Butyraceous

Butyraceous (pronounced byoo-tuh-rey-shuhs)

Of the nature of, resembling, or containing butter.

1660–1670: A compound word, the construct being the Latin būtȳr(um) + -aceous.  Butyro-, a combining form of Latin būtȳrum (butter) was borrowed from the Ancient Greek βούτῡρον (boútūron) and -aceous was from the New Latin, derived from the Classical Latin -aceus (of a certain kind) and related to –ac & -ax, the Latin adjectival suffixes.  The construct of the Ancient Greek βούτῡρον was βοῦς (boûs) (cow) +‎ τυρός (turós) (cheese).  Synonyms include buttery, waxy, slippery, creamy, oiled, lubricant, lustrous, polished, rich, sleek, smooth, soapy, soothing, swimming, unctuous, adipose, oleaginous, lardy, lubricative & lubricous.

Making fake Sizzler cheese toast

Ingredients

(1) Thick sliced bread.

(2) Butter (room temperature).

(3) Pecorino cheese (shredded or grated).

Instructions

(1) Combine equal amounts of butter with parmesan and mix to create a paste.

(2) Using suitable knife, spread the butter/cheese paste on one side of bread.

(3) Pan-fry the bread paste-side down in frying pan over a medium heat and place a lid or flat plate over bread so it can steam while cooking.  Cook until golden brown and serve.

Notes

Sizzler use Pecorino cheese but toast can be made with Parmesan, the original using shredded cheese but grated or shaved can also be used, the latter able to produce a slightly chunky effect some prefer.

Sizzler has always used only white bread but it works with wholemeal or wholegrain varieties.  The recipe is best in its simple form but garlic powder, dried herbs or small quantities of sliced or grated onion can be added to the mix.  Some recommend beating the butter before adding the cheese.  This doesn’t affect the taste but is said both to reduce the cooking time and produce a toast with a slightly different texture.  Margarine should not be used.

Lindsay Lohan, Butter Nightclub, New York City, 2006.

Honorific

Honorific (pronounced on-uh-rif-ik)

(1) Conveying honor, as a title or a grammatical form used in speaking to or about a superior, elder etc.

(2) In certain languages (including Chinese and Japanese) a class of forms used to show respect, especially in direct address.

(3) A title or term of respect.

(4) Of a pronoun, verb inflection etc, indicating the speaker's respect for the addressee or his acknowledgment of inferior status

1640–1650: The construct was honor + -ific, from the Latin honōrificus (honor-making).  Honor as a noun dates from circa 1150–1200, from the Middle English honour, honor & honur (glory, renown, fame earned), from the Anglo-French honour & Old French onor, honor & honur (honor, dignity, distinction, position; victory, triumph) (which persists in Modern French as honneur), from the Latin honōr- (stem of honor & the earlier honōs), from honorem (nominative honos).  The verb was from the Middle English honouren & honuren, from the Anglo-French honourer & honurer, from the Latin honōrāre, derivative of honor.  It displaced the Middle English menske (honor, dignity among men), from the Old Norse menskr (honor).  In Middle English, it also could mean "splendor, beauty; excellence" and until the seventeenth century, honour and honor appears to have been equally popular forms, the former still used in places most influenced by British use, the latter long the preferred form in North America.  Meaning "feminine purity, a woman's chastity" dates from the late fourteenth century.  The idea of the “honor roll” is attested in an academic context from 1872 and from here it spread to sporting and other organizations.  The initial h is merely etymological, the sound having disappeared even prior to it entering Middle English.

The verb was from the Middle English honouren & honuren (to do honor to, show respect to) from the Old French onorer, honorer (respect, esteem, revere; welcome; present (someone with something)), from the Latin honorare (to honor) from honor (honor, dignity, office, reputation).  It was a Latinate correction that began to be made in early Old French and from circa 1300 was used to mean “confer honors on; action of honoring or paying respect to; act or gesture displaying reverence or esteem; state or condition inspiring respect; nobleness of character or manners; high station or rank; a mark of respect or esteem; a source of glory, a cause of good reputation" and shortly after "to respect, follow teachings & instructions etc”.  In commercial transaction, the meaning "accept a bill due etc, is attested from 1706, via the notion of "perform a duty of respect toward".  The meaning "one's personal title to high respect or esteem" is from the 1540s.  The suffix -ific (creating or causing something) was from the Latin -ficus, from the Proto-Italic -fakos and related to faciō, from the Proto-Italic fakjō, from the primitive Indo-European dheh- (to put, place, set), perhaps via a later intermediate root dh-k-yé/ó- and cognate with the Ancient Greek τίθημι (títhēmi), the Sanskrit दधाति (dádhāti), the Old English dōn (which begat the English do) and the Lithuanian dėti (to put).  Facere (to make) was the present active infinitive of faciō.  Honorific is an adjective & noun; honorifically is an adverb.  The rare adjective honorifical is used when describing the doing or conferring of an honor.

performance.

