Grammatology

Grammatology (pronounced gram-uh-tol-uh-jee)

(1) Historically, the scientific study of systems of writing.

(2) In latter-day use, a critique of orthodox linguistics.

Early 1800s (in its original sense): The construct was gramma(r) + -t- + -ology; the modern (some would say post-modern) re-purposing was first used in 1967.  Dating from the mid fourteenth century, grammar was from the Middle English gramery & gramere, from the Old French gramaire (classical learning), from the unattested Vulgar Latin grammāria, an alteration of the Classical Latin grammatica, from the Ancient Greek γραμματική (grammatikḗ) (skilled in writing), from γράμμα (gramma) (line of writing), from γράφω (gráphō) (write), from the primitive Indo-European gerbh (to carve, to scratch).  It displaced the native Old English stæfcræft; a doublet of glamour, glamoury, gramarye & grimoire.  In English, grammar is used to describe the system of rules and principles for the structure of a language (or of languages in general) but in colloquial use it’s applied also to morpology (the internal structure of words) and syntax (the structure of phrases and sentences of a language).  In English, generative grammar (the body of rules producing all the sentences permissible in a given language, while excluding all those not permissible) has for centuries been shifting and it’s now something policed by the so-called “grammar Nazis”, some of whom insist on enforcing “rules” regarded by most as defunct as early as the nineteenth century.

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).  Grammatology & grammatologist are nous, grammatological is an adjective and grammatologically is an adverb; the noun plural is grammatologies.

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

Grammatology in its re-purposed sense was from the French grammatologie, introduced to the world by French philosopher Jacques Derrida (1930-2004) in his book De la grammatologie (Of Grammatology (1967)).  It may be unfair to treat Derrida’s use as a “re-purposing” because although the word grammatology (literally “the study of writing”) had existed since the early nineteenth century, it was a neologism, one of an expanding class of “-ology” words (some of them coined merely for ironic or humorous effect) and there was prior to 1967 scant evidence of use, those studying languages, literature or linguistics able satisfactorily to undertake their work without much needing “grammatology”.  On the basis of the documents thus far digitized, “grammatology” was never an accepted or even commonly used term in academia and although it seems occasionally to have been used variously in fields related to “the study of writing systems” (apparently as a synonym for paleography, epigraphy, writing-system classification or orthographic description) it was only in passing.  Until the modern era, words “going viral” happened relatively infrequently and certainly slowly and, as used prior to 1967, “grammatology” was attached to no theoretical construct or school of thought and described no defined discipline, the word indicative, empirical and neutral.  If “pre-modern” grammatology could be summed up (a probably dubious exercise), it would be thought a technical term for those concerned with scripts, alphabets, symbols and the historical development of writing systems.  Tempting though it may seem, it cannot be thought of as proto-structuralism.

The novelty Derrida introduced was to argue the need for a discipline examining the history, structure and philosophical implications of writing, his particular contention that writing is not secondary to speech, a notion at odds with centuries of Western metaphysics.  At the time, it was seen as a radical departure from orthodoxy, Derrida exploring (in the broadest imaginable way), the possibilities of writing, not simply the familiar physical inscriptions, but anything that functions as “trace,” “differance,” or symbolic marking, the core argument being writing is not secondary to speech (although in the narrow technical sense it may be consequent); rather, it reveals the instability and “constructedness” of language and thereby meaning.

De la grammatologie (First edition, 1967) by Jacques Derrida.

Ambitiously, what Derrida embarked upon was to do to the study something like what Karl Marx (1818-1883) claimed to have done to the theories of Hegel (Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel (1770-1831)): “turn things on their head”, a process that can be classified under four themes: (1) Writing as prior to speech (as opposed to the earlier “Writing is derivative of speech”).  What this meant was writing had to be considered as “originary”, implying structures of difference could precede both writing and speech. (2) Writing (the act as opposed to the content) as a philosophical concept rather than a finite collection of technical objects to be interpreted or catalogued on the basis of their form of assembly.  (3) Grammatology becomes a critique (as opposed to the earlier descriptive tool) of science, reimagining it as a critical discipline exposing the logocentrism of Western thought.  Logocentrism describes the tendency to prioritize “logos” (in academic use a word encompassing words, speech or reason), as the ultimate foundation for truth and meaning (with speech often privileged over writing).  Logocentrism was at the core of the Western philosophical tradition that assumed language accurately and directly can express an external reality, the companion notion being rational thought represents the highest form of knowledge.  Derrida labelled this a false hierarchy that devalued writing and other non-verbal forms of communication and feeling. (4) Writing is expanded beyond literal inscriptions.  Whereas the traditional Western view had been that writing was simply the use of an alphabet, cuneiform, hieroglyphs and such, what Derrida suggested was the concept of writing should be extended to any system of differences, traces, or marks; the condition for meaning itself.

So Derrida took grammatology from an dusty corner of the academy where it meant (for the small number of souls involved) something like “a hypothetical technical study of writing systems” and re-invented it as a philosophical discipline analysing the deeper structures that make any representation or meaning possible.  The notion of it as a tool of analysis is important because deconstruction, the word Derrida and other “celebrity philosophers” made famous (or infamous depending on one’s stance on things postmodern) is often misunderstood as something like “destruction” when really it is a form of analysis.  If Derrida’s subversive idea been presented thirty years earlier (had the author been able to find a publisher), it’s possible it would have been ignored or dismissed by relative few who then read such material.  However, in the post-war years there was an enormous expansion in both the number of universities and the cohorts of academics and students studying in fields which would come to be called “critical theory” so there was a receptive base for ideas overturning orthodoxy, thus the remarkable path deconstruction and postmodernism for decades tracked.

Deconstruction in art, Girl With Balloon by street artist Banksy, before, during & after a (successful) test deconstruction (left) and in its final form (right), London, October 2018.

There is an ephemeral art movement but usually it involves works which wholly are destroyed or entirely disappear.  Banksy’s Girl With Balloon belonged to a sub-category where (1) the deconstruction process was part of the art and (2) the residual elements were “the artwork”.  Banksy’s trick with this one was as the auctioneer’s hammer fell (at Stg£1m), an electric shredder concealed at the base of the frame was activated, the plan being to reduce the work “to shreds” in a pile below.  However, it’s claimed there was a technical glitch and the shredder stopped mid-shred, meaning half remained untouched and half, neatly sliced, hung from the bottom.  As a headline grabbing stunt it worked well but the alleged glitch worked better still, art experts mostly in agreement the work as “half shredded” was more valuable than had it been “wholly shredded” and certainly more than had it remained untouched in the frame.  Thus: “meaning is just another construct which emerges only through differences and deferrals”.

