Rainbow

Rainbow (pronounced reyn-boh)

(1) An arc-shaped spectrum of color seen in the sky opposite the Sun, especially after rain, caused by the refraction and reflection of sunlight by droplets of water suspended in the air.  Secondary rainbows that are larger and paler sometimes appear within the primary arc with the colors reversed (red being inside). These result from two reflections and refractions of a light ray inside a droplet.  The colors of the rainbow are violet, indigo, blue, green, yellow, orange, and red.  

(2) A similar bow of colors, especially one appearing in the spray of a waterfall or fountain.

(3) Any brightly multi-colored arrangement or display.

(4) A wide variety or range; gamut.

(5) A visionary goal, sometimes illusory (as in “chasing rainbows”).

(6) In DEI (diversity, equity and inclusion) politics, as a modifier, of or relating to a political grouping together by several minorities, especially representatives from multiple identity groups, as those identifying variously by race, ethnicity, gender, and sexual orientation.

(7) The flag of the LGBTQQIAAOP movement.

(8) In zoology, a descriptor used in some species (rainbow lorikeet, rainbow trout etc).

(9) In baseball jargon, a curveball, particularly a slow one.

(10) In the slang of poker (Texas hold 'em or Omaha hold 'em), a flop that contains three different suits.

(11) In the UK Girl Guide Association (as the Rainbow Guides), the faction containing the youngest group of girls (aged 5-7 years).

Pre 1000: From the Middle English reinbowe & reinboȝe, from the Old English reġnboga & rēnboga (rainbow), from the Proto-Germanic regnabugô (rainbow; literally rain +‎ bow (arch).  It was cognate with the Old Norse regnbogi, the West Frisian reinbôge, the Dutch regenboog, the German Regenbogen, the Danish regnbue, the Swedish regnbåge and the Icelandic regnbogi, all of which translated as “rainbow).  Rainbow is a noun, verb & adjective, rainbowing is a verb, rainbowed is a verb & adjective and rainbowlike & rainbowish are adjectives; the noun plural is rainbows.

A fire rainbow (circumhorizontal arc). 

A fire rainbow is an atmospheric optical phenomenon which occurs when (1) the Sun sits above 85^o and (2) ice crystals in high-altitude cirrus cloud formations exist in sufficient volume.  What that conjunction creates is a jagged, horizontal band of colors; it’s a rarely recoded spectacle although the number of photographs has increased since smartphones became ubiquitous.  In nephology (the branch of meteorology focused on clouds and cloud formation), the phenomenon is describes as a “circumhorizontal arc” but most folk prefer the more evocative “fire rainbow”.

The Rainbow Flag

The rainbow flag is more commonly known as the gay pride or LGBTQQIAAOP (usually truncated to LGBTQI+) pride flag although it has been co-opted for other purposes.  It was designed in 1978 by San Francisco artist Gilbert Baker (1951-2017) using eight colors but has long been displayed with six stripes, red at the top as it appears in a natural rainbow.  The original colors were assigned thus:

Hot pink: Sex
Red: Life
Orange: Healing
Yellow: Sunlight
Green: Nature
Turquoise: Art
Indigo: Harmony
Violet: Spirit

Gilbert Baker's original eight-stripe design (1978, left), the version with hot pink deleted because of supply difficulties with the fabric (1978-1979, centre) and the six-stripe version (more or less) standardized since 1979 with royal blue substituted for indigo & turquoise (right).

However, for technical reasons, hot pink proved difficult to produce in volume and was deleted, the first commercial release having seven stripes but within a year it was again modified.  When hung vertically from the lamp posts of San Francisco's Market Street, the centre stripe was obscured by the post and changing to an even number of stripes was the easiest fix.  Thus emerged the final version: red, orange, yellow, green, blue, and violet.  On its 25^th anniversary in 2003, Gilbert Baker advocated the original design be restored but there’ was little support, the six-stripe standard clearly having reached critical mass although there have been one-off variations such as the addition of a black stripe symbolizing those community members lost to AIDS.  Aged 65, Mr Baker died in New York City on 31 March 2017.

Unfurling the flag: Emperor Dale on the Gay and Lesbian Kingdom of the Coral Sea Islands.  The plaque in the sand contains the words of the kingdom's  declaration of independence.

In June 2004, activists from the G and L factions of the LGBTQQIAAOP collective sailed to Australia's almost uninhabited Coral Sea Islands Territory and proclaimed the now liberated lands independent, calling it the Gay and Lesbian Kingdom of the Coral Sea Islands (GLK) with the rainbow flag its official standard.  It was a symbolic gesture with no validity in domestic or international law, the declaration in response to the Australian government's refusal to recognize same-sex marriage.  Undeterred by such tiresome details, the GLK immediately issued stamps, the official website listing tourism, fishing and philatelic sales as its only economic activities but that swimming, reef walking, lagoon snorkeling, bird-watching, seashell-collecting, and shipwreck-exploring were all GLK sanctioned non-economic activities.

Then Senator Eric Abetz.

Fearing it’s assertion of independence seemed not to be making much impression on the former colonial oppressor, on 13 September 2004 the GLK declared war on Australia.  Neither the declarations of statehood or war attracted much attention until February 2017 when, in a Senate estimates hearing on finance and public administration, Senator Eric Abetz (b 1958; senator for Tasmania (Liberal) 1994-2022) objected to the GLK's flag being hung in the Department of Finance’s building on the grounds that (1) government departments should take a neutral stand on political debates and (2) it was wrong to hang in government buildings the flag of an aggressive, hostile state (the GLK) which had declared war on Australia, the comparison presumably that the swastika wasn't hung in the White House or Downing Street during World War II (1939-1945).  The finance minister, Senator Mathias Cormann (b 1970; senator (Liberal) for Western Australia 2007-2020, minister for finance 2013-2020, Secretary-General of the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) since 2021) agreed, assuring Senator Abetz he would ensure “…there are no flags of hostile nations anywhere in any government building.”

