Flute

Flute (pronounced floot)

(1) A woodwind instrument consisting of a tube with a row of finger-holes (or keys) which produce sound through vibrations caused by air blown across the edge of the holes, often tuned by plugging one or more holes with a finger; the Western concert flute, a transverse side-blown flute of European origin (in colloquial use, a recorder, also a woodwind instrument).

(2) An organ stop with wide flue pipes, having a flutelike tone.

(3) In architecture or engineering (particularly the manufacture of firearms), a semi-cylindrical vertical channel, groove or furrow, as on the shaft of a column, in a pillar, in plaited cloth, or in a rifle barrel to cut down the weight.

(4) Any groove or furrow, as in a ruffle of cloth or on a piecrust.

(5) One of the helical grooves of a twist drill.

(6) A slender, footed wineglass with a tall, conical bowl.

(7) A similar stemmed glass, used especially for champagne and often styled as "champagne flute".

(8) In steel fabrication, to kink or break in bending.

(9) In various fields of design, to form longitudinal flutes or furrows.

(10) A long bread roll of French origin; a baguette.

(11) In weaving, tapestry etc, a shuttle.

(12) To play on a flute; to make or utter a flutelike sound. 

(13) To form flutes or channels in (as in a column, a ruffle etc); to cut a semi-cylindrical vertical groove in (as in a pillar etc).

1350-1400; From the Middle English floute, floute & flote, from the Middle French flaüte, flahute & fleüte, from the twelfth century Old French flaute (musical), from the Old Provençal flaüt (thought an alteration of flaujol or flauja) of uncertain origin but may be either (1) a blend of the Provencal flaut or  flaujol (flageolet) + laut (lute) or (2) from the Classical Latin flātus (blowing), from flāre (to blow) although there is support among etymologists for the notion of it being a doublet of flauta & fluyt.  In other languages, the variations include the Irish fliúit and the Welsh ffliwt.  The form in Vulgar Latin has been cited as flabeolum but evidence is scant and all forms are thought imitative of the Classical Latin flāre and other Germanic words (eg flöte) are borrowings from French. 

Portrait of Archduchess Maria Antonia of Austria (later Queen Marie Antoinette of France (1774-1792)), circa 1768, oil on canvas by Martin van Meytens  (1695–1770).

Fluted & fluting both date from the 1610s while the verb (in the sense of "to play upon a flute") seems to bave been in use as early as the late fourteenth century.  The use to describe grooves in metalwork emerged in the 1570s and was applied to the tall, slender wine glass almost a century later although the term "champagne flute" didn't enter popular use until the 1950s.  The champagne flute is preferred by many to the coupé (or saucer) even though it lacks the (since unfortunately debunked) legend the shape of the latter was modelled on Marie Antoinette’s (1754-1793) left breast (historians gleefully recounting the tale all agree it definitely was the left).  Elegant though it is, the advantages of the flute are entirely functional, the design providing for less spillage than a coupé, something which comes to be more valued as lunch progresses to the third uncorking and the slender, tapered shape is claimed better to preserve the integrity of the bubbles, the smaller surface area and thus reduced oxygen-to-wine ratio longer maintaining aroma and taste.

Grand Cru's guide to the shape of champagne glasses.

Among musical instruments, there are a dozen or more distinct types of flute.  Early French flutes differed greatly from modern instruments in having a separate mouthpiece and were called flûte-a-bec (literally "flute with a beak").  The ancient devices were played directly, blown straight through a mouthpiece but held away from the player's mouth, the modern transverse (or "German") flute not appearing until the eighteenth century and the familiar modern design and key system of the concert flute were perfected 1834 by Bavarian court musician & virtuoso flautist Theobald Boehm (1794–1881), the fingering system known to this day as "Boehm system".  The architectural sense of "furrow in a pillar" dates from the mid-seventeenth century and was derived from the vague resemblance to the inside of a flute split down the middle.

Solidarity: 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 euphemism “playing the skin flute” was coined.

One imaginative linguistic re-purposing was the use in the 1940s (apparently first in the US) of “playing the skin flute” to mean “to perform fellatio” and while still in that sense used in certain LGBTQQIAAOP circles, in general use the meaning has shifted, no describing “a male engaged in the act of masturbation”.  Use shifted to fruit, either by virtue of use at the time being almost exclusively oral rather than written (linguistically, that’s classified as an example of an imperfect echoic) or because "fruit" was then in use as a gay slur.   The nouns flute-player, fluter & flutist can be used of flute players but the preferred term is flautist.  Presumably, someone employed to add flutes to an object could be designated “the fluter” but it’s doubtful such as specialist job-description has ever been written.  Flute is a noun & verb, flutiness, flautist, flutist & fluter are nouns, fluted is a verb & adjective, fluting is a noun, verb & adjective, flutelike is an adjective; the noun plural is flutes.  

Fluted grill on 1972 Series 1, 4.2 Litre Daimler Sovereign.

In British use, one who plays the flute is a flautist (pronounced flaw-tist (U) or flou-tist (non-U)), from the Italian flautista, the construct being flauto (flute) +‎ -ista.  The -ist suffix was from the Middle English -ist & -iste, from the Old French -iste and the Latin -ista, from the Ancient Greek -ιστής (-istḗs), from -ίζω (-ízō) (the -ize & -ise verbal suffix) and -τής (-tḗs) (the agent-noun suffix).  It was added to nouns to denote various senses of association such as (1) a person who studies or practices a particular discipline, (2), one who uses a device of some kind, (3) one who engages in a particular type of activity, (4) one who suffers from a specific condition or syndrome, (5) one who subscribes to a particular theological doctrine or religious denomination, (6) one who has a certain ideology or set of beliefs, (7) one who owns or manages something and (8), a person who holds very particular views (often applied to those thought most offensive).  The alternative forms are the unimaginative (though descriptive) flute-player and the clumsy pair fluter although the odd historian or music critic will use aulete, from the Ancient Greek αὐλητής (aulētḗs), from αὐλέω (auléō) (I play the flute), from αὐλός (aulós) (flute).  The spelling flutist is preferred in the US and it's actually an old form, dating from circa 1600 and probably from the French flûtiste and it replaced the early thirteenth century Middle English flouter (from the Old French flauteor).

