Vantage

Vantage (pronounced van-tij or vahn-tij)

(1) A position, condition, or place affording some advantage or a commanding view, expressed usually as "vantage point".

(2) An advantage or superiority (obsolete except when used by Aston-Martin).

(3) In lawn tennis, short for advantage (obsolete except for a few tennis snobs).

1250-1300: Middle English from Anglo-French, by apheresis from the Old French avantage (advantage or profit).  The phrase vantage point first noted in 1865, a variation of the earlier vantage ground from circa 1610.  The early English alternative vauntage, soon faded from use and the derived forms, vantages (third-person singular simple present) vantaging (present participle) and vantaged (simple past and past participle) are now wholly obsolete. 

DB2 Vantage DHC

The word Vantage was first used by Aston Martin in 1950 on the DB2.  The title indicated an uprated engine specification: a pair of larger carburetors and a higher compression ratio which added 20bhp to the standard DB2’s 105.  Almost 250 were built with both saloon (AM’s term for a two door coupé) and drophead coupé (DHC, the term then often used by English manufacturers to refer to formal convertibles) coachwork.

DB4 Vantage Saloon

Strangely, although the Vantage moniker caught on with aficionados, it wouldn’t be again used by the factory for almost a decade.  The DB4 Vantage was released with the Series IV cars in 1961, now with triple carburetors and a higher compression ratio, the cylinder head was also revised with bigger valves, the package yielding 266bhp, some ten per cent more than a standard DB4.  The Vantage this time was visibly distinct as well as technically upgraded, gaining the faired-in headlights and bright aluminum trim from the earlier DB4 GT.

DB5 Vantage Saloon

While mechanically almost identical to the Series IV, the more spacious Series V Vantage of 1962, the last in the DB4 line, was stylistically different, being essentially a prototype for the upcoming DB5.  The two are virtually indistinguishable; indeed one Series V DB4 Vantage was used alongside a DB5 in the filming of the James Bond film Goldfinger.  Of the 141 built, the rarest and most desirable were the half-dozen with the optional DB4 GT engine.

DB5 Vantage DHC

The Vantage option remained on the books when the DB5 was released in 1965.  Now with triple Weber carburetors, the factory rated the Vantage at 325bhp, a jump of 40 over the standard engine and only 68 of the 887 saloons were built to the Vantage specification.  More rare still was the DB5 Vantage convertible, a mere eight of the 123 built although, over the decades, a great many of both have be upgraded to the Vantage standard.

DB6 Vantage Saloon

Introduced in 1965 and made in two series, the now Kham-tailed DB6 remained in production until 1970.  The DB6 Vantage was mechanically identical to its predecessor but there were detail changes.  Retained was the Vantage badge introduced with the DB5, but the nomenclature was now added as a discreet script on the side strakes and much attention was devoted to improving passenger comfort.  At this point, while coupés continued to be labelled saloons, convertibles were now styled Volantes (a derivation of the Italian word for "flying").  Spread between two series, out of a total DB6 production of 1739, 405 Saloons and 42 Vantage Volantes were built

DBS Vantage Saloon

By the mid 1960s, the market in which Aston Martin competed, although larger, was more contested than even a decade earlier.  As early as 1961, Jaguar’s E-Type had, at a fraction of the cost, matched the DBs in style and performance, if not quality and their V12 project was known to be well-advanced.  The Italian thoroughbreds, Ferrari, Maserati and Lamboghini, all with eight and twelve cylinder engines, were setting new standards and there was now an array of trans-Atlantic hybrids which combined exquisite European coachwork with cheap, effortless and reliable American V8 power.  Aston Martin’s six cylinder engine, Vantage tweaked or not, was starting to look technologically bankrupt.  Accordingly, the factory developed both a new car, the DBS, and their own V8.  For a variety of reasons, the V8 wasn’t ready by the time the DBS, a typical Aston Martin mix of traditional and modern, was released in 1967 so the familiar six, again available in Standard or Vantage form was carried over from the DB6 although, to counter increased weight, the Vantage version boasted revised camshafts.

