Fake & Faux

Fake (pronounced feyk)

(1) To prepare or make something specious, deceptive, or fraudulent.

(2) To conceal the defects of or make appear more attractive, interesting, valuable etc, usually in an attempt to deceive.

(3) To pretend; simulate; emulate.

(4) To accomplish by trial and error or by improvising:

(5) To trick or deceive.

(6) In jazz music, to improvise (non pejorative).

(7) To play music without reading from a score (usually non pejorative).

(8) Anything made to appear otherwise than it actually is; counterfeit.

(9) A person who fakes; faker.

(10) To lay (a rope) in a coil or series of long loops so as to allow to run freely without fouling or kinking (often followed by down).

(11) Any complete turn of a rope that has been faked down; any of the various ways in which a rope may be faked down.

(12) In German, a male given name.

1350–1400: From the Middle English faken (to coil a rope) of unknown origin.  The nautical adoption fake (one of the windings of a cable or hawser in a coil) was from the Swedish veck (a fold) and probably entered English from exchanges between English and Scandinavian sailors.  The more familiar modern meaning is documented from 1775 as an adjective meaning “to counterfeit”.  It’s attested from 1812 as vagrants' slang meaning “to do for, rob or kill someone” but was also, in an echo of the earlier form, used to mean “shape something”.  It’s thought to have been either (1) a variant of the obsolete feak & feague (to beat), akin to Dutch veeg (a slap) & vegen (to sweep, wipe) or (2), a part of the Lingua Franca via Polari from the Italian facciare (to make or do).

It’s documented from 1851 as a noun (a swindle) and from 1888 was applied to a person (a swindler), but most etymologists assume the oral use was older.  The most likely source is thought to have been feague (to spruce up by artificial means), from the German fegen (polish, sweep) which, in colloquial use was used to mean "to clear out, to plunder".  In English, much of the early slang of thieves is from German or Dutch sources, dating from that great linguistic melting pot, the Thirty Years' War (1618-1648) and until the nineteenth century, was largely un-documented although the fragmentary evidence available does suggest use was constantly shifting.

Fake news (journalism deliberately misleading), although popularized in the 2016 US presidential campaign (and subsequently applied quite incorrectly), was actually first attested in 1894 although, as a device, fake news is probably about as old as news itself.  Faker as an agent noun from faker the verb is from 1846 and the noun fakement (forgery) is from 1811.  To “fake (someone) out” is a description of applied gamesmanship in sport and noted from 1941.  To jazz musicians, “to fake” was merely oral slang for improvising and the “fake book” is attested from 1951.  Interestingly, the adjective "jivey" was sometimes used as a pejorative (phony, fake) unlike "jive" which, in a musical context, was always purely descriptive.

Fake is a noun & verb, faker & fakery are nouns and the verbs (used with object) are faked, faking; the noun plural is fakes.  Synonyms include ersatz, fake, false, imitation, imitative, unreal, counterfeit, fabricated, factitious, spurious, substitute, affected, contrived, feigned, insincere, plastic, synthetic, unnatural, bogus, affected, forged, fraudulent, mock, phony, spurious, deception, forgery, hoax, scam, sham, trick, put on, assumed, fraud, impostor, quack, charlatan, deceiver, substitute, contrived, feigned, insincere, plastic, unnatural

Faux (pronounced foh)

Artificial or imitation.

1676: from the twelfth century French faux (feminine singular fausse, masculine plural faux, feminine plural fausses), from the Old French fals, from the Latin falsus (false), perfect passive participle from fallō (deceive, trick; mistake).  The origin of fallō is uncertain.  It’s thought either from the Proto-Italic falsō, from the primitive Indo-European (s)whzel (to stumble) or from the primitive Indo-European ǵhwel- (to lie, deceive) but etymologists note structural problems with the latter.  A doublet of false.

The word fake almost always carries negative connotations, the idea of something that is not real, an imitation designed to trick someone into thinking it is real or original.  A fake might be a forgery or copy which is (certainly with many digital fakes) indistinguishable from whatever is the real or original thing it imitates, indeed it might even be an improvement but it remains fake.

Lindsay Lohan in faux fur, amfAR gala, New York City, 2013.

Faux has since the 1980s been used in English (with French pronunciation) to describe anything which is imitative without attempting to deceive.  Prior to this, the only frequent use in English was the faux pas (breach of good manners, any act that compromises one's reputation (literally "false step")), noted since the 1670s.  Faux tends not to convey the negative association of fake because it so blatantly an alternative rather than an attempt to deceive, indeed, it can have positive connotations, such as when it’s fur.  Faux fur is now respectable and, among some circles, there’s long been a micro-industry devoted to turning into social pariahs anyone wearing the real thing.  Sometimes, supporters of PETA (People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals) use direct action, the flinging of red paint onto the offending coast or stole a favorite.

Pamela Anderson, mostly real.

People do however seem unforgiving of fake boobs which, even if advertised as fake (which really should make them faux), seem forever doomed to be called fake.  The preferred form seem to be "fake tits". 

Faux also blends well; there are fauxmosexuals & fauxtatoes.  Donald Trump dubbed Elizabeth Warren (b 1949; United States senator (Democrat) for Massachusetts since 2013) Pocahontas because of her claim to Native American ancestry which proved dubious but allies of her predecessor Scott Brown (b 1959; United States senator (Republican) for Massachusetts 2010–2013), referred to her as Fauxcahontas.  That was actually an incorrect use necessitated by the need of rhyme and word formation; technically she was a Fakecahontas but as a word it doesn’t work as well.  People anyway seemed to get the point: as a Native American, she was fake, bogus, phoney.

Christ with the Woman Taken in Adultery by Han van Meegeren (1889–1947) following Vermeer (1632-1675).

