Rationale

Rationale (pronounced rash-uh-nal)

(1) The fundamental reason or reasons serving to account for something.

(2) A statement of reasons.

(3) A reasoned exposition of principles, especially one defining the fundamental reasons for a course of action or belief; a justification for action.

(4) A liturgical vestment worn by some Christian bishops of various denominations (now rare), the origin of which is the breastplate worn by Israelite high priests (a translation of λογεῖον (logeîon) or λόγιον (logion) (oracle) in the Septuagint version of Exodus 28)).  The French spelling (rational) of the Latin ratiōnāle was used in Biblical translations.

(5) In engineering, a design rationale is the explicit documentation of the reasons behind decisions made when designing a system; it was once used of what now would be described as a set of parameters.

1650-1660: From the Late Latin ratiōnāle (exposition of principles), nominative singular neuter of ratiōnālis (rational, of reason).  After some early inventiveness, the modern sense "fundamental reason, the rational basis or motive of anything" became standardised during the (1680s).  In the nature of such things, many rationales are constructed ex post facto.  Rationale is a noun; the noun plural is rationales or rationalia.

Prince Metternich & Dr Rudd: illustrating rationale & rational

Portrait of Prince Metternich (1822), miniature on card by Friedrich Lieder (1780-1859).

Rationale and rational are sometimes confused.  A rationale is a process variously of explanation, reason or justification of something that need not be at all rational (although many fashioned ex post facto are re-formulated thus).  To be rational, something must make sense and be capable of being understood by the orthodox, accepted methods of the time.  That something may subsequently be shown to be irrational does not mean it did not at some time appear rational; one can construct a rationale for even something irrational.  To construct a post-Napoleonic Europe, Prince Metternich (Prince Klemens of Metternich-Winneburg zu Beilstein (1773–1859); foreign minister of the Austrian Empire 1809-1848 & chancellor 1821-1848) built a rationale for the Congress of Vienna (1814-1815) that was well understood.  It was vision of a Europe, divided between the great powers, in which was maintained a perpetual balance of power which would ensure peace.  That in the two centuries since, the Congress has attached much criticism, largely for imposing a stultifying air of reaction on the continent, does not render the structure irrational nor detract from Metternich’s rationale.  Some historians have come to regard the congress more fondly and while it’s not true the consequence was a century of peace in Europe, it created a framework which meant a good number of decades in that time were notably less blood-soaked than what came before and certainly what followed.

Dr Rudd at the ceremony to be conferred DPhil, University of Oxford, September, 2022.

By 2009, Kevin Rudd ((b 1957); Prime Minister of Australia 2007-2010 & June-September 2013), having realised being prime-minister was a squandering of intellectual talent, embarked on a re-design of relationships in the Asia-Pacific, structured in a way to suit what was self-evidently obvious: he should assume regional leadership.  These things do happen when folk get carried away.  Not discouraged by the restrained enthusiasm for his good idea, Mr Rudd penned one of his wordy rationales which, to him, must have sounded rational but less impressed was just about everybody else in the region including his own cabinet and it’s difficult to recall any hint of interest from other countries.  Mr Rudd quibbled a bit, claiming his use of the word community was just diplomatic shorthand and he wasn’t suggesting anything like what the EU ever was or had become but just better way of discussing problems.  Anyway, it for a while gave him a chance to use phrases like “ongoing and continuing discussions” and “regional and sub-regional architecture” so there was that.  By 2010 the idea had been allowed quietly to die and he had more pressing problems.

Attaining the premiership was Rudd’s mistake.  Had he never achieved to position he’d probably be spoken of as “the best prime-minister Australia never had” but instead he’s among those (and of late there have been a few) remembered as the Roman historian Tacitus (circa 56–circa 120) in the first volume of his Histories (circa 100) wrote of Galba (3 BC–AD 69; Roman Emperor 68-69): "...omnium consensu capax imperii nisi imperasset" (everyone would have agreed he was qualified for governing if he had not held the office).  His background was as a senior public servant who provided advice to others so they could make decisions and he enjoyed a solid career which was clearly well-suited to his skills.  Unfortunately, when occupying the highest political office in the land, he proved indecisive and too often inclined to refer to committees matters which he should have insisted came to cabinet with the necessary documents.  His other character flaw was he seemed unable to understand there was a difference between “leadership” and “command”, unable to realise there was a difference between the structured hierarchy of the public service and the swirling clatter of politics.  His career in The Lodge (the prime-minister’s official residence in Canberra) can be recalled as the Italian historian and politician Francesco Guicciardini (1483–1540) noted of Pope Clement VII (1478–1534; pope 1523-1534): “…knowledgeable and effective as a  subordinate, he fell victim when in charged to timidity, perplexity and habitual irresolution.”  With that, the Italian writer Piero Vettori (1499–1585) concurred, writing: “From a great and renowned cardinal, he was transformed into a little and despised pope”, a sentiment familiar in the phrase repeated in militaries around the world (outstanding major; average colonel; lousy general) to describe that truism in organizational behaviour: “Everyone gets promoted to their own level of incompetence”.

