Bunker

Bunker (pronounced buhng-ker)

(1) A large bin or receptacle; a fixed chest or box.

(2) In military use, historically a fortification set mostly below the surface of the ground with overhead protection provided by logs and earth or by concrete and fitted with above-ground embrasures through which guns may be fired.

(3) A fortification set mostly below the surface of the ground and used for a variety of purposes.

(4) In golf, an obstacle, classically a sand trap but sometimes a mound of dirt, constituting a hazard.

(5) In nautical use, to provide fuel for a vessel.

(6) In nautical use, to convey bulk cargo (except grain) from a vessel to an adjacent storehouse.

(7) In golf, to hit a ball into a bunker.

(8) To equip with or as if with bunkers.

(9) In military use, to place personnel or materiel in a bunker or bunkers (sometimes as “bunker down”).

1755–1760: From the Scottish bonkar (box, chest (also “seat” (in the sense of “bench”) of obscure origin but etymologists conclude the use related to furniture hints at a relationship with banker (bench).  Alternatively, it may be from a Scandinavian source such as the Old Swedish bunke (boards used to protect the cargo of a ship).  The meaning “receptacle for coal aboard a ship” was in use by at least 1839 (coal-burning steamships coming into general use in the 1820s).  The use to describe the obstacles on golf courses is documented from 1824 (probably from the extended sense “earthen seat” which dates from 1805) but perhaps surprisingly, the familiar sense from military use (dug-out fortification) seems not to have appeared before World War I (1914-1918) although the structures so described had for millennia existed.  “Bunkermate” was army slang for the individual with whom one shares a bunker while the now obsolete “bunkerman” (“bunkermen” the plural”) referred to someone (often the man in charge) who worked at an industrial coal storage bunker.  Bunker & bunkerage is a noun, bunkering is a noun & verb, bunkered is a verb and bunkerish, bunkeresque, bunkerless & bunkerlike are adjectives; the noun plural is bunkers.

Just as ships called “coalers” were used to transport coal to and from shore-based “coal stations”, it was “oilers” which took oil to storage tanks or out to sea to refuel ships (a common naval procedure) and these STS (ship-to-ship) transfers were called “bunkering” as the black stuff was pumped, bunker-to-bunker.  That the coal used by steamships was stored on-board in compartments called “coal bunkers” led ultimately to another derived term: “bunker oil”.  When in the late nineteenth century ships began the transition from being fuelled by coal to burning oil, the receptacles of course became “oil bunkers” (among sailors nearly always clipped to “bunker”) and as refining processes evolved, the fuel specifically produced for oceangoing ships came to be called “bunker oil”.

Bunker oil is “dirty stuff”, a highly viscous, heavy fuel oil which is essentially the residue of crude oil refining; it’s that which remains after the more refined and volatile products (gasoline (petrol), kerosene, diesel etc) have been extracted.  Until late in the twentieth century, the orthodox view of economists was its use in big ships was a good thing because it was a product for which industry had little other use and, as essentially a by-product, it was relatively cheap.  It came in three flavours: (1) Bunker A: Light fuel oil (similar to a heavy diesel), (2) Bunker B: An oil of intermediate viscosity used in engines larger than marine diesels but smaller than those used in the big ships and (3) Bunker C: Heavy fuel oil used in container ships and such which use VLD (very large displacement), slow running engines with a huge reciprocating mass.  Because of its composition, Bucker C especially produced much pollution and although much of this happened at sea (unseen by most but with obvious implications), when ships reached harbor to dock, all the smoke and soot became obvious.  Over the years, the worst of the pollution from the burning of bunker oil greatly has been reduced (the work underway even before the Greta Thunberg (b 2003) era), sometimes by the simple expedient of spraying a mist of water through the smoke.

Floor-plans of the upper (Vorbunker) and lower (Führerbunker) levels of the structure now commonly referred to collectively as the Führerbunker.

History’s most infamous bunker remains the Berlin Führerbunker in which Adolf Hitler (1889-1945; Führer (leader) and German head of government 1933-1945 & head of state 1934-1945) spent much of the last few months of his life.  In the architectural sense there were a number of Führerbunkers built, one at each of the semi-permanent Führerhauptquartiere (Führer Headquarters) created for the German military campaigns and several others built where required but it’s the one in Berlin which is remembered as “the Führerbunker”.  Before 1944 when the intensification of the air raids by the RAF (Royal Air Force) and USAAF (US Army Air Force) the term Führerbunker seems rarely to have been used other than by the architects and others involved in their construction and it wasn’t a designation like Führerhauptquartiere which the military and other institutions of state shifted between locations (rather as “Air Force One” is attached not to a specific airframe but whatever aircraft in which the US president is travelling).  In subsequent historical writing, the term Führerbunker tends often to be applied to the whole, two-level complex in Berlin and although it was only the lower layer which officially was designated as that, for most purposes the distinction is not significant.  In military documents, after January, 1945 the Führerbunker was referred to as Führerhauptquartiere.

Führerbunker tourist information board, Berlin, Germany.

Only an information board at the intersection of den Ministergärten and Gertrud-Kolmar-Straße, erected by the German Goverment in 2006 prior to that year's FIFA (Fédération Internationale de Football Association (International Federation of Association Football)) World Cup now marks the place on Berlin's Wilhelmstrasse 77 where once the Führerbunker was located.  The Soviet occupation forces razed the new Reich Chancellery and demolished all the bunker's above-ground structures but the subsequent GDR (Deutsche Demokratische Republik (German Democratic Republic; the old East Germany) 1949-1990) abandoned attempts completely to destroy what lay beneath.  Until after the fall of the Berlin Wall (1961-1989) the site remained unused and neglected, “re-discovered” only during excavations by property developers, the government insisting on the destruction on whatever was uncovered and, sensitive still to the spectre of “Neo-Nazi shrines”, for years the bunker’s location was never divulged, even as unremarkable buildings (an unfortunate aspect of post-unification Berlin) began to appear on the site.  Most of what would have covered the Führerbunker’s footprint is now a supermarket car park.