Daimler, the flutes and US trademark law

1972 Daimler Double-Six Vanden Plas.

Originally Belgium-based and noted for both the sporty and large bodies built for the chassis of Rolls-Royce, Lagondas, Daimlers, Bentleys and such, the coach-building house Vanden Plas was in 1946 acquired by Austin and through the British industry’s M&As (mergers and acquisitions) in the following decades, by the early 1970s it was British Leyland’s in-house coach-builder, one of its projects being to add still more luxurious appointments to the anyway lavish Daimler Double-Six.  Vanden Plas completed only 342 of the Series 1 (1972-1973) Daimler Double Sixes, the later S2 (1973-1979) & S3 (1979-1992) cars much more numerous and, in deference to the oil crisis which was the prime economic force in the decade, the S2 & S3 were available with the 4.2 litre (258 cubic inch) XK-six as were as the heroically thirsty 5.3 litre (326 cubic inch) V12.  The flutes atop the grill dated from the early twentieth-century and were originally a functional addition to the radiator to enhance heat-dissipation but later became a merely decorative embellishment.  Although some sources claim there were 351 of the Series 1 Double-Six Vanden Plas, the factory insists the total was 342.  British Leyland and its successor companies would continue to use the Vanden Plas name for some of the more highly-specified Daimlers but applied it also to Jaguars because in some markets the trademark to the Daimler name came to be held by Daimler-Benz AG (since 2022 Mercedes-Benz Group AG), a legacy from the earliest days of motor-car manufacturing and despite the English middle class often pronouncing the name as van-dem-plarr, it should said as van-dem-plass.  It's an error with the same origin as that suffered by Moët & Chandon: to English speaking ears, mow-eh sounds "more French" than mow-et. 

1976 Daimler Double-Six Vanden Plas two door.

The rarest Double-Six Vanden Plas was a genuine one-off, a two door built reputedly using one of the early prototypes, a regular production version contemplated but cancelled after the first was built.  Jaguar would once have called such things a FHC (fixed head coupé) but labelled the XJ derivatives as "two door saloons" and always referred to them thus, presumably as a point of differentiation with the XJ-S (later XJS) coupé produced at the same time.  Despite the corporate linguistic nudge, everybody seems always to have called the two-door XJs "coupés".  Why the project was cancelled isn't known but it was for the company a time of industrial and financial turmoil and distractions, however minor, may have been thought unwelcome.  Although fully-finished, apart from the VDP-specific trim, it includes also some detail mechanical differences from the regular production two-door Double-Six but both use the distinctive fluted finish on the grill and trunk (boot) lid trim; the car still exists.  The two-door XJs (1975-1978) rank with the earliest versions (1961-1967) of the E-Type (XKE; 1961-1974) as the finest styling Jaguar ever achieved and were it not for the unfortunate vinyl roof visually, it would be as close to perfect as any machine ever made.

1975 Jaguar XJC: The design perfected.  Even Jaguar's usually uncompromising originality police seem to approve.

The orthodoxy is the gluing-on of the vinyl was a necessity imposed by the inability of the paint of the era to cope with the slight flexing of the roof.  As a two-door hardtop, there was no B-pillar so the expanse of un-supported metal was larger than that of the sedans and thus more subject to higher stress-loads, resulting in the paint being subject to crazing.  Modern chemistry means suitable paints have long been available and many owners have taken the opportunity to fix the cars one visual flaw.  However, not all accept the “flexing roof” theory and claim the vinyl was a deliberate aesthetic choice, noting the 1972 Double-Six Vanden Plas (which appeared in 1972, three years before the two-door XJ went on sale) was fitted as standard with a vinyl roof, despite obviously there been no paint-related imperative.  Possibly it may have been a way of reducing interior noise but some argue it appeared just because the covering was then undeniably fashionable.  The inexcusable lapse in taste had been seen (then using leather) as early as the 1920s but it was in the US in the mid-1960s the motif hit the mass-market to attract those who wanted “a convertible’s rakish vibe” but needed something more practical; things soon got out of hand, the trend spreading to the UK and Australia.  For up-market models, the Australians even emulated the US practice of the “padded vinyl roof” which was a bad idea made worse the closer one got to the tropics, the foam in the “vinyl-metal sandwich” trapping moisture and leading quickly to rust.  The Europeans proved commendably resistant and by the 1980s the moment had passed in the UK and Australia but the Americans doubled-down and, until the mid-1990s, Detroit’s designers devoted much energy to styling elaborate variations on the theme, the marketing department doing its usual bit by labelling them with fanciful names.

Using one of his trademark outdoor settings, Norman Parkinson (1913-1990) photographed model Suzanne Kinnear (b 1935) adorning a Daimler SP250, wearing a Kashmoor coat and Otto Lucas beret with jewels by Cartier.  The image was published on the cover of Vogue's UK edition in November 1959.