In May 1945, immediately after the liberation from Nazi occupation of the Netherlands, the authorities arrested Dutch national Han van Meegeren (1889–1947) and charged him with collaborating with the enemy, a capital crime.  Evidence had emerged that van Meegeren had during World War II sold Vermeer's Christ with the Woman Taken in Adultery to Hermann Göring (1893–1946; prominent Nazi 1922-1945, Reichsmarschall 1940-1945).  His defense was as novel as it was unexpected: He claimed the painting was not a Vermeer but rather a forgery by his own hand, pointing out that as he had traded the fake for over a hundred other Dutch paintings seized earlier by the Reich Marshal and he was thus a national hero rather than a Nazi collaborator.  With a practical demonstration of his skill, added to his admission of having forged five other fake "Vermeers" during the 1930s, as well as two "Pieter de Hoochs" all of which had shown up on European art markets since 1937, he convinced the court and was acquitted but was then, as he expected, charged with forgery for which he received a one year sentence, half the maximum available to the court.  He died in prison of heart failure, brought on by years of drug and alcohol abuse. 

His skills with brush and paint aside, Van Meegeren was able successfully to pass off his 1930s fakes as those of the seventeenth century painter of the Dutch baroque, Johannes Vermeer (1632–1675), because of the four years he spent meticulously testing the techniques by which as a new painting could be made to look centuries old.  The breakthrough was getting the oil-based paints thoroughly to harden, a process which naturally occurs over fifty-odd years.  His solution was to mix the pigments with the synthetic resin Bakelite, instead of oil.  For his canvas, he used a genuine but worthless seventeenth-century painting and removed as much of the picture as possible, scrubbing carefully with pumice and water, taking the utmost care not to lose the network of cracks, the existence of which would play a role in convincing many expert appraisers they were authentic Vermeers.  Once dry, he baked the canvas and rubbed a carefully concocted mix of ink and dust into the edges of the cracks, emulating the dirt which would, over centuries, accumulate.

Guilty as sin: A slimmed-down Hermann Göring in the dock, Nuremberg, 1946.

Modern x-ray techniques and chemical analysis mean such tricks can no longer succeed but, at the time, so convincing were his fakes that no doubts were expressed and the dubious Christ with the Woman Taken in Adultery became Göring's most prized acquisition, quite something given the literally thousands of pieces of art he looted from Europe.  One of the Allied officers who interrogated Göring in Nuremberg prison prior to his trial (1945-1946) recorded that the expression on his face when told "his Vermeer" was a fake suggested that "...for the first time Göring realized there really was evil in this world".  For his crimes, Göring was sentenced to be hanged, a fate he probably believed the forger should have shared.

2013 Mercedes-AMG G 63 6×6.

Aimed at the Middle East market and manufactured between 2013-2015, a run of one-hundred units was planned for the Mercedes-AMG G 63 6×6 and it was advertised on that basis, exclusivity part of the attraction.  Such was the demand that dealers prevailed on behalf of a few influential customers so some additional units were built but not many and within months, used models were selling for well above the US$550,000 (€379,000) list price.  That encouraged imitations and probably not since the DEMAG Sd.Kfz half-tracks of Field Marshal Erwin Rommel's (1891–1944) Africa Corps ranged across Cyrenaica in 1941-1942 has there been a vehicle so suited to the open desert. 

2014 Brabus B63S.

The tuning house Brabus, noted for catering to the small but lucrative market of those who like the AMG cars but think they need more power, released the B63S, its 700 horsepower quite a chunk above the 536 offered by AMG.  Something imitative certainly but nobody calls the B63S a faux or a fake.  Being in some sense a manufacturer lends validity so what Brabus does can be imitative but what ends up as their part-number is not an imitation, let alone a fake.  Real, faux or fake, Greta Thunberg (b 2003) will not be impressed.

2017 Mercedes-AMG G63 6×6 Conversion.

This was said to have been a “conversion” of a 2017 G63 by G Wagon Car Technology GmbH (Austria).  Very well done and said to have been completed with mostly factory part-numbers, most would regard it as a clone, replica or recreation.  Curiously (though perhaps predictably), whether a Mercedes-Benz, Chevrolet, Ford or Ram, the three-axle pickups, although ideal suited to certain tasks in certain non-urban environments, seem usually resident in cities where their sheer size renders them difficult to use.  They have an appeal to those who value the image they believe is projected and in a sense that's a sort of functionality.  In the post-MAGA US, such machines have become personal and political statements.

1938 Mercedes-Benz G4 (W31).

The G63 6x6 may anyway have had its own hint of the imitative.  Although Mercedes-Benz prefers not too much to dwell on the details of its activities between 1933-1945, one of the remarkable vehicles it built during the era was the G4 (W31).  The factory developed three-axle cross-country vehicles for military use during the 1920s but after testing a number of the prototype G1s, the army declined to place an order, finding them too big, too expensive and too heavy for their intended purpose.  Adolf Hitler (1889-1945) however, as drawn to big, impressive machines as he was to huge, representational architecture, ordered them adopted as parade vehicles and the army soon acquired a fleet of the updated G4, used eventually not only on ceremonial occasions but also as staff and command vehicles, two even specially configured, one as a baggage car and the other a mobile communications centre, packed with radio-telephony.

Eventually, between 1934-1939, 57 were built, originally exclusively for the OKW (Oberkommando der Wehrmacht (Armed Forces High Command)) and OKH (Oberkommando des Heeres (Army High Command)) but one was gift from Hitler to Generalissimo Franco (1892-1975; Caudillo of Spain 1939-1975).  The Spanish G4, one of few which still exists, was restored and remains in the royal garage in Madrid.  According to factory records, all were built with 5.0, 5.3 & 5.4 litre straight-eight engines but there is an unverified report of interview with Hitler’s long-time chauffeur, Erich Kempka (1910-1975), suggesting one for the Führer’s exclusive use was built with the 7.7 litre straight-eight used in the 770K Grosser (W07 (1930–1938) & W150 (1938–1943)).  Some of the 770s were supercharged so, if true, it's a tantalizing prospect but the story is widely thought apocryphal, no evidence of such a one-off ever having been sighted.

