Knob

Knob (pronounced nob)

(1) A projecting part, usually rounded, forming the handle of a door, drawer window-frame or the like.

(2) A (usually) ball-shaped part of a handle, lever etc, designed to be grasped by the hand.

(3) In machinery, an almost always rounded control switch that can be rotated on it axis (ie to turn on/off, raise/lower volume etc), designed to be operated by the fingers and visually also emulated in software on screens.

(4) A rounded lump or protuberance on the surface or at the end of something, as a knot on a tree trunk or a fleshy lump or caruncle.

(5) A rounded ornament on the hilt of an edged weapon (the pommel).

(6) In architecture, furniture design etc, an ornamental boss, as of carved work.

(7) In geography, a rounded hill, mountain, a knoll, an elevation on a ridge or morainic ridge.

(8) In botany, a bulb of the garlic plant consisting of multiple cloves in a chunky branch,

(9) In certain military and other institutions, a new recruit.

(10) In hunting & animal husbandry (as knobber), a hart in its second year; a young male deer.

(11) In cooking, a dollop, an amount just larger than a spoonful (used usually in reference to butter and in professional catering there are “butter curlers” which produce an attractive ribbed-curl of butter to be served with the bread-rolls, each curl said to be the equivalent of a “half dollop”.

(12) In slang, the head, thus a person with red hair being a “gainer knob”.

(13) In vulgar slang the head (glans (spongiosum)) of the penis but sometimes used of the whole organ, thus the slang “knobhead” (an unintelligent or contemptible person) and a “literal” synonym of “dickhead”), sometimes used in the forms “knobber” & “knobber”.

(14) In vulgar slang (by extension), to have sexual intercourse with (someone).

(15) In vulgar slang (usually in the plural), a woman's breasts (sometimes with a modifier thought appropriate to the anatomy specifically being referenced).

(16) In vulgar slang, the clitoris.

(17) To produce a knob on (an object).

(18) To furnish with a knob, typically for a functional purpose (adding one to a door, window frame etc) but also as an ornament.

(19) To turn an object into a knob (rare).

(20) In stone cutting, to knock off (excess stone) preparatory to dressing; to knobble; to skiffle.

1350–1400: From the Middle English knobe & knobbe, thought almost certainly from a Scandinavian or German source and probably at least influenced by the Middle Low German knubbe & knobbe (knob; knot in wood; bud), the Middle Dutch knobbe & cnoppe, the Dutch knop (knob, button, bud), the Old Frisian knopp & knapp, the Old High German knopf (bud, pommel of a sword, knot, loop), the Middle High German knospe, the German Knopf (button, knob) & Knospe (bud), the Danish knap (button) & knop (knob, button, bud) and the Old Norse knyfill (short horn).  Most etymologists seem most convinced by it being a variant of the Proto-Germanic knappô (knob, lump) & knuppô (lump, clod), both among the “kn-” words related to knudaną (to knead).  Probably related were the Middle English knap & knappe (small projection, knob (in the sense of “button, tassel, tuft etc”), hill, hilltop etc)), from the Old English cnæp & cnæpp (summit, top), which may in some way be linked with the Old Norse knappr (small projection, knob (in the sense of “button, head of a stick etc”)) (and from which English gained knop), the source again the Proto-Germanic knappô.  The meaning “knoll, isolated round hill” seems first to have appeared in the 1640s and, perhaps surprisingly, no instance of “doorknob” has been found prior to 1829 although the word may have been long in oral use (drawer-knob, window-knob etc all followed).  Knob is a noun & verb, knobless is a noun, knobbed & knobbing are verbs, knoblike & knobby are adjectives; the noun plural is knobs.

Yorkeys Knob, Cairns, Queensland, Australia.

In idiomatic use, the phrase “same to you with knobs (sometimes “brass knobs”) means “the same to you but even more so” (used typically in response to an insult or slight).  A “knob-twiddler” can be an informal term for a technician or console operator whose job entails adjusting electronic devices via knobs but it can also describe anyone whose role seems either unimportant or not particularly demanding.  As machinery and later electronics became an increasingly ubiquitous part of life, so did knobs and as early as the late nineteenth century the humorous “knobologist” had been coined to describe both those designing the system and the “knob-twiddlers” using them; the discipline of design was of course dubbed “knobology” and that remains a core component of ergonomics, exploring imperatives such as placement, size, tactility and labelling, all of which influence the functionality of controls on an instrument as relevant to their application.  The knobologists deeply were implicated in convenient physical switches, knobs and buttons disappearing from cars and re-imagined virtualizations on inconvenient touch-screens.  Such has been the reaction (including the realization the change made driving more accident prone) that the tactile controls are making a welcome comeback.  The now archaic “knob-thatcher” was an affectionate term for a maker of wigs while the more modern “surfer's knob” was slang from the sport, describing a hard bump or nodule on a surfer's knee, shin or ankle, resulting from recurrent contact with their surfboard.  In engineering and metallurgy, “to knobble” was (1) to render a surface with a knobbly finish and (2) to produce wrought iron by treating semi-refined puddled iron on a hearth before shingling, a specialized device in the business being the ominous sounding “knobbling furnace”.

Gay men supporting lesbians at the first “Dyke March”, Washington DC, April 1993.  The sign held by the protester at the far left uses the compound word for which the euphemisms “knob polisher” & “knob-gobbler” were coined.

Because knob was popular slang for penis, a number of derived terms predictably emerged.  A “knob polisher” or “knob-gobbler” was “one who gives fellatio”.  “Knob rot” was a reference to certain sexually transmitted diseases contracted by men, the acute condition “galloping knob rot” describing a rapidly progressing or uncontrollable variant of the condition.  A “knob job” was the act of fellatio.  “Knob cheese” (the terms “cock cheese”, “dick cheese” and (in context) even “cheese”) was vulgar slang for smegma (a whitish sebaceous secretion that collects between the glans penis and foreskin or in the vulva).  “Knob jockey” must however be used with care because it has variously been applied to (1) gay men, (2) promiscuous straight women and (3) promiscuous straight men; context thus matters.