From a distance of sixty-odd years, in the milieu of the strands of thought which are in a sense part of a “new orthodoxy”, it can be hard to understand just what an impact Derrida and his fellow travellers (and, just as significantly, his critics) had and what an extraordinary contribution deconstruction made to the development in thought of so many fields.  Derrida in 1967 of course did not anticipate the revolutionary movement he was about to trigger, hinted at by his book starting life as a doctoral thesis entitled: De la grammatologie: Essai sur la permanence de concepts platonicien, aristotélicien et scolastique de signe écrit. (Of Grammatology: Essay on the Permanence of Platonic, Aristotelian and Scholastic Concepts of the Written Sign).  A typically indigestible title of the type beloved by academics, the clipping for wider distribution was on the same basis as Adolf Hitler’s (1889-1945; Führer (leader) and German head of government 1933-1945 & head of state 1934-1945) publisher deciding Mein Kampf (My Struggle) was snappier than Viereinhalb Jahre (des Kampfes) gegen Lüge, Dummheit und Feigheit (Four and a Half Years [of Struggle] Against Lies, Stupidity and Cowardice).  There’s a reasons authors usually don’t have the final say on titles and cover art.

Derrida acknowledged linguistics in the twentieth century had become a sophisticated form of study but maintained the discipline was failing to examine its most fundamental assumptions; indeed his point was those core values couldn’t be re-evaluated because they provided the framework by which language was understood.  What Derrida indentified as the superstructure which supported all was the commitment to the primacy of speech and presence and because the prevailing position in linguistics was that speech was primary, the assumption worked to shape all that followed.  It was the influence of the Swiss philosopher & semiotician Ferdinand de Saussure (1857–1913) which was profound in positioning speech as the natural, original, living form of language with writing as a secondary, derivative (and, in a sense, artificial although this was never wholly convincing) representation of speech.  What made the Saussureian position seem compelling was it sounded logical, given the consensus it was human speech which predated the development of writing, the latter thus the product of the former and so persuasive was the thesis the hierarchy came to provide the framework for other disciplines within linguistics including phonology (the study of the way sounds function in languages) and morphology (the study of the internal structure of morphemes (the smallest linguistic unit within a word able to support a meaning)that can carry a meaning.  What this meant was syntax was also defined by speech (writing a mere convenient means of exchange) with phonetics (the study of the physical sounds of human speech) the true source of the material language.  Thus for generations, in academic discourse, historical linguistics were documented primarily by an analysis of changes in sound with orthography (the methods by which a language or its sounds are represented by written symbols); a mechanical by-product.

Deconstruction in fashion.  Lindsay Lohan in Theia gown, amfAR gala, New York City, February 2013 (left) and after “deconstruction by scissors” (right).

All gowns are “constructed” (some 3D printed or even “sprayed-on”) but sometimes circumstances demand they be “deconstructed”.  On the night, the shimmering nude and silver bugle-beaded fringe gown from Theia’s spring 2011 collection was much admired but there was an “unfortunate incident” (ie the fabric was torn) and, apparently using a pair of scissors, there was some ad-hoc seamstressery to transform the piece into something described as a “mullet minidress”.  That turned out to be controversial because the gown was on loan for the night but such things are just part of the cost of doing business and, with its Lohanic re-imagining, it’s now an artefact.

Derrida didn’t dispute the historic timelines; his point was that in defining linguistics based on this hierarchy, it became impossible to question the orthodoxy from within.  In a classic example of how deconstruction works, he argued the hierarchy was based not on the historical sequence of events (ie writing coming after speech) but was a culturally defined attachment to the idea of presence, voice and authentic meaning; with speech entrenched in its primacy, no discipline within linguistics was able fully to study writing because of this structural prejudice positioning writing as an auxiliary system, a mere notation of sounds encoding the pre-existing spoken language.  That didn’t mean writing couldn’t be studied (as for centuries it had been) but that it could be considered only a tool or artefact used to record speech and never a primary object of meaning.  While there were all sorts of reasons to be interested in writing, for the reductionists who needed to get to the essence of meaning, writing could only ever be thought something mechanistic and thus was philosophically uninteresting.  So, if linguistics was unable to analyse writing as (1) a structure independent of speech, (2) a fundamental element of thought processes, (3) a source of new or changed meanings or (4) a construct where cultural and philosophical assumptions are revealed, that would imply only speech could create meaning with writing a mere form of its expression.  Daringly thus, what Derrida demanded was for writing to be seen as conceptually prior to speech, even if as a physical phenomenon it came later.  In 1967, linguistics couldn’t do that while maintaining the very foundations on which it was built.

Never has there been published a "Grammatology for Dummies" but there is The Complete Idiot's Guide to Literary Theory and Criticism (2013) by Dr Steven J. Venturino.

At this point things became more technical but Derrida did provide a simplified model, explaining linguistics existed as the study of signs and not of traces, his work depending ultimately on certain distinctions: (1) Signs assume stable signifieds and (2) traces imply meaning is always deferred but never present.  For orthodox linguistics to work, the assumption had to be that signs enjoy a stability of meaning within a system; this Derrida dismissed as illusory arguing (1) meaning is just another construct which emerges only through differences and deferrals, (2) no signified is ever (or can ever fully be) “present” and (3) speech is no closer to meaning than writing.  By its own definitions in 1967, linguistics could not accommodate that because (1) its methods depended on systematic relations sufficiently stable to permit analysis, (2) it needed constant objects (definable units such as phonemes, morphemes and rules of syntax), syntactic structures) and (3) it relied on signs which could be described with the required consistency (ie “scientifically”).  Any approach grounding in trace and difference lay beyond the boundaries of orthodox linguistics.

So the conflict would seem irreconcilable but that’s true only if viewed through the lens of a particular method; really, linguistics was empirical and grammatology was philosophical and in that were alternative rather than competing or even parallel paths.  If linguistics was a system of codification, then grammatology was a critique of the foundations of linguistics and Derrida made clear he was not attempting to reform linguistics simply because that couldn’t be done; any attempt to interpolate his ideas into the discipline would have meant it ceased to be linguistics.  He wanted a new discipline, one which rather than empirically describing and categorising language and its elements, stood back and asked what in the first place made such systems possible.  That meant it was a transcendental rather than empirical process, one studying the conditions of representation and the metaphysics implicit in the idea of signification.  Writing thus was not merely marks on a surface but a marker of a difference in being.

The twist in the tale is that although De la grammatologie was highly influential (especially after an Edition appeared in English in 1976), grammatology never became a defined, institutionalised academic field in the way Derrida envisioned it at least supplementing departments of linguistics, anthropology and philosophy.  That was due less to the well-documented phenomenon of institutional inertia than it proving impossible for any consensus to be reached about what exactly “grammatological analysis” was or what constituted “grammatological research”.  Pleasingly, it was the structuralists who could account for that by explaining grammatology was a critique of the metaphysics underlying other disciplines rather than a method for generating new empirical knowledge.  Fields, they noted, were likely organically to grow as the tools produced were picked up by others to be applied to tasks; grammatology was a toolbox for dismantling tools.

Jacques Derrida with pipe, deconstructing some tobacco.

Even if Derrida’s concepts proved sometimes too vague even for academics the influence was profound and, whether as a reaction or something deterministic (advances in computer modelling, neurology and such), the discipline of linguistics became more rather than less scientific, the refinements in the field of generative grammar in particular seen as something of a “doubling down” of resistance to Derrida’s critique, something reflected too in anthropology which came even more to value fieldwork and political economy, philosophical critiques of writing thought less helpful.  So the specialists not only clung to their speciality but made it more specialized still.  Grammatology did however help create genuinely new movements in literary theory, the most celebrated (and subsequently derided) being deconstruction where Derrida’s ideas such as interpretation being an infinite play of differences and the meaning of texts being inherently unstable created one of the more radical schools of thought in the post-war West, introducing to study concepts such as paratext (how academics “read between and beyond the lines) the trace (the mark of something absent, a concept that disrupts the idea of pure presence and self-contained meaning) and marginalia (used here as an abstract extension of what an author may have “written in the margins” to encompass that which may seem secondary to the main point but is actually crucial to understanding the entire structure of thought, blurring the (literal) line between what lies inside and outside a text).