Stamps of the GLK authorized for issue by the edict of Emperor Dale Parker Anderson (b 1965).

Self-described as a "gay 22×-great-grandson of King Edward II (who was also born gay) and a direct descendant of all English kings & queens down to King Richard III", the emperor traces his family back to the fifteenth century marriage of the Earl of Huntington to Princess Catherine of England.  Despite the emperor's illustrious lineage from an age of absolutism and the divine right of kings, the GLK was established as a constitutional monarchy.  While the GLK never released details about the extent to which it could be considered a democracy with institutions such as a representative & responsible legislative assembly or an independent judiciary, the spirit seemed not to be despotic.  As a new state, the GLK might even have appeared with a system as genuinely novel as monarchical anarchy.    

Fobbed off.

While no governments granted recognition to the GLK as a sovereign state or established diplomatic relations, the chief of staff in Queensland's Department of Premier and Cabinet did in 2004 write to Emperor Dale Parker Anderson which suggested at least a tacit acknowledgment of the existence of the GLK which sat off Queensland's east coast.  There's no record of further communication between any level of Australian government and the GLK and nor does it appear the GLK made any attempt to secure even observer status in any international bodies.  Following the Australian people voting to make lawful same-sex marriage, the GLK was on 17 November 2017 dissolved and the state of war officially lapsed.  There were no casualties.

Kim Jong-un (Kim III, b 1982; Supreme Leader of DPRK (North Korea) since 2011) celebrates the happy news.

With the passage of the Marriage Amendment (Definition and Religious Freedoms) Act (2017), same-sex marriage was made lawful in Australia, the law coming into effect on 9 December 2017 with recognition simultaneously extended to same-sex marriages performed in other jurisdictions.  With that, so concluded was one of the battles in the culture wars and it was notable for having been conducted in an untypically democratic way, the bill for the act introduced into parliament following a voluntary postal survey of all Australians.  When the votes were counted, the “Yes” case had prevailed by 61.6 to 38.4% on a turnout of 79.52% (12,727.920 of the 16,006,180 registered voters).  For a non-compulsory (and non-binding) plebiscite in a country with compulsory voting in regular elections, the turnout was thought high, especially given it required responders to seal the form in the supplied envelope and put it in a mailbox; for a significant part of the population, it was probably their first visit to a mailbox.  The novel idea of the a non-compulsory postal vote came from Malcolm Turnbull (b 1954; prime-minister of Australia 2015-2018) whose brief leadership was a rare interlude of political sanity for the Liberal Party which for much of the past two decades has been led by right-wing fanatics, religious weirdos, soft-drink salesmen and suspected Freemasons.  What Mr Turnbull wanted to avoid was the issue becoming something divisive between the Liberal Party’s factions and by off-loading the decision from the politicians to the people, the trick worked.  Amusingly, Mr Turnbull once delivered a speech in which he assured his audience there were: “no factions in the Liberal Party”; there was laughter.  Unfortunately (though understandably), the postal survey was modest in that it dealt only with same-sex relationships and didn’t extend to the objectum community, despite in theology and philosophy there being no history of objection to those wishing to marry objects.

Slender rainbow: Lindsay Lohan in a vintage Hervé Leger bandage dress at the Gansevoort Hotel, NYC, May 2007.

The distinctive colors of the rainbow flag and their simple, geometric deployment in stripes have made the flag a popular design.  At the human scale it can be applied to just about any article of clothing and worn as a political statement either of self-identity or an expression of inclusiveness and although the motif can exist at the level of fashion, regardless of intent, the design is now so vested with meaning that probably it's always interpreted as political.

The Brandenburg Gate, Berlin, bathed in a rainbow flag projection during a vigil for victims of a shooting at a gay nightclub in Orlando, June 2016.

Bold, horizontal stripes on a rectangle are perhaps uniquely suited to being deployed at scale and can thus be an aspect of representational architecture but even structures in the built environment with little relationship to the straight lines and right angles of the rectangle offer a suitable canvas.  Because the stripes can flow across and around even the most complex curves and there's no inherent hierarchy in the significance of the colors, if a treated shape emphasizes some and minimizes others, it matters not because the meaning is denoted by the whole.

Flying the rainbow flag: Members of Gay Men Fighting AIDS with their pink SPG, London for Pride Parade, 24 June 1995.

In service with both the British and Indian armies variously between 1965-2016, Vickers built 234 of the FV433 "Abbot" 105 mm Self-Propelled Gun (SPG) Field Artillery vehicles, using the existing FV430 platform with the addition of a fully-rotating turret.  The factory project code (and informal military designation) was “Abbot”, in the World War II (1939-1945) British tradition of using ecclesiastical titles for self-propelled artillery (following the Bishop, Deacon & Sexton).  The official model name was “L109” but to avoid confusion with the US-built 155 mm “M109” howitzer, 144 of which also entered British Army service in 1965, this rarely was used.  While the sight of a cluster of gay men atop a pink SPG might have frightened a few, the thought of one in the hands of a pack of lesbians truly is terrifying.

