Croissant

Croissant (pronounced krwah-sahn (French) or kruh-sahnt (barbarians))

A rich, buttery, often crescent-shaped, roll of leavened dough or puff paste.

1899:  From the French croissant (crescent), present participle of the verb croître (to increase, to grow), from the Middle French croistre, from the Old French creistre derived from the Classical Latin crēscēns & crēscentem, present active infinitive of crēscō (I augment), drawn from the Proto-Italic krēskō. The ultimate root was the primitive Indo-European ḱreh (to grow, become bigger).  Correct pronunciation here.  

The Austrian Pastry

Like some other cultural artefacts thought quintessentially French (French fries invented in Belgium; Nicolas Sarkozy (b 1955; French president 2007-2012) from here and there; the Citroën DS (1955-1975) styled by an Italian) the croissant came from elsewhere, its origins Austrian, the Viennese kipferl a crescent-shaped sweet made plain, with nuts or other fillings.  It varies from the French classic in being denser and less flaky, made with softer dough.  First noted in the thirteenth century at which time, it was thought a “sweet” it was another three-hundred years before it came to be regarded as a morning pastry.  Tastes changed as new techniques of baking evolved and around the turn of the seventeenth century, recipes began to appear in Le Pâtissier François using Pâte feuilletée (puff pastry), these being the first recognisably modern croissants.

Culinary histories include a number of (likely apocryphal) tales of why the croissant adopted a crescent shape.  One suggests it was baked first in Buda to celebrate the defeat of the Ummayyad (the Umayyad Caliphate (661–750) was the second of the four major caliphates created after the death of the prophet Muhammad (circa 570-632)) forces by the Franks in the Battle of Tours (732), the shape representing the Islamic crescent moon although more famous is the notion it was designed after the battle of 1683 when the Ottomans were turned back from the gates of Vienna.  A baker, said to have heard the Turks tunneling under the walls of the city as he lit his ovens to bake the morning bread, sounded an alarm, and the defending forces collapsed the tunnel, saving the city.   To celebrate, bread was baked in the shape of the crescent moon of the Turkish flag.

Portrait of Marie Antoinette (1755–1793; Queen of France 1774-1792) (1769), oil on canvas by Joseph Ducreux (1735-1802).

The official title of the portrait was Archduchess Maria Antonia of Austria and it was created as the era’s equivalent of a Tinder profile picture, the artist summoned in 1769 to Vienna to paint a pleasing rendering of the young lady the Hapsburg royal court planned to marry off to Louis, Dauphin of France (1754-1973) who would reign as Louis XVI (King of France 1774-1792)).  Tinder profile pictures can be misleading (some pounds and even more years sometimes vanishing) so the work must be considered in that context although she was barely fourteen when she sat so it may be true to the subject.  Ducreux’s portrait was the first glimpse the prince had of his intended bride and it must have been pleasing enough for him metaphorically to "swipe right" and the marriage lasted until the pair were executed with the blade of the guillotine.  As a reward, Ducreux was raised to the nobility as a seigneur de la baronnie (lord of the barony, the grade of of baron granted to roturiers (commoners)) and appointed premier peintre de la reine (First Painter to the Queen), outliving the royal couple.

A more romantic tale attributes the pastry to Marie Antoinette, who, as an Austrian, preferred the food of her homeland to that of the French court and, at state dinners, would sneak off to enjoy pastries and coffee.  There is no documentary evidence for her having re-christened the kipferl as the croissant but the story is she so missed what she knew as kipfel (German for crescent) that she commanded the royal baker to clone the treat.  More prosaic, but actually verified by historical evidence, is that August Zang (1807-1888), a retired Austrian artillery officer founded a Viennese Bakery in Paris in 1839 and most food historians agree he is the one most likely to have introduced the kipfel to France, a pastry that later inspired French bakers to create crescents of their own.  The first mention of the croissant in French is in French chemist Anselme Payen’s (1795-1871) Des Substances alimentaires (1853), published long after Marie-Antoinette’s time in court, the first known printed recipe, using the name, appearing in Swiss chef Joseph Favre’s (1849-1903) Dictionnaire universel de cuisine (1905) although even that was a more dense creation than the puffy thing known today.

Once were croissants: 1967 Mercedes-Benz 600 (with "jam rolls", left), 1969 Mercedes-Benz 600 (with "croissants" (better known as "rabbits ears"), centre) and 1990 Mercedes-Benz 560 SEL (with boring "headrests", right).

Mercedes-Benz introduced their Kopfstütze (literally “head support” although in the factory’s technical documents the design project was the Kopfstützensystem (head restraint system)) when the 600 (W100, 1963-1981) was displayed at the 1963 Frankfurt Motor Show, the early cars having only a rear-pair as standard equipment (there was an expectation many 600s would be chauffeur-driven) with the front units optional but the hand-built 600 could be ordered with one, two, three or four Kopfstützen (or even none although none seem to have be so-configred ordered).  In 1969 the design was updated and over three weeks the new type was phased in for the models then in production.  While a totally new design (one cognizant of the US safety regulations which had mandated them for the front seats of passenger vehicles) with a different internal structure and mounting assembly, the most distinctive aspect was the raised sides which some compared to the “pagoda” roof then in use on the W113 (230, 250 & 280 SL, 1963-1971) roadster but this was coincidental.  In the early press reports the shapes were described with culinary references, the previous versions said to resemble a Biskuitrolle mit Marmelade (jam filled sponge roll) while the new generation was more like a croissant.  In the English-speaking world, neither term caught on, the older style was called something like “older style” while the new came to be known as “rabbits ears” which was much more charming.  Uncharmed, the humorless types at the factory continued to call them teilt (split) or offener Rahmen (open-frame).  The “rabbits ears” were phased out in 1979 although the low volume 600 retained them (along with the archaic rear swing-axles!) until the last was built in 1981.  The design introduced in 1979 seems never to have been compared to any kind of food and it reverted to lateral symmetry although the structure was noticeably more vertiginous.

Petit-déjeuner à Paris: café; croissant; Gauloises.

In 2025, to enjoy this pleasure began to demand a little more planning after the French government banned the smoking of cigarettes in all outdoor areas where children can be present (US$130 on-the-spot fine).  Vaping was still allowed (!) so there was that and terrasses (the outdoor areas of coffee shops bars) were exempt.  It's good Jean-Paul Sartre (1905–1980) & Simone de Beauvoir (1908–1986) didn't live to see this day. 

Although the famous shape is much admired, for purists, the choice is always the un-curved croissant au beurre, (butter croissant), the more eye-catching crescents being usually the ordinaires, made with margarine.  The taste in the English-speaking world for things like ham-and-cheese croissants is regarded by the French as proof of Anglo-Saxon barbarism although they will tolerate a sparse drizzle of chocolate if it’s for children and food critics reluctantly concede the almond croissant (with a frangipane filling, topped with slivered almonds and a dusting of powdered sugar) is “…enjoyed by younger women”.  Generally though, the French stick to the classics, eschewing even butter, a croissant being best enjoyed unadorned and taken with a strong black coffee and while some will insist this should be accompanied with a Gitanes, that is optional.

The cube croissant, an Instagram favorite.

