Glaucus

Glaucus (pronounce gloh-kus)

(1) Bluish-green, grayish-blue, sea-colored (ie of certain seas) or a gleaming pale blue.

(2) Any member of the genus Glaucus of nudibranchiate mollusks, found in the warmer latitudes, swimming in the open sea, strikingly colored with blue and silvery white.  They’re known also as sea swallow, blue angel, blue glaucus, blue dragon, blue sea slug, blue ocean slug).  If offered the choice, the organisms presumably would prefer to be called swallows, angels or dragons rather than slugs.

(3) A desert lime (Citrus glauca), a thorny shrub species endemic to semi-arid regions of Australia.

From the Ancient Greek γλαυκός (glaukós) (the γλαῦκος (glaûkos) was an edible grey fish although the species is uncertain (perhaps the derbio)) and was taken up by the Medieval Latin as glaucus (bright, sparkling, gleaming” and “bluish-green).  There may be an Indo-European root but no link has ever been found and despite the similarity, other words used to denote gleaming or shimmering light and colors (glow, gleam etc), there’s no known etymological link and it may have been a substratum word from Pre-Greek.  The eighth century BC poet Homer used the Greek glaukos to describe the sea as “gleaming, silvery”, apparently without any suggestion of a specific color but later writers adopted it with a sense of “greenish” (of olive leaves) and “blue; gray” (of eyes).  In English, the adjective glaucous dates from the 1670s and was used to refer to shades of bluish-green or gray; it’s a popular form in botany and ornithology, describing surfaces with a powdery or waxy coating that gives a pale blue-gray appearance.  In fashion, the vagueness of glaucus (especially the adjective glaucous) makes it handy because it can be used to describe eyes or fabrics neither quite blue nor green yet really not suited to being called turquoise, teal, aqua etc.  Glaucus is a noun & adjective; the noun plural is glaucuses.

Translators seem to believe Homer's glauk-opis Athene (Athena Glaukopis) meant “bright-eyed” rather than “gray-eyed” goddess; it was an epithet emphasizing her intelligence and wisdom, the construct being glau(kos) (gleaming, silvery; bluish-green; grey) + opsis (eye; face).  The word γλαύξ (glaux) (little owl) may have been related and linked to the bird’s distinctive, penetrating stare but it may also be from a pre-Greek source.  Owls do however sometimes appear with the goddess in Greek art and, like her, became a symbol of wisdom and intelligence.  The other epithets applied to Athena included Ophthalmitis and Oxyderkous, both references to her sharp, penetrating gaze.  As a descriptor of color, glaucus was applied widely including to eyes, the sea, the sky or fabrics and was used of shining surfaces.  The descendants include the Catalan glauc, the English glaucous, the French glauque, the Romanian glauc, the Italian glauco, the Portuguese glauco, the Romanian glauc and the Spanish glauco.  The Middle English glauk (bluish-green, gray) was in use as late as the early fifteenth century.

Renaissance-era engraving of Athena, the Ancient Greek goddess of wisdom, warfare, and craft, depicted in Corinthian helmet with spear and clothed in a long πέπλος (péplos); her aegis (shield or breastplate), bearing the Gorgon's head, rests nearby.  Athena’s sacred bird, the Athene noctua (little owl) is perched atop a pile of books, symbolizing knowledge & wisdom while the creature at her feet is the chthonic serpent Erichthonius which she raised, used often to stand for the triumph of reason over chaos, thus appearing also as the sacred serpent which protected the Acropolis.  The Greek Inscription on the banner reads: ΜΟΧΘΕΙΝ ΑΝΑΓΚΗ ΤΟΥΣ ΘΕΛΟΝΤΑΣ ΕΥ ΠΡΑΤΤΕΙΝ (Those who wish to do well must undergo toil) a classical aphorism often suggested as being a paraphrasing lines from Pindar or Isocrates, extolling effort and virtue.

In the myths of Antiquity there were many tales of Glaucus and in that the character was not unusual, the figures in the stories sometimes differing in details like parentage, where they lived, the lives they led and even whether they were gods or mortals; sometimes the lives depicted bore little similarity to those in other tales.  The myths in ancient Greece were not a fixed canon in the modern Western literary tradition; they were for centuries passed down orally for centuries before being written and in different regions a poet or dramatist was likely to tell it differently.   That was not just artistic licence because the stories could be a product people would pay to hear and content providers needed new product.  Additionally, as is a well-documented phenomenon when information is passed on orally, over generations, the “Chinese whispers problem” occurs and things, organically, can change.

Lindsay Lohan’s in glaucous (in the Medieval Latin sense of gleaming as well as the color) John Galliano satin gown, worn with Santoni stilettos, Irish Wish (Netflix, 2024) premiere, Paris Theater, New York City, March, 2024.

Nor was there the modern conception of IP (intellectual property) or copyright in the characters, the myths “belonging” literally to all as a shared public cultural heritage.  Were a poet (Ovid, Homer, Hesiod etc) to “re-imagine” an old myth or use well known characters to populate a new plot, that wasn’t plagiarization but simply a creative act in interpretation or reshaping.  There were social and political determinisms in all this: We now refer casually to “Ancient Greece” but it was not a unitary state (a la modern Greece) but an aggregation of city-states with their own distinct cults, local legends and literary traditions.  So, in one region Glaucus might have been depicted as a sea-god while somewhere to the south he was a warrior; a tragedian might make Glaucus tragic, a philosopher might use him as an allegorical device and a poet might map him onto a formulaic tale of jealousy, transformation and redemption.  The best comparison is probably the fictional characters which have entered public domain (as Mickey Mouse recently achieved) and thus become available for anyone to make of what they will.  To be generous, one might suggest what the AI (artificial intelligence) companies now wish to be made lawful (vacuuming up digitized copyright material to train their LLMs (large language models) for commercial gain while not having to pay the original creators or rights holders) is a return to the literary practices of antiquity.

Lindsay Lohan’s eyes naturally (left) are in the glaucus range but with modern contact lens (right), much is possible.

So it wasn’t so much that writers felt free to adapt myths to suit their purposes but rather it would never have occurred to them there was anything strange in doing exactly that.  Significantly, any author was at any time free to create a wholly new cast for their story but just as movie producers know a film with “bankable” stars has a greater chance of success than one with talented unknowns, the temptation must have been to avoid risking market resistance and “stick to the classics”.  Additionally, what’s never been entirely certain is the extent to which the poets who wrote down what they heard were inclined to “improve” things.  The myths were in a sense entertainment but they were often also morality tales, psychological studies or statements of political ideology, a medium for exploring fate, identity, love, betrayal, divine justice and other vicissitudes of life.  The very modern notion of “authorship” would have been unfamiliar in Antiquity, a ποιητής (author; poet) being someone who “shaped” rather than “owned” them and Homer (who may not have been a single individual) was revered not because he “made up” the Trojan War, but because masterfully he recounted it, just as now historians who write vivid histories are valued. 

Some of the many lives of Glaucus (Γλαύκος)

(1) He was the son of Antenor who helped Paris abduct Helen and to punish him, his father drove him out.  He fought against the Greeks, and was said sometimes to have been slain by Agamemnon but the more common version is he was saved by Odysseus and Menelaus; as the son of Antenor, who was bound to them by ties of friendship.