There are however fake cars and they're considered bogus if represented as a factory original (a modified version of something else).  Even if an exact copy of what the factory did, that’s fake yet exactly the same machine modified in the same way is instead a “clone” a “recreation” or a “replica” if represented as such.  Clone, recreation & replica do imply a exact copy but some leeway does seem to be granted given mechanical exactitude is sometimes simply not possible.  A vehicle which is substantially a replica of something but includes modifications to improve safety, performance or some other aspect of the dynamics is usually styled a “tribute” or restomod (a portmanteau word, the construct being resto(red) + mod(ified)).  The improvements can be transformative and, in certain cases, increase value but in others, might actually detract.  Whether a clone, a replica or a tribute, if what’s being referenced is something rare and desirable, the difference in value can be a factor of more than fifty times.  Originality can trump all.

1962 Ferrari 250 GTO recreation by Tempero of New Zealand.

As an extreme example there is the Ferrari 250 GTO, of which it’s usually accepted 36 were built although there were actually 41 (2 x (1961) prototypes; 32 x (1962–63) Series I 250 GTO; 3 x (1962–1963) “330 GTO”; 1 x (1963) 250 GTO with LM Berlinetta-style body & 3 x (1964) Series II 250 GTO).  The GTOs in the hands of collectors command extraordinary prices, chassis 4153GT in June 2018 realizing US$70 million in a private sale whereas an immaculately crafted replica of a 1962 version by Tempero (New Zealand) was listed for sale at US$1.3 million (no NFT required).  The Tempero cars are acknowledged to be better built than any original GTO although that is damning with faint praise, those who restore pre-modern Ferraris wryly noting that while the drive-trains were built with exquisite care, the assembly of the coachwork could be shoddy indeed.  Indeed, when the head of one restoration company was asked if a vintage Ferrari exactly could be replicated the answer was it was doubtful: "...because none of our staff can weld that badly.",   Even less exalted machinery, though actually more rare still, like the 1971 Plymouth Hemi Cuda convertible (only 12 of which were built) also illustrate the difference for there are now considerably more clones / replicas / recreations etc than ever there were originals and the price difference is typically a factor of ten or more.

Ferrari GTO production numbers 1961-1964.

Hearse

Hearse (pronounce hurs)

(1) A vehicle, such as a specially designed car or carriage, used to carry a coffin to a place of worship and ultimately to a cemetery or crematorium; a bier or hand-cart for conveying the dead to the grave.

(2) A triangular frame for holding candles, used at the service of Tenebrae (in Christianity (Western), a service celebrated on the evening before or early morning of Maundy Thursday, Good Friday, and Holy Saturday, involving the gradual extinguishing of candles while a series of readings and psalms are chanted or recited).

(3) A framework of wood or metal placed over the coffin or tomb of the deceased and covered with a pall; also, a temporary canopy bearing wax lights and set up in a church, under which the coffin was placed during the funeral ceremonies.

(4) A hind (female deer) in the second year of her age.

(5) A grave, coffin, tomb, or sepulchral monument (obsolete).

1250–1300; From the Middle English herse, hers & herce (a flat framework for candles, hung over a coffin), from the Middle French herse (a harrow; long rake for breaking up soil, harrow; portcullis (and in churches a descriptor of those large chandeliers with some resemblance to the long prongs of a rake)), from the Old French herce, from the Medieval Latin hercia, from the Classical Latin herpicem, accusative of hirpex (harrow), a rustic word ultimately from the Oscan hirpus (wolf), said by some etymologists to be an allusion to its sharp teeth but not all agree although all seem to concur the Oscan term is related to the Latin hīrsūtus (bristly, shaggy (and the source of hirsute)).

The verb rehearse dates from circa 1300 and was from Middle English rehersen & rehercen (to give an account of, report, tell, narrate (a story); speak or write words) and by the early fourteenth century the meaning had extended to "repeat, reiterate".  The source was the Anglo-French rehearser, from the twelfth century Old French rehercier (to go over again, repeat (literally "to rake over, turn over" (soil, ground, furrows in a field))), the construct being re- (again) + hercier (to drag, trail (on the ground), be dragged along the ground; rake, harrow (land); rip, tear, wound; repeat, rehearse;" from the French forms herce & herse (a harrow).  In English, the meaning "to say over again, repeat what has already been said or written" dates from the mid-fourteenth century, the now familiar sense (as a transitive & intransitive verb) of "practice (a play, part, etc.) in private to prepare for a public performance" emerged in the 1570s.

The use of hearse to describe the vehicles carrying coffins has become so pervasive that it’s now only in ecclesiastical jargon that funeral displays or church fittings are now so-named.  The funeral display picked up the name because they typically resembled a harrow and it was only in the fifteenth century that the sense of "a portcullis" appeared in English.  From there, use extended to other temporary frameworks built over the dead to be used while ceremonies were in progress while the idea of a "vehicle for carrying a dead person to the grave" came into use in the 1640s, the adoption presumably stimulated by covering structures being added to the horse drawn carts (or biers) on which coffins had traditionally been transported uncovered.

Recent hearses of note

Lindsay Lohan in habit, emerging from hearse in Machete (2010).  The Machete hearse was based on a 1987 Cadillac Brougham (1987-1992).

Between 1931-1979, General Motors' Cadillac division offered a line called the Cadillac Commercial Chassis, a long-wheelbase, heavy-duty platform which was mechanically complete but with a partially built body (without bodywork rear of the windscreen, doors and other panels included on request).  Produced on the D platform (exclusive to Cadillac), the Commercial Chassis was used by coach-builders to create high-roofed ambulances, hearses (often called funeral coaches in the US) and cleverly designed hybrids which at short notice could be converted from ambulances to hearses or used by a coroner's staff to transport a corpse; they were popular in towns with small populations.  The early Commercial Chassis were based on the Series 355 (1931-1935) and the Series 75 (1936-1992) from 1936 and although there were specific modification to the frame, the mechanical components were always shared with the 75 which, used for the big limousines, meant costs were amortized across the ranges.  After 1980, production continued on the downsized platform but there was no longer a separate D platform, the partially bodied cars structurally identical to the mainstream line.  The landau irons (which some coachbuilders insist should be called "carriage bars") on the rear side-panels emulate in style (though not function) those used on horse-drawn carriages and early automobiles (the last probably the Mercedes-Benz 300 (the “Adenauer”; W186 (1951-1957) & W189 (1957-1962)) Cabriolet D.  On those vehicles, the irons actually supported the folding mechanism for the fabric roof but on hearses they are merely decorative, there to relieve the slab-sidedness of the expanse of flat metal.