That aphorism was from The Peter Principle (1970), written by Raymond Hull (1919–1985) and based on the research of Laurence Peter (1919–1990), the idea being someone who proves successful in one role will be promoted and if competent there, they will be promoted again.  However, should they fail, within the hierarchy, that is the point of their incompetence, the implication being that the tendency is, as time passes, more and more positions within a corporation will be filled by the incompetent.  The exceptions of course are (1) those competent souls who for whatever reason decline promotion and (2) the habitually successful who will in theory continue to be promoted until they reach the top and, if they prove competent there, this results in the paradox of the typical corporation being run by someone competent but staffed substantially by the incompetent.  In politics, reaching the top means becoming prime-minister, president or some similar office and as Winston Churchill (1875-1965; UK prime-minister 1940-1945 & 1951-1955) described it: "...if he trips he must be sustained. If he makes mistakes they must be covered. If he sleeps he must not wantonly be disturbed. If he is no good he must be poleaxed.  In one of the more amusing recent episodes in politics, the Australian Labor Party (ALP) decided Dr Rudd had been promoted to the relevant point and poleaxed him, a back-stabbing which remains one of the best organized and executed seen in years.  Subsequently, the party concluded his replacement was even more of a dud and restored Dr Rudd to the job, a second coming which lasted but a few months but that was long enough for him to revenge himself upon the hatchet men responsible for his downfall so there was that.       

Still, after his political career (which can be thought a success because he did did reach the top of the “greasy pole” and the delivered the ALP a handsome election victory although their gratitude was short-lived (a general tendency in democracies noted (sometimes gleefully) by many political scientists)) he has been busy, even if the secretary-generalship of the United Nations (UN) (an office which is an irresistible lure for a certain type) proved elusive.  Recently he became Dr Rudd, awarded Doctorate of Philosophy (DPhil) by the University of Oxford.  His 420 page thesis, written over four years, explores the world view of Xi Jinping (b 1953; general secretary of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) and paramount leader of the People's Republic of China (PRC) since 2013) and the relationship of his ideology to both the direction taken by the CCP and the links with the thoughts (and their consequences) of Chairman Mao (Mao Zedong 1893–1976; chairman of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) 1949-1976).

Dr Rudd says his thesis argues “…there has been a significant change in China’s ideological worldview under Xi Jinping compared with previous ideological orthodoxies under Deng Xiaoping, Jiang Zemin and Hu Jintao [and summarises] Xi’s worldview as a new form of ‘Marxist-Leninist Nationalism’”.  Dr Rudd says he preferred “Marxist Nationalism” because “the term contains within it three core propositions”: (1) “Xi’s Leninism has taken both the party and Chinese politics in general to the left” (and he defines “left” for these purposes as “…the reassertion of the power of the party over all public policy as well as elevating the position of the individual leader against the rest of collective leadership”), (2) “Xi’s notion of Marxism has similarly taken the centre of gravity of Chinese economic thought to the left” ("left" in this aspect defined as “…a new priority for party-state intervention in the economy, state-owned enterprises over the private sector and a new ideology of greater income equality”) and (3) “Xi has also taken Chinese nationalism to the right (“right” here meaning “a new assertion of Chinese national power as reflected in a new array of nationalist ‘banner terms’ that are now used in the party’s wider ideological discourse.”)  Dr Rudd views these three forces as “…part of a wider reification of the overall role of ideology under Xi Jinping. This has been seen in the fresh application of Marxist Leninist concepts of dialectical materialism, historical materialism, the primary stage of socialism, contradiction and struggle across the range of China’s current domestic and international challenges. The role of nationalism has also been enhanced within Xi’s new ideological framework. This hybrid form of Marxist Nationalist ideology is also being increasingly codified within the unfolding canon of Xi Jinping thought.” 

“Finally, the thesis argues there is a high degree of correlation between these ideological changes on the one hand and changes in the real world of Chinese politics, economic policy and a more assertive foreign policy on the other - including a different approach to Chinese multilateral policy as observed by diplomatic practitioners at the UN in New York.  The thesis concludes these changes in Xi Jinping’s ideological worldview and its impact on Chinese politics and public policy is best explained by a theoretical framework that integrates Authoritarian Resilience Theory, the realist and constructivist insights of the English School of International Relations Theory, and Foreign Policy Analysis.”  Clearly, Dr Rudd thinks the CCP has come a long way since comrade Stalin (1878-1953; Soviet leader 1924-1953) casually dismissed Maoist theory as “ideologically primitive”.

Since March 2023, Dr Rudd has served as Australian Ambassador to the United States, the announcement of the appointment attracting some speculation there may be a secret protocol to the contract, providing for him to report to the prime-minister rather than the foreign minister.  It was mischievous speculation and there has been little but praise for the solid work he has been doing in the Washington embassy.  Dr Rudd’s role attracted headlines in March 2022 when a interview with Donald Trump (b 1946; US president 2017-2021) was broadcast in which the former president was acquainted (apparently for the first time) with some uncomplimentary assessments Dr Rudd had made of him including describing him “the most destructive president in history” and “a traitor to the West”.

Having doubtless heard and ignored worse over the years, Mr Trump seemed little concerned but did respond in his usual style, observing he didn’t know much about Dr Rudd except he’d heard he was “a little bit nasty” and “not the brightest bulb”, adding “he’d not be there long” if hostile to a second Trump presidency.  Trumpologists analysing these thoughts suggested the mildness of the reaction indicated the matter was unlikely to be pursued were he to return to the Oval Office, noting his habit of tending to ignore or forget about anything except actual threats to his immediate self-interest.  After taking office in 2017, when asked if he would pursue the legal action he’d during the campaign threatened against Bill (b 1946; US president 1993-2001) & crooked Hillary Clinton (b 1947; US secretary of state 2009-2013) (mostly on the basis of crooked Hillary’s crooked crookedness), he quickly brushed it off saying: “No, they’re good people” and moving on.  It’s thought Dr Rudd won't end up in the diplomatic deep-freeze, the most severe version of which is for a host nation to declare a diplomat "persona non grata" (the construct being the Latin persōna (person) + nōn (not) + grāta (from grātus (acceptable)), the consequence of which is an expulsion from the territory and the worst fate he may suffer is not receiving an invitation to a round of golf (something unlikely much to upset him).  Others however should be worried, in a second Trump White House, there will be vengeance.