Interior of Porsche 917K with cool (in both senses of the word) balsa-wood shift knob.  The obviously "fake" passenger bucket seat was installed to comply with the rules in sports car racing.

To this day, the myth persists the balsa-wood gear-shift knob used in the Porsche 917 was there as a “weight-saving measure”.  While it’s true the small knob was light, the difference between it and the aluminum or magnesium units the company had fitted to earlier race cars would have been so insignificant it’s doubtful it would have equalled a gulp of coffee the driver may or may not have enjoyed.  The stylish timber piece was however not a decorative flourish but a legitimate engineering solution to ameliorate one manifestation of “chronic heat soak”.  In 1969, the 917 was a radical advance which, Dreadnought-like, rendered all other cars in its class instantly obsolescent but the flat-12 engine (Porsche’s first in the configuration) radiated so much heat it was difficult to manage.  In a tradition it would not for decades abandon, Porsche continued to use air-cooling for the engine (which really means “oil cooled” about as much) and it ran hot; between that heat source and the gear level was a unbroken metal path, each component a most efficient conductor.  During endurance racing (some events conducted over 24 hours), cockpit temperatures could reach what doctors would rate as “extreme”.  The metal lever was just one of the sources of this heat and the knob (which sat next to the driver’s knee) needed to be grasped by the driver, often many times a minute; were it to become so hot it caused pain, it would have been safety issue.  Although in 1969 the space-age was at its zenith, the materials which could have made a driver’s gloves close to heat-proof were not then commercially available so they gained much of their protective quality from thickness but the problem was they could be only so thick because a driver needed still to handle a highly-geared steering wheel and operate the many knobs and switches within arm’s reach.  Balsa-wood, with its very low thermal conductivity was ideal because while not exactly cool to the touch after a few hours on the track, it never got so hot it felt unpleasant.  It also had adequate strength for its task; a gear-lever knob does not bear structural loads and, being Porsche, it received the same careful attention as every other component, each one precisely machined to exact dimensions before receiving two coats of clear lacquer.  Most variants of the 917 used the Balsa-wood part although when (as the “Turbo-panzers”) the most powerful of the breed appeared in the Can-Am (for Group 7, unlimited displacement sports cars) a metal knob was fitted, made possible because Group 7 was for open cars and significantly that reduced cabin temperatures.  By the late 1970s when the space age had made available materials (phenolic plastics, composites etc) with superior insulation qualities, the need to resort to a balsa-wood knob vanished but the visual appeal remained and in the aftermarket, 917-style knobs remain widely available.

1959 Ford Fairlane Galaxie 500 Sunliner with suicide knob (on steering wheel at 10 o'clock).

“Suicide knob” was the most popular name for the device attached to a vehicle’s steering wheel which facilitated easier “single arm steering”.  The idea dated from the days before the almost universal fitting of power-steering and the things became popular in the US in the US in the 1950s and 1960s as even low-priced cars became heavier; for some drivers, they were invaluable when manoeuvring at low speed, especially when reversing.  They were known also as the “necker knob”, “wheel spinner” and “granny knob” but the most correct term was “Brodie Knob”, the name in honor of Steve Brodie (1861–1901), an apparently rather raffish gentleman from New York City who, as a last resort in 1886 after losing everything gambling, staged a stunt in which he jumped off the Brooklyn Bridge (site of a good many suicides), the lure a sum of money he was bet although the details of that are murky.  Mr Brodie anyway survived to collect on the wager and, on the basis of the notoriety gained, began performing other dare-devil acts for even more money.  So the jump from the Brooklyn Bridge was a good career move although the consensus now is it was a cunning stunt (ie a scam), a weighted dummy the real diver with Mr Brodie entering the water from the safety of the shoreline.  In fairness, at least some of his subsequent dangerous stunts were verified by observation and he parlayed his fame into a successful career in business, becoming a noted philanthropist and dying a rich man.

The invention of the suicide knob generally is credited to Joel Thorp of Wisconsin but similar devices had for centuries been in use on land and water.  What Mr Thorpe described in the supporting documents for what was issued as US Patent 2,101,519 STEERING WHEEL SPINNER KNOB (Dec 7, 1937) was an “improvement” of the concept:

“The present invention relates generally to improvements in appliances for facilitating manipulation of the steering wheels of vehicles, and relates more specifically to improvements in the construction and operation of spinner knob attachments co-operable with the peripheral rims of steering wheels or the like in order to effect more convenient and rapid operation of such wheels under certain conditions of use.  Generally defined, an object of my present invention is to provide an improved steering wheel spinner knob which is simple in construction and highly efficient in use.”

A young lady wrapping practiced fingers around the timber shift knob in 1970 Maserati Indy (Tipo 116, 1969-1975).  In the era, it was fashionable in Italian exotica for the knob and steering wheel rim to match (ie in leather or wood).