(2) He was the son of Hippolochus and grandson of Bellerophon and with his cousin Sarpedon, he commanded the Lycian contingent at Troy.  In the fighting around the city, he found himself face to face with Diomedes but both recalled their families were bound by ties of friendship so the two exchanged weapons, Diomedes of bronze and Glaucus of gold.  Later, when Sarpedon was wounded, he went to assist him, but was stopped by Teucer, wounded and forced to retire from the fray.  Apollo cured Glaucus in time to recover Sarpedon's body, though he was unable to stop the Greeks stripping the corpse of its arms.  Glaucus was killed during the fight for the body of Patroclus by Ajax and on Apollo's order his body was carried back to Lycia by the winds.

(3) He was the son of Sisyphus and succeeded his father to the throne of Ephyra, which later became Corinth.  Glaucus took part in the funeral games of Pelias but was beaten in the four-horse chariot race by Iolaus; after this his mares ate him alive after being maddened either by the water of a magic well, or as a result of Aphrodite's anger, for in order to make his mares run faster Glaucus refused to let them breed, and so offended the goddess.  In another legend, this Glaucus drank from a fountain which conferred immortality. No one would believe that he had become immortal, however, so he threw himself into the sea, where he became a sea-god and every sailor who cast a gaze upon him was assured an early death.

(4) He was a sea-deity.  Glaucus was a fisherman standing on the shore when he noticed if he laid his catch upon a certain herb-covered meadow, the fish miraculously were restored to life and jumped back into the sea. Curious, he tasted the herb himself and was seized by an irresistible urge to dive into the waters where the sea goddesses cleansed him of his remaining traces of mortality.  With that, he assumed a new form, his shoulders grew broader and his legs became a fish’s tail, his cheeks developed a thick beard (tinted green like the patina of bronze) and he became a part of the oceanic pantheon.  He also received the gift of prophecy to become a protector of sailors, often giving oracles and wisdom drawn from the sea.

Glaucus et Scylla (1726), oil on canvas by Jacques Dumont le Romain (1704-1781), (Musée des Beaux-Arts de Troyes). 

(5) Virgil made him the father of the Cumaean Sibyl and he appeared to Menelaus when the latter was returning from Troy; in some traditions he is said to have built the Argo and to have accompanied the ship on its voyage.  Glaucus courted Scylla unsuccessfully, and also tried to win the favours of Ariadne when Theseus abandoned her on Naxos. In that quest he failed but Dionysus included him in his train when the god took her away and made her his wife.

(6) He was the son of Minos and Pasiphae and while still a child he was chasing a mouse when he fell into a jar of honey and drowned.  When Minos finally found his son's corpse, the Curetés told him the child could be restored to life by the man who could best describe the colour of a certain cow among his herds which changed its colour three times a day.  It first became white, then red and finally became black.  Minos asked all the cleverest men in Crete to describe the colour of the cow and it was Polyidus who answered that the cow was mulberry-coloured, for the fruit is first white, turns red, and finally goes black when ripe. Minos felt that Polyidus had solved the problem and told him to bring Glaucus back to life, shutting him up with Glaucus' body.  Polyidus was at his wits' end, until he saw a snake make its way into the room and go over towards the body. He killed the serpent but soon a second came in and, seeing the first lying dead, went out before returning carrying in its mouth a herb with which it touched its companion.  Immediately, the snake was restored to life so Polyidus rubbed this herb on Glaucus, who revived at once.  Minos, however, was still not satisfied.  Before allowing Polyidus to return to his fatherland he demanded that the soothsayer should teach Glaucus his art.  This Polyidus did, but when he was finally allowed to go, he spat into his pupil's mouth, and Glaucus immediately lost all the knowledge he had just acquired.  In other versions of the legend, it was Asclepius, not Polyidus, who brought Glaucus back to life.

Asperger

Asperger (pronounced a-spuh-guh or a-spr-gr)

(1) In neo-paganism and modern witchcraft, a ceremonial bundle of herbs or a perforated object used to sprinkle water (in spells as “witches water”), usually at the commencement of a ritual.

(2) In neurology, as Asperger's syndrome (less commonly Asperger syndrome), an autism-related developmental disorder characterised by sustained impairment in social interaction and non-verbal communication and by repetitive behaviour as well as restricted interests and routines.  The condition was named after Austrian pediatrician Hans Asperger (1906–1980).

Pre-1300: The surname Asperger was of German origin and was toponymic (derived from a geographical location or feature).  The town of Asperg lies in what is now the district of Ludwigsburg, Baden-Württemberg, in south-west Germany and in German, appending the suffix “-er” can denote being “from a place”, Asperger thus deconstructs as “someone from Asperg” and in modern use would suggest ancestral ties to the town of Asperg or a similar-sounding locality.  Etymologically, Asperg may be derived from older Germanic or Latin roots, possibly meaning “rough hill” or “stony mountain” (the Latin asper meaning “rough” and the German berg meaning “mountain or hill”.  The term “Asperger’s syndrome” was in 1976 coined by English psychiatrist Lorna Wing (1928–2014), acknowledging the work of Austrian pediatrician Hans Asperger (1906–1980).  Dr Wing was instrumental in the creation of the National Autistic Society, a charity which has operated since 1962.  Asperger is a noun (capitalized if in any context used as a proper noun).  Aspergerian & Aspergic are nouns; the noun plural forms being Aspergers, Aspergerians & Aspergics.  In the literature, Aspergerian & Aspergic (of, related to, or having qualities similar to those of Asperger's syndrome (adjective) & (2) someone with Asperger's syndrome (noun)) appear both to have been used.  In general use “Asperger's” was the accepted ellipsis of Asperger's syndrome while the derogratory slang forms included Aspie, autie, aspie, sperg, sperglord & assburger, now all regarded as offensive in the same way “retard” is now proscribed.

The noun asperges described a sprinkling ritual of the Catholic Church, the name was applied also to an antiphon intoned or sung during the ceremony.  It was from the Late Latin asperges, noun use of second-person singular future indicative of aspergere (to scatter, strew upon, sprinkle), the construct being ad (to, towards, at) + spargere (to sprinkle).  The use in Church Latin was a learned borrowing from Latin aspergō (to scatter or strew something or someone; to splash over; to spot, stain, sully, asperse; besmirch; (figuratively) to bestow, bequeath something to, set apart for) the construct being ad- +‎ spargō (strew, scatter; sprinkle; moisten).  The origin lay in the phrase Asperges me, Domine, hyssopo et mundabor (Thou shalt sprinkle me, O Lord, with hyssop, and I shall be cleansed), from the 51^st Psalm (in the Vulgate), sung during the rite of sprinkling a congregation with holy water.  Hyssop (any of a number of aromatic bushy herbs) was from the Latin hȳsōpum, from the Ancient Greek ὕσσωπος (hússōpos), of Semitic origin and the idea was would be cleansed of one’s sins.  In the Old English the loan-translation of the Latin aspergere was onstregdan.

The three most recent popes demonstrate their aspergillum (also spelled aspergill) technique while performing the sprinkling rite.  In the more elaborate rituals, it's often used in conjunction with a container called an aspersorium (holy water bucket).  Benedict XVI (1927–2022; pope 2005-2013, pope emeritus 2013-2022, left), Francis (1936-2025; pope 2013-2025, centre) and Leo XIV (b 1955; pope since 2025, right).