The first part of the complex to be built was the Vorbunker (upper bunker or forward bunker), an underground facility of reinforced concrete intended only as a temporary air-raid shelter for Hitler and his entourage in the old Reich Chancellery.  Substantially completed during 1936-1937, it was until 1943 listed in documents as the Luftschutzbunker der Reichskanzlei (Reich Chancellery Air-Raid Shelter), the Vorbunker label applied only in 1944 when the lower level (the Führerbunker proper) was appended.  In mid January, 1945, Hitler moved into the Führerbunker and, as the military situation deteriorated, his appearances above ground became less frequent until by late March he rarely saw the sky,  Finally, on 30 April, he committed suicide.

Bunker Busters

Northrop Grumman publicity shot of B2-Spirit from below, showing the twin bomb-bay doors through which the GBU-57 are released.

Awful as they are, there's an undeniable beauty in the engineering of some weapons and it's unfortunate humankind never collectively has resolved exclusively to devote such ingenuity to stuff other than us blowing up each other.

The use in June 2025 by the USAF (US Air Force) of fourteen of its Boeing GBU-57 (Guided Bomb Unit-57) Massive Ordnance Penetrators (MOP) bombs against underground targets in Iran (twelve on the Fordow Uranium Enrichment Plant and two on the Natanz nuclear facility) meant “Bunker Buster” hit the headlines.  Carried by the Northrop B-2 Spirit heavy bomber (built between 1989-2000), the GBU-57 is a 14,000 kg (30,000 lb) bomb with a casing designed to withstand the stress of penetrating through layers of reinforced concrete or thick rock.  “Bunker buster” bombs have been around for a while, the ancestors of today’s devices first built for the German military early in World War II (1939-1945) and the principle remains unchanged to this day: up-scaled armor-piercing shells.  The initial purpose was to produce a weapon with a casing strong enough to withstand the forces imposed when impacting reinforced concrete structures, the idea simple in that what was needed was a delivery system which could “bust through” whatever protective layers surrounded a target, allowing the explosive charge to do damage where needed rtaher than wastefully being expended on an outer skin.  The German weapons proved effective but inevitably triggered an “arms race” in that as the war progressed, the concrete layers became thicker, walls over 2 metres (6.6 feet) and ceilings of 5 (16) being constructed by 1943.  Technological development continued and the idea extended to rocket propelled bombs optimized both for armor-piercing and aerodynamic efficiency, velocity a significant “mass multiplier” which made the weapons still more effective.

USAF test-flight footage of Northrop B2-Spirit dropping two GBU-57 "Bunker Buster" bombs.

Concurrent with this, the British developed the first true “bunker busters”, building on the idea of the naval torpedo, one aspect of which was in exploding a short distance from its target, it was highly damaging because it was able to take advantage of one of the properties of water (quite strange stuff according to those who study it) which is it doesn’t compress.  What that meant was it was often the “shock wave” of the water rather than the blast itself which could breach a hull, the same principle used for the famous “bouncing bombs” used for the RAF’s “Dambuster” (Operation Chastise, 17 May 1943) raids on German dams.  Because of the way water behaved, it wasn’t necessary to score the “direct hit” which had been the ideal in the early days of aerial warfare.

RAF Bomber Command archive photograph of Avro Lancaster (built between 1941-1946) in flight with Grand Slam mounted (left) and a comparison of the Tallboy & Grand Slam (right), illustrating how the latter was in most respects a scaled-up version of the former.  To carry the big Grand Slams, 32 “B1 Special” Lancasters were in 1945 built with up-rated Rolls-Royce Merlin V12 engines, the removal of the bomb doors (the Grand Slam carried externally, its dimensions exceeding internal capacity), deleted front and mid-upper gun turrets, no radar equipment and a strengthened undercarriage.  Such was the concern with weight (especially for take-off) that just about anything non-essential was removed from the B1 Specials, even three of the four fire axes and its crew door ladder.  In the US, Boeing went through a similar exercise to produce the run of “Silverplate” B-29 Superfortresses able to carry the first A-bombs used in August, 1945. 

Best known of the British devices were the so called “earthquake bombs”, the Tallboy (12,000 lb; 5.4 ton) & Grand Slam (22,000 lb, 10 ton) which, despite the impressive bulk, were classified by the War Office as “medium capacity”.  The terms “Medium Capacity” (MC) & “High Capacity” referenced not the gross weight or physical dimensions but ratio of explosive filler to the total weight of the construction (ie how much was explosive compared to the casing and ancillary components).  Because both had thick casings to ensure penetration deep into hardened targets (bunkers and other structures encased in rock or reinforced concrete) before exploding, the internal dimensions accordingly were reduced compared with the ratio typical of contemporary ordinance.  A High Capacity (HC) bomb (a typical “general-purpose” bomb) had a thinner casing and a much higher proportion of explosive (sometimes over 70% of total weight).  These were intended for area bombing (known also as “carpet bombing”) and caused wide blast damage whereas the Tallboy & Grand Slam were penetrative with casings optimized for aerodynamic efficiency, their supersonic travel working as a mass-multiplier.  The Tallboy’s 5,200 lb (2.3 ton) explosive load was some 43% of its gross weight while the Grand Slam’s 9,100 lb (4 ton) absorbed 41%; this may be compared with the “big” 4000 lb (1.8 ton) HC “Blockbuster” which allocated 75% of the gross weight to its 3000 LB (1.4 ton) charge.  Like many things in engineering (not just in military matters) the ratio represented a trade-off, the MC design prioritizing penetrative power and structural destruction over blast radius.  The novelty of the Tallboy & Grand Slam was that as earthquake bombs, their destructive potential was able to be unleashed not necessarily by achieving a direct hit on a target but by entering the ground nearby, the explosion (1) creating an underground cavity (a camouflet) and (2) transmitting a shock-wave through the target’s foundations, leading to the structure collapsing into the newly created lacuna. 

The etymology of camouflet has an interesting history in both French and military mining.  Originally it meant “a whiff of smoke in the face (from a fire or pipe) and in figurative use it was a reference to a snub or slight insult (something unpleasant delivered directly to someone) and although the origin is murky and it may have been related to the earlier French verb camoufler (to disguise; to mask) which evolved also into “camouflage”.  In the specialized military jargon of siege warfare or mining (sapping), over the seventeen and nineteenth centuries “camouflet” referred to “an underground explosion that does not break the surface, but collapses enemy tunnels or fortifications by creating a subterranean void or shockwave”.  The use of this tactic is best remembered from the use on the Western Front in World War I, some of the huge craters now tourist attractions.