Although much focused upon, the shape of a croissant of course becomes less relevant when eaten when the experience becomes one of taste and texture.  For that reason the pastry used has long attracted those chefs for whom food offers architectural possibilities and while for more than a century one-offs have been created for competition and special event, in recent years the phenomenon of social media has been a design stimulant, Instagram, TikTok etc fuelling a culinary arms race and patisseries have built (sometimes short-lived) product lines in response to viral videos.  Fillings have of course been a feature but it’s the shapes which have been most eye-catching (and by extension click-catching which is the point for the content providers). There have been “croissants” in the shape of spheres, discs, pyramids, spirals, wedges and cubes, the last among the more amusing with chefs referencing objects and concepts such as dice, cubist art and, of course, the Rubik’s Cube.  Many have been just a moment while some have for a while trended.

Dominique Ansel's Cronut, stacked and sliced.

Some have endured for longer such as the Cronut (the portmanteau’s construct being cro(issant) + (dough)nut) and so serious was New York based French pastry chef Dominique Ansel (b 1978) that in 2013 he trademarked his creation.  In the familiar shape of a doughnut, the composition was described as “a croissant-like pastry with a filling of flavored cream and fried in grapeseed oil.”  Interviewed by Murdoch tabloid the New York Post, the chef revealed it took “two months of R&D (research & development)” before the Cronut was perfected and the effort was clearly worthwhile because after being released in his eponymous bakery in Manhattan’s SoHo neighbourhood, the city’s food bloggers (a numerous and competitive population) responded and within days photographs circulated of dozens waiting for opening time, a reaction which prompted the application to the US Patent and Trademark Office.  In the way of such things, around the planet “clones”, “tributes”, “knock-offs”, “imitations”, “rip-offs” (the descriptions as varied as the slight changes in the recipes introduced presumably to fend off a C&D (cease and desist letter)) soon appeared.  Predictably, some were called “Doughssants” (the Germanic eszett a nice touch) although others were less derivative.

New York Post, August 16 2022.

Monsieur Ansel in 2015 released Dominique Ansel: The Secret Recipes, a cookbook which included the Cronut recipe and the thing in its authentic form was clearly for the obsessives, the instructions noting making one or a batch was a three-day process.  In its review of the year, Time magazine nominated the Cronut as one of the “best inventions of 2013”, prompting one cultural commentator (another species which proliferates in New York City) to observe the decadence of the West had reached the point the breakdown of society was close.  There may have been something in the idea the new “Visigoths at the Gates of Rome” were actually pastry chefs because in the wake of the Cronut the city was soon flooded with all sorts of novel sugary treats, mostly elaborations of croissants, doughnuts and, it being NYC, bagels.  By 2022 the New York Post was prepared to proclaim: “Move over cronuts! NYC's hot new baked good is the Suprême”, the defenestrator from Noho’s Lafayette Grand Café and revealed to be a “unique circular croissant filled with pastry crème and topped with ganache and crushed up cookies.”  Again of the Instagram & TikTok age, queues were reported even though at a unit cost of US$8.50 it was two dollars more expensive than a Cronut, the price of which had increased fairly modestly since 2013 when it debuted at US$5.00.

All the recent variations on the croissant are built on the theme chefs have for centuries understood is the easy path to popularity: FSS; add fat, salt & sugar, the substances mankind has for millennia sought.  Once it took much effort (and often some risk) to find these things but now they’re conveniently packaged and widely available at prices which, although subject to political and economic forces, remain by historic standards very cheap.  Often, we don’t even need to seek out the packages because so much of the preparation and distribution of food has been outsourced to specialists, mostly industrial concerns but the artisans persist in niches.  That’s certainly true of the croissant, few making their own whether basic or embellished and one of the latest of the croissant crazes is FSS writ large: the crookie.

Miss Sina's crookie (without added topping or powered sugar).

A crookie is a croissant stuffed with chocolate chip cookie dough and its very existence will be thought particularly shameful by some Parisian purists because it was first sold in December 2023 by the Boulangerie Louvard, located on Rue de Châteaudun in Paris’s 9^th arrondissement which, in an Instragram post announced the arrival: “Our pure butter croissant, awarded the seventh best croissant in the Île-de-France region in 2022, is made every morning with a 24-hour fermented milk sourdough and layered with Charente butter.  For our cookie dough, we use one of the best and purest chocolates in the world, from @xoco.gourmet.”  Offered originally in a test batch to test the market, the boulangerie soon announced “The concept was well received, so we're keeping it.  Available every day in-store!”

Unlike a Cronut which (at least in its pure form) demands three days to make, the charm of the crookie is its elegant simplicity and Instagrammers quickly deconstructed and posted the instructions:

(1) With a serrated knife, cut open a croissant lengthwise, leaving a “hinge” at the back.

(2) Add 2-3 tablespoons of your chocolate chip cookie dough (from a packet or home-made).

(3) Close the two sections of croissant wholly encasing the dough.

(4) When the dough is almost cooked (time will vary according to oven and the volume of dough but it takes only a few minutes), remove from oven.

(5) Add more cookie dough to the top of croissant and return to the oven for final bake.

(6) When the outside is crispy and the centre gooey, remove from oven and top with a dusting of powdered sugar.

Some crookie critics don't recommend either adding the second lashing of dough or the powered sugar because they tend to "overwhelm" the croissant and limit the surface area, thereby denying the dish some of the essential crispiness.  

The croissant in fashion

Louis Vuitton Loop (part number M81098).  Created by Nicolas Ghesquière (b 1971) for the Cruise 2022 Collection, the Loop is described as a "half-moon baguette" and was inspired by the earlier Croissant bag, the original a less fussy design but the details in the new reflect modern consumer preference.

Rendered by Vovsoft as cartoon character: a brunette Lindsay Lohan in croissant T-shirt.

While a handbag lends itself well to the shape of a crescent, it does inherently limit the efficiency of space utilization but this aspect is often not a primary goal in the upper reaches of the market.  With garments however, although actually a common component because the shape makes all sorts of engineering possible such as the underwire of the bra or other constructions where any sort of cantilever effect is demanded, it’s usually just an element rather than a design motif.  As a playful touch, a distinctive crescent moon or croissant might appear on a T-shirt or scarf but it’s rare to see a whole garment pursue the theme although they have appeared on the catwalks where they attract the usual mix of admiration and derision.   

Sarah Jessica Parker (b 1965) in "croissant dress".

Sometimes though, such things escape the catwalk.  In 2022 the actor Sarah Jessica Parker appeared in Home Box Office's (HBO) And Just Like That, a spin-off (2021-2022) of the Sex and the City TV series (1998-2024), wearing an orange Valentino couture gown from the house’s spring/summer 2019 collection.  It recalled a large croissant, the piece chosen presumably because the scene was set in Paris although it must have been thought the viewers needed the verisimilitude laid on with a trowel because also prominent was a handbag in the shape of the Eifel Tower.  A gift to the meme-makers, admiration for the dress was restrained.

Assassin

Assassin (pronounced uh-sas-in)

(1) A murderer, especially one who kills a politically prominent person for reason of fanaticism or profit.

(2) One of an order of devout Muslims, active in Persia and Syria circa 1090-1272, the prime object of whom was to assassinate Christian Crusaders (should be used with initial capital).