Like "diplomatic toothache" and "null & void", the phrase "persona non gratia" has become part of general language, the utility being in few words describing what would otherwise take many more.  Impressionistically, it would seem "troubled starlets" are more than most declared "persona non gratia".

Impeach

Impeach (pronounced im-peech)

(1) To accuse (a public official) before an appropriate tribunal of misconduct in office.

(2) In law, as “to impeach a witness”; to demonstrate in court that a testimony under oath contradicts another testimony from the same person, usually one taken during deposition.

(3) To bring an accusation against; to call in question; cast an imputation upon:

(4) In British criminal law, to accuse of a crime, especially of treason or some other offence against the state

(5) In the US and some other jurisdictions, to charge (a public official) with an offence committed in office.

(6) To hinder, impede, or prevent (archaic).

(7) To call to account (now rare).

1350–1400: From the Middle English empechen & enpeshen, from the Anglo-French empecher (to hinder) from the Old French empeechier from the Late Latin impedicāre (to fetter, trap, entangle or catch), the construct being im- + pedic(a) (a fetter (derivative of pēs (foot))) + -ā- (a thematic vowel) + -re (the Latin infinitive suffix) and cognate with French empêcher (to prevent); The most usual Latin forms were impedicō & impedicāre.  Impeach is a verb, impeachment & impeachability &  are nouns, impeaching & impeached are verbs and impeachable & impeachmentworthy are adjectives (although not all authorities acknowledge the latter as a standard form); the noun plural is impeachments.

An English import the Americans made their own 

Although most associated with the US where the constitution permits the House of Representatives to impeach government officials (most notably the president) and send them for trial in the Senate, the concept of impeachment is a borrowing from the procedures of the UK Parliament.  Always a rare mechanism, impeachment was first used in England in 1376 with the last UK case in 1806 and while technically extant, is probably obsolete although it’s not unknown for relics of the UK’s long legal past occasionally to be resuscitated.  What is more likely is that matters once dealt with by impeachment would now be brought before a court although most historians and constitutional lawyers seem to believe it remains part of UK constitutional law and abolition would demand legislation.  That was exactly what select committees recommended in 1967 and again ten years later but nothing was done and despite the New Labour government (1997-2010) imposing some quite radical structural changes on the legal system, the mechanism of impeachment remained untouched.  In September 2019, it was reported that opposition politicians in the House of Commons were considering impeachment proceedings against Boris Johnson (b 1964; UK prime-minister 2019-2022) "on charges of gross misconduct in relation to the unlawful prorogation of parliament", as well as his threat to break the law by failing to comply with the European Union (Withdrawal) (No. 2) Act 2019 (which required the prime-minister in certain circumstances to seek an extension to the Brexit withdrawal date of 31 October 2019).  Mr Johnson survived that one though it proved a temporary reprieve for his premiership.

Although the Sturm und Drang of Donald Trump’s (b 1946; US president 2017-2021) unprecedented two impeachments was entertaining for political junkies, as a spectacle the two trials were muted affairs because the verdicts were both predictable.  Under the US Constitution, the House of Representatives has the “sole Power of Impeachment” (essentially a form of indictment in other proceedings) while the Senate is vested with “the sole Power to try all Impeachments”.  An act of impeachment requires only a majority vote on the floor of a House but conviction in the Senate demand “the concurrence of two thirds of the members present”.  Given the numbers and the state of partisan which these days characterizes the two-party system, nobody in Washington DC believed there was even a vague prospect of Mr Trump being convicted.  Still, the dreary, confected, set-piece speeches on both sides were like slabs of raw meat thrown to the attack dogs watching Fox News and NBC so in that sense it was a kind of substitute for what the Founding Fathers might have hoped would have been the standard of debate in the Congress, 250-odd years on.  In an ominous sign, the Republicans have since made attempts to stage a retaliatory impeachment trial of Joe Biden (b 1942; US president since 2021) despite knowing there is no prospect of a conviction.  Political scientists have expressed concern this may be a harbinger of something like the situation is some countries (such as Pakistan & Bangladesh (the old West & East Pakistan)) where it is almost a form of ritualized revenge to pursue one's predecessor through the courts, jailing them if possible.  The hope is that such a culture might be peculiar to the Trump era and something less confrontation might emerge when he leaves the stage although, what he has threatened in a second term does sound like he has vengeance on his mind.

Lindsay Lohan and her lawyer in court, Los Angeles, December 2011. 

The best impeachment in the US was the one which never was, the one Richard Nixon (1913-1994; US president 1969-1974) avoided by resigning the presidency on 9 August 1974.  That an impeachment became inevitable was Nixon’s own fault.  The evidence of those acts of Nixon which met the standard of “Treason, Bribery, or other high Crimes and Misdemeanors.” existed only on the tapes which came to the knowledge of those investigating the White House’s involvement in the Watergate affair only through a chance remark by an aide; prior to that the existence of the president’s recording mechanism had been restricted to a small circle around Nixon.  There was a wealth of other material which hinted or suggested there may have been unlawful acts by Nixon but what was lacking was what came to be called the “smoking gun”, the undeniable proof.  That proof was on the tapes and as soon as knowledge of them became public, Nixon should have destroyed them and the ways and means existed close to home.  Even in oppressively hot Washington summers, Nixon would have the air-conditioning turned high to provide a wintery ambiance and have a log fire burning in the fireplace, close to which he would sit while writing his noted on yellow legal pads; it was a lifelong habit.

