Kyiv (formerly Kiev)

Kyiv (formerly Kiev) (pronounced kee-yiv (Ukrainian) or kee-yev (Russian))

(1) Capital of Ukraine, in the north-central region of the country on the Dnieper River.

(2) An oblast (a region or province in Slavic or Slavic-influenced countries (plural oblasts or oblasti)) of Ukraine, the medieval principality centered on Kiev (the Kievan state (Kievan Rus)).

(3) In culinary slang, a shortened for the dish Chicken Kiev (a breast of chicken stuffed with butter, garlic and parsley, rolled, breaded and fried). 

Pre 1000: From the Ukrainian Kýjiv or Kyyiv (Ки́їв), from the Russian Kíjev (Ки́ев), perhaps from the name Кий (Kij or Kyi), one of the city’s four legendary founders, from the Proto-Slavic kyjь (stick, club) although some historians regard this as a folk etymology and instead link it to an evolution of something from the local language.  The alternative forms are Kyïv, Kyjiv & Kyyiv, the earlier forms Kiou, Kiow, Kiovia, Kiowia, Kiew, Kief, Kieff & Kief all obsolete.  Historically, in Western use, an inhabitant of Kiev was a Kievan.

The Ukrainian government's official roman-alphabet name for the city is Kyiv, according to the national standard for romanization of Ukrainian Київ (Kyjiv), and has been adopted by geographic naming databases, international organizations, and by many other reference sources.  In the West, many style guides have been updated to reflect the government’s recommendation the preferred spelling should be Kyiv (although a few historians insist it should be Ki'iv), pronounced kee-yiv and a transliteration of the Ukrainian Київ.

The Russian form was a transliteration from the Russian Cyrillic Киев and, along with the associated pronunciation, was the internationally accepted name during the Soviet era, something that lasted well into the twenty-first century and many who couldn’t have found the place on a map would have been familiar with both because of the eponymous chicken dish introduced to popular Western cuisine in the 1960s.  The post-Soviet reaction to the Russification of Ukraine encouraged the Ukrainian authorities to adopt the local spelling, the cultural sensitivities heightened by Russia’s military incursions into Ukrainian territory since 2014.  The changing of locality names is nothing new in Europe, various parts of the continent having changed hands over thousands of years and names of localities have often been altered better to suit the needs of conquerors, sometimes as a form of triumphalism and sometimes just to ease the linguistic difficulties.  The area in which sits Kyiv has at times over the last millennium fallen under Mongol, Lithuanian, Polish, Russian, Soviet and now Ukrainian rule and while Russian and Ukrainian are both east Slavonic languages (as opposed to west Slavonic languages such as Polish, and south Slavonic ones like Bulgarian) and from the one original root they have, like just about all languages, diverged in forks which sometimes evolved and sometimes went extinct.

In the early modern period, Ukrainian absorbed some Polish influences and a number of vowels came to be pronounced differently from their Russian counterparts, the kind of regional difference quite familiar to those in England, Germany or the United States.  That would be variation enough to account for many differences but in its evolution, several letters of the alphabet became unique to Ukrainian (such as the ї in Київ) and the variations can make it difficult for native Russian speakers to understand some words or expressions when spoken by Ukrainians.  Still, there must be acknowledgement that name changes imposed from Moscow (whether Russian, Tsarist or Soviet) have so often reflected an astute understanding of propaganda and the implications of language.  When in the 1660s the Ukraine was taken from the Kingdom of Poland, the Russians promptly renamed the territory "Little Russia" although despite the assertions of some that here began the Kremlin's manufactured fiction that Russians & Ukranians are the one people with the one language, the root of that lie earlier.  The legend shared by three Slavic peoples is of three brothers, Czech, Lech & Rus who set off in three directions from the family and later settled in different places, the three fathering the Czechs, the Poles and the Rus (which begat both the Russians and Ukranians).     