Funeral procession of Kim I: Kim Il-sung (1912-1994; The Great Leader of DPRK (North Korea) 1948-1994 (left) and Kim II: Kim Jong-il (1941–2011; The Dear Leader 1994-2011) (right).  For the latter sad event, Kim III (Kim Jong-un (b 1984; The Supreme Leader since 2011) was chief mourner and is here pictured with his left hand holding the wing mirror, the location of which identifies the cars as having probably been sold in Japan. 

In the West, the tradition is now for the coffin to be carried in a glassed-in enclosure, in effect a lengthened station-wagon, often with a raised roof.  Big station wagons are now extinct so hearses are fabricated by coach-builders usually with a large sedan or SUV as a base but in the wacky world of hearses, anything seems to be possible.  One quirky variation is pursued by Kim dynasty in the DPRK (North Korea).  There, the coffin is displayed on fluffy catafalque mounted on the roof of a limousine, something not far removed from the military tradition of using horse-drawn gun carriages.

The DPRK’s hearse appears to be a 1975 or 1976 Lincoln Continental which has been lengthened, presumably by one of the US coachbuilders with which Ford made such arrangements when the cars were new.  Given the state of US-DPRK relations since the end of the Korean War (1950-1953), the unexpected appearance of the big Lincolns attracted comment when first seen at the Great Leader’s funeral in 1994.  There were three stretched Lincolns in the cortege, all appearing to have been built in 1975 or 1976 (based on the full rear fender skirts and the five vertical bars separating the grille into six sections (the later Continentals used a narrower style)) and all would be powered by a 460 cubic inch (7.5 litre) version of Ford 385 series engine.  The wheelbase on two of the cars had been extended by an estimated 36 inches (915 mm), the other by perhaps a foot (300 mm) but all appeared equipped with fittings which suggested they’d been prepared for the Japanese market and the assumption is it’s from Japan they were exported.  That’s contrary to Japanese law but it’s known to happen, using third countries (usually China) as a first port-of-call, the practice being continued by Kim III who appears to have few problems obtaining the Mercedes-Benz and Rolls-Royces which now adorn the presidential fleet, despite Western sanctions intended to stop such imports by the DPRK.  As the funeral of the UK’s Queen Elizabeth II illustrated, there is much symbolism in the continuity of use of the symbols and regalia of a dynastic past and should the Supreme Leader die (God forbid), it’s highly likely the Lincoln will carry his corpse.

Land Rover used at the funeral Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh (1921-2021).

In the narrow technical sense, the Land Rover should probably be considered a funeral bier rather than a hearse because the coffin was un-covered, the word hearse applied to such vehicles only after the hearses (framed coverings used in churches) were added to funeral biers in the 1640s.  It’s a distinction unlikely to bother many and the Land Rover has been almost universally referred to as a hearse.

It may look like many a Land Rover but, remarkably, the duke tinkered with the design over sixteen years, the result a modified 2003 Defender TD5 130 chassis cab finished in a military specification green (called dark-bronze green (or GDB in army supply parlance, reflecting the color appearing as “Green, Dark Bronze" in military databases).  Functionally, the most obvious modifications are to the tray where stainless steel stanchions with buffered, laterally placed rollers were engineered to secure the coffin and fitted to a custom made catafalque, for strength fabricated in steel rather the aluminum used for most of a Land Rover’s bodywork.  It’s actually a quite thoughtful design, suitable for parade and non-parade modes of coffin conveyance.  For parades, the coffin can be carried atop the catafalque while for transport tasks, the long, external strap hinges on the heavy steel rear hatch allow a coffin to be slipped inside the bed and thus out of view.  The rear hatch opens not to either side, but down and it includes a centre brace which folds to the ground, thereby bracing the hatch flat and so providing the bearers with more convenient lateral access to the coffin as they slide it in and out.  Cut into either side of the cabin's rear are two curved rear windows, affording the attending footmen extra visibility of their load when it's atop.  As a functional device to be used by an old Navy man, the workmanship is sturdy and well-finished but there’s been no attempt to conceal or disguise the bolt-heads and rivets.  So, it was a bit more than most of the Land Rovers (“gun buses” he called them) he used on shooting parties here and there and while he had long ago told the queen “...just stick me in the back of a Land Rover and drive me to Windsor", sixteen years of mission creep followed.

Hearses by German coach builders, Pollmann of Bremen: 1959 Mercedes-Benz 300 (W189, left) and 1967 Mercedes-Benz 600 (W100, right).

Pollmann of Bremen have a long history in the construction of Mercedes-Benz hearses and after some difficult times in the early post-war years, the Wirtschaftswunder (the German post-war economic miracle) which emerged in the 1950s encouraged them to move from utilitarian designs to something more grand and they converted a number of 300s (W186 & W189, nicknamed the “Adenauer” because Konrad Adenauer (1876–1967; chancellor of the Federal Republic of Germany (FGR; West Germany) 1949-1963) used a number as the state limousine) models, one technical attraction being the innovative, self-levelling rear-suspension which provided a very stable load platform, regardless of the surface, something of some importance when carrying coffins.

The 600 was built on a (lengthened) 1967 short wheelbase (SWB) platform and remains a genuine one-off, the only 600 hearse ever built.  The story (which may be true), repeated whenever it’s offered for sale, is it was originally a sedan purchased by a German farmer (always referred to as Herr K) whose particular experience of the Wirtschaftswunder was the massive capital gain enjoyed when he sold his farmland for urban development.  Happy, he bought a Mercedes-Benz 600 (in champagne metallic gold) for his wife and commissioned an architect to design a house for them to enjoy.  Unfortunately, he arrived home one day to find the ungrateful hausfrau had run off with the architect and, unable to bear to keep the 600 because it was a reminder of the strumpet’s infidelity, he returned the car to the dealer to off-load.  It was sold to the coach-builders Pollmann which converted it to a hearse which seems appropriate although it's not known if the former farmer was impressed by the symbolism of the transformation.  It was for some years used for the purpose for which it was designed and has since been restored by US-based expert in all things 600esque, Karl Middelhauve.

