Flachkühler

Flachkühler (pronounced flak-koo-ler)

In German, (literally "wide cooling device" (radiator)), a name adopted by Daimler-Benz to describe the W111 Mercedes-Benz coupés and cabriolets built (1969-1971) with a lower, wider radiator grill than the earlier W111 (and W112) coupés and cabriolets (1961-1969).

Circa 1860s: The construct was Flach + kühler.  The adjective flach (the singular flacher, the comparative flacher and the superlative flachsten) (shallow (wide and not deep)) was from the Middle High German vlach, from the Old High German flah, from the Proto-Germanic flakaz of uncertain origin.  The construct of the noun Kühler ((1) cooler (anything device which cools) or (2) radiator (of an ICE (internal combustion engine)) was kühlen +‎ -er.  Kühlen was from the Middle High German küelen, from the Old High German kuolōn & chuolen, from the Proto-Germanic kōlōną & kōlēną and related to kalaną (to be cold).  It was cognate with the Hunsrik kiele, the Luxembourgish killen, the Dutch koelen, the Saterland Frisian köile, the English cool (verb) and the Swedish kyla.  The German suffix -er (used to forms agent nouns etc from verbs (suffixed to the verb stem)) was from the Middle High German -ære & -er, from the Old High German -āri, from the Proto-West Germanic -ārī, from the Proto-Germanic -ārijaz, from the Latin -ārius.  When used as an adjective, kühler was a comparative degree of kühl ((1) cool (of temperature), (2) calm, restrained, passionless and (3) cool, frigid (particularly of the emotions)), from the Middle High German küele, from the Old High German kuoli, from the Proto-West Germanic kōl & kōlī, from the Proto-Germanic kōluz & kōlaz, from the primitive Indo-European gel-.  It was cognate with the Dutch koel and the English cool.  Flachkühler is a noun; the noun plural is Flachkühlers.

1966 Mercedes-Benz 300 SE (W112, 1962-1967) Cabriolet (Hōchkühler).

The dimensions of the grill used on the Mercedes-Benz W111 coupé & cabriolet were dictated by the height of the 3.0 litre (183 cubic inch) straight six (M189; 1957-1967) engine used in the more exclusive W112 (300 SE) versions.  The M189 was one of several de-tuned variants of the M198 used in the 300SL Gullwing & roadster (W198; 1954-1963) which had started life as the M186 in the big 300 (W186 & W189, “Adenauer” 1950-1963, (the nickname referencing Konrad Adenauer (1876–1967; chancellor of the FRG (Bundesrepublik Deutschland (Federal Republic of Germany; the old West Germany) 1949-1990) 1949-1963) before revealing its competition potential by gaining victories at the Nürburgring, the Carrera Panamericana in Mexico and, most famously, the Le Mans 24 Hours endurance classic.  In the sports cars, the long-stroke six had been installed at an angle of 50^o and fitted with a dry sump which permitted a low hood (bonnet) line but in the W111 & W112 the unit was mounted in a conventional perpendicular arrangement and used a wet sump, further adding to the height, thus the relatively tall grill.  The smaller sixes used in the car (2.2 litre (M127); 2.5 (M129) & 2.8 (M130)) were of a more modern, short-stroke design and didn’t demand such a capacious engine bay but production line rationalization meant maintaining two different sets of coachwork for what were low volume models was not viable.

1971 Mercedes-Benz 280 SE 3.5 Coupé (Flachkühler).

By the mid 1960s however, Mercedes-Benz was well aware the gusty, high-revving sixes with which the brand’s reputation had in the post-war years been re-built were technologically bankrupt for an attempt to compete in the vital US market where, for more than a decade, Detroit had been building the world’s finest engine-transmission combinations.  What was needed was a mass-market V8 and because the big-block 6.3 litre V8 (M100 (1963-1981), introduced in 1963 in the 600 Grosser (W100)) wasn’t suitable for down-sizing, two physically smaller V8 ranges were developed, the first of which was designated M116; released in 1969 and in displacements of 3.5, 3.8 & 4.2 litres, it would serve the line until 1991 (confusingly, there were two iterations of the 3.8, the bore/stroke relationship altered for markets with lower speed limits and more onerous emission regulations).  The 3.5 came first and in 1969 it debuted in the W111 coupé & cabriolet, designated 280 SE 3.5.  By then, the old 3.0 litre six had been discontinued so the tall grill, which had come to look rather baroque, was no longer required and shortly after production commenced, the factory took the opportunity to modernize things with the new, lower & wider grill coming to be known as the Flachkühler (literally “flat cooler” and best translated as “flat radiator grill”, the engineers deciding the earlier design should be referred to as the Hōchkühler (high radiator).  Hōch (high, tall; great; immense; grand; of great importance) was from the Middle High German hōch, from the Old High German hōh, from the Proto-West Germanic hauh, from the Proto-Germanic hauhaz, from the primitive Indo-European kewk-, a suffixed form of kew-; it may be compared to the Dutch hoog, the English high and the Swedish hög.

1955 Chrysler C-300 (top left and dubbed retrospectively the 300A), 1970 Mercedes-Benz 280 SE 3.5 Coupé (Flachkühler, top right), Rover 3.5 Coupé (bottom left) and Rover 3.5 Saloon (bottom right).