In the Christian liturgy, an aspergillum was used to sprinkle holy water and the borrowing, adaptation and re-purposing of ceremonies, feasts days and such from paganism widely was practiced by the early Church.  In the Bible (notably chapter 14 in the Old Testament’s Book of Leviticus) there are descriptions of purification rituals involving the use of cedar wood, hyssop, and scarlet wool to create an instrument for sprinkling blood or water and historians sometimes cite this as “proto-aspergillum”.  While it seems the earliest known use on English of “aspergillum” dates from 1649, the documentary evidence is clear the practice in the Christian liturgy was ancient and common since at least the tenth century.  Exactly when the ritualistic practice began isn’t known but because water is so obviously something used “to cleanse”, it’s likely it has been a part of religious rituals for millennia before Christianity.

Asperger ceremonial herb bundle.

The use of the “asperger” in neo-paganism & witchcraft was a continuation of the concept and well documented in the remarkably prolific literature (some book shops have dedicated sections) devoted to modern witchcraft and the construction of the objects (a bundle of fresh herbs or a perforated object for sprinkling water) is a lineal descendent of the aspergillum of the Medieval church and that makes sense, both institutions devoted to the process of cleansing although the targets may have differed.  According to Ancient Pathways Witchcraft (which sounds an authoritative source), although it’s the fluid which does the cleansing, the asperger is significant because it symbolizes “the transformative and cleansing properties of water…”, rinsing away “…spiritual debris that might interfere with the sanctity of rituals.”  In both neo-paganism and witchcraft, the herbs used may vary and while, pragmatically, sometimes this was dictated by seasonal or geographical availability, priests and witches would also choose the composition based on some “unique essences” being better suited to “enhance the sacred water's effectiveness”.  Nor were herbs always used for, as in the rituals of the church, “an asperger might be a metal or wooden rod designed with perforations or an attached mesh”, something like a “small brush or a dedicated holy water sprinkler akin to those seen in Christian liturgy.”  Again, it was the sprinkling of the water which was the critical element in the process, the devices really delivery systems which, regardless of form, existed to transform simple water into “a divine medium of purity and transformation.”  That said, their history of use did vest them with tradition, especially when certain herbs were central to a spell.

Dr Hans Asperger at work, Children's Clinic, University of Vienna, circa 1935.

The term “Asperger’s syndrome” first appeared in a paper by English psychiatrist Lorna Wing (1928–2014) although use seems not to have entered the medical mainstream until 1981.  Dr Wing (who in 1962 was one of the founders of the charitable organization the National Autistic Society) named it after Austrian pediatrician Hans Asperger (1906–1980) who first described the condition in 1944, calling it autistischen psychopathen (autistic psychopathy).  Dr Wing was instrumental in the creation of the National Autistic Society, a charity which has operated since 1962.  The German autistischen was an inflection of autistisch (autistic), the construct being Autist (autistic) +‎ -isch (an adjectival suffix).

Dementia Praecox, oder Gruppe der Schizophrenien (1911) by Eugen Bleuler.

The English word autism was from the German Autismus, used in 1913 by Swiss psychiatrist and eugenicist Eugen Bleuler (1857-1939), the first known instance dating from 1907 and attributed by Swiss psychiatrist & psychotherapist Carl Jung (1875-1961) as an alternative to his earlier “auto-erotism” although in his book Dementia Praecox, oder Gruppe der Schizophrenien (Precocious Dementia, or Group of Schizophrenias, 1911) Bleuler differentiated the terms.  The construct of the word was the Ancient Greek αὐτός (autos) (self) + -ισμός (-ismós) (a suffix used to form abstract nouns of action, state or condition equivalent to “-ism”).  Being a time of rapid advances in the relatively new discipline of psychiatry, it was a time also of linguistic innovation, Dr Bleuler in a Berlin lecture in 1908 using the term “schizophrenia”, something he’d been using in Switzerland for a year to replace “dementia praecox”, coined by German psychiatrist Emil Kraepelin's (1856-1926).  What Dr Bleuler in 1913 meant by “autistic” was very different from the modern understanding in that to him it was a symptom of schizophrenia, not an identifiably separate condition.  In the UK, the profession picked this up and it was used to describe “a tendency to turn inward and become absorbed in one's own mental and emotional life, often at the expense of connection to the external world” while “autistic thinking” referred to those who were “self-absorbed, fantasy-driven, and detached from reality; thinking patterns, commonly seen in those suffering schizophrenia.”

Looking Up was the monthly newsletter of the International Autism Association and in Volume 4, Number 4 (2006), it was reported Lindsay Lohan’s car had blocked the drop-off point for Smashbox Cares, a charity devoted to teaching surfing to autistic youngsters.  Arriving at the designated spot at Malibu’s Carbon Beach, the volunteers were delayed in their attempt to disembark their charges, something of significance because routine and predictability is important to autistic people.  To make up for it, Ms Lohan staged an impromptu three hour beach party for the children, appearing as a bikini-clad DJ.  Apparently, it was enjoyed by all.

Autistic Disturbances of Affective Contact (1943) by Leo Kanner.

The modern sense of “autistic” began to emerge in the 1940s, among the first to contribute the Austrian-American psychiatrist Leo Kanner (1894–1981) who in 1943 published a paper using the phrase “early infantile autism” to describe a distinct syndrome (which now would be understood as autism spectrum disorder).  The following year, in Vienna, Dr Asperger wrote (seemingly influenced by earlier work in Russia) of his observational studies of children, listing the behaviors he associated with the disorder and unlike some working in the field during the 1940s, Dr Asperger wasn’t wholly pessimistic about his young patients, writing in Autistic Psychopathy in Childhood (1944): “The example of autism shows particularly well how even abnormal personalities can be capable of development and adjustment. Possibilities of social integration which one would never have dreamt of may arise in the course of development.”  Many of the documents associated with Dr Asperger’s work were lost (or possibly taken to the Soviet Union) in the chaotic last weeks of World War II (1939-1945) and it wasn’t until Dr Wing in the 1970s reviewed some material from the archives that his contributions began to be appreciated although not until 1992 did “Asperger’s Syndrome” became a standard diagnosis.

DSM IV (1994).  Not all in the profession approved of the reclassification of Asperger’s syndrome under the broader Autism Spectrum Disorder, believing it reduced the depth of diagnostic evaluation, flattened complexity and was disconnected from clinical reality.  There was also regret about structural changes, DSM-5 eliminating the multiaxial system (Axes I–V), which some clinicians found useful for organizing information about the patient, especially Axis II (personality disorders) and Axis V (Global Assessment of Functioning).