Derrida for Beginners (2007) by Jim Powell (illustrated by Van Howell).  On has to start somewhere.

The movement became embedded in many English and Comparative Literature departments as well as in post-structuralism and Continental philosophy.  Modern beasts like media studies & cultural theory are (in their understood form) unthinkable without deconstruction and if grammatology didn’t become “a thing”, its core elements (difference, trace etc) for decades flourished (sometimes to the point of (published) absurdity) and although not all agree, some do argue it was Derrida’s subversion in 1967 which saw the field of semiotics emerge to “plug the gaps” left by the rigidity of traditional linguistics.  Of course, even if grammatology proved something of a cul-de-sac, Derrida’s most famous fragment: “Il n'y a pas de hors-texte” (literally “there is no outside-text” endured to underpin deconstruction and postmodernism generally.  Intriguingly for a concept from linguistics, the phrase took on a new life in the English-speaking world where it came to be understood as “everything is text”, an interpretation which created a minor publishing industry.  In English, it’s a marvellously literalist use and while it does to an extent overlap with the author’s original intention, Derrida meant there is (1) no access to pure, unmediated presence and (2) no meaning outside interpretation and no experience outside context.  In using texte he was referring to the interplay of differences, traces, relations, and contexts that make meaning possible (ie not literally the words as they appear on a page).  What that meant was all acts were “textual” in that they must be interpreted and are intelligible only within systems of meaning; the phrase a philosophical statement about signification and mediation, not characters printed on page.

Fiveable's diagram of what we need to know to understand literature.  Hope this helps.

However, demonstrating (in another way) the power of language, the “everything is text”) movement (“cult” may once have been a better word) in English came to be understood as meaning no reality could exist beyond language; everything (literally!) is text because it is words and discourse which both construct and describe reality.  That notion might have remained in an obscure .ivory tower were it not for the delicious implication that values such as right & wrong and true & false are also pieces of text with meanings able to be constructed and deconstructed.  That meant there was no stable “truth” and nothing objectively was “wrong”; everything just a construct determined by time, place and circumstances.  That Derrida never endorsed this shocking relativism was noted by some but academics and students found so intoxicating the notion of right & wrong being variables that “everything is text” took on a life of its own as a kind of selective nihilism which is, of course, quite postmodern.  Again, language was responsible because the French texte was from the Latin textus, from texō (weave) and while in French it can mean “text” (in the English sense), among philosophers it was used metaphorically to suggest “weave together”; “an interconnected structure” in the sense of the Latin textus (woven fabric); it was this meaning Derrida used.  Had the English-speaking world remained true to the original spirit of Il n'y a pas de hors-texte it would have entered the textbooks as something like “There is nothing outside the interplay of signs and contexts; There is no meaning outside systems of interpretation” and perhaps have been forgotten but “everything is text” defined and seduced a movement.  Thus, it can be argued things either were “lost in translation” or “transformed by translation” but for the neo- Derridaists there’s the satisfaction of knowing the meaning shift was an example of “grammatology in action”.

Penthouse

Penthouse (pronounced pent-hous)

(1) An apartment or dwelling on the roof of a building, usually set back from the outer walls.

(2) Any specially designed apartment on an upper floor, especially the top floor, of a building.

(3) A structure on a roof for housing elevator machinery, a water tank etc.

(4) Any roof-like shelter or overhanging part.

(5) In real tennis, a corridor having a slanted roof and projecting from three walls of the court.

(6) As mechanical penthouse, a floor, usually directly under a flat-roof, used to house mechanical plant & equipment.

(7) A special-interest magazine, aimed at a mostly male audience and published in several editions by a variety of owners between 1965-2023.

1520–1530: Despite the appearance penthouse is not a portmanteau (pent + house) word.  Penthouse is an alteration (by folk etymology) of the Middle English pentis, pentiz & pendize (and other spellings), from the Old French apentiz & apentis (appendage, attached building), the construct being apent (past participle of apendre (to hang against)) + -iz (the French -is ) from the unattested Vulgar Latin –ātīcium (noun use of neuter of the unattested –ātīcius, the construct being the Latin -āt(us) (past participle suffix) + -īcius (the adjectival suffix)).  Old French picked up apentis from the Medieval Latin appendicium (from the Classical Latin appendo (to hang) & appendere (to hang from).  A less common alternative variant to describe a shed with a sloping roof projecting from a wall or the side of a building was pentice.  Penthouse is a noun & verb, penthousing is a verb and penthoused & penthouslike are adjective; the noun plural is penthouses.  The adjectives penthouseish & penthousesque are non-standard.

Penthouse magazine, December 1993.

First published in 1965, Penthouse magazine was one of many ventures (in many fields) which proved unwilling or unable to adapt to the changes wrought by the internet and the atomization of the delivery of content; its last print edition (after a few stuttering years) appeared in 2023 although there must remain some perception of value in the name because of the decades-long prominence of the title and it's not impossible there will be a revival, even if it's unlikely to re-appear in the glossy magazine format of old.  In Australia, for students of the print industry the comparison between the “men’s magazines” Penthouse and Playboy (first published in 1953, on-line since 2020 and a print “annual edition” appeared in 2025) was something like that between the “women’s magazines” Cosmopolitan (since 1965 in its current niche) and Cleo (1972-2016) in that the two pairings were superficially similar but different in emphasis.  Not too much should be made of that because although identifiably there were “Cosmo women” & “Cleo women” (presumably with some overlap at the margins), between Penthouse and Playboy there were probably more similarities than variations.  Structuralists explained the difference between the two genres: “men’s magazines” were bought by men so they could look at pictures of women not wearing clothes while “women’s magazines” were bought by women so they could look at pictures of women wearing clothes.

View from the penthouse in which Lindsay Lohan lived in 2014, W Residences, Manhattan, New York City.

When the lovely Ms Schiffer appeared on the cover of the December 1993 edition of Penthouse, the editors may not have been aware of the beast which was coming to consume them but it was in April 1993 CERN (in 1953 the Conseil Européen pour la Recherche Nucléaire (European Council for Nuclear Research) but the following year re-named Organisation européenne pour la recherche nucléaire (European Organization for Nuclear Research) with the acronym retained because it was both more mnemonic and pronounceable than OERN) released into the public domain details of technology which would allow the free development of applications using the www (world wide web) which ran atop the internet, making indexed content more easily accessible and distributable.  When in April 1993 the NCSA (National Center for Supercomputing Applications) released version 1.0 of its Mosaic web browser, it triggered a social and industrial revolution which (variously on TikTok, X (formerly known as Twitter), FoxNews and such) continues to unfold.  Mosaic wasn’t the first web browser but it was the first to gain a critical mass and the applications which superseded it claimed many victims including Penthouse magazine.