Daimler DS420 hearse, funeral of Diana, Princess of Wales, London, 6 September 1997 (right).

Diana's hearse (B626MRK) was a 1985 model, built by Wilcox Limousines and owned by the Funeral Directors Leverton & Sons; it was the last DS420 so modified by Wilcox before hearse production was shifted to the sister company Eagle Specialist Vehicles and was the same car used to collect her coffin from RAF Northolt after its arrival from France.  In 2003, Levertons sold B626MRK after it had for some years been in storage.  It was purchased by an anonymous buyer for £90,000, the somewhat macabre celebrity association gaining it quite a premium over the £3,000 and £4,000 a typical DS420 hearse of this age and condition would be expected to attract.  Inevitably, there was criticism, some claiming the thing should have been donated to a museum but, accustomed to death, undertakers are pragmatic and to Levertons doubtlessly it was just another piece of obsolete equipment to be sold to the highest bidder.  In production between 1968-1992, the DS420 was built on the platform of the old Mark X (1961-1966 which, substantially unchanged was renamed 420G and sold until 1970).  The bulk of the Mark X had in the 1960s proved an impediment to success but it made a fine basis for a limousine and spin-offs such as hearses and for decades the DS420 was a fixture in the wedding and funeral trades.  With the exception of some recent, lucrative forays into the "continuation" business (it's XKSS & lightweight E-Types), the DS420 was the last car to use the XK-six, first shown in 1948 in the XK120.     

State Jaguar XF hearse of the Royal Mews, built for the funeral of Elizabeth II (1926-2022; Queen of the UK and other places 1952-2022).

Elizabeth II was the first monarch of the television age and quickly grasped its implications, understanding better than many politicians of the early years of the mass-adoption of the medium that it used wisely it was a useful tool but that little good came from over-exposure.  Well acquainted too with a feeling for color, light and angle from long and sometimes doubtlessly tiresome sessions with painters and photographers, she sometimes surprised television producers with her knowledge of the technical aspects of their trade.  Her contributions the design of her own Jaguar XF hearse were those of someone who knew her funeral would be her last performance as a content provider for television and probably one which would attract the greatest audience in history.

Accordingly, the queen specified a design which would afford the best possible view of her coffin, regardless of the camera angle, so the glass would be more expansive, the roof was raised several inches from the dimension supplied originally by the royal household, the roof panel above the coffin fully glazed a particular request.  Climate change has affected the UK but it can still be relied upon sometimes to be dark and gloomy and, not knowing what the weather would offer on the day, she had the rear compartment fitted with lighting which would illuminate in a way that, if need be, there would be a clear, reflection-free view through the glass.  The state hearse was finished in Royal Claret, a specific royal-family color (and an official part-number used by manufacturers with a royal warrant) and has a notably large hood ornament, a silver-plated bronze statue of St. George slaying a dragon, a personal mascot of Her Majesty which appeared also on the state Bentley limousine.  The automotive ornaments seem to have been a bit of a thing for the queen, renderings of dogs sometimes observed on her Range Rovers.

Enclave & Exclave

Enclave (pronounced ahn-kleyv (U) or en-klave (non-U))

(1) A country or (especially), an outlying portion of a country, entirely or mostly surrounded by the territory of another country.

(2) In casual use (and as a quasi-technical term in demography and sub-strains of applied geography), any (usually) small, distinct area or group enclosed or isolated within a larger one.

(3) By extension, in politics, sociology etc, non-physically defined subsets of a whole; a group that set off from a larger population by its characteristics or behavior.    

(4) To isolate or enclose (especially territory) within a foreign or uncongenial environment; ie by an act of enclaving to created something enclaved.

(5) In pathology, a detached mass of tissue enclosed in tissue of another kind.

(6) In computer operating systems, an isolated portion of an application's address space which places certain restrictions on access by code outside the enclave (not to be confused with a sandbox (of which one or more enclaves may be a part.

(7) In geology, an aggregate of minerals or rock found inside another larger rock body.

1868: From the Middle French enclave, a noun derivative of enclaver (to enclose), from the Old French enclaver (to inclose, lock in), from the unattested Vulgar Latin inclāvāre (to lock in), the construct being in- + clave.  The prefix in- from the Proto-Italic en-, from the primitive Indo-European n̥- (not), a zero-grade form of the negative particle ne (not) and akin to ne-, nē & nī).  Clave was from clavis (key), from the Proto-Italic klāwis which was either (1) a secondary i-stem derivation of the primitive Indo-European kleu- & klēu (nail, pin, hook (the old instruments (ie bars & bolts) used to secure the doors of primitive structures)) from which Classical Latin also gained clāvus (nail), an inherited Indo-European word originally denoting an instrument for unlocking doors or (2) a loanword from the dialectal Ancient Greek κλᾱϝίς (klāwís) (in the Classical: κλείς (kleís)), from the same primitive Indo-European root.  Enclave is a noun, enclaved & enclaving are verbs and enclavish is the (rare) adjective; the noun plural is enclaves.

In political geography, the use to describe a "small portion of one country which is entirely surrounded by the territory of another" dates from 1868 in English but it had been in use in French since the mid-fifteenth century as a derivative of the thirteenth century verb enclaver which had since the late 1400s been a technical term in property law describing “a parcel of land surrounded by land owned by a another which could not be reached for its exploitation in a practical and sufficient manner without crossing the surrounding land”.  The legal mechanism to resolve this was what was called “servitude passage for the benefit of the owner of the surrounded land”, a device which was essentially a personal easement.  The word was first used in international law when the Treaty of Madrid was signed in 1526 and enclave came to be applied to just about any legally defined territory surrounded by land under other ownership, proving popular in English and many other languages although, under the Raj, "pocket" tended to be used instead and British geographical were also called detachments within the UK while the Colonial Office invented “detached dominions”.  In the Church of England, where the same concept existed as ecclesiastical districts, parishes, chapels or churches which operated outside the jurisdiction of the bishop and archdeacon of the diocese in which they were situated, the canon lawyers invented “the peculiar”.