Lindsay Lohan on the panel of The Masked Singer (2019).  The term "diva" can be used as a honorific.

Divas (real and imagined) are popular figures to parody and the word has produced a number of derived forms including (1) the nouns divaism (diva-like behavior) & divadom (the condition of being a diva; the sphere of divas) and (2) the adjectives divaesque (behavior reminiscent of a diva (the comparative more divaesque, the superlative most divaesque)), divalike & divaish (pertaining to the manner expected of a diva (some noting of the latter the anagram was HIV/AIDS)).  The adjective divaistic and the verbs divaed & divaing (doing something in a divaish way) are non-standard and used for jocular effect.  In music, the noun “diva house” described a late 1980s subgenre of house music, much associated with booming vocals (handbag house listed usually as the synonym although, being pop culture, there are likely some who find a distinction)).  The noun divo is used of “a male diva” (a man with the traits characteristic of a typical diva (used also with the implication the word should summon in the mind "deviant" (ie he's a bit gay)).  Diva (in the sense used in English) was also borrowed from the Italian in un-adapted form in Catalan, Dutch, French, Norwegian Nynorsk, Portuguese, Serbo-Croatian, Slovak, Spanish, Swedish and Turkish.

A honorific is a title that conveys esteem or respect when used in addressing or referring to a person.  In the modern age, until the late twentieth century, the most common honorific forms were Mr, Mrs & Miss which became so procedural they could hardly any longer be though honorific except in the most narrow technical sense.  Feminist thought came to preferred Ms which caught on and the LGBTQQIAAOP movement introduced Mx which didn’t although it did intriguingly turn the honorific from a matter of etiquette into something political.  Although less common a practice now, English also had a tradition of the anti-honorific (despective or humilific) first person forms such as an expressions like “your most humble servant”, the effect of which is to enhance the relative honor accorded to the person addressed.

There are some who define the term quite widely, even to the point where it’s essentially synonymous with “title” although, at the margins, the distinction can be difficult to determine.  In the US, senators and ambassadors are so styled while holding the office and that’s because it’s a title proper yet, upon retirement, they continue to be addressed so and at that point, it becomes a honorific.  In the English-speaking world this extends also to military ranks.  A retired general is properly styled General (rtd) but is addressed as “general” which is a honorific whereas those of five-star rank (field marshal and equivalent) are deemed technically never to retire and thus retain the title proper.  Pedants insist, in the narrow technical sense, the title doctor is honorific if used by those who actually don’t hold doctorates (most dentists, vets and physicians and these days even osteopaths & chiropractors are often so-styled) yet some of those holding honorary doctorates use the titles.  In the Commonwealth, the title “honourable” is given to members of the executive and legislative bodies during their term of service.  It can also be retained by royal licence (ie the approval of the Governor-in-Council) after a certain number of years’ service although there appear to be no formal rules requiring the subject actually to be in any way honorable, the effluxion of time apparently deemed sufficient.  In some fields, titles are wholly informal and may be though honorific even if technically outside the usual understanding.  In music, a distinguished conductor or virtuoso instrumentalist may be known as maestro (from the Italian maestro, from the Latin magister (master)) and a great (or possibly troublesome) soprano may be a diva (from the Italian diva, from Latin dīva (goddess), feminine of dīvus (divine, divine one; notably a deified mortal)).

In the intricate world of the British peerage, and the related order of precedence, honorifics abound; the younger son of a duke is styled Lord though he’s not actually a lord; it’s just a courtesy title.  Winston Churchill, fond of decorations but with little interest in titles, upon accepting the Garter, suggested he might continue to be called Mr Churchill as a "discourtesy title".  In society, the order of precedence is a thing of some importance and one that even experts need sometimes to check to ensure the youngest daughter of a duke is in the right place in relation to the oldest son of a viscount.  Get it wrong and there could be a comment in Tatler.

The B-san: Boeing B-29 Superfortress, 1945.  The cost to develop the B-29 far exceeded what was spent on the Manhattan Project which built the first atom-bombs.  Coincidently, the cost was similar to that spent by Nazi Germany on another influential delivery system, the V2 (Aggregat 4 (A4)) rocket project.  

