The Illustrated Etymologicon E-Book

Mark Forsyth

• Herausgeber: Icon Books
• Kategorie: Geisteswissenschaft
• Sprache: Englisch
• Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2021

Beschreibung

A NEW, BEAUTIFULLY ILLUSTRATED EDITION OF THE SUNDAY TIMES NUMBER ONE BESTSELLER, PUBLISHED ON ITS TENTH ANNIVERSARY. 'Witty and erudite ... stuffed with the kind of arcane information that nobody strictly needs to know, but which is a pleasure to learn nonetheless.' Nick Duerden, Independent. 'Particularly good ... Forsyth takes words and draws us into their, and our, murky history.' William Leith, Evening Standard. The Etymologicon is an occasionally ribald, frequently witty and unerringly erudite guided tour of the secret labyrinth that lurks beneath the English language. What is the actual connection between disgruntled and gruntled? What links church organs to organised crime, California to the Caliphate, or brackets to codpieces? Mark Forsyth's riotous celebration of the idiosyncratic and sometimes absurd connections between words is a classic of its kind: a mine of fascinating information and a must-read for word-lovers everywhere. 'Highly recommended' Spectator

Leseprobe

The IllustratedEtymologiconA Circular Stroll Throughthe Hidden Connectionsof the English Language

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The IllustratedEtymologiconMark ForsythA Circular Stroll Throughthe Hidden Connectionsof the English LanguageICON BOOKS

DedicationFor John Goldsmith,With thanks.e author would like to thankeverybody involved with the productionof this book, but especially Jane Seeberand Andrea Coleman for their advice,suggestions, corrections, clarificationsand other gentle upbraidings.About the authorMARK FORSYTH is the author ofthree books on the English language:e Etymologiconwhich was a SundayTimes No. 1 bestseller,e Horologiconande Elements of Eloquence. He hasalso writtene Unknown Unknownon the joy of bookshops,ChristmasCornucopiaon the origins of festivetraditions, andA Short History ofDrunkenness. His books have beentranslated into overfifteen languages.He lives in Clerkenwell, London.is book is the papery child of theInky Fool blog, which was started in2009.ough most of the material isnew, some of it has been adapted fromits computerised parent.e blog isavailable at http://blog.inkyfool.com/which is a part of the grander wholewww.inkyfool.com.is illustrated edition published in theUK in 2021 by Icon Books LtdFirst published in the UK in 2011 byIcon Books Ltd, Omnibus Business Centre,39–41 North Road, London N7 9DPemail: [email protected] in the UK, Europe and Asiaby Faber & Faber Ltd, Bloomsbury House,74–77 Great Russell Street,London WC1B 3DA or their agentsDistributed in the UK, Europe and Asiaby Grantham Book Services,Trent Road, Grantham NG31 7XQDistributed in Australia and New Zealandby Allen & Unwin Pty Ltd,PO Box 8500, 83 Alexander Street,Crows Nest, NSW 2065Distributed in South Africa byJonathan Ball, Office B4,e District,41 Sir Lowry Road, Woodstock 7925Distributed in Indiaby Penguin Books India,7th Floor, Infinity Tower – C,DLF Cyber City,Gurgaon 122002, HaryanaISBN: 978-1-78578-785-0Text copyright © 2011 Mark Forsythe author has asserted his moral rights.No part of this book may be reproduced inany form, or by any means, without priorpermission in writing from the publisher.Design copyright © UniPress Books Limited 2021Project Management: Jason HookDesign: Luke HerriottIllustration: Nicky Ackland-SnowPrinted in Italy

Praise for the original editionofe Etymologicon‘is year’s must-have stockingfiller – the angel on the top of thetree, the satsuma in the sock, thethreepenny bit in the plum pudding,the essential addition to the library inthe smallest room is Mark Forsyth’se Etymologicon.’Ian Sansom,Guardian‘I’m hooked on Forsyth’s book …Crikey, but this is addictive.’Matthew Parris,e Times‘Kudos should go to Mark Forsyth,author ofe Etymologicon…Clearly a man who knows his onions,Mr Forsyth must have worked 19 tothe dozen, spotting red herrings andunravelling inkhorn terms, to bestowthis boon … a work of thefirst water,to coin a phrase.’Daily Telegraph‘e Etymologiconcontainsfascinating facts.’Daily Mail‘I really love books about words,and this is a particularly good one …Forsyth takes words and draws usinto their, and our, murky history.’William Leith,Evening Standard‘One of the books of the year.It is too enjoyable for words.’Henry Coningsby, Waterstones Watford‘is witty book liberates etymologyfrom the dusty pages of the dictionaryand brings it alive.’Good Book Guide‘Forsyth is the ancient mariner ofall wordsmiths, spinning a never-ending story of unexpected coinagesand devious linkages, sexy, learnedand satisfyingly obscure.’Christina Hardyment,e Times(review of the audiobook)