1525–1535: An English borrowing via French and Italian, from the Medieval Latin assassīnus (assassinī in the plural), from the Arabic Hashshashin (ḥashshāshīn in the plural) (eaters of hashish), the Arabic being حشّاشين, (ħashshāshīyīn (also Hashishin or Hashashiyyin).  It shares its etymological roots with the Arabic hashish (from the Arabic: حشيش (ḥashīsh)) and in the region is most associated with a group of Nizari Shia Persians who worked against various Arab and Persian targets.  The Hashishiyyin were an Ismaili Muslim sect at the time of the Crusades, under leadership of to Hasan ibu-al-Sabbah (known as shaik-al-jibal or "Old Man of the Mountains") although the name was widely applied to a number of secret sects operating in Persia and Syria circa 1090-1272.  The word was known in Anglo-Latin from the mid-thirteenth century and variations in spelling not unusual although hashishiyy (hashishiyyin in the plural) appears to be the most frequently used.  The plural suffix “-in” was a mistake by Medieval translators who assumed it part of the Bedouin word.  Assassin, assassination, assassinator, assassinatress, assassinatrix, assassinism, autassassinophilia and assassinship are nouns, assassining & assassinating are verbs and assassinlike & assassinous are adjectives; the noun plural is assassins.  The number of derived forms seems untypically high and although some are listed various as obsolete or archaic, that they ever existed is an indication the “assassin” may have exerted a special fascination.  A female assassin (there have been a few) was an assassinatress or assassinatrix (assassinatrices the plural) and they inspired a special horror, presumably because, (1) being less often suspected of being a murderer they might strike when least expected and (2) man may have harboured the fear their method of dispatch might be especially gruesome.  Noted assassinatrices include the Biblical Judith whose decapitation of Holofernes has been depicted in some of Renaissance art's most confronting paintings and Valerie Solanas (1936-1988) who in 1968 shot pop-artist Andy Warhol (1928-1987).  Warhol didn't immediately die from his wounds but never did he fully recover and it's believed the would-be assassin hastened his death.

"Fear of" assassination is a condition different from being "turned on" by the fear of being assassinated.

A special use was autassassinophilia (in psychiatry, a paraphilia in which an individual is sexually aroused by the risk of being killed) and despite the name, the condition is not restricted to those imagining being assassinated, the paraphilia instead covering all those sexually by the risk of being killed.  It’s a fetish which can overlap with others involving specific ways of finding death (drowning, decapitation, dehydration etc) and does not of necessity require actual risk of death; merely imagining it can be sufficient.  The paraphilia could for example be as specific as being sexually aroused by the thought of being murdered by the Freemasons but that is distinct from a fear of being murdered by the Freemasons (an instance of foniasophobia (fear of being murdered)) which was a condition once suffered by Lindsay Lohan while being stalked by "a schizophrenic Freemason".  The condition was first described by John Money (1921–2006), a New Zealand-born professor of psychology at Johns Hopkins University who listed it as the “reciprocal condition” to erotophonophilia (in which one sexually is aroused by “stage-managing and carrying out the murder of an unsuspecting sexual partner”, both paraphilias under the rubric of the “sacrificial/expiatory type”.  Neither have ever been listed as a separate diagnosis in the American Psychiatric Association's (APA) Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM) but both, depending on the patient, could variously be “bolted into” the criteria for Sexual Masochism Disorder or Paraphilic Disorder.

Whether in personal, political or family relations, assassination is one of the oldest and, done properly, one of the most effective tools known to man.  The earliest known use in English of the verb "to assassinate" in printed English was by Matthew Sutcliffe (circa 1548-1629) in A Briefe Replie to a Certaine Odious and Slanderous Libel, Lately Published by a Seditious Jesuite (1600), borrowed by William Shakespeare (circa 1564-1616) for Macbeth (1605).  Among the realists, it’s long been advocated, Sun Tzu in the still read The Art of War (circa 500 BC) arguing the utilitarian principle: that a single assassination could be both more effective and less destructive that other methods of dispute resolution, something with which Niccolò Machiavelli (1469–1527), in his political treatise Il Principe (The Prince, written circa 1513 & published 1532), concurred.  As a purely military matter, it’s long been understood that the well-targeted assassination of a single leader can be much more effective than a battlefield encounter whatever the extent of the victory; the “cut the head off the snake” principle.  Idiomatic uses include (1) “great assassin” which sarcastically was in September 1896 bestowed by William Ewart Gladstone (1809–1898; prime-minister 1868–1874, 1880–1885, Feb-July 1886 & 1892–1894) on the Ottoman Empire’s Sultan Abdul Hamid II (1842–1918; sultan of the Ottoman Empire 1876-1909) as a dark reference to the massacres of Ottoman Armenians, (2) “smiling assassin” (can be applied literally but is usually a figurative form meaning “one who maintains a friendly and pleasant visage but really is a back-stabber) and (3) “baby-faced assassin” (one whose youthful or innocent appearance belies their ruthless character).

Modern history

The assassination in July 2022 of Abe Shinzō san (安倍 晋三 (Shinzo Abe, 1954-2022, prime minister of Japan 2006-2007 & 2012-2020) came as a surprise because as a part of political conflict, assassination had all but vanished from Japan.  That’s not something which can be said of many countries in the modern era, the death toll in Asia, Africa, the Middle East and South & Central America long, the methods of dispatch sometimes gruesome.  Russia’s annals too are blood-soaked although it’s of note perhaps in that an extraordinary number of the killings were ordered by one head of Government.  The toll of US presidents is famous and also documented are some two-dozen planned attempted assassinations.  Even one (as far as is known) prime-minister of the UK has been assassinated, Spencer Perceval (1762–1812; Prime-Minister of the UK 1809-1912) shot dead (apparently by a deranged lone assassin) on 11 May 1812, his other claim to fame that uniquely among British premiers, he served at times also as solicitor-general and attorney-general.  Conspiracy theorists note also the death of Pope John-Paul I (1912–1978; pope Aug-Sep 1978).

Death by katana.

Samuri Ultranationalist activist Otoya Yamaguchi (1943-1960), about to stab Socialist Party leader Inejiro Asanuma san (1898-1960) with his yoroi-dōshi ("armor piercer" or "mail piercer"), a short sword, fashioned with particularly thick metal and suitable for piercing armor and using in close combat; it was carried by the samurai class in feudal Japan.), Hibiya Public Hall, Tokyo, 12 October 1960.  The assassin committed suicide while in custody.

Historically however, political assassinations in Japan were not unknown, documented since the fifth century, the toll including two emperors.  In the centuries which unfolded until the modern era, by European standards, assassinations were not common but the traditions of the Samurai, a military caste which underpinned a feudal society organized as a succession of shogunates (a hereditary military dictatorship (1192–1867)), meant that violence was seen sometimes as the only honorable solution when many political disputes were had their origin in inter and intra-family conflict.  Tellingly, even after firearms came into use, most assassinations continued to be committed with swords or other bladed-weapons, a tradition carried on when the politician Asanuma Inejirō san was killed on live television in 1960.

Most remembered however is the cluster of deaths which political figures in Japan suffered during the dark decade of the 1930s.  It was a troubled time and although Hara Takashi san (1856-1921; Prime Minister of Japan 1918-1921) had in 1921 been murdered by a right-wing malcontent (who received a sentence of only three years), it had seemed at the time an aberration and few expected the next decade to assume the direction it followed.  However in an era in which the most fundamental aspects of the nation came to be contested by the politicians, the imperial courtiers, the navy and the army (two institutions with different priorities and intentions), all claiming to be acting in the name of the emperor, conflict was inevitable, the only thing uncertain was how things would be resolved.