Sometimes the changes effected by governments happen instantly upon occupation such as much as what was done in Nazi-occupied Europe but sometimes, the rectification or correction waits for centuries.  Although the Byzantine capital Constantinople fell to the Ottomans in 1453, it wasn’t until the Turkification movement, which began in the 1920s after the formation of the modern Turkish state, that the government began to encourage other countries to use Turkish names for Turkish cities, instead of the transliterations to Latin script which had been used during the Ottoman era.  In 1930, the Government gazetted the official change of name from Constantinople to Istanbul.  Ankara’s interest in linguistic hygiene was recently revived, the Turkish authorities issuing a communiqué advising the country’s name would change from the internationally recognized name from "Turkey" to “Türkiye”.  The concern is said to be the association of Turkey with other meanings in English (not the birds but rather “a person who does something thoughtless or annoying; an event or product which fails badly or is totally ineffectual”).  Around the word, those in chancelleries dutifully adjusted their directory entries while cynics wondered if the Turkish president might be looking for something to distract people from their problems.

The Chicken Kiev speech

What came to be known as the “Chicken Kiev speech” was delivered by President Bush (George HW Bush, George XLI; 1924–2018; US president 1989-1993) to a session of the Supreme Soviet of Ukraine in Kyiv on 1 August 1991.  The tone of his words came to be much criticized by the right of the Republican Party, still infused with the spirit of Ronal Reagan and heady from breathing in the dust which rose as the Berlin Wall fell.  Three weeks after the speech, the Ukrainian Declaration of Independence would be presented and a few months after that, over 90% of Ukrainians would vote to secede from the Soviet Union which would collapse before the year was out, an event at least hastened by Ukrainian independence.  Bush’s speech came directly after his meetings with Mikhail Gorbachev (b 1931; leader of the USSR 1985-1991), the last Soviet leader, who seems to have impressed the US president with both his sincerity and ability to pursue economic and political reform. 

Bush started well enough, telling his audience “…today you explore the frontiers and contours of liberty…”, adding “For years, people in this nation felt powerless, overshadowed by a vast government apparatus, cramped by forces that attempted to control every aspect of their lives.”  That encouraging anti-Moscow direction must have raised expectations but they were soon dashed, Bush continuing “President Gorbachev has achieved astonishing things, and his policies of glasnost, perestroika, and democratization point toward the goals of freedom, democracy, and economic liberty.”  Just to make sure there was no hint that Washington might be encouraging in Ukrainian minds any thoughts of independence, Bush provided clarification, telling his by now perhaps disappointed audience that “…freedom is not the same as independence.  Americans will not support those who seek independence in order to replace a far-off tyranny with a local despotism. They will not aid those who promote a suicidal nationalism based upon ethnic hatred."

The speech had been written by Condoleezza Rice (b 1954; US secretary of state 2005-2009), then on the eastern Europe desk at the National Security Council and a special assistant to the president for national security affairs although the "suicidal nationalism" flourish was inserted by Bush himself.  Commenting later, Dr Rice and Mr Bush would acknowledge the speech did not capture the moment, the winds of change which had been blowing since the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989, but both in their (sort of) apologias made the point that August of 1991 was a very different time and place from December and nobody had predicted the imminent demise of the Soviet Union.

Whatever the reaction of the Ukrainians, it was no more severe than that unleashed at home by the aggregations of anti-communists, American exceptionalists and right-wing fanatics, New York Times columnist William Safire (1929-2009) calling it the "Chicken Kiev speech" and a "colossal mis-judgment".  Later presidents, all of course who served in a post-Soviet environment, seemed to agree and changed direction, pushing for an aggressive expansion of NATO to embrace all the former Soviet bloc.  NATO would, at the now famous Bucharest summit in 2008, go further still, pledging that Ukraine and Georgia would one day be invited to join the alliance. Perhaps wishing to atone for the sins of the father, another President Bush (George W Bush, George XLIII; b 1946; US president 2001-2009) then wanted immediately to offer both nations membership roadmaps but even then, Berlin and Paris were cautious about antagonizing Russia and put both the former Soviet republics on the back-burner.  There they’ve stayed.

Chicken Kiev (côtelette de volaille in Russian & Ukrainian cuisine)

Chicken Kiev variations.