Although Daimlers had, in small numbers, been imported into US for decades, after Jaguar purchased the company in 1960, there was renewed interest and the first model used to test the market was the small, fibreglass-bodied roadster, probably the most improbable Daimler ever and one destined to fail, doomed by (1) the quirky styling and (2) the lack of product development.  It was a shame because what made it truly unique was the hemi-head 2.5 litre (155 cubic inch) V8 which was one of the best engines of the era and remembered still for the intoxicating exhaust note.  The SP250 was first shown to the public at the 1959 New York Motor Show and there the problems began.  Aware the small sports car was quite a departure from the luxurious but rather staid line-up Daimler had for years offered, the company had chosen the pleasingly alliterative “Dart” as its name, hoping it would convey the sense of something agile and fast.  Unfortunately, Chrysler’s lawyers were faster still, objecting that they had already registered Dart as the name for a full-sized Dodge so Daimler needed a new name and quickly; the big Dodge would never be confused with the little Daimler but the lawyers insisted.  Imagination apparently exhausted, Daimler’s management reverted to the engineering project name and thus the car became the SP250 which was innocuous enough even for Chrysler's attorneys and it could have been worse.  Dodge had submitted their Dart proposal to Chrysler for approval and while the car found favor, the name did not and the marketing department was told to conduct research and come up with something the public would like.  From this the marketing types gleaned that “Dodge Zipp” would be popular and to be fair, dart and zip(p) do imply much the same thing but ultimately the original was preferred and Darts remained in Dodge’s line-up until 1976, for most of that time one of the corporation's best-selling and most profitable lines.  The name was revived between 2012-2016 for an unsuccessful and unlamented small sedan.

Leaper, growler and flutes on US market 1999 Jaguar Vanden Plas (X308).  The retractable, solid-timber picnic tables in the back of the front seats were much admired.

Decades later, US trademark law would again intrude, this time on Jaguar’s low-volume business of selling Daimlers in the US.  There, the company had after 1967 ceased offering the Daimler because, it being clear the trickle of safety & emission regulations was soon to be a flood, with capital scarce, it was decided resources needed to be devoted to compliance and one form of economy was to re-allocate the funds absorbed by maintaining Daimler as a separate brand, most of which were spent on advertising.  In Stuttgart, the Daimler-Benz lawyers took note and decided to reclaim the name, eventually managing to secure registration of the trademark and Daimlers have not since been available in the US.  However, there was still clearly demand for an up-market Jaguar and so the Sovereign name (used on Daimlers between 1966-1983) was applied to Jaguar XJ sedans which, although mechanically unchanged, were equipped with more elaborate appointments.

Lindsay Lohan with stainless steel Rolex Datejust (Roman numeral dial) with fluted white gold bezel.  Note the blue eyes; it's not known if the effect was achieved with colored contact lens or digital editing.

Sales of the up-market Sovereign were good and the profit margins fatter so the US market also received some even more luxurious Vanden Plas models and during the XJ’s X308 model run (1997-2003), the VDP cars were fitted with the fluted grill and trunk-lid trim as an additional means of product differentiation; it would be the last appearance of the flutes in North America and the only occasion on which the leaper and growler were used in conjunction with them.  Although some might dismiss the interior fittings of the Vanden Plas models as “bling”, there were nice touches.  The ones based on the X308 featured the fold-down picnic-tables once so beloved by English coach-builders (the affection in the 1960s trickling down to the middle-class as they began to appear on blinged-up mass-market vehicles) but, rather than the usual burl walnut veneer, the pieces were of solid timber.  The factory seems never to have discussed the rationale but it may be it was cheaper to do it that way, the veneering process being labor-intensive.

Pim Fortuyn in his chauffeur-driven Daimler Super V8, February 2002 (left), paramedics attending to him at the scene of his assassination (centre) a few paces from the Daimler, 6 May, 2002 (he died at the scene) and the car when on sale, Amsterdam, June 2018 (right).  His assassin, memorably, was described in press reports “deranged vegetarian”; perhaps it was the sight of meneer Fortuyn sprawled across those Connolly Leather hides which was triggering.

Jaguar became aware the allure of the flutes was real when it discovered a small but profitable industry had emerged in the wake of the company ceasing to use the Daimler name in European markets (by the 1990s, it was only in the UK, Japan, Australia & New Zealand they could be bought off the showroom floor).  Entrepreneurial types, armed with nothing more than a list of Jaguar part-numbers, had created kits containing the fluted trim pieces and Daimler-specific badges, these shipped to dealers or private buyers on the continent so Jaguar XJs could become “Daimlers”.  Being factory-supplied parts of no mechanical significance, their use did not affect warranties or insurance rates (though owners were required to inform registration authorities the badgework had changed) so, unlike many after-market modifications, administratively, it was a hassle-free process.  Jaguar took note of this uptick in the Daimler-demand curve and decided to meet it with supply, re-introducing the marque to Europe.  Because the company was, in effect, doing only what was being done by those buying the kits, it proved one of the industry's cheapest and quickest brand resurrections, Germany and the Netherlands especially receptive.  One notable owner of a real LWB (long wheelbase) Daimler Super V8 (X308) was the Dutch academic and politician Pim Fortuyn (1948-2002), assassinated by a left-wing environmentalist and animal rights activist during the 2002 national election campaign.

Mnemonic

Mnemonic (pronounced ni-mon-ik)

(1) Something assisting or intended to assist the memory.

(2) Pertaining to mnemonics or to memory.

(3) In computing, truncated code thought easy to remember (eg STO for store).

1660–1670: From the New Latin mnemonicus from the Ancient Greek μνημονικός (mnēmonikós) (of memory) derived from μνήμων (mnḗmōn) (remembering, mindful) & μνᾶσθαι (mnâsthai) (to remember); the ultimate root was the primitive Indo-European men (to think).  The meaning "aiding the memory", a back-formation from mnemonics dates from 1753, the noun meaning "mnemonic device" is from 1858.  The use in computer programming emerged in the early days of code and was a space-saving (eg del rather than delete) tool as well.  Mnemonical was the original form from the 1660s.  One of the charming ironies of mnemonic is it is one of those words so many can't quite remember how to spell.  It's thus in a sense "antimnemonic" and a contronym (also as auto-antonym, antagonym, or enantiodrome) which describes a word with two opposite or contradictory meanings, depending on context.  Mnemonic is a noun & adjective, mnemonician, mnemonicalist, mnemotechnist & mnemonicon are nouns, mnemonize & mnemonized are verbs, mnemonical & mnemotechnic are adjectives and mnemonically & mnemotechnically are adverbs; the noun plural is mnemonics.