Probably every country on the planet has an array of honorifics though some apply them more formally.  In Japan, san is the most commonplace honorific and is a title of respect typically used between equals of any age, the closest analogues in English being Mr, Miss etc.  San is sometimes used with company names; the offices or shop of Nippon Denso might be referred to as Nippon Denso san by those in another corporation.  On the small maps in phone books and on business cards in Japan, names of companies are written using san and it can be attached to the names of animals or even inanimate objects; a pet rabbit might be called usagi-san, and fish used for cooking can be referred to as sakana-san though being akin in English to Mr Fish, some might avoid the term in mixed company.  Married people often refer to their spouse attaching san and during the Second World War, even enemy aircraft attracted the honorific; Japanese civilians the target of the United States Army Air Force’s (USAAF) Boeing B29 bombers called them the B-san.  Due to san being gender neutral and commonly used, it can be used to refer to people who are not close or to whom one does not know but it may not be appropriate when using it on someone who is close or when it is clear other honorifics should be used.  Rules for this are doubtlessly best understood by the Japanese.  San is a simple form but a myriad of other Japanese honorifics such as Sama, Kun, Chan, Tan, Bō, Senpai, Sensei, hakase, Sensi, and Shi are applied under a more complex matrix of rules.

Aggression

Aggression (pronounced uh-gresh-uhn)

(1) The action of a state in violating by force the rights of another state, particularly its territorial rights; an unprovoked offensive, attack, invasion, or the like.

(2) Any offensive action, attack, or procedure; an inroad or encroachment.

(3) The practice of making assaults or attacks; offensive action in general.

(4) In clinical psychiatry, overt or suppressed hostility, either innate or resulting from continued frustration and directed outward or against oneself.

(5) In the study of animal behavior and zoology, behavior intended to intimidate or injure an animal of the same species or of a competing species but is not predatory.  Aggression may be displayed during mating rituals or to defend territory, as by the erection of fins by fish and feathers by birds.

1605–1615: English borrowed the word directly from the French aggression, derived from the Latin aggressionem (nominative aggressio (a going to, an attack)), a noun of action from past participle stem of aggredi (to approach; attack) a construct of ad (to) + gradi (past participle gressus (to step)) from gradus (a step).  The Classical Latin aggressiōn (stem of aggressiō), was equivalent to aggress(us) + iōn derived from aggrēdi (to attack).  Psychological sense of "hostile or destructive behavior" had its origin in early psychiatry, first noted in English in 1912 in a translation of Freud.  Related forms are antiaggression (adjective), counteraggression and preaggression (nouns); most frequently used derived form is aggressor (noun).

Aggression and International Jurisprudence, Locarno, Kellogg–Briand and the Nuremberg Trial

For centuries, philosophers, moral theologians and other peripheral players had written of the ways and means of outlawing wars of aggression but in the twentieth century, in the aftermath of the carnage of World War I (1914-1918), serious attempts were made to achieve exactly that, the first of which was the Locarno Pact.

Gustav Stresemann, Austen Chamberlain & Aristide Briand, Locarno, 1926.

Although usually referred to as the Locarno Pact, technically the pact consisted of seven treaties, the name derived from the Swiss city of Locarno at which the agreements negotiated between 5-16 October, 1925 although the documents were formally signed in London on 1 December.  Cynically, it can be said the Locarno Pact was a device by the western European powers to ensure they’d not again be the victims of German aggression which, if and when if were to happen, would be directed against those countries on its eastern border.  Of the seven treaties, it was the first which mattered most, a guarantee of the existing frontiers of Belgium, France, and Germany, underwritten by the UK and Italy.  Of the other agreements, two were intended to reassure the recently created Czechoslovakia and the recreated Poland, both of which, presciently as it turned out, felt some threat from Germany.

Whatever the implications, the intent was clear and about as pure as anything in politics can be: an attempt to ensure European states would never again need to resort to war.  Although the structural imbalances appear, in retrospect, obvious, at the time there were expectations of continued peaceful settlements and there arose, for a while, what was called the "spirit of Locarno": Germany was admitted to the League of Nations in September 1926, with a permanent seat on its council and Nobel Peace Prizes were awarded to the lead negotiators of the treaty, Sir Austen Chamberlain (1863-1937; UK foreign secretary 1924-1929), Aristide Briand (1862-1932; French foreign minister 1926-1932) and Gustav Stresemann (1878-1929; German foreign minister 1923-1929).

Members of the Cabinet, Senate, and House are seen gathered in the East Room of the White House, after President Coolidge and Secretary of State Kellogg signed the Kellogg-Briand Pact.

The spirit of Locarno proved infectious and inspired the noble notion it might be possible for men to gather around tables and sign papers which for all time would outlaw war and the Kellogg–Briand Pact (known also as the Pact of Paris and technically the General Treaty for Renunciation of War as an Instrument of National Policy) was a product of this optimism.  Signed in 1928 and named after the two main authors, Briand and Frank Kellogg (1856-1937; US Secretary of State 1925-1929), it was soon ratified by dozens of countries, all the signatory states promising not to use war to resolve "disputes or conflicts of whatever nature or of whatever origin they may be, which may arise among them".  It gained Kellogg his Nobel Peace Prize but peace proved elusive and in little more than a decade, the world was at war.  Another point cynics note is that the real consequence of the pact was not the prevention of war but the unfashionability of declaring war; wars continuing with a thin veneer of legal high-gloss.  Anthony Eden (1897-1977; UK prime-minister 1955-1957) during the Suez Crisis (1956), noting no declaration had been made, distinguished between being “at war” and being in “a state of armed conflict” although those on the battlefield doubtless noticed no difference.  Because the pact was concluded outside the League of Nations, it remains afoot and the influence lingers; although hardly militarily inactive since 1945, the last declaration of war by the United States was in 1942.