The progress flag

The concept of the rainbow flag continues to evolve.  Although the text string has been appended as the factions in sexual politics achieved critical mass in acceptability, while the "T" in LGBTQQIAAOP included the trans community, their flags and banners had been separate.  One suggestion to achieve more inclusive vexillological recognition was the "progress flag" (sometimes with initial capitals) which in its latest form is defined:

Red: Life
Orange: Healing
Yellow: New Ideas
Green: Prosperity
Blue: Serenity
Violet: Spirit
Black & Brown: People of Color
White, blue & pink: Trans people
Purple circle on yellow: Intersex

The intersex component was in 2021 interpolated by Valentino Vecchietti, an activist with the UK’s Intersex Equality Rights movement, building on the original progress flag designed in 2018 by US graphic artist Daniel Quasar who had added the five-striped chevron.  The element Vecchietti used was the intersex flag, first displayed in 2013 by Australian bioethicist Morgan Carpenter, the design rationale of which was the purple and yellow being positioned as a counterpoint to blue and pink, traditionally binary, gendered colors, the choice of the circle being to represent “…being unbroken, about being whole, symbolizing the right to make our own decisions about our own bodies.”  Carpenter has noted that statement is not an abstraction, non-consensual surgeries still being performed in many places.  The new design reflects recent internal LGBTQQIAAOP politics which have for some time focused on inclusivity underneath the broader LGBTQ+ umbrella, the feeling being intersex people have long been not only underrepresented but also visually undepicted in the Pride imagery ubiquitous in clothing, events and publicity materials.  The only community which continues to be excluded is the objectum (those for whom objects of romantic affection are objects) and never has the basis for this discrimination been explained. 

Defrock

Defrock (pronounced dee-frok)

(1) To remove a frock.

(2) To deprive a person in holy orders of ecclesiastical status.

(3) As informal slang (by extension), formally to remove the rights and authority of someone, eg a medical practitioner or lawyer.

1575-1585: From the fifteenth century French défroquer (unfrock), the construct being dé (partially inherited from the Old and Middle French des, inherited from the Classical Latin dis (apart), the ultimate root being the primitive Indo-European dwís, and partially borrowed from the Latin dē (from), in some cases + froc (from the Middle French frocq (cloth made of coarse wool), from the Old French froc (compare Late Latin hroccus (frock)) from the Frankish hrokk (robe, tunic), from the Proto-Germanic hrukkaz (robe, garment, cowl), a variant of rukkaz (upper garment, smock, shirt), from the primitive Indo-European rug (upper clothes, shirt) which was cognate with the Old High German hroch & roc (tunic, smock, jersey) (German rock), the Old Saxon rok (mantle, jacket), and the Old English rocc (over-garment, jacket).  Defrock has become so associated with the mechanism used to deal with sinful priests that (unless with irony) it shouldn't be used to mean "removing one's dress", the companion terms disfrock & unfrock both available although neither are exactly elegant.  Defrock & defrocked are verbs and defrocking is a noun & verb; the noun plural is defrockings (a word the Vatican had had to read much in recent years).

For literalists: Lindsay Lohan frocked-up (left) at the Venice Film Festival, September 2006 (left) and defrocked (right) for photo-shoot by photographer & director Indrani Pal-Chaudhuri (b 1983), October 2010. 

Laicization

Defrocking, sometimes called unfrocking (there’s nothing in the etymological record to suggest de-frock or un-frock has ever had currency) is the act of denying an ordained member of the clergy the right to practice ministry.  The procedure differs between Christian denominations (although, for technical reasons, is rare and often impossible in Anglicanism) and is most often applied to the Roman Catholic Church although, as a point of law, it does not overturn ordination.  Although the term defrock is widely used to describe the process whereby members of the Catholic Church clergy are dismissed from the clerical state, the term doesn’t exist in canon law and is never used by the Vatican, clerical expulsion instead known as laicization.  Unlike the more common suspension, which can be reversed upon repentance, laicization is a permanent and final measure although it’s not always imposed as a punishment (Latin: ad poenam) and may granted at the request of a priest (Latin: pro gratia).  Although criticized for not having done enough during his pontificate to ensure sinful priests were defrocked, regulations authorized by Benedict XVI (1927–2022; pope 2005-2013, pope emeritus 2013-2022) in 2009 did simplify the process which, unchanged for centuries, could take more than a decade.

Guilty as sin:  Former Roman Catholic Cardinal Theodore McCarrick (b 1930).  Ordained in 1958, he was first appointed bishop in 1977 and created cardinal in 2001.  Accused of long-term sexual misconduct towards boys and seminarians, after being retired from the ministry in 2018 he was defrocked (laicized) in 2019.

The defrocking by the Holy See followed McCarrick’s trial before the Inquisition (then called The Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith (CDF)) in which he was found guilty of "solicitation in the Sacrament of Confession, and sins against the Sixth Commandment with minors and with adults, with the aggravating factor of the abuse of power".  The Inquisition rejected an appeal against the judgement and sent the papers to the pope, who, as the Holy See’s chief magistrate, certified the verdict as res iudicata (no further appeal possible).   One curiosity of canon law is that ordination cannot be excised so McCarrick remains a priest but is barred from performing any priestly duties except in one exceptional case: he may administer the last rites to the dying if no other priest is available.  Criminal charges were laid but the defrocked priest began to suffer the "significant" and "rapidly worsening" cognitive decline which seems to afflict so many priests charged with sexual offences and after a state-appointed forensic psychologist reported "deficits of his memory and ability to retain information", in late 2023 a court ruled that McCarrick was mentally incompetent to stand trial.

Clutch

Clutch (pronounced kluhch)

(1) To seize with or as with the hands or claws; snatch.

(2) To grip or hold tightly or firmly.

(3) In slang, to spellbind; grip a person's emotions, attention, or interest; to become tense with fright or panic (both archaic and rare outside US).

(4) To operate the clutch in a vehicle.

(5) The hand, claw, etc when grasping.

(6) Power of disposal or control; mastery (usually in the plural).

(7) The act of clutching; a snatch or grasp; a tight grip or hold.

(8) A device for gripping something.