Hamaguchi Osachi san (1870–1931; Prime Minister of Japan 1929-1931) was so devoted to the nation that when appointed head of the government’s Tobacco Monopoly Bureau, he took up smoking despite his doctors warnings it would harm his fragile health.  His devotion was praised but he was overtaken by events, the Depression crushing the economy and his advocacy of peace and adherence to the naval treaty which limited Japan’s ability to project power made him a target for the resurgent nationalists.  In November 1930 he was shot while in Tokyo Railway station, surviving a few months before succumbing an act which inspired others.  In 1932 the nation learned of the Ketsumeidan Jiken (the "League of Blood" or "Blood-Pledge Corps Incident"), a nationalist conspiracy to assassinate liberal politicians and the wealthy donors who supported them.  A list on twenty-two intended victims was later discovered but the group succeeded only in killing one former politician and one businessman.

The death of Inukai Tsuyoshi san (1855–1932; Prime Minister of Japan 1931-1932) was an indication of what was to follow.  A skilled politician and something of a technocrat, he’d stabilized the economy but he abhorred war as a ghastly business and opposed army’s ideas of adventures in China, something increasingly out of step with those gathering around his government.  In May 1932, after visiting the Yasukuni Shrine to pay homage to the Meiji’s first minister of war (assassinated in 1869), nine navy officers went to the prime-minister’s office and shot him dead.  Deed done, the nine handed themselves to the police.  At their trial, there was much sympathy and they received only light sentences (later commuted) although some fellow officers feared they may be harshly treated and sent to the government a package containing their nine amputated fingers with offers to take the place of the accused were they sentenced to death.  In the way the Japanese remember such things, it came to be known as “the May 15 incident”.

Nor was the military spared.  Yoshinori Shirakawa san (1869–1932) and Tetsuzan Nagata san (1884–1935), both generals in the Imperial Japanese Army were assassinated, the latter one of better known victims of the Aizawa Incident of August 1935, a messy business in which two of the three army factions then existing resolved their dispute with murder.  Such was the scandal that the minister of army was also a victim but he got of lightly; being ordered to resign “until the fuss dies down” and returning briefly to serve as prime-minister in 1937 before dying of natural cause some four years later.

Lindsay Lohan as assassin nun in Machete (2010).  The revolver is a Smith & Wesson .50 Magnum with 8.38" barrel (S&W500: SKU 163501).

All of the pressures which had been building to create the political hothouse that was mid-1930s Japan were realized in Ni Ni-Roku Jiken (the February 26 incident), an attempted military coup d'état in which fanatical young officers attempted to purge the government and military high command of factional rivals and ideological opponents (along with, as is inevitable in these things, settling a few personal scores).  Two victims were Viscount Takahashi Korekiyo san (1854–1936; Prime Minister 1921-1922) and Viscount Saitō Makoto san (1858–1936; admiral in the Imperial Japanese Navy & prime-minister 1932-1934 (and the last former Japanese Prime Minister to be assassinated until Shinzo Abe san in 2022)).  As a coup, it was a well-drilled operation, separate squads sent out at 2am to execute their designated victims although, in Japanese tradition, they tried not to offend, one assassin recorded as apologizing to terrified household staff for “the annoyance I have caused”.  Of the seven targets the rebels identified, only three were killed but the coup failed not because not enough blood was spilled but because the conspirators made the same mistake as the Valkyrie plotters (who sought in 1944 to overthrow Germany’s Nazi regime (1933-1945)); they didn’t secure control of the institutions which were the vital organs of state and notably, did not seize the Imperial Palace and thus place between themselves between the Emperor and his troops, something they could have learned from Hernán Cortés (1485–1547) who made clear to his Spanish Conquistadors that the capture of Moctezuma (Montezuma, circa 1466-1520; Emperor of the Aztec Empire circa 1502-1520) was their object.  As it was, the commander in chief ordered the army to suppress the rebellion and within hours it was over.

However, the coup had profound consequences.  If Japan’s path to war had not been guaranteed before the insurrection, after it the impetus assumed its own inertia and the dynamic shifted from one of militarists against pacifists to agonizing appraisals of whether the first thrust of any attack would be to the south, against the USSR or into the Pacific.  The emperor had displayed a decisiveness he’d not re-discover until two atomic bombs had been dropped on his country but, seemingly convinced there was no guarantee the army would put down a second coup, his policy became one of conciliating the military which was anyway the great beneficiary of the February 26 incident; unified after the rebels were purged, it quickly asserted control over the government, weakened by the death of its prominent liberals and the reluctance of others to challenge the army, assassination a salutatory lesson.

Assassins both:  David Low’s (1891-1963) Rendezvous, Evening Standard, 20 September 1939. 

The Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact (usually styled as the Nazi-Soviet Pact), was a treaty of non-aggression between the USSR and Nazi Germany and signed in Moscow on 23 August 1939.  A political sensation when it was announced, it wouldn't be until the first Nuremberg Trial (1945-1946) that the Western powers became aware of the details of the suspected secret protocol under which the signatories partitioned Poland between them.   Low's cartoon was published shortly after the Soviets (on 17 September) invaded from the east, having delayed military action until convinced German success was assured.

Low's work satirizes the cynicism of the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact, Adolf Hitler (1889-1945; Führer (leader) and German head of government 1933-1945 & head of state 1934-1945) and comrade Stalin (1878-1953; Soviet leader 1924-1953) bowing politely, words revealing their true feelings.  After returning to Berlin from the signing ceremony, Joachim von Ribbentrop (1893–1946; Nazi foreign minister 1938-1945) reported the happy atmosphere to Hitler as "…like being among comrades" but if he was fooled, comrade Stalin remained the realist.  When Ribbentrop proposed a rather effusive communiqué of friendship and a 25 year pact, the Soviet leader suggested that after so many years of "...us tipping buckets of shit over each-other", a ten year agreement announced in more business-like terms might seem to the peoples of both nations, rather more plausible.  It was one of a few occasions on which comrade Stalin implicitly admitted even a dictator needs to take note of public opinion.  His realism served him less well when he assumed no rational man fighting a war against a formidable enemy would by choice open another front of 3000-odd kilometres (1850 miles) against an army which could raise 500 divisions.  Other realists would later apply their own calculations and conclude that however loud the clatter of sabre rattling, Mr Putin (Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin; b 1952; president or prime minister of Russia since 1999) would never invade Ukraine.

Cloak and axe of Giovanni Battista Bugatti (1779–1869), official executioner for the Papal States 1796-1864, Criminology Museum of Rome.