Although widely used on tractors, heavy transport vehicles and such, it was in the 1950s as cars in the US became heavier the suicide knobs gained popularity and some of that was due to reasons Mr Thorp probably never envisaged.  One receptive market was males aged 17-25 (a crew infamous for many reasons) who found the combination of suicide knob and bench seat made an idea ecosystem, enabling one hand to be used steer the vehicle while the "free" arm could wrap around the girlfriend (or alternative) who affectionately was resting her head on the driver’s shoulder.  In this arrangement, a driver’s attention more easily could be divided between her and the road.  It was also males aged 17-25 who were the core of the hot-rod community which began as a West Coast phenomenon (induced by a critical mass of the right demographic, available disposable income and a good supply of cheap, used cars which easily could be modified as desired) and they found suicide knobs the best way to “do a half donut” (a spin of one’s hot rod through 180^o), the trick being to grip the knob and then suddenly turn the wheel while applying full throttle, resulting in a loud, spectacular maneuver, made the more pleasing for the driver by him having “left his mark” in strips of runner on the road.  This, the hot rodders called “spinning a brodie”, a variant on the earlier “doing a Brodie” (a dangerous or otherwise inadvisable act) which entered the language after the nation-wide publicity which followed Mr Brodie’s alleged leap from the Brooklyn Bridge.  In the era, a Brodie Knob was as essential a piece of equipment as one’s packet of unfiltered Camel cigarettes or pair of fluffy dice hanging from the rear-view mirror.

1962 Maserati 3500 GTi.  Some Maserati 3500 GTs (Tipo 101, 1957-1964) had the unusual feature of having front and rear quarter-vents fitted to the same door; they were opened and closed using knurled, stainless steel knobs.

The dark appellation “suicide knob” was bestowed because (1) the devices came to be associated with accident-prone drivers (the “males aged 17-25” cohort prominent in the statistics) who probably did use the things to engage in “risk-taking” and (2) by virtue of their location (by default affixed to the upper quadrant) on the wheel, they were a genuine danger in accidents and, in an era of non-collapsible steering columns, tales of them penetrating the eye socket, causing irreparable loss of vision and traumatic brain injury, were legion.  The crusading US lawyer Ralph Nadar (b 1934) is criticized for much but the contribution his book Unsafe at Any Speed (1965) made to reducing the death toll on the roads cannot be under-estimated and the effect was world-wide because the rest the industry eventually followed the lead of the US legislation which came in the book’s wake.  In the US and elsewhere, change was of course resisted but it came and while it’s not possible to estimate how many deaths and often gruesome injuries the reforms prevented, no one denies it’s a big number.  The suicide knob was one minor casualty of the movement and in road-registered vehicles, in most jurisdictions (although some US states remain permissive), such devices are permitted only for specialized (often low-speed) vehicles and if used by drivers with some disability which precludes the use of conventional controls.

A Hurst Jaws of Life used between 1977-2012 by the fire department in Carlsbad, New Mexico, now on display at the National Museum of American History.

Another to make a life-saving contribution to reducing the road told was George Hurst (1927-1986; founder of his eponymous company) whose great legacy to humanity was the “Jaws of Life”, a hydraulic cutter he first developed in 1961 after being shocked at how long it sometimes took to extract the driver from the crumpled wreck of a race car.  The great advantage of the “Jaws of Life” was that it worked like a very powerful pair of scissors, avoiding the showers of sparks produced by mechanical saws, always a risk to use in areas where fuel is likely to have been spilled.  The basic design came to be used in hydraulic rescue devices worldwide and quite how many lives have been saved by virtue of its use isn’t known but again, it would be a big number.

Two decades of progress: Shifter for the two-speed Powerglide automatic transmission in 1953 Chevrolet Corvette (left) and a classic spherical shift knob in 1972 Chevrolet Corvette LT1.  The delicate-looking shifter in the 1953 Corvette seems modest but the location was a world-first for an automatic and was efficient because the location (between the driver’s seat and transmission tunnel) provided the shortest possible path to the linkage.  As late as 1964, Chrysler used a similar apparatus in the 1964 300K.

However, before the Jaws of Life, Hurst was already famous in the vibrant sub-culture which was at the times also known for its propensity to purchase and install suicide knobs.  Hurst produced “shifters” which were the assemblies connected to a transmission, used by the driver to “change gears” and they proved instantly popular which may seem strange given every manufacturer at the time included a shifter with every vehicle.  However, beginning in the late 1930s, the US manufacturers had begun moving from centrally located, floor-mounted levers to units on the steering column because it made for better packaging efficiency in the cabins, then optimized for bench-seats with three-astride seating.  That move achieved the goal but with the linkage between lever and gear-changing mechanism now longer and making more turns, some precision in the shifting was lost and column shifting (the once almost universal “three on the tree”) was less conducive to an enthusiastic driving style (such as that of the “suicide knob equipped” crowd).  It was in the 1950s the taste for floor-shifts like those in European sports cars began to gain critical mass and even though the 1953 Chevrolet Corvette was hardly a sports car in the tradition of MGs, Fiats and such, it’s notable Chevrolet from the start installed a floor shift for the (two-speed!) Powerglide automatic transmission; it may not have been a sports car with a “four-on-the-floor” but it had a floor-shift so there was that.  Automatic transmissions in mass-produced cars was then something of a novelty barely a decade old and the Corvette’s floor shift was apparently a world-first.

A butter curler producing curls.  Generally, the curlers come in large and small, respectively producing a curl notionally equivalent to a dollop or a knob (half-dollop).  In the kitchen however, knobs and dollops are what the chef decides they are.

Four-speed manual transmissions began to appear in Detroit-made cars in the late 1950s and within half a decade George Hurst’s shifters were close to obligatory for any racer (authorized or not) seeking “street cred” and it wasn’t a confected image, the Hurst shifters demonstratively superior without being excessively expensive.  So stellar did their reputation become even GM (General Motors) relaxed their long-standing ban on other brand-names being associated with their products and made a feature of one being standard equipment of the 1964 Pontiac GTO, the car credited with being “the first muscle car” and such was the success in 1965 the shifter’s handle was even permitted to be embossed: HURST.  Soon, other manufacturers actively were seeking co-productions.  George Hurst’s path to market domination was shockingly simple and might have come from a textbook: (1) a perfected design, (2) skilful engineering in development, (3) high quality in production and (4) an attractive price, a combination of elements with great appeal for buyers and manufacturers alike.