(9) In automotive and other machinery, a mechanism for readily engaging or disengaging a shaft with or from another shaft or rotating part (a specialized form of coupling); a control, usually a pedal, for operating this mechanism.

(10) In sports, an extremely important or crucial moment of a game (rare outside US).

(11) Any critical position or situation; emergency (rare outside US).

(12) A small purse that can be carried in the hand and usually has no handle or strap (also called clutch bag).

(13) In poultry production, a hatch of eggs; the number of eggs produced or incubated at one time; a brood of chickens.

(14) One of several collective nouns for books or dancers.

1175–1225: A variant of (the now Northern English dialectal) cletch, from the Middle English clucchen, clicchen, cluchen, clechen & cleken, a variant of clicchen, from the Old English clyccan (bring together, bend (the fingers), clench), akin to the Scots cleck (to hatch) from the Old Norse klekja (to hatch) and related to the Old Frisian kletsie (spear) & the Swedish klyka (clasp, fork).  It was cognate with the Irish glac (hand).  The origins of the English verb were Germanic, the source the Proto-Germanic klukjaną, from the Proto-Germanic klu- (to ball up, conglomerate, amass), from the primitive Indo-European glew- (to ball up; lump, mass).  It was cognate with the Swedish klyka (clamp, fork, branch). The noun is from Middle English cleche, cloche, & cloke (claw, talon, hand), related to the Scots cleuk, cluke & cluik (claw, talon), of uncertain origin, with the form probably assimilated to the verb.

The meaning "to grasp" is early fourteenth century; that of "to seize with the claws or clutches" from later that century.  The sense of "hold tightly and close" is from circa 1600, influenced by the Middle English cloke (a claw) whereas "a brood, the number of eggs incubated at any one time" (in reference to chickens) dates from 1721 and is a (southern England) dialectal variant of cletch (1690s), noun from the verb cleck which is from the 1400s Middle English clekken (to hatch, give birth to), most likely from a Scandinavian source such as the Old Norse klekja (to hatch), perhaps of imitative origin in the same way as cluck.  The original meaning (a grip, grasp, tight hold) dates from circa 1200, the form clutches (in the sense of “the hands" suggesting grasping rapacity or cruelty) not emerging until the 1520s.  A product of the industrial revolution, the mechanical clutch (movable mechanical coupling or locking and unlocking contrivance for transmitting motion) is from 1814 with the "seizing" sense extended to "a coupling device for bringing working parts together".  Originally applied to the static machines in mills, it was first used to describe the transmissions (as the coupling between crankshaft and gearbox) in 1899.  The now rare meaning "moment when heroics are required" is attested from the 1920s but never gained currency outside the US

The clutch purse

One’s eye is always drawn to a nice clutch purse.  Salma Hayek (b 1966) with Alexander McQueen (1969-2010) skull clutch, Evening Standard Theatre Awards, London, November 2015.

The modern definition of a “clutch” is a handbag without handles but with a detachable (sometimes a chain) strap and (usually) rectangular in shape.  Most often an evening bag, they can be used during the day, the most defining characteristics being they’re slim and primarily hand-held.  Bags and purses predate pockets and the clutch bag seems to have been a very early solution to the problem of carrying small, high-value possessions.  Evidence survives in the historic record in paintings and tapestries but few examples remain extant because almost all were made from perishable materials, a seven-hundred year old relic on display at London’s Courtauld Gallery the oldest known to exist.

For her much anticipated appearances at the Cannes film Festival, Salma Hayek has over the years made the clutch purse her signature accessory, guaranteeing attention from the photographers.

Lindsay Lohan with Carmen Steffens evening clutch, annual amfAR fundraiser at the Cannes Film Festival, Hotel Eden Roc in Cap D’Antibes, May 2017.

In many parts of the world, clutch bags never went away but in the west, the increasing emancipation in the nineteenth century meant bags became larger and the clutch all but disappeared.   It was the resurgence of classical style dresses in the 1920s which led to its revival because it was an ideal accessory for the diaphanous flapper dresses of the era, a style which didn’t detract from the line of the body.  They’ve not since faded from popularity and are now an essential fashion accessory, performing also the socially invaluable function of giving the hands something to do. Because clutch purses so often tend to the rectangular in all aspects, they’re often styled using the motifs associated with the art deco era of the early-mid twentieth century and most designers seem to favor the elaborate, decorative styles of the earlier (pre 1929 Wall Street crash) art deco.  Given the small size of a clutch purse, this can be a challenge to implement but so can the more simplified plays of flattened and stylized geometric shapes or abstract patterns.

Cadillac, Ferrari and the clutch pedal

Although not all early Ferraris were so equipped and by 1976 the 400 GT was even offered with an automatic transmission (General Motors’ famously robust Turbo-Hydramatic 400), the open-gate shift was for decades a motif associated with the marque.  However, advances in hydraulics and electronics meant that by the early twenty-first century, the inefficiencies and technical disadvantages attached to automatic transmissions had been overcome to the point where no Ferrari with a manual transmission, however expertly driven, could match their performance.  Using automatic transmissions meant a clutch pedal was no longer necessary but it didn’t mean clutches were deleted; instead they were automated.  Scuderia Ferrari first used the technology in the Tipo 640 Formula One car in 1989 and any doubts about its speed or reliability were quickly allayed, the machine winning at its maiden appearance in the Brazilian Grand Prix.  Development continued and in 1997, the automated system, dubbed F1, was offered as an option in the F355, the first road car so equipped, the electro-hydraulic system operated by paddles behind the steering wheel linked to the F355's otherwise conventional 6-speed manual transmission.