As used to describe a segmented memory space in computer operating systems, enclaves are regarded by some as synonymous with sandboxes but the two constructs have separate purposes.  An enclave is created by an application as a memory space protected from the rest of the application yet if a call is made into the enclave, it remains able to access all memory used by the application; this is a deliberate aspect of the design.  Those requiring bi-directional exclusivity need to run their enclave (and in most cases thus the application) inside a sandbox, sonthing which obviously limits functionality in a production environment.

Enclave and exclave are distinct in legal definition and geographical consequence but in idiomatic or metaphorical use, enclave is used almost exclusively as a descriptor of anything where the idea is of something small surrounded by a larger whole.  It’s applied especially in economic and social demography (white enclave; Chinese enclave etc).   

Exclave (pronounced eks-kleyv)

(1) A portion of a country geographically separated from the main part by surrounding foreign territory.

(2) An outlying, detached portion of a gland or other part, as of the thyroid or pancreas; an accessory gland.

1885-1890: Modeled on enclave, the construct was ex- + -clave.  In Middle English, the prefix ex- was applied to words borrowed from Middle French.  It was from the Latin ex- (out of, from), from the primitive Indo-European eǵ- & eǵs- (out) and was cognate with the Ancient Greek ἐξ (out of, from), the Transalpine Gaulish ex- (out), the Old Irish ess- (out), the Old Church Slavonic изъ (izŭ) (out) and the Russian из (iz) (from, out of).  In English, the x in ex- sometimes is elided before certain constants, being reduced to e- (eg ejaculate), almost always to ensure spelling aligns with pronunciation.

In political geography, enclaves are territories (sometimes a disconnected part of a larger territory) wholly surrounded by another state or political entity and the edges need not be land borders, enclaves existing sometimes within territorial waters.  There are also semi-enclaves which differ from enclaves in that they possess (at least in part) a coastline which constitutes an un-surrounded sea border, thus providing and outlet to international waters.  Depending on historical circumstances, enclaves and semi-enclaves can be independent states or remote parts of sovereign states.

An exclave is that part of a state geographically separated from the main part by surrounding alien territory (which may be more than one foreign entity) and exclaves are in some cases also enclaves.  A pene-exclave is a part of the territory of one country that can be conveniently approached only through the territory of another country.  Pene- is from the Latin paene (almost).

At the international, national and sub-national level, there are literally hundreds of enclaves and exclaves, illustrative examples including:

Vatican City, an enclave surrounded wholly by Italy and in its modern form a creation of the Pacta Lateranensia (the Lateran Pacts of 1929), the most significant part of which is remembered as the Lateran Treaty which resolved many of the issues which had existed between Rome and the Holy See since the unification of Italy (1861-1871), one celebrated consequence of which was popes no longer living in self-imposed captivity in the Vatican.

The rather unimaginatively named  Australian Capital Territory (ACT), site of Canberra, the country’s artificially created capital, came about because during the debates in the 1890s about the idea of federating the six colonies as the Commonwealth of Australia, it became clear that the two largest states, New South Wales (NSW) and Victoria, would never accede to either becoming the national capital.  Accordingly, it was agreed the new capital would be located not less than 100 miles (160 km) from the NSW capital (Sydney) and that the Victorian capital (Melbourne), would be the seat of government until the new city was built.  Thus some sheep country was carved from NSW to become the ACT and there, Canberra was built.  It’s very hot in summer, very cold in winter and otherwise unremarkable other than having over the years soaked up extraordinary amounts of money.   

Just east of the exclave of Andorra, the little Spanish town of Llivia lies some two kilometres (1¼ miles) from Spain’s border, surrounded completely by France, thereby making it both enclave and exclave, depending on whether one views the place from Madrid or Paris.  The stranger arrangement exists by virtue of the Treaty of the Pyrenees (1659), when Spain ceded certain territories to France but the words in the document specified that only villages were to be transferred.  Llivia had long been gazetted as a town so remained Spanish.

In the narrow technical sense Alaska is a pene-exclave because although it cannot be reached overland except by transiting through Canada, it can be reached by sea or air because its coastline leads to international waters.  Alaska ranks with the Louisiana Purchase (in which the US in 1803 purchased from the French land equivalent to about 20% the size of the modern contiguous 48 states for less than US$20 per square mile) as the greatest real estate deals of all time.  The US in 1867 purchased Alaska from Russia for $7.2 million and during the twentieth century, there was much buyer’s remorse.

The medieval walled city of Dubrovnik sits on Croatia, Adriatic coast in the region of Dalmatia.  Laid siege to for seven months during the first of the Balkan wars which followed the breakup of Yugoslavia, the city was heavily shelled but in the late 1990s extensive repair work was undertaken with the assistance of overseas funding.  The southern-most part of Croatia's Dubrovnik-Neretva County, which includes Dubrovnik, is cut off from the rest of the country by a sliver of the neighboring Bosnia and Herzegovina, the 20-kilometre zone created in 1699 as a buffer zone between Venice and the Ottoman Empire.

Suddenly the world's most famous exclave (though many refer to it as an enclave which, in the sociological sense, it is), Kaliningrad, sandwiched between Poland and Lithuania on the Baltic Sea, is part of Russia.  Historically, it’s best remembered as a part of Prussia but, in the way Europe for centuries did things, its national identity has often changed.  It was known as Konigsberg German rule and was the site of an extraordinarily expensive (and militarily ineffectual) propaganda film produced by the Nazis towards the end of World War II.  It became part of the USSR in 1945 where it remained until Lithuanian independence in 1991 turned it into an exclave of Russia and to most it remained obscure until the invasion of Ukraine.