Sans Forgetica

Sans Forgetica sample text.

Recently released, Sans Forgetica (which translates as "without forgetting") is a sans-serif font developed by RMIT University in Melbourne.  Back-slanted and with gaps in the character constructions, it’s designed explicitly to assist readers better to understand and retain in their memory what they’ve read.  Perhaps counter-intuitively for those outside the field, the shape is intended to reduce legibility, thereby (1) lengthening the tame taken to read the text and (2) adding complexity to learning and absorbing what’s been read.  Together, they create what in cognitive psychology and neuroscience is called "desirable difficulty", in this case forcing (RMIT might prefer "nudging") people to concentrate.

The first three paragraphs of Lindsay Lohan's Wikipedia page, rendered in Sans Forgetica.  Sans was from the Middle English saunz & sans, from the Old French sans, senz & sens, from the Latin sine (without) conflated with absēns (absent, remote).   Forgetica was an opportunistic coining, the construct being forget + -ica.  Forget was from the Middle English forgeten, forgiten, foryeten & forȝiten, from the Old English forġietan (to forget) (which was influenced by the Old Norse geta (to get; to guess), from the Proto-West Germanic fragetan (to give up, forget).  The -ica suffix was from the Latin -ica, the neuter plural of -icus (belonging to derived from; of or pertaining to; connected with).

From usually a young age, readers become skilled at scanning text, a process helped by most publishers seeking to render their works as legible as possible.  The theory of desirable difficulty is that omitting parts of the font requires the reader to pause and process information more slowly, thus provoking an additional cognitive processing which may enhance both understanding and retention.  While the application of the science to a font is novel, there’s nothing original about Sans Forgetica as a piece of typography, it being described as a hybrid of several existing schools and within the theory, on the basis of a small-group sample of students, it’s claimed to be a balance between legibility and difficulty.  According to the documents supplied by the developer, it’s not been tested as a device for advertisers to draw people to their text, the theory of that being people scan and dismiss (without retention) the great bulk of the large, static signage which is a feature of just about every urban environment.  With Sans Forgetica, because it can’t as quickly be scanned, people will tend longer to linger and so more carefully read the whole; a memorable event itself.

The most recent revision (DSM-5-TR (2022)) to the American Psychiatric Association's (APA) Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM) followed DSM-5 (2013) in refining the somewhat vague section on amnesia in both the DSM-IV (1994) & DSM-IV-TR (2000) where appeared the terms “Psychogenic amnesia” & “dissociative amnesia”, the core element of which was: “one or more episodes of inability to recall important personal information, usually of a traumatic or stressful nature, that is too extensive to be explained by ordinary forgetfulness.”  That really reflected the popular understanding and there was no clear definition of sub-types in the diagnostic criteria although in the text (not always in criteria) there was mention of localized, selective or generalized forms.  In the fifth edition, the disorder was called Dissociative Amnesia (psychogenic amnesia seems to have been replaced) and it was listed in the dissociative disorders section.  The definition still includes an “inability to recall important autobiographical information, usually of a traumatic or stressful nature, that is inconsistent with ordinary forgetting” so the popular understanding remains acknowledged but sub-types are now listed: localized (for specific event(s)), selective (some parts of the event), or generalized (identity and life history) amnesia.  Consistent with the structural revisions elsewhere in the fifth edition, the exclusion criteria was made more explicit (ie the memory loss should not be due to substances, medication, a neurological condition or better accounted for by another mental disorder) although clinician remain aware of overlap.  Significantly the DSM-5 did clarify that amnesia is retrograde (loss of pre-existing memories), especially of autobiographical kind and emphasised the memory loss is “beyond what is expected from normal forgetting.”  Because in such matters, there will be so much variation between patients, it remains one of those conditions with fuzzy boundaries and the symptoms presented must be assessed on a case-by-case basis.

Amnesia (memory loss) is much studied and although associated with the aging process, traumatic events (brain injury or psychological impacts) and certain neurological conditions, there have been some celebrated cases of recovery without medical intervention.  One celebrated case was that of Rudolf Hess (1894–1987; Nazi Deputy Führer 1933-1941) who in 1941 (on the eve of Germany invading the USSR) flew himself to Scotland in a bizarre and unauthorized attempt to negotiate a peace deal with those in the UK he though would be "reasonable men".    His "offer" was rejected and he was locked up (including two weeks in the Tower of London), later to be sent as a defendant before the IMT (International Military Tribunal) in the first Nuremberg Trial (1945-1946).  There, so convincing were his symptoms of amnesia and other mental states the judges requested submissions from defence and prosecution counsel on the matter of his fitness to stand trial.  The prosecutors assured the bench Hess would be able to both understand and cope with the proceedings and that an imperfect memory was merely a hindrance to his defence rather than an insuperable obstacle.  This was of course a predictable argument and the judges acceded to the defence’s request for a thorough medical investigation although they declined the suggestion Swiss doctors be consulted, assembling instead a team from medical staff on hand (three Soviet, three American, three British and one French), all from the nations running the trial.  The physicians presented four national papers which broadly were in agreement: Hess was sane (as legally defined) but was suffering from hysterical amnesia, induced by his need to escape from uncomfortable realities, something they found was often typical of “those with Hess’s unstable personality”.  All concluded the amnesia was temporary and would vary in intensity, the US doctors suggesting it may even disappear were any threat of punishment removed.

Caricature of Rudolf Hess at the first Nuremberg Trial by New Zealand-born UK cartoonist David Low (1891-1963).

