February 2012
6 posts
6 tags
Antiscii
The antiscii are those who live on the same meridian but on opposite sides of the equator, so that at noon their shadows fall in opposite directions.
Schott’s Quintessential Miscellany by Ben Schott, 2011.
8 tags
Chess Mates
Queen’s mate - a Gracious mate
Bishop’s mate - a Gentle mate
Knight’s mate - a Gallant mate
Rook’s mate - a Forcible mate
Pawn’s mate - a Disgraceful mate
The Book of Chess by George H. Selkirk, 1868. Found in Schott’s Quintessential Miscellany by Ben Schott, 2011.
6 tags
Montessori exercise
One Montessori exercise for veery young children consists in providing them two boxes and a number of geometrical solids made of wood, with instructions to put together in one box those forms that are angular, like the tetrahedron and the cube, and in the other those that are smooth to the touch, like the egg and the sphere.
Projective Ornament by Claude Bragdon, 1915.
6 tags
Magic Squares
There is a magic square of four carved in Sanskrit characters on the gate of the fort at Gwalior, in India.
Projective Ornament by Claude Bragdon, 1915.
3 tags
Nine Worthies
Joshua
David
Judas Maccabeus
Hector
Alexander
Julius Caesar
King Arthur
Charlemagne
Godfrey de Bouillon
The Mummy, the Will and the Crypt by John Bellairs, 1984.
6 tags
Blue Flames & Evil
“If an evil person is near, candle flames burn blue. That’s what Shakespeare says, and it happens to be true.”
The Mummy, the Will and the Crypt by John Bellairs, 1984.
January 2012
186 posts
5 tags
9 tags
Whitwitch
A pretend conjuror, whose power depends on his learning, and not from a contract with the devil.
A glossary of provincial and local words used in England by Samuel Pegge, 1839.
10 tags
Watsail
A drinking song, sung on twelfth-day eve, throwing toast to the apple-trees in order to have a fruitful year, which seems to be a relic of the heathen sacrifice to Pomona.
A glossary of provincial and local words used in England by Samuel Pegge, 1839.
6 tags
Tantrells
Idle unsettled people, who will not fix to any employment.
A glossary of provincial and local words used in England by Samuel Pegge, 1839.
6 tags
Snow-Bones
Remnants of snow after a thaw.
A glossary of provincial and local words used in England by Samuel Pegge, 1839.
7 tags
Slim
Wicked, mischievous, perverse; from the German schlim. It is a word generally used in the same sense with sly.
A glossary of provincial and local words used in England by Samuel Pegge, 1839.
7 tags
Scopperloit
A time of idleness or relaxation, play-time.
A glossary of provincial and local words used in England by Samuel Pegge, 1839.
8 tags
Pringle
A small silver Scotch coin, worth about a penny, with two XX on it.
A glossary of provincial and local words used in England by Samuel Pegge, 1839.
7 tags
Ni! Ni!
An exclamation expressing amazement on seeing any one finely dressed.
A glossary of provincial and local words used in England by Samuel Pegge, 1839.
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Ming
To remind, give warning, or allude to a thing.
A glossary of provincial and local words used in England by Samuel Pegge, 1839.
8 tags
Hotch
To hotch beans is to separate them from the peas after they are threshed.
A glossary of provincial and local words used in England by Samuel Pegge, 1839.
7 tags
Gra-Mercy!
An exclamation. Fr. Grande-mercie. See Titus Andronicus.
A glossary of provincial and local words used in England by Samuel Pegge, 1839.
6 tags
Flantum-Flatherum
A woman fantastically dressed in a variety of colors.
A glossary of provincial and local words used in England by Samuel Pegge, 1839.
5 tags
Elvish
Irritable, spiteful. The bees are elvish today.
A glossary of provincial and local words used in England by Samuel Pegge, 1839.
6 tags
Dumbledore
The brown cock-chafer. Cornish. Or: A humble, or bumble-bee.
A glossary of provincial and local words used in England by Samuel Pegge, 1839.
6 tags
Doundrins
Afternoon drinkings.
A glossary of provincial and local words used in England by Samuel Pegge, 1839.
6 tags
Conkabell
An icicle, in the Somersetshire dialect called a Clinkabell.
A glossary of provincial and local words used in England by Samuel Pegge, 1839.
6 tags
Colt-Pixy
A spirit or fairy in the shape of a horse which (whickers) neighs and misleads horses into bogs.
A glossary of provincial and local words used in England by Samuel Pegge, 1839.
7 tags
6 tags
Cagmag
Bad food, or other coarse things.