Asperger’s Syndrome first appeared in the American Psychiatric Association's (APA) classification system when it was added to the fourth edition of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM-IV, 1994) and the utility for clinicians was it created a sub-group of patients with autism but without a learning disability (ie characterized by deficits in social interaction and restricted interests, in the absence of significant language delay or cognitive impairment), something with obvious implications for treatment.  In the DSM-5 (2013), Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) was re-defined as a broader category which combined Asperger syndrome, Autistic Disorder & PDD-NOS (Pervasive Developmental Disorder Not Otherwise Specified) into a single ASD diagnosis, the editors explaining the change as a reflection of an enhanced understanding of the condition, the emphasis now on it being something with varying degrees of severity and presentation rather than distinct types.  The eleventh release of the World Health Organization’s (WHO) International Classification of Diseases (ICD) (ICD-11) aligned with the DSM-5 and regards what once would have been diagnosed as Asperger’s Syndrome to be deemed a relatively mild manifestation of ASD.  The diagnostic criteria for ASD focus on deficits in social communication and interaction, as well as repetitive behaviors and interests.  Although no longer current, the DSM IV’s criteria for Asperger's Disorder remain of interest because although the label is no longer used, clinicians need still to distinguish those in the spectrum suffering some degree of learning disability and those not so affected:

DSM-IV diagnostic criteria for Asperger’s Disorder (299.80).

A. Qualitative impairment in social interaction, as manifested by at least two of the following:

(1) marked impairments in the use of multiple nonverbal behaviors such as eye-to-eye gaze, facial expression, body postures, and gestures to regulate social interaction.

(2) failure to develop peer relationships appropriate to developmental level.

(3) a lack of spontaneous seeking to share enjoyment, interests, or achievements with other people (eg by a lack of showing, bringing, or pointing out objects of interest to other people).

(4) lack of social or emotional reciprocity.

B. Restricted repetitive and stereotyped patterns of behavior, interests, and activities, as manifested by at least one of the following:

(1) encompassing preoccupation with one or more stereotyped and restricted patterns of interest that is abnormal either in intensity or focus.

(2) apparently inflexible adherence to specific, non-functional routines or rituals.

(3) stereotyped and repetitive motor mannerisms (eg hand or finger flapping or twisting, or complex whole-body movements).

(4) persistent preoccupation with parts of objects.

C. The disturbance causes clinically significant impairment in social, occupational, or other important areas of functioning

D. There is no clinically significant general delay in language (eg single words used by age 2 years, communicative phrases used by age 3 years).

E. There is no clinically significant delay in cognitive development or in the development of age-appropriate self-help skills, adaptive behavior (other than social interaction), and curiosity about the environment in childhood.

F. Criteria are not met for another specific Pervasive Developmental Disorder or Schizophrenia.

The term in the twenty-first century became controversial after revelations of some of Dr Asperger's activities during the Third Reich (Austria annexed by Germany in 1938) which included his clinic in Vienna sending selected children to be victims of Aktion T4 (a mass-murder programme of involuntary euthanasia targeting those with disabilities), an operation which ran at times in parallel with the programmes designed to exterminate the Jews, Gypsies, homosexuals and others.  While there is no surviving documentary evidence directly linking Dr Asperger to the selection process which decided which children were to be killed, researchers have concluded the records suggest his construction of what came later to be called “Asperger’s syndrome” was actually that very process with an academic gloss.  Because those Dr Asperger so categorized were the autistic children without learning difficulties, they were thus deemed capable of being “cured” and thus spared from the T4’s lists, unlike the “uneducable” who would never be able to be made into useful German citizens.  While the surviving material makes clear Dr Asperger was at least a “fellow traveller” with the Nazi regime, in professional, artistic and academic circles there was nothing unusual or even necessarily sinister about that because in a totalitarian state, people have few other choices if they wish to avoid unpleasantness.  However, it does appear Dr Asperger may have been unusually co-operative with the regime and his pre-1945 publication record suggests sympathy with at least some aspects of the Nazis’ racial theories and eugenics.

Quota

Quota (pronounced kwoh-tuh)

(1) The share or proportional part of a total that is required from, or is due or belongs to a particular district, state, person, group etc.

(2) A proportional part or share of a fixed total amount or quantity.

(3) The number or percentage of persons of a specified kind permitted (enrol in an institution, join a club, immigrate to a country, items to be imported etc).

1660–1670: From the Medieval Latin, a clipping of the Latin quota pars ((a percentage of yield owed to the authority as a form of taxation (in the New Latin, a quota, a proportional part or share; the share or proportion assigned to each in a division), from quotus ((which?; what number?; how many?, how few?)), from quat (how many?; as many as; how much?), from the Proto-Italic kwot, from the primitive Indo-European kwóti, the adverb from kwos & kwís; it was cognate with the Ancient Greek πόσος (pósos) and the Sanskrit कति (kati).  In English, until 1921 the only known uses of “quota” appear to be in the context of the Latin form, use spiking in the years after World War I (1914-1918) when “import quotas” were a quick and simply form of regulating the newly resumed international trade.  Quota is a noun, the noun plural is quotas.

Google ngram: Because of the way Google harvests data for their ngrams, they’re not literally a tracking of the use of a word in society but can be usefully indicative of certain trends, (although one is never quite sure which trend(s)), especially over decades.  As a record of actual aggregate use, ngrams are not wholly reliable because: (1) the sub-set of texts Google uses is slanted towards the scientific & academic and (2) the technical limitations imposed by the use of OCR (optical character recognition) when handling older texts of sometime dubious legibility (a process AI should improve).  Where numbers bounce around, this may reflect either: (1) peaks and troughs in use for some reason or (2) some quirk in the data harvested.

Being something imposed by those in authority, quotas attract work-arounds and imaginative techniques of avoidance & evasion.  The terms which emerged included (1) quota-hopping (the registration of a business, vehicle, vessel et al in another jurisdiction in order to benefit from its quota), (2) quota quickie (historically, a class of low-cost films commissioned to satisfy the quota requirements of the UK’s Cinematograph Films Act (1927), a protectionist scheme imposed to stimulate the moribund local industry.  The system widely was rorted and achieved little before being repealed by in the Films Act (1960) although modern historians of film have a fondness for the quota quickies which are a recognizable genre of cultural significance with a certain period charm, (3) quota refugee (a refugee, relocated by the office of the UNHCR (United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees) to a country other the one in which they sought asylum in, in accord with relevant certain UN quotas).

South Park's Eric Cartman (left) and Token (now Tolkien) Black (right).

The writers of the animated TV series South Park (1997) (made with the technique DCAS (digital cutout animation style), a computerized implementation of the original CAS (cutout animation style) in which physical paper or cardboard objects were (by hand) moved (still images later joined or the hands edited-out if filmed); the digital process deliberately emulates the jerky, 2D (two-dimensional) effect of the original CAS) had their usual fun with the idea of a DEI (diversity, equity, inclusion) quota as “tokenism” with the creation of the character Token Black (ie the “token black character” among the substantially white ensemble).  However, in 2022, some 300 episodes into the series, the character was retconned to become “Tolkien Black”, the story-line being he was named after JRR Tolkien (1892–1973), author of the children’s fantasy stories The Hobbit (1937) & The Lord of the Rings trilogy (1954-1955).  Retonning (the full form being “retroactive continuity” is a literary device (widely (and sometimes carelessly) used in many forms of pop culture) in which previously-established facts in a fictional are in some way changed (to the point even of eradication or contradiction).  This is done for many reasons which can be artistic, a reaction to changing public attitudes, administrative convenience or mere commercial advantage.  What South Park’s producers did was comprehensively retrospective in that the back-catalogue was also updated, extending even to the sub-titles, something like the “unpersoning” processes under Comrade Joseph Stalin (1878-1953; Soviet leader 1924-1953) or the painstaking “correcting” of the historic record undertaken by Winston Smith in George Orwell’s (1903-1950) Nineteen Eighty-Four (1949) .  Undertaken during the high-point of the BLM (Black Lives Matter) movement, the change did attract comment and most seemed to regard it as an attempt to remove a possible trigger for protest but there was also the argument there may have been concern the use of the given name “Token” might be able to be interpreted as a comment on the sometimes inventive spellings used by African-American parents.  While the use of “Token” as a comment on “white racism” was acceptable, an allusion to the racial stereotyping implicit in the spelling would be classified as at least a microaggression and probably white racism in action.