It certainly started a trend and paddles quickly become almost a de rigueur piece of technology for high-performance cars, the occasional old style, three-pedal model released only to cater for the dwindling number of drivers who enjoyed the experience of the way things used to be done.  In Ferrari dealerships, the numbers dwindled fast and the last Ferrari with a manual transmission was sold in 2012, the replacement a dual-clutch transmission (also called twin-clutch or double-clutch) which used two separate clutches for odd and even gear-sets although the separate transmissions had their respective clutches contained in one housing, working as a single unit.  The model which enjoyed the distinction of providing a swansong for the old open gate was the California.  Upon release in 2008 it was estimated between 5-10% of buyers would opt for a clutch pedal but, between then and late 2011, a mere three were ordered (some sources say two or five but the factory insists it was three).

2012 Ferrari California (top) and 2012 Cadillac CTS-V sedan.

So the last decade at Maranello has been automatic (technically “automated manual transmission”) all the way and although a consequence of the quest for ultimate performance, it wasn’t anything dictatorial and had customer demand existed at a sustainable level, the factory would have continued to supply manual transmissions.  Amusingly, Cadillac had in 2004 begun offering a model with a manual transmission for the first time since the 1953 Series 75 (among the Cadillac crowd the Cimarron (1982-1988) is never spoken of except in the phrase "the unpleasantness of 1982" ) and by 2013, while one could buy a Cadillac with a clutch pedal, one could not buy such a Ferrari.  For most of the second half of the twentieth century, few would have thought that anything but improbable or unthinkable.

Whether that’s going to change isn’t certain but in 2025 Ferrari disclosed the idea was being considered.  Not only have there been requests from “customers in good standing with the factory” but also it will have been noted a niche industry has emerged where specialists convert the paddle-shifted into cars with the traditional gated transmission, complete with a clutch pedal.  In some cases this is done exclusively with the use of genuine Ferrari parts while others use a mix of those and some machined as replicas; either way the build costs tens of thousands of dollars so it’s easy to see why the feeling in  Maranello may be there’s a lucrative gap in the market.  It’s not that Ferrari’s view about the technical superiority of the automated transmission has changed, just that the laws of physics and the realities of human physiology interact to impose a limit on the performance it’s possible for modern cars to attain.  While years of technological advances and investments in engineering probably could make cars quicker and faster, Ferraris in their present form already offer performance beyond what most drivers safely can exploit (certainly on public roads).  Indeed, Ferrari note the AWD (all-wheel-drive) SF90 XX already is within two-tenths of a second of the 2.3 seconds the current Formula One race car takes for the 0-100 km/h (0—60 mph) run and there’s little point in pushing further in this direction because the Formula One drivers of today have a very different physiology from those of earlier generations because of the specific muscle development required to withstand the stresses and G-forces.  A typical human simply wouldn’t cope.

In the Ferrari boardroom, when pondering the return of the gated transmission, the 1969 Ford Mustang Mach 1 428 probably won't much be discussed but the principle is the same: The three-speed automatic (left) is quicker while the four-speed manual (right) is more fun.

So while the focus on ultimate performance might be restricted to a handful of special models, the famous gated shifter might make a comeback, not because it’s better but because it’s more fun.  In the post-war years the British manufacturers sold to Americans shiploads of their underpowered, antiquated roadsters, not because they were fast but because they were so entertaining to drive and the collector market does support the allure: all else being equal, between a Ferrari with a gated shift and an otherwise identical one with paddles, it’s the one with the clutch pedal which will command a premium.  That preference extends to other segments such as the Porsche 911 & Jaguar E-Type and while with that pair the manual gearbox offers both higher speeds and more fun, even though many US muscle cars were in the 1960s & 1970s ordered with automatic gearboxes because that was the quickest way along a drag-strip’s ¼ mile, it’s now the ones with a four-speed manual which are most sought.  The attraction for Ferrari is of course that fun can be just another packaged commodity on the option list and if it does re-appear, the gated transmission is expected to be expensive because while its old technology, it needs to be profitable and the factory are well acquainted with the margins options offer.  On the 2019 812 Superfast for example, in addition to the MSRP (Manufacturer's Suggested Retail Price) of US$561,272, buyers could tick the box for, inter alia, the AFS (Adaptive Front Lights) & SBL (Static Bending Lights) combo (US$3,375), yellow brake calipers (US$1,519), a pair of cloisonné prancing horse fender shields (US$15,000), carbon-fibre dashboard inserts (US$7,593) and a golf bag matching the interior trim (US$10,000).  All those were cheaper than matte paint (US$40,000) but Bentley charge US$160,000 for a Breitling clock so it’s not unreasonable to expect a Ferrari gated shift to list well into six figures and to "test the waters", at least initially, availability will be restricted to a single model although, as the "customer is always right", if demand clearly exists, supply will follow.

Pox

Pox (pronounced poks)

(1) In human & animal pathology, a disease characterized by multiple skin pustules, as smallpox, associated with the pockmarks left by the purulent skin eruptions.

(2) Historically, a reference to syphilis and sometimes to other venereal diseases (now called sexually transmitted diseases (STDs)) (archaic).

(3) In plant pathology, a disease of sweet potatoes, characterized by numerous pitlike lesions on the roots, caused by a fungus, Streptomyces ipomoea (also called soil rot and distinct from the condition root rot).

(4) In idiomatic use (usually as "a pox on (someone or something)"), an interjection to express distaste, rejection, aversion etc and thus a synonym of curse; the adjective poxy is a variation of the idea.

(5) As the acronym POx, variously Pulse Oximetry, Pressure Oxidation, Partial Oxidation, Point of Exit, Plain Old XML & Purgeable Organic Halogens.

(6) As the acronym POX (or PoX), proof of X.