Prefacetothe2019Edition8-Preface12-ATurn-upfortheBooks14-AGameofChicken16-Hydrogentlemanly18-eOld&New

Testicle20-ParentheticalCodpieces22-SufferingformyUnderwear26-Pans28-MiltonicMeanders32-BloodyTypicalSemanticShifts34-eProofofthePudding36-SausagePoisoninYourFace39-Bows&Arrows&Cats42-Black&White44-HatChequePointCharlie46-Sex&Bread50-ConcealedFarts53-Wool56-Turkey62-InsultingFoods65-FolkEtymology66-ButterfliesoftheWorld69-Psychoanalysis&theReleaseoftheButterfly72-eVillainsoftheLanguage76-TwoExecutioners&aDoctor78-omasCrapper82-MythicalAcronyms86-JohntheBaptist&eSoundofMusic90-Organic,Organised,Organs92-Clipping94-Buffalo96-Antanaclasis100-China102-Coincidences&Patterns104-Frankly,MyDearFrankfurter108-BeastlyForeigners110-Pejoratives112-CiaoSlave-Driver114-Robots116-Terminators&Prejudice118-Terminators&Equators120-EqualityinEcuador122-Bogeys124-Bugbears&Bedbugs126-VonMunchausen’sComputer130-SPAM(notspam)132-Heroin134-MorphingDeQuincey&Shelley136-Star-SpangledDrinkingSongs140-Torpedoes&Turtles143-FromMountVernontoPortobelloRoadwithaHangover146-APunchofDrinks148-eScamperingChampionoftheChampagneCampaign148-InsultingNames154-PeterPan158-HerbaceousCommunication162-PapaWasaSaxumVolutum164-FlyingPeters166-Venezuela&Venus&Venice170-WhatNewsontheRialto?172-Magazines174-DickSnary176-Autopeotomy180-WaterClosetsforRussia184-FatGunhilda186-QueenGunhilda&theGadgets188-Shell190-InaNutshell191-eIliad192-eHumanBody194-eFiveFingers196-HoaxBodies199-Bunking&Debunking202-eAnglo-SaxonMystery204-eSedge-strewnStream&Globalisation208-Coffee212-CappuccinoMonks214-CalledtotheBar216-Ignorami218-Fossil-Less221-eFrequentativeSuffix224-Pending226-Worms&theirTurnings228-Mathematics230-Stellafied&OilyBeavers233-Beards236-Islands238-SandwichIslands242-eFrenchRevolutioninEnglishWords246-RomanceLanguages248-PeripateticPeoples250-FromBohemiatoCalifornia(viaPrimroseHill)252-California255-eHashGuys258-Drugs262-PleasingPsalms264-BiblicalErrors267-Salt270-HalcyonDays272-DogDays276-CynicalDogs278-GreekEducation&Fastchild280-Cybermen282-TurningTrix284-AmateurLovers286-DirtyMoney288-Death-Pledges292-WageringWar294-StrappedforCash296-FastBucks&DeadOnes298-eBuckStopsHere302-BacktoHowthCastle&Environs304-TheQuizzes306-eCreamoftheSources316-AlsoAvailable318-Acknowledgements320

8Preface to the 2019 EditionPreface to the2019 EditionI had a friend called Andrea, a girl of infinite and intricateeccentricity. Andrea could not be trusted within 50 yards of afountain pen. She would somehow contrive to get ink on herfingers and from there it would be smudged on her face. WhenI would point this out to her, she would smile and I would call herthe Inky Fool.at was years ago when we were at Oxford. In 2009 Andreasuggested that we write a blog together on the English language.It was her idea and we named it after her: Inky Fool. Andrea had afull-time job, though (another of her delightful eccentricities), andso her posts petered out and I was left writing under my friend’sname. I had my hopeless hopes of being a professional author.e Inky Fool was what is rather violently known as ‘a hit’, andthe result was that in the New Year of 2011 I was offered a bookdeal, an event that I immediately celebrated with Andrea. Whenthefirst edition of this book was printed the cover said that it wasby ‘Mark Forsyth (e Inky Fool)’.e motive of the publisherswas simple (publishers’ motives often are): I was a nobody exceptinsofar as the Inky Fool made me a somebody.en, that was apractical reality; now, it is an irreparable truth.