Under watchful eyes: Grand Ayatollah Ali Khamenei (b 1939; Supreme Leader, Islamic Republic of Iran since 1989) delivering a speech, sitting in front of the official portrait of the republic’s ever-unsmiling founder, Grand Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini (1900-1989; Supreme Leader, Islamic Republic of Iran, 1979-1989).  Ayatollah Khamenei seemed in 1989 an improbable choice as Supreme Leader because others were better credentialed but though cautious and uncharismatic, he has proved a great survivor in a troubled region.

Since aerial bombing began to be used as a strategic weapon, of great interest has been the debate over the BDA (battle damage assessment) and this issue emerged almost as soon as the bunker buster attack on Iran was announced, focused on the extent to which the MOPs had damaged the targets, the deepest of which were concealed deep inside a mountain.  BDA is a constantly evolving science and while satellites have made analysis of surface damage highly refined, it’s more difficult to understand what has happened deep underground.  Indeed, it wasn’t until the USSBS (United States Strategic Bombing Survey) teams toured Germany and Japan in 1945-1946, conducting interviews, economic analysis and site surveys that a useful (and substantially accurate) understanding emerged of the effectiveness of bombing although what technological advances have allowed for those with the resources is the so-called “panacea targets” (ie critical infrastructure and such once dismissed by planners because the required precision was for many reasons rarely attainable) can now accurately be targeted, the USAF able to drop a bomb within a few feet of the aiming point.  As the phrase is used by the military, the Fordow Uranium Enrichment Plant is as classic “panacea target” but whether even a technically successful strike will achieve the desired political outcome remains to be seen.

Mr Trump, in a moment of exasperation, posted on Truth Social of Iran & Israel: “We basically have two countries that have been fighting so long and so hard that they don't know what the fuck they're doing."  Actually, both know exactly WTF they're doing; it's just Mr Trump (and many others) would prefer they didn't do it.

Donald Trump (b 1946; US president 2017-2021 and since 2025) claimed “total obliteration” of the targets while Grand Ayatollah Khamenei admitted only there had been “some damage” and which is closer to the truth should one day be revealed.  Even modelling of the effects has probably been inconclusive because the deeper one goes underground, the greater the number of variables in the natural structure and the nature of the internal built environment will also influence blast behaviour.  All experts seem to agree much damage will have been done but what can’t yet be determined is what has been suffered by the facilities which sit as deep as 80 m (260 feet) inside the mountain although, as the name implies, “bunker busters” are designed for buried targets and it’s not always required for blast directly to reach target.  Because the shock-wave can travel through earth & rock, the effect is something like that of an earthquake and if the structure sufficiently is affected, it may be the area can be rendered geologically too unstable again to be used for its original purpose.

Within minutes of the bombing having been announced, legal academics were being interviewed (though not by Fox News) to explain why the attacks were unlawful under international law and in a sign of the times, the White House didn't bother to discuss fine legal points like the distinction between "preventive & pre-emptive strikes", preferring (like Fox News) to focus on the damage done.  However, whatever the murkiness surrounding the BDA, many analysts have concluded that even if before the attacks the Iranian authorities had not approved the creation of a nuclear weapon, this attack will have persuaded them one is essential for “regime survival”, thus the interest in both Tel Aviv and (despite denials) Washington DC in “regime change”.  The consensus seems to be Grand Ayatollah Khamenei had, prior to the strike, not ordered the creation of a nuclear weapon but that all energies were directed towards completing the preliminary steps, thus the enriching of uranium to ten times the level required for use in power generation; the ayatollah liked to keep his options open.  So, the fear of some is the attacks, even if they have (by weeks, months or years) delayed the Islamic Republic’s work on nuclear development, may prove counter-productive in that they convince the ayatollah to concur with the reasoning of every state which since 1945 has adopted an independent nuclear deterrent (IND).  That reasoning was not complex and hasn’t changed since first a prehistoric man picked up a stout stick to wave as a pre-lingual message to potential adversaries, warning them there would be consequences for aggression.  Although a theocracy, those who command power in the Islamic Republic are part of an opaque political institution and in the struggle which has for sometime been conducted in anticipation of the death of the aged (and reportedly ailing) Supreme Leader, the matter of “an Iranian IND” is one of the central dynamics.  Many will be following what unfolds in Tehran and the observers will not be only in Tel Aviv and Washington DC because in the region and beyond, few things focus the mind like the thought of ayatollahs with A-Bombs.

Of the word "bust"

The Great Bust: The Depression of the Thirties (1962) by Jack Lang (left), highly qualified porn star Busty Buffy (b 1996, who has never been accused of misleading advertising, centre) and The people's champion, Mr Lang, bust of Jack Lang, painted cast plaster by an unknown artist, circa 1927, National Portrait Gallery, Canberra, Australia.  Remembered for a few things, Jack Lang (1876–1975; premier of the Australian state of New South Wales (NSW) 1925-1927 & 1930-1932) remains best known for having in 1932 been the first head of a government in the British Empire to have been sacked by the Crown since William IV (1765–1837; King of the UK 1830-1837) in 1834 dismissed Lord Melbourne (1779–1848; prime minister of the UK 1834 & 1835-1841).

Those learning English must think it at least careless things can both be (1) “razed to the ground” (totally to destroy something (typically a structure), usually by demolition or incineration) and (2) “raised to the sky” (physically lifted upwards).  The etymologies of “raze” and “raise” differ but they’re pronounced the same so it’s fortunate the spellings vary but in other troublesome examples of unrelated meanings, spelling and pronunciation can align, as in “bust”.  When used in ways most directly related to human anatomy: (1) “a sculptural portrayal of a person's head and shoulders” & (2) “the circumference of a woman's chest around her breasts” there is an etymological link but these uses wholly are unconnected with bust’s other senses.

Bust of Lindsay Lohan in white marble by Stable Diffusion.  Sculptures of just the neck and head came also to be called “busts”, the emphasis on the technique rather than the original definition.