Hurst’s dual-gate automatic transmission “His and Hers” shifter with conventional apparatus “for the automatic minded little lady” and a performance-oriented configuration offering manual control for the “man who really wanted a 4-speed standard stick but bought this extra just for her.”  Note the unfamiliar shift pattern, the now universal PRNDL not an industry standard until 1965, the year before it was demanded by regulations.  From the early days of automatic transmissions in the 1940s, reverse had been directly adjacent to Low, allowing drivers more easily to emulate what was done with manual transmissions when a “rocking” was being induced to try to free a vehicle from mud or snow.  It was a quirk of the age and, because reliability was not then what decades later came to be expected, the early transmissions included a second (rear) fluid pump to permit push/tow/hill starts.  Probably, not many much dwelt on the shape of the knob Hurst put atop the His and Hers” shifter but in geometry it would be described as an oblate spheroid with two parallel planar truncations.  Now easily modelled in software rendered with a 3D printer, perfecting a shape like this for production used to absorb much time on the drawing board and in the creation of prototypes.  A spheroid is an ellipsoid generated by rotating an ellipse about one of its principal axes which, if “stretched” along one axis becomes a prolate spheroid (ie elongated and something like a rugby ball).  If slightly flattened along the axis of rotation, it’s an oblate spheroid (like planet Earth which isn’t quite a pure sphere) but the His & Hers knob, having a slight elongation along the shifter’s axis, is closest to a prolate spheroid.  The planar-truncation (ie sliced by two parallel planes) created the (left & right) flat faces and the knob can thus be described as a “truncated ellipsoid” or “truncated prolate spheroid” but anyone wishing to out-nerd the rest would probably coin something like “biaxial ellipsoid with parallel planar truncations”.

It was early in the era of second-wave feminism (1960s-1980s) that George Hurst made his brief foray into marriage guidance counselling.  First-wave feminism (1895-1950s) is sometimes called the “de jure” or “structural” period because the focus was on legal issues such as women's suffrage, property rights and political candidacy but, in the West, an early victory was overcoming any opposition to women being granted driver’s licences.  Attitudes however evolved not wholly in parallel with legal rights and even today, among some, the view persists it’s men who are focused on performance and speed while women value vehicles using other criteria.  Impressionistically, that stereotype is not wholly without foundation but, since second wave feminism reset the rules, it’s no longer possible to run advertising perpetuating the notion.  The “His and Hers” shifter worked with a key-lock which enabled the husband to ensure only he could use the “manual override” feature and the idea in recent decades has been revived although this time the target of the lockout includes one’s (presumably male) children and any concierge or attendant who might be entrusted with parking one’s car.

Advertisement for Hurst's "custom knobs" (left) and the famous Hurst "pistol grip shifter" in 1970 Plymouth 'Cuda 440+6 (ie 3 x 2bbl carburetors) (right).

The magic of Hurst’s shifters was in the mechanism but, just as for computer users the mouse and keyboard assume great importance because it’s by touching these relatively simple pieces of hardware that use can be made of the machine’s more sophisticated internals, it was the shifter’s knob which was a driver’s most intimate connection with the transmission.  Although in the art deco era there had been some lovely detailing, it wasn’t until the 1960s most conceptually moved beyond beyond “variations on a theme of sphere” and Hurst was among the manufacturers to explore shapes and substances.  There were “T-Handles” (which, usually as "T-Bars", were for decades popular around the world for automatics) and “Horseshoes” which attracted admiring glances but didn’t catch on and any number of novelty items including billiard balls (the “8 ball” predictably a favourite of the V8 crowd) and scale models of this and that including human body parts such as the skull and mammary gland.  Knobs could be of plastic, wood or various metals and came in designer colors, velvet coatings a nice touch of the 1960s.  The most fetishized of the muscle car era however was Hurst’s “Pistol Grip Shifter” which did what it said on the tin: it gave the user the feeling of holding a handgun.  In the 1960s, gun culture in the US hadn’t yet become what it is today (as now defined, the first “mass-shooting” didn’t happen until 1966) but it was still a place with a lot of firearms.  However, despite the potential implications, when in 1970 Chrysler made one standard equipment on the 1970 Plymouth ‘Cuda, one brochure made mention of the device only with the bland: “...a convenient pistol grip”.  For a corporation which called the Cuda’s hood scoop the I.Q.E.C.A.G. (Incredible Quivering Exposed Cold Air Grabber), it seemed a missed opportunity though it didn’t have much linguistic luck with I.Q.E.C.A.G., customers and everybody else deciding it was a “shaker”.

Ginger knob Lindsay Lohan in The Parent Trap, approaching 23 Egerton Terrace (tagged 7 for the film), Knightsbridge, SW3, London (the front door with a knob, left) and standing next to a door with a handle (right), from a photo-shoot by Rebecca Lader.

Architecturally, the choice between specifying door levers or door knobs is often one of mere preference or aesthetic conformity but for public or commercial buildings, some regulatory authorities now mandate the use of levers because typically they are easier to use for those with disabilities (especially if hand-mobility is limited) as they demand less dexterity.  Additionally, being circular and often highly polished, knobs can be hard to use with wet hands so that’s a consideration in kitchens, bathrooms and such; nor do young children find them as convenient as a handle.  So, all that would seem to make a compelling case for the handle but for domestic use, there’s one quirky consideration some may wish to include when making the choice.  While there are verified cases of cats and dogs learning to open doors using a handle, no pet has yet been observed mastering the turning of a door knob; while a rare problem, the chance of one’s cat or dog opening door using a lever is not zero and, because houses tend to use the same style of lever throughout, once they have learned to open one door, they’ve really learned to open all.  If it’s a concern, the good news is most doors are adaptable for either so replacing a lever with a knob does not usually require the door being replaced.