Although it's the 280 SE 3.5 Cabriolets which now command the highest price, what they miss is the coupe's lovely roofline, a style the factory reprised for the C215 coupés (1998-2006) but in fairness to Chrysler's stylists, the look was borrowed from them.  For a brief, shining moment in 1955-1956, Chrysler offered their elegant “Forward Look”, the flirtation with restraint not lasting long as "irrational exuberance" washed over Detroit's studios but the influence endured longer in Europe, both the Mercedes-Benz W111 & W112 Coupés and the Rover P5 (1958-1967) & P5B (1967-1973) interpreting the shape.  The Rover was a tale of two rooflines: the “Establishment” Saloon and the rakish Coupé, the latter the sort of thing described in barristers' slang as a "co-respondent's car" (ie the type driven by the sort of chap inclined to sleep with other men's wives and thus be cited in divorce proceedings while the man with the unfaithful wife would have driven a 3.5 Saloon).  For those doubting the relatively modest Rover 3.5 saloon's credentials as a “car of the establishment”, for decades UK prime ministers were chauffeured in one and Elizabeth II (1926-2022; Queen of the UK and other places, 1952-2022) had several, using one until 1987.  

1970 280 SE 3.5 Coupé.  The lovely roofline was a highlight and it's a design best left unadulterated although many haven't been able to resist adding reproductions (usually in anodized plastic) of the chrome wheel arch trim fitted only to the W112.

Testing a 280 SE 3.5 Coupé in 1970, the US magazine Road & Track greeted the revised model with much the same feeling the press would a year later display when Jaguar’s new V12 made its debut in the Series 3 (1971-1974) E-Type (XKE, 1961-1974), writing of the German car: “The vintage coupe gets a lovely new engine”.  The testers came away most impressed with the new power-train, the sheer quality of the build and the performance, the ability to achieve 125 mph (200 km/h) and cruise at high speed for hours not of great relevance in most of the US but anyway something to note of a large and heavy machine of (by US standards) relatively small displacement.  Criticisms were limited mostly to the air-conditioning (it took European manufacturers decades to match what Detroit perfected early in the 1960s) and the swing-axle rear suspension (admittedly a state-of-the-art implementation but still antiquated).  In a sign of the times, the fuel consumption of 15.8 mpg (18.9 mpg calculated in imperial gallons) was deemed “impressive” but that needs to be assessed in the context of the performance and what other cars in the era achieved.  What Road & Track didn’t foresee what was to come for the things as used cars.  Noting the hefty premium charged for the two-door coachwork and that the V8 was also available in the four-door 300 SEL 3.5 (W109), the editors commented: “We wouldn’t give you two cents extra for that hardtop [coupé] body (or the even more expensive convertible [cabriolet] but right now you have to take either that or the also expensive air-suspension on the 4-door sedan to get the V8 engine.  And that is nice.”  By the mid 2020s, all else being equal, the 3.5 coupé sells for 4-5 times what’s achieved by the sedans, the cabriolet at least ten-fold more valuable but in 1970, who would have predicted that?

1970 Mercedes-Benz 280 SE 3.5 Cabriolet (Flachkühler, left) and 1968 Mercedes-Benz 280 SE Cabriolet (Hōchkühler, right).

Produced only between 1969-1971, the two-door 280 SE 3.5s were always expensive and only 3,270 coupés and 1,232 cabriolets were built.  On the US West Coast, in 1970 a 3.5 Cabriolet listed at more than US$13,500 and that was at a time when a Cadillac De Ville Convertible had a base price of US$6,068 (although buyers typically would tick a few boxes on the option list so usually paid around US$7,000; a 1970 Coupe de Ville two-door hardtop listed at US$5,884).  Of course, the Cadillacs included a 472 cubic inch (7.7 litre) V8 and in terms of “dollars per pound” they offered a lot more metal for the money but the customer profile probably then not often overlapped (that would change).  Being another age, the Mercedes-Benz was available with a four-speed manual gearbox (an option Cadillac withdrew after 1953) which was a rather clunky thing which few choose but such is the rarity, they have a following.  The whole ecosystem of 280 SE 3.5 coupés and cabriolets actually became a cult in itself, perfectly restored cabriolets commanding prices in excess of US$500,000 and some German tuning houses will charge more for examples modernized with attributes like ABS (anti-lock brakes and literally "anti-bloc-system"), later V8 engines, transmissions and suspension.  Even now, although in essence the structure dates from the late 1950s and the mechanicals a decade later, the appeal remains because the things are remarkably usable in modern conditions and aesthetically, nothing Mercedes-Benz has made since has anything like the elegance but then, nor have many.   

1953 Morgan Plus 4 ("flat radiator", top left), 1955 Morgan Plus 4 (top right), 1969 Morgan Plus 8 (bottom left) and 2024 Morgan Plus 6 (bottom right).  Thematically, since 1954 not much has changed although, under the skin, there is much is the modern Morgan that is "most modern".