Bust in the sense of “a sculpture of upper torso and head” dates from the 1690s and was from the sixteenth century French buste, from the Italian busto (upper body; torso), from the Latin bustum (funeral monument, tomb (although the original sense was “funeral pyre, place where corpses are burned”)) and it may have emerged (as a shortened form) from ambustum, neuter of ambustus (burned around), past participle of amburere (burn around, scorch), the construct being ambi- (around) + urere (to burn),  The alternative etymology traces a link to the Old Latin boro, the early form of the Classical Latin uro (to burn) and it’s though the development in Italian was influenced by the Etruscan custom of keeping the ashes of the dead in an urn shaped like the person when alive.  Thus the use, common by the 1720s of bust (a clipping from the French buste) being “a carving of the “trunk of the human body from the chest up”.  From this came the meaning “dimension of the bosom; the measurement around a woman's body at the level of her breasts” and that evolved on the basis of a comparison with the sculptures, the base of which was described as the “bust-line”, the term still used in dress-making (and for other comparative purposes as one of the three “vital statistics” by which women are judged (bust, waist, hips), each circumference having an “ideal range”).  It’s not known when “bust” and “bust-line” came into oral use among dress-makers and related professions but it’s documented since the 1880s.  Derived forms (sometimes hyphenated) include busty (tending to bustiness, thus Busty Buffy's choice of stage-name), overbust & underbust (technical terms in women's fashion referencing specific measurements) and bustier (a tight-fitting women's top which covers (most or all of) the bust.

The other senses of bust (as a noun, verb & adjective) are diverse (and sometimes diametric opposites and include: “to break or fail”; “to be caught doing something unlawful / illicit / disgusting etc”; “to debunk”; “dramatically or unexpectedly to succeed”; “to go broke”; “to break in” (horses, girlfriends etc): “to assault”; the downward portion of an economic cycle (ie “boom & bust”); “the act of effecting an arrest” and “someone (especially in professional sport) who failed to perform to expectation”.  That’s quite a range and that has meant the creation of dozens of idiomatic forms, the best known of which include: “boom & bust”, “busted flush”, “dambuster”, “bunker buster”,  “busted arse country”, “drug bust”, “cloud bust”, belly-busting, bust one's ass (or butt), bust a gut, bust a move, bust a nut, bust-down, bust loose, bust off, bust one's balls, bust-out, sod buster, bust the dust, myth-busting and trend-busting.  In the sense of “breaking through”, bust was from the Middle English busten, a variant of bursten & bresten (to burst) and may be compared with the Low German basten & barsten (to burst).  Bust in the sense of “break”, “smash”, “fail”, “arrest” et al was a creation of mid-nineteenth century US English and is of uncertain inspiration but most etymologists seem to concur it was likely a modification of “burst” effected with a phonetic alteration but it’s not impossible it came directly as an imperfect echoic of Germanic speech.  The apparent contradiction of bust meaning both “fail” and “dramatically succeed” happened because the former was an allusion to “being busted” (ie broken) while the latter meaning used the notion of “busting through”.

Psychache

Psychache (pronounced sahyk-eyk)

Psychological pain, especially when it becomes unbearable, producing suicidal thoughts.

1993: The construct was psyche- + ache.  Psychache was coined by US clinical psychologist Dr Edwin Shneidman (1918-2009) and first appeared in his book Suicide as Psychache: A Clinical Approach to Self-Destructive Behavior (1993).  The prefix psych- was an alternative form of psycho-.  Psycho was from the Ancient Greek ψῡχο- (psūkho-), a combining form of ψυχή (psukhḗ) (soul).  Wit was used with words relating to the soul, the mind, or to psychology.  Ache was from the Middle English verb aken & noun ache (noun), from the Old English verb acan (from the Proto-West Germanic akan, from the Proto-Germanic akaną (to ache)) and the noun æċe (from the Proto-West Germanic aki, from the Proto-Germanic akiz), both from the primitive Indo-European heg- (sin, crime).  It was cognate with the Saterland Frisian eeke & ääke (to ache, fester), the Low German aken, achen & äken (to hurt, ache), the German Low German Eek (inflammation), the North Frisian akelig & æklig (terrible, miserable, sharp, intense), the West Frisian aaklik (nasty, horrible, dismal, dreary) and the Dutch akelig (nasty, horrible).  Historically the verb was spelled ake, and the noun ache but the spellings became aligned after Dr Johnson (Samuel Johnson (1709-1784)) published A Dictionary of the English Language (1755), the lexicographer mistakenly assuming it was from the Ancient Greek ἄχος (ákhos) (pain) due to the similarity in form and meaning of the two words.  As a noun, ache meant “a continuous, dull pain (as opposed to a sharp, sudden, or episodic pain) while the verb was used to mean (1) to have or suffer a continuous, dull pain, (2) to feel great sympathy or pity and (3) to yearn or long for someone or something.  Pyscheache is a noun

Psychache is a theoretical construct used by clinical suicidologists and differs from psychomachia (conflict of the soul).  Psychomachia was from the Late Latin psӯchomachia, the title of a poem of a thousand-odd lines (circa 400) by Roman Christian poet Prudentius (Aurelius Prudentius Clemens; 348-circa 412), the construct being the Ancient Greek Greek psukhē (spirit) + makhē (battle).  The fifth century poem Psychomachia (translated usually as “Battle of Spirits” or “Soul War”) explored a theme familiar in Christianity: the eternal battle between virtue & vice (onto which can be mapped “right & wrong”, “good & evil” etc) and culminated in the forces of Christendom vanquishing pagan idolatry to the cheers of a thousand Christian martyrs.  An elegant telling of an allegory familiar in early Christian literature and art, Prudentius made clear the battle was one which happened in the soul of all people and thus one which all needed to wage, the outcome determined by whether the good or evil in them proved stronger.  The poem’s characters include Faith, Hope, Industry, Sobriety, Chastity, Humility & Patience among the good and Pride, Wrath, Paganism, Avarice, Discord, Lust & Indulgence in the ranks of the evil but scholars of literature caution that although the personifications all are women, in Latin, words for abstract concepts use the feminine grammatical gender and there’s nothing to suggest the poet intended us to read this as a tale of bolshie women slugging it out.  Of interest too is the appearance of the number seven, so familiar in the literature and art of Antiquity and the Medieval period as well as the Biblical texts but although Prudentius has seven virtues defeat seven vices, the characters don’t exactly align with either the canonical seven deadly sins, nor the three theological and four cardinal virtues.  In modern use, the linguistic similarity between psychache and psychomachia has made the latter attractive to those seduced by the (not always Germanic) tradition of the “romance of suicide”.