The author Rebecca West (1892–1983) covered the trial as a journalist and wrote some vivid thumbnail sketches, noting of Hess: “Hess was noticeable because he was so plainly mad: so plainly mad that it seemed shameful that he should be tried.  His skin was ashen and he had that odd faculty, peculiar to lunatics, of falling into strained positions which no normal person could maintain for more than a few minutes, and staying fixed in contortion for hours. He had the classless air characteristic of asylum inmates; evidently his distracted personality had torn up all clues to his past.  He looked as if his mind had no surface, as if every part of it had been blasted away except the depth where the nightmares live.”  Whether or not Hess was "mad" (as such folk were described in 1946) can be debated but to many at the time, he certainly looked a madman.

Predictably unconvinced, Hess’s counsel at a hearing on 30 November 1945 told the bench a defendant could hardly stage an adequate defence if unable to remember names or incidents vital to his case, adding that on the basis of discussions with his client, even if he understood the words, Hess was incapable of grasping the significance of the charges against him.  Nor would a trial in absentia be fair because it would constituent a “grave injustice” were a defendant not present to give evidence or challenge the testimony of witnesses.  He concluded by requesting proceedings against him should be suspended and resumed only if his condition significantly improved.  To that, the British countered with a lengthy lecture on the distinctions in English law between amnesia & insanity and seconded the Soviet view that participation in the trial (and thus the need to make a defence) might well cure his condition.  Essentially, the British argued if he could follow the proceedings, he was fit to stand trial.  The US team noted Hess had at times claimed to be suffering amnesia while in captivity in England between 1941-1945 and on other occasions admitted the condition was simulated.  In the slang of the English criminal bar: “He had a bit of previous”.  The Americans also expressed annoyance at him having repeatedly refused any of the treatment prescribed by the Allied doctors, concluding: “He is in the volunteer class with his amnesia”.  The lawyers having finished, the IMT asked Hess if he wished to speak on the matter.  Without delay, he rose in the dock and walked to the microphone where he addressed the court in a clear and calm voice, his statement coherent, unambiguous and, most historians have concluded, clearly premeditated: “Henceforth my memory will again respond to the outside world.  The reasons for simulating loss of memory were of a tactical nature.  Only my ability to concentrate is, in fact, somewhat reduced.  But my capacity to follow the trial, to defend myself, to put questions to witnesses, or to answer questions myself is not affected thereby.  I also simulated loss of memory in consultations with my officially appointed defence counsel. He has therefore represented in good faith.”

He then sat down in what was described as a “stunned courtroom”.  It was at that point the trial’s most sensational moment and after taking a few seconds to digest things, the assembled press pack in their dozens rushed outside to file the story (the US military newspaper Stars and Stripes ran the punchy headline “Hess Nuts. Fake Story Fake”).  Immediately, the president of the IMT adjourned the session and the judges went into private session to decide whether Hess should be tried.  From their subsequent interviews and writings it appears they were not much influenced by Hess’s unexpected statement but were impressed by the similarity of the conclusions offered by the doctors, the chief US prosecutor saying such “unanimity of medical opinion” was, in his experience: “historically unique”.  All eight judges agreed Hess was fit to stand trial and, after being convicted on two counts ((1) conspiracy to wage aggressive war and (2) waging aggressive war), he was handed a life sentence and would remain incarcerated until in 1987 he committed suicide after some 46 years behind bars, the last two decades of which were served as the sole inmate (guarded by dozens of soldiers on rotation from France, the UK, US and USSR) of Berlin’s sprawling Spandau Prison, a huge facility designed to incarcerate hundreds.

Low’s take on the official German line explaining Hess deserting the German government as “madness”.  This cartoon does represent what was then the prevailing public perception of the typical appearance expected of those in “lunatic asylums”.  Depicted (left to right) are:

Hermann Göring (1893–1946; leading Nazi 1922-1945, Hitler's designated successor & Reichsmarschall 1940-1945): Committed suicide by by crushing between his teeth an ampule of a potassium cyanide (KCN), smuggled into his cell in circumstances never confirmed, shortly before he was to be hanged after being convicted on all four counts ((1) Conspiracy to wage aggressive war; (2) Waging aggressive war; (3) War crimes and (4) Crimes against humanity.

Adolf Hitler (1889-1945; Führer (leader) and German head of government 1933-1945 & head of state 1934-1945): With his wife Eva (née Braun; 1912–1945) of a few hours, committed suicide (he by gunshot and KCN, she by KCN alone) with the tanks of the Red Army only a couple of blocks from the Berlin Führerbunker.

Dr Robert Ley (1890–1945; head of the Deutsche Arbeitsfront (German Labour Front) 1933-1945): Before the trial began, he committed suicide by hanging (by means of suffocation) himself from the toilet-pipe in his cell in Nuremberg, after having for some years made a reasonable attempt to drink himself to death.  He died with his underpants stuffed in his mouth, decades before the phrase "Eat my shorts!" began to circulate in popular culture.

Joachim von Ribbentrop (1893–1946; Nazi foreign minister 1938-1945): Hanged at Nuremberg after being convicted on all four counts.

Dr Joseph Goebbels: With his wife (Magda Goebbels (née Ritschel; 1901-1945), committed suicide (by gunshot) in the courtyard above the Führerbunker, shortly after they’d murdered their six young children.

Heinrich Himmler (1900–1945; Reichsführer SS 1929-1945): Captured by the British while attempting to escape disguised as a soldier, he committed suicide using an ampule of KCN concealed in his mouth.