Defendants at the International Military Tribunal for the Far East (IMTFE), popularly known as the Tokyo War Crimes Tribunal.

Kellogg–Briand thus failed but was a vitally important twentieth century instrument.  It was from Kellogg-Briand the prosecutors at the Nuremberg Trial in 1945-1946 were able to find the concept of a crime against peace as pre-existing law that was of such importance in establishing the legal validity of the incitements, both there and at the subsequent Tokyo Tribunal.  Without that legal framework from the 1920s, the construction of the legal basis for the concept of crimes against peace (the first two of the four articles of indictment at Nuremberg), may not have been possible.

At Nuremburg, the indictments served by the International Military Tribunals were:

(1) Conspiracy to plan the waging of wars of aggression.

(2) Planning, initiating and waging wars of aggression.

(3) War crimes.

(4) Crimes against humanity.

It’s always been the fourth which has attracted most attention because the crimes committed were of such enormity and on such as scale, the word genocide had to be invented.  However, the greater effect on international law was the creation of the notion that those who plan wars of aggression can be punished for that very act, punishments wholly unrelated to the mechanics or consequences of how the wars may be fought.  Form this point can be traced the end of the centuries-old legal doctrine of sovereign immunity for those waging wars of aggression.

So, after Nuremberg, the long tradition of the preemptive and preventative war as an instrument of political policy was no longer the convenient option it had for thousands of years been.  With section 4 of the United Nations (UN) Charter prohibiting all members from exercising "the threat or use of force against the territorial integrity or political independence of any state", there was obvious interest in the charter's phrase phrase of exculpation: "armed attack" which effectively limited the parameters of the circumstances in which the use of military force might be legitimate under international law.  Stretching things as far as even the most accommodating of impartial lawyers were prepared to reach, if no armed attack has been suffered, for an act of preemptive self-defense to be lawful, (1) a threat must be demonstratively real and not merely a perception of the possible and (2), the force applied in self-defense must be proportional to the harm threatened.  All this is why General Colin Powell's (1937–2021; US Secretary of State 2001-2005) statement of justification to the Security Council seeking authority to invade Iraq in 2003 took the tortured form it did.

Mr Putin.

The state of international law is why President Vladimir Putin (b 1952; prime-minister or president of Russia since 1999) has resorted to some unusual terminology and some impressive, if not entirely convincing, intellectual gymnastics in his explanations of geography and history.  While hardly the direct and unambiguous speech used by some of his predecessors in the Kremlin, it's certainly kept the Kremlinologists and their readers interested.  As early as December 2020, Mr Putin was already using the phrase "military-technical measures" should NATO (again) approach Russia's borders and the charm of that presumably was that having no precise meaning, it could at any time mean what Mr Putin wanted it to mean at that moment.  Mr Putin also claimed the government in the Ukraine is committing genocide against ethnic Russians within the territory and, in an echo of similar claims from the troubled 1930s "seemed to believe his own atrocity stories", later doubling-down, calling the Ukranian government a "Nazi regime" and said he was seeking a process of "de-Nazification" (an actual structured and large-scale programme run in post-war Germany by the occupying forces aimed at removing the worst elements of the Third Reich from public life).  

Most interestingly, Mr Putin said Ukraine wasn’t a real country, a significant point if true because it's only foreign countries which can be invaded.  If a government moves troops into parts of their own territory, it's not an invasion; it might be a police action, a counter-insurgency or a military exercise or any number of things but it can't be an invasion.  Technically of course, that applies also to renegade provinces.  It seemed an adventurous argument to run given Ukraine has for decades been a member of the UN and recognized by just about every country (including Russia) as a sovereign state.  To clarify, Mr Putin added the odd nuance, claiming Ukraine was "...not a real country..." and had "...never had its own authentic statehood."  "There has never been a sustainable statehood in Ukraine.”  The basis of that was his assertion that Ukraine was created by the Soviet Union's first leader, Vladimir Lenin (1870–1924; Leader of Soviet Russia 1917-1924 & the USSR 1922-1924) as either a sort of administrative zone or just as a mistake depending on interpretation.  Ignoring the wealth of historical material documenting the pre-Soviet history of the Ukraine, Mr Putin insisted it was part of Russia, an "...integral part of our own history, culture, spiritual space.”