A pioneer in the field of suicidology, Dr Shneidman’s publication record was indicative of his specialization.

Dr Edwin Shneidman (1918-2009) was a clinical psychologist who practiced as a thanatologist (a practitioner in the field of thanatology (the scientific study of death and the practices associated with it, including the study of the needs of the terminally ill and their families); the construct of thanatology being thanato- (from the Ancient Greek θάνατος (thánatos) (death)) +‎ -logy.  The suffix -ology was formed from -o- (as an interconsonantal vowel) +‎ -logy.  The origin in English of the -logy suffix lies with loanwords from the Ancient Greek, usually via Latin and French, where the suffix (-λογία) is an integral part of the word loaned (eg astrology from astrologia) since the sixteenth century.  French picked up -logie from the Latin -logia, from the Ancient Greek -λογία (-logía).  Within Greek, the suffix is an -ία (-ía) abstract from λόγος (lógos) (account, explanation, narrative), and that a verbal noun from λέγω (légō) (I say, speak, converse, tell a story).  In English the suffix became extraordinarily productive, used notably to form names of sciences or disciplines of study, analogous to the names traditionally borrowed from the Latin (eg astrology from astrologia; geology from geologia) and by the late eighteenth century, the practice (despite the disapproval of the pedants) extended to terms with no connection to Greek or Latin such as those building on French or German bases (eg insectology (1766) after the French insectologie; terminology (1801) after the German Terminologie).  Within a few decades of the intrusion of modern languages, combinations emerged using English terms (eg undergroundology (1820); hatology (1837)).  In this evolution, the development may be though similar to the latter-day proliferation of “-isms” (fascism; feminism et al).

Death and the College Student: A Collection of Brief Essays on Death and Suicide by Harvard Youth (1973) by Dr Edwin Shneidman.  Dr Shneidman wrote many papers about the prevalence of suicide among college-age males, a cross-cultural phenomenon.

Dr Shneidman was one of the seminal figures in the discipline of suicidology, in 1968 founding the AAS (American Association of Suicidology) and the principal US journal for suicide studies: Suicide and Life-Threatening Behavior.  The abbreviation AAS is in this context used mostly within the discipline because (1) it is a specialized field and (2) there are literally dozens of uses of “AAS”.  In Suicide as Psychache: A Clinical Approach to Self-Destructive Behavior (1993) he defined psychache as “intense psychological pain—encompassing hurt, anguish, and mental torment”, identifying it as the primary motivation behind suicide, his theory being that when psychological pain becomes unbearable, individuals may perceive suicide as their only escape from torment.

Although since Suicide as Psychache: A Clinical Approach to Self-Destructive Behavior appeared in 1993 there have been four editions of American Psychiatric Association's (APA) Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM), “psychache” has never appeared in the DSM.  That may seem an anomaly given much in the DSM revolves around psychological disturbances but the reason is technical.  What the DSM does is list and codify diagnosable mental disorders (depression, schizophrenia. bipolar disorder et al), classifying symptoms and behaviors into standardized categories for diagnosis and treatment planning.  By contrast, psychache is not a clinical diagnosis; it is a theoretical construct in suicidology which is used to explain the subjective experience of psychological pain that can lead to patients taking their own lives.  It thus describes an emotional state rather than a psychiatric disorder.

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

Despite that, mental health clinicians do actively use the principles of psychache, notably in suicide risk assessment and prevention and models have been developed including a number of “psychache scales”, self-reporting tools used to generate a metric measuring the intensity of psychological pain (categorized with headings such as shame, guilt, despair et al).  The approaches do in detail differ but most follow Dr Shneidman’s terminology in that the critical threshold is the point at which the patient’s pain becomes unbearable or inescapable and the objective is either to increase tolerance for distress or reframe troublesome thoughts.  Ultimately, the purpose of tools is to improve suicide risk assessments and reduce suicide rates.

DSM-5 (2013).

Interestingly, Suicidal Behavior Disorder (SBD) was introduced in Section III of the DSM-5 (2013) under “Conditions for Further Study”.  Then, SBD chiefly was characterized by a self-initiated sequence of behaviors believed at the time of initiation to cause one’s own death and occurring in the last 24 months.  That of course sounds exact but the diagnostic criteria in the DSM are written like that and the purpose of inclusion in the fifth edition was to create a framework so systematically, empirical studies related to SBD could be reviewed so primary research themes and promising directions for future research could be identified.  Duly, over the following decade that framework was explored but the conclusion was reached there seemed to be little utility in the clinical utility of SBD as a device for predicting future suicide and that more research was needed to understand measurement of the diagnosis and its distinctiveness from related disorders and other self-harming behaviors.  The phase “more research is required” must be one of the most frequently heard among researchers.

In the usually manner in which the APA allowed the DSM to evolve, what the DSM-5s tentative inclusion of SBD did was attempt to capture suicidality as a diagnosis rather than a clinical feature requiring attention.  SBD was characterized by a suicide attempt within the last 24 months (Criterion A) and that was defined as “a self-initiated sequence of behaviors by an individual who, at the time of initiation, expected that the set of actions would lead to his or her own death”.  That sounds uncontroversial but what was significant was the act could meet the criteria for non-suicidal self-injury (ie self-injury with the intention to relieve negative feelings or cognitive state in order to achieve a positive mood state (Criterion B) and cannot be applied to suicidal ideation or preparatory acts (Criterion C).  Were the attempt to have occurred during a state of delirium or confusion or solely for political or religious objectives, then SBD is ruled out (Criteria D & E).  SBD (current) is given when the suicide attempt occurred within the last 12 months, and SBD (in early remission), when it has been 12-24 months since the last attempt.  It must be remembered that while a patient’s behavior(s) may overlap across a number of the DSM’s diagnosises, the AMA’s committees have, for didactic purposes, always preferred to “silo” the categories.

DSM-5-TR (2022).