Strangely, the idea of the “flat radiator” had been around for a while in the vernacular of collector car circles but it referred to another aspect of geometry.  In 1952, Morgan of Malvern Link, Worcestershire, was (as it is now sort of still is) an English cottage industry manufacturing pre-war sports cars with more modern engines and they received advice from Lucas that because MG’s new TF (due for release in 1953) would have its headlamps integrated with the bodywork, production of the housing assemblies was ending.  There being no alternative supplier, Morgan were compelled to follow MG’s lead and restyle things so the headlamps were faired in.  Concurrent with unwelcomed change, Morgan the opportunity to effect one of their rare styling changes, abandoning the long-establish upright radiator grill for one mounted in a cowl that blended into the hood (bonnet).  It wasn’t exactly the onset of modernity but there presumably was some aerodynamic gain and just to assure buyers change wasn’t being made for the sake of change, disc brakes would have to wait another few years.  The change to the grill was made in 1953 although, because of the way Morgan operated, some of the older style cars were actually assembled later than the new.  The cars with the traditional Morgan look which features the upright grill are known among aficionados as the “flat radiator Morgans” (definitely not “FlatRads” as has appeared on-line).  In a quirk of industry economics, when the 1961 Imperial range was released, Chrysler began manufacturing its own old-style “freestanding” headlamp nacelles, four of which were mounted on short stalks within deeply scalloped front fenders, a motif (vaguely) recalling what was done in the 1930s.  That the designer dubbed “neo-classical” which may have been a bit of a leap from the term's origin in revivalist architecture.  Imperial retained the look for three seasons although the tailfins were pruned for 1962 after in their final year setting the mark for verticality, peaking at their highest point just a fraction of an inch higher than the famous “twin bullet” installations on the 1959 Cadillac.

Impromptu Flachkühler.

In October 2005, Lindsay Lohan went for a drive in her Mercedes-Benz SL 65 AMG roadster.  It didn’t end well, a low-speed unpleasantness with a van resulting in her roadster suffering a Flachkühler.  Based on the R230 (2001-2011) platform, the SL 65 AMG was produced between 2004-2012, all versions rated in excess of 600 horsepower, something perhaps not a wise choice for someone with no background handling such machinery though it could have been worse, the factory building 400 (175 for the US market, 225 for the RoW (rest of the world)) of the even more powerful SL 65 Black Series, the third occasion an SL was offered without a soft-top and the second time one had been configured with a permanent fixed-roof.  A production number of 350 is sometimes quoted but those maintaining registers insist it was 400.  Ms Lohan's SL 65 was later repaired and sold so all's well that ends well.

Rosemarie Nitribitt and Joe the poodle, with 190 SL, going to or coming from work.

The best-known owner of a Mercedes-Benz 190 SL (W121; 1955-1962) was Fraulein Rosemarie Nitribitt (1933-1957) who, by 1957, was Frankfurt’s most illustrious (and reputedly most expensive) prostitute, a profession to which she seems to have been drawn by necessity but at which she proved more than proficient and, as the reports of the time attest, there was nothing furtive in the way she plied her trade.  Something of a celebrity in Frankfurt (the republic's financial centre), her black roadster became so associated with her business model that the 190 SL was by some referred to as the “Nitribitt-Mercedes” (and, less charitably, the Hurentaxi (whore's cab)), her car seen frequently, if briefly, parked in the forecourts of the city’s better hotels.  The lives of prostitutes, even the more highly priced, can descend to their conclusion along a Hobbesian path and in 1957, aged 24, she was murdered in her smart apartment, strangled with a silk stocking, the body not found for several days.  Given Fraulein Nitribitt operated at the upper end of the market, her clients tended variously to be rich, famous & powerful and that attracted the raft of inevitable conspiracy theories there had been a cover-up to protect their interests, a rather botched police investigation encouraging such rumors.  The murder remains unsolved.

Frankfurt police officers examining Helga Matura's 220 SE cabriolet (Hōchkühler).  Note the jackboots.

In a coincidence of circumstances and geography, a decade later, Fraulein Helga Sofie Matura (1933-1966) was another high-end prostitute murdered in Frankfurt, the weapon this time a stiletto (the stylish shoe rather than the slender blade).  Never subject to the same rumors the Nitribtt case attracted, it too remains unsolved.  In another coincidence, Fraulein Matura’s car was a convertible Mercedes, a white 220 SE Cabriolet (W111, Hōchkühler).  Despite the connection, the W111 never picked up any prurient nicknames and there was no reputational damage but claims Fraulein Nitribitt's murder contributed to 190 SL sales suffering appear over-stated.  The W121's first year of full-production was 1956 with second-season drop-offs in sales not unknown and while at least in Germany, the association with the dead courtesan may have been off-putting for the bourgeoise, without qualitative data, one really can’t say.  There was a precipitous decline in 190 SL sales in 1958 but that was the year of the worst US recession of the post-war years (1945-1973) and it was in the US most of the drop was booked; on both sides of the Atlantic, sales anyway quickly recovered.

Corduroy

Corduroy (pronounced kawr-duh-roi)

(1) A cotton-filling pile fabric with lengthwise cords or ridges.

(2) In the plural as corduroys (or cords), trousers made from this fabric.

(3) Of, relating to, or resembling corduroy.

(4) A method of building an improvised road or causeway, constructed with logs laid together transversely (used by military forces, those operating in swampy ground areas etc); the result was described originally as “ribbed velvet” and when intended for sustained use, earth was thrown into the gaps and compacted, thus rendering a relatively smooth, stable surface.

(5) To form such a “road” by arranging logs transversely.

(6) In ski-run maintenance, a pattern on snow resulting from the use of a snow groomer to pack snow and improve skiing, snowboarding and snowmobile trail conditions (corduroy thought a good surface for skiing).

(7) In Irish slang, cheap, poor-quality whiskey (based on the idea on the fabric corduroy not being “smooth”).