Vantage Saloon

The DBS and DB6 were produced in parallel until 1970, the last few DB6s built after the DBS V8’s release the previous year.  The last of the six cylinder DBSs came in a run of seventy named simply Vantage, all with the revised twin-headlight coachwork introduced in 1972 which would serve the line essentially unchanged until 1989.  Historically, the final seventy were then a unique anomaly, the first time a Vantage was not the most but the least potent offering.

V8 Vantage Volante

That historical quirk was certainly rectified after the Vantage’s half-decade hiatus, during which the first oil crisis of the early 1970s had transformed the market.  Most of the trans-Atlantic hybrids had been driven extinct, Jaguar had moved in a different direction, Mercedes-Benz had chosen not to compete, Lamborghini, Aston Martin and Maserati all had their own brushes with bankruptcy, Porsche were moving up-market to become a competitor and governments were imposing more and more regulations.  The 1977 Aston Martin Vantage took a different approach to the mid-engined Italian or turbo-charged German opposition.  Although there was much attention to aerodynamics and chassis dynamics, mostly it was about simple brute force, the additional power over the standard V8 gained by the traditional methods used in Vantages past and it proved effective, able to run with the Lamborghini Countach, the Ferrari BB and even the Porsche 911 Turbo of the time.  This time, the factory didn’t release a claimed power output, describing it instead as “adequate”.

V8 Vantage Zagato Saloon

The Vantage, as both saloon and volante, remained in production until 1989 and served as the basis of the shorter, radical, and very rare, V8 Vantage Zagato saloon and volante.

Virage Vantage V550 Saloon

High-priced brute force remained a gap in the market and Aston Martin continued its commitment with a Virage-based supercharged Vantage in 1993 which, by 1998, was running twin superchargers, its 600bhp making it the most powerful production powerplant in the world, making the Vantage capable of close to 200 mph (320 km/h); Virage production ended in 2000.

DB7 Vantage Saloon

The DB7, first shown at the Geneva Motor Show in 1999, became the next Vantage and now under Ford’s ownership, it used a 5.9 litre V12 engine developed in co-operation with Cosworth Technology.  It was the first time a Vantage wasn’t a development of the standard engine, the straight six in the DB7 being a different configuration and remarkably, by historic standards, the DB7 Vantage verged on mass-production: over four-thousand built over a four and a half year life which ended in 2003.

VH V8 Vantage Saloon

Ford were pleased by the sales and in 2003, again at the Geneva Motor Show, unveiled on the VH platform the AMV8 Vantage Concept, so well-received the order books were bulging by the time the production version was released in 2005.  It proved to be the most successful car in Aston Martin’s history and this time it really was mass-produced, necessitating construction of a second production line; eventually more than fifteen thousand would leave the factory.  Less brute force than before, the new V8 Vantage relied on technology to exceed the performance of most of its predecessors.  For those attracted by more performance or more exclusivity, in 2009, Aston Martin unveiled the V12 Vantage, weighing little more than its V8 sibling but boasting an additional hundred-odd horsepower and able to reach 190 mph (305 km/h).  In 2012, the V12 Vantage Zagato was added to the books.

V12 Vantage S

However, after the GFC (Global Financial Crisis), the expansion of the money supply (essentially governments giving cash to the rich) at the upper end of the market meant there was increasing taste for conspicuous consumption.  Like other manufacturers anxious to meet demand with supply, Aston Martin responded with a bespoke programme, offering degrees of customisation to the point of one-off creations but also, new product lines, hence the 2013 V12 Vantage S.  It joined the new generation of machines now able routinely to attain the 200mph (320 km/h) speeds first promised by the Italians in the early 1970s but not realised because of the means available at the time to defeat the formidable opposition of physics.  At a tested 205mph (330 km/h), the terminal velocity of the V12 Vantage S made it the fastest Aston Martin ever and, in a nicely nostalgic touch, in 2016, even a manual gearbox was offered.

