Episode 5 - Eager To Make My Point

According to my wife's cousin (Brandon Vogt, et al), Kansas is flat as a pancake. Brandon now lives in the sharp shadows of the Rocky Mountains, so we're going to take his word on all matters topological.

Years ago the late great announcer, Paul Sherwen, was calling the Tour de France bike race. As the race entered a mountain stage, Paul said some words that I'll never forget: 

"Now these boys are turning up into

the sharp teeth of the mountains,

and trust me, they didn't come here

to just go halfway up."

Let's join Paul Sherwen and think about those sharp mountain teeth.

Are you familiar with America's Sawtooth mountain range? South of Albuquerque we find the Sierra Cuchillo, the "saw knife" mountains. And of course you know the Sierra Nevada range in California. Does Sierra sound familiar? It means what it sounds like - serrated.

The ancient root of our word family today is -ak- meaning "sharp". In Episode 4, we discovered chevrons – obtuse angles. Obtuse describes the condition of being dull. You don't want an obtuse angle on your knife edge. You sharpen your knife to an "acute" angle. ak-ute. Sharp.

Sherwen was "accurate" (also an -ak- word meaning "exact", "precise") when he described the Alps mountain range as sharp. One peak is even called a "horn"…Mattherhorn, another is the Eiger mountain.

Words describe shapes in the three dimensional world. Those descriptive words then help describe ideas, attributes, and even feelings. Think of all things you refer to as sharp, from sharp dresser to sharp cheese, sharp eye, sharp wit, sharp tongue.

The word "acid" uses an ac sound instead of ak. Acid is often described as being sharp and this certainly includes foods with acidic ingredients (like lemons) which we say have a "sharp taste". In the early days of chemistry, scientists found that all acids had one component in common. They named this element: "oxygen" (ox is a form of our root -ak- and gen which means "cause" or "make" (as in generate)). Oxygen… Sharp making!

What if you made wine very acidic? The French call wine "vin" and if you make it sharp it's called vin – egar… "vinegar". We're reminded again of that sharp mountain in the alps - vinegar, Eiger, and of course eager.

Let's go ahead and pair our sharp wine with some sharp cheese? Bacteria is added to milk and the longer cheese ages, the more the bacteria converts the lactose sugars in milk into lactic acid.

Smells can be sharp, too. If your barbeque was bathed in acrid smoke, it's not going to taste good. Of course, an "axe" is sharp. If it’s dull, well then, you have an axe to grind!

Do you remember Wile E. Coyote? Wile E. mail-ordered his contraptions from The "Acme" Co. Acme means "highest" - the sharp point, the top, only the best. By the same reasoning, "acne" also means point.

BONUS WORD: Remember what my TV buddy said, "Now these boys are turning up into the sharp teeth of the mountains, and trust me, they didn't come here to just go halfway up."

Tour de France announcer, Paul Sherwen assured me that these two-wheeled gladiators haven't come to the sharp mountain points of the Alps to stop at half-way. But what if they had? How would we describe a person who stopped half-way up the sharp mountain?

"half" plus "sharp"
Half leads us to the word part "medi" as in medium and sharp leads us straight back to -ak-… "mediocre" - a literal word-picture of someone that had the ability or desire to go to Acme, the top, but stopped half-way. What a disappointment! Mediocre. That's a sharp rebuke!

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Episode 4 – Let's Name The Place After Our Guests

Welcome to Thinking Backwords.
I'm your host, Clark H Smith.
We're thinking about the common ancestors of modern words.

Today's words range from the study of geography to geometry to gastronomy. They all arise from the ancient root -ank-, meaning angle. 

It strikes me as humorous that England is actually named after an obscure piece of land the size of New York City far away from its own shores. The English language is built almost entirely from foreign words so it makes sense that "England" itself should be a foreign word.

From high school history class, do you remember tales of the Jutes, Angles, Saxons. Maybe you identify your heritage as Anglo-Saxon. These folks lived in Northern Europe and had eager aspirations to conquer distant lands. The Angles a land we now call England.

Where did that ambitious old clan of Angles get their name? Obviously, we can't overlook the clue staring us in the face – angle.