Iso, the Grifo and the Penthouse

1965 Iso Grifo Bizzarini A3/C, Le Mans, 1965.

One of the most admired of the trans-Atlantic hybrids of the post-war years (1945-1973) which combined elegant coachwork, (hopefully) high standards of craftsmanship and the effortless, low-cost power of large-displacement American V8 engines, the Iso Grifo was produced between 1965-1974 by the Italian manufacturer Iso Autoveicoli.  Styled by Bertone’s Giorgetto Giugiaro (b 1938) with engineering handled by the gifted Giotto Bizzarrini (1926-2023), the Grifo initially used a 327 cubic inch (5.3 litre) version of the small-block Chevrolet V8, coupled with the equally ubiquitous Borg-Warner (four & five speed) manual gearbox or robust General Motors (GM) Turbo-Hydramatic automatics.  Later, after some had been built with the big-block Chevrolet V8, GM began to insist on being paid up-front for hardware so Iso negotiated with the more accommodating Ford Motor Company (FoMoCo) and switched to 351 cubic inch (5.8 litre) versions of their 335 (Cleveland) engine.

1955 Iso Isetta.

Iso was already familiar with the mechanical configuration, production of their Rivolta coupe, equipped also with the Chevrolet 327, having begun in 1962.  The Rivolta, let alone the Grifo was quite a change of direction for Iso which until then had produced a variety of appliances, scooters & moto-cycles, it’s most famous product the Isetta, one of the generation of “bubble cars” which played such a part in putting Europeans back on (three or four) wheels during the re-construction of the early post-war years.  Surprisingly, despite the prominence of the Isetta name and the Italian association, barely a thousand were actually manufactured by Iso, the overwhelming majority produced in many countries by BMW and others to which a license was granted.  The bubble cars were a product of the economic circumstances of post-war Europe and the ones produced in England even used the single rear wheel which had been abandoned by Iso because of the inherent instability; UK taxation laws made three-wheelers significantly cheaper and only a motor-cycle license was required to drive one.  Powered by tiny two and four-stroke engines, their popularity waned as “real” cars such as the Fiat 500 (1955-1975) and later the BMC (British Motor Corporation) Mini (1959-2000) emerged; although costing little more than the bubble cars, they offered more space, performance and practicality.  By the early 1960s, the bubble cars were almost extinct but, as a tiny specialized niche, they never completely vanished and the Isetta is enjoying a twenty-first century revival as model urban transportation, including the option of (Greta Thunberg (b 2003) approved) electric propulsion.  Once dismissed as dated and even absurd, their bug-eyed look is now thought to have "retro-charm".

1968 Iso Rivolta.

The Rivolta was thus quite a jump up-market and, while the engine wasn't the bespoke thoroughbred found in a Ferrari or Aston-Martin, the rest of the specification justified the high price.  Unlike some of the British interpretations using American V8s, Iso insisted on modernity, the platform probably the best of the era with a body welded to a pressed-steel chassis, a combination which proved both light and stiff.  Just as importantly, given the high rate of corporate failure among those attracted to this potentially lucrative market, it was cost-effective to manufacture, reliable and easy to service.  Probably the feature which let it rank with the most accomplished of the era was the sophisticated de Dion rear suspension which, combined with four wheel disc brakes, lent it a rare competence (surprising some Maserati and Ferrari drivers, their cars with rear suspension designs dating from the horse & buggy era).  The de Dion design was not an independent arrangement but certainly behaved as if it was and, despite what Mercedes-Benz claimed of their beloved swing-axles, was superior to many of the independent setups on offer.  A noted benefit of the de Dion system is it ensures the rear wheels remain always parallel, quite an important feature in an axle which has to transmit to the road the high torque output of a big V8, a lesson Swiss constructor Peter Monteverdi (1934–1998) applied later in the decade when he went into production using even bigger engines.  Iso, with a solid base in accounting and production-line economics, ran an efficient and profitable operation not beset by the recurrent financial crises which afflicted so many and the elegant Rivolta was a success, remaining available until 1970.  Some eight hundred were sold.

1967 Iso Grifo Series One.

The Rivolta’s platform proved adaptable.  In 1965, Iso released the Grifo coupé which was more overtly oriented to outright performance and strictly a two-seater.  With lovely lines and a modified version of the Rivolta’s fine chassis, the Grifo was another product of the fertile imaginations of Giugiaro & Bizzarrini but, in something not untypical in Italian industry of the time, the relationship between the latter and Iso’s founder Renzo Rivolta (1908–1966) soon became strained and was sundered.  Bizzarrini would go on to do remarkable things and Iso’s engineers assumed complete control of the Grifo after the first few dozen had been completed.  Bizzarrini had pursued a twin-stream development, a competition version called the A3/C with a lower, lightweight aluminum body as well as the road-going A3/L and when he decamped, he took with him the A3/C, to be released also under his name while Iso devoted its attentions to the A3/L, again using engine-transmission combinations borrowed from the Chevrolet Corvette.

1964 Iso Grifo A3/L Spider prototype by Bertone.

The Grifo weighed a relatively svelte 1430 kg (3153 lbs) in what must have been a reasonably slippery shape because the reports at the time confirmed some 240 km/h (150 mph) was easily attained, an increase on that managed by the C2 Corvette (1962-1967 and which turned out to be not aerodynamically efficient as it looked) and, when configured with the taller gearing the factory offered, the factory claimed 260 km/h (162 mph), was possible.  A test in the UK in 1966 almost matched that with a verified 161 mph (259 km/h) recorded and two years later, the US publication Car & Driver 1968 tested a 327 Grifo but didn't to a top-speed run, instead estimating 157 mph (253 km/h) should be possible given enough road.  There were surprisingly few variations, fewer than two-dozen made with a targa-style removable roof panel and a single, achingly lovely roadster was displayed on Bertone's stand at the 1964 Geneva Motor Show; it remained a one-off although a couple of coupés privately have been converted.  What made the Bertone prototype special however was it was a companion to the original A3/L prototype coupé with which it shared a number of distinctive features including (1) a side exhaust rakishly snaking through the passenger side of the cowl and under the rocker panel trim with its an almost matte finish, (2) frontal styling with the then fashionable “twin-nostril” fascia and (3) angled vents in the rear fenders.  Although visually similar to the series production Grifos, almost every line on the pair of A3/L prototypes was in some subtle way different.

The one-off Iso Grifo Spider on Bertone's stand, 1964 Geneva Salon, 1964 (left) and as discovered in Rudi Klein's famous shed, Los Angeles, 2024 (right). 