Washington Post 7 August 1974.

The tapes should have been tossed into that fire and that would have solved the problem, a smoking tape no smoking gun.  It would of course have created other problems but they were political and could be handled in a way legal difficulties could not.  However, as soon as the tapes were subpoenaed they became evidence and their destruction would have been an obstruction of justice or worse.  Nixon had a narrow window of opportunity and didn’t take it, apparently convinced the doctrine of executive privilege would operate to ensure he wasn’t required to surrender the tapes to the investigators although in some of his subsequent writings he also maintained he genuinely believed they contained nothing which could cause him problems.  Given he genuinely would have had no knowledge of what exactly was on the tapes, that is at least plausible but all the material since published suggests his opinion of the protection executive privilege affords a president was the critical factor.  As it was the US Supreme Court (SCOTUS) limited the application of the doctrine and compelled Nixon to hand over the tapes.

New York Times, 9 August 1974.

With the release of the “smoking gun tape” which contained recordings proving Nixon was implicated in the cover-up of the involvement in the Watergate break-in by staff connected to the White House, his support in the Congress collapsed and those Republican representatives who previously had refused to vote for impeachment switched sides and the same day, after sounding out the numbers in the Senate, a delegation of senior Republican senators told the president he would be convicted and by a decisive margin.  What was revealed on the tapes was enough to seal his fate but the verdict of history might have been worse still because To this day, mystery surrounds one tape in particular, a recording of a discussion between Nixon and HR Haldeman (1926–1993; White House chief of staff 1969-1973) on 20 June 1972, three days after the Watergate break-in.  Of obviously great interest, when reviewed, there was found to be a gap of 18½ minutes, the explanations offered of how, why or by whom the erasure was effected ranging from the humorously accidental to the darkly conspiratorial but half a century on, it remains a mystery.  Taking advantage of new data-recovery technology, the US government did in subsequent decades make several attempts to “un-delete” the gap but without success and it may be, given the nature of magnetic tape, that there is literally nothing left to find.  However, the tape is stored in a secure, climate-controlled facility in case technical means emerge and while it’s unlikely the contents would reveal anything not already known or assumed, it would be of great interest to historians.  What would be even more interesting is the identity of who it was that erased the famous 18½ minutes but that will likely never be known; after fifty years, it’s thought that were there to be any death-bed confessions, they should by now have been heard.  Some have their lists of names of those who might have "pressed the erase button" and while mostly sub-sets of Watergate's "usual suspects", one who tends not to appear is Nixon himself, the usual consensus being he was technically too inept to operate a tape machine though it's not impossible he ordered someone to do the deed.  However it happened, the suspects most often mentioned as having had their "finger on the button" (which may have been a foot-pedal) are Nixon's secretary and his chief of staff. 

On 8 August 1974, Nixon resigned his office, effective the next day, saying in conclusion during his nationally televised speech:

To leave office before my term is completed is abhorrent to every instinct in my body. But as President, I must put the interest of America first. America needs a full-time President and a full-time Congress, particularly at this time with problems we face at home and abroad. To continue to fight through the months ahead for my personal vindication would almost totally absorb the time and attention of both the President and the Congress in a period when our entire focus should be on the great issues of peace abroad and prosperity without inflation at home. Therefore, I shall resign the Presidency effective at noon tomorrow. Vice President Ford will be sworn in as President at that hour in this office.

Herblock's (Herbert Block; 1909–2001) Watergate affair-era take on Richard Nixon's then novel position on the presidency and the US Constitution, Washington Post, 13 March 1974.  The cartoon has been noted by some in the light of Donald Trump's comments about the extent of presidential immunity.

Felicitous

Felicitous (pronounced fi-lis-i-tuhs)

(1) Characterized by felicity; causing happiness or pleasure.

(2) Well-suited to the occasion (of actions, manners, speech, expression etc); something apt or appropriate in the circumstances.

(3) Possessing a particular aptitude to display a suitable manner or expression; possessing an agreeable style.

(4) In structural linguistics (of a sentence or other fragment), semantically and pragmatically coherent; fitting in the context.

(5) In astrology, a planet or other heavenly body in an influential position.

1720s: The construct was felicit(y) + -ous.  Felicity was from the Middle English felicite (bliss, happiness, joy; delight, pleasure; a source of happiness; good fortune; prosperity; well-being; a heavenly body in an influential position (used in astrology), from the Old French felicité (source of the modern French félicité (bliss, happiness; felicity)), from the Latin fēlīcitātem, the accusative singular of fēlīcitās (fertility, fruitfulness; happiness, felicity; good fortune; success), from fēlix (happy; blessed, fortunate, lucky; fertile, fruitful; prosperous; auspicious, favorable) (ultimately from the primitive Indo-European dheh & dhehy (to nurse, suckle)) + -itās (a variant of -tās (the suffix used to form nouns indicating a state of being)).  The -itas suffix was from the Proto-Italic -itāts & -otāts (-tās added to i-stems or o-stems, later used freely) and ultimately from the primitive Indo-European -tehats.  The –ous suffix was from the Middle English -ous, from the Old French –ous & -eux, from the Latin -ōsus (full, full of); a doublet of -ose in an unstressed position.  It was used to form adjectives from nouns, to denote possession or presence of a quality in any degree, commonly in abundance.  In chemistry, it has a specific technical application, used in the nomenclature to name chemical compounds in which a specified chemical element has a lower oxidation number than in the equivalent compound whose name ends in the suffix -ic.  For example sulphuric acid (H₂SO₄) has more oxygen atoms per molecule than sulphurous acid (H₂SO₃).  There are degrees of felicitousness; the comparative is more felicitous, the superlative most felicitous.  Felicitous is an adjective, felicitousness is a noun and felicitously is an adverb.