9Preface to the 2019 Editionis book and all those I have written since were caused byAndrea.e facts recounted here may be true (facts often are),but they aremerelytrue. If this book has any virtue it is that thefacts have been smuggled away into a comic world that Andreaand I invented together.When I wrote this book we were sharing a house and Andrearead the proofs in the evening and critiqued my clumsy commas.When thatfirst cover said that the author was ‘Mark Forsyth(e Inky Fool)’, it was quite correct. A national newspaperonce asked to print some stufffrom the blog and accidentallypublished Andrea’s writing under my name (they had chosen welland wisely). Andrea used to joke that she would someday sueme for all my royalties, and I always replied that I would nevercontest the case.It’s a decade since Andrea suggested that we wrote a blog. It hasbeen a happy decade in which I wrote six books and Andreamarried and had two children. Sometimes, at literary events andthe like, I am still introduced as the Inky Fool.Andrea Colvile (née Coleman) died on the seventh of July 2019from auto-immune hepatitis.is is my friendIn whose sweet praiseI all my daysCould gladly spend.

… they who are so exact forthe letter shall be dealt withby the Lexicon, and theEtymologicon too if they please …JOHN MILTON

12PrefacePreface(or that which is said –fatus– before)Occasionally people make the mistake of asking me where a wordcomes from.ey never make this mistake twice. I am naturally astern and silent fellow; even forbidding. But there’s something aboutetymology and where words come from that overcomes my inbuilttaciturnity. A chap once asked me where the wordbiscuitcame from.He was eating one at the time and had been struck by curiosity.I explained to him that a biscuit is cooked twice, or in Frenchbi-cuit, and he thanked me for that. So I added that thebiinbiscuit is the samebithat you get inbicycleandbisexual, to which henodded. And then, just because it occurred to me, I told him that theword bisexual wasn’t invented until the 1890s and that it was coinedby a psychiatrist called Richard von Krafft-Ebing and did he knowthat Ebing also invented the wordmasochism?He told mefirmly that he didn’t.Did he know about Mr Masoch, after whom masochism was named?He was a novelist and …e fellow told me that he didn’t know about Mr Masoch, that hedidn’t want to know about Mr Masoch, and that his one ambition inlife was to eat his biscuit in peace.But it was too late.e metaphoricalfloodgates had opened and thehorse had bolted. You see there are a lot of other words named afternovelists, like Kafkaesque and Retifism … It was at this point that hemade a dash for the door, but I was too quick for him. My blood wasup and there was always something more to say.ere always is, youknow.ere’s always an extra connection, another link that joins twowords that most of mankind quite blithely believe to be separate, whichis why that fellow didn’t escape until a couple of hours later when hemanaged to climb out of the window while I was drawing a diagram toexplain what the name Philip has to do with a hippopotamus.

13PrefaceIt was after an incident such as this that my friends and familydecided something must be done.ey gathered for a confabulationand, having established that secure psychiatric care was beyond theirmeans, they turned in despair to the publishing industry, whichhas a long history of picking up where social work leaves off. So,a publisher was found somewhere near the Caledonian Road and aplan was hatched. I would start with a single word and then connectit to another word and then to another word and so on and so forthuntil I was exhausted and could do no more.A book would therefore have a twofold benefit. First it would rid meof my demons and perhaps save some innocent conversationalist frommy clutches. Second, unlike me, a book could be left snugly on thebedside table or beside the lavatory: opened at will andclosedat will.So a book it was, which set me thinking …

