking its bollocks (and humping a particularly large fluffy slipper - well, it is only 8 weeks old, and doesn't know any better !).
To get to my point (yes, there is a point to all this), if we'd ended up with a female puppy, it wouldn't have had any bollocks to lick. This may or may not be a problem, except that as there is no female equivalent to uses of the word bollocks in relation to dogs (try some - it just doesn't work), it is an essentially sexist remark, and all decent people should immediately stop using it.

One of the many problems having a puppy at home (believe me, there ARE many), is that I said I'd leave home if she got one - so if anyone out there can offer a friendly, non-smoking researcher a dog-free home to share, please write back !

As I wrote it I thought there was trouble ahead. Yes, I sort of remembered that Ulster (The Ancient Kingdom Of) includes those counties to the West, but it was too late. And, I should have made it clear that only if a citizen of Northern Ireland wishes to, would he/she call themselves British. He/she may just as easily wish to be thought of as Irish. Does the term 'Ulster' have any allegiance connotations?

'Twee' has a sense of contrived 'olde worlde' stuff like gingham covers on fancy jampots, or reproduction Horse brasses. I don't like it.

Fancy a crown then, K?

Oh, and to answer your first question, G. It depends whether you are Argentinian or not!

Queen of France - moi? I think not!

Around here, 'piffle' is almost always preceeded by the word 'absolute' (and, sadly, followed by my name). Isn't it strange how some words become so attached.

Later K, it gets more serious. Utter becomes the pre-piffle word and a very sad sigh follows. The speaker will often walk away slowly shaking their head. Watch for the signs.

Hey Pheroneous, what about all those people in Wales who are English-Welsh bilingual? Forgot those, didn't you?

Would I? How could I? I didnt forget them, just forgot to write about them. Or did I, I forget.

Actually its quite surprising (to an Englishman, who learned to write English in Haverfordwest) just how many Welsh speakers there are around. To go into a shop, for instance, and hear only Welsh spoken... Its much more widely spoken than Scottish Gaelic for example. You might also expect some similarity to English, they being neighbours for so long, but its totally different.

I guess Pheroneous thought gaelic covered all the celtic languages, where Percy von Wurzel did point out there is a difference (also pointed out to me as the p and k celtic languages by a scotsman, welshman and (northern) irishman whilst discussing place names in cornwall )

Well I like that!!! You go to the trouble of remembering not to tell a Welshman he's English and he tells you off for calling you British. Can he prove on paper that he is Welsh?

And going back quite a way - flabberghasted to me seems to deserve an "h" and means stunned or shocked or bemused, whereas flummoxed means at a loss, not being able to solve the present problem. Well, I think there's a difference, anyway.

In many other threads we have gone into the intricacies of Great Britain, the United Kingdom and the other variations on that theme (I think the national anthem thread does the most) What you say agrees with everything else that has been said, although I was surprised to read, in both instances, that the Isle of Man was a separate entity. Sorry, Manxmen.

And one thing, after getting finally through the last 20-30 postings (and I can tell you, folks, it was worth it). How about "Don't get your knickers in a twist" or "Put a sock in it" or "Put t'wood in t'hole"?

Question to our colonial friends (except Keori) - how many of those can you explain?

or as can be commonly heard, "Put t'wood in t'hole, you weren't born in t'barn were you?"