When in 2022 the “text revision” of the DSM-5 (DSM-5-TR) was released, SBD was removed as a condition for further study in Section III and moved to “Other Conditions That May Be a Focus of Clinical Attention” in Section II. The conditions listed in this section are intended to draw to attention of clinicians to the presence and breadth of additional issues routinely encountered in clinical practice and provide a procedure for their systematic documentation.  According to the APA’s editorial committee, the rationale for the exclusion of SBD from the DSM-5-TR was based on concerns the proposed disorder did not meet the criteria for a mental disorder but instead constituted a behavior with diverse causes and while that distinction may escape most of us, within the internal logic of the history of the DSM, that’s wholly consistent.  At this time, despite many lobbying for the adoption of a diagnostic entity for suicidal behavior, the APA’s committees seem still more inclined to conceptualize suicidality as a symptom rather than a disorder and despite discussion in the field of suicidology about whether suicide and related concepts like psychache should be treated as stand-alone mental health issues, that’s a leap which will have to wait, at least until a DSM-6 is published.

How to and how not to: Informatie over Zorgvuldige Levensbeëindiging (Information about the Careful Ending of Life, 2008) by Stichting Wetenschappelijk Onderzoek naar Zorgvuldige Zelfdoding (The Foundation for Scientific Research into Careful Suicide) (left) and How Not to Kill Yourself: A Phenomenology of Suicide (2023) by Clancy Martin (right).

Informatie over Zorgvuldige Levensbeëindiging (Information about the Careful Ending of Life, 2008) was published by a group of Dutch physicians & and researchers; it contained detailed advice on methods of suicide available to the general public, the Foundation for Scientific Research into Careful Suicide arging “a requirement exists within society for responsible information about an independent and dignified ending of life.”  It could be ordered only from the foundation’s website and had the advantage that whatever might be one’s opinion on the matter, it was at least written by physicians and scientists and thus more reliable than some of the “suicide guides” which are sometimes found on-line.  At the time research by the foundation had found that despite legislation in the Netherlands which permit doctors (acting within specific legal limits) to assist patient commit suicide, there were apparently several thousand cases each year of what it termed “autoeuthanasia” in which no medical staff directly were involved.  Most of these cases involved elderly or chronically ill patients who refused food and fluids and it was estimated these deaths happened at about twice the rate of those carried out under the euthanasia laws.  Since then the Dutch laws have been extended to included those who have no serious physical disease or are suffering great pain; there are people who simply no longer wish to live, something like the tragic figure in Blue Öyster Cult’s (Don't Fear) The Reaper (1976) © Donald Roeser (b 1947):

Came the last night of sadness
And it was clear she couldn't go on
Then the door was open and the wind appeared
The candles blew then disappeared
The curtains flew then he appeared
Saying don't be afraid

There is a diverse literature on various aspects of suicide (tips and techniques, theological & philosophical interpretations, cross-cultural attitudes, history of its treatment in church & secular law etc) and some are quite personal, written variously by those who later would kill themselves or those who contemplated or attempted to take their own lives.  In How Not to Kill Yourself: A Phenomenology of Suicide (2023) by Canadian philosopher Clancy Martin (b 1967), it was revealed the most recent of his ten suicide attempts was “…in his basement with a dog leash, the consequences of which he concealed from his wife, family, co-workers, and students, slipping back into his daily life with a hoarse voice, a raw neck and series of vague explanations.”

BKA (the Bundeskriminalamt, the Federal Criminal Police Office of the FRG (Federal Republic of Germany (the old West Germany)) mug shots of the Red Army Faction's Ulrike Meinhof (left) and Gudrun Ensslin (right).

The song (Don't Fear) The Reaper also made mention of William Shakespeare's (1564–1616) Romeo and Juliet (1597) and in taking her own life (using her dead lover’s dagger) because she doesn’t want to go on living without him, Juliette joined the pantheon of figures who have made the tragedy of suicide seem, to some, romantic.  Politically too, suicide can grant the sort of status dying of old age doesn’t confer, the deaths of left-wing terrorists Ulrike Meinhof (1934–1976) and Gudrun Ensslin (1940–1977) of the West German Red Army Faction (the RAF and better known as the “Baader-Meinhof gang”) both recorded as “suicide in custody” although the circumstances were murky.  In an indication of the way moral relativities aligned during the high Cold War, the French intellectuals Jean-Paul Sartre (1905–1980) and Simone de Beauvoir (1908–1986) compared their deaths to the worst crimes of the Nazis but sympathy for violence committed for an “approved” cause was not the exclusive preserve of the left.  In July, 1964, in his speech accepting the Republican nomination for that year’s US presidential election, proto-MAGA Barry Goldwater (1909–1998) concluded by saying: “I would remind you that extremism in the defense of liberty is no vice!  And let me remind you also that moderation in the pursuit of justice is no virtue!”  The audience response to that was rapturous although a few months later the country mostly didn’t share the enthusiasm, Lyndon Johnson (LBJ, 1908–1973; US president 1963-1969) winning the presidency in one of the greatest landslides in US electoral history.  Given the choice between crooked old Lyndon and crazy old Barry, Americans preferred the crook.

Nor was it just politicians and intellectuals who could resist the appeal of politics being taken to its logical “other means” conclusion, the Canadian singer-songwriter Leonard Cohen (1934-2016) during the last years of the Cold War writing First We Take Manhattan (1986), the lyrics of which were open to interpretation but clarified in 1988 by the author who explained: “I think it means exactly what it says.  It is a terrorist song.  I think it's a response to terrorism.  There's something about terrorism that I've always admired.  The fact that there are no alibis or no compromises.  That position is always very attractive.”   Even in 1988 it was a controversial comment because by then not many outside of undergraduate anarchist societies were still romanticizing terrorists but in fairness to the singer the coda isn’t as often published: “I don't like it when it's manifested on the physical plane – I don't really enjoy the terrorist activities – but Psychic Terrorism.”

First We Take Manhattan (1986) by Leonard Cohen

They sentenced me to twenty years of boredom

For tryin' to change the system from within

I'm coming now, I'm coming to reward them

First we take Manhattan, then we take Berlin

 

I'm guided by a signal in the heavens

I'm guided by this birthmark on my skin

I'm guided by the beauty of our weapons

First we take Manhattan, then we take Berlin

 

I'd really like to live beside you, baby

I love your body and your spirit and your clothes

But you see that line there moving through the station?