1776: Of uncertain origin.  There’s no consensus among etymologists but the most support seems to be for the construct being cord +‎ duroy (one of a number of lightweight, worsted fabrics once widely produced and known collectively as “West of England Cloth”).  Cord (A long, thin, flexible length of twisted yarns (strands) of fiber) was from the late thirteenth century Middle English corde (a string or small rope composed of several strands twisted or woven together; bowstring, hangman's rope), from the Old French corde (rope, string, twist, cord), from the Latin chorda (string of a musical instrument, cat-gut), from the Doric Ancient Greek χορδά (khordá) (string of gut, the string of a lyre) and may be compared with the Ionic χορδή (khordḗ), from the primitive Indo-European ghere- (bowel; intestine).  The adjective cordless (of electrical devices or appliances working without a cord (ie powered by a battery) dates from 1905 and was augmented later by “wireless” which described radios so configured.  Cordless is still a useful word now that the meaning of “wireless” in the context of computing has become dominant.  The curious use of cord as “a unit of measurement for firewood, equal to 128 cubic feet (4 × 4 × 8 feet), composed of logs and/or split logs four feet long and none over eight inches diameter (and usually seen as a stack 4 feet high by 8 feet long)” dates from the 1610s and was so-called because it was measured with a cord of rope marked with the appropriate measures.

Lindsay Lohan as fashion influencer: In burnt red corduroy pants & nude platform pumps, Los Angeles, December 2011 (left) and leaving Phillippe Restaurant after dinner with Woody Allen (b 1935), New York, May 2012 (right).  It's said that before he met Lindsay Lohan, the film director had never worn corduroy trousers and he still prefers brown, seemingly unable to escape the 1970s when he was perhaps at his happiest.

Until well into the twentieth century, the old folk etymology was still being published which held the word was from the French corde du roi (cloth of the king”), which seems never to have be used in France, the correct term for “cloth of the king” being velours côtelé.  It’s not impossible there’s some link with cordesoy, from the French corde de soie (“rope of silk” or “silk-like fabric”) because that form is documented in an advertisement for clothing fabrics dating from 1756.  The spelling corderoy appears in commercial use in 1772 but the modern “corduroy” became the standard form in the 1780s.  The origin of duroy is obscure and the earliest known use (in print) of the word appeared in the early seventeenth century; it may be from the French du roi (of the king), a 1790 trade publication in France including the term duroi (a woolen fabric similar to tammy).  So, although the case for cord +‎ duroy seems compelling, etymologists note (1) duroy was fashioned from wool while corduroy was made with cotton and there’s no other history of the two words being associated, (2) grammatically, the compound should have been duroy-cord and (3) this does not account for the earlier corderoy.

None of that of course means cord +‎ duroy was not the source and many English words have been formed in murky ways.  There’s also the possibility of some link with the English surname Corderoy (although there is no evidence of a connection); the name was also spelt Corderey & Cordurey, the origin lying in the nickname for “a proud person” (of French origin, it meant “king’s heart”).  Some are more convinced by a suggestion made in 1910 by the English philologist Ernest Weekley (1865-1954) who speculated corduroy began life as folk-etymology for the trade-term common in the sixteenth century: colour de roy, from the French couleur de roi (king’s colour) which originally was a reference to both a cloth in the rich purple associated with the French kings and the color itself. Later, it came to signify a bright tawny colour and a cloth of this hue.  Corduroy as an adjective came into use after 1789 and the use to describe roads or causeways improvised by means of with logs laid together transversely (usually to provide wheeled vehicles passage over swampy ground) dates from the 1780s.  Corduroy is a noun, verb & adjective, corduroying & corduroyed are verbs and corduroylike is an adjective; the noun plural is corduroys.

1975 Mercedes-Benz 450 SEL 6.9 (V116, 1975-1980) trimmed in classic 1970s brown corduroy.

The top-of-the-range variant of the W116 (1972-1980 and the first formerly to be styled "S-class"), the 6.9 had been slated for release in 1974 but introduction was delayed a year because of the first "oil crisis".  It used a version of the 600's (W100, 1963-1981) M100 V8, enlarged from the 6.3 litre (386 cubic inch) unit used in the 300 SEL 6.3 (1967-1972) to 6.8 (417).  Unfortunately, uncertainty over the future of the oil supply (and the consequent effect on the world economy) meant the 7.4 litre (452 cubic inch) version of the V8 never left the drawing board.  Very few 6.9 sold outside of Europe were trimmed in cloth, leather almost universal in most markets.  

By the 1960s most Mercedes-Benz were being trimmed in their famously durable MB-Tex, a robust vinyl which was not only easy to maintain but closely resembled leather, lacking only the aroma (and third-party manufacturers soon made available aerosols for those who found the olfactory appeal too much to forgo).  However, leather and velour (of mohair in the most exclusive lines) were either standard or optional on more expensive models and when exported to first-world markets beyond Europe (such as North America or Australia), MB-Tex or leather was standard and the fabrics were available only by special order.  A notable exception was the Japanese market where buyers disliked the way their prized “car doilies” slid of the hide; they always preferred cloth.  The velour was certainly better suited to harsh northern European winters and testers would often comment on how invitingly comfortable were the seats trimmed in the fabric.  To add to the durability, the surfaces subject to the highest wear (ie those at the edges on which there was the most lateral movement during ingress and egress) used a corduroy finish (the centre panels also trimmed thus, just for symmetry).