14his is a book.e glorious insanities of the English language mean that you can do all sorts ofodd and demeaning things to a book. You can cook it. You can bring a criminalto it, or, if the criminal refuses to be brought, you can throw it at him. You mayeven take a leaf out of it, the price of lavatory paper being what it is. But there isone thing that you can never do to a book like this. Try as and how you might,you cannot turn up for it. Becausea turn-up for the bookshas nothing, directly, todo with the ink-glue-and-paper affair that this is (that is, unless you’re terriblymodern and using a Kindle or somesuch). It’sa turn-up for the bookmakers.Any child who sees the bookmaker’s facing the bookshop across the High Streetwill draw the seemingly logical conclusion. And a bookmaker was, once, simplysomebody who stuck books together. Indeed, the termbookmakerused to be usedto describe the kind of writer who just pumps out one shelf-filler after anotherwith no regard for the exhaustion of the reading public.e modern sense of the bookmaker as a man whotakes bets originated on the racecourses ofVictorian Britain.e bookmaker wouldaccept bets from anyone who wantedto lay them, and note them all downin a big betting book. Meanwhile,a turn-up was just a happy chance.A dictionary of slang from 1873thoughtfully gives us this definition:Turn up -an unexpected sliceof luck. Among sporting menbookmakers are said to havea turn up when an unbackedhorse wins.A Turn-Up for the BooksThomas Moreobserved in 1533 that‘of newe booke makersthere are now moe thenynough’. Luckily for thebook trade, More wasbeheaded a couple ofyears later.A Turn-Up for the Books

15A Turn-Up for the BooksSo, which horses are unbacked?ose with the best (i.e. longest)odds. Almost nobody backs ahorse at 1,000/1.is may seem a rather counterin-tuitive answer. Odds of a thousand toone are enough to tempt even a saint tostake his halo, but that’s because saints don’tknow anything about gambling and horseflesh.ousand to one shots never, ever come in. Everyexperienced gambler knows that a race is very often won by the favourite, whichwill of course have short odds. Indeed, punters want to back a horse that’s so farahead of thefield he merely needs to be shooed over the line. Such a horse isashoo-in.So you pick the favourite, and you back it. Nobody but a fool backs a horse that’sunlikely to win. So when such an unfancied nag romps over thefinish line, it’s aturn-up for the books, because the bookies won’t have to pay out.Not that the bookmakers need much luck.ey always win.ere will always bemany more bankrupt gamblers than bookies. You’re much better offin a zero-sumgame, where the players pool their money and the winner takes all.Pooling your money began in France, and has nothing whatsoever to do withswimming pools, and a lot to do with chickens and genetics ...Pooling

16A Game of ChickenGambling in medieval France was a simple business. All you needed were somefriends, a pot and a chicken. In fact, you didn’t need friends – you could do this withyour enemies – but the pot and the chicken were essential.First, each person puts an equal amount of money in the pot. Nobody should onany account make a joke about apoultry sum. Shoo the chicken away to a reasonabledistance. What’s a reasonable distance? About a stone’s throw.Next, pick up a stone.Now, you all take turns hurling stones at that poor bird, which will squawk andflap and run about.efirst person to hit the chicken wins all the money in thepot. You then agree never to mention any of this to an animal rights campaigner.at’s how the French played a game of chicken.e French, though, being French,called it a game ofpoule, which is French for chicken. And the chap who had wonall the money had therefore won thejeu de poule.e term got transferred to otherthings. At card games, the pot of money in the middle of the table came to beknown as thepoule. English gamblers picked the term up and brought it back withthem in the seventeenth century.ey changed the spelling topool, but they stillhad a pool of money in the middle of the table.It should be noted that this pool of money has absolutely nothing to do with a body ofwater. Swimming pools, rock pools and Liverpools are utterly different things.Back to gambling. When billiards became a popular sport, people started to gambleon it, and this variation was known aspool, hence shooting pool.en,finally, thatpoor French chicken broke free from the world of gambling and soared majesticallyout into the clear air beyond. On the basis that gamblerspooledtheir money, peoplestarted to pool their resources and even pool their cars in acar pool.en theypooled their typists in atyping pool. Le chicken was free!And then he grew bigger than any of us, because, since the phrase was invented in1941, we have all become part of thegene pool, which, etymologically, means thatwe are all little bits of chicken ...1.2.3.ooLingPA Game of Chicken