Buffer

Buffer (pronounced buhf-er)

(1) A static apparatus at the end of a railroad car, railroad track etc, for absorbing shock during coupling, collisions etc with the contact section made usually from spring-loaded steel pads or (in areas of low-speed activity such as shunting yards) timber.

(2) Any device, material, or apparatus used as a shield, cushion, or bumper, especially on machinery.

(3) Any intermediate or intervening shield or device reducing the danger of interaction between two machines, chemicals, electronic components etc.

(4) A person or thing that shields and protects against annoyance, harm, hostile forces etc, or that lessens the impact of a shock or reversal.

(5) Any reserve moneys, negotiable securities, legal procedures, etc., that protect a person, organization, or country against financial ruin.

(6) In ecology, as buffer state, an animal population that becomes the prey of a predator that usually feeds on a different species.

(7) In computing, a storage device for temporarily holding data until the device is ready to receive or process the data, as when a receiving unit has an operating speed lower (eg a printer) than that of the unit (eg a computer) feeding data to it.

(8) In electronics, a circuit with a single output activated by one or more of several inputs.

(9) In chemistry, any substance or mixture of compounds that, added to a solution, is capable of neutralizing both acids and bases without appreciably changing the original acidity or alkalinity of the solution; also called a buffer solution; any solution containing such a substance.

(10) To treat with a buffer.

(11) To cushion, shield, or protect; to lessen the adverse effect of; ease:

(12) In computing, temporarily to save data before actively accessing it so it may be loaded at a rapid or uniform rate.

(13) A device for polishing or buffing, as a buff stick or buff wheel, often in the form “floor buffer” for polishing floors; a worker who uses such a device.

(14) In admiralty slang, the senior non-commissioned officer serving on a ship or boat.

(15) In (mostly UK) colloquial use, a good-humored, slow-witted fellow, usually an elderly man, thus often as “old buffer” (archaic).

(16) In medicine, a preparation designed to decrease acidity in the stomach.

(17) In geopolitics, as buffer state, a country the land mass of which physically separates two opposing potentially powers and the existence of which is intended to prevent conflict or permit an attacked state a greater time to organize its defense.

(18) In geopolitics as buffer zone, a region separating two areas, often demilitarized, to segregate antagonistic populations: based usually on regional, ethnic or religious lines.

1835: The noun buffer in the sense of "something that absorbs a blow, apparatus for deadening the concussion between a moving body and that against which it strikes" was an agent noun from the obsolete verb buff (make a dull sound when struck), from the mid-sixteenth century Old French buffe & bufe (a blow, slap, punch).  The figurative sense of "anything that prevents impact or neutralizes the shock of impact of opposing forces" is from 1858 and was adopted universally by the railroad industry.  The sense of “one who or that which polishes by buffing” dates from 1854, an agent noun from the verb.  The verb use extended to “lessen the impact of” by 1886.  The use in chemistry began in the mid-nineteenth century, borrowed by analogy from the railroads although the meaning in science was soon extended and was adopted in electrical engineering.  In geopolitics the term wasn’t used until the mid-nineteenth century, the word again picked up from the general use inspired by railroads.  However, the concept had been well-understood for centuries.  The Congress of Vienna (1814-1815) created the United Kingdom of the Netherlands (modern day Belgium & the Netherlands) to remove the means of conflict between the UK, France & Prussia and although it lasted only until the separation of Belgian in 1830, the defined land-mass continued to fulfil the same function.

The derived forms include buffering, buffered & bufferize; the noun plural is buffers.  In the nineteenth century, a number of languages picked up buffer directly from English, including Danish, Dutch, Italian, Portuguese & Romansch, spread apparently by the international growth in railroad construction.

Europe 1945-1989.

The deployment of ten-odd Russian army divisions on the border with Ukraine’s revived interest in the old squabble about whether, in the last days of the USSR, politicians from the West made promises or at least provided assurances to Moscow that NATO would not expand eastwards.  The archivists have for decades been looking for any document which might clarify at least what was at the time discussed but nothing emerged until some material was declassified in 2017.  The conclusion is that the USSR was never offered any formal guarantee about NATO membership but the interpretations of what happened after 1990 vary, the view from the West that the enlargement of NATO was undertaken honorably and in accordance with the rights international law accords to sovereign states whereas Moscow’s narrative is one of Western deception and duplicity. 

Most scholars of the Cold War seem to agree the story begins in February 1990 when James Baker (b 1930; US secretary of state 1989-1992), secretary of state under George HW Bush (1924–2018; US president 1989-1993 (George XLI)) met with Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev (b 1931; leader of the USSR 1985-1991) in Moscow.  Only three months after the fall of the Berlin Wall, the matter of immediate interest was whether Germany, divided since 1945 into east and west, would be reunified, something that was most feared, though for different reasons, in the Kremlin and Downing Street.  London’s concern was its traditional fear to the emergence of an overwhelmingly strong Germany; Moscow feared the specter of NATO’s missiles being stationed in the GDR (East Germany). 

What both Russian and US transcripts of the meeting reveal was that the US position was it was in everyone’s interest that a unified Germany existed within NATO's political and military structure but at no point did either side discuss any of the nations aligned with the Warsaw Pact joining NATO.  That was not on the agenda because the thought of the imminent collapse of the USSR had not then occurred to many, none of whom were prominent in the US administration.  Orthodox political thought in the US, across most of the political spectrum, was that the Soviet empire probably was doomed but it’s life was expected to extend for at least decades.  A similar spirit animated the discussion Gorbachev had the next day with the FRG’s (West Germany) Chancellor Helmut Kohl (1930–2017; Chancellor of FRG or Germany 1982 to 1998), most taken up with the matter of German unification, NATO enlargement not even mentioned.  What was agreed was that the US, France, the UK and Germany, agreed not to deploy non-German NATO forces in the former East Germany.

In casual use, a "buffer zone" can be used of any mechanism (which need not be physical) designed prevents two entities coming into contact.