Woodcuts and other depictions from the era suggest the blood-red cloak wasn't always worn during executions.  At various points popes have hired assassins to do the Lord’s work (and many more have been contracted “on behalf of His Holiness (both with and without his knowledge) but (as far as is known), none have been on the payroll for at least two centuries.  The last executioner employed was Giovanni Battista Bugatti began his career at a youthful 17 under Pius VI (1717–1799; pope 1775-1799) and diligently he served six pontiffs before being pensioned off by Pius IX (1792–1878; pope 1846-1878).  His retirement induced not by the Holy See losing enthusiasm for the death penalty because one Antonio Balducci succeeded him in the office which fell into disuse only with the loss of the Papal States (756-1870; a conglomeration of territories in the central & northern Italian peninsula under the personal sovereignty of the pope), after the unification of Italy.  Unlike his illustrious predecessor, history has recorded little about Signor Balducci although it’s known he performed his final execution in 1870.  Signor Bugatti was by far the longest-serving of the Papal States’ many executioners and locals dubbed him Mastro Titta, a titular corruption of maestro di giustizia (master of justice) and his 69 year tenure in his unusual role can be accounted for only by either (1) he felt dispatching the condemned a calling or (2) he really enjoyed his work, because his employers were most parsimonious: he received no retainer and only a small fee per commission (although he was granted a small, official residence).  His tenure was long and included 516 victims (he preferred to call them pazienti (patients), the term adopted also by Romans who enjoyed the darkly humorous) but was only ever a part-time gig; most of his income came from his work as an umbrella painter (a part of the labour market which still exists in an artisan niche).  Depending on this and that, his devices included the axe, guillotine, noose and mallet(!) while the offences punished ranged from the serious (murder, conspiracy, sedition etc) to the petty (habitual thieves and trouble-makers).

Cardinal Pietro Gasparri (1852–1934; Cardinal Secretary of State 1914-1930, left) and Benito Mussolini (1883-1945; Duce (leader) & prime-minister of Italy 1922-1943, right), signing the Lateran Treaty, Lateran Palace, Rome, 11 February 1929.

Although as early as 1786 the Grand Duchy of Tuscany became the first Italian state to abolish the death penalty (torture also banned), the sentence remained on the books in the Papal States; then as now, the poor disproportionately were victims of the sanction, similar (or worse) crimes by the bourgeoisie or nobility usually handled with less severity, “hushed-up” or just ignored.  With the loss of the Papal States, the pope’s temporal domain shrunk to little more than what lay around St Peter’s Square; indeed between 1870 and the signing of Lateran Treaty (1929) after which the Italian state recognized Vatican City as a sovereign state, no pope left the Vatican, their status as self-imposed prisoners a political gesture.  The Lateran treaty acknowledged the validity of the sentence (Article 8 of the 1929 Vatican City Penal Code stating anyone who attempted to assassinate the pope would be subject to the death penalty) although this provision was never used, tempted though some popes must have been.  Paul VI (1897-1978; pope 1963-1978) in 1969 struck capital punishment from the Vatican's legal code and the last reference to the sanction vanished in 2001 under Saint John Paul II (1920–2005; pope 1978-2005).

In contemporary Russia, such is the volume of deceased prominent citizens with a cause of death reported as: “Falling from window of high building” the mode of death is known on the streets as the “oligarch elevator”; predating even the Tsarist state, grim humor has a long tradition in Russia.  It may thus be assumed the Kremlin has on the books at least one “state assassin” but there may be more because there’s only so much one assassin or assassinatrix can do and the workload clearly is heavy.  Of other nations, there are the “usual suspects” assumed also to have such a contractor (although the DPRK (Democratic Republic of Korea (North Korea)) seems also on occasion to outsource “jobs” in a most imaginative way) and these positions are not advertised, appointees doubtlessly selected for their demonstrated skills.  Whether in the West there are still many state assassins isn’t known although in the not too distant past the activities of some have been documented.

Fidel Castro enjoying a fine Havana cigar.  At 90, he died in his bed.

The most interesting example is the US but the answer to the question of whether Washington DC still “does assassinations” ultimately is: “Well, it depends how one defines ‘assassination’”.  Unambiguously, US administrations certainly did assassinate tiresome people and documents relating to some of the plots made good reading, especially the “exploding cigars” with which the CIA (Central Intelligence Agency) planned to kill Fidel Castro (1926–2016; prime-minister or president of Cuba 1959-2008).  The conduct of Richard Nixon’s (1913-1994; US president 1969-1974) administration weakened the authority of the executive and US Congress in the mid-1970s took steps to prohibit unlawful assassinations by government agencies, this prompted by revelations about the CIA’s involvement in plots to assassinate foreign leaders.  In response to the congressional nudge, Gerald Ford (1913–2006; US president 1974-1977) in 1976 issued Executive Order (EO) 11905, explicitly prohibiting political assassinations by US government personnel: “No employee of the United States Government shall engage in, or conspire to engage in, political assassination.”  This was later reaffirmed and expanded by Jimmy Carter’s (b 1924; US President 1977-1981) EO 12036 (1978) and Ronald Reagan’s (1911-2004; US president 1981-1989) EO 12333 which in 1981 sought to close the “outsourcing” loophole with the words: “No person employed by or acting on behalf of the United States Government shall engage in, or conspire to engage in, assassination.”  Despite the impression which seems afoot, Congress never passed a law banning assassinations and while EO 12333 remains active and binding on the executive branch it can, at the stroke of a pen, be amended or revoked by any POTUS (President of the United States).

So scope exists for an imaginative POTUS to act and the obvious device is a new EO.  While most EOs are published (gazetted) in the Federal Register and are thus publicly available, if a POTUS issues a certificate classifying an EO as being related to national security, they can be unpublished and their existence not even disclosed, meaning any change in an administration’s interpretation of the restriction (or even the word “assassination”) can remain unknown outside a small circle.  As the words are presumed still to be operative include: “No person employed by or acting on behalf of the US Government...” that would include the military, CIA personnel and many others but there are certain legal and operational ambiguities including:

(1) The targeted killing of enemy combatants during armed conflict: The phrase “armed conflict” is significant because the US last declared war on another country in 1942, despite which, they’ve hardly been militarily inactive since.  What is means is that “armed conflict” has proved pleasingly flexible and of great utility in the age of drone strikes which has allowed the US precisely to target individuals, something justified subsequently as “self-defense”.

(2) Authorization for Use of Military Force (AUMFs): In the wake of the 9/11 terrorist attacks, the AUMF (2001) gives administrations broad powers to target individuals linked to 9/11 (or “associated groups”) and much use of the term “associated groups” has since been made as a legal justification for drone strikes in a number of countries.

(3) Covert Activities vs Military Operations: Covert operations by the CIA (or any other organ) require a “Presidential Finding” and a formal notification to the congressional intelligence committees (a legacy of the restrictions imposed during the 1970s) while the military are not subject to the same degree of oversight though are covered by the rules of war (the Geneva Conventions, the implications of the finding of the Nuremberg tribunals etc).

(4) The psychological effect of the UAV (Unmanned Aerial Vehicle, commonly called "drone"): From a legal standpoint, the use of drones to kill people really added no new factors but in the political and public mind they seemed a “game changer” and with each high-profile “hit” there’s usually an intense (if brief) debate, an example of which followed the 2020 killing of Lieutenant General Qasem Soleimani (1957-2020) of Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC).  As was usually the case, the “debate” was formulaic, the administration claiming a military act of self-defense while critics labeled it a political assassination.  After both sides let off some steam, life returned to business as usual.