Whether Hess was at any point insane (in the legal or medical sense) remains debated although, as is often the case, more interesting still is the speculation about just when the instability began.  Whether any credence can be attached to the official statement on the matter from the Nazi Party is doubtful but in the view of Reich Chancellery, his madness predated his flight to Scotland in 1941 (one of the strangest incidents of World War II (1939-1945)).  What the German press was told to publish was that Hess had become "deluded and deranged", his mental health affected by injuries sustained during World War I (1914-1918) and that he'd fallen under the influence of astrologers.  Just to make that sound convincing, the police conducted a crackdown (a well oiled technique in the Nazi state) on soothsayers and fortune-tellers.  Dr Joseph Goebbels (1897-1945; Nazi propaganda minister 1933-1945) wasn't consulted before the "madness" explanation was announced and he seems to have been the only senior figure in the regime to grasp the potential implications of revealing to the public that for some time the country's deputy leader had been mad.  Others though did make the connection.  When Hermann Göring tried to shift the blame to aircraft designer and manufacturer Willy Messerschmitt (1898–1978) because he'd provided Hess a twin-engined Bf 110 Zerstörer (destroyer (heavy fighter)) for his flight, the engineer responded by saying Göring was more culpable because he should have done something about having someone unstable serving as Deputy Führer.  Göring could only laugh and told Messerschmitt to go back to building warplanes and, as it turned out, the strange affair was but a "nine day wonder" for not only did the British make no attempt to use Hess's arrival on their soil for propaganda purposes (which astonished Goebbels) but other events would soon dominate the headlines.  The only place where the strange flight left a great impression was in the Kremlin where comrade Stalin (1878-1953; Soviet leader 1924-1953) for years mulled over who within the British establishment might have conspired with Hess to allow the UK to withdraw from the conflict, leaving Germany able to invade Russia without having to fight on two fronts.  Historians have concluded the reluctance by the British to use for propaganda the arrival of Hess was their concern comrade Stalin might suspect collusion. 

Arthur Sinodinos, b 1957; Liberal Party functionary and minister variously 2007-2019; Australian ambassador to the US 2019-2023, right ) presenting to Donald Trump (b 1946; US president 2017-2021 and since 2025, left) his credentials as Australia's ambassador to the US, the White House, Washington DC, February 2020.

Less dramatic but perhaps medically even more remarkable than the Hess affair was the recovery from amnesia by Arthur Sinodinos, a case which deserves to enter the annals of academic psychiatry & neurology (and debatably, those of the thespians).  In Australia, royal commissions are public investigations, established by but independent of government.  Not a court, royal commissions are created to enquire into matters of public importance and, within their terms of reference, have broad powers to conduct public & in camera hearings; they can call witnesses, compelling them (under oath) to provide testimony and they deliver recommendations to government about what should be done, consequent upon their findings.  These can include recommendations for legislative or administrative changes and the prosecution of institutions or individuals and they’re of great interest because they appear to be the only institution (at least theoretically) able to compel a politician to tell the truth.  Even that power is limited though because when appearing before royal commissions, politicians seem especially prone to suffering amnesia, an obviously distressing condition which compels them frequently to utter phrases like “I can’t remember”, “I don’t recall”, “not in my recollection” etc.  In the lore of the New South Wales (NSW) bar, Mr Sinodinous, while in 2014 being questioned by an enquiry, is believed to have set a record for the frequency with which the condition manifested.  Fortunately, the enquiry handed down no adverse findings against him and almost immediately, his memory appeared miraculously to recover, enabling the Australian Liberal Party government to appoint him ambassador to the US in 2019 so there's that.  The following transcript is wholly fake news:

Donald Trump: "What did you and Joe Biden talk about?"

Arthur Sinodinous: "I can't remember."

Donald Trump: "Not to worry, he won't remember either."

In the rich slang of the NSW bar, the condition once known as RCM (Royal Commission Memory) is now also referred to as “Sinodinos Syndrome”, on the model of “Marcinkus Syndrome” which describes the medical status of Roman Catholic priests who, being investigated for this, that or the other, although seemingly fit and healthy, are never able to be certified quite well enough to be interviewed by police or other authorities.  The condition is named after Archbishop Paul Marcinkus (1922–2006; President of the Institute for the Works of Religion (the “Vatican Bank’) 1971-1989).

Combat

Combat (pronounced kuhm-bat or kom-bat (verb); kom-bat (noun))

(1) To fight or contend against; vigorously to oppose.

(2) In military matters, certain parts of branches of the services which engage in armed conflict with enemy forces.

(3) An action fought between two military forces.

(4) As a descriptor (in the military and of weapos and weapons systems), a means to distinguish between an item design specifically for use in combat as oppose to one intended for other purpose.

1535-1540: From the Middle English intransitive verb combat (to fight, struggle, contend), from the sixteenth century French combat, from the twelfth century Old French combattre, from the Late Latin combattere, the construct being com (with (each other) (an an archaic form of cum)) + battuere (to beat, fight) (source of the modern English verb "batter").  The transitive sense dates from the 1580s; the figurative use from the 1620s.  The noun combat (a fight (originally especially "a fight between two armed persons" and later distinguished as single combat in the 1620s)), emerged in the 1560s and soon was applied in a general sense to "any struggle or fight between opposing forces".  Combat is a noun, verb & adjective, combater & combatant are nouns, combatted & combatting are verbs and combative is an adjective; the noun plural is combats.

Combative and dressed for combat: Lindsay Lohan in boxing gloves.

The phrase hors de combat (out of action; disabled; no longer able to fight (literally "out of combat")) was constructed from hors (out, beyond), from the Latin foris (outside (literally "out of doors")) + de (of) + combat.  It dates from 1757 and was related originally to battlefield conduct (the principle of which which would later be interpolated into the the rules of war) and is now a literary and rhetorical device.  It shouldn't be confused with the French expression hors concours (out of competition) which, dating from 1884, is applied to works of art in an exhibition but not eligible to be awarded a prize.  Given the sometimes nasty battles waged in galleries, perhaps hors de combat might sometimes be as appropriate but in exhibitions it's most often used of works which have either already won a prize or have been awarded the maximum number provided for in the competition rules.  Other sporting competitions sometimes use hors concours to describe entries which don't conform with the rules of the event but are for a variety of reasons permitted to run (notably in motorsport).  The adjective combative (pugnacious, disposed to fight) is from 1819 and by the mid nineteenth century had become much associated with the long discredited pseudo-science of phrenology, the related forms being combatively and the earlier (1815) combativeness.  Combatant (contending, disposed to combat) was an adjective by the mid fifteenth century and a noun (one who engages in battle) by circa 1855, both from the Old French combatant (which survives in Modern French as combattant) (skilled at fighting, warlike) where it had also been a noun.    The adjective combative (pugnacious, aggressive; disposed to engage in conflict (though not necessarily violence)) seems not pleasing to some because the incorrect spelling combatative is not uncommon.