Gracious Quotes have aggregated Lindsay Lohan’s top ten quotes.

The English word quote (pronounced kwoht) was related to quota by a connection with the Latin quot.  It is used variously: (1) to repeat or use (a passage, phrase etc.) from a book, speech or such, (2) to enclose (words) within quotation marks or (3) to state a price.  It dated from the mid-fourteenth century and was from the Middle English coten & quoten (to mark a text with chapter numbers or marginal references), from the Old French coter, from the Medieval Latin quotāre (to divide into chapters and verses), from the Latin quot (how many) and related to quis (who).  The use evolved from the sense of “to give as a reference, to cite as an authority” to by the late seventeenth meaning “to copy out exact words”.  The use in commerce (“to state the price of a commodity or service” dates from the 1860s and was a revival of the etymological meaning from the Latin, the noun in this context in use by at least 1885.

In Australian politics, there have long been “informal” quotas.  Although Roman Catholics have in recent years infiltrated the Liberal Party (in numbers which suggest a “take-over” can’t be far off), there was a time when their presence in the party was rare and Sir Neil O'Sullivan (1900–1968) who between 1949-1958 sat in several cabinets under Sir Robert Menzies (1894–1978; prime-minister of Australia 1939-1941 & 1949-1966), noted wryly that as the ministry’s “designated Roman Catholic”, he: “wore the badge of his whole race.”  That was of course an “unofficial” (though for years well-enforced) quota but the concept appears to this day to persist, including in the ALP (Australian Labor Party) which, long past it’s “White Australia” days, is now more sensitive than some to DEI.  However, the subtleties of reconciling the ALP’s intricate factional arrangements with the need simultaneously to maintain (again unofficial) quotas preserving the delicate business of identity politics seem to have occasional unexpected consequences.  In the first cabinet of Anthony Albanese (b 1963; prime-minister of Australia since 2022), there was one “designated Jew” (Mark Alfred Dreyfus (b 1956).  Mark Dreyfus’s middle name is “Alfred” which is of course striking but there is no known genealogical connection between and the Alfred Dreyfus (1859–1935), the French Jewish army officer at the centre of the infamous Dreyfus affair (1894-1906).  The surname Dreyfus is not uncommon among European Jews and exists most frequently in families of Alsatian origin although the Australian’s father was a Jewish refugee from Nazi Germany.  Having apparently outlived his ethnic usefulness, Dreyfus fell victim to factional axe and was dumped from the ministry, some conspiracy theorists pondering whether the ALP might have liked the “optics” of expelling a Jew while the party’s reaction to the war in Gaza was being criticized by Muslim commentators.

Smiles all round.  Official photograph of the new ALP ministry, Canberra, Australia, June 2022. 

The cabinet also had one “designated Muslim” (Edham Nurredin “Ed” Husic (b 1970)), notable for being both the first Muslim elected to federal parliament and thus the first to serve in a ministry.  That had an obviously pleasing multi-cultural symmetry but for a number of reasons the ALP achieved a remarkably successful result in the 2025 election and that complicated things because radically it changed the balance in the numbers between the party’s right-wing, the relativities between the New South Wales (NSW) and Victorian factions significantly distorted relative to their presence in the ministry.  While the ALP is often (correctly) described as “tribal”, it’s really an aggregation of tribes, split between the right, left and some notionally non-aligned members, those alliances overlaid by each individual’s dependence on their relevant state or territory branch.  The system always existed but after the 1960s became institutionalized and it’s now difficult to imagine the ALP working without the formalized (each with its own letterhead) factional framework for without it the results would be unpredictable; as all those who claimed the Lebanese state would be a better place were the influence of the Hezbollah to be eliminated or at least diminished are about to discover, such changes can make things worse.

However, the 2025 election delivered the ALP a substantial majority but what was of interest to the political junkies was that the breakdown in numbers made it obvious the NSW right-wing was over-represented in the ministry, compared to the Victorian right.  What that meant was that someone from NSW had to be sacrificed and that turned out to be Mr Husic, replaced as the cabinet’s designated Muslim by Dr Anne Aly from the Western Australia’s Labor Left.  Culturally, to many that aspect seemed culturally insensitive.  To be replaced as designated Muslim might by Mr Husic have been accepted as just a typical ALP factional power play (a reasonable view given it was the faction which put him in the ministry in the first place) had he been replaced by a man but to be replaced by a Muslim woman must have been a humiliation and one wonders if the factional power-brokers have done their “cultural awareness training”, something the party has been anxious to impose on the rest of the country.  Mr Husic’s demise to the less remunerative back-bench is said to have been engineered by Deputy Prime Minister Richard Marles (b 1967) of the Victorian Right Faction and his role wasn’t ignored when Mr Husic was interviewed on national television, informing the country: “I think when people look at a deputy prime minister, they expect to see a statesman, not a factional assassin.”  Given the conduct & character of some previous holders of the office, it’s not clear why Mr Husic would believe Australians would think this but, in the circumstances, his bitterness was understandable.  Somewhat optimistically, Mr Husic added: “There will be a lot of questions put to Richard about his role.  And that's something that he will have to answer and account for.”  In an act of kindness, the interviewer didn’t trouble to tell his interlocutor: (1) Those aware of Mr Marles’ role in such matters don’t need it explained and (2) those not aware don’t care.

Richard Marles (right) assessing Ed Husic’s (left) interscapular region.

When Mr Marles was interviewed, he was asked if he thought he had “blood on his hands”, the same question which more than forty years earlier had been put to Bob Hawke (1929–2019; Prime Minister of Australia 1983-1991) who had just (on the eve of a general election) assumed the ALP leadership after the “factional assassins” had pole-axed the hapless Bill Hayden (1933–2023; ALP leader 1977-1983) after the latter’s earnest but ineffectual half decade as leader of Her Majesty’s loyal opposition.  Mr Hawke, not then fully house-trained by the pre-modern ALP machine, didn’t react well but to Mr Marles it seemed water of a duck’s back and he responded: “I don't accept that, these are collective processes... they are obviously difficult processes.  But, at the end of the day we need to go through the process of choosing a ministry in the context of there being a lot of talented people who can perform the role.”  Unfortunately, Mr Marles declined to discuss the secret factional manoeuvring which led to Mr Husic being sacrificed, the speculation including Dr Ally being thought better value because she could be not only cabinet’s designated woman but also boost the female numbers in the body, a matter of some sensitivity given how many women had joined the ALP caucus, many of them unexpectedly winning electorates to which they’d gain pre-selection only because the factional power-brokers considered them unwinnable.