A Game of Chickent17

18HydrogentlemanlyHydrogentlemanlye gene ofgene poolcomes all the way from the ancient Greek wordgenos, whichmeans birth. It’s the root that youfind ingeneration, regenerationanddegeneration;and along with its Latin cousingenusit’s scattered generously throughout theEnglish language, often in places where you wouldn’t expect it.Takegenerous: the word originally meantwell-born, and because it was obviousthat well-bred people were magnanimous and peasants were stingy, it came tomean munificent. Indeed, the well-bredgentleman established such a reputationfor himself that the wordgentle, meaningsoft, was named after him. In fact, somegentlemen became so refined that theginingingerlyis probably just anothergenlurking in our language.Gingerlycertainly has nothing to do with ginger.Genosis hidden away in the very air that you breathe.e chemists ofthe late eighteenth century had an awful lot of trouble with thegases that make up the air. Oxygen, carbon dioxide, nitrogenand the rest all look exactly alike; they are transparent, theyare effectively weightless.e only real difference anybodycouldfind between them was their effects: what we nowcall oxygen makes things burn, while nitrogen putsthem out.Scientists spent a lot of time separating the different kindsof air and then had to decide what to call them all. Oxygenwas calledflammable airfor a while, but it didn’t catch on. Itjust didn’t have the right scientific ring to it. We all know thatscientific words need an obscure classical origin to make themsound impressive to those who wouldn’t know an idiopathiccraniofacial erythema1if it hit them in the face.Eventually, a Frenchman named Lavoisier decided that thesort of air that produced water when it was burnt should be calledthewater-producer. Being a scientist, he of course dressed this up inGreek, and the Greek for water producer ishydro-gen.e bit of airthat made things acidic he decided to call theacid-makeroroxy-gen,and the one that producednitrethen got callednitro-gen.gene

19HydrogentlemanlyArgon, the other major gas in air, wasn’t known about at the time, because it’s aninert gas and doesn’t produce anything at all.at’s why it’s called argon.ArgonisGreek forlazy.Most of the productive and reproductive things in the world havegenhiddensomewhere in their names. All words are not homogenous and sometimes they areengendered in odd ways. For example, a group of things that reproduce is agenusand if you’re talking about a wholegenus then you’re speaking ingeneral and ifyou’re ingeneral command of the troops you’re ageneral and ageneralcan order histroops to commitgenocide, which, etymologically, would be suicide.Of course, a general won’t commit genocide himself; he’ll probably assign the job tohis privates, andprivatesis a euphemism forgonads, which comes from exactly thesame root, for reasons that should be too obvious to need explaining ...OO1at’s a blush to you and me.

20The Old & New TesticleThe Old & New TesticleGonadsaretesticlesand testicles shouldn’t really have anything to do with the Oldand NewTestaments, but they do.e Testaments of the Bibletestifyto God’s truth.is is because the Latin forwitnesswastestis. From that one root,testis, English has inherited protest(bear witness for),detest(bear witness against), contest(bear witness competitively), andtesticle. Whatare testicles doing there?ey aretestifying to a man’s virility. Do you want to provethat you’re a real man? Well, yourtesticles willtestify in your favour.at’s the usual explanation, anyway.ere’s another, more interesting theory that inbygone days witnesses used to swear to things with their hands on their balls, or evenon other people’s balls. In the Book of Genesis, Abraham makes his servant swearnot to marry his son to a Canaanite girl.e King James version has this translation:‘I pray thee, thy hand under my thigh: And I will makethee swear by the LORD, the God of heaven, and theGod of the earth … ’Now, thatmaybe the correct translation, but the Hebrew doesn’t say thigh, it saysyarek, which means, approximately,soft bits. Nobody knows how oaths were sworn inthe ancient world, but many scholars believe that people didn’t put their hands on theirhearts or their thighs, but on the testicles of the man to whom they were swearing,which would make the connection betweentestisandtestesrather more direct.Testicles. Bollocks. Balls. Nuts. Cullions. Cojones. Goolies. Tallywags. Twiddle-diddles. Bawbles, trinkets, spermaria …ere are a hundred words for the danglers and they get everywhere. It’s enough tomake a respectable fellow blush. Do you enjoy the taste of avocado? So did I, untilthe terrible day when I realised that I was eating Aztec balls. You see, the Aztecsnoticed the avocado’s shape and decided that it resembled nothing so much as abig, green bollock. So they called it anahuakatl, their word for testicle. When theSpanish arrived they misheard this slightly and called itaguacate, and the Englishchanged this slightly toavocado. To remember that I used to like avocados with atouch of walnut oil only adds to my shame.OOTONewldessticle