Although well-known in the collector community for its large stocks of rusty and wrecked Porsches, Mercedes-Benz and other notable vehicles from the post-war years, the Californian “junkyard” belonging to Rudi Klein (1936-2001) attracted world-wide interest when details were published of the gems which had for decades been secreted in the site's large and secure shed.  Mr Klein was a German butcher who in the late 1950s emigrated to the US to work at his trade but quickly discovered a more enjoyable and lucrative living could be had dealing in damaged or wrecked European cars, sometimes selling the whole vehicles and sometimes the parts (“parting out” in junkyard parlance).  His Porsche Foreign Auto business had operated for some time before he received a C&D (cease & desist) letter from the German manufacturer’s US attorneys, the result being the name change in 1967 to Porche (sic) Foreign Auto.  Unlike many collectors, Mr Klein amassed his collection unobtrusively and, astonishingly to many, apparently with little interest in turning a profit on the rarest, despite some of them coming to be worth millions.  After Mr Klein died in 2001, his two sons preserved the collection untouched until, in October 2024,the auction house Sotheby’s began a series of rolling sales, one to go under the hammer the one-off Grifo spider.  At some point there was an accident which damaged the nose so a standard Grifo facia was installed and in this form Mr Klein ran it for a while as a road car before parking it in the shed among its illustrious companions.  Remarkably original except for the nose, it sold for US$1,875,000 and the expectation is it will be fully restored (including a fabricated replica of the original nose) before appearing on the show circuit.  In the decades to come, it will likely spend its time in collections with the occasional outings to auction houses.

1970 Iso Grifo Targa (left) Series Two and 1971 Iso Grifo Can-Am (454) Targa.  Only four Series II Can-Ams were built with the targa roof.

The bodywork was revised in 1970, subsequent cars listed as Series Two models.  The revisions included detail changes to the interior, improvements to the increasingly popular air-conditioning system and some alterations to the body structure, the hydraulics and electrical system, some necessitated by new regulatory requirements in Europe but required mostly in an attempt to remain compliant with the more onerous US legislation.  The most obvious change was to the nose, the headlamps now partially concealed by flaps which raised automatically when the lights were activated.  Presumably the smoother nose delivered improved aerodynamics but the factory made no specific claims, either about performance or the drag co-efficient (CD) number.

1972 Iso Lele & 1972 Iso Fidia.

In 1972, an unexpected change in the power-train was announced.  After almost a decade exclusively using Chevrolet engines, Iso issued a press release confirming that henceforth, the Series Two Grifo would be powered by Ford’s Boss 351 cubic inch (5.8 litre) 335 series (Cleveland) V8.  In the state of tune (close to that fellow Italian specialist De Tomaso were using in their mid-engined Pantera) chosen, the Ford engine was similar in size, weight to the small-block Chevrolet and delivered similar power and torque characteristics so the driving experience differed little although there were 22 high-performance Leles using a tuned 351, all with a ZF five-speed manual gearbox.  The other improvement in performance was presumably Iso’s balance sheet.  The switch had been made because internal policy changes at GM meant they were now insisting on being paid up-front for their product whereas Ford was still prepared to mail an invoice with a payment term.  The change extended to the other models in the range, the Lele coupé and Fidia saloon and while the Chevrolet/Ford split in the Lele was 125/157, the circumstances of the time meant that of the 192 Fidias made, only 35 were fitted with the 351.

1969 Iso Grifo 7 Litre (427).

One of the trends which made machines of the 1960s so memorable was a tendency never to do in moderation what could be done in excess.  In 1968, Iso announced the Grifo 7 Litre, built following the example of the US manufacturers who had with little more than a pencil and the back of an envelope worked out the economics of simple seven litre engines were more compelling than adding expensive components like overhead camshafts and fuel-injection to five litre engines; in the US, gas (petrol) was then relatively cheap and and assumed by most to be limitless.  Gas wasn’t as cheap in Italy or the rest of Europe but Iso’s target market for the Grifo was those who either could afford the running costs or (increasingly) paid their bills with OPM (other people’s money) so in those circles fuel consumption wasn’t something often considered or much discussed.  The new version used a 427 cubic inch (7.0 litre) version of the big-block Chevrolet V8, bigger and heavier than the 327 so the driving characteristics of the nose-heavy machine were changed but contemporary reports praised the competence of the chassis, the de Dion rear-end notably superior in behavior compared with the Corvette’s independent rear suspension although some did note it took skill (which meant often using some restraint) effectively to use the prodigious power.  Tellingly, the most receptive market for the Grifos, small and big-block, was the  FRG (Bundesrepublik Deutschland (Federal Republic of Germany; the old West Germany) 1949-1990) with its network of highways without the tiresome speed limits elsewhere imposed and (even in Italy), often enforced.  The Autobahn really was the Grifo's native environment.

1971 Iso Grifo Can Am (454).

Faster it certainly was although the factory’s claim of a top speed of 186 mph (a convenient 300 km/h) did seem optimistic to anyone with a slide-rule and there appears not to be any record of anyone verifying the number although one published test did claim to have seen well over 255 km/h (150 mph) with the Grifo still "strongly accelerating" before “running out of road”.  It had by then become a genuine problem.  Gone were the happy times when testers still did their work on public roads; increased traffic volumes by the late 1960s meant the often deserted stretches of highway (in 1956 an English journalist had taken a Mercedes-Benz 300SLR Coupé to 183 mph (294 km/h) on the autobahn) were now rare but whatever the terminal velocity, nobody seemed to suggest the 7 litre Grifo lacked power.  In 1970, after Iso’s stock of the by-then out-of-production triple carburetor 427 were exhausted, the big-block car was re-named Can-Am and equipped instead with a 454 cubic inch (7.5 litre) version, the name an allusion to the unlimited displacement Group 7 sports car racing series run in North America in which the big-block Chevrolets were long the dominant engine.

Despite the increased displacement, power actually dropped a little because the 454 was detuned a little to meet the then still modest anti-emission regulations.  Officially, the 454 was rated at 395 HP (gross horsepower) but the numbers in that era were often at best indicative: The Boss 429 Mustang was said to produce 375 HP whereas the 500 cubic inch (8.2 litre) V8 in the FWD! (front-wheel-drive) Cadillac Eldorado was rated at 400; a comparison of their performance belies the numbers and the difference is not all accounted for by the Eldorado's weight and power-sapping accessories.  As early as the the mid-1960s Detroit had begun understating the output of many of their high-performance engines and as politicians and insurance companies (for their own reasons) became interested, the trend continued.    

1971 Iso Grifo Can Am (454).

Unlike the 427 which breathed through three two barrel carburetors, the 454 was equipped with less intricate induction, a single four barrel and while with output (officially) dropping from 435 to 395 HP, performance was s little blunted although it's probable few owners often went fast enough to tell the difference.  What didn’t change between the 7 Litre and the Can Am was its most distinctive feature, the modification to the hood (bonnet) made to ensure the additional height of the 427's induction system could be accommodated.  The raised central section, the factory dubbed "the penthouse".

Penthouse on 1969 Iso Grifo 7 Litre (427).

Not everyone admired the stark simplicity, supposing, not unreasonably, Giugiaro might have done something more in sympathy with its surroundings.  Critics more stern would have preferred a curvaceous scoop, blister or bulge and thought the penthouse amateurish, an angular discordance bolted unhappily atop Giugiaro’s flowing lines  but for those brought up in the tradition of brutalist functionalism, it seemed an admirable tribute to what lay beneath.  The days of the big-block Grifo were however numbered.  In 1972, with Chevrolet no longer willing to extent credit and Ford’s big-block (429 & 460) engines re-tuned as low-emission (for the time) units suitable for pickup trucks and luxury cars, the Can-Am was retired.  So the small-block 351 Grifo became the sole model in the range but it too fell victim to changing times, production lasting not long beyond the first oil shock (triggered by the OAPEC (Organization of Arab Petroleum Exporting Countries) on 17 October 1973 imposing an embargo on crude oil exports to certain countries) which made gas suddenly not only much more expensive but sometimes also scarce and the whole ecosystem of the thirsty trans-Atlantic hybrids became threatened; in little more than a year, Iso was one of the many dinosaurs driven extinct.  Decades later, the survivors of the 414 sold are highly desirable; fine examples of the small-block Grifos attract over US$500,000, the few dozen penthouse have sold for close to a million and the rare early A3/Cs for even more.