Angle is a geometry term that comes to us from that ancient word root -ank-. The same root word is found as the -ag- sound in geometry terms like diagonal, pentagon, octagon, and so on. Our root word is also found at the bottom of the ocean - anchor.

The Land of the Angles – let's call it Angle-Land is now in the larger province of Holstein of milk-cow fame. Angle-land was mapped along a line between three major towns. This line angled down in the middle, and thus the province, looked like a very broad V, or a chevron, an obtuse angle. The people who lived in the angle-shaped land were called Angles. England is named for the people who lived far away on a piece of land shaped like an angle. 

Bonus Word: Remember that Angle-land appeared on a map as a sort of Chevron shape. The back lower leg of a goat, just like a human ankle, also forms an angle, a chevron. Chevron is based in an ancient root word for goat that forms the basis of Capricorn, capricious, chevre, Chevrolet, etc.

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Episode 3 – Call In The Cavalry

Welcome to Thinking Backwords.
I'm your host, Clark H Smith.
We're diving into the distant ancestors of modern words.

Today's words are Cavalry, Chivalry, and Cavalier. Although they don't clearly sound like it, they all arise from the ancient root – ekwo – as in equine – relating to horses and those that ride them. As language does, the KW sound in –ekwo– morphed slightly into the CV sound in our key words, Cavalry, Chivalry.

Let's play with some pretty little words first. In fact, Let’s start with “pretty”. Now trust me, "pretty" originally "manly, gallant". Then, the way words do, "pretty" slowly morphed to "ingeniously or cleverly made". So we might say, "that Rolex watch is very pretty."

After that, in language evolutionary time, "pretty" morphed into "beautiful in a slight way". As in, "Isn't that a pretty pansy flower."
Flashing back to Camelot era, you hear someone say, “Oh, here comes Lancelot, Sir Lancelot, isn’t he pretty man?" In those times, that would be a great compliment. These days, we'd never call a chivalrous knight, "pretty".

Recently, my wife and I watched a 1950s sci-fi movie.  It was performed in English,  but it had Portuguese subtitles. A meeting of gentlemen gathered to discuss how to fight the space aliens.
When the word “gentleman” was spoken, the Portugese word “cavalheiro” appeared in the subtitles. But alas, the gentlemen did not coming riding to the meeting on horses. Even today in Portugese, the word for gentleman harkens back to the word family that includes chivalry, cavalry, and cavalier.

Let's add some definitions to these words.
Cavalry: "soldiers who travel and fight on horseback"
Chivalry: means "having the high social and moral code of medieval feudalism". Chivalry is synonymous with gallantry, courage, and courtly manners, putting us in mind again of the behavior of true gentlemen.

But, here's where the word family falls over backwords. Cavalier: now means "disdainful". In modern usage we would say "LeBron had a pretty cavalier attitude about missing two free throws. They would have won the game."

Earlier, cavalier had a sense of "easy, offhand". The pastor had a cavalier way of speaking, he made his point, but was pretty casual about it.

Thinking further backwords, cavalier originally described the lifestyle of a knight. "Sir Gawain was as cavalier in the jousting match as he was courting the ladies."

Cavalier certainly means something different now than it did originally. So how did these pretty, gallant boys on their fine horses wind up meaning disdainful or having “no concern for a serious matter”?

Imagine if you will… If you’re a by-gosh horse-handling, lance-wielding, lady-wooing, pretty, gallant knight. You might sashay your way into town of a Saturday night with a bit of swagger. You have an easy, off-hand, devil-may-care demeanor about you. Why? Because you’re a knight of the realm! And you're not intimidated by anyone or anything. If you cause a ruckus in a bar, no one is going to call you out.

But that dang attitude gets annoying after a while. The local cobbler shows up at the tavern and commences getting hydrated. He starts behaving with the knight's who-gives-a-dang attitude, He’s even called "cavalier" – mockingly. The adjective sticks and the next overly casual fellow and then the next overly casual fellow all get tagged "cavalier". And in a whorl of linguistic chaos, the word that originally defined a strong, courageous, gallant warrior now means ambivalent, indifferent… and annoying. One knight's casual attitude is a cobbler's irritating behavior.