A just completed corduroy road constructed by the Wehrmacht’s (German military, 1935-1945) Pioniertruppen (Pioneer troops, who performed similar duties to sappers or combat engineers in other armies), the photograph said to have been taken in 1942 in the Eastern Front’s Volkhov sector during the Continuation War (1941-1944 and known also as the Second Soviet–Finnish War).  Although labour-intensive, the attraction of the corduroy road was if the logs were conveniently to hand and manpower was available, functional roads could be built more quickly than any other method.  On the Eastern Front, the Wehrmacht usually had ready access to forests and prisoners who could be used as forced-labour so many corduroy roads were built and their need was anticipated by some of the staff who planned the invasion of Russia, well away two of the greatest threats they would face would be "Major Mud" and "General Winter".  Unfortunately for them, Adolf Hitler (1889-1945; Führer (leader) and German head of government 1933-1945 & head of state 1934-1945) envisaged the campaign being successfully concluded before the winter of 1941-1942 and the German forces were equipped neither for the cold nor the impassable conditions. 

The corduroy road (a more recent name for the “log road” or “log track”) gained its name from the appearance; the logs arrayed in the perpendicular, thereby, when viewed at a distance, resembling the fabric.  Because in concept a corduroy road is essentially a deck or floor writ large, on a small (certainly domestic) scale such things doubtless existed thousands of years ago but in the sense of “major thoroughfares”, excavations suggest they’ve been in use since at least the eleventh century although it seems clear some were constructed atop existing pathways, presumably at times when the weather conditions rendered the surface impassable.  Timber of course can rot but certain types were very long-lasting and in some soils (especially the more acidic) the logs could retain their integrity for decades and, in the pre-motorized era, they were not subject to the heavy loads or high speeds which would come in the twentieth century.  For obvious reasons, many corduroy roads were constructed during wartime by military engineers and the term “corduroy road” is also used in slang to refer to a rutted-road in a poor state of repair.

Rook

Rook (pronounced rook)

(1) A large Eurasian passerine bird, Corvus frugilegus, with a black plumage and a whitish base to its bill from the family Corvidae (crows) and noted for its gregarious habits.

(2) In slang, a swindler, someone who cheats at cards, dice etc; a deceiver or fraudster.

(3) In slang, someone who betrays (now rare).

(4) In slang, a bad deal; rip off.

(5) In historic English slang, a parson, vicar, priest etc (based on the traditional black cassock clerics wore).  A variant with a similar origin was Adolf Hitler's (1889-1945; Führer (leader) and German head of government 1933-1945 & head of state 1934-1945) disparaging German Roman Catholic clergymen as “diese schwarzen Krähen” (those black crows). 

(6) In chess, one of four pieces (two of each color) that may be moved any number of unobstructed squares horizontally or vertically; also called castle.  Rooks start the game on the four corners of the board.

(7) As chess rook, in Canadian heraldry, the cadency mark of a fifth daughter.

(8) In cards, a trick-taking game, played usually with a specialized deck. 

(9) As rookie, a type of firecracker used by farmers in the UK to scare birds (including, but not restricted to, rooks).

(10) To cheat, fleece or swindle.

Pre 900: From the Middle English rok & roke, from the Old English hrōc, from the Proto-West Germanic hrōk, from the Proto-Germanic hrōkaz.  In other languages there was the Old Norse hrókr, the Saterland Frisian Rouk, the Middle Swedish roka, the Old High German hruoh (crow), the Middle Dutch roec and Dutch roek (and the obsolete German Ruch, from the primitive Indo-European kerk- (crow, raven).  Related avian forms included the Old Irish cerc (hen), the Old Prussian kerko (loon, diver), the dialectal Bulgarian кро́кон (krókon) (raven), the Ancient Greek κόραξ (kórax) (crow), the Old Armenian ագռաւ (agṙaw), the Avestan kahrkatat (rooster), the Sanskrit कृकर (kṛkara) and the Ukrainian крук (kruk) (raven). The Old French was roc, from the Spanish rocho & ruc, from the Arabic رُخّ‎ (ruḵḵ), from the Persian رخ‎ (rox).  Use as the bird’s name was possibly imitative of its raucous voice, an etymology hinted at by other languages (the Gaelic roc (as in "croak") and the Sanskrit kruc (as in "to cry out")).  Rook & rooking are nouns & verbs, rookery, rooker & rooklet are nouns, rooked is a verb, rookish, rooless, rooklike & rooky are adjectives, rookie is a noun, verb & adjective and rookwise is an adjective & adverb; the noun plural is rooks.

Chess pieces.

Rook was applied as a disparaging term for persons since at least the early sixteenth century, extended by the 1570s to mean "a cheat", especially at cards or dice, this probably associated with the thieving habits of the rook, a habit it shares with other acquisitive corvine birds like the crow and magpie.  The adverb rookwise can be applied to anyone or anything said to be moving exclusively in “a cardinal direction” (ie toward any of the four principal points of the compass: north, south, east and west), as a rook moves on a chessboard.  In use, it’s applied usually to mean “in the perpendicular or horizontal” (as opposed to a curve, diagonal or other angle) though not of necessity to true north, south, east or west.  The companion term is bishopwise (moving exclusively in diagonals, as a bishop moves on a chessboard).  A rooker is a person who cheats or swindles but the victim is not described as a “rookee”; other terms are applied to these unfortunates.  Rookie means (1) someone new to some activity (much used thus in sport), (2) an inexperienced recruit (much used thus in the military & law enforcement) and (3) a firecracker used in the UK to scare birds away from crops) but it’s only the use in agriculture which is related to the bird. Rookie may have been some sort of phonetic derivative for “recruit” or may be from either (1) the Dutch broekie (short for broekvent (a boy still so young as to be in short trousers)) which was a common a common term for “a shipmate” or (2) the Irish rúca (an inexperienced person).