Still, to be fair to Mr Marles, his anodyne non-answers were a master-class in composition and delivery: “There are so many people who would be able to admirably perform the role of ministers who are not ministers.  What I would say is I'm really confident about the ministry that has been chosen and the way in which it's going to perform on behalf of the Australian people.  But in the same breath, I'd also very much acknowledge the contribution that Ed Husic has made and for that matter, that Mark Dreyfus has made.  Both have made a huge contribution to this country in the time that they have served as ministers. I am grateful for that.”  Whether or not he believed his gratitude would be appreciated, Mr Marles was emphatic about his faction maintaining its Masonic-like cloak of secrecy, concluding his answer by saying: “I'm not about to go into the detail of how those processes unfold.  I've not spoken about those processes in the past obviously and I'm not about to talk about them now.”  It’s a shame politicians don’t think their parties should be as “transparent” the standard they often attempt to impose on others because Mr Marles discussing the plotting & scheming of factional machinations would be more interesting than most of what gets recited at his press conferences.

Although the most publicized barbs exchanged by politicians are inter-party, they tend to be derivative, predictable or scripted and much more fun are the spur-of-the-moment intra-party insults.  Presumably, intra-faction stuff might be juicier still but the leaks from that juicer are better sealed which is a shame because the ALP has a solid history in such things. 

Bill Hayden not having forgotten the part played in his earlier axing as party leader by Barrie Unsworth (b 1934; Premier of NSW 1986-1988) observed of him: “…were you the sort person who liked the simple pleasures in life, such as tearing the wings off butterflies, then Barrie Unsworth was the man for you.”  Hayden had not escape critiquing either, the man who deposed him (Bob Hawke) describing him in the run up to the coup as “A lying cunt with a limited future.”  Another ALP leader (Gough Whitlam (1916–2014; prime minister of Australia 1972-1975)) had a way with words, complaining to Charlie Jones (1917-2003): “You’re the transport minister, but every time you open your mouth, things go into reverse.”  Nor did Whitlam restrict his invective to individuals, once complaining of some of his colleagues: “I can only say we've just got rid of the '36 faceless men' stigma to be faced with the 12 witless men.”  The twelve were members of the ALP’s federal executive who in 1966 were poised to engineer Whitlam’s removal as deputy leader of the opposition and would have, had he not out- maneuvered them.

Sydney Daily Telegraph 22 March 1963 (left) and Liberal Party campaign pamphlet for 1963 federal election (right).

Dating from 1963, the phrase “36 faceless men” (one of whom was the token woman, the ALP having quotas even then) described the members of the ALP’s federal conference which, at the time, wrote the party platform, handing to the politicians to execute.  The term came to public attention when a photograph appeared on a newspaper’s front page showing Whitlam and Arthur Calwell (1896-1973; ALP leader 1960-1967) standing outside the hotel where the 36 were meeting, waiting to be invited in to be told what their policies were to be.  The conservative government used to great effect the claim the ALP was ruled by “36 faceless men”.  In the 2010s, there was a revival when there were several defenestrations of prime-ministers & premiers by factional operators who did their stuff, mostly in secret, through back channel deals and political thuggery.  In an untypically brief & succinct address, Dr Kevin Rudd (b 1957; Prime-Minister of Australia 2007-2010 & 2013) at the time summed up his feelings for his disloyal colleagues: “In recent days, Minister Crean [Simon Crean (1949–2023; ALP leader 2001-2003)] and a number of other faceless men have publicly attacked my integrity and therefore my fitness to serve as a minister in the government.... I deeply believe that if the Australian Labor Party, a party of which I have been a proud member for more than 30 years, is to have the best future for our nation, then it must change fundamentally its culture and to end the power of faceless men. Australia must be governed by the people, not by the factions.”  Otherwise mostly forgotten, Simon Crean and his followers are remembered as “Simon and the Creanites”, a coining by Peter Costello (b 1957; Treasurer of Australia, 1996-2007) who re-purposed “Creanites” from an earlier use by Paul Keating (b 1944; Prime Minister of Australia 1991-1996).

Centaur

Centaur (pronounced sen-tawr)

(1) In classical mythology, one of a race of monsters having the head, trunk, and arms of a man, and the body and legs of a horse (some modern depictions prefer the upper body of a woman).  The synonym is hippocentaur.

(2) In astronomy, the constellation Centaurus (initial capital).

(3) In astronomy, any of a group of icy bodies with the characteristics of both asteroids and comets, orbiting the Sun in elliptical paths mostly in the region between Saturn & Neptune.

(4) In modern slang, a skillful (male or female) rider of a horse.

(5) In rocketry, a US-designed and built upper stage (with re-startable liquid-propellant engine), used with an Atlas or Titan booster to launch satellites and probes.

(6) In chess, team comprising a human player and a computer.

(7) By extension, in AI (artificial intelligence), a human and some form or AI, working together.

1325–1375: From the Middle English, from the Old English, from the Latin centaurus, from the Ancient Greek, from Κένταυρος (Kéntauros), thought to mean “a member of a savage race from Thessaly” although some etymologists are sceptical.  Historically, Thessaly was known as Αἰολία (Aiolía (Aeolia in modern use)) and that’s how it was referred to in the Odyssey (Homer’s epic poem from the eighth or seventh century BC); the gentlemen in Athens were very quick to describe as savages or barbarians, those from elsewhere.  The half-human, half horse Centaur from Greek mythology belongs in the class of mixtumque genus, prolesque biformis (a mixed or blended race, offspring of two forms), the phrase made famous when it appeared in the Roman poet Virgil’s (Publius Vergilius Maro (70–19 BC)) Aeneid (29-19 BC) description of the Minotaur, the mythical creature with a bull's head and a human body.  Centaur & centaurdom are nouns, centaurian is a noun & adjective and centauresque, centaurial & centauric are adjectives; the noun plural is centaurs.  The most common use of the adjective centauric was a reference to the mythological creatures (resembling or of the nature of a centaur) but in the sometimes weird world of spiritualism it was defined as "characterized by an integration of mind and body for consciousness above the ego-self" (whatever that means).  When the adjective is used in SF (SciFi or science fiction) it's with an upper case if referring to the residents or natives of the constellation Centaurus.  The case difference matters because there no reason why in SF half human, half-horse beasts can't be part of the ecosystem in Centaurus and they would have to be described as Centauric centaurs.  In fantasy fiction, a centauress was a female centaur (a she-centaur) and the term centaurette has also been used; it does not (as the -ette prefix might be thought to imply) mean a “a small centaur”.  Presumably, a centauress, while possessing the secondary sex characteristics of a human female could, anatomically, in the hind quarters either colt, stallion, filly or mare so it could be helpful if authors differentiated centauress & centaurette thus.

Centaurus, copperplate engraving by Polish astronomer Johannes Hevelius (1611–1687) from Firmamentum Sobiescianum sive Uranographia (1687), his atlas of constellations.  In English, the southern constellation of Centaurus has been so described since the 1550 but was known by that name to the Romans and known as a centaur to the Greeks.  The ninth largest constellation, visible in the far southern sky in the months around March, since classical times, it has been confused with Sagittarius.

Judy Volker’s annotation of Sea & Sky’s sky-chart of the Centaurus constellation.