Bonus word: Gallant

We're going back to King Arthur's court for this one. Just as in the modern military, there are uniforms meant for combat and there are dress uniforms designed almost strictly for appearance significant events. Let's imagine the king summons his one-percenters to a grand gala celebrating his realm's latest conquest. The knights are perfectly gallant. They dress in their prettiest attire, their hardware brightly shining, and they are "politely attentive to women". That's what gallant encompasses.

But just like "cavalier", gallant took on a less noble meaning in the form of "gallivant". A poem from about 1800 defines gallivant for us perfectly.

Young Lobski said to his ugly wife,

"I'm off till to-morrow to fish, my life;"

Says Mrs. Lobski, "I'm sure you a'nt",

But you brute you are going to gallivant."

What Mrs. Lobski said was right,

Gay Mr. Lobski was out all night.

He ne'er went to fish, 'tis known very well

But where he went I shall not tell.

Gallivanting, not very chivalrous, is it?

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Episode 2 - Both Sides Now

 Welcome to Thinking Backwords.

I'm your host, Clark H Smith.

We're diving into the distant ancestors of modern words.

On side A of this episode, we'll Think Backwords about words like ambassador and ambulance. Then we'll Flip over to side B and think about the *ultimate* family of words.

Joni Mitchell is the songbird of my youth. And now, as I've grown beyond childhood into an adult, her songs still whisper words of joy. Joni sang that growth to adulthood helped her see Both Sides Now of love and life. Seeing Both sides, that's an important perspective.

The idea of both (or all) sides is deeply rooted in language. The ancient root word -ambhi- means "from both sides" or even "around". What do you call an animal, say a frog, that can live in both water and on land?  Amphibios (amphi = both + bios = life habitats). What do you call a government official who discusses national interests with the other side? Ambassador. 

Now, here's the fun part of words. Sometimes words wind up with almost the opposite of their original meaning. What does "ambivalent" mean to you?

Let's test the meaning. I want to buy you lunch. Do you want barbeque or pizza?

If you don't have a preference, and if you like to use big words, you would say you were  ambivalent. In that sense, ambivalent means apathetic – no feeling for one option or the other.

But, that is the opposite of what ambivalent actually means! We've got ambi – meaning both sides and the root word of "valiant" meaning strong. Ambivalent actually means strong for both sides. So If I offer you barbeque or pizza, and you are truly ambivalent, you yell, Absolutely, Yes! I'll have both!!

Now that we've had a robust lunch, let's walk off some of those calories

The ancient root word for walk is -el or sometimes heard as -ul.

Let's take amb- (both or around) and add -ul… we get ambulate, to walk around. Perambulate is a word built from per = through, amb = both, and ul = walk).  It means simply to walk around on all sides – to go anywhere. When the Brits take their baby out for a walk around the park, they don't use a stroller, they put baby in a pram – a great big contraction of perambulate.

It's kind of funny, to me, that the ambhi word family has more than one word like ambivalent – a word that has flipped sides to mean the opposite.

Let's say that excessive lunch just isn't sitting well with you. Not well at all!

You're beginning to think that you need medical attention at a hospital. But what if you can't make it to the hospital? What do you do? You call 911 to summon the hospital to come to you, but you don't want them to walk, do you??

Nowadays, we have fantastic motorized hospitals, painted brightly with fast motors, bright lights, and loud sirens. But indeed, before automobiles, the hospital just came walking to you. The French called it the hôspital ambulant - the walking hospital. Especially during war, the medics would walk (or run!) out to the injured in the field.

Now isn't that just the way language works? Hospital is clearly the important part of the phrase hôspital ambulant. But when we shorten phrases, we often drop the important part and keep the details.

Now to Side B.

Decades ago, a radio host asked a housemaid how many people she tended to in the home. "Well, let's see, there are four boys, three girls, one adult, and one adultress."

This simple statement riveted my attention for years. What is the difference between an adult and adulterer".Why is it so desirable to be one and not the other?

Adult - Let's start with the common prefix ad- meaning "to". The root word, -ult, does that ring a bell? Ult is an ancient root word that means "beyond". You see it in words like "ultimate", "ulterior", and even "alter" and "alternate". Adult literally means "to beyond" or more fully it describes a person who has lived to an age beyond childhood.