Rendered by Vovsoft as cartoon character: a young Lindsay Lohan moves her rook.

Chess arrived in Russia perhaps as early as the ninth century, the path via the Islamic world from India and soon it was being played in much of Europe.  The rook gained its name from the chaturanga, the piece used in Indian chess and represented by a रथ (ratha) (a war chariot); when the game was adopted by the Persians, ratha became رخ (rukh) (chariot), the term retained by the Arabic-speaking world and in this form it reached Europe.  It was adapted in the Italian as rocco and in the Old French as roc or roche, the later influencing English when eventually it evolved into rook (although in Middle English the name of the chess piece was sometimes confused with the roc (the enormous mythical bird in Eastern legend).  The name thus changed little between languages and nor did the strategic role of the piece vary: chariot-like fast, powerful charges in straight lines.

Gilt metal chess set in gold, sterling silver, enamel, amethyst & pearl, made by Viennese artisans of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, circa 1898.

The use of “castle” as the informal name for the rook was an unintended consequence of the operation of phonetic similarity in the sub-set of the population practicing an oral culture.  Apparently in southern Italy, some rural folk interpreted rukh as the Italian rocca (fortress or rock) and this led to a new visual representation: the rook as a castle tower or siege tower, the position in the corner of the board reflecting its defensive strength.  This quickly became the standard shape in European chess pieces and historians of the game have speculated that because carving a plausible “castle turret” from a small base of wood, stone or metal would have been quicker and easier (and this cheaper) than a “chariot”, the economics of production may also have been persuasive.  It was European folk etymology that created “castle” as the alternative and it has survived to become (depending on one’s view), informal, incorrect or old-fashioned and has been cited as a class-identifier (a la Knave vs Jack in playing cards): In Noblesse Oblige: An Enquiry Into the Identifiable Characteristics of the English Aristocracy (1956) Nancy Mitford (1904–1973) didn’t list the chess pieces but had she bothered the rook would have been the “U” word and castle the “non-U”.   Curiously, even among those who insist the piece is a rook, use persists in the move “castling” in which the rook and king can switch positions along the “base-line” (ie rows 1 & 8).  Chess purists insist this is the only permissible use of “castle” but seem resigned to the “mistake’s” regrettable survival.

Camembert & Brie

Camembert (pronounced kam-uhm-bair or ka-mahn-ber (French))

(1) A village in the Normandy region of France.

(2) A mellow, soft cheese, the centre of which is creamy and of a golden cream color, made from cow's milk.

1867 (the cheese): The cheese is named after Camembert, the village near Argentan, Normandy where it originated.  The village name was from the Medieval Latin Maimberti (field of Maimbert), a West Germanic personal name derived from the Proto-Germanic maginą (strength, power, might) and the Proto-Germanic berhtaz (bright).  A rich, sweet, yellowish cream-cheese with the name Camembert was first sold in 1867, but the familiar, modern form of the cheese dates from 1791.  Camembert is a masculine form; there is no plural.

Camembert labels from the Serge Schéhadé collection.

A tyrosemiophile is one for whom collecting the colorful (usually round) labels affixed to wooden boxes of Camembert cheese wheels is (depending on where they sit on the spectrum) variously a hobby, calling or obsession.  The practice is called tyrosemiophilia (the construct being the Ancient Greek tyro (cheese) + semio (sign; label) + philos (love) and while there appears to be no documented use of tyrosemiophobia (morbid dread or aversion to Camembert cheese labels), there’s no reason why someone who suffered some disturbing experience with a wheel of Camembert wouldn’t become a tyrosemiophobe.  Collecting objects with a high degree of structural similarity (Camembert cheese labels, beer bottle tops etc) has much appeal for some and in cultural studies is classed as “connoisseurial collecting”, described as a collecting focused on variations within a narrow type (which can be structural, thematic chronologic etc but tends to exclude much within the field collected by those casting a wider net).  The hobby (or whatever) falls under the rubric of “typological accumulation” in which objects are exemplars of a “type” and while each is to some degree different, their attraction lies in the similarity, something like Karl Marx’s (1818-1883) exasperated description of peasants as “…like a sack of potatoes, all the same, yet all different”.

Camembert labels from the Serge Schéhadé collection.

Whether such things especially draw “obsessional collectors” doesn’t seem to have been studied but the characteristics of the stuff (Camembert cheese labels a classic example): (1) structurally similar objects, (2) tiny differences (colors, typography etc) and (3) adaptability to being stored or displayed in a precise, geometrical form may hint at the personality type attracted.  Cognitive psychology has identified how pleasing some find “variation within sameness” and that seemed in some way linked to PRDW (pattern recognition dopamine reward) in which the brain rewards the subject for creating, modifying or spotting subtle distinctions within a structured set.  Cheese production being an ongoing business, the collecting of Camembert labels is obviously not a closed system but within the whole, it can be possible to achieve “complete sets” (a single producer, region, period etc) and this aspect too is a thing among collectors.

Camembert labels from the Serge Schéhadé collection.