21TThe Old & New TesticleEven if youflee to an ivory tower and sit there wearing an orchid and a scowl,it still means that you have a testicle in your buttonhole, because that’s what anorchid’s root resembles, andorchiswas the Greek for testicle. Indeed, the green-winged orchid used to rejoice in the nameFool’s Ballocks.e technical term forsomebody who hasa lot of ballsis apolyorchid.And it’s very possible that thisorbon which we all live comes from the same rootasorchid, in which case we are whirling around the Sun on a giant testis, six billiontrillion tons of gonad orcod, which is wherecod-philosophy,codswallopandcodpiececome from.ere are two codpieces at the top right of your computer keyboard, and how theygot there is a rather odd story …[CODTTTT

22Parenthetical CodpiecesParenthetical CodpiecesYour computer keyboard contains two pictures of codpieces, and it’s all the faultof the ancient Gauls, the original inhabitants of France. Gauls spoke Gaulish untilJulius Caesar came and cut them all into three parts. One of the Gaulish words thatthe Gauls used to speak wasbracameaning trousers.e Romans didn’t have a wordfor trousers because they all wore togas, and that’s why the Gaulish term survived.Frombracacame the early Frenchbraguemeaning trousers, and when they wanteda word for a codpiece they decided to call it abraguetteorlittle trousers.is is notto be confused withbaguette, meaning stick. In fact a Frenchman might brag thathis baguette was too big for his braguette, but then Frenchmen will claim anything.ey’rebraggarts(literallyone who shows offhis codpiece).Braguettes were much more important in the olden days, especially in armour.On the medieval battlefield, with arrowsflying hither and thither, a knight knewwhere he wanted the most protection. Henry VIII’s codpiece, for example, was agargantuan combination of efficiency and obscenity. It was big enough and shinyenough to frighten any enemy into disorganised retreat. It bulged out from theroyal groin and stretched up to a metal plate that protected the royal belly.And that is significant. What do you call the bit of stone that bulges out froma pillar to support a balcony or a roof ? Until the sixteenth century nobody hadbeen certain what to call them; but one day somebody must have been gazing ata cathedral wall and, in a moment of sudden clarity, realised that the architecturalsupports looked like nothing so much as Henry VIII’s groin.And so such architectural structures came to be known asbraggets, and that bringsus to Pocahontas …PIECE]

23Parenthetical Codpieces

24Parenthetical CodpiecesPocahontas was a princess of the Powhatan tribe, which lived inVirginia. Of course, the Powhatan tribe didn’tknowthey livedin Virginia.ey thought they lived in Tenakomakah, and so theEnglish thoughtfully came with guns to explain their mistake.But the Powhatan tribe were obstinate and went so far as to takeone of the Englishmen prisoner.ey were planning to kill himuntil Pocahontas intervened with her father and Captain JohnSmith was freed.e story goes that she had fallen madly in lovewith him and that they had a passionate affair, but as Pocahontaswas only ten years old at the time, we should probably moveswiftly on.Of course, it may not have happened exactly that way.e storyhas been improved beyond repair. But there definitelywasaPocahontas and there definitelywasa Captain John Smith, andthey seem to have been rather fond of each other.en he had anaccident with one of his guns and had to return to England.ecruel colonists told Pocahontas that John Smith was dead, andshe pined away in tears thinking that he was lost for ever. In fact,he wasn’t dead, he was writing a dictionary.e Sea-Man’s Grammar and Dictionary: Explaining all the DifficultTerms of Navigationhit the bookstands in 1627. It had all sortsof nautical jargon for the aspiring sailor to learn. But, for ourstory, the important thing is that Captain Smith speltbraggetsasbrackets, and the spelling stuck.

25Parenthetical Codpiecese original architectural device was called a bragget/bracket,because it looked like a codpiece. But what about a double bracket,which connects two horizontals to a vertical? An architecturaldouble bracket looks like this:[Look around you: there’s probably one on the nearest bookshelf.And just as a physical bracket got its name because it resembleda codpiece, so the punctuation bracket got its name because itresembled the structural component.In 1711 a man called William Whiston published a book calledPrimitive Christianity Revived.e book often quotes from Greeksources and when it does, it gives both Whiston’s translationandthe original in what he was thefirst man to call [brackets].And that’s why, if you look at the top right-handcorner of your computer keyboard, you will seetwo little codpieces …[ ]… lingering obscenely beside the letter P forpants.