Ingredients

4 rashers of smoked streaky bacon
Olive oil
4 x 150 g skinless chicken breasts
3 tablespoons of plain flour
2 large free-range eggs
150 g fresh breadcrumbs
Sunflower oil
2 large handfuls of baby spinach or rocket
2 lemons
Butter
4 cloves of garlic
½ a bunch (15g) of fresh flat-leaf parsley
4 knobs of butter (at room temperature)
1 pinch of cayenne pepper
800 g Piper potatoes
1 head of broccoli
1 knob of unsalted butter

Instructions

Fry bacon in a pan at medium heat with no more than a drizzle of olive oil, until golden and crisp, then remove.

For the butter, peel garlic, then finely chop with the parsley leaves and mix into the softened butter with the cayenne.  Refrigerate.

Stuff the chicken breasts.  Pull back the loose fillet on the back of the breast and use a knife to slice a long pocket.

Cut the chilled butter into four and insert into the pocket, then crumble in a rasher of crispy bacon.  Fold and seal back the chicken, completely covering the butter so it becomes a wrapped parcel.

Preheat oven to 350°F (180°C).

Place flour in a shallow bowl, whisk the eggs in another and put breadcrumbs and a pinch of seasoning into a third.  Evenly coat each chicken breast in flour, then beaten egg, letting any excess drip off, and finally, turn them in the breadcrumbs, repeating until all four are evenly coated.

Shallow-fry in ¾ inch (20 mm) of sunflower oil on a medium to high heat until lightly golden (should take no more than 2-3 minutes), then transfer to a tray and bake in the oven until cooked through (typically around 10-12 minutes).  The alternative method is to bake them completely in the oven and skip the frying process; this requires drizzling them with olive oil and baking for about 20 minutes; taste will be the same but they won’t have the golden surface texture.

While cooking, peel and roughly chop the potatoes and cook in a large pan of boiling salted water until tender (typically 12-15 minutes).

Chop up broccoli and add it to the potatoes for the last 8-odd minutes of cooking.  Drain and leave to steam dry, then return to the pan and mash with a knob of butter and a pinch of salt and pepper.

Dollop the mash on the serving plates, placing a Kiev atop each. Lightly dress the spinach leaves or rocket in a little oil and lemon juice, then sprinkle over the top as garnish. Serve with a wedge of lemon.

Hotline

Hotline (pronounced hot-lahyn)

(1) In Canadian use, talkback radio; of or relating to a radio program that receives telephone calls from listeners while on-air.

(2) A direct telecommunications link, either as a telephone line, teletype circuit or other connection, enabling immediate communication between heads of state and intended for use in times of crisis.

(3) A telephone service enabling people confidentially to speak with someone about a personal problem or crisis.

(4) A telephone line providing customers or clients with direct access to a company or professional service.

1950-1955: Hot was from the Middle English hot & hat, from the Old English hāt (hot, fervent, fervid, fierce), from the Proto-Germanic haitaz (hot), from the primitive Indo-European kay- (hot; to heat).  It was cognate with the Scots hate & hait (hot), the North Frisian hiet (hot), the Saterland Frisian heet (hot), the West Frisian hjit (hot), the Dutch heet (hot), the Low German het (hot), the German & Low German heet (hot), the German heiß (hot), the Danish hed (hot), the Swedish het (hot) and the Icelandic heitur (hot).  Line was from the Middle English line & lyne, from the Old English līne (line, cable, rope, hawser, series, row, rule, direction), from the Proto-West Germanic līnā, from the Proto-Germanic līnǭ (line, rope, flaxen cord, thread), from the Proto-Germanic līną (flax, linen), from the primitive Indo-European līno- (flax).  The Middle English forms evolved under the influence of the Middle French ligne (line), from the Latin linea and the oldest sense of the word is "rope, cord, thread"; from this the senses "path" and "continuous mark" were derived.  That was also the source of the use in telecommunications, telephone traffic originally routed along physical lines, usually a pair of copper wires; the use of “cable” “telegraph” & “wire” to describe the messages sent across these means of transmission had a similar gestation.  The spelling variously is hotline, hot-line and hot line and inconsistencies in use are common.