Among producers, there is something of a tradition of making the labels miniature “works of art” with themes including, florals, farm animals, fields of grass, famous (dead) figures from history and, of course, comely milkmaids in period costumes.  There is in France the CTF (Club Tyrosémiophile de France), which has existed since 1960 and still conducts annual conferences (a significant part of which are the “swap-meet” sessions at which members can sell or exchange labels and like any commodity, based on desirability (the prime determinate usually rarity), the value of items varies.  Collectively the club’s inventory now includes several million labels, many of which are on display at the Camembert Museum in Vimoutiers, Normandy and there are plans to digitize the collection and make them publicly accessible.  That millions of different cheese labels exist may not surprise those who recall the (apparently apocryphal) quote attributed to Charles de Gaulle (1890-1970; President of France 1959-1969): “How can one govern a country which has 246 varieties of cheese?” because, even in Le Général’s time, the true count was well into four figures.  In a sign of the times, as the CTF’s membership roll dies off, numbers are shrinking because the young seem not attracted to the cause.  Interestingly, it’s said the artistic labels (called étiquettes in French) date from circa 1910 where they were used as means of attracting children, the idea being the same as the little trinkets distributed in breakfast cereal boxes; the small proto-consumers being trained as “influencers” there to persuade their parents to buy more cheese so they could afforce their label collection.

La persistència de la memòria (1931).

La persistència de la memòria (The Persistence of Memory) is Salvador Dalí’s (1904-1989) most reproduced and best-known painting.   Completed in 1931 and first exhibited in 1932, since 1934 it’s hung in New York’s MoMA (Museum of Modern Art) and in popular culture, the work is often referred to as the more evocative “Melting Clocks”.  Despite the gushing of some critics, surrealism's intellectual undercoating was patchy, some of the latter output being openly imitative but with Dalí, critics seemed often ready to find something.  His "theory of softness and hardness" has been called "central to his artistic thinking" at the time The Persistence of Memory was painted and some suggested the flaccidity of the watches is an allusion to Albert Einstein's (1879-1955) theory of special relativity (1905), a surreal pondering of the implications of relativity on our once-fixed notions of time and space.  Dalí was earthier, claiming the flaccidity of the clocks was inspired not by Einstein but by imagining a wheel of camembert cheese melting in the Catalan sun, although in Conquest of the Irrational (1935) he did write:  Conquest of the Irrational (1935): “The famous soft watches are nothing else than the tender, extravagant, solitary paranoiac-critical camembert of time and space.”  Dali's distortions were of course a deliberate device.  Celebrities who manage inadvertently to produce their own by not quite mastering Photoshop or other image-editing software quickly find the internet an unforgiving critic.  For better or worse, AI (artificial intelligence) has now reached the point where such manipulation is often close to undetectable.

Brie (pronounced bree)

(1) A mainly agricultural region in north-east France, between the Seine and the Marne, noted especially for its cheese.

(2) A salted, creamy, white, soft cheese, ripened with bacterial action, originating in Brie and made from cow's milk.

(3) A female given name (with the spelling variant Bree), from the French geographical region but also as a truncation of Brianna.

1848 (the cheese): The name of the cheese is derived from the name of the district in department Seine-et-Marne, southeast of Paris, the source being the Gaulish briga (hill, height).  The English brier (a type of tobacco pipe introduced circa 1859) is unrelated to the cheese or the region in France which shares the name.  The pipes were made from the root of the Erica arborea shrub from the south of France and Corsica, from the French bruyère (heath plant) from the twelfth century Old French bruiere (heather, briar, heathland, moor), from the Gallo-Roman brucaria, from the Late Latin brucus (heather), from the Gaulish bruko- (thought linked with the Breton brug (heath), the Welsh brwg and the Old Irish froech).  The noun plural is bries.

Lindsay Lohan with cheese board, rendered by Vovsoft as a pen drawing: Clockwise from top left, Camembert, Shropshire, Morbier, Nerina & Appenzeller.

Before the French crown assumed full-control in the thirteenth century, the region of Brie was from the ninth century divided into three sections ruled by different feudal lords, (1) the western Brie française (controlled by the King of France), corresponding approximately to the modern department of Seine-et-Marne in the Île-de-France region, (2) the eastern Brie champenoise (controlled by the Duke of Champagne), forming a portion of the modern department of Marne in the historic region of Champagne (part of modern-day Grand Est) and (3) the northern Brie pouilleuse, forming part of the modern department of Aisne in Picardy.  As well as the cheese, Brie is noted for the culturing of roses, introduced circa 1795 by the French explorer Admiral Louis-Antoine, Comte de Bougainville (1729–1811).  Papua New Guinea’s (PNG) Bougainville Island and the Bougainvillea flower were both named after him.

Whipped Brie dip.

A trick of commercial caterers, wedding planners and others who have to gain the maximum visual value from the food budget is whipped Brie dip.  Often a feature of charcuterie boards or a flourish at wine & cheese events, apart from the taste, the main attraction is that aerating Brie almost doubles its volume, making it a cost-effective component.  Technically, the reason the technique works so well as a base is the aeration increases the surface area of the material which comes into contact with the taste receptors.  There are few rules about what goes into a whipped Brie dip although honey, salty bacon & lemon-infused thyme tend often to be used, some including crushed walnuts.  Timing has to be managed because it’s at its best just after being prepared and served at room temperature; if it’s chilled it sets hard and becomes difficult to spread and will break any cracker being dipped.  So, it can be a last-minute task but preparation time is brief and it’s worth it.

Brie & Camembert

Wheel of Camembert.