Having established his case the Ukraine was no foreign country but just another piece of Russia, Mr Putin turned his thoughts to the nature of the threat the obviously renegade province posed.  Although after the collapse of the USSR, the Ukraine voluntarily (and gratefully) gave up the nuclear weapons in its territory in exchange for a security guarantees issued by the US, UK, and Russia, Mr Putin expressed concern the neo-Nazi regime there had both the knowledge and the desire to obtain nuclear weapons and delivery systems, adding: “If Ukraine acquires weapons of mass destruction, the situation in the world and in Europe will drastically change, especially for us, for Russia... we cannot but react to this real danger, all the more so since, let me repeat, Ukraine’s Western patrons may help it acquire these weapons to create yet another threat to our country.”

The internal logic of this was perfect to satisfy international law: (1) The territory which on maps is called Ukraine is not a country and just a part of Russia and (2), the illegal administration running the renegade province of Ukraine is plotting to acquire weapons of mass-destruction.  Under those conditions, military action by Moscow would be valid under international law but just to make sure, Mr Putin recognized Donetsk and Luhansk (two separatist regions in the Donbas), and deployed Russian troops as "peacekeepers".  Around the world, just about everybody except the usual suspects called it an invasion.

Many also discussed the legal position, perhaps not a great consolation to the citizens of Ukraine and the limitations of international law had anyway long been understood by those who were most hopeful of their civilizing power.  In his report to President Truman (1884–1972; US president 1945-1953) at the conclusion of the Nuremberg trial (1945-1946), Justice Robert Jackson (1892–1954; sometime justice of the US Supreme Court, US solicitor general & attorney general and chief US prosecutor at the Nuremberg trials), noted the judgment had "...for the first time made explicit and unambiguous what was theretofore, as the Tribunal has declared, implicit in International Law, namely, that to prepare, incite, or wage a war of aggression, or to conspire with others to do so, is a crime against international society, and that to persecute, oppress, or do violence to individuals or minorities on political, racial, or religious grounds in connection with such a war, or to exterminate, enslave, or deport civilian populations, is an international crime, and that for the commission of such crimes individuals are responsible. This agreement also won the adherence of nineteen additional nations and represents the combined judgments of the overwhelming majority of civilized people. It is a basic charter in the International Law of the future."  However, his idealism tempered by what he knew to be the nature of men, he conceded it would be "... extravagant to claim that agreements or trials of this character can make aggressive war or persecution of minorities impossible." although he did add that there was no doubt "they strengthen the bulwarks of peace and tolerance."  One of the US judges at Nuremburg had, whatever the theoretical legal position, reached an even more gloomy conclusion, Francis Biddle (1886–1968; US solicitor general 1940-1941 & attorney general 1941-1945 and primary US judge at the Nuremberg Trials) writing to the president that the judgements he'd helped deliver couldn't prevent war but might help men to "... learn a little better to detest it."  "Aggressive war was once romantic, now it is criminal."

Biddle was a realist who understood the forces which operated within legal systems and nation states.  Even the long-serving liberal judge William O Douglas (1898–1980; associate justice of the US Supreme Court 1939-1975) couldn’t bring himself to accept that the aggression which led to World War II (1939-1945) in which as many a sixty millions died was not reason enough to overcome his aversion to ex post facto law (the construct being the Latin ex (from) + post (after) + facto, ablative of factum (deed), (that which retrospectively changes the legal consequences of actions from what would have applied prior to the application of the law).  Douglas deplored the way the IMT had not only convicted but imposed capital sentences of those indicted for conduct which has at time been legal under metropolitan and international law:

“No matter how many books are written or briefs filed, no matter how finely the lawyers analyzed it, the crime for which the Nazis were tried had never been formalized as a crime with the definiteness required by our legal standards, nor outlawed with a death penalty by the international community. By our standards that crime arose under ex post facto law. Goering et al. deserved severe punishment. But their guilt did not justify us in substituting power for principle.”

Developments since in international law have seen progress.  The United Nations Charter, adopted in 1945, prohibits the use of force by one state against another, except in cases of self-defense or when authorized by the UN Security Council for the purpose of maintaining or restoring international peace and security, Article 2(4) of the UN Charter stating “all Members shall refrain in their international relations from the threat or use of force against the territorial integrity or political independence of any state."  That works in conjunction with the Nuremberg Principles which declared the planning, preparation, initiation, or execution of a war of aggression is a crime against peace and a violation of international law, a more concrete underpinning of customary international law than the Kellogg-Briand Pact which was in the same vein but always was of limited practical application because there existed no mechanism of enforcement or codification of penalties.  Despite that, the core concept of just what does constitute the crime of “aggressive war” has never been generally agreed and although the UN’s 1974 statement: “Aggression is the use of armed force by a State against the sovereignty, territorial integrity or political independence of another State, or in any other manner inconsistent with the Charter of the United Nations.” seems compelling, the debate continues.

Phonetic

Phonetic (pronounced fuh-net-ik)

(1) Of or relating to speech sounds, their production, or their transcription in written symbols.