However, in the great geopolitical event of the second half of the twentieth century, the USSR did in 1991 collapse, ending the perhaps unhappy but essentially stable post-war arrangement whereby east and west were separated by an array of buffer states, the cordon sanitaire which was built by Comrade Stalin (1878–1953; leader of the USSR, 1924-1953), which constituted the line of the Iron Curtain from “…Stettin in the Baltic to Trieste in the Adriatic…”.  They were difficult years for the post-Soviet buffer states but, in 1999, NATO welcomed as members, three nations of the former Warsaw Pact: Hungary, Poland & the Czech Republic.  That sounds now like an event of great significance and of course it was but with all the social and economic disruption happening in Russia, it evoked surprisingly few complaints, the political faction in Moscow which tilted towards Europe and saw their country’s future there, much more influential than today.  Some did however dwell on things.  A decade after the first NATO expansion, Gorbachev complained that the West had tricked Moscow, claiming he’d been assured NATO would not be moving “one centimeter further east."

Gorbachev later retreated from that, in 2014 admitting that in all the discussions which followed the fall of the Berlin Wall and the reunification Germany, the topic of “NATO expansion” was never raised by either side, adding that not a single Eastern European country brought up the issue, not even after the Warsaw Pact had been dissolved 1991.  Equally sanguine seems to have been the first Russian president, Boris Yeltsin (1931–2007; president of the Russian Federation 1991-1999).  Although hardly enthusiastic about NATO expansion, he raised no objection but did urge caution on the West, warning it was important to take into account public opinion in Russia.  In that he may have had some misplaced faith in realism of those he viewed as his new Western partners, writing later that "the spirit of the treaty on the final settlement...precludes the option of expanding the NATO zone into the East."  None of that was in writing of course, the generous interpretation being inferences were drawn where no implications were intended.  Either that or, in Washington, views changed in the post Cold-War world.

Still, for a time, tensions seemed not great and cooperative structures were created including NATO-Russia Founding Act, a kind of statement of peaceful co-existence and in 2002, a joint consultative council was established as a framework in which differences could be resolved; rather wishy-washy in detail, it was regarded by most as ineffectual but at least harmless.  The real crossing of the Rubicon came in 2004 when NATO undertook its largest expansion, admitting seven more Eastern European countries including, critically, the Baltic states Latvia, Lithuania & Estonia, Latvia, all of which had been republics, unhappily, of the USSR.  It was the closest NATO’s divisions & missiles had ever been to Moscow.

By 2007 with the oil price high and the Russian economy thus buoyant, if rather distorted by its reliance on energy exports, the new Russian president, Vladimir Putin (b 1952; Russian president or prime-minister since 1999) made the official Russian position explicit, accusing NATO (ie the US) of duplicity and threatening Russia:  “I think it is obvious that NATO expansion has no relation with the modernization of the alliance itself or with ensuring security in Europe. On the contrary, it represents a serious provocation that reduces the level of mutual trust.”  “What happened to the assurances our Western partners made after the dissolution of the Warsaw Pact? Where are those declarations today?"  There being no documents, it seems Mr Putin might be relying on Mr Yeltsin’s evocation of the “spirit” of the discussions which both he and Mr Gorbachev had earlier confirmed contained no discussion of NATO expansion.  Still, some sense of realism was on display at a summit in Bucharest in 2008 when NATO declined to offer Georgia and Ukraine a fast-track path to membership but assured both they would eventually join the alliance.  No date was mentioned and it seemed a quiet triumph of Realpolitik for the Kremlin.

However, four months later, Russia invaded Georgia, crushing its armed forces and occupying two regions that had already had near complete autonomy.  Then, in 2014, after seizing and then annexing the Ukraine's Crimea Peninsula, Moscow equipped, financed, and provided military support to separatist fighters in eastern Ukraine, stoking the war that continues to this day, the death toll some fourteen-thousand.  NATO and the Kremlin no longer have active anything but emergency channels of communications.

Mr Putin is quite emphatic that assurances were provided NATO would never expand beyond what was necessitated by the unification of Germany and the last US ambassador to the USSR did insist, in his testimony to a congressional enquiry, that Mr Gorbachev had received assurances that if Germany united and remained in NATO, the borders of NATO would not move eastward and declassified documents released in 2017 do suggest Mr Baker may well have said “not one inch eastward” (source or Mr Gorbachev’s “one centimetre”) but that this was subsequently vetoed by Mr Bush who had a different vision of a “new world order”.  In the West, over the years, many seemed to treat all this as hearsay evidence and prefer to cite the 1990 treaty (the 2+4 Treaty) which created the framework by which German unification would be achieved.  There was no mention of NATO enlargement.  Beyond that, also invoked in the West is an argument apparently based on the doctrine of “acceptance by acquiescence” from contract law: Russia accepted enlargement, with detailed conditions, and in writing, when the NATO-Russia Founding Act was agreed.  One can see what they’re getting at but to use an analogy with domestic contract law seems a bit of a stretch but NATO expansion anyway didn’t happen in isolation.  The first expansion, in 1999, came around the time of the NATO’s bombing campaigns in the Balkans, a traditional Russian sphere of influence and aimed at their traditional allies the Serbs.  While sympathetic to the US operation in Afghanistan, the 2003 invasion of Iraq raised Moscow's ire.

Mr Putin’s position has since hardened.  The massing of infantry and cavalry divisions on the border has a nineteenth century feel but the economic and cyber warfare is already being waged and what’s already being called the Ukrainian crisis has attracted speculation from military and political theorists.  All agree (1) Mr Putin wants his buffer states back, (2) this is the first time in history the timing of military action must await the end of the closing ceremony of the Winter Olympics and (3), the Kremlin learned certain lessons about the nature of the Biden administration from the scuttle from Afghanistan.  There the consensus seems to end but Mr Putin's ambition, no less than a re-configuration of the architecture of European security arrangements back to the 1992 lines on the map, is breathtaking.  This is not however 1941 and the world isn't (yet) quite holding it's breath.  Mr Putin has gambled before and won and if he can emerge from this round with something tangible, like a land bridge to the Crimea, he'd take it.  He plans anyway to still be Tsar when all the Western leaders facing him are gone and believes Russia's position in the future will only strengthen.