Circa 1480s: A spelling variant of pocks, the plural of pock, from the plural of the Middle English pocke.  Pox in the sense of “a disease characterized by eruptive sores" emerged in the late fifteenth century, a spelling alteration of pocks & pockes (used since the late thirteenth century in this context), the plural forms of the Middle English pocke (pustule).  From the sixteenth century, it became the common word with which to refer to syphilis.  Pock (pustule raised on the surface of the body in an eruptive disease) was from the Middle English pok, from the Old English poc & pocc (pock; pustule; ulcer), from the Proto-Germanic pukkaz & pukkǭ (pock; swelling) and puh & puhh (to swell up; blow us), from the primitive Indo-European beu & bew- (to grow; swell).  It was cognate with the Middle Dutch pocke, the Dutch pok, the East Frisian pok, the dialectal German Pfoche, the Low German & German Pocke, the French pocque was also from Germanic sources.  The present participle is poxing and the past participle poxed; the noun plural is poxes.

As surnames, Pox & Pocks both long pre-dated the use in pathology and were of Germanic origin, recorded in Bavaria & Austria as a variant Of the Bavaria Böck) and the North German Beck (Baker).  Pox may in some cases have been an alternative spelling of these but is documented as a nickname for a “short man”, from the Low German Pōk (young child; Dwarf).  In some regions it may have been a Germanized form of both the Hungarian Pók and the Slovenian & Croatian Pok common in the Balkans.  In the US, Pox appears to have been an Americanized version of Pocks, most prevalent in the north-eastern states during the nineteenth century.  Coincidently, the Proto-Turkic bok means “dirt, dung” and was cognate with the Turkish bok & Chuvash пӑх (păh); in vulgar slang used predictably in the same sense as “shit” (solid excretory product evacuated from the bowel); the word persists in modern Azerbaijani.  The now idiomatic deprecatory adjective poxy entered English in the late nineteenth century as terms of distaste and disapprobation, having been in the medical literature sin 1853 in the sense of “infected with pox; pocked-marked”.  The noun pock-mark (pockmark later prevailed) dates from the 1670s and was used to describe “the scar or pit left by a pustule" after an infection, particularly after smallpox where the effects were most severe and it was noted as a verb & adjective after 1756.  The earlier word in this sense was the mid-fifteenth century pokbrokyn.  Pock-marked was used by astronomers to refer to the craters visible on the surface of the moon.

Cow-pox (also cowpox), was a disease of cattle, noted from the 1780s and the fluid of the vesicles made it transmissible to humans.  It played an important role in the history of inoculation because it was noted milkmaids (with much exposure to cowpox) enjoyed an almost complete immunity to smallpox.  Chicken-pox was first described circa 1730 and the name is thought either an allusion to the mildness of the condition (compared to syphilis (the pox) or smallpox) or it being most associated with children, or the resemblance of the lumps on the skin to chick-peas.  In medical Latin, the circa 1765 varicella (chicken-pox) was an irregular diminutive of variola, the adjectival form varicellous.  Smallpox, the acute, highly contagious disease and frequently (fatal in a quarter to a third of unvaccinated cases) deadly disease was first so named in the 1510s, as small pokkes, which distinguished the symptoms from the great pox (syphilis).

The famous exchange…

“You sir shall die either on the gallows or of the pox (ie from a STD)”.

“That sir, will depend on whether I embrace your principles or your mistress”.

.. has been attributed to many over the last two centuries odd so the ultimate source is uncertain but the first known record of what may anyway have been an apocryphal exchange appears to have been published in 1784 the London periodical The European Magazine.  Supposedly, protagonist and antagonist were the fourth Earl of Sandwich (1718-1792) and Samuel Foote (1720-1777) who met at a dinner held in his house by Sir Francis Blake Delaval. (1727–1771).

In the decades which followed, frequently the tale was re-told, sometimes with different participants (although Lord Sandwich was often named) and although occasionally embellished, what’s more interesting is that euphemisms and niceties were sometimes adopted; “the halter” replacing references to nooses and gallows and “p-x and “certain disease” substituting for pox.  Whether the changes reflected editorial taste or changes in what readers thought acceptable in print isn’t clear but by the early nineteenth century the anecdote was published with the punch-line but not the setup sentence.  That may however have been because, being well-known, by then a mere allusion was probably more funny still, a technique used to effect in the House of Commons as recently as 1968.  Whether or not the exchange ever happened or between who will never be known with certainty but the rejoinder is of such voltairesque quality it’s been attributed to more than half-a-dozen political notables.

Monkeypox

Little political energy could be summoned in the West to deal with climate change while it appeared to afflict only Africans, Arabs, Asians and animals (those inhabiting the places Mr Trump would have called “shithole countries”).  It took Europe & North America roasting, flooding and burning to focus minds.  Similarly, monkeypox (a zoonotic virus in the genus Orthopoxvirus) although for decades endemic in parts of Africa, attracted little interest in the West until outbreaks in 2022 and most people had probably never heard of it until a rapid spread of cases began to be reported in the UK, Europe and the US.  On 23 July 2022, the World Health Organization (WHO) declared the outbreak a Public Health Emergency of International Concern (PHEIC) with cases reported in 77 countries and territories, similar declaration in the past issued for Swine flu, polio, Ebola, Zika and Covid-19.

Monkeypox movement out of Africa 2022 tracked by the US Center for Disease Control (CDC).