Centaurus is one of two constellations said to represent Centaurs and is associated primarily with Chiron (Cheiron), a wise, immortal being who was King of the Centaurs and said to be a scholar and prophet skilled in the healing arts.  In some of the myths, from his cave on Mount Pelion, he is said to have raised, tutored, or counselled several figures prominent in Greek mythology, including Jason, Heracles and Asclepius.  Of Chiron's association with the constellation, there are several tales.  In one legend, Chiron was the first to identify the constellations and teach them to mortal humans, placing an image of himself in the sky to help guide Jason on his quest for the Golden Fleece.  A different story has Chiron was placed in the sky by Zeus and of this telling there are variants but the most common element is Chiron being accidentally wounded by a poisoned arrow and giving up his immortality as a way to escape the never-ending pain.  A twist on this has Chiron simply bored with life and wanting it to be over and this came to the attention of Prometheus, the Titan undergoing permanent torture for stealing fire from the gods to give to humans.  For Prometheus to be released from his torture, an immortal had to volunteer to renounce eternal life and go to Tartarus in his place.  Someone (Zeus, Heracles, or Chiron himself depending on the author) suggested Chiron's offer be used to release Prometheus and for this Zeus honored Chiron with his place in the sky.  There’s even a tale in which the constellation represents the Centaur Pholus, honoured thus by Zeus for his skill in prophecy.

Lindsay Lohan AI generated as a centaur by EnjoyLingerie on DeviantArt.

In astronomy, a centaur is a small, icy celestial body orbiting the Sun in an in elliptical paths, most tracking between Jupiter and Neptune, the name gained from them typically having the characteristics of both asteroids and comets, the dual-nature the link with the half-human, half-horse from mythology.  Centaurs are considered transitional objects which may originally have been Kuiper Belt Objects and often have unstable orbits due to gravitational interactions with the giant planets.  Orbiting mostly between 5.5-30 AU (an “astronomical unit the average distance between the Earth and Sun (about 150 million km (93 million miles)) from the sun, such is the gravitational effect of the big planets that most centaurs (which range in diameter between 100-400 km (60-250 miles) are expected over millennia to be sent into the inner solar system or even ejected into interstellar space.  Astronomers first became aware of the objects in 1977 with the discovery of Chiron but the technology of the time didn’t permit the structure fully to be understood and the body was thus initially classified both as a comet (95P/Chiron) and minor planet.  It was improvements in observational hardware which demonstrated that while appearing as asteroids, when closer to the sun the comet-like behavior of developing a coma or tail will manifest.  The largest known centaur is 10199/Chariklo.  Listed as a minor planet, it orbits the Sun between Saturn and Uranus and in 2014 it was announced it possessed two rings (nicknamed Oiapoque and Chuí after the rivers that define Brazil's borders), the existence confirmed by observing a stellar occultation.  One implication of the rings is that it likely also has at least one shepherd moon and infrared images indicate the Chariklo is named after the nymph Chariclo (Χαρικλώ), the wife of Chiron and the daughter of Apollo.

Front (left) and rear (right) covers of the album Ride a Rock Horse (1975) by The Who's lead singer Roger Daltrey (b 1944).  The artwork was done by his cousin Graham Hughes who produced a number of album covers during the 1970s.

Things rarely were consistent in the evolution of the myths from Antiquity and the mythical centaurs were described variously as being wholly equine from (human) torso down or with the from parts of the legs also human, the latter a popular depiction during the Medieval period while in Classical era, they had four horses' hooves and two human arms.  Living on raw flesh and inhabiting mountains and forests, they were descended either from Centaurus (the son of Apollo & Stilbe) or of Ixion & Nephele although the Centaurs Chiron and Pholus were of a different descent lineage: Chiron was the son of Philyra & Cronus while Pholus was fathered by Silenus and born of an unnamed Nymph; what distinguished that pair was that unlike the other herds, they were hospitable and non-violent.  The cooking of food being a marker of civilization, it was recorded that when Heracles was hunting the Erymanthian boar, he visited Pholus who received him hospitably, giving him cooked meat whereas Pholus himself ate exclusively raw food.  When Heracles asked for wine, Pholus told him that there was only one jar, which either belonged communally to the Centaurs or had been a gift from Dionysus who had told them to open it only if Heracles should be their guest.  Telling his host not to be afraid, Pholus broke the seal but when the Centaurs smelled the wine they galloped from the mountains, armed with rocks, fir trees and torches to attack the cave.  The first two Centaurs to attack were Anchius and Agrius (killed by Heracles) but Pholus was killed in the aftermath of the fight: while burying a fallen Centaur he drew one of Heracles' poisoned arrows from a wound but it fell from his grasp, piercing his leg and almost instantly he died.  Heracles drove off the remaining Centaurs and pursued them to Cape Malea where they took refuge with Chiron.  In the ensuing battle Heracles shot Elatus in the elbow, but Chiron either dropped one of Heracles' arrows on his foot or was shot in the knee by Heracles.  The wounds of Heracles' arrows could not be healed and the immortal Chiron begged the gods to make him mortal.  It was Prometheus agreed to take on his immortality, and Chiron died, leaving most of the Centaurs to take refuge in Eleusis.  Their mother (Nephele) aided them by summoning a rain storm but that didn’t deter Heracles who slaughtered a dozen including Daphnis, Argeius, Amphion, Hippotion, Oreius, Ispoples, Melanchaetes, Thereus, Doupon, Phrixus & Homadus.

Wedding reception gone bad: Rape of Hippodamia (The Lapiths and the Centaurs) (1636-1637), oil on canvas by Peter Paul Rubens (1577-1640), Museo Nacional del Prado, Madrid, Spain.  The painting was one of a large cycle of mythologies by Rubens for the Torre de la Parada, Philip IV's (1605–1665; King of Spain 1621-1665 and (as Philip III) King of Portugal 1621-1640) newly built hunting lodge on the outskirts of Madrid.  One of Rubens’ oil sketches for the work is on display at Musees Royaux des Beaux-Arts de Belgique in Brussels, Belgium and is of interest to art students and critics because of the detail differences in the final composition.

The Centaurs also fought a legendary battle against the Lapiths (a Thessalian people who originally inhabited Pindus, Pelion and Ossa; they drove out the native people, the Pelasgians).  Pirithous invited the Centaurs (who regarded themselves as his parents) to his wedding feast and it went well until, unaccustomed to the effects of wine, the Centaurs became drunk and one of them tried to rape (in the classical sense of "abduction") Deidamia (Pirithous' bride and more commonly known as Hippodamia), resulting in a violent brawl which ended with the Lapiths driving the Centaurs out of Thessaly after killing many.  Containing so many wonderful subjects (Centaurs, a feast, a rape scene, a brawl), the disrupted wedding reception (which came to be known as “the Centauromachy”) for centuries drew artists to the theme.  In Antiquity the Centaurs got a bad press because and they appear in other appear in other legends involving rape, abductions and violence.  In many ways the myths can be deconstructed as violent soap operas with an undercurrent of licentiousness, typified by the tales of Eurytion attempting to rape Hippolyta or Mnesimache, the daughter of Dexamenus.  In one version Dexamenus had betrothed his daughter to Azan (an Arcadian) and Eurytion (again as a guest at the wedding feast) attempted a kidnapping but was saved by the hero Heracles arrived in time to kill him, returning bride safely to groom.  Most scribes were member of the Heracles admiration society and there also the story of how Heracles, on his way to Augias, seduced the girl, promising to marry her upon his return.  While he was away, forcibly she was betrothed to Eurytion but just as the wedding ceremony was about to begin, Heracles stormed in, killed the Centaur and had himself declared her husband.