The Moscow–Washington hotline

President Warren Harding with the first telephone installed in the Oval Office, 29 March 1929.

The Moscow–Washington hotline (technically the Washington–Moscow Direct Communications Link) was established in 1963 after the experience of the Cuban Missile Crisis suggested to US diplomats that had the channels of communication been able more quickly to deliver messages, it may have been possible to resolve matters before they reached to point of crisis.  The solution was felt to be a means of immediate, secure communication between the Kremlin and the White House so the leaders of the USSR and USA instantly could communicate in times of crisis, the imagery being two telephones connected by a long line between Moscow and Washington DC.  Unfortunately, although the classic image is of red analogue telephones (without a dialing mechanism) sitting on the two desks, telephones actually weren’t part of the system.  There has been a telephone on the president’s desk in the White House since 1929 but never a red one and although there have been many red-colored phones in both civilian and military service in the US, there was never one connected to the Moscow–Washington hotline.

The photograph of George W Bush was a fake although it circulated widely, complete with a doctored photo-frame in the background, containing a picture of then UK prime-minister Tony Blair. 

The classic hotline was between two callers but there's no reason why they can't be multi-node: Four-way call, Mean Girls (2004).

The reasons telephones weren’t thought suitable was that in moments of crisis in international relations, it’s vital there be no misunderstandings and a conversation between two people speaking different languages through translators, separated by thousands of miles over a phone line of sometimes variable quality, would be inherently error-prone.  Additionally, a certainty of historic record in important in diplomatic discourse so a device which committed everything to paper, in text, was required.  What was adopted was the technology which was at the time the most appropriate, something robust, reliable and suitable for technicians at both ends; in 1963, that was the teleprinter (also known as teletypewriter, teletype or TTY), an electromechanical device which had for decades been used in inter-continental communications, much of its popularity due to the ability to bolt it to a variety of communications channels.  Over the years, the technology has changed to take advantage of advances including an era (which began during the Reagan administration (1981-1989)) in which the hotline was facsimile (fax) based, something which sounds now archaic but which was at the time both fast and secure.  Satellite links have for years been used and there is now a secure fibre-optic link.   

Hotline Teleprinter, the Pentagon, circa 1966.

Before the term hotline came into use in the 1950s, there had actually been a “hotline” which really did use telephones: In 1943, the first use of a scrambler (an early, analogue form of voice-encryption) was the system installed between the White House Downing Street to render secure conversations between President Roosevelt and Prime-Minister Churchill and both the UK military and civil service had for years used hotlines (literally dedicated phone-lines) between departments.  The idea has spread and other countries have either installed hotlines or at least flirted with the idea although, the implementation has been patchy; some installed and never commissioned or switched off during periods of heightened tensions.  The usual suspects have been involved, China–USSR (and later Russia), China-India, China–United States, China-Japan, North Korea-South Korea and India–Pakistan.

A fake Hotline.

One linguistic quirk in the name of the Moscow–Washington hotline is misleading in that while the Russian end does terminate in Moscow, the US end is technically not in Washington DC but under military control in a secure facility in the Pentagon, located in Langley, Virginia where, twenty-four hours a day, a technician and translator attend the office.  Despite reality, in many fictional depictions of US-Soviet relations in the Cold War and beyond, literal, bright-red analogue telephones sometimes appeared, long after any such devices had been replaced, an example of the way in which verisimilitude in fiction is constructed sometimes by conforming to a popular perception of reality rather than reality itself.

Four-node hotline, Mean Girls (2004).

Corps

Corps (pronounced kore)

(1) A military body with a specific function (intelligence corps, medical corps etc).

(2) A military unit of ground combat forces consisting of two or more divisions and other troops.

(3) A group of persons associated or acting together (diplomatic corps; press corps et al).

(4) In printing, a continental designation that, preceded by a number, indicates size of type in Didot points of 0.0148 inches (3.8 mm).

(5) An alternative word for a corpse (obsolete).