I told you, I told you, told you, I was one of those

 

Ah you loved me as a loser, but now you're worried that I just might win

You know the way to stop me, but you don't have the discipline

How many nights I prayed for this, to let my work begin

First we take Manhattan, then we take Berlin

 

I don't like your fashion business, mister

And I don't like these drugs that keep you thin

I don't like what happened to my sister

First we take Manhattan, then we take Berlin

 

I'd really like to live beside you, baby

I love your body and your spirit and your clothes

But you see that line there moving through the station?

I told you, I told you, told you, I was one of those

First We Take Manhattan performed by Jennifer Warnes (b 1947), from the Album Famous Blue Raincoat (1986). 

Whatever they achieved in life, it was their suicides which lent a lingering allure to German-American ecofeminist activist Petra Kelly (1947–1992) & the doomed poet American poet Sylvia Path (1932-1963) and the lure goes back for millennia, the Roman Poet Ovid (Publius Ovidius Naso; 43 BC–17 AD) in his Metamorphoses telling an ancient Babylonian tale in which Pyramus, in dark despair, killed herself after finding her young love lifeless.  Over the centuries it’s been a recurrent trope but the most novel take was the symbolic, mystical death in Richard Wagner's (1813–1883) Tristan und Isolde (1865).  Mortally wounded in a duel before the final act, Tristan longs to see Isolde one last time but just as she arrives at his side, he dies in her arms.  Overwhelmed by love and grief, Isolde sings the famous Liebestod (Love-Death) and dies, the transcendent aria interpreted as the swansong which carries her to join Tristan in mystical union in the afterlife.  This, lawyers would call a “constructive suicide”.

Austrian soprano Helga Dernesch (b 1939) in 1972 performing the Liebestod aria from Wagner’s Tristan und Isolde with the Berlin Philharmonic under Herbert von Karajan (1908–1989).

While she didn’t possess the sheer power of the greatest of the Scandinavian sopranos who in the mid-twentieth century defined the role, Dernesch brought passion and intensity to her roles and while, on that night in 1972, the lushness of what Karajan summoned from the strings was perhaps a little much, her Liebestod was spine-tingling and by then, Karajan had been forgiven for everything.  Intriguingly, although Tristan und Isolde is regarded as one of the great monuments to love, in 1854 Wagner had written to the Hungarian composer Franz Liszt (1811–1886) telling him:

“As I have never in life felt the real bliss of love, I must erect a monument to the most beautiful of all my dreams, in which, from beginning to end, that love shall be thoroughly satiated.  I have in my head ‘Tristan and Isolde’, the simplest but most full-blooded musical concepion; with the ‘black flag’ which floats at the end of it I shall cover myself to die.”

It’s not known whether Listz reflected on this apparent compositional self-medication for psychache after in 1870 learning from his morning newspaper his daughter Cosima (1837-1930) was to be married to Wagner (then 24 years her senior) but because she’d been for some seven years conducting an adulterous affair with the German the news may not have been unexpected.  He was aware Cosmia’s daughter (Isolde Beidler (1865–1919)) had been fathered not by her then husband (the German conductor Hans von Bülow (1830–1894)) but by Wagner and her second marriage proved happier than the first so there was that.

Demimonde

Demimonde (pronounced dem-ee-mond or duh-mee-mawnd (French))

(1) That class of women existing beyond or on the margins of respectable society because of their indiscreet behavior or sexual promiscuity; typically they were mistresses but not courtesans and certainly not prostitutes (classic meaning from the mid-late nineteenth century).

(2) A group, the activities of which are ethically or legally questionable (later use).

(3) Any social group considered to be not wholly respectable (though vested sometimes with a certain edgy glamour).

(4) By extension, a member of such a class or group of persons.

1850–1855: From the French demi-monde, the construct being demi- (half) + monde (world (in the sense of “people”)), thus literally “half world” and translatable as something like “those really not ‘one of us’”.  It may have been coined by the French author and playwright Alexandre Dumas (1802-1870) but certainly was popularized in his comedic play, Le Demi Monde (1855).  The hyphenated original from French (demi-monde) is sometimes used in English.  Demimonde is a noun; the noun plural is demimondes.

In English, demi dates from the mid-1300 and was from the Middle English demi (half, half-sized, partial), from the twelfth century Anglo-Norman demi (half), from the Vulgar Latin dimedius, from the Classical Latin dīmidius, the construct being dis- (apart; in two) + medius (middle).  The French demi (which English borrowed) was a combining form which existed as noun, adjective, and adverb.  The French monde was from the twelfth century Old French monde, a semi-learned form of the tenth century mont (etymologists trace the alteration to ensure the word was distinct from the unrelated mont (mountain)), from the Latin mundus which could mean (1) clean, pure; neat, nice, fine, elegant, sophisticated, decorated, adorned or (2) universe, world (especially the heavens and heavenly bodies with the sense “universe” being a calque of the Ancient Greek κόσμος (kósmos)).or mankind (as in "inhabitants of the earth").  In Medieval Latin it was used also the mean "century" and "group of people".  The Latin mundus may have been from the Etruscan munθ (order, kit, ornament) or the primitive Indo-European mhnd- (to adorn) which was cognate with the Old High German mandag (joyful, happy; dashing).  As well as the historically pejorative sense in demimonde, “demi” appeared in other loanwords from French meaning “half”  including demilunes (in the shape of a half-moon (semi-circular)) and demitasse (a small coffee cup of the type associated with the short black) and, on that model, is also prefixed to words of English origin (eg demigod).

Treading Water Perfume's Demimonde.  The Trending Water brand is described as “queer-owned” and the products are “hand crafted”.

Similar forms in French included beau monde (literally “beautiful world”, the plural being beaux mondes) which meant “the fashionable part of society” (ie the “beautiful people”) and demi-mondaine (plural demimondaines) which was used in a variety of ways ranging from “women of equivocal reputation and standing in society” to “a sexually promiscuous woman” (ie, one of the demimonde).  Of lifestyles in some way disreputable (or at least unconventional), the terms “bohemian” and “demimonde” are often used although if one is to acknowledge the history of use, they should be differentiated despite both being associated with non-conformity.  Bohemianiam is best used of artistic and intellectual milieus where there’s a pursuit of the non-orthodox and often a rejection of societal norms (or they are at least ignored).  Demimonde, reflecting the specific origin as describing a social class of women financially able to sustain a lifestyle deemed morally dubious, retains to this day the hint of something disreputable although with the decline in the observation of such things, this is now more nuanced.  The gradual distancing of the word from its origins in the intricacies of defining the sexual morality of nineteenth century French women meant it became available to all and in her politely received novel The Last Thing He Wanted (1996), Joan Didion (1934-2021) explored the murky world of the back-channel deals in politics as it is practiced, a demimonde in which individuals are “trying to create a context for democracy” but may be “getting [their] hands a little dirty in the process.”