In structural linguistics felicitous is a technical term used to indicate a sentence is semantically and pragmatically coherent (in the context of use).  It is not a synonym for “correct” in every situation because a sentence can be grammatical yet not be felicitous, analogous with law where a contract to undertake a murder can be found to be a valid (legal) contract because it conforms to the rules for such things yet be held to be “void for illegality” because the act of murder is unlawful.

In use, "felicitation", (complimentary expression of belief in another's happiness or good fortune), the noun of action from felicitate, is often used in the plural as “please extend my felicitations” although it’s now rare and probably something of an affectation by those for whom Noël Coward’s (1899–1973) drawing room scenes remain models of good manners; it may be the ultimate middle-class phrase.  In English drawing rooms and other places, felicitation was in use by the early eighteenth century.  Some style guides note the occasional error of use in which felicitation is used as a synonym for “congratulations” and caution it should instead be though a companion term.  Like the verb congratulate, congratulation implies one’s feeling of pleasure in another's happiness or good fortune while felicitation refers to an expression of belief the other is fortunate; what felicitations should suggest to the recipient is their pleasure is well deserved and should be enjoyed.  Expressions of both congratulations and felicitations can be sincere or wholly fake and those skilled in the art of such things deliberately can, with exactly the same text, convey either meaning through nuances such as intonation or non-verbal clues.  The guides’ distinction seems helpful (at least at the margins) but not arbiters of English agreed.  One of the most consistently severe of these was Henry Fowler (1858–1933) who in his authoritative A Dictionary of Modern English Usage (1926) included “felicitate” in his list of “formal words” as a merely decorative alternative to “congratulate”, lumping it in with other needlessly ornate forms (adumbrate vs outline; endeavour vs try; desist vs cease (layers can prove those two are distinct); extend vs send; proceed vs go et al).  No fan of “genteelisms” in language, Henry Fowler thought there were few exceptions to his rule that the common or vernacular form is better than the formal.

Intriguingly, etymologists note a single verified use of “felicitously” in the 1530s but it's thought probably an error and the form wasn’t to emerge for more than a century.  The now obsolete verb felicitate (to render happy) was in use in the early seventeenth century, during which it picked up the sense of “to reckon happy”.  It was from the Late felicitatus, past participle of felicitare (to make happy), from felicitas (fruitfulness, happiness), again from fēlix.  The meaning “congratulate, compliment upon a happy event” seems to have emerged in the 1630s and the related forms were the verbs felicitated & felicitating; the rare alternative verb form felicify was documented in the 1690s and by the late nineteenth century this yielded adjective felicific and the companion antonym infelicific, neither now in common use but being shorter, seem more convenient than the alternative adjective infelicitous (unhappy, unlucky), in use by the late 1740s, supplanting the late sixteenth century form infelicious.  In most cases, there will anyway probably be better words to use but infelicific, infelicitously & infelicitousness seem more elegant that the alternatives (nonfelicitous, nonfelicitously & nonfelicitousness and unfelicitous, unfelicitously & unfelicitousness).

Because of the way Google harvests data for their ngrams, they’re not literally a tracking of the use of a word in society but can be usefully indicative of certain trends, (although one is never quite sure which trend(s)), especially over decades.  As a record of actual aggregate use, ngrams are not wholly reliable because: (1) the sub-set of texts Google uses is slanted towards the scientific & academic and (2) the technical limitations imposed by the use of OCR (optical character recognition) when handling older texts of sometime dubious legibility (a process AI should improve).  Where numbers bounce around, this may reflect either: (1) peaks and troughs in use for some reason or (2) some quirk in the data harvested.  So, all the ngrams reveal only what's in the particular sub-set Google’s grabbers extract from their catchments and that indicates the use of “felicitous” & “infelicitous” was most common in the mid-nineteenth century and although the former seems to have been used more than the latter, no conclusions should be drawn about the changes in the state of human happiness.  One clear finding however is that the double-negative form (that favorite of lawyers, politicians and Foreign Office mandarins) never found favor; if people wished to convey felicitousness they bothered not with “not infelicitous”.

Lindsay Lohan and her lawyer in court, Los Angeles, December 2011.

The double negative is though handy to add nuance; whatever would be the surface analysis on the combination, “not bad” is understood to mean something different than “good” and it may be that like “I’m not unhappy”, “not infelicitous” can be useful in that it can be used to convey the sense that although one might not be all that happy, one is not despairingly miserable.  Given the nature of the human condition, it’s surprisingly it’s not heard more often.

Donald Trump (b 1946; US president 2017-2021) and Nikki Haley (b 1972; US ambassador to the United Nations (UN) 2017-2018): Feeling respectively "felicitous" and "not infelicitous" after the South Carolina Republican Primary, February 2024.

Nefandous

Nefandous (pronounced nef-and-us or nef-fandus)

(1) Not to be spoken of (archaic).

(2) Unspeakable, appalling; abominable, shocking to reasonable senses (rare).