Zigzag

Zigzag (pronounced zig-zag)

(1) A line, course, or progression characterized by sharp turns first to one side and then to the other.

(2) One of a series of such turns, as in a line or path (typically in a repeating “Z-like” pattern.

(3) Proceeding or formed in a zigzag:

(4) In sewing, dressmaking etc, a pattern or stitches in this shape.

(5) In military use (land, sea & air), to move or manoeuvre in a zigzaging motion, usually as a form of evasion.

(6) In figurative use, something performed in a non-lineal way, characterized by frequent changes, often in response to external influences such as criticism.

(7) As “zigzag rule”, a rule composed of light strips of wood joined by rivets so as to be foldable, all the opening and closing parts being in parallel planes.

(8) In World War I (1914-1918) US military slang, a slang term for “someone drunk”.

1712: From the mid-seventeenth century French zigzag which replaced the earlier ziczac, from the German zickzack, from the Walloon ziczac, a gradational compound based on Zacke (tack) (familiar in English use as the “zigzagging technique” used in yachting).  It’s thought the coining of the original may have been influenced by the letter “Z” which appears twice, a “Z” able to be interpreted as a representation of a “zigzag movement”.  Less supported among etymologists is the alternative theory the German Zickzack was from Zacke (point; tooth; prong; jagged projection).  The earliest known use in German was to describe military siege approaches, a use adopted (by analogy) by early English landscape architects (then known as “gardeners”) to the layout of appropriately shaped paths in parks.  It was used as an adjective from the mid eighteenth century, the first appearing in 1774.  The brand of cigarette paper (a favorite of many stoners because the glue was said to make joints “easier to roll”) was first sold in 1909.  The adjectival use is common in fabric design and dressmaking, the zigzag pattern widely used.  In sewing, a zigzag stitch is one of the standard set in sewing machines, used usually to finish edges, the attachment to create such stitches known as a zigzagger.  The hyphenated spelling zig-zag is common.  Zigzag is a noun, verb adjective & adverb; zigzaggedness & zigzagger are nouns and zigzagged & zigzagging are verbs; the noun plural is zigzags.

ZIG is used as an acronym for a number of purposes including (1) zoster immune globulin (a globulin fraction of pooled plasma from patients who have recovered from herpes zoster and used prophylactically for immuno-suppressed children exposed to varicella and therapeutically to ameliorate varicella infection), (2) a general-purpose imperative, statically typed, compiled programming language intended as a modern successor to the C language and is (3) the abbreviation of Zimbabwe Gold, the official national currency of Zimbabwe since April 2024; it began in October 2023 as a gold-backed digital token in October 2023.  ZAG is the International Air Transport Association’s (IATA) code for Zagreb International Airport, Croatia and to describe Zymosan-Activated Granulocytes (a type of white blood cell (granulocytes) that have been stimulated by exposure to zymosan, a polysaccharide derived from the cell walls of yeast species like Saccharomyces cerevisiae).

Lindsay Lohan with Kim Kardashian (b 1980) with strategically placed “gash” in dress.

The feature may be described as either a “zig” or “zag” because the terms are interchangeable.  However, were there to be two connected gashes which assume opposite directions: that would be a “zigzag”.  While the nature of the formation of the words “zig” & “zag” is not unique, it is unusual in that, dating from the late eighteenth century, both were extractions: back-formation from “zigzag”.  A notable quirk of zig & zag is that interchangeably they can be used to mean the same thing yet when used in the same sentence, they mean “to move in opposite directions”.  In separate use, it thus matters not whether one says “she zigged around” or “she zagged around”; the meaning is the same.  Used together however, the rule is strict: she will always be described as “zigzagging” and never “zagzigging”.  Zigzag is often intended to be humorous and when applied to politicians it’s a way of saying they are “being evasive” or “flip-flopping”.

Lindsay Lohan wearing a Tolani zig zag scarf (given it was winter, the piece should probably be described as a “muffler”) in the style made famous by the Italian fashion house Missoni, New York, November 2007.

Founded in 1953 by Ottavio (1921-2013) and Rosita (b 1931) Missoni, the house became well-known during the 1960s for their vibrant and colorful knitwear, the signature motif of which was a distinctive zigzag pattern.  The technology which made the garments possible was not new, the Missoni’s “re-discovering” the long discarded “Rachel” machines traditionally used to create the shawls worn in the south of Italy, devices which permitted an almost infinite variation of lines and styles within a given design; such things were of course possible using other machinery but the versatile Rachels allowed changes to be integrated into the production line process, making possible economies of scale not available to other manufacturers; all that was required was a quick juggling of the assembly’s array of multi-colored points and what would emerge was fabric with horizontal and vertical lines in a rainbow of colors.  Ottavio Missoni did acknowledge the stylistic debt owed, once saying: “For a thousand years, the Incas have been copying my knit sweaters…”

A swatch of Missoni's signature zigzag.

The event which made Missoni famous was at the time thought scandalous although, given what these days is worn on catwalks and red carpets, it seems quaint indeed.  After their first, well-received, catwalk show in 1966, Missoni was invited to the event held in Florence’s Pitti Palace in April 1967 and it was only during last-minute rehearsals Rosita Missoni became aware the shape and color of the models’ bras were clearly visible, distracting attention from the unique zigzagging patterns which were the brand’s signature.  With no time to arrange a fix like skin-toned bodysuits, her solution was for the models to remove their bras; that solved the problem but replaced one distraction with another, the assembled pack of photographers most impressed because, under venue’s unusually bright lights, the pieces became transparent.  Since dubbed “The Battle of the Bras”, at the time not all thought the look “appropriate” but it generated much publicity and was one of the reasons Milan would in the late 1960s emerge as one of the world’s fashion capitals, the photographers following the Missonis back to Milan.  The couple weren’t invited to the next year’s Pitti Palace show but Vogue, Marie Claire, Elle, and Harper's Bazaar all provided generous coverage and the Rubicon had been crossed, Yves Saint-Laurent (1936–2008) in 1968 displaying the “see-through” look.  Since then, it’s never gone away.