A glossary of provincial and local words used in England by Samuel Pegge, 1839.
5 tags
Arain
A spider; from the French, Araignee.
A glossary of provincial and local words used in England by Samuel Pegge, 1839.
8 tags
Witching Hour of Midnight
An allusion to Shakespeare’s Hamlet: ‘the very witching time of night, when graveyards yawn’.
A Dictionary of Cliches by Eric Partridge, 1940.
6 tags
Under the Southern Cross
In the Southern Hemisphere: an Australian cliche dating from 1880.
A Dictionary of Cliches by Eric Partridge, 1940.
6 tags
A Triton Among Minnows
A person far pre-eminent above his fellows; a sea-god among the fish.
A Dictionary of Cliches by Eric Partridge, 1940.
4 tags
To temper the wind to the shorn lamb
To make things tolerable - less harsh, less difficult - to the inexperienced or helpless.
A Dictionary of Cliches by Eric Partridge, 1940.
7 tags
Solvitur Ambulando
The matter - or difficulty - is solved by walking.
A Dictionary of Cliches by Eric Partridge, 1940.
3 tags
Sine Qua Non
An indispensible condition or thing. Literally ‘without which, nothing.’
A Dictionary of Cliches by Eric Partridge, 1940.
4 tags
“Si jeunesse savait, si vieillesse pouvait.”
– “If youth but knew; if old age but could.” A Dictionary of Cliches by Eric Partridge, 1940.
6 tags
A Roland for an Oliver
A fair exchange; an equal reciprocation. Two celebrated knights in La Chanson de Roland and other medieval romances.
A Dictionary of Cliches by Eric Partridge, 1940.
4 tags
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On the Qui Vive
Alert; on the alert, the look-out; sharply watchful. From ‘qui vive la?’, a sentry’s cry of ‘who goes there?”
A Dictionary of Cliches by Eric Partridge, 1940.
6 tags
Mirabile Dictu
Marvellous (or very strange) to relate.
A Dictionary of Cliches by Eric Partridge, 1940.
5 tags
"The king is dead, long live the king"
One powerful man, one acknowledged authority, is dead; welcome to his successor! From the literal sense - which is a translation of le roi est mort: vive le roi.
A Dictionary of Cliches by Eric Partridge, 1940.
6 tags
Jupiter Pluvius
Rain (properly, the dispenser of rain), as in ‘Jupiter Pluvius permitting’.
A Dictionary of Cliches by Eric Partridge, 1940.
7 tags
Hell for Leather
At great speed; in urgent or desperate haste.
A Dictionary of Cliches by Eric Partridge, 1940.
6 tags
To Chronicle Small Beer
To record trifles, analyse the unimportant. From Shakespeare’s Othello: ‘To suckle fools, and chronicle small beer’
A Dictionary of Cliches by Eric Partridge, 1940.
5 tags
Castles in Spain
Fond imaginings; a rosy dream of future wealth and happiness.
A Dictionary of Cliches by Eric Partridge, 1940.
6 tags
Blood and Iron
This phrase (Blut und Eisen), ‘military force as opposed to diplomacy’, was used by Bismarck in a speech delivered to the Diet in 1862.
A Dictionary of Cliches by Eric Partridge, 1940.
6 tags
Barmecide Feast
An imaginary sumptuous feast; great illusory benefits. The Barmecides, a princely family of Bagdad, once put before a beggar a succession of magnificent dishes - all empty.
A Dictionary of Cliches by Eric Partridge, 1940.
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To Take French Leave
The Emily Post of France in the eighteenth century ruled that a guest who had pressing engagement elsewhere might without propriety leave the function which he was attending without going through the formality of seeking his host or hostess and making a ceremonious apology for his departure. The latter, it felt, might lead to a general exodus of guests and be embarrassing to the host.
A Hog on...
5 tags
Gone to Pot
The earliest usage, which goes back at least to the sixteenth century, seems to have been literal, actually going into the pot, chopped up into pieces as meat, for stewing in a pot. A number of writers use the phrase with allusion to death, in some instances with the implication that the person dying had been the victim of a cannibalistic feast.
A Hog on Ice by Charles Earle Funk, 1948.
5 tags
The Riot Act (1716)
“Our Sovereign Lord the King chargeth and commandeth all persons being assembled immediately to disperse themselves, and peaceably to depart to their habitations or to their lawful business, upon the pains contained in the act made in the first year of King George for preserving tumultuous and riotous assemblies. God save the King.
A Hog on Ice by Charles Earle Funk, 1948.