From the lost, tactile days of buttons and toggle switches: 1966 Iso Grifo, one of 31 built in RHD (right hand drive).

Not fans of brutalist functionalism were the Lancia-loving types at Road & Track (R&T) magazine in the US.  Late in 1974, R&T published their 1975 buyer’s guide for imported and domestically-built smaller cars (R&T neither approving of nor understanding why anyone would wish to buy a big American car) and surprisingly, there were reviews of the Grifo, Lele and Fidia although the last of these sold in the US some two years earlier had been titled as 1973 models, the company having never sought to certification to continue sales although, given nothing had been done to modify them to meet the new safety regulations, that would likely have been pointless unless the strategy was to seek a "low volume" exemption, something improbable by 1975.

A tale of two penthouses: Paradoxically, as installed in the Grifo the induction system of the big-block Chevrolet V8 sat a little lower than that of the small-block Ford (a not unusual anomaly in the small-block vs big-block world) so the Ford-engined Grifos (right) used a taller penthouse than those fitted with the Chevrolet unit.     

The distributors had however indicated to the press all three would return to the US market in 1975, supplying publicity photographs which included a Series II "penthouse" Grifo.  A further complication was that during 1974, Ford had discontinued in the US production of the high-performance 351 (the "Cleveland" 335 series which was exiled to Australia) V8 so it wasn't clear what power-train would have been used.  Others had the same problem, De Tomaso (which withdrew from the US market in 1974) switching to use tuned versions of the Australian-built 351s but for Iso, the whole issue became irrelevant as the factory was closed late in 1974.  R&T's last thoughts on the penthouse appeared in the buyer's guide: "However, the clean lines of the original Grifo have been spoiled by that terrible looking outgrowth on the hood used for air cleaner clearance.  For US$28,500 (around US$155,000 in 2025 US$ although direct translation of value is difficult to calculate because of the influence of exchange rates and other variables), a better solution to this problem should have been found."

Cape & Cloak

Cape (pronounced keyp)

(1) A sleeveless garment of various lengths, fastened around the neck and falling loosely from the shoulders, worn separately or attached to a coat or other outer garment.

(2) The capa of a bullfighter.

(3) The act of caping.

(4) Of a matador or capeador during a bullfight, to induce and guide the charge of a bull by flourishing a capa.

(5) A piece of land jutting into the sea or some other large body of water; a headland or promontory

(6) In nautical use, of a ship said to have good steering qualities or to head or point; to keep a course.

(7) As The Cape (always initial capital letters), pertaining to the Cape of Good Hope or to (historically) to all South Africa.

(8) To skin an animal, particularly a deer.

(9) To gaze or stare; to look for, search after (obsolete).

1350–1400: From the (northern dialect) Middle English cap, from the Old English cāp, from the Middle French cape & Old Provençal capa, from the Vulgar Latin capum from the Latin caput (head) and reinforced in the sixteenth century by the Spanish capa, from the Late Latin cappa (hooded cloak).  A fork in the Late Old English was capa, & cæppe (cloak with a hood), directly from Late Latin.  In Japanese the word is ケープ (kēpu).  The sense of a "promontory, piece of land jutting into a sea or lake" dates from the late fourteenth century, from the Old French cap (cape; head) from the Latin caput (headland, head), from the primitive Indo-European kaput (head).  The Cape of Good Hope at the southern tip of Africa has been called the Cape since the 1660s, and sailors in 1769 named the low cloud banks that could be mistaken for landforms on the horizon, Cape fly-away.  The obsolete sense of gazing or staring at something & to look for or search after is from the Middle English capen (to stare, gape, look for, seek), from the Old English capian (to look), from the Proto-West Germanic kapēn.  It was cognate with the Dutch gapen, the German gaffen (to stare at curiously) and the Low German gapen (to stare); related to the Modern English keep.

Cardinal George Pell (1941-2023) in Cappa Magna (great cape) with caudatario (train-bearer).  The church's rituals vie with the Eurovison Song Contest and the Sydney Gay & Lesbian Mardi Gras for having the most variety in men's costuming.

Copes are one of many capes in the extensive wardrobe of Roman Catholic clerics and the highlight of any ecclesiastical fashion parade is the silk cappa magna.  Technically a jurisdictional garment, it’s now rarely seen and worn only in processions or when "in choir" (attending but not celebrating services).  Cardinals wear red and bishops violet and both cardinals and papal nuncios are entitled to a cappa magna of watered silk.  Well into the twentieth century, a cappa magna could stretch for nearly 15 metres, (50 feet) but Pius XII’s (1876-1958; pope 1939-1958) motu proprio (literally “on his own impulse”, essentially constitutionally the same as a royal decree which unilaterally creates law) Valde solliciti (1952) laid down that they should not be longer than 7m (23 feet) and later instructions from the Vatican banned them from Rome and curtailed their use elsewhere.  Valde solliciti translates literally as “very worried” and Pius in 1952 was clearly exactly that, concerned at complaints that the extravagance of the Church’s rituals was inappropriate at a time of such troubled austerity.  There was in 1952 still little sign of the remarkable post-war economic recovery which within a decade would be critiqued in Federico Fellini's (1920–1993) film La Dolce Vita (The Sweet Life, 1960).

Actor Anya Taylor-Joy (b 1996) in ankle-length, collared houndstooth cape with matching mini-skirt by Jonathan Anderson (b 1984; creative director of Christian Dior since 2025) over a sleeveless, white, button-down vest and black, stiletto pumps, Paris Fashion Week, October, 2025.

The car is a Rolls-Royce Silver Spirit (1980-1997), the first of the SZ Series platform which would serve the line until 2003.  The Silver Spirit (and the companion LWB (long wheelbase) variant the Silver Spur (1980-2000)) was mechanically little changed from the Silver Shadow (1965-1980) but with styling updated with hints from the still controversial Camargue (1975-1986), a somewhat ungainly two-door saloon designed by Pininfarina which, as an addition to the range which included the conceptually identical Corniche (under various names available since 1966), appeared to have no purpose other than being positioned as the “world’s most expensive car” but that was apparently enough; even in the troubled 1970s, there was a demand for Veblen products.

In the closet: The ensemble awaits.