1630s: From the Latin nefandus (unmentionable, impious, heinous), the construct being ne- (the negative particle: “not”) + fandus (to be spoken), gerundive of fārī (to speak), from the primitive Indo-European root bha (to speak, tell, say).  Nefandous is an adjective.  Although not obviously a word needing an intensifier, the comparative is “more nefandous” and the superlative “most nefandous”.

Google's ngrams trace the use of words but because of the way the data is harvested, the numbers represented by the ngrams are not of necessity accurate but, over decades, probably are broadly indicative.  While the numbers do bounce around a bit, it would seen that in British English (lower chart), use of "nefandous" was not infrequent in the nineteenth century while the most recent spike was during the 1930s; while politically and financially a troubled decade, any suggestion of a causal link with use would be speculative.  In US English (upper chart) use appears also to have declined after the nineteenth century, the most recent spike in the use of "nefandous" coinciding with the 2016 presidential campaign; again, to suggest any link with Donald Trump (b 1946; US president 2017-2021) or crooked Hillary Clinton (b 1947; US secretary of state 2009-2013) would be speculative.  With the 2024 election threatening to be a re-run of 2020 (something quite a few seem to think variously unspeakable, unthinkable or unmentionable), there may be another revival of the word.   

The extinct nineteenth century formations were the noun nefandousness and the adverb nefandously; as an expression of character, nefandousness briefly found uses but the adverb was just silly.  Both seem to have followed the example of nefariousness & nefariously which is etymologically distant although in meaning there’s some overlap, those labelled nefandous often associated with things nefarious (sinful, villainous, criminal, or wicked).  Dating from the late sixteenth century, nefarious was from the Latin nefārius (execrable, abominable), from nefās (that which is contrary to divine law, an impious deed, a sin, crime), the construct being ne- (the negative particle: “not”) + fās (the dictates of religion, divine law), related to the Latin forms Latin forms meaning “I speak, I say” (thus the link with nefandous) and cognate with the Ancient Greek φημί (phēmí) (I say).

Unspeakable, unthinkable, unmentionable

Although the word "nefarious" is now rare, the idea is often expressed in the term "unspeakable", used to describe anything from crimes against fashion to mass murderers.  There was also the use use of "unmentionable" as a euphemism for a lady's underwear (usually in the plural as "her (or my) unmentionables") and although sometimes cited as an example of prudery in Victorian England, the evidence of use at the time suggests it was often something jocular or ironic.  However, there was also the notion of "unspeakable" a piece of literal positive law.  In Asia Minor (near present-day Selcuk, Türkiye), in a sacred grove not far from the city of Ephesus, stood the Great Temple of Artemis (also known as the Temple of Diana), one of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World. During the evening of 21 July, 356 BC, Herostratus (also called Erostratus) of Ephesus saturated the timber and fabric furnishings of the temple with gallons of oil and when all was thoroughly soaked, he set fires in many places, inside and out.  Within minutes, as he had planned, the fire was uncontrollable and the temple doomed.  Coincidently, on the day the temple was razed, Alexander the Great (356-323 DC) was born.

St. Paul Preaching in Ephesus Before the Temple of Artemis (1885), by Adolf Pirsch (1858-1929).

Herostratus was apparently a wholly undistinguished and previously obscure citizen, different from others only in his desire to be famous and the lengths to which he was prepared to go to achieve that fame.  As shocked Ephesians rushed to the fire, Herostratus met them and proudly proclaimed his deed, telling them his name would for all eternity be remembered as the man who burned down the Great Temple of Artemis and razed one of the wonders of the world.  Herostratus was, as he expected, executed for his arson.  In an attempt to deny him the fame he craved, the Ephesians passed the damnatio memoriae law, making it a capital crime ever to speak of him or his deed.  However, it proved impossible to suppress the truth about such an event; the historian Theopompus (circa 380–circa 315 BC) relates the story in his Philippica and it later appears in the works of the historian Strabo (circa 64 BC–circa 24 AD).  His name thus became a metonym for someone who commits a criminal act in order to become noted.  Subsequent attempts to erase names from history by declaring them unspeakable (tried on a grand scale by comrade Stalin (1878-1953; Soviet leader 1924-1953) and the Kim dynasty in the DPRK (North Korea)) seem always to fail.

It's unfortunate history didn't unfold so Android and iOS were available in 356 BC so  Herostratus could have played Lindsay Lohan's The Price of Fame instead of turning to arson.  The game was said to be "a parody on celebrity culture and paparazzi" and enabled players to become world famous celebrities by creating an avatar which could "purchase outfits, accessories, toys and even pets".  Played well, he could have entered a virtual herostratisphere and the temple might stand today.  As Ms Lohan would understand, the tale of Herostratus reminds all that for everything one does, there's a price to be paid. 

Like many of the tales from antiquity, the story of destruction by arson is doubted.  Various conjectures have been offered, some of which doubt the technical possibility of what Herostratus is said to have done, some claiming it was a kind of inside job by the temple’s priests who had their own reasons for wanting a new building and even a reference to the writings of Aristotle which offers a lightning strike as the catalyst for the conflagration.  However, whatever did or didn’t happen in 356 BC, the word herostatic, to describe one who seeks fame at any cost, has endured, the attempt to make his name unspeakable as doomed as the temple.

Cacography

Cacography (pronounced kuh-kog-ruh-fee)

(1) Bad handwriting; poor penmanship.

(2) Incorrect spelling.