While not something often discussed by the administration, the DoD (Department of Defense) does have a (sort of) codified doctrine in their War Manual (last updated in 2015 with the title retained despite no declarations of war since 1942 and there having been no secretary of defense in cabinet since 1947).  While DoD avoids reducing things to a single definition, it does distinguish between “assassination” and “lawful targeting”: “The term assassination has been interpreted to mean an unlawful killing of a specific individual for political or ideological reasons”, to which is added: “The lawful targeting of an enemy combatant is not assassination.”  What that would appear to imply is (1) killing enemy combatants or terrorist leaders during an armed conflict or in self-defense is not considered assassination and (2) killing a civilian political leader, or someone not engaged in hostilities, especially outside armed conflict may constitute an assassination.  Presumably, being an army officer (albeit not one on a battlefield (in the conventional sense of the word)) General Soleimani would be defined “an enemy combatant”.  Some deaths since have been rather more in the realm of a “gray area” but the strikes continue.

Mike Pompeo before & after.

Mr Pompeo told interviewers he had in six months achieved a 90 lb (41 kg) weight loss through rigorous adherence to a D&E (diet & exercise) schedule.  It was an impressive outcome but in the Ozempic age, some were sceptical, suspecting there may have been surgical or chemical assistance.  Being a politician does have the general effect of generating an air of doubt about their assertions and those accessing the likelihood of truthfulness have to weigh up variables like "possible", "plausible" and "unbelievable".  Generously, what Mr Pompeo claimed was "plausible" and a 90 lb shred, however done, a reasonable achievement.

One who seemed anxious to explore gray areas was Mike Pompeo (b 1963; director of the CIA 2017-2018 and US secretary of state 2018-2021).  Although an evangelical Christian, one-time church deacon and Sunday school teacher on the record as saying “…politics is a never-ending struggle... until the Rapture.”, Mr Pompeo seems to believe the sixth commandment is open to interpretation.  While General Soleimani was a military figure, WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange (b 1971) unambiguously was a civilian and one with no position in any government or Quango.  Despite that, Mr Pompeo was reported as have requested “options” which would provide a legal justification for killing Assange, his interest prompted by WikiLeaks’ publication of details of the CIA’s “Vault 7” hacking tools, said by the agency to be its worst ever data loss.  The possibilities Mr Pompeo could have been offered apparently included both abduction and assassination and Mr Pompeo, a trained lawyer, had in 2017 laid the groundwork for a bit of escalation, describing WikiLeaks as a “non-state hostile intelligence service”, a term thought to be a declaration of his intent rather than a formal step up a rung on the ladder of legal possibility.  As things turned out, politics triumphed and a deal was done whereby Mr Assange pleaded guilty to something and was set free.

Chair

Chair (pronounced cherr)

(1) A seat, especially if designed for one person, usually with four legs (though other designs are not uncommon) for support and a rest for the back, sometimes with rests for the arms (as distinct from a sofa, stool, bench etc).

(2) Something which serves as a chair or provides chair-like support (often used in of specialized medical devices) and coined as required (chairlift, sedan chair, wheelchair etc).

(3) A seat of office or authority; a position of authority such as a judge.

(4) In academic use, a descriptor of a professorship.

(5) The person occupying a seat of office, especially the chairperson (the nominally gendered term “chairman” sometimes still used, even of female or non-defined chairs).

(6) In an orchestra, the position of a player, assigned by rank (1^st chair, 2^nd chair etc).

(7) In informal use, an ellipsis of electric chair (often in the phrase “Got the chair” (ie received a death sentence)).

(8) In structural engineering, the device used in reinforced-concrete construction to maintain the position of reinforcing rods or strands during the pouring operation.

(9) In glass-blowing, a glassmaker's bench having extended arms on which a blowpipe is rolled in shaping glass.

(10) In railroad construction, a metal block for supporting a rail and securing it to a crosstie or the like (mostly UK).

(11) To place or seat in a chair.

(12) To install in office.

(13) To preside over a committee, board, tribunal etc or some ad hoc gathering; to act as a chairperson.

(14) To carry someone aloft in a sitting position after a triumph or great achievement (mostly UK and performed after victories in sport).

(15) In chemistry, one of two possible conformers of cyclohexane rings (the other being boat), shaped roughly like a chair.

(16) A vehicle for one person; either a sedan chair borne upon poles, or a two-wheeled carriage drawn by one horse (also called a gig) (now rare).

(17) To award a chair to the winning poet at an eisteddfod (exclusive to Wales).

1250-1300: From the Middle English chayer, chaire, chaiere, chaere, chayre & chayere, from the Old French chaiere & chaere (chair, seat, throne), from the Latin cathedra (seat), from the Ancient Greek καθέδρα (kathédra), the construct being κατά (katá) (down) + ἕδρα (hédra) (seat).  It displaced the native stool and settle, which shifted to specific meanings.  The twelfth century modern French chaire (pulpit, throne) in the sixteenth century separated in meaning when the more furniture came to be known as a chaise (chair).  Chair is a noun & verb and chaired & chairing are verbs; the noun plural is chairs.

The figurative sense of "seat of office or authority" emerged at the turn of the fourteenth century and originally was used of professors & bishops (there once being rather more overlap between universities and the Church).  That use persisted despite the structural changes in both institutions but it wasn’t until 1816 the meaning “office of a professor” was extended from the mid-fifteenth century sense of the literal seat from which a professor conducted his lectures.  Borrowing from academic practice, the general sense of “seat of a person presiding at meeting” emerged during the 1640s and from this developed the idea of a chairman, although earliest use of the verb form “to chair a meeting” appears as late as 1921.  Although sometimes cited as indicative of the “top-down” approach taken by second-wave feminism, although it was in the 1980s that the term chairwoman (woman who leads a formal meeting) first attained general currency, it had actually been in use since 1699, a coining apparently thought needed for mere descriptive accuracy rather than an early shot in the culture wars, chairman (occupier of a chair of authority) having been in use since the 1650s and by circa 1730 it had gained the familiar meaning “member of a corporate body appointed to preside at meetings of boards or other supervisor bodies”.  By the 1970s however, the culture wars had started and the once innocuous “chairwoman” was to some controversial, as was the gender-neutral alternative “chairperson” which seems first to have appeared in 1971.  Now, most seem to have settled on “chair" which seems unobjectionable although presumably, linguistic structuralists could claim it’s a clipping of (and therefore implies) “chairman”.

Chairbox offers a range of “last shift” coffin-themed chairs, said to be ideal for those "stuck in a dead-end job, sitting on a chair in a cubicle".  The available finishes include walnut (left) and for those who enjoy being reminded of cremation, charcoal wood can be used for the seating area (right).  An indicative list price is Stg£8300 (US$10,400) for a Last Shift trimmed in velvet.

The slang use as a short form of electric chair dates from 1900 and was used to refer both to the physical device and the capital sentence.  In interior decorating, the chair-rail was a timber molding fastened to a wall at such a height as would prevent the wall being damaged by the backs of chairs.  First documented in 1822, chair rails are now made also from synthetic materials.  The noun wheelchair (also wheel-chair) dates from circa 1700, and one so confined is said sometimes to be “chair bound”.  The high-chair (an infant’s seat designed to make feeding easier) had probably been improvised for centuries but was first advertised in 1848.  The term easy chair (a chair designed especially for comfort) dates from 1707.  The armchair (also arm-chair), a "chair with rests for the elbows", although a design of long-standing, was first so-described in the 1630s and the name outlasted the contemporary alternative (elbow-chair).  The adjectival sense, in reference to “criticism of matters in which the critic takes no active part” (armchair critic, armchair general etc) dates from 1879.  In academic use, although in the English-speaking world the use of “professor” seems gradually to be changing to align with US practice, the term “chair” continues in its traditional forms: There are chairs (established professorships), named chairs (which can be ancient or more recent creations which acknowledge the individual, family or institution providing the endowment which funds the position), personal chairs (whereby the title professor (in some form) is conferred on an individual although no established position exists), honorary chairs (unpaid appointments) and even temporary chairs (which means whatever the institution from time-to-time says it means).