Vantage Roadster

The times are changing and there is an end-of-an-era feel to the latest Vantage.  Now with a Mercedes-Benz-AMG four litre V8, it doesn’t quite match the top-end performance of the V12 but is said to be a more practical day-to-day proposition to own while being less environmentally thuggish.  These are relative terms and while today’s Vantage is not quite how things used to be done, it’s unlikely there’ll ever be another big V12.  Those who can may be advised to enjoy it while it’s here.

Aston Martin Vantage Production Numbers

DB2 Vantage: 248 saloon and DHC

DB4 Vantage: 135 (plus 6 DB4 GT Vantage)

DB5 Vantage: 68 saloon (plus 8 DHC)

DB6 Vantage: 335 saloon (plus 29 Volante)

DB6 Vantage MkII: 70 saloon (plus 13 Volante)

DBS Vantage:290 saloon

Vantage 70 saloon

V8 Vantage: 372 saloon (plus 194 Vantage Volante)

V8 Vantage Zagato: 52 saloon (plus 8 Vantage Volante)

Vantage/V8 Vantage: 273 saloon (plus 40 specials)

DB7 V12 Vantage: 2,086 coupe (plus 2,056 Volante)

V8 Vantage (VH): 15,458 coupe (plus 6,231 Roadster)

V12 Vantage: 2,957 (all types including V12 Vantage S)

Vantablack

Vantablack (pronounced van-tah-blak)

A black material which absorbs 99.965% of light reaching its surface.

2014: Modern English construct, Vanta, an acronym for Vertically Aligned NanoTube Arrays + black.

Vantablack is built from clusters of vertical nanotubes on a substrate using a modified chemical vapour deposition process (CVD).  When light strikes Vantablack, instead of reflecting back and thus being visible, it becomes trapped, bouncing among the tubes until absorbed, dissipating into heat.  The densities are impressive for physical stuff; each square centimetre contains about a billion nanotubes.

Industrially, it’s an improvement over previous products because it can be created at 750°f (400°c) whereas an earlier substance, developed by NASA, demanded a 1380°f (750°c) environment.  However, in manufacturing, this is expensive and, Vantablack can be grown only on materials capable of enduring this temperature, further limiting commercial application.  Despite this Vantablack is a functional improvement which also offers better thermal stability and a greater resistance to mechanical vibration.  First developed in the UK’s National Physical Laboratory, trademark is held by Surrey NanoSystems.

The blackest known material ever in earthly existence, Vantablack is used to improve the performance of both ground and space-based cameras, improve heat-absorption in solar arrays and prevent stray light entering telescopes.  The military apply it to thermal camouflage because if used to coat 3D objects, they appear visually flat “black holes” without any shape or depth.

Potential LVBD customer.  Lindsay Lohan and the quest for the perfect LBD.

Nictate

Nictate (pronounced nik-teyt)

To wink.

1755–1765: From the Latin nictātus, past participle of nictāre (to wink, fidget, blink, signal with the eyes), related to nicere (to beckon) from the primitive Indo-European root kneigwh- (to blink, to draw together (the eyes or eyelids)), source also of the Gothic hniewan, the Old High German nigan (to bow, be inclined).  The related forms are nictitated & nictitating.

The alteration nictitate

The intransitive verb nictitate is sometimes described as an alternative spelling of nictate but it’s more a niche alteration for a specialised niche.  Nictitate’s origins are the same as nictate, coming from the Latin word for winking, nictāre.  The addition of the extra syllable is thought to have been under the influence of Latin verbs ending in -itare, such as palpitare and agitare (from which, respectively, English gained palpitate and agitate).  The niche is in zoology, a role it’s played since scientists in the early eighteenth century began to describe a “nictitating membrane”, the so-called "third eyelid", the thin, usually transparent membrane in the eyes of birds, fishes, and other vertebrates, the function of which is to help keep the eyeball moist and clean.