1570–1580: The construct was caco- + -graphy and was presumably influenced by the Middle French cacographie.  The prefix caco- (used before a vowel as cac-) was a word-forming element meaning “bad, ill, poor” and was from the Latinized form of the Ancient Greek κακός (kakós) (bad) and while the origin is unknown, most etymologists conclude it was probably connected with primitive Indo-European root kakka- (to defecate), the implications of the connections obvious and often reflected in contemporary English (although there are some who suggest a pre-Greek origin).  The ancient Greek word was common in compounds; when added to words already bad, it made them worse; when added to words signifying something good, it often implied too little of it, thus applied as a measure of (1) quality: bad, worthless, useless, (2) appearance: ugly, hideous, (3) circumstances: injurious, wretched, unhappy & character: low, mean, vile, evil.  The Greek form may be compared with the Phrygian κακον (kakon) (harm) and the Albanian keq (bad).  The -graphy suffix was from the French -graphie, from the Latin -graphia, from the Ancient Greek -γραφία (-graphía), from γραφή (graphḗ) (writing, drawing, description).  It was used to create words describing (1) something written or otherwise represented in the specified manner, or about a specified subject & (2) a field of study.  The extinct alternative spelling was kakography.  Cacography & cacographer are nouns and cacographic & cacographical are adjectives; the noun plural is cacographies.

Cacographic: A fragment of the original draft of Karl Marx’s (1818-1883) Das Kapital. Kritik der politischen Ökonomie (Capital: A Critique of Political Economy (1867-1894)).  Marx’s writing was notoriously bad and for his drafts to be acceptable for publishers, they needed first to be re-written by his wife (Jenny von Westphalen (1814–1881)).  Given the drafts of Das Kapital ran to thousands of pages, she had quite a task.

The original sense developed in the sixteenth century and was a reference to poor spelling or punctuation, especially unintuitive spellings considered as a feature of a whole language or dialect.  The antonym was orthography but it must be noted that in the sixteenth century, spelling in English was far from standardized and regional differences were frequent and typically, cacographic texts were those where there were instances of inconsistencies (such as the one word being spelled in more than one way) or the spelling was such that unlike some other variations, the construct was inexplicable.  In the seventeenth century, the meaning extended to bad or illegible handwriting, the antonym being calligraphy, a word which has now come to mean “an intricate or stylized form of script”.  Thus, what might once have been described as cacographical would now variously be condemned as illegible, indecipherable (or the less common undecipherable), indistinct, scrawled, unclear or unreadable.  Sometimes, those with elegant handwriting can use techniques to make their text appear functionally cacographic.  Baldur von Schirach (1907-1974; head of the Hitlerjugend (Hitler Youth) 1931-1940 & Gauleiter (district party leader) and Reichsstatthalter (Governor) of Vienna (1940-1945), when writing the material he had smuggled out of Spandau Prison where he was serving the 20 year sentence he was lucky to receive, wrote in English but in an old-style German script, his object being to make them hard for anyone else to read.

Calligraphic: Coming to attention first during one of her court appearances, there was genuine surprise Lindsay Lohan’s writing (left) was so neat.  It later transpired her style shared a characteristic with that of Donald Trump (b 1946; US president 2017-2021): tending to write (right) on the diagonal.  Mr Trump prefers to write with a Sharpie (recommended also by Pippa Middleton (b 1983)) and a thick nib is one of the tricks used to lend elegance to one’s handwriting.    

Cacography is the antonym of both calligraphy and orthography which is something unusual in a language which even in the early days of Modern English rejoiced in coining new words to create something unique for every purpose so it may be a reflection of the manner in which, at the time, the content and appearance of a document were considered together; different aspects of the same thing.  The noun calligraphy (the art of beautiful writing, elegant penmanship) dates from the 1610s and was from the French calligraphie, from a Latinized form of the Ancient Greek καλλιγραφία (kalligraphía (literally “pretty writing”)), the construct being κάλλος (kállos) (beauty) + γράφω (gráphō) (to draw).  It was used to mean (1) the art or practice of writing letters and words in a decorative style; the letters and words so written, (2) any such style of decorative writing & (3) a document written in decorative style, the last meaning now the default; the advent of digital fonts and printing has meant the styles have become common although hand-written script is now rare.  Henry Watson Fowler (1858–1933) in A Dictionary of Modern English Usage (1926) cautioned calligraphy should not be altered to caligraphy, noting Greek compounds were made wither with καλλι- (from κάλλος (beauty)) or κάλο- (from κάλος (beautiful)).  The choice thus was between “calligraphy” or “calography” and because the Greek compounds were in the form of καλλιγραφία etc, the former was obviously correct.  The noun orthography was from the mid fifteenth century ortographie & ortografie, (branch of knowledge concerned with correct or proper spelling), from the thirteenth century Old French ortografie, from the Latin orthographia, from the Ancient Greek orthographia (correct writing), the construct being orthos (correct (familiar in the suffix ortho-) + the root of graphein (to write).  The classical spelling was restored in English and French (orthographie) in the early sixteenth century while the meaning “branch of language study which treats of the nature and properties of letters” dates from the 1580s.  As an indication of how spelling used to be, in an early fifteenth century glossary, ortographia was defined as “ryght wrytynge” and that would have be just one of the ways “right writing” might have been written.

Slight

Slight (pronounced slahyt)

(1) Something small in amount, degree, etc.

(2) A small increase in something.

(3) Of little importance, influence, trivial.

(4) Slender or slim; not heavily built.

(5) Frail; flimsy; delicate; of little substance or strength.