(6) In classical ballet, as the corps de ballet, the group of dancers who are not soloists

1225-1275; Middle English corps and Middle French cors, both derived from Latin corpus (body) from the primitive Indo-European kwerp- (body, form, appearance).  Sense in English evolved from dead body (thirteenth century) to live body (fourteenth century) to body of citizens (fifteenth century).  The modern military sense (dating from 1704) is from French corps d'armée, picked up in English during Marlborough's campaigns, the use at the time not based on a specific number of troops but the more generalized "a part of an army expressly organized and having a head".  In English, pronunciation was corse at first and this persisted until the eighteenth century by which time it was archaic except for poetic use.

The field corps, a tactical unit of an army and which contained two or more divisions, was one of Napoleon’s structural innovations in military re-organization although such formations, ad-hoc or planned, had long been a known feature of battlefield tactics. The word was soon extended to other organized groups under a leader, as in corps de ballet (1826) or corps diplomatique (1796), although with the latter, the leader (dean of the diplomatic corps) is an appointment for ceremonial purposes, often, by convention, extended to the papal nuncio.  The special use Corpsman (enlisted medical auxiliary) was used first by the US military in 1941.

The corps in army organizational structures.

Standard of the Corps of Royal Engineers.  Specialized formations (intelligence corps, medical corps et al) exist in all branches of the military with no rules or consistency in the numbers of their establishment.  However, whereas the structures of navies (squadrons, flotillas, fleets etc) and air forces (flights, squadrons, wings, groups etc) are based on the number of vessels or airframes attached, the army (mostly) defines its organization by the number of personnel allocated, the numbers listed below generally indicative based on historic formations.  

Command Group   Size of Command

Army Group           400,000-2,000000

Army                     150,000-360,000

Corps                    45,000-90,000

Division                 10,000-30,000

Brigade                 1500-5000

Regiment              1500-3500

Battalion               500-1500

Company              175-250

Platoon                 12-60

Squad                   4-24

Most armies use all or a subset of the above although the numbers vary (greatly).  A division is made up of 3-4 brigades, a corps of 3-4 divisions and so on.  In western armies, the numbers listed above reflect the big-scale mass formations used during World War II; peacetime armies are a fraction of the size but the organizational framework is retained, most forces actively using only the smaller clusters.  During WWII, US army command groups tended to be up to twice the size of British units though within the same army, divisions often varied in size, an infantry division being usually larger than the armored.  A corps can be assembled from the armies of more than one nation, the Australian & New Zealand Army Corps (ANZAC) being formed in 1915 prior to deployment as part of the Dardanelles Campaign.  Other organizational tags such as squadron also exist but tend now either to be rare or, like battery, applied to specialized units based on function rather than size.  A special case is troop which is generally an alternative word for platoon but there are exceptions.

In twenty-first century wars, entire divisions are rarely committed operationally and brigade level engagements are regarded as large-scale.  In the world wars of the twentieth century, uniquely big, multi-theatre affairs, the standard battlefield unit tended to be the division of which the Soviet Union fielded nearly five-hundred.  The numbers in the world wars were certainly impressive but in a sense could be deceptive, the percentage of those listed on the establishment actually committed to combat sometimes surprisingly low (though this tended to apply less to those of the USSR).  One British prime-minister, pondering this, complained to the Chief of the Imperial General Staff (and the CIGS was a noted ornithologist) that the army reminded him “…of a peacock; all tail and very little bird”.  Dryly, the field marshal responded by pointing out “the peacock would be a very poorly balanced bird without its tail”.

Royal Flying Corps publicity photograph, 1917.

The Royal Flying Corps (RFC) was created in 1912 as the air arm of the British Army.  Late in the First World War, it was merged with Royal Naval Air Service (RNAS), the Royal Air Force (RAF) being formed on 1 April 1918.  Military aviation didn't however become exclusive to the RAF, the army retaining its own operations, mainly for communications, reconnaissance and meteorological services.  The Admiralty was never entirely happy about the merger and the Fleet Air Arm (FAA), though still an operational unit of the RAF, was formed in 1924, necessitated by the launching that year of the of the Royal Navy's first aircraft carrier.  By 1937, even the RAF was convinced naval aviation was different and in 1939 FAA reverted to the Admiralty, operating both from carriers and ground stations.