26Suffering for my UnderwearSuffering for my Underwearnce upon a timethere was a chap who probably didn’t existand who probably wasn’t called Pantaleon. Legend has itthat he was personal physician to Emperor Maximianus.When the emperor discovered that his doctor was aChristian he got terribly upset and decreed that thedoctor should die.e execution went badly.ey tried to burn him alive,but thefire went out.ey threw him into molten leadbut it turned out to be cold.ey lashed a stone to himand chucked him into the sea, but the stonefloated.eythrew him to wild beasts, which were tamed.ey tried tohang him and the rope broke.ey tried to chop his head offbut the sword bent and he forgave the executioner.This last kindness was what earned the doctor the namePantaleon, which meansAll-Compassionate.In the end they got Pantaleon’s head offand he died, thus becoming one of themegalomartyrs(the great martyrs) of Greece. By the tenth century Saint Pantaleonhad become the patron saint of Venice.Pantalontherefore became a popularVenetian name and the Venetians themselves were often called thePantaloni.en, in the sixteenth century, came theCommedia Dell’Arte: short comic playsperformed by travelling troupes and always involving the same stock characterslike Harlequin and Scaramouch.In these plays Pantalone was the stereotypical Venetian. He was a merchant and amiser and a lustful old man, and he wore one-piece breeches, like Venetians did.eselong breeches therefore became known aspantaloons. Pantaloons were shortened topantsand the English (though not the Americans) called their underwearunderpants.Underpantswere again shortened topants, which is what I am now wearing.Pants are all-compassionate. Pants are saints.is means that my underwear isnamed after an early Christian martyr …Pans

27Suffering for my Underwear

28PansApanaceacuresabsolutely everything,which is useful if you’re in themiddle of apandemic, whichis one up from anepidemic.An epidemic is onlyamongthe people, whereas a pandemicmeansall the peoples of theworldare infected.PansSopantsandpantiescome from Saint Pantaleon and yourundies are all-compassionate and your small-clothes aremartyred. St Pantaleon was therefore a linguistic relation ofSt Pancras (whoheld everything) and Pandora, who wasgiveneverythingin a box that she really shouldn’t have opened.Panis one of those elements that gets everywhere. It’s pan-present. For example, when afilm camerapansacross fromone face to another, thatpancomes from the same Greek wordthat you’llfind in your underpants. Cinematicpanningis shortfor thePanoramic Camera, which was patented back in 1868and so-called because apanoramais where you see everything.Pan also gives you all sorts of terribly useful words that for some reason loiter in darkand musty corners of the dictionary.Pantophobia, for example, is the granddaddy of allphobias as it meansa morbid fear of absolutely everything. Pantophobia is the inevitableoutcome ofpandiabolism– the belief that the Devil runs the world – and, in its milderforms, is apanpathy, orone of those feelings that everybody has now and then.Pandora

29PansHowever, not allpansmeanall. It’s one of the great problems of etymology thatthere are no hard and fast rules: nothing is panapplicable.e pans and pots inyour kitchen have nothing whatsoever to do with panoramas and pan-Africanism.Panic is not a fear of everything; it is, in fact, the terror that the Greek god Pan,who rules the forests, is able to induce in anybody who takes a walk in the woodsafter dark. And the Greek god Pan is not panipotent. Nobody knows where hisname comes from – all we’re sure of is that he played the pan-pipes.Back in 27 BC the Roman general Marcus Agrippa built a big temple on the edgeof Rome and, in afit of indecision, decided to dedicate it to all the gods at once.Six hundred years later the building was still standing and the Pope decided toturn it into a Christian church dedicated to St Mary and the Martyrs. Fourteenhundred years after that it’s still standing and still has its original roof. Technicallyit’s now called the Church of Saint Mary, but the tourists still call it thePantheon,orAll the Gods.The exact opposite of the Pantheon isPandemonium, the placeof all the demons. These days pandemonium is just a word weuse to mean that everything is a bit chaotic, but originally itwas a particular palace in Hell. It was one of the hundreds ofEnglish words that were invented by John Milton…