PLA Shenyang J-8II (left) and USN Lockheed EP-3E ARIES II (right)

The phrase “he zigged when he should have zagged” came into common use in the mid-twentieth century and is believed to have been popularized by radio sports commentators who needed something “graphical” to paint a “word picture” of why a football player had been tackled.  The origin is thought to be sardonic military humor and a euphemism for “he was killed while attempting an evasive maneuver”.  An example of “he zigged when he should have zagged” was the fate of the unfortunate Lieutenant Commander (shao xiao) Wang Wei (1969-2001) of the People's Liberation Army (PLA) Navy of the PRC (People’s Republic of China), killed when his Shenyang J-8II interceptor (a Chinese knock-off of the old Soviet-era MiG 21) collided with a US Navy Lockheed EP-3E ARIES II signals reconnaissance aircraft (a development of the old P-3 Orion).  The affair became known as the “Hainan Island Incident” because the damaged EP-3 was forced to land on the Chinese territory of Hainan Island, the ensuring diplomatic spat played out over the next ten days, resolved by the US ambassador to Beijing handing to the PRC’s foreign minister the “Letter of the two sorries”; US surveillance flights have continued and the PLA is now more cautious in its shadowing.  US pilots noted the dark linguistic coincidence of the name “Wang Wei” being pronounced “wong way”.

Jewish Museum Berlin (2001), overhead view (left), exterior (centre) and interior (right).

Designed by US architect Daniel Libeskind (b 1946) and opened in 2001, Berlin’s Jewish Museum is noted for the “zigzag” theme reflected in its floor plan, exterior surfaces and interior detailing.  The “gashes”, a recurring motif, are integral to the design and described as “voids”, deep, empty spaces which “cut their way” through the building, serving as symbols representing the absence, loss, and emptiness left by the Holocaust.  The architect’s idea was to evoke a sense of disorientation & fragmentation, recalling the often disrupted history of the Jewish people in Germany (the Holocaust only the most severe of the pogroms suffered).  According to the museum, the voids are intended to summon in visitors periods of reflection, silence, and remembrance; a recall of what irrevocably has been lost.  In terms of design & effect, one of the most celebrated voids is the "Memory Void" in which houses the installation Shalekhet (Fallen Leaves) by Israeli painter & sculptor Menashe Kadishman (1932–2015), constructed with thousands of metallic faces spread across the floor.  On these, visitors walk, producing a haunting sound many report as “intensifying the emotional experience”.  Voids are not unusual in museums, galleries and other exhibition spaces but unlike some, those in the Jewish Museum contain no exhibits, reminding visitor of the void in Jewish culture rent by the Holocaust.

Emend & Amend

Emend (pronounced ih-mend)

(1) To edit or change a text by means of by critical editing.

(2) To free from faults or errors; to correct.

1375–1425: From the late Middle English emend, from the Middle French emender, from the Latin Latin ēmendāre (to correct), the construct being ē- (in the sense of “out”) + mend(um) (fault) + -āre (the infinitive suffix).  The adjective emendable (capable of being emended, corrigible) was from the Latin emendabilis (the comparative more emendable, the superlative most emendable).  Emendation was from the Middle English emendatioun, from the Latin emendationem (nominative ēmendātiō) (a correction, improvement), a noun of action from past-participle stem of emendare (to free from fault) and is the only form of emend to have survived to see occasional use in the twenty-first century, specialists finding three niches: (1) The act of altering for the better, or correcting what is erroneous or faulty; correction; improvement, (2) an alteration by editorial criticism, as of a text so as to give a better reading; removal of errors or corruptions from a document and (3), in zoology & taxonomy, an intentional change in the spelling of a scientific name (something usually proscribed).  The verb emend emerged probably simultaneously with the noun, the original sense being “remove faults from, alter for the better”.  Emend is a verb, emendation is a noun, emending & emended are verbs (historically emended was used as an adjective) and emendable is an adjective (eˈmendable the historic alternative spelling); the noun plural is emendations.  The derived forms included nonemendable, unemendable, unemended (all rare and historically rarely hyphenated).

Amend (pronounced uh-mend)

(1) To alter, modify, rephrase, or add to or subtract from (a motion, bill, constitution etc) by a formal procedure or device.

(2) To change something for the better; improve

(3) In the sense of “to amend one's ways”, to grow or become better by “reforming” one’s character or behavior oneself.

(4) In the sense of “to make amends”, an act of righting a wrong; compensation.

(5) To remove or correct faults in something; to rectify defects or in some way improve.

(6) To heal (someone sick); to cure (a disease etc) (obsolete).

(7) To be healed, to be cured, to recover (from an illness) (obsolete).