The Combat: Woman Pleading for the Vanquished, oil on canvas by William Etty (1787-1849), National Gallery of Scotland.

Unusually for works in this tradition, The Combat is not a depiction of a historical or mythological event but a kind of morality tale exploring “the beauty and quality of mercy”.  Structurally, the picture is of a woman clutching a warrior who, with sword raised, seems poised to inflict a fatal strike on his fallen foe whose own blade lies shattered on the ground, the woman begging he be spared.  Praised for its technical accomplishment The Combat also attracted the criticism the ahistorical piece seemed just another of the artist’s opportunistic pretexts for painting more nude figures, long his favourite motif, but the painter dismissed the carping, reminding critics such imaginative works had a tradition dating from Antiquity, the Romans calling that school of composition “the Roman Visions, works not having their origin in history or poetry”.  Mr Etty certainly made a seminal contribution to the genre and he’s regarded as the first English painter of any skill to produce a substantial number of nudes, something which, predictably, has overshadowed his catalogue of estimable still lifes.  His life was solitary and in some ways strange and in much of the popular press his output was damned as “indecent” but when in 1828 proposed for membership of the Royal Academy, he was elected, defeating no less than John Constable 1776–1837) by 18 votes to five so his fellow artists rated him highly.  

The Norton Commando 750 Combat

1968 Kawasaki 500 Mach III (H1).

British manufacturers once regarded competition from the far-east with little concern but by the late 1960s, Japanese motorcycles had become serious machines enjoying commercial success.  Kawasaki’s 500cm³ (H1, Mach III) two-stroke triple debuted in 1968 while Honda’s 750-Four was released a year later, the former fast but lethally unstable, the latter more refined.  Three years on, the release of Kawasaki’s 900 cm³ Z1 confirmed the maturity of the Japanese product and the era of British complacency was over though the realization was too late to save the industry.

Nothing ever quite matched the rawness of the original Kawasaki Mach III.  Riders of high performance machines had for decades distinguished between fast, well-balanced motorcycles and those which, while rapid, needed to be handled with caution if used in anything but a straight line and on a billiard table smooth surface but even in those circumstances the Mach III could be a handful, the engine's power band narrow and the entry to it sudden and explosive.  Probably the best comparison was something like the BRM grand prix car (1947-1955) which used a supercharged 1.5 litre (91 cubic inch) V16; it was only marginally responsive under 8000 rpm but at that point suddenly delivered its extraordinary power which could be as much as 500-600 horsepower.  Many Mach III owners were soon noting while rear tyre life was short, the front lasted well because it spent so little time in contact with the road.  Adding to the trickiness, lacking the rigidity needed to cope with such stresses, the frame design meant there was something of a gyroscopic tendency under hard acceleration which could be at least disquieting and the consequences were often worse.  Still, nobody denied they were quick.  Clearly, only crazy people would buy such a thing but fortunately for Kawasaki (and presumably this was part of the product planning), by 1968 the Western world was populated as never before with males aged 17-25 (peak craziness years) with sufficient credit or disposable income to indulge the madness of youth.  It helped that under the Bretton Woods system (1944) of fixed exchange rates, at ¥360 to the US$, the Mach III was quite a bargain; on cost breakdown, nothing on two wheels or four came close and even at the time it was acknowledged there really were two identifiable generations of Mach IIIs: the ones built between 1968-1972 and those from 1973 until 1975 when production ended.  Not only was the power-band made a little wider (at the expense of the top-end) but a disk front brake was added, the swing-arm was extended and the frame geometry improved; while this didn’t wholly tame the challenging characteristics created by putting what was then the world’s most powerful two-stroke engine in what was essentially the light and not especially still frame used for their 350, it did mean the later Mach IIIs were a little more forgiving and not quite as quick.

1973 Kawasaki 750 Mach IV (H2).

As a design, the Mach III obviously had its flaws but as a piece of engineering, it exhibited typical Japanese soundness and attention to detail.  They borrowed much and while little was genuinely innovative, they had started with a clean sheet of paper and buyers found, unlike the British bikes, electrics were reliable and mechanical parts were not subject to the oil-leaks which the British had for decades claimed were endemic to the breed; far-eastern engineering was now mass-producing bikes a generation or more advanced.  However, the British industry was chronically under-capitalized so, lacking resources to develop new models, resorted to "improving" existing models.  While they were doing that, the Japanese manufacturers moved on and Kawasaki were planning something which would match the Mach III for performance but deliver it in a more civilized (and safer) manner.  This project was a four-stroke, four cylinder 750, developed while the Mach III was being toned down (a little) while the good idea of a broader power band and a (slightly) stiffer frame was used on the Mach IV (750 H2), the ultimate evolution of the two-stroke triple which delivered best of the the Mach III experience while (somewhat) taming the worst of its characteristics.

1969 Honda 750-Four "Sandcast".  The crankcases of the early 750s are referred to as being sandcast but they were actually gravity cast.  The production method for the first batch was was chosen because of uncertainty about demand.