Monkeypox gained its name in 1958 when scientists in Denmark isolated the virus in laboratory monkeys in 1958, when two outbreaks of the disease occurred in monkey colonies.  It’s since become clear that a number of rodents are much more efficient vectors of transmission and the virus is neither exclusive too nor most prevalent in monkey populations but, in the way of these things, the name stuck.  This is not a new phenomenon; the famous Spanish flu linked to the pandemic of 1918-1920 picked up the name only because cases there were reported in the press in 1918 whereas news of those already detected in the US, Europe and the UK were suppressed by wartime censorship which wasn’t applied in neutral Spain.  Another case is Rubella which came to be known as “German” measles, simply because it was scientists in that country which identified and first describe the cause and there are many more, most associated with countries not the source of the disease which bears the name.  It’s not known where and where a person first was infected but a human case of monkeypox was first documented in 1970 in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) in 1970.  Since then, the DRC has always recorded the majority of infections although between then and 2022, it had spread to a number of African countries, cases beyond the continent rare until 2022.

Example of regional variations in reported transmission: Nigeria 2017-2022.

Other associations linked to the name monkeypox have also become controversial and the WHO announced it is to receive a new name, noting comments from scientists and public health officials that the current name is "discriminatory and stigmatizing" and it’s also inaccurate to name versions of the virus after parts of Africa.  Accordingly, the WHO has already renamed two clades (from the Ancient Greek κλάδος (kládos) (shoot, branch, family) of the virus to avoid the stigma associated with geographical names: The variant formerly known as “Congo Basin'' will now be referred to as “Clade I” and the “West Africa” variant will be known as “Clade II”.  The first suggestion of a new name is hMPXV, to denote the human version of the monkeypox virus and rather than anything geographic locations, letters and numbers should be used, based on order of discovery. In that system, the lineage behind the current international outbreak would be dubbed hMPXV-B1.  Some local authorities have acted preemptively, Chicago public health authorities for example using the bland “MPV”.  Whatever it ends up being called however, in the West, like COVID-19, monkeypox may be here to stay.

Take-off point of 2022 spread charted by the Lancet.

One aspect of the epidemiology of monkeypox in the West is that some 95% of those diagnosed are gay or bi-sexual men (“men who have sex with men” now the preferred and most accurate terminology).  Activists from the relative LGBTQQIAAOP faction are among those advocating a change of name although this is unlikely to remove the stigmatization based on the rate of transmission among men who have sex with men; presumably a stigmatization associated with hMPXV-B1 (or whatever) must be thought less offensive than one linked with monkeypox, probably because  an alpha-numeric string is a step removed from any link with animals and thus the slur of bestiality.  In the 1980s, that was one of the complaints once it was revealed HIV/AIDS was probably a mutated monkey virus from Africa and, even in the pre-internet era, unsubstantiated theories soon circulated that the entry of the virus into the human system was linked to men having sex with monkeys, a slur on both African men and the gay community who at the point constituted the bulk of infections, almost all as a result of sexual contact.  The consensus now is that HIV/AIDS entered human circulation (perhaps even as long ago as the nineteenth century) because of blood-blood mixing while monkeys were being butchered as part of the bush-meat trade.  The monkeypox vector may have been the same.

Naming virus species is the responsibility of the International Committee on the Taxonomy of Viruses (ICTV) (the expert group which brought us COVID-19) but the WHO has decided to ask for the public’s help, announcing an “…open consultation for a new disease name for monkeypox.  Anyone wishing to propose new names can do so”.  A portal will soon be provided.

Bureau

Bureau (pronounced byoor-oh)

(1) A chest of drawers, sometime with a mirror atop.

(2) A division of a government department or an independent administrative unit.

(3) An office for collecting or distributing news or information, coordinating work, or performing specified services; agency; typically a travel or news bureau.

(4) A desk or writing desk with pigeonholes, drawers etc, against which the writing surface can be closed when not in use, the best known form of which is the roll-top (historically chiefly British but now widely used in the international antiques trade).

1710-1720 (some sources claim instances from the 1690s): A borrowing from the French bureau, the earlier meaning of which was "coarse cloth (as desk cover), baize", from the Old French burel (woolen cloth), and a diminutive of bure (related were the Middle French bure (coarse woolen cloth) and the French bourre (hair, fluff)) from the Late Latin burra (wool, fluff, shaggy cloth, coarse fabric).  It was akin to the Ancient Greek βερβέριον (berbérion) (shabby garment) and a doublet of burel and borrel, taken from the Old French.  The Latin burra remains of unknown origin.  Bureau desks were once common office furniture of offices, rather the cubicles of their day and the meaning expanded by 1720 to "office or place where business is transacted" and by 1796 to "division of a government."  The meaning "chest of drawers for clothes etc" dates from 1770, said to be American English but was most associated with British use.  Bureau is a noun and the modern view is bureaus & bureaux (both pronounced byoor-ohz) are both accepted noun plural forms but the former seems preferred by most.

Lindsay Lohan's page at the All American Speaker's Bureau.

Squabbles on the Wilhelmstrasse; the German Foreign Ministry and the Ribbentrop Bureau

Most historical analysis of the Third Reich has understandably focused on the evil and the damage done but for structuralists, the nature of the bureaucratic state and those with is an interesting study.  Although assuming office in 1933, the Nazis didn’t immediately become the totalitarian regime familiar in later years because there were too many other power centres over which their control was either incomplete or non-existent.  For that reason, the party, while attempting to take control of the machinery of the state, within a numbers of sphere of activity, also sometimes maintained one or more party institutions in a competition for influence, something which reflected the Hitlerian world-view.  Sometimes these organizations would run in parallel, sometime in opposition.