There were nice touches in the cape, a highlight of the detailing the arpeggiating used for the hem.  In sewing, the arpeggiated stitch is a technique in hand-stitching that creates an invisible and durable finish by catching only a single thread from the main fabric with each stitch.  This demands the hem be folded, turning the garment inside out allowing a hand-held needle to form small, V-shaped stitches by piercing the seam allowance and then the main fabric.  For the necessary robustness to be achieved, the stitching is kept deliberately loose (preventing pulling which would distort the line) with the finished hem pressed and steamed further to conceal the stitch-work.  Obviously labor intensive and therefore expensive to implement, it’s used in garments where the most immaculate finish is desired and although it’s now possible partially to emulate the effect using machine-stitching, the fashion houses know that for their finest, the old ways are best.

Poetry in motion: The lovely Anya Taylor-Joy on the move, illustrating the way the fashion industry cuts its capes to provide a "framing effect" for the rest of the outfit.

Amusingly, although the industry is sensitive to the issue of cultural appropriation (and especially so if matters end up in court), the term “arpeggiated” was “borrowed” from music.  In music, arpeggiate describes the playing of a chord as an arpeggio (the notes of a chord played individually instead of simultaneously, moving usually from lowest to highest but the same word is used whether notes are rising or falling).  It was from the Italian arpeggiare (to play on a harp), the construct being arpa (harp) +‎ -eggiare (a suffix from the Late Latin -izāre and used to form verbs from adjectives or nouns).  The connection comes from the harp’s sound being associated with flowing sequences of notes rather than “block sounds”.  So, the word can be understood as meaning “broken into a rhythmic or sequential pattern, note by note” and the use in sewing (as “arpeggiated stitch”) took the metaphorically from the musical term, referencing a series of short, regularly spaced diagonal or looped stitches that create a flowing, undulating pattern (ie a rising and falling wave-like progression rather than a static block).

Anya Taylor-Joy in cape, swishing around.

Capes often are spoken of as having an “equestrian look” and it’s true capes do have a long tradition on horseback, both in military and civilian use although in fashion the traditional cut of the fabric has evolved into something better thought of as a “framing effect” for what is worn beneath.  That differs from the more enveloping capes worn by those in professions as diverse as cavalry officers and nomadic sheep herders form whom a cape was there to afford protection from the elements and to act as barrier to the dust and mud which is a way of life in such professions.  On the catwalks and red carpets there’s not usually much mud thrown about (other than metaphorically when the “best & worst dressed” lists appear) and the cape is there just for the visual effect.  That effect is best understood on the move because a cape on its hanger is a lifeless thing whereas when on someone walking so it can flow, coming alive; models become expert in exploiting the billowing made possible by the “sail-like” behavior of the fabric when the fluid dynamics of air are allowed to do their stuff.  A skilled model can make a cape swish seductively.

Imelda Marcos (she of “the shoes”, b 1929; First Lady of the Philippines 1965-1986, left) and General Augusto Pinochet (1915-2006; dictator of Chile 1973-1990) at the funeral of Generalissimo Francisco Franco (1892-1975; Caudillo of Spain 1939-1975), Plaza de Oriente, Madrid, Spain, 23 November, 1975.  Franco was something of a model for Pinochet in terms of approach to public administration (having tiresome people “disappeared” or taken outside and shot etc) but not so much in sartorial matters, the Caudillo never having shown much fondness for capes.

Franco’s body originally was interred in a granite and marble crypt beneath the basilica floor of Valle de los Caídos (Valley of the Fallen), a mausoleum & memorial site in the Sierra de Guadarrama mountain range close to Madrid, built by order of the Generalissimo at the end of the Spanish Civil War (1936-1939).  The vast structure, officially opened in 1959, was said the government to be a “national act of atonement” and symbol of reconciliation but controversies about the war and Franco’s subsequent dictatorship were only ever suppressed and in the decades after his death the political and legal manoeuvres to remove from public display all the many relics of the glorification of the victory and dictatorship gathered strength.  In October 2019, his remains were exhumed from the mausoleum and re-interred in the Mingorrubio Cemetery in El Pardo, this time in a family crypt, an event which much divided opinion.  The forces unleashed by the civil war and its decades-long aftermath remain a cleavage in Spanish society and political scientists expect the tensions to continue, even after the war passes from living memory.  In his last public speech a few weeks before his death, Franco had warned the country it remained threatened by a conspiracy involving “communists, left-wing terrorists and Freemasons”.

Cloak (pronounced klohk)

(1) A wrap-like outer garment fastened at the throat and falling straight from the shoulders.

(2) Something that covers or conceals; disguise; pretense.

(3) To cover with or as if with a cloak.

(4) To hide; conceal.

(5) In internet use, a text replacement for an IRC user's hostname or IP address, which makes the user less identifiable.

1175–1225: From the Middle English cloke, from the Old North French cloque, from the Old French cloche & cloke (traveling cloak) from the Medieval Latin cloca (travelers' cape), a variant of clocca (bell-shaped cape (literally “a bell”) and of Celtic origin, from the Proto-Celtic klokkos (and ultimately imitative).  The best known mention of cloak in scripture is in 1 Thessalonians 2:5: For neither at any time “vsed wee flattering wordes, as yee knowe, nor a cloke of couetousnesse, God is witnesse”

The cloak was an article of everyday wear as a protection from the weather for either sex in Europe for centuries, use fluctuating but worn well into the twentieth century, a noted spike happening when revived in the early 1800s as a high-collared circular form fashion garment, then often called a Spanish cloak.  The figurative use "that which covers or conceals; a pretext" dates from the 1520s.  The adjectival phrase cloak-and-dagger is attested from 1848, said to be a translation of the French de cape et d'épée, as something suggestive of stealthy violence and intrigue.  Cloak-and-sword was used from 1806 in reference to the cheap melodramatic romantic adventure stories then published, a similar use to the way sword-and-sandals was used dismissively to refer to the many films made during the 1950s which were set during the Roman Empire.  The cloak-room (or cloakroom), "a room connected with an assembly-hall, opera-house, etc., where cloaks and other articles are temporarily deposited" is attested from 1827 and later extended to railway offices for temporary storage of luggage; by the mid twentieth century it was, like power room and bathroom, one of the many euphemisms for the loo, WC, lavatory.  The undercloak was a similar, lighter garment worn for additional protection under the cloak proper.

The cape and the coat worn as cloak.  A caped Hermann Göring (left), photographed on the way to the lavish celebrations the state staged (and paid for) to mark his 45^th birthday, Berlin, January, 1938 (left) and in sable-trimmed coat with Luffwaffe General Paul Conrath (1896–1979), Soviet Union, 1942 (right). Worn over the shoulders, a coat becomes cloak-like.

Ruthless, energetic and dynamic in the early years of Nazi rule, Hermann Göring (1893–1946; leading Nazi 1922-1945, Hitler's designated successor & Reichsmarschall 1940-1945) was the driving force in the build-up of the Luftwaffe (the German air force) but as things went from bad to worse as the fortunes of war changed, he became neglectful of his many responsibilities, described in 1945 upon his arrival at the jail attached to the Palace of Justice at Nuremberg as “a decayed voluptuary”.  However, he never lost his love for military decorations & uniforms, designing many of his own to suit the unique rank of Reichsmarschall (a kind of six-star general or generalissimo) he held including some in white, sky blue and, as the allied armies closed in on Germany, a more military olive green.  He became fond of capes (all that material can conceal corpulence) and had a number tailored to match his uniforms, Count Galeazzo Ciano (1903–1944; Italian foreign minister 1936-1944) in January 1942 noting of Göring’s visit to Rome: “As usual he is bloated and overbearing”, two days later adding “We had dinner at the Excelsior Hotel, and during the dinner Goering talked of little else but the jewels he owned.  In fact, he had some beautiful rings on his fingers… On the way to the station he wore a great sable coat, something between what automobile drivers wore in 1906 and what a high-grade prostitute wears to the opera.”