Both thought delicious by cheese fiends, Brie & Camembert are often confused because the appearance is so similar, both soft, creamy cheeses with an edible white rind and tending to be sold in wheels (squat little cylinders) though it’s easier to tell the difference with cheeses made in France because there they usually maintain the convention that a Camembert will be smaller (unless it’s a baby Brie or petit Brie which will be indicated on the label).  Because most Brie is matured in larger wheels, it’s often sold in wedges, rare among Camembert because the wheels are so small.  However, in the barbaric English-speaking world where anything goes, Brie is sometimes sold in smaller sizes.  Traditionally, like most, they were farmhouse cheeses, but have long been produced mostly in larger artisanal cheeseries or on an industrial scale.

Wheel of Brie.

Both originally created using unpasteurized cow's milk, thanks to the dictatorial ways of humorless EU eurocrats and their vendetta against raw milk, they’re now almost always made with pasteurized milk although there remain two AOP (Appellation d'origine protégée (Protected designation of origin)) unpasteurised Bries, Brie de Meaux & Brie de Melun and one AOP Camembert, Camembert de Normandie, said best to be enjoyed with French cider.  As a cheese, Brie is characterized as being refined, polite and smooth whereas a Camembert is more rustic, the taste and texture earthier (food critics like to say it has more of a “mushroomy taste”), cream being added to the curd of Brie which lends it a milder, more buttery finish and double and triple Brie are even more so.  To ensure the integrity of the brand, French agricultural law demands that a double-cream cheese must contain 60-70% butterfat (which results a fat content around 30%+ in the finished product.  Although variations exist, according to calorieking.com.au, Brie contains 30.5g fat and 18.5g protein per 100g and the same amount of Camembert, 25g fat and 19.5g protein.

Visually, if left for a while at room temperature, it’s easier to tell the difference because a Camembert will melt whereas Brie will retain its structure.  Because of the marked propensity to melt into something truly gooey, Camembert is often used in cooking, sometimes baked and paired with cranberry sauce or walnuts but. Like Brie, is also a staple of cheese plates, served with things like grapes or figs and eaten with crackers, crusty bread and just about any variety of wine.  One local tradition in the Brie region was the Brie Noir (a type of longer-ripened Brie) which villagers dipped into their café au lait over breakfast.

Turkey, Camembert and cranberry pizza (serves 4)

Ingredients

4 medium pita breads
Olive oil spray
120ml cranberry sauce
1 small garlic clove, minced
80g Camembert, sliced and torn
200g lean shaved turkey breast
8 table spoons parmesan cheese
1 cup rocket leaves

Instructions

(1) Heat oven to 390°F (200°C) conventional or 360°F (180°C) fan-forced and line 2 oven trays with baking paper.

(2) Place pita bread on trays and spray lightly with olive oil.

(3) Mix cranberry sauce with garlic and smear onto the pita bread.

(4) Top with Camembert, shaved turkey and finish with a sprinkling of parmesan.

(5) Bake in the oven for 10-15 minutes until golden and the cheese has melted.

(6) Remove from the oven, sprinkle over rocket leaves and serve.

Phyllo-Wrapped Brie With Hot Honey and Anchovies (serves 10-12)

Ingredients

¼ cup chopped roasted red bell pepper (pre-packaged is fine as well as fresh)
3 oil-packed anchovy fillets, minced
1 garlic clove, finely grated or minced
¾ teaspoon finely grated lemon zest
1 pound phyllo (or filo) dough (must be thawed if bought frozen)
10 tablespoons (1¼ sticks) unsalted butter, melted
1 large (about 26 ounces (750 grams)) wheel of Brie
Hot honey (or regular honey (see below)) for serving
Crackers and/or sliced bread, for serving

Instructions

(1) Heat the oven to 425°F (220°F). In a small bowl, stir together the roasted bell pepper, anchovies, garlic, and lemon zest. Set aside.

(2) On a clean work surface, lay out the phyllo dough and cover it with a barely damp kitchen towel to keep it from drying out. Take 2 phyllo sheets and lay them in an 11 × 17-inch rimmed baking sheet. Brush the top sheet generously with melted butter, then lay another 2 phyllo sheets on top the opposite way, so they cross in the centre and are perpendicular to the first two (like making a plus sign). Brush the top sheet with butter. Repeat the layers, reserving 4 sheets of phyllo.

(3) Using a long sharp kitchen knife, halve the Brie horizontally and lay one half, cut-side up, in the centre of the phyllo (you will probably need another set of hands to help lift off the top layer of cheese). Then spread the red pepper mixture all over the top. Cover with the other half of Brie, cut-side down, and then fold the phyllo pieces up around the Brie. There will be a space in the centre on top where the Brie is uncovered, and that’s okay.

(4) Lightly crumple one of the remaining sheets of phyllo and place it on top of the phyllo/Brie package to cover up that space. Drizzle a little butter on top, then repeat with the remaining phyllo sheets, scattering them over the top of the pastry and drizzling a little butter each time. It may look messy but will bake up into gorgeous golden waves of pastry, so fear not.

(5) Bake until the phyllo is golden, 20 to 25 minutes. Remove it from the oven and let it rest for about 15 minutes before drizzling it with the hot honey. Slice (it will be runny) and serve with crackers or bread, and with more hot honey as needed.

Most baked Bries tend to the sweet with layers of jam or chutney beneath the crust but this is a savoury variation using anchovies, garlic, and roasted bell peppers.  A drizzle of honey and the pinch of lemon zest lends the dish a complexity and for the best effect it should be served straight from the oven because that’s when the Brie is at its most seductively gooey.  It’s ideal with crisp crackers or crusty bread for crunch.  The hot honey is a bit of a novelty and those who want to enhance or tone-down the effect can create their own by stirring a pinch or more of cayenne into any mild honey.