(6) To treat as of little importance.

(7) A description of a form of deception or trickery, literal and metaphorical.

(8) To treat someone with indifference; ignore, especially pointedly or contemptuously; snub.

(9) To defame with a casual or off-hand comment; a pointed and contemptuous discourtesy; an affront.

1350-1400: From the Middle English slight (bad, of poor quality, unimportant, trivial, slender, slim, smooth, level), from the Old English sliht (smooth, level), derived from the Proto-Germanic slihtaz (smooth, plain, common).  Cognate with the Danish slet (bad, evil, poor, nasty, wrong), the Dutch slecht (bad), the Icelandic sléttur (even, smooth, level), the German schlecht (bad) & schlicht (plain, artless, natural), the Norwegian slett (even), the Low German slecht (bad) and the Swedish slät (smooth).  The early fourteen century sense of “flat, smooth” is thought to come from a Scandinavian source akin to the Old Norse slettr (smooth, sleek), derived from the Proto-Germanic slikhtaz (smooth).  It also mean “plain or common” as in the Old Saxon slicht, the Low German slicht and the Old English sliht (level) is documented as as eorðslihtes (level with the ground).  Related too are the Old Frisian sliucht (smooth, slight), the Middle Dutch sleht (even, plain) the Old High German sleht, the Gothic slaihts (smooth), all thought most likely ultimately derived from a collateral form of the primitive sleig (to smooth, glide, be muddy) from the root slei (slimy).

In the (sometimes) organic way of English, from the original meaning(s) “plain, smooth, common, level”, there emerged in the 1520s “small amount or weight” and, in the 1590s, the adjectival sense of “having little worth”.  The meaning "act of intentional neglect or ignoring out of displeasure or contempt" is from 1701, almost certainly from the seventeenth century phrase “to make a slight of”, first attested in 1608.  Interestingly, in German, schlecht likewise developed from "smooth, plain, simple" to "bad, mean, base," and as it did it was replaced in the original senses by schlicht, a back-formation from schlichten (to smooth, to plane), a derivative of schlecht in the old sense.  In English, the original meaning went extinct.  Slight, slightness & slighting are nouns, verbs & adjectives, slighten is a verb, slighted is an adjective & verb, slightful, slighty, slighter, slightest & slightish are adjectives and slightingly & slightly are adverbs; the noun plural is slights.

A slight Lindsay Lohan during her "thin phase", early in the third millennium.  Note the fine ribcage definition.

Slights: Boris on crooked Hillary Clinton and others

Few have managed so often to slight so many as former UK prime minister Boris Johnson (b 1964; UK prime-minister 2019-2022) and unusually, those best remembered tend to be where the victim was friend rather than foe.  It should be noted that when referring to Mr Johnson having friends, the word is used in a specific technical sense, vaguely similar to the form pioneered by Facebook.

Long before there was Crooked Hillary, there was Hillary Clinton (b 1947; US secretary of state 2009-2013) and she had been promised the Democratic Party nomination for the 2008 presidential election.  It had all been fixed up at head office "and the middle-class was quite prepared" but her 1990s style campaign fell apart.  Johnson had tried to help.  In November 2007, writing in his Daily Telegraph column, he endorsed Clinton as candidate, helpfully adding… “She's got dyed blonde hair and pouty lips, and a steely blue stare, like a sadistic nurse in a mental hospital."  “Clinton…” he continued, had done the job of First Lady like "…Lady Macbeth, stamping her heel, bawling out subordinates and frisbeeing ashtrays at her erring husband."  Actually, it was the husband (Bill Clinton (b 1946; US president 1993-2001)) he wanted back in the White House.  "For all who love America, it is time to think of supporting Hillary, not because we necessarily want her for herself but because we want Bill in the role of First Husband." he concluded.

Years later, in mid-2016, confident Donald Trump (b 1946; US president 2017-2021) would never become president, Johnson said Trump was "clearly out of his mind" and his "ill-informed comments are complete and utter nonsense...", accusing him of "stupefying ignorance".  He finished by saying "…the only reason I wouldn't go to some parts of New York is the real risk of meeting Donald Trump".

Another head-of-state slighted was Recep Tayyip Erdoğan (b 1954; prime-minister or president of the Republic of Türkiye since 2003).  Upset about the lawsuit brought by Mr Erdogan against a German comedian who recited a poem the president found insulting, the conservative weekly The Spectator ran a competition to find who could write the most offensive poem about the president.  Johnson won, his entry an ode to Mr Erdogan enjoying intimacy with a goat.  The president met Mr Johnson in 2016 during his brief stint as foreign secretary; the two seemed to get on well.

Slights can be avoided with a little luck.

World War II (1939-1945) veteran George HW Bush (1924–2018; US President (George XLI 1989-1993)) would have remembered Winston Churchill's (1875-1965; UK prime-minister 1940-1945 & 1951-1955) wartime "V for victory" sign and that’s the meaning the gesture gained in the US.  Unfortunately he wasn’t aware of the significance of "the forks" in the antipodes: when given with the palm facing inwards, it’s the equivalent to the upraised middle finger in the US.  On a state visit to Australia in 1992, while his motorcade was percolating through Canberra, he made the sign to some locals lining the road.  What might have been thought a slight worked out well, the crowd lining the road cheering the gesture which must have been encouraging.  That same day, the president gave a speech advocating stronger efforts “to foster greater understanding” between the American and Australian cultures. The Lakeland Ledger, reporting his latest gaffe, wrote, “...wearing mittens when abroad would be a beginning”.