(2) Corresponding to pronunciation; agreeing with pronunciation; spelling in accord with pronunciation.

(3) Concerning or involving the discrimination of non-distinctive elements of a language (in English, certain phonological features, as length and aspiration, are phonetic but not phonemic); denoting any perceptible distinction between one speech sound and another, irrespective of whether the sounds are phonemes or allophones.

(4) As a noun, (in Chinese writing) a written element that represents a sound and is used in combination with a radical to form a character.

(5) In the language of structural linguistics, relating to phones (as opposed to phonemes).

1803: From the New Latin phōnēticus, from the Ancient Greek φωνητῐκός (phōnētikós) (vocal), the construct being phōnēt(ós) (utterable; to be spoken (verbid of phōneîn (to make sounds; to speak))) + -ikos (the adjective suffix).  The source was the Latin phōnē (sound, voice), from the primitive Indo-European bha- (to speak, tell, say).  The meaning "relating or pertaining to the human voice as used in speech" was in use by 1861 but the technical use "phonetic science” (scientific study of speech) was in the literature twenty years earlier.  Phonetic is an adjective and a noun (in the technical sense of a element in Chinese writing) and phonetically an adverb.  Phonetical is an adjective which can correctly be used in certain sentences but is largely synonymous with phonetic and thus often potentially redundant.  Fauxnetic (the construct being faux (fake) + (pho)netic) exists to describe a respelling system: not adequately indicating pronunciation and can be used humorously or technically.

The NATO Phonetic Alphabet

Phonetic alphabets were devised as radiotelephonic spelling systems to enhance the clarity of voice-messaging in potentially adverse audio environments, afflicted by factors such as the clatter of the battlefield, poor signal quality or language barriers where differences in pronunciation can distort understanding.  If a universal radiotelephonic spelling alphabet (substituting a code word for each letter of the alphabet) is adopted, critical messages are more likely correctly to be understood.

The NATO (North Atlantic Treaty Organization) phonetic alphabet became effective in 1956 and soon became the established universal phonetic alphabet but the one familiar today took some time to emerge, several adaptations earlier trialed.  The early inventors and adopters of what were then variously called voice procedure alphabets, (radio-)telephony alphabets & (word-)spelling alphabets, were branches of the military anxious, as the volume of radio communication increasingly multiplied, to adopt a standardized set of standards as they had in Morse Code for cable traffic and semaphore for signals.  A surprising array of systems were developed by the military and the cable & telephony operators which, obviously worked well within institutions but as communications systems were tending to become interconnected, the utility for interoperability was limited by the confusion which could arise where the choices of name didn’t coincide.

Probably the first genuinely global models were those standardized during the 1920s by the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) and International Telecommunication Union (ITU), the latter adopted by many post offices (and other authorities administering regional telephone systems).  It featured mostly the names of cities across the globe although substituted kilogramme (sic) for the Khartoum or Kimberley used earlier by others:

Amsterdam, Baltimore, Casablanca, Denmark, Edison, Florida, Gallipoli, Havana, Italia, Jerusalem, Kilogramme, Liverpool, Madagascar, New York, Oslo, Paris, Quebec, Roma, Santiago, Tripoli, Uppsala, Valencia, Washington, Xanthippe, Yokohama, Zurich.

City names had long been a popular choice because they were usually well-known with (at least in the English-speaking world), more-or-less standardized pronunciations but the military, always interested in specific (if not general) efficiencies, preferred words with no more than two syllables and preferably one.  The joint Army/Navy project in the US (called the Able Baker alphabet after the first two code words) was adopted across the entire service in 1941 and its utility, coupled with the wealth of documentation available saw it quickly and widely used by allied forces, something encouraged by their dependence on US materiel and logistical support.  In the muddle of war, adoption was ad hoc and it seems nothing was formalized until the 1943 when the British Royal Air Force (RAF) advised all stations that Able Baker was the RAF standard, codifying what had for some time been standard operating procedure.  The Able Baker set used:

Able, Baker, Charlie, Dog, Easy, Fox, George, How, Item, Jig, King, Love, Mike, Nan, Oboe, Peter, Queen, Roger, Sugar, Tare, Uncle, Victor, William, X-ray, Yoke, Zebra.

The demands of war meant there was little time for linguistic sociology but after the war, concerns began to be expressed that almost all (and by then dozens had been created) the phonetic alphabets were decidedly English in composition.  A new version incorporating sounds common to English, French, and Spanish was proposed by the International Air Transport Association (IATA), one of the alphabet soup of international organizations which emerged after the formation of the United Nations (UN); their code-set was, for civil aviation only, adopted in 1951 and was very similar to that used today:

Alfa, Bravo, Coca, Delta, Echo, Foxtrot, Gold, Hotel, India, Juliett, Kilo, Lima, Metro, Nectar, Oscar, Papa, Quebec, Romeo, Sierra, Tango, Union, Victor, Whiskey, eXtra, Yankee, Zulu.