Noted nictator, Lindsay Lohan, nictating.

Platform

 Platform (pronounced plat-fawrm)

(1) A horizontal surface or structure raised above the surrounding area.

(2) The raised area between or alongside the tracks of a railroad station, from which the cars of the train are entered.

(3) The open entrance area, or vestibule, at the end of a railroad passenger car.

(4) A landing in a flight of stairs.

(5) A public statement of the principles, objectives, and policy of a political party, especially as put forth by the representatives of the party in a convention to nominate candidates for an election; a body of principles on which a person or group takes a stand in appealing to the public; program; a set of principles; plan.

(6) A place for public discussion; forum.

(7) A deck-like construction on which the drill rig of an offshore oil or gas well is erected.

(8) In building, a relatively flat member or construction for distributing weight, as a wall plate, grillage, etc.

(9) In military jargon, solid ground on which artillery pieces are mounted or a metal stand or base attached to certain types of artillery pieces.

(10) In geology, a vast area of undisturbed sedimentary rocks which, together with a shield, constitutes a craton.

(11) In footwear design, a thick insert of leather, cork, or other sturdy material between the uppers and the sole of a shoe, usually intended for stylish effect or to give added height.

(12) In computing, a standardised hardware or software system.

(13) In manufacturing, a standardised design which permits variations to be produced without structural change to the base. 

1540–1550: From the earlier platte forme, a derivative of the Middle French plateforme (a flat form) from plate (flat) from the Old French plat, from the Ancient Greek πλατύς (platús) (flat) + forme (form) from the Latin fōrma (shape; figure; form”).

Lindsay Lohan in Saint Laurent Billy leopard-print platform boots (Saint Laurent part number is 5324690SR00), New York, March 2019.

Monocoque

Monocoque (pronounced mon-uh-kohk or mon-oh-kok (non-U))

(1) A type of boat, aircraft, or rocket construction in which the shell carries most of the stresses.

(2) A type of automotive construction in which the body is combined with the chassis as a single unit.

(3) A unit of this type.

1911: An English borrowing from the French monocoque, the construct being mono + coque.  Mono is from the Ancient Greek μόνος (monos) (alone, only, sole, single), from the primitive Indo-European root men (small, isolated).  Coque is from the Old French coque (shell) and concha (conch, shell), from the Latin coccum (berry) and concha (conch, shell) from the Ancient Greek kokkos (berry, seed).  In the early twentieth century, it was the French who were most dominant in the development of aviation.  Words like monocoque, aileron, fuselage and empennage are of French origin and endure in English because it’s a vacuum-cleaner of a language which sucks in anything from anywhere which is handy and manageable.

Noted monocoques

Deperdussin Monocoque, 1912.

A monocoque (sometime referred to as structural skin) is a form of structural engineering where loads and stresses are distributed through an object's external skin rather than a frame; concept is most analogous with an egg shell. Early airplanes were built using wood or steel tubes covered with starched fabric, the fabric rendering contributing only a small part to rigidity.  A monocoque construction integrates skin and frame into a single load-bearing shell, reducing weight and adding strength.  Although examples flew as early as 1911, airframes built as aluminium-alloy monocoques would not become common until the mid 1930s.  In a pure design where only function matters, almost anything can be made a stressed component, even engine blocks and windscreens.

Lotus 25, 1962.

In automotive design, the word monocoque is often misused, treated as a descriptor for anything built without a separate chassis.  In fact, most road vehicles, apart from a handful of expensive exotics, are built either with a separate chassis (trucks and some SUVs) or are of unibody/unitary construction where box sections, bulkheads and tubes to provide most of the structural integrity, the outer-skin adding little or no strength or stiffness.  Monocoque construction was first seen in Formula one in 1962, rendered always in aluminium alloys until 1981 when McLaren adopted carbon-fibre.  A year later, the McLaren F1 followed the same principles, becoming the first road car built as a carbon-fibre monocoque.

