Nude (pronounced nood or nyood)
(1) Naked or unclothed, as a person or the body.
(2) Without the usual coverings, furnishings etc; bare.
(3) In art, being or prominently displaying a representation of the nude human figure.
(4) In law, a contract made without a consideration or other legal essential and therefore invalid (nudum pactum).
(5) In historic commercial use (usually for underwear), a light grayish-yellow brown to brownish-pink color (no longer in common use; now considered offensive because of the cultural implications of its association with white skin).
1531: As an artistic euphemism for naked, use was first applied to sculpture first emerged in the 1610s but the term not common in painting until the mid-nineteenth century when the idea of "the nude" was recognized as a genre. The origin of the use in painting in the sense of "the representation of the undraped human figure in visual art" is said to date from 1708 and be derived from the French nud, an obsolete variant of nu (naked, nude, bare) also from the Latin nūdus. The phrase idea of being in the nude (in a condition of being unclothed) emerged in the 1850s in parallel with the use in art criticism.
The adjective nude in legal use dates from the 1530s and meant "unsupported, not formally attested", the use from the Latin nūdus (naked, bare, unclothed, stripped) from the primitive Indo-European root nogw- (naked). In legal matters it was typically applied in contract law (hence the "nude contract") and, by extension, the general sense of "mere, plain, simple" emerged twenty years later. is attested from 1550s. In reference to the human body, "unclothed, undraped," it is an artistic euphemism for naked, dating from 1610s (implied in nudity) but not in common use in this sense until mid-nineteenth century. The noun nudie (a nude show) dates from 1935 while the much earlier noun nudification (making naked) was from 1838, presumably a direct borrowing of the French nudification which had been in use since 1833. The practice of nudism actually has roots in Antiquity but nudist (as applied to both practitioners and practice) came into use only in 1929 as an adjective and noun, both influenced by the French nudiste. The noun nudism (the cult and practice of going unclothed) also dates from 1929 and in the UK, however inaccurately, it was described as a cult of German origin which had been picked up also by the more bohemian of the French, the more respectable London press linking the practice with vegetarianism, physical exercise, pagan worship and the eating of seeds.
Naked (pronounced ney-kid (U) or neck-ed (non-U))
(1) Being without clothing or covering; nude.
(2) Without adequate clothing.
(3) A natural environment bare of any covering, overlying matter, vegetation, foliage, or the like.
(4) Bare, stripped, or destitute.
(5) A descriptor of the most basic version of something sometimes more elaborate or embellished.
(6) In optics, as applied to the eye, sight etc, unassisted by a microscope, telescope, or other instrument.
(7) Defenseless; unprotected; exposed.
(8) Not accompanied or supplemented by anything else.
(9) In botany, (of seeds) not enclosed in an ovary; (of flowers) without a calyx or perianth; (of branches etc) without leaves; (of stalks, leaves etc) without hairs or pubescence.
(10) In zoology, having no covering of hair, feathers, shell etc.
(11) In motorcycle design, a machine in which the frame and engine are substantially exposed by virtue of screens and fairings not being fitted.
Pre 900: From the Middle English nakede & naked (without the usual or customary covering" (of a sword etc)) from the Old English nacod (nude, bare, empty or not fully clothed); related to the Old High German nackot, the Old Norse noktr and Latin nudus; cognate with the Dutch naakt, the German nackt, the Gothic naqths; akin to the Old Norse nakinn, the Latin nūdus, the Greek gymnós and Sanskrit nagnás. Source was the Proto-Germanic nakwathaz, also the root of the Old Frisian nakad, the Middle Dutch naket, the Old Norse nökkviðr, the Old Swedish nakuþer and the Gothic naqaþs and ultimate source the primitive European nogw (naked), related to the Sanskrit nagna, the Hittite nekumant, the Old Persian nagna, the Lithuanian nuogas, the Old Church Slavonic nagu, the Russian nagoi, the Old Irish nocht and the Welsh noeth. As applied to qualities, actions, etc, use emerged in the early thirteenth century, the phrase “naked truth” first noted in 1585 in Alexander Montgomerie's (circa 1550-1598) The Cherry and the Slae. The phrase “naked as a jaybird (1943) was earlier referenced as “naked as a robin” (1879); the earliest known comparative based on it was the fourteenth century “naked as a needle”. “Naked eye” is from 1660s, the form unnecessary in the world before improvements in lens grinding technology led to the invention of telescopes and microscopes. The adjective nakedly (without concealment, plainly, openly) was from circa 1200. The noun nakedness was from the Old English nacedness (nudity, bareness).