Most agreed the IATA system was technically better and certainly more suited to communications conducted by a multi-language community, for whom many English was neither a first nor sometimes even a familiar tongue.  However, the military in this era was still using the Able Baker system and the difficulties this created were practical, many airfields and the overwhelming bulk of air-space shared between civil and military operators.  It was clear the need for a universal phonetic alphabet was greater than ever and accordingly, reviews were begun, soon coordinated by the newly formed NATO.  After some inter-service discussion, NATO provided a position paper proposing changing the words for the letters C, M, N, U, and X.  This was submitted to the International Civil Aviation Organization (IACO) and, having a world-wide membership structure, the IAOC took a while to consider thing but eventually, a consensus was almost to hand except for the letter N, the military faction wanting November, the civil Nectar and neither side seemed willing to budge.  Seeing no progress, NATO in April 1955 engaged I a bit of linguistic brinkmanship, the North Atlantic Military Committee Standing Group advising that regardless of what the IACO did, the alphabet would “be adopted and made effective for NATO use on 1 January 1956.”

This created the potential for an imbroglio in that there were many civilian institutions and not a few branches of militaries with which they interacted, hesitant to adopt the alphabet for national use until the ICAO decided what to do which would have created the unfortunate situation in which the NATO Military Commands would be on the one system and others on a mixture.  Fortunately, the ICAO responded with new-found alacrity and approved the alphabet, November prevailing.  NATO formalized the use with effect from 1 March 1956 and the ITU later adopted it which had the effect of it becoming the established universal phonetic alphabet governing all military, civilian and amateur radio communications.  Although it was substantially the work of other, particularly the various civil aviation authorities around the world, because it was NATO which was most associated with the final revision, it became known as the NATO Phonetic Alphabet.

Russian military phonetic alphabet compared with NATO set.

There were objections.  In the word-nerdy world of structural linguistics, there are objections to the very phrase "phonetic alphabet" because they don’t indicate phonetics and cannot function as genuine phonetic transcription systems like the International Phonetic Alphabet, reminding us the NATO system is actually the International Radiotelephony Spelling Alphabet.  Those few who note the argument tend politely to agree and move on.  There are also those who use the NATO set but disapprove of the Americans, NATO, the West, capitalism etc; they call it something else if they call it anything at all.  Then there are countries which speak languages other than English.  English is the international language of civil aviation so they’re stuck with that but foreign militaries and security services often have their own sets.

There’s never been the same interest in or effort devoted to a system of numeric code words (ie the numbers from zero to nine) and the IMO defines a different set than does the ICAO: 0 (Nadazero), 1 (Unaone), 2 (Bissotwo), 3 (Terrathree), 4 (Kartefour), 5 (Pantafive), 6 (Soxisix), 7 (Setteseven), 8 (Oktoeight) & 9 (Novenine).  The divergence has never created much controversy because the nature of the words which designated numbers tend not easily to be confused with others and the fact they were often spoken is a context which made obvious their numerical nature added to clarity.  Indeed, although NATO created a comple set of ten names for numbers, the only ones recommended for use were : 3 (Tree), 4 (Fowler), 5 (Fife) & 9 (Niner), these the only ones thought potentially troublesome.  In practice, in NATO and beyond, these are rarely used and that very rarity means they’re as likely to confuse as clarify, especially if spoken between those who speak different languages.

Pronunciation can of course be political so therefore can be contextual.  Depending on what one’s trying to achieve, how one chooses to pronounce words can vary according to time, place, platform or audience.  Some still not wholly explained variations in Lindsay Lohan’s accent were noted circa 2016 and the newest addition to the planet’s tongues (Lohanese or Lilohan) was thought by most to lie somewhere between Moscow and the Mediterranean, possibly via Prague.  It had a notable inflection range and the speed of delivery varied with the moment.  Psychologist Wojciech Kulesza of SWPS University of Social Sciences and Humanities in Poland identified context as the crucial element.  Dr Kulesza studies the social motives behind various forms of verbal mimicry (including accent, rhythm & tone) and he called the phenomenon the “echo effect”, the tendency, habit or technique of emulating the vocal patters of one’s conversational partners.  He analysed clips of Lilohan and noted a correlation between the nuances of the accent adopted and those of the person with who Ms Lohan was speaking.  Psychologists explain the various instances of imitative behaviour (conscious or not) as one of the building blocks of “social capital”, a means of bonding with others, something which seems to be inherent in human nature.  It’s known also as the “chameleon effect”, the instinctive tendency to mirror behaviors perceived in others and it’s observed also in politicians although their motives are entirely those of cynical self-interest, crooked Hillary Clinton’s adoption of a “southern drawl” when speaking in a church south of the Mason-Dixon Line a notorious example.