Although the Nazi hierarchy was beset by internecine hatreds and jealousies, one of the few things on which most agreed was the stupidity, incompetence and unsuitability for his role of Joachim von Ribbentrop (1893–1946), foreign minister between 1938 and the end of the war.  Propaganda Minister Dr Joseph Goebbels (1897-1945), ever ready with a memorable phrase, noted in his diary that Ribbentrop “...bought his name, married his money and swindled his way into office.”  Historians don't dispute Ribbentrop's ineptitude but some are prepared to concede the blame should be shared and he should be thought "not competent" rather than "incompetent", a distinction which the more generous might be prepared to make of plenty of failed politicians.  In other words, a champagne salesman should no more have been appointed foreign minister that a sybaritic, bemedaled fighter ace should have been put in charge of the "four-year plan" (a sprawling apparatus which aimed to make Germany self-sufficient in essential raw materials (autarky), reduce unemployment through a public works programme, increase military production and reform the agricultural sector).  Hitler however, was an admirer (Ribbentrop's sycophancy a particular attraction) and in 1934 permitted him to create a party organization called the Büro Ribbentrop (later the Dienststelle Ribbentrop (Dienststelle best translated as office or department)) which, bizarrely, operated as a kind of alternative foreign ministry.

Illustration by Noel Sickles (1910–1982) in Life magazine, 28 October 1946, depicting the moments before von Ribbentrop was hanged, Palace of Justice, 16 October 1946.  The temporary gallows was erected in the prison gymnasium.

The Büro Ribbentrop also operated as a dirty-tricks outfit with some effort devoted to undermining the authority of the Foreign Ministry which, in a nice touch, operated from offices on Berlin’s Wilhelmstrasse, just over the road from the Buro.  The Buro and its back-channel communications served as Hitler’s personal tool for the implementation of his foreign policy (which can be summed up as "lies, lies and damned lies"), the traditional institutions and diplomatic protocols often side-lined although, Ribbentrop himself had to fend of intrusions from yet more party units with interests in international affairs.  Ribbentrop however prevailed and was appointed foreign minister in 1938, serving in the position until the end of hostilities; convicted of planning & waging aggressive war, war crimes and crimes against humanity, he was hanged in 1946.

Victorian (circa 1870) English cylinder roll-top writing bureau: mahogany with burr walnut fitted interior and a trio of leather skivers.

Perpetual

Perpetual (pronounced per-pech-oo-uhl)

(1) Continuing or enduring forever; lasting indefinitely; continuing or continued without intermission or interruption; ceaseless.

(2) In horticulture, blooming almost continuously throughout the season or the year; a perennial plant.

(3) As "perpetual motion machine", a hypothetical device which, which, once set in motion, will continue forever unless stopped by some external force.  Dating from the 1590s, however "constructed", it would violate either or both the first or second laws of thermodynamics and is thus a physical impossibility and now thought of as an engineer's version of alchemy.

1300–1350: From the late Middle English perpetual & perpetuall (everlasting, unceasing, existing indefinitely, continuing forever in future time), from the twelfth century Old French perpetual (without end; uninterrupted), from the Latin perpetuālis (universal ("permanent" in the Medieval Latin)), from perpetuus (continuous, universal), from perpetis, genitive of the Old Latin perpes (lasting; continual).  The construct of perpetu(us) was per (through), from the primitive Indo-European root per (forward (hence "through")) + pet (to fly, to rush), the root of petere (to seek; reach for; go towards; aim at) + -uus (the deverbal adjectival suffix (deverbal nouns are nouns derived from verbs or verb phrases, but that behave grammatically purely as nouns, not as verbs)).  The English forms were a direct borrowing from the Old French perpetual and the spellings perpetuall and perpetual co-existed in Middle English.  The synonyms include ceaseless, constant, perennial, unceasing, continuous, eternal, persistent, never-ending, incessant, unending, permanent, enduring, infinite, interminable, endless, recurring, continued, abiding, everlasting, immortal and uninterrupted.  The spelling perpetuall is obsolete.  Perpetual is a noun & adjective, perpetuality, perpetualness & perpetuity are nouns, perpetuate is a verb & adjective and perpetually is an adverb; the noun plural is perpetuals.

In the matter of Mary

Wall painting (unknown artist), circa 1870, in Saint Laurentius Church in Voorschoten, the Netherlands, painted to commemorate Pastor aeternus.  It depicts Saint Thomas Aquinas (1225-1274) holding his book Summa Theologica (1265-1274), Jesus Christ (with the Vatican in the background which was a nice touch) and Pope Pius IX (1792–1878; pope 1846-1878).

The Roman Catholic Church’s dogma of papal infallibility holds that a pope’s rulings on matters of faith and doctrine are infallibility correct and cannot be questioned.  When making such statements, a pope is said to be speaking ex cathedra (literally “from the chair”).  Although ex cathedra pronouncements had been issued since medieval times, as a point of canon law, the doctrine was codified first at the First Ecumenical Council of the Vatican (Vatican I; 1869–1870) in the document Pastor aeternus (shepherd forever).  Since Vatican I, the only ex cathedra decree has been Munificentissimus Deus (The most bountiful God), issued by Pius XII (1876–1958; pope 1939-1958) in 1950, in which was declared the dogma of the Assumption; that the Virgin Mary "having completed the course of her earthly life, was assumed body and soul into heavenly glory".  Pius XII never made explicit whether the assumption preceded or followed earthly death, a point no pope has since discussed although it does seem of some theological significance.

Prior to the solemn definition of 1870, there had been decrees issued ex cathedra.  In Ineffabilis Deus (Ineffable God (1854)), Pius IX defined the dogma of the Immaculate Conception of the Blessed Virgin Mary, an important point because of the theological necessity of Christ being born free of sin, a notion built upon by later theologians as the perpetual virginity of Mary.  It asserts that Mary "always a virgin, before, during and after the birth of Jesus Christ", explaining the biblical references to brothers of Jesus either as children of Joseph from a previous marriage, cousins of Jesus, or just folk closely associated with the Holy Family.

In general use, "perpetual" is used typically in the sense of something constant and unchanging although it's used often as a deliberate exaggeration; a term of emphasis.