Nude or naked?
In many places the words may correctly be used interchangeably. In law, a nude and a naked contract are the same, a pact which is unenforceable because if doesn’t possess all the elements required to be valid. The legal maxim nuda pactio obligationem non parit signifies a naked promise which is a promise without anything being provided in return. Nuda pactio obligationem non parit thus does not create a legal obligation.
Kenneth Clark, a cultural elitist of a kind now perhaps either extinct or rendered silent by a less deferential culture, opened The Nude: A Study in Ideal Form (1956) by noting naked implied something embarrassing yet nude “… carries, in educated usage, no uncomfortable overtone”. Clark’s view was there were works of art in which there were nudes but other depictions were just variations of nakedness for whatever purpose. The nude, he concluded, "…is not the subject of art, but a form of art." In other word, the models in men's magazines were photographed in a state of nakedness while the women rendered in fine art were part of the tradition of the nude. Photographers who thought their work artistic didn't agree and the onset of cultural relativism means such debates no longer happen. However, the adoption by some that nude was something to used exclusively about works of art dates only from the eighteenth century, a movement led by critics and the commercial art industry which wanted the English market again to start buying the many nudes available for sale but which, even before the Victorian era, had fallen from fashion.
Bert Stern’s (1929-2013) nude photo shoot of Marilyn Monroe (1926–1962) was commissioned by Vogue magazine and shot over three days, some six weeks before her death. In book form, the images captured were compiled and published as The Last Sitting (first edition, William Morrow and Company (1982) ISBN 0-688-01173-X). Stern reprised his work in 2008 with Lindsay Lohan, the photographs published in February 2008’s spring fashion issue of New York magazine. Stern chose the medium of forty-six years earlier, committing the images to celluloid rather than using anything digital. The reprised sessions visually echoed the original with a languorous air though the diaphanous fabrics were draped sometimes less artfully than all those years ago. He later expressed ambivalence about the shoot, hinting regret at having imitated his own work but the photographs remain an exemplar of Lohanary.
The theory of the naked motorcycle is a machine reduced to its essence of a frame, wheels and an engine, thereby making it lighter than more exotically configured models which may include flashings, windshields, saddlebags or fairings. Simple physics mean a machine with less mass accelerates, turns and stops with less demand of energy and at low speed they tend to be easier to manoeuvre, are lighter to hold up when static and certainly easier to mount on a centre-stand. There's also the attraction there are fewer things to break, fibreglass fairings being notorious for getting cracked, scratched or broken and Perspex screens are, with age, prone to cloudiness. The look however is why some buy naked bikes, the intricacies of the exposed mechanicals appealing especially to engineers anxious to display the quality of the frame's welding or the indefinable but real attraction of Allen-headed bolts. They're also quick. Although sacrificing the aerodynamic advantages gained by fairings means in some cases the naked machines can have lower top speeds, they tend to accelerate with more alacrity, offer instant responsiveness and, in street use, top speeds are now anyway rarely approached.
Lindsay Lohan, Playboy magazine, January/February 2012.
Nudity & nakedness are defined by both context & circumstances. The cover photograph for Lindsay Lohan's 2012 Playboy shoot was, in the narrow technical sense, ambiguous because the chair could have been concealing a pair of delicate lace knickers. However, because of the nature of the publication, this is a nude shot (shoes don't count; everybody knows that).
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