1976 Chrysler Centura GL.  Despite the visual resemblance, the (optional) styled steel wheels were unrelated to those used on Oldsmobiles between 1966-1987.

Whatever processes led to Chrysler Australia adopting the name “Centura” for their local version of the European Chrysler 180 (1970-1982) may still exist in the corporation’s archives but it seems the details have never been published though it can be assumed it was not an Anglicized adaptation of the Romanian centură (belt, girdle).  In Latin centum meant "one hundred" and the term centuria referred to (1) a unit of the Roman army, nominally consisting of 100 soldiers (historians suggest in practice the establishments varied between 60-160) and headed by a centurion, (2) in real estate a unit of area, equal to 100 heredia or 200 iugera (circa 125 acres (50  hectares)), (3) a group of citizens eligible to vote, the system apparently one of the reforms introduced by Servius Tullius (king of Rome 578-535 BC) and based on the ownership of land, one of the many systems which, over millennia, have codified a relationship between ownership of property (usually land) with a right to in some way participate in the polity (usually by voting) and (4) figuratively or literally, things in some way related to "100".  In modern Romance languages, things of course evolved: the Romanian centura (belt or girdle) was from the French ceinture (belt), from the Latin cinctura (girdle, belt), thus by extension used also to refer to the to beltways (ring roads) around cities.  In Spanish & Portuguese, the related cintura (waist; belt) is from the same Latin root cingere (to gird; surround).

The name of the short-lived Chrysler Centura (1975-1978) may have been an allusion to the Centaurs of myth because, like them it had a dual nature, combining the platform of a European four-cylinder with a much more powerful (and heavier) Australian built six.  That had been a concept Holden (the General Motors (GM) outpost) in 1969 introduced when they installed their six-cylinder engine in a modified Vauxhall Viva and called it the Torana.  It proved a great success and Ford Australia in 1972 responded by fitting it’s even bigger sixes to the Cortina which, being longer than the Viva, didn’t need the four inch (100 mm) odd stretch of the wheelbase required for things (tightly) to fit in the Torana.  Given the way local journalists would within a few years decry the inherently unbalanced Cortina six, it is remarkable how well the press received it upon debut.

1975 Chrysler Centura brochure shot (GL left; XL right).

Had the Centura been released in 1973 as planned, it might have been a success but the timing was unfortunate, the decision by the French government of Georges Pompidou (1911–1974; President of France 1969-1974) to conduct tests of nuclear weapons in its South Pacific territories causing the trade unions to blacklist French goods arriving in ports (Australian trade unions in those days running an independent foreign policy and the ACTU (Australian Council of Trade Unions) a kind of co-government).  As a consequence, it wasn’t until 1975 the Centura arrived in showrooms and by then the market had moved on, competition rather more intense.  Although the Centura offered class-leading performance (indeed, in a straight line it could out-run some V8s) by virtue of its optional 4.0 litre (245 cubic inch) straight-six, increasingly buyers were more tempted by the equipment levels and perceptions (sometimes true) of superior build quality and economy of operation offered by vehicles with origins in the Far East.  As it was, Chrysler in 1976 began local production of the Japanese Mitsubishi Sigma and it proved a great success, even without the six cylinder engine once thought such a selling point.  Tellingly, although a prototype Centura with the 5.2 litre (318 cubic inch) V8 was built, the project rapidly was abandoned.  Officially, the explanation was the body structure lacked the rigidity to come with the additional torque, the same reason Ford never contemplated their V8 Cortina entering production; engineers familiar with the structures of both platforms agree that was true of the Cortina but maintain the Centura was robust enough and suspect both companies, having observed the subdued demand for the V8 Holden Toranas (1974-1978) decided Holden was welcome to its exclusive presence in the niche sector.  Fewer than 20,000 Centuras were built during its dismal three year run, a fraction of what was projected as its annual production.

Stormy Daniels (2019) by Robert Crumb (b 1943).

It’s not known if than Donald Trump (b 1946; US president 2017-2021 & since 2025) is a student of Greek mythology (stranger things have happened) but he did provide us with his unique version of the half horse, half human beast, labeling pornographic actress & director Stormy Daniels (Stephanie Gregory Clifford; b 1979) “horse face”.  In May, 2024, the memorable phrase returned to the news as matters came before court related to “hush money” allegedly paid to Ms Daniels (on behalf the of the President) in exchange for her maintaining a silence about a certain “intimate encounter” they had shared, their apparently brief tryst including her spanking him on the butt with a rolled-up magazine featuring his picture on the cover.  Mr Trump denies not only the spanking but the very encounter, claiming it never happened.  To give a flavor of the proceedings, at one point counsel asked Ms Daniels: “Am I correct in that you hate President Trump?” to which she replied: “Yes.”  No ambiguity there and although not discussed in court, her attitude may not wholly be unrelated to Mr Trump’s rather ungracious description of her as “horse face”.  Really, President Trump should have been more respectful towards a three-time winner of F.A.M.E.'s (Fans of Adult Media and Entertainment) much coveted annual “Favorite Breasts” award.

Death of a Centaur (1912), oil on canvas by Arthur Lemon (1850–1912).  For Lemon, the Centaur was what would now be called his "spirit animal" and the work was painted when he was close to death. 

Born on the Isle of Mann, Arthur Lemon spent his childhood in Rome before moving to California to work as a cowboy; there he became a devotee of what he would call en plain air (by which he meant “an outdoor life”.  Later he would return to Europe to study art and for the rest of his life he would travel between Italy and England where regularly he staged exhibitions at London's Royal Academy; his work most associated with scenes of the Italian countryside and the daily lives of the rural peasantry.  Lemon's fine eye for painting a Centaur was a thing of practice.  He became close friends with English artist Henry Scott Tuke (1858–1929), noted for his prolific output of works in the Impressionist tradition focused on nude adolescent boys and during the 1880s the pair for a time lived Florence where they “spent time sketching male nudes in the Italian sunshine.”

The Wooing of Daphnis (exhibited 1881), oil on canvas by Arthur Lemon.

Daphnis possessed the youthful beauty of the kind idealized by Tuke and the many nymphs who so adored him.  A victim of that beauty, his life ended badly.  The artistic approach of Lemon and Tuke was interesting in that their nude youths often were shown in a contemporary setting and in that they differed from the many paintings and sculptures of Ancient Greek gods and mythological which, historically, enabled an exploration of the male nude without upsetting public decency; what Lemon and Tuke especially did was eroticise their young subjects.  From his time as a cowboy, Lemon was well acquainted with the physicality of the horse and knew from his studies that in Greek art Centaurs often were depicted as highly sexed figures; being not wholly human, Centaurs could be treated as creatures able to ignore the strict moral expectations of society and accordingly, formed their own community.  Lemon and Tuke in their own ways noted this and both took the Centaur as something of a model although while Lemon devoted much of his energy to painting horses, Tuke’s attention on the nude male youth was an obsession and today, among sections of the gay community, he’s a minor cult.