1175–1225: From the Middle English amenden (to free from faults, rectify), from the twelfth century Old French amender (correct, set right, make better, improve), from the Latin ēmendō (free from faults), the construct being ex- (from, out of) + mendum (fault), from ēmendāre (to correct), the construct being ē- (out of, from) + mend(a) (blemish) + -āre (the infinitive suffix).  The primitive Indo-European mend (physical defect, fault) was the source also of the Sanskrit minda (physical blemish), the Old Irish mennar (stain, blemish), the Welsh mann (sign, mark) and the Hittite mant- (something harming).  The parallel development of the words spelled with an initial “a” & “e” was not usual in English but happened also in Italian and Provençal and Italian.  The meaning “to add to legislation” (ostensibly to improve or correct) appears first in British parliamentary records in 1777.  The noun amendment (betterment, improvement) was in use by the late thirteenth century of persons to suggest their “correction or reformation”; it was from the Old French amendement (rectification, correction; advancement, improvement), from amender (to amend) and in the 1600s the use expanded to the law including “correction of error in a legal process” and later “alteration of a writ or bill to remove fault”.  The noun amends in the sense of “recompense, compensation for loss or injury” was a collective singular, from the Old French amendes “fine, penalty, reparation, compensation”, the plural of amende (reparation) from amender (to amend) and use began in the early 1300s.  The adjective amendable (capable of correction or repair) dates from the 1580s while the injunction “unamendable” came into use (often with an exclamation mark) in the early twentieth century, presumably as a punchier version of “not to be amended”.  Amend is a noun & verb, amender (aˈmender the historic alternative spelling), amendability, amendment & amendation are nouns, amending is a verb, amended is a verb & adjective, amendable (aˈmendable the historic alternative spelling) & amendful are adjectives; the common noun plural is amendments.  The derived forms included nonamendable, unamendable, reamend  & unamended (all except unamended now rare and sometimes hyphenated).

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

There is sometimes a quality of randomness in the way English evolves.  Amend & emend both once meant “to improve by correcting or by freeing from error” but amend is now a general term which can mean “correct (errors in content, spelling, punctuation, grammar” or “make a change” (which may have no substantive effect).  Emend however specifically refers to a conjectural correction of error in a manuscript or proof copy; it’s thus now a technical term from publishing describing the correction of a text in the process of editing or preparing for publication and at least implies improvement in the sense of greater accuracy.  There have however been a number of instances where “emendations” have been controversial, often in the transcription from original log or diary entries written contemporaneously to printed form for purposes of record or public consumption.  Examples include the sanitized version of the “Chronicle” (the so-called “Speer Chronik” or “Office Journal”), the diary of departmental activities undertaken under Albert Speer (1905–1981; Nazi court architect 1934-1942; Nazi minister of armaments and war production 1942-1945) and the “War Diary” of Field Marshal Douglas Haig (Earl Haig, 1861–1928; commander-in-chief of British Army forces on the Western Front 1915-1918).  So synonyms like change, augment, alter, enhance, modify, rectify, revise, remedy, better, ameliorate & correct can all be used of amend but only forms like correct, rectify or remedy really convey the modern sense of emend.

Palliate

Palliate (pronounced pal-ee-yet)

(1) To relieve or lessen (pain, disease etc) without curing or removing; to mitigate; to alleviate.

(2) To attempt to mitigate or conceal the gravity of (conduct (especially as of offenses)) by excuses, reasons, apologies etc; to extenuate.

(3) To cause an offence to seem less serious; some act of concealment.

1490s: From the Late Latin palliāre (to cover up), from palliātus (cloaked, covered), (in Late Latin the past participle of palliare (to cover with a cloak)), from palliāre (to cover up) or pallium (cloak).  Palliate is a verb & adjective, palliation, palliator & pallium are nouns, palliative is a noun & adjective, unpalliated is an adjective, palliated & palliating are verbs and palliatively is an adverb; the common noun plural is palliatives.

Palliate is one of those words in English which has become mostly overwhelmed by the associative meaning of a derived form. Palliative medicine (or palliative care) is a branch of medicine which focuses on those terminally ill (usually with months, at the most, to live) by providing pain relief and attempting to allowing the dying to enjoy the best possible quality of life.  The alternative industry is that of voluntary euthanasia (the so-called right-to-die movement) which is now permitted and regulated by legislation in many jurisdictions.  Palliative medicine gained the name from the idea of the use of “palliatives”, drugs which provide pain relief for those for whom there is no possibility of a cure.  In that sense, the treatment regime “cloaks rather than cures” and expectations are limited to concealment of the consequences of the condition.  Although such practices (along with euthanasia, voluntary and not) had been part of medical practice for centuries, it was in the 1960s it came to be recognized as a discipline and a structural part of (or adjunct to depending on the jurisdiction) the hospital industry, and there are both academic courses in the subject and peer-reviewed journals such as the European Association for Palliative Care’s (EAPC) Palliative Medicine, published since 1987.  Although On Death and Dying (1969) by Swiss-American psychiatrist Elisabeth Kübler-Ross (1926–2004) is sometimes cited as the intellectual impetus for emergence, it happened really because of the mid-century advances in hygiene, nutrition, pharmaceuticals & surgical techniques and the extension of medical services in the welfare states which extended life-spans but not necessarily wellness, thus the increasing population of those terminally ill and in need of care.  The ability to prolong life (sometimes for decades) of someone in a debilitated condition, combined with the social changes which had seen the decline in numbers of extended family living arrangements, meant a substantially public-funded industry needed to evolve.

Cloaked for the occasion: Lindsay Lohan in appropriate Grim Reaper mode, fulfilling a court-mandated community service order at LA County Morgue, October 2011.