As well as his vividly entertaining diaries, Ciano was noted for having married the daughter of Benito Mussolini (1883-1945; Duce (leader) & prime-minister of Italy 1922-1943).  The marriage was certainly a good career move (the Italians would joke of the one they called “ducellio”: “the son-in-law also rises”) although things didn’t end well, Il Duce having him shot (at the insistence of Adolf Hitler (1889-1945; Führer (leader) and German head of government 1933-1945 & head of state 1934-1945), something which over the years must have drawn the envy of many a father-in-law (a sentiment was expressed by Winston Churchill (1875-1965; UK prime-minister 1940-1945 & 1951-1955) who thought his daughters' tastes in men sometimes appalling).  Like the bemedaled Reichsmarschall, the count was also a keen collector of gongs and in 1935, during the Second Italo-Ethiopian War (the last war of conquest in the era of European colonialism which even at the time seemed to many an embarrassing anachronism), Ciano had commanded the Regia Aeronautica's (Royal Air Force) 15^th Bomber Flight (nicknamed La Disperata (the desperate ones)) in air-raids on tribal forces equipped with only primitive weapons, being awarded the Medaglia d'argento al valor militare (Silver Medal of Military Valor), prompting some to observe he deserved a gold medal for bravery in accepting a silver one, his time in the air having but barely & briefly exposed him to risk.

The difference

Lindsay Lohan in Lavish Alice striped cape, June 2015.

There probably was a time when the distinction between a cape and a cloak was well defined and understood but opportunistic marketing practices and a declining use of both styles has seen the meaning blur and, in commerce, perhaps morph.  Described correctly, there are differences, defined mostly by length, style and function and what they have in common is that while there are layered versions, generally both are made from one sheet of fabric and worn draped over the shoulders, without sleeves.  The most obvious difference is in length, capes in general being much shorter than cloaks, the length of a cape usually anywhere from the top of the torso to the hips and rarely will a cape fall past the thighs.  By comparison, even the shortest cloak falls below the knees, many are calf-length at minimum and the most luxurious, floor-length.

Yves Saint Laurent Rive Gauche full-length hooded cloak in black velvet.

Stylistically, cloaks and capes differ also in aesthetic detail.  Capes typically cover the back and are open and loose in the front, fastening around the neck with a tiny hook or cords that tie together, although in recent years it’s become fashionable to tailor capes with button or zipper closures down the front.  Traditionally too, capes have tended to be more colorful and embellished with decoration, reflecting their origin as fashion items whereas the history of the cloak was one of pure functionally, protection from the weather and the dirt and grime of life.  Some capes even come with a belt looped through them, creating the look of a cinched waist with billowing sleeves.  Cloaks cover the front and back.  They are more streamlined, fitted and tailored than capes and, because of the tailoring, in earlier times, a small number of women in society sometimes wore cloaks styled like a dress, adorned with belts, gloves and jewelry.  This is rarely done today, but a cloak is still dressier than a cape or coat and can be stunning if worn over an evening gown.  As that suggests, the cloak could function as a social signifier of rank or wealth; although worn by all for warmth, a garment of made from an expensive material or lined with silk was clearly beyond what was needed to fend off mud from the street.

Audrey Hepburn (1929–1993) in calf-length cloak over taffeta.

Because of its origins as something protective, hoods are more commonly seen on cloaks; rare on capes which may have a collar for added warmth bit often not even that.  It’s value as a fashion piece aside, a cape’s main function is to cover the back of the wearer, just for warmth.  Because a cape is much shorter than a cloak, slit openings for the arms are not always necessary because arms easily pass through the bottom opening whereas a cloak usually has slit openings for the arms since the length demands it.  Cloaks were supplanted by coats in the post-war years and exist now mostly as a high-fashion pieces, capes in a similar niche in the lower-end of the market.

The cloak as workwear

Cloak and axe of Giovanni Battista Bugatti (1779–1869), official executioner for the Papal States 1796-1864, Criminology Museum of Rome.  Woodcuts and other depictions from the era suggest the blood-red cloak wasn't always worn during executions. 

Giovanni Battista Bugatti began his career at a youthful 17 under Pius VI (1717–1799; pope 1775-1799) and diligently he served six pontiffs before being pensioned off by Pius IX (1792–1878; pope 1846-1878), his retirement induced not by the Holy See losing enthusiasm for the death penalty because one Antonio Balducci succeeded him in the office which fell into disuse only with the loss of the Papal States (756-1870; a conglomeration of territories in the central & northern Italian peninsula under the personal sovereignty of the pope), after the unification of Italy.  Unlike his illustrious predecessor, history has recorded little about Signor Balducci although it’s known he performed his final execution in 1870.  Signor Bugatti was by far the longest-serving of the Papal States’ many executioners and locals dubbed him Mastro Titta, a titular corruption of maestro di giustizia (master of justice) and his 69 year tenure in his unusual role can be accounted for only by either (1) he felt dispatching the condemned a calling or (2) he really enjoyed his work, because his employers were most parsimonious: he received no retainer and only a small fee per commission (although he was granted a small, official residence).  His tenure was long and included 516 victims (he preferred to call them “patients”, the term adopted also by Romans who enjoyed the darkly humorous) but was only ever a part-time gig; most of his income came from his work as an umbrella painter (a part of the labour market which exists still in an artisan niche).  Depending on this and that, his devices included the axe, guillotine, noose or mallet while the offences punished ranged from the serious (murder, conspiracy, sedition etc) to the petty (habitual thieves and trouble-makers).

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

Although as early as 1786 the Grand Duchy of Tuscany became the first Italian state to abolish the death penalty (torture also banned), the sentence remained on the books in the Papal States; then as now, the poor disproportionately were victims of the sanction, similar (or worse) crimes by the bourgeoisie or nobility usually handled with less severity, “hushed-up” or just ignored, an aspect in the administration of justice not unknown in modern, Western liberal democracies.  With the loss of the Papal States, the pope’s temporal domain shrunk to little more than what lay around St Peter’s Square; indeed between 1870 and the signing of Lateran Treaty (1929) after which the Italian state recognized Vatican City as a sovereign state, no pope left the Vatican, their status as self-imposed prisoners a political gesture.  The Lateran treaty acknowledged the validity of the sentence (Article 8 of the 1929 Vatican City Penal Code stating anyone who attempted to assassinate the pope would be subject to the death penalty) although this provision was never used, tempted though some popes must have been.  Paul VI (1897-1978; pope 1963-1978) in 1969 struck capital punishment from the Vatican's legal code and the last reference to the sanction vanished in 2001 under Saint John Paul II (1920–2005; pope 1978-2005).  Although some states are believed to have (secretly) on the payroll one or more "executioners", retained to arrange assassinations when required, it's not believed the Vatican still has one.