BRM P83 (H16), 1966.

In 1966, there was nothing revolutionary about the BRM P83’s monocoque chassis.  Four years earlier, in the second season of the voiturette era, that revolution had been triggered by the Lotus 25, built with the first fully stressed monocoque chassis, an epoch still unfolding as materials engineering evolves; the carbon-fibre monocoques seen first in the 1981 McLaren MP4/1 becoming soon ubiquitous.  The P83 used a monocoque made from riveted Duralumin (the word a portmanteau of durable and aluminium), an orthodox construction for the time.  Its novelty was that the engine was a stressed part of the monocoque.

BRM Type 15 (V16), 1949.

The innovation was born of necessity.  Not discouraged by the glorious failure of the extraordinary V16 BRM had built, with much fanfare and little success, shortly after the war, the decision was taken again to join together two V8s in one sixteen cylinder unit.  Whereas in 1949, the V8s had been coupled at the centre to create a V16, for 1966, the engines were re-cast as 180^o flat 8s with one mounted atop another in an H configuration, a two-crankshaft arrangement not seen since the big Napier-Sabre H24 aero-engines used in the last days of the war.  The design yielded the advantage that it was short, affording designers some flexibility in lineal placement, but little else.  It was heavy and tall, exacerbating further the high centre of gravity already created by the need to raise the engine location so the lower exhaust systems would clear the ground.  Just as significantly, it was wide, too wide to fit into a monocoque socket and thus was taken the decision to make the engine an integral, load-bearing element of the chassis.  There was no other choice.

BRM H16 engine and gearbox, 1966.

 

Structurally, it worked, the monocoque was strong and stable and despite the weight and height, the P83 might have worked if the H16 had delivered the promised horsepower but the numbers were never realised.  The early power output was higher than the opposition but it wasn’t enough to compensate for the drawbacks inherent in the design and, these being so fundamental they couldn’t be corrected, the only hope was even more power.  The path to power was followed and modest increases were gained but it was never enough and time ran out before the plan to go from 32 to 64 valves could come to fruition, an endeavour some suggested would merely have “compounded the existing error on an even grander scale.”  Additionally, with every increase in power and weight, the already high fuel consumption worsened.

The H16 did win one grand prix, albeit in a Lotus rather than a BRM monocoque, but that was a rare success; of the forty times it started a race, twenty-seven ended prematurely.  The irony of the tale is that in the two seasons BRM ran the 440 horsepower H16 with its sixteen cylinders, two crankshafts, eight camshafts and thirty-two valves, the championship in both years was won by the Repco-Brabham, its engine with 320 horsepower, eight cylinders, one crankshaft, two camshafts and sixteen valves.  Adding insult to the exquisitely bespoke H16’s injury, the Repco engine was based on an old Oldsmobile block which General Motors had abandoned.  After two seasons the H16 venture was retired, replaced by a conventional V12.

Masticate

Masticate (pronounced mas-ti-keyt)

(1) To chew (usually food).

(2) To reduce materials (such as rubber) to a pulp by crushing or kneading.

1640–1650: A back-formation of the earlier mastication, from the Late Latin masticātus, past participle of masticāre (to chew), from the past participle stem of the post-Classical Latin masticō (I chew), from the Ancient Greek μαστιχάω (mastikháō) (I gnash the teeth”).

Thespian Lindsay Lohan with cheeseburger, masticating.

Masticate and masticating are verbs, masticable and masticated are adjectives, masticatory, masticator & mastication are nouns.  All forms tend now to be seen in specialised niches, masticatory almost always in medical or scientific literature and seems to be a favorite in entymology.  Other than for technical purposes, masticate’s most obvious niche is in humor, the effect achieved by using the word in a way easily confused with the almost homophonic masturbate, a device used also with the thespian/lesbian homophone.  Usually then, the monosyllabic "chew" is better.