The Canyons (2013), Lindsay Lohan's demimonde film.

It was Alexandre Dumas’ play Le Demi Monde (1855) which popularized the use but in earlier works, notably La Dame aux Camélias (1848), the character of the demi-mondaine is identifiable although in that work the doomed protagonist is more of a courtesan whereas as used during the second half of the century, the term really wasn’t applied to that class and was most associated with women on the margins of “respectable society” who lived lavishly thanks to wealthy patrons; subtly different from a courtesan.  The literal translation “half-world” implied an existence halfway between the “proper" world and that of the disreputable and that was the sense in the late Victorian era of the Belle Époque era: glamorous but morally ambiguous women, living on the margins of high society in a state of the tolerably scandalous.  Social mores and moral codes are of course fluid and in the first half of the twentieth century the meaning shifted to encompass some other marginalized or shadowy subcultures and ones which encompassed not only women and the association was no longer of necessity associated with sexual conduct.  Thus bohemian artists, the underground nightlife, those who live by gambling and later the counter-cultural movements all came to be described as demimonde.  What that meant was these was less of a meaning shift than an expansion, the word now applied to many groups existing in some way not wholly outside the mainstream but neither entirely in conformity.  There were thus many demimondes and that use persists to this day although the air of the glamorous depicted by Dumas is now often absent, some demimondes distinctly squalid and definitely disreputable.

By the late nineteenth century the notion of the demimonde had attracted the avant-garde and non-conformists, their circles of artists, writers and intellectuals in their own way vested with the edgy glamour of the type attached to the salons the well-kept mistresses conducted in parallel with those of the establishment ladies and it’s easy to draw parallels with Andy Warhol’s (1928–1987) Factory in the 1960s which was a magnet for New York’s non-mainstream “creatives” as well as the flotsam and jetsam of the art schools.  Sometimes too, there are echos, the demimonde of Berlin after the fall of the wall (1989) drawing comparisons with that described in the city during the last years the Weimar Republic (1918-1933).  So, the track of demimonde has been (1) mistresses, and women not quite respectable but with funds enough to defy conventions (nineteenth century), (2) the more subversive of the avant-garde added (early twentieth century), (3) bohemian subcultures, various “underground” scenes (mid-late twentieth century) and (4) reflecting the implication of post-modernity, anyone who likes the label.

Sarah Bernhardt (1876), oil on canvas by Georges Clairin (1843-1919).

The Parisian Belle Époque (beautiful era) was the time between the late 1800s and the outbreak of World War I (1914-1918).  For more than a century the period has been celebrated (accurately and not) in art and literature, the great paintings mush sought by collectors.  The Belle Époque is considered still one of Europe’s “golden ages” and although its charms would have escaped most of the working population, for the fortunate few it was a time of vitality and optimism and in some ways modernity’s finest hour until ended by the blast of war.  One trend was the way the cultural hegemony of the private salons of the networks of artists, aristocrats and intellectuals lost some its hold as discourse shifted to the more public (and publicized) realm of the stage, cabriolets and cafés, lending a new theatricality to society life and an essential part was the demimonde, those who operated in the swirling milieu yet were not quite an accepted part of it, their flouting of traditional mores and bourgeois politeness perhaps a little envied but not obviously embraced.  While it could be said to include drug-takers, gamblers and such, the classic exemplar in the spirit of Dumas’ demimonde was the demimondaine, those thrusting women who maintained their elevated (if not respectable) position by parlaying their attractiveness and availability to men willing to pay for the experience.  It usually wasn’t concubinage and certainly not prostitution (as understood) but it was clear les demimondaines belonged with the bohemians and artists of the avant-garde and they were known also as les grandes horizontals or mademoiselles les cocottes (hens) among other euphemisms but for youth and beauty much is tolerated if not forgiven and in all but the inner sanctums of the establishment, mostly there was peaceful co-existence.  Among the demimondaines were many actresses and dancers, a talent to entertain meaning transgressions might be overlooked or at least not much dwelt upon.  Sarah Bernhardt (1844–1923) benefited from that and her nickname monstre sacré (sacred monster) was gained by her enjoying a status which proved protective despite her life of ongoing controversy.  The Irish writer Oscar Wilde (1854–1900) also found a niche as an amusing proto-celebrity with a good stock of one-liners and being part of the demimonde of the not quite respectable was integral to the appeal although being convicted of the abominable crime of buggery proved social suicide. 

Marthe de Florian (1898), oil on canvas by Italian-born society portraitist Giovanni Boldini (1842–1931).  The painter’s style of brushwork saw him dubbed le maître du swish (the master of swish) and he was another of Mademoiselle de Florian’s many lovers.

What tends now to be forgotten is that among the demimonde it was only figures like Bernhardt and Wilde who were well known outside of society gossip.  The once obscure Marthe de Florian (1864–1939) joined the “half worlders” by being, inter-alia, the one-time lover of four subsequent prime ministers of France (a reasonable achievement even given the churn rate in the office) although she took the name she adopted from a banker; nothing really matters except money.  When the details of her life emerged, they inspired the novel A Paris Apartment (2014) by US author Michelle Gable (b 1974), a theme of which was une demimondaine could be distinguished from a common prostitute because the former included (at least as a prelude) romance with the le grande acte (acts of intimacy) and ultimately some financial consideration.  That seems not a small difference and unlike the transactional prostitute, the implication was that to succeed in their specialized profession (debatably a calling), a demimondaine needed the skills associated with the Quai d'Orsay: tact, diplomacy, finesse, daring, low cunning and high charm.  It needed also devotion to the task because for Mlle de Florian to get where she did, she inspired “some three duels, an attempted suicide and at least one déniaisé (sexual initiation) of one lover’s eldest son”.