However, in 1969 Honda, the largest in the Japanese industry and the company which in 1964 had stunned Formula One community when their 1.5 litre V12 car won a Grand Prix, released the motorcycle which threatened the very existence of the new big Kawasaki and the four-stroke Honda 750-Four was for a generation to set the template for its genre, as influential for big motorcycles as the Boeing 707 had in 1957 been for commercial airliners.  Kawasaki reviewed this disturbing intrusion on their planning, concluding the Honda was a touring machine and that the Mach III had proved there was demand machines orientated more to high-performance.  The board looked at the demographic charts and decided to proceed, enlarging their project to 900cm³ which, with double overhead camshafts (DOHC) was tuned more for top-end power than the more relaxed, single cam (SOHC) Honda.  Released in 1972, almost a year after the Mach IV, the Z1 attracted praise for its quality and performance, all delivered while offering a stability the charismatic but occasionally lethal triples never approached.  Internally, Kawasaki did their bit to ensure a good reception for the Z1 by making sure it was just a bit quicker than the Mach IV over a quarter mile, the 750 never tuned to the extent possible although as some found, more horsepower quickly and cheaply was available.    

1973 Kawasaki Z1.

The big Nortons, named Commando since 1967, had long been a benchmark for high-performance motorcycles and although the Mach III had (on paper) matched its speed, its handling characteristics were such that it could really be enjoyed only in a straight line and even then, was best handled by cautious experts.  The Honda 750-Four and Kawasaki Z1 were both vastly better as road machines and clearly the future of the breed.  The long-serving big British twins, while their handling was still impeccable, were now outdated, no longer offered a performance premium and still leaked oil.  Norton’s response in 1972 was the hastily concocted Commando Combat, the engine tweaked in the usual British manner with a high compression ratio, bigger carburetors, larger ports and a high-lift, long-duration camshaft.  These modifications, while the orthodox approach for racing engines, are not suitable for the road and the “peaky” Combat’s only advantage was great top-end power though it was noted the clever isolastic engine mounting did work well to limit the extent to which the greater vibration transmitted through the frame.  Unfortunately, the gains high in the rev-range compromised the low and mid-range performance, just where a road-bike most often operates.  Indeed, at points, the torque-curve actually went the wrong way and the only obvious way to disguise this was to lower the gearing which (1) restricted the top-speed to something embarrassing low and (2) meant even cruising speeds demanded high engine revolutions.  Sadly, it wasn’t possible for all long to enjoy the pleasures of all that power because the Combat's specification exposed weaknesses in pistons, bearings and crankshafts.  In some cases, main bearing life could be as little as 4000 miles (7000 km) but a small number of engines succumbed to other failures long before.  As a consolation, even if the Combat wouldn’t keep going, it was easy to stop, the front disk brake (designed by Norton and built by Lockheed, it used a hard chrome-plated cast-iron rotor because the heat-dissipation qualities were superior to stainless steel) was among the best in the industry.

So the most of the things that were changed made things worse.  Other things stayed the same including the oil leaks (the joke being seals existed to keep the dirt out, not the fluids in) and the absence of electric starting, the right legs of Norton owners reputedly more muscular than the left.  For the engine's problems the solution lay in engineering and metallurgy, a combination of a self-aligning spherical roller bearing called a superblend and un-slotted pistons.  But, by the time things were fixed, the fiasco had had triggered irreparable damage to market perceptions and Norton quietly dropped the Combat, applying the improvements to their mainstream engines without trying to match its top-end power.  Despite the reputation, there are owners (many of whom with great success used their Combats in competition) who reported sterling reliability from their machines and the consensus is it was only a relatively small number of Combat engines which failed but in mass-production, a well-publicized consumer-level failure rate well under 5% is enough to create  reputational damage.  Norton went bankrupt within a few years but the name has been revived several times over the past decades.

For those who can remember how things used to be done: 1972 Norton Commando 750 Combat Roadster (left) and 1972 Norton Commando 750 Combat Interstate (with custom drilled disk brake, right).

Introduced in 1972, the Interstate model was a response (as the name suggests) to US demand and was distinguished by the larger fuel tank, some of the additional capacity gained by removing the scalloped knee indentations seen on the Roadsters (which used a 2.2 imperial gallon (10 litre, 2.6 US gallon) tank.  The early Interstates were fitted with a 5.25 imperial gallon (23.9 litre, 6.30 US gallon) unit but in mid-year this was enlarged to a 5.5 imperial gallon (25 litre, 6.6 US gallon) device, the latter size carried-over as an option when in 1973 the Commando 850 was introduced and this remained available until production ended in 1977, by which time only a handful of Roadsters were leaving the line.

1954 Norton Dominator 500 (left), 1967 Norton Atlas 750 (centre) and 1972 Norton Commando 750 Combat (right).

When introduced in 1949, the 497 cm³ (30.3 cubic inch) parallel twin was as good an engine as any then available on two wheels and a great success but that popularity was ultimately what doomed Norton in the 1970s.  Over the years enlarged and tuned for more power, it proved adaptable to new frame designs and was an engine which kept Norton in the front rank of high-performance motorcycles but in not even half a decade between 1968-1972, the manufacturers in the Far East advanced further than the British industry had achieved in twenty years.  In 1967, well aware of the antiquity of the machinery from which they were coaxing another generation, Norton's management had been surprised at both the positive critical reception to the Commando and the volume of orders being received and for a while the immediate feature looked bright.  It perhaps could have been because the clever Isolastic engine mounting system had made it possible to absorb much of the big twin's chronically insoluble vibrations before they reached the rider and the Commando was a rewarding ride but what it should have been was a stop-gap while something better was developed.  Instead, it proved but a stay of execution.

Isolastic-era advertising: The agencies never depicted women riding Norton Commandos but they were a fixture as adornments, usually with lots of blonde hair and a certain expression.  One reason they may not have been suitable to use as riders was the phenomenon known as “helmet hair” (in idiomatic use, the effects of helmet wearing on those with “big hair”), which, upon removing helmet, manifested either as an unintended JBF or a bifurcated look in which the hair above the shoulders was flattened against the scalp while that beneath sat as the wind had determined.  There was also the challenge of kick-starting the big twins, the long-overdue electric-start not installed until 1975.