The purported fallacy

The purported fallacy is a rhetorical device intended to confuse or suggest irrelevant considerations into the mind of the listener?  It’s related to but distinct from the “red herring”.  A well-known example is often quoted but is unfortunately a myth, fake news in its time but still refusing to die.  In the Florida primary contest for the Democratic nomination in the 1950 Senate campaign, Claude Pepper (1900–1989; Democrat Senator for Florida 1936-1951, Democrat member of House of Representatives (Florida 1963-1989)) lost to George Smathers (1913–2007; Democrat member of House of Representatives (Florida) 1947-1951 and Democrat Senator for Florida 1951-1969).  Smathers had managed Pepper's successful 1938 campaign and the association continued, Pepper pulling strings so Smathers could avoid military service during WWII and helping him become an assistant attorney-general.

The 1950 Senate election in Florida was noted for flamboyant oratory, ideological ferocity and personal dramas but that was neither novel nor unique to Florida.  Smathers labeled his opponent “Red” Pepper which, if unfair, was funny and, in the early cold war, not an unusual tactic, Senator Joe McCarthy (1908–1957; Republican Senator for Wisconsin 1947-1957) that year having delivered his inflammatory Lincoln Day speech in which he claimed to have list of known communists employed by the State Department.  However, what arose during the campaign was the legend that Smathers, assuming low education and high prejudice in the minds of some voters, had made speeches in rural areas accusing his opponent of being “a shameless extrovert”, having “a sister who was once a thespian in wicked New York”, having "practiced celibacy before his marriage" and being someone “who had been seen masticating fish”.

Irresistibly good copy, the words appeared in the 17 April issue of Time magazine and despite cautioning they were “of doubtful authenticity” they’ve for decades been recycled, used for illustrative effect for this and that across the political spectrum; Robert Sherrill on the left and William F Buckley on the right, both claiming it happened.  The truth, which Buckley later acknowledged, was the words turned out to be the work of journalists covering the campaign who, over drinks, began inventing double-talk quotations and swapping them.  It became a contest to see who could write the funniest and some of them leaked, published as fact.

After decades of estrangement, a Pepper fund-raising letter ended up in Smathers' office.  Smathers responded with a contribution and Pepper, after joking that the cheque bounced, sent a note of thanks.  Smathers said he would contribute to Pepper as long as he was in the Congress as a champion of the elderly, adding he was now “old enough to where I kind of feel like he may speak for me''.

Satirists work in a similar vein to those tipsy reporters.  In 2006, in a parody of the attack ads the Liberal Party was using against Stephen Harper’s (b 1959; prime minister of Canada 2006-2015) Conservative government, NPR offered:

Stephen Harper has plans for Canada, scary plans.  Scary, evil plans.  We can't make this up, we're not allowed to. Stephen Harper owns a dragon.  He keeps it in a shed. Seriously.  Stephen Harper drinks his own blood.  We saw him. We're not allowed to make this up.  The liberal party, let's see how badly we can lose this thing.

Bachelorette

Bachelorette (pronounced bach-uh-luh-ret or bach-luh-ret)

(1) An unmarried young woman.

(2) In Canada, a term for a small apartment suitable for a single man.

1935: Some sources date the word from 1895 but it appears more likely bachelor-girl was first seen in 1888 and bachelorette is an American invention first noted in 1935.  Root is bachelor which came from the Middle English bachelor, derived from Anglo-Norman bacheler which exists in modern French as bachelier.  The Medieval Latin baccalārius was from Late Latin baccalāris and the Tuscan baccalare.  Ultimate source is a bit murky and strangely, although Old French had bachelette (young girl) in the 1400s, it's something English seems never to have borrowed.