That has meant the word has faded from some of its historic uses.  In law, it used to be part of the language of courtrooms, defense counsel attempting to palliate the conduct of their client in the hop the just or jury would view the alleged act less harshly and deliver a verdict less severe.  That sense came into use in seventeenth century England and in courtrooms it described attempts to cover or disguise the seriousness of an offence by reasons (fanciful & not), excuses (plausible & not) or apologies (sincere & not).  In legal use, palliate has been replace by mitigation (a plea assembling reasons why conduct should be regarded more favourably than it may appear and be thus awarded with a lesser sentence), from the Middle French mitigation, from the Latin mitigation from mītigātus (softened, pacified).  The companion term is exculpation which etymologically and legally is unrelated both to palliate & mitigate.  Exculpate was from the Medieval Latin exculpātus, the perfect passive participle of exculpō, from the Latin ex culpa, the construct being ex- (out, from) + culpa (fault; blame (and familiar in Modern English as “culpability”)).  Whereas a plea of palliation or in mitigation was entered in the context of asking certain matters be considered so a guilty party may receive a lesser punishment, an successful exculpation exonerates the accused.  The lawyers in the 1630s picked-up and adapted palliate’s earlier meaning.  In the fifteenth century, true to the Latin origin derived from “a cloak”, it was used to mean “to relieve the symptoms of; to ameliorate” the sense (concealing the symptoms) to which palliative medicine would in the 1960s return.  This use was extended by the mid-1500s to become a general way to “conceal, hide or disguise” and was used widely in fields such as tailoring, architecture, landscaping, interior decorating and anywhere else where techniques of illusion were valued.

Many of the artistic depictions of scenes from Antiquity are probably at least misleading (no epoch has ever been so idealized) but one aspect of the fashions seems usually faithfully to have reflected what really was: the garb of the physicians, philosophers and teachers which was a woollen cloak, draped over the left shoulder and wrapped around the body; the Romans called it a pallium and it was the stage garment also of the hetaerae (plural of hetaera (in Ancient Greece, a high-price escort of some beauty & culture who entertained upper-class men with company, conversation and other services; they're sometimes referred to as courtesans but this can be misleading and a more accurate modern comparison is probably with the business model of the “sugar-babe”)).

Appreciative audience: Phryne revealed before the Areopagus (1861), oil on canvas by Jean-Léon Gérôme (1824-1904), Hamburger Kunsthalle, Hamburg.

The painting depicts Phryne (circa 371-320 BC), a legendarily beautiful hetaera of Ancient Greece, on trial before the Areopagus (from the Ancient Greek Ἄρειος Πάγος (Áreios Págos (literally “Rock of Ares”)) which during some periods in classical times functioned as the final appellate court (both civil & criminal matters) in Athens.  As a deliberative body, the Areopagus (it picked up the name from the location where the sittings were conducted) may also at times have been a legislative (or at least an advisory) assembly something like a senate.  The comparison with the UK's House of Lords in its historic role as both the (upper) house of review is sometimes made because of the dual function as both a legislative body and a final court of appeal but the history of the role of the Aeropagus in law-making is sketchy and as a judicial organ it seems also to have sat as a whole, never restricting (as the Lords eventually did) the judicial hearings to committees of those with appropriate legal experience.

Defended (and by dubious legend not very well) by the speech-writer Hypereides (circa 390–322 BC), she was arraigned before the Areopagus on a charge of Asebeia (a criminal indictment alleging impiety, something like blasphemy towards the divine objects and perhaps an occupation risk in her profession and the charge appears to have been brought by a jilted and vengeful ex) and the most told tale of the trial is that acquittal was secured when she bared her breasts to those assembled to judge.  Depending on which imaginative medieval scribe was writing, either her counsel pulled the pallium from her body or she disrobed herself although all agree the unusual legal tactic was resorted to because the defence was going not well.  The famous legal critique of the Roman writer Marcus Fabius Quintilianus (circa 35-circa 100), the verdict was secured “non Hyperidis actione... sed conspectus corporis” (not by Hypereides' pleading, but by the sight of her body") and as a gesture it wasn’t unknown in Athenian culture.  Although the trial and acquittal (by a majority vote) are uncontested history, whether the “boobs offered in mitigation” ever happened is at least suspect but if true, it’s not surprising the venerable gentlemen judging her were impressed because she also modelled her nude form for the sculptor Praxiteles who based his Aphrodite of Knidos on those sessions.  In the late eighteen century, something of a Phryne cult formed among European artists although what is history and what myth in the stories of her illustrious career is mostly uncertain although there’s no doubt she’d often have worn a pallium.

Life Roots Palliate Cream 30ml Twin Pack.

Containing bilberry, witch hazel, mangosteen, sage, rosemary, calendula, rose flower, sea buckthorn, lemon grass, grapefruit, nettle & Iceland moss, Life Roots' Palliate Cream is advertized as an agent to (1) moisturize, (2) reduce inflammation & (3) protect against dryness.  This would suggest the product is thought something which genuinely improves the state of the skin, rather than just “papering over the cracks” (as some skin-care products unashamedly are).  The phrase “to paper over the cracks” is a particular sense of palliation meaning “to use a temporary expedient; to create the semblance of order or agreement; temporarily to conceal problems”.  The phrase (in English translation) is attributed to the Prussian statesman Otto von Bismarck (1815-1989; Chancellor of the German Empire 1871-1890) who used the equivalent German expression in a letter dated 14 August 1865 during the negotiations of the Convention of Gastein (1865), a treaty between Austria and Prussia which temporarily would postpone the onset of the Austro-Prussian War (1866) and can thus be thought a prelude to the wars and the subsequent system of intricately interlocked treaties which would be the framework of the Bismarckian form of Reichism: “We are working eagerly to preserve the peace and to cover the cracks in the building.”  Under Bismarck, the stresses inherent in the structure were contained but in the hands of hiss less able successors, the forces became unleashed and consumed the continent ending the rule of four dynastic empires.  Still, “papering over the cracks” remains often the way politics is done, usually the way coalitions are formed and of late, a new flavor of the technique has emerged: Benjamin Netanyahu (b 1949; Israeli prime minister 1996-1999, 2009-2021 and since 2022) doesn’t care if people see the cracks through the paper.