But what about "adulter"? Instead of going beyond childhood, adultery means going beyond a relationship. An adulterer is someone who has gone to (someone else) beyond (the marriage partner). So there we have here identical word parts with dramatically different meanings.

BONUS WORD:

Hidalgo is a given-name in Spanish cultures. Hidalgo - the 'hid' part is a form of the ancient word that is related to "fillial" and "affiliate" with a core meaning of "family".

Hid, in this case, means son.

Hid—al—go.

The 'al' part of the word derives from that root meaning of "beyond". The 'al' in Hidalgo word implies "beyond you and me". Hidalgo literally means "the son who is beyond... not simply my son, not simply your son, but is the son of all of us."

We have a term "favorite son" that has this same idea, Iif a popular or accomplished person is from our home town, we can all claim ownership… parenthood of them. We've lost the meaning of Hidalgo, but it is a beautiful idea, don't you think?

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Episode 1 - Pirate Food

Welcome to Thinking Backwords.

I'm your host, Clark H Smith.

We're diving into the distant ancestors of modern words.

Today’s words are beard, barb, barber, and barbeque. They all arise from an ancient root word – bhardha – meaning beard.

Beards, come in all shapes and sizes – ranging, from Shakespeare to Duck Dynasty.

There are even bearded iris and bearded turkeys.

Barbs vary, too. If you look at the business end of a fishhook, you actually see a little beard – a whisker of metal set off from the form of the hook. That's a barb.

Barbed wire has the same sense – strands of wire with whiskers on them… sharp, pointy, don’t-mess-with-Texas kind of whiskers.

Do you remember this: “Shave and a haircut, two bits?” In days long gone by, when a man wanted a clean shave, he visited his local barber. The barber groomed the whole head - top and bottom.

The Foodies tell us Wordies that "barbeque" is a term used by the native folks of Central America and the Caribbean Islands. Local culture shaped what kind of meat and what seasonings were fused together in their favorite barbeque.

Barbeque methods evolved over time based on local preferences and local resources so it is really not plausible to say there is only one way to prepare barbeque.

How do we get from beards to burnt ends?

Meat + Heat + Time is the holy trinity of barbeque.

The word “barbeque” comes to us from the Caribbean word barbacoa – which means just what you think… slow smoked, seasoned meat.

When you barbeque meat, you want to keep the meat and the heat source at a reasonable distance from each other so the meat can cook longer – there’s the trinity. Even in our modern rigs, meat is suspended on a rack at some distance above the source of the rising heat and smoke. 

In the native home of the barbacoa, the preferred wood for separating the meat from the fire was the branches of a tree scientifically named ficus barbata – commonly known as the Bearded Fig. And yes, ficus barbata is a close cousin of that ubiquitous office plant, the ficus tree.

The wood of the bearded fig is dense and pretty heat resistant. It’s great for standing strong between meat and fire.

The Spanish word for this ficus barbata is Los Barbadoes.

Yes! Barbados, an island in the Caribbean, is named specifically for that tree.

But why would a tree be described as having a beard?

The ficus barbata grows aerial roots, dangling from the lower limbs... like a beard.

The tree got its name because it literally looks like it’s growing a beard.

Barbacoa is the word for the TRINITY -  meat cooked low and slow over heat and smoke on a rack of bearded fig wood.

BONUS WORD

Now about that Pirate Food… Just as in merry old Pirate Times, our modern barbeque rigs have a device that holds the meat up over the smoke, away from direct heat.

We usually call that a grill or grate. But centuries ago there was a word that referred specifically to the rack of the barbado wood that the meat was placed on. That rack of wood was called a buccan. Yes, buccan, as in buccaneer.

The apparatus for cooking barbeque lent its name to those festive young men who enjoyed a hearty meal of smoked meat before venturing out on a wee bit of pillaging and piracy around the Caribbean.

The Tampa Bay Buccaneers and the Pittsburg Pirates (who are nicknamed the Bucs - short for "buccaneer") carry on the lore and legend of fish hooks, barber shops, bearded trees, and tasty, tasty meat.

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