In universities, the term “named chair” refers usually to a professorship endowed with funds from a donor, typically bearing the name of the donor or whatever title they nominate and the institution agrees is appropriate.  On rare occasions, named chairs have been created to honor an academic figure of great distinction (usually someone with a strong connection with the institution) but more often the system exists to encourage endowments which provide financial support for the chair holder's salary, research, and other academic activities.  For a donor, it’s a matter both of legacy & philanthropy in that a named chair is one of the more subtle and potentially respectable forms of public relations and a way to contribute to teaching & research in a field of some interest or with a previous association.

Professor Michael Simons (official photograph issued by Yale University's School of Medicine).

So it can be a win-win situation but institutions do need to practice due diligence in the process of naming or making appointments to named chairs as a long running matter at Yale University demonstrates.  In 2013, an enquiry convened by Yale found Professor Michael Simons (b 1957) guilty of sexual harassment and suspended him as Chief of Cardiology at the School of Medicine.  Five years on, the professor accused Yale of “punishing him again” for the same conduct in a gender-discriminatory effort to appease campus supporters of the #MeToo movement which had achieved national prominence.  That complaint was prompted when Professor Simons was in 2018 appointed to, and then asked to resign from a named chair, the Robert W Berliner Professor of Medicine, endowed by an annual grant of US$500,000 from the family of renal physiologist, Robert Berliner (1915-2002).  Professor Simons took his case to court and early in 2024 at a sitting of federal court ruled, he obtained a ruling in his favour, permitting him to move to trial, Yale’s motion seeing a summary judgment in all matters denied, the judge fining it appropriate that two of his complaints (one on the basis of gender discrimination in violation of Title VII of the Civil Rights Act (1964) and one under Title IX of the Education Amendments Act (1972)) should be heard before a jury.  The trial judge noted in his judgment that there appeared to be a denial of due process in 1918 and that happened at a time when (as was not disputed), Yale was “the subject of news reports criticizing its decision to reward a sexual harasser with an endowed chair.”

What the documents presented in Federal court revealed was that Yale’s handling of the matter had even within the institution not without criticism.  In 2013 the University-Wide Committee on Sexual Misconduct found the professor guilty of sexual harassment and he was suspended (but not removed) as chief of cardiology at the School of Medicine.  Internal documents subsequently leaked to the New York Times (NYT) revealed there were 18 faculty members dissatisfied with that outcome and a week after the NYT sought comment from Yale, it was announced Simons would be removed from the position entirely and in November 2014, the paper reported that Yale had also removed him from his position as director of its Cardiovascular Research Center.  Simons alleges that these two additional actions were taken in response to public reaction to the stories published by the NYT but the university disputed that, arguing the subsequent moves were pursuant to the findings of an internal “360 review” of his job performance.  In 2018, Simons was asked to relinquish the Berliner chair on the basis he would be appointed instead to another endowed chair.  In the documents Simons filed in Federal Court, this request came after “one or more persons … sympathetic to the #MeToo movement” contacted the Berliner family encouraging them to demand that the University remove Simons from the professorship, prompting Yale, “fearing a backlash from the #MeToo activists and hoping to placate them,” to “began exploring” his removal from the chair.

School of Medicine, Yale University, New Haven, Connecticut, USA.

Later in 2018, Simons was duly appointed to another named chair, prompting faculty members, students and alumni to send an open letter to Yale’s president expressing “disgust and disappointment” at the appointment.  The president responded with a formal notice to Simmons informing him he had 24 hours to resign from the chair, and Simmons also alleges he was told by the president of “concerns” the institution had about the public criticism.  In October 2019, Simons filed suit against Yale (and a number of individuals) on seven counts: breach of contract, breach of the implied warranty of fair dealing, wrongful discharge, negligent infliction of emotional distress, breach of privacy, and discrimination on the basis of gender under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and Title IX of the Education Amendments of 1972.   Three of these (wrongful discharge, negligent infliction of emotional distress and breach of privacy) were in 2020 struck-out in Federal Court and this was the point at which Yale sought summary judgment for the remainder.  This was partially granted but the judge held that the matter of gender discrimination in violation of Title VII and Title IX needed to be decided by a jury.  A trial date has not yet been set but it will be followed with some interest.  While all cases are decided on the facts presented, it’s expected the matter may be an indication of the current state of the relative strength of “black letter law” versus “prevailing community expectations”.

Personal chair: Lindsay Lohan adorning a chair.

The Roman Catholic Church’s dogma of papal infallibility holds that a pope’s rulings on matters of faith and doctrine are infallibility correct and cannot be questioned.  When making such statements, a pope is said to be speaking ex cathedra (literally “from the chair” (of the Apostle St Peter, the first pope)).  Although ex cathedra pronouncements had been issued since medieval times, as a point of canon law, the doctrine was codified first at the First Ecumenical Council of the Vatican (Vatican I; 1869–1870) in the document Pastor aeternus (shepherd forever).  Since Vatican I, the only ex cathedra decree has been Munificentissimus Deus (The most bountiful God), issued by Pius XII (1876–1958; pope 1939-1958) in 1950, in which was declared the dogma of the Assumption; that the Virgin Mary "having completed the course of her earthly life, was assumed body and soul into heavenly glory".  Pius XII never made explicit whether the assumption preceded or followed earthly death, a point no pope has since discussed although it would seem of some theological significance.  Prior to the solemn definition of 1870, there had been decrees issued ex cathedra.  In Ineffabilis Deus (Ineffable God (1854)), Pius IX (1792–1878; pope 1846-1878) defined the dogma of the Immaculate Conception of the Blessed Virgin Mary, an important point because of the theological necessity of Christ being born free of sin, a notion built upon by later theologians as the perpetual virginity of Mary.  It asserts that Mary "always a virgin, before, during and after the birth of Jesus Christ", explaining the biblical references to brothers of Jesus either as children of Joseph from a previous marriage, cousins of Jesus, or just folk closely associated with the Holy Family.

Technically, papal infallibility may have been invoked only the once since codification but since the early post-war years, pontiffs have found ways to achieve the same effect, John Paul II (1920–2005; pope 1978-2005) & Benedict XVI (1927–2022; pope 2005-2013, pope emeritus 2013-2022) both adept at using what was in effect a personal decree a power available to one who sits at the apex of what is in constitutional terms an absolute theocracy.  Critics have called this phenomenon "creeping infallibility" and its intellectual underpinnings own much to the tireless efforts of Benedict XVI while he was head of the Inquisition (by then called the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith (CDF) and now renamed the Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith (DDF)) during the late twentieth century.  The Holy See probably doesn't care but DDF is also the acronym, inter-alia, for "drug & disease free" and (in gaming) "Doom definition file".  There's also the DDF Network which is an aggregator of pornography content.