Memo: Team Douglas Productions, 29 July 2004.

Also of interest to students of nomenclature is the process by which the names of people can become objects applied variously.  As Napoleon, Churchill and Hitler live on as Napoleonic, Churchillian and Hitlerite, on the internet is a body of the Lohanic.  Universally, that’s pronounced lo-han-ick but Lindsay Lohan has mentioned in interviews that being a surname of Irish origin, it’s “correctly” low-en, a form she adopted early in 2022 with her first posting on TikTok where it rhymed with “Coen” (used usually for the surname “Cohen” which is of Hebrew origin and unrelated to Celtic influence).  For a generation brought up on lo-han it must have been a syllable too far because it didn’t catch on and by early 2023, she was back to lo-han with the hard “h”.  Curiously, while etymologists seem to agree that historically lo-en was likely the form most heard in Ireland, the popular genealogy sites all indicate the modern practice is to use lo-han so hopefully that’s the last word.  However, the brief flirtation with phonetic h-lessness did have a precedent:  When Herbie: Fully Loaded (2005) was being filmed in 2004, the production company circulated a memo to the crew informing all that Lohan was pronounced “Lo-en like Coen” with a silent “h”.

Disc or Disk

Disc or disk (pronounced disk)

(1) A phonograph record.

(2) Any thin, flat, circular plate or object.

(3) Any surface that is flat and round, or seemingly so.

(4) In computing hardware, any of several types of media consisting of thin, round plates of plastic or metal, used for external storage.

(5) In zoology and anatomy, any of various roundish, flat structures or parts in the body, especially an intervertebral disc.

(6) In botany, (in the daisy and other composite plants) the central portion of the flower head, composed of tubular florets (especially the middle part of the lip of an orchid).

(7) Any of the circular steel blades that form the working part of a disk harrow.

(8) In mathematics, the domain bounded by a circle.

1655-1665: From the French disque, from the Latin discus, from Ancient Greek δίσκος (dískos) (disk, quoit, platter; a circular plate suited for hurling) from δικεῖν (dikeîn) (to hurl, to launch) from the primitive Indo-European dik-skos from the root deik (to show, pronounce solemnly).  The Proto-Germanic diskaz was also drawn from the Latin and Greek root and was cognate with the Old Saxon disk, the Old Dutch disc (Dutch dis (table)), the Old High German tisc (German tisch (table)) and the Old Norse diskr (plate).

The sense of "phonograph disk" dates from 1888 and discophile was used to describe enthusiasts for gramophone recordings from 1940.  Disk jockey as a term to describe those on radio who broadcast music from records was first recorded 1941; it became dee-jay is 1955 and was further truncated to DJ in 1961; the video version "veejay" is from 1982 but never really caught on.  Disk-drive is from 1952 although disk was first noted in the context of computing in 1947.  Disc brakes were first developed in the late nineteenth century, began to be used on cars at scale in the 1950s and were widely widely available early in the next decade.  The first compact disc (CD) was released in 1982, the digital versatile disc (DVD) in 1995 and the BluRay (BD) disc in 2006.

Disk or Disc

LP album cover; the LP was the final evolution of the traditional phonographic disk.  This cover is memorable but fake, it is a fake disk.

Although both the Latin and Greek spellings have endured, there is in English no formal rule for the use of disc & disk and the two are often used interchangeably.  Even within industries or in countries, there is no consensus on the difference but there are conventions.  Historically the Latinate form was preferred in the British Empire and the Greek in the US but the advent of disk as the preferred use in the computing industry from the 1940s spread worldwide although, as a point of deliberate differentiation, disc was adopted for the new optical hardware (CD, DVD and BluRay).  The distinction is maintained still; mechanical devices are diskettes or hard disks whereas the optical are all discs.

The newer form of storage is solid state and the devices are properly called semiconductor storage devices (SSD) but are more typically referred to (wrongly and presumably influenced by the SSD acronym) as  solid-state disks, or solid-state drives even though SSDs don't have the rotating disk or the drive mechanism which powers the movable read–write heads used with hard disk drives (HDD) and floppy disks (FDD); even among those who understand the difference, the habits of old die hard.  So, the SSD has neither disk nor drive but does require, somewhere in the system, a software driver.

Lindsay Lohan music albums on CD: Speak (2004) and A Little More Personal (RAW) (2005, both released by Casablanca Records.

Although the use in IT greatly increased use of disk, even before the debut of optical media, there was never any indication disc would become extinct.  Except where specifically defined as a brand-name or trademark (such as the CD), both are likely to continue to be used interchangeably with regional and perhaps even generational variations.  Most style guides, even those which provide prescriptive lists, acknowledge this and suggest regardless of the form(s) users choose, what matters is to maintain consistency.  Rotating disks and discs are anyway vanishing from computer hardware so the influence of the industry's conventions of use will presumably diminish.