Once were spinsters

Neither bachelor-girl (1888) nor bachelorette (1935) can really be considered proto-feminist because neither replaced spinster; merely re-defined as something applied to older un-married women; in the shifting hierarchy of misogyny, ageism prevailed.  It may thus be thought casual, female-specific ageism, especially because older, un-married men remain described as bachelors even if centenarians.  It’s not clear when spinster came to be thought of as disparaging and offensive but the usage certainly declined with rapidity after World War II and both it and bachelor have effectively been replaced with the gender-neutral single although in English common-law, the older forms lasted until 2005.

There's another quirk.  Middle French had the unrelated bachelette (young girl) which persists in the Modern French bachelière but that applies exclusively to students.  In the narrow technical sense, still sometimes insisted upon in British circles, a more proper neologism would be bacheloress, since -ess is the usual English suffix denoting a female subject, while -ette is a French-origin diminutive suffix, traditionally used to describe something smaller in size.  However, bachelorette was invented in the US where the -ette suffix can indicate a feminine version of a noun without implying a change in size.

In these gender-conscious times, the -ess suffix is anyway falling into disuse due to attempts to neutralize professional terms.  Except for historic references, it’s probably now obsolete.

Noted bachelorette Lindsay Lohan.

Gestapo

Gestapo (pronounced guh-stah-poh or guh-shtah-poh (German)

(1) The German state secret police during the Nazi regime, 1933-1945.

(2) A critical descriptor of any organ (usually) of a state which to some degree resembles Nazi Gestapo, especially in the brutal suppression of opposition (often initial lower-case).

1933: An abbreviated form of the German Geheime Staatspolizei (the construct being Ge(heime) Sta(ats)po(lizei)); literally “secret state police”.

A typically German abbreviation

The Gestapo was an outgrowth of the Prussian police.  Shortly after Hitler assumed power in 1933, the political and intelligence sections of the Prussian police were detached from the general force and, after being purged of those not sympathetic to the new regime, re-staffed with Nazis.  In April 1933, the two entities were merged as to become the Geheime Staatspolizei (secret state police), the famous abbreviation the work of a post office clerk whose job description included truncating long names (of which the German language has many) so they would fit on franking stamps.  He intended originally to name it Geheimes Polizeiamt (Secret Police Office) but the German initials (GPA) were too similar to those of the USSR’s Gosudarstvennoye Politicheskoye Upravlenie (State Political Directorate), known throughout Europe as the GPU.  It’s an urban myth that Hugo Boss designed the uniforms of both the Gestapo and the SS; Hugo Boss was one of a number of companies contracted to produce the uniforms.

Assart

Assart (pronounced ess-sart)

(1) In English law, as an intransitive verb, the act of grubbing up trees or bushes to convert forest into arable land; variant is the less common essart.

(2) In English law, as a noun, a piece of land cleared.

Pre 1000: From the Middle French essarter, from the Old French essart, from the Late Latin exartum, assumed from the Vulgar Latin exsartum, neuter of exsartus, past participle of exsarire (to weed out), the construct being ex (out) + sarire (to hoe, weed).  It was akin to the Old High German sarf (sharp), the Latin sarpere (to prune), the Ancient Greek harpagē (hook, rake) and the Sanskrit sṛṇī (sickle).

Land clearance

To assart is to clear forested lands agricultural or other purposes; in English land law, it was illegal to assart any part of a royal forest without permission and, once approval was granted, the parcel of land assarted was described as “an assart” (except in northern England where the common law term was “a riding”).  In medieval England, clearances happened usually on common land which was then put to private use, “assart rents” were those paid to the Crown for the land assarted.  

Assarting has been practiced since the last days of the hunter-gatherer societies towards the end of the pre-historic era, usually to increase the production of food to feed rising populations.  The thousand-year trend, in most parts of the world settled or colonised by Europeans, has been that assartment has tended to increase the acreage of cleared land suitable for agriculture and reduce the size of forests.  However, one aberration happened during the fourteenth century when the Black Death pandemic radically depopulated the countryside and many assarted areas reverted to woodland.

Lindsay Lohan, 2013.