The “chair” photo (1963) of Christine Keeler (1942-2017) by Hong Kong Chinese photographer Lewis Morley (1925-2013) (left) and Joanne Whalley-Kilmer (b 1961) in Scandal (1989, a Harvey Weinstein (b 1952) production) (centre).  The motif was reprised by Taiwanese-American photographer Yu Tsai (b 1975) in his sessions for the Lindsay Lohan Playboy photo-shoot; it was used for the cover of the magazine’s January/February 2012 issue (right).  Ms Lohan wore shoes for some of the shoot but these were still "nudes" because "shoes don't count"; everybody knows that. 

The Profumo affair was one of those fits of morality which from time-to-time would afflict English society in the twentieth century and was a marvellous mix of class, sex, spying & money, all things which make an already good scandal especially juicy.  The famous image of model Christine Keeler, nude and artfully positioned sitting backwards on an unexceptional (actually a knock-off) plywood chair, was taken in May 1963, during the moral panic over the disclosure the young lady simultaneously was enjoying the affection of both a member of the British cabinet and a Soviet spy.  John Profumo (1915-2006) was the UK’s Minister for War (the UK cabinet retained the position until 1964 although it was dis-established in the US in 1947) who, then 46, was found to be conducting an adulterous affair with the then 19 year old topless model at the same time she (presumably as her obviously crowded schedule permitted) fitted in trysts with a KGB agent, attached to the Soviet embassy with the cover of naval attaché.  Although there are to this day differing interpretations of the scandal, there have never been any doubts this potential Cold-War conduit between Moscow and Her Majesty’s Secretary of State for War represented at least a potential conflict of interest.  The fallout from the scandal ended Profumo’s political career, contributed to the fall of Harold Macmillan’s (1894–1986; UK prime-minister 1957-1963) government and was one of a number of the factors in the social changes which marked English society in the 1960s.  Commendably, the former Grenadier Guards captain's sang froid didn't desert him: woken from his sleep to be told the scandal was about to break, he remarked: "Well, at least it was with a woman".  That line was for years quoted approvingly and it was only when the old Etonian's bisexuality became common knowledge it was re-appraised.   

Commercially & technically, photography then was a different business and the “chair” image was the last shot on a 12-exposure film, all taken in less than five minutes at the end of a session which hurriedly had been arranged because Ms Keeler had signed a contract which included a “nudity” clause for photos to be used as “publicity stills” for a proposed film about the scandal.  As things turned out, the film was never released (not until Scandal (1989) one would appear) but the photograph was leaked to the tabloid press, becoming one of the more famous of the era although later feminist critiques would deconstruct the issues of exploitation they claimed were inherent.  Playboy’s editors would not be unaware of the criticism but the use of a chair to render a nude image SFW (suitable for work) remains in the SOP (standard operating procedures) manual.

Contact sheet from photoshoot, Victoria and Albert (V&A) Museum: exhibit E.2830-2016.

Before the “nude” part which concluded the session, two rolls of film had already been shot with the subject sitting in various positions (on the chair and the floor) while “wearing” a small leather jerkin.  At that point the film’s producers mentioned the “nude” clause.  Ms Keeler wasn’t enthusiastic but the producers insisted so all except subject and photographer left the room and the last roll was shot, some of the earlier poses reprised while others were staged, the last, taken with the camera a little further away with the subject in what Mr Morley described as “a perfect positioning”, was the “chair” shot.

The “Keeler Chair” (left) and an Arne Jacobsen Model 3107 (right).

Both chair & the gelatin-silver print of the photograph are now in the collections of London’s Victoria and Albert (V&A) Museum (the photograph exhibit E.2-2002; the chair W.10-2013).  Although often wrongly identified a Model 3107 (1955) by Danish modernist architect & furniture designer Arne Jacobsen (1902-1971), it’s actually an example of one of a number of inexpensive knock-offs produced in the era.  Mr Morley in 1962 bought six (at five shillings (50c) apiece) for his studio and it’s believed his were made in Denmark although the identity of the designer or manufacturer are unknown.  Unlike a genuine 3107, the knock-off has a handle cut-out (in a shape close to a regular trapezoid) high on the back, an addition both functional and ploy typical of those used by knock-off producers seeking to evade accusations of violations of copyright.  Structurally, a 3017 uses a thinner grade of plywood and a more subtle molding.  The half-dozen chairs in Mr Morley’s studio were mostly unnoticed office furniture until Ms Keeler lent one its infamy although they did appear in others of his shoots including those from his session with television personality & interviewer Sir David Frost (1939–2013) and it’s claimed the same chair was used for both.  In London’s second-hand shops it’s still common to see the knock-offs (there were many) described as “Keeler” chairs and Ms Lohan’s playboy shoot was one of many in which the motif has been used.  The obvious choice of pose for Joanne Whalley-Kilmer’s promotional shots for the 1989 film in which she played Ms Keeler, it appeared also on the the covers of the DVD & Blu-ray releases 

Old Smoky, the electric chair once used in the Tennessee prison system, Alcatraz East Crime Museum.  "Old Sparky" was once the preferred but in modern use "the chair" seems to have prevailed.

"Then we'd get the chair": The Simpsons, season six.

Crooked Hillary Clinton in pantsuit.

Although the numbers did bounce around a little, polling by politico.com found that typically about half of Republican voters believe crooked Hillary Clinton (b 1947; US secretary of state 2009-2013) should be locked up while fewer than 2% think she should “get the chair”, apparently on the basis of her being guilty of something although some might just find her “really annoying” and take the pragmatic view a death sentence would remove at least that problem from their life.  The term “electric chair” is most associated with the device used for executions but is also common slang to describe other machinery including electric wheelchairs and powered (heat, cooling or movement) seats or chairs of many types.  First used in the US during the 1890s, like the guillotine, the electric chair was designed as a more humane (ie faster) method of execution compared with the then common hanging where death could take minutes.  Now rarely used (and in some cases declared unconstitutional as a “cruel & unusual punishment”), in some US states, technically it remains available including as an option the condemned may choose in preference to lethal injection or the firing squad.  Interestingly, although during the successful 2016 campaign, Donald Trump (b 1946; US president 2017-2021 and since 2025) made much of "locking up" crooked Hillary were he to be elected, once in the White House, the usefulness of the "promise" was exhausted.  His supporters however expected a prosecution and journalists did whether he would order investigations into the conduct of Bill  (b 1946; US president 1993-2001) and crooked Hillary.  He replied with a perfunctory shake of the head and an almost mumbled "No, they're good people" and that was the end of that.  It was an interesting insight into many aspects of Mr Trump's character and political techniques.    

Electric Chair Suite (1971) screen print decalogy by Andy Warhol.

Based on a newspaper photograph (published in 1953) of the death chamber at Sing Sing Prison in New York, where US citizens Julius (1918-1953) & Ethel Rosenberg (1915-1953) were that year executed as spies, Andy Warhol (1928–1987) produced a number of versions of Electric Chair, part of the artist’s Death and Disaster series which, beginning in 1963, depicted imagery such as car crashes, suicides and urban unrest.  The series was among the many which exploited his technique of transferring a photograph in glue onto silk, a method which meant each varied in some slight way.  His interest was two-fold: (1) what is the effect on the audience of render the same image with variations and (2) if truly gruesome pictures repeatedly are displayed, is the effect one of reinforcement or desensitization?  His second question was later revisited as the gratuitous repetition of disturbing images became more common as the substantially unmediated internet achieved critical mass.  The first of the Electric Chair works was created in 1964.