United States Army Air Corps Curtiss P-40, 1940.

Military aviation in the US was formalized in 1907 with the creation of the United States Army Air Corps (USAAC); the service renamed to United States Army Air Force (USAAF) in 1941.  It wasn't until 1947 when, as part of the National Security Act of that year that the US Air Force (USAF) was established as the fourth branch of the US military.  Remarkably, given it was the US which in the 1940s created the parameters for modern, carrier-based warfare, the admirals, still hankering for the great set-piece, high seas clash of the battleship fleets (which would never happen, largely because of aircraft), tried in 1919 to abolish naval aviation because there was “…no use the fleet will ever have for aviation."  The naval aviators (pilots work for the air force they say) however weren't forced to walk the plank and the navy received its first carrier in 1922 though the intra and inter service squabbles would continue for years.

Invasion

Invasion (pronounced in-vey-zhuhn)

(1) A military action consisting of armed forces of one (usually geopolitical) entity entering territory controlled by another such entity, generally with the objective of conquering territory & altering or overthrowing an established government.

(2) The entrance or advent of anything troublesome or harmful, as disease; the entry without consent of an individual, group or species into an area where they are not wanted.

(3) Entrance as if to take possession or overrun.

(4) Infringement by intrusion.

(5) In pathology, the spread of cancer from its point of origin into surrounding tissues.

(6) In Botany, the movement of plants to a new area or to an area to which they are not native.

(7) In surgery, the breaching of the skin barrier.

1400–1450: From the late Middle English, From the Middle French invasion from the Late Latin invāsiōnem, accusative of invāsiō, from invāsus, past participle of invādō, the construct being in- (in, into) +‎ vādō (I go, rush).  Invāsus was the past participle of invādere + -iōn-.  The noun was from the mid-fifteenth century Middle English invasioun (an assault, attack, act of entering a country or territory as an enemy), from the twelfth century Old French invasion (invasion, attack, assault), from the Late Latin invasionem (nominative invasio) (an attack, invasion), the noun of action from the past-participle stem of invadere (to go, come, or get into; enter violently, penetrate into as an enemy, assail, assault, make an attack on), the construct being in- (in) from the primitive Indo-European root en- (in)) + vadere (to go, to walk, go hastily) from the primitive Indo-European root wadh- (to go) (source also of the Old English wadan (to go) and the Latin vadum (ford).  Of the meanings in the extended senses, of diseases it referred to "a harmful incursion of any kind; with reference to rights etc, it was about "infringement by intrusion, encroachment by entering into or taking away what belongs to another".

The later noun incursion (hostile attack) dates from the early fifteenth century, from the fourteenth century Old French incursion (invasion, attack, assault) or directly from the Latin incursionem (nominative incursio) (a running against, hostile attack), the noun of action from past participle stem of incurrere (run into or against, rush at).  Although in practice often synonymous with invasion, “incursion” is often in a specifically military context used to distinguish a operation which is either a prelude to or a distinct part of an invasion.  It’s a practice of historians rather than a convention of use and is one of a number of words used to describe the mechanics of an invasion including: aggression, assault, breach, infiltration, infringement, intrusion, offensive, onslaught, raid, violation, entrenchment, foray, infraction, inroad, irruption, maraud, offense & transgression.

The (second) Italian invasion of Ethiopia

Italy’s invasion in of Abyssinia (Ethiopia) in 1935 was a curious business.  Conceived by the Duce (Benito Mussolini (1883-1945, prime-minister of Italy 1922-1943) as the means by which his country might acquire a colony of note, a rightful thing he thought denied by the ineptness of previous regimes in Rome and the unfairness of the treaty of Versailles from which Italy had gained so little from the spoils of victory to which she’d made a slight contribution.  In his mind too was the memory of the last Italian adventure in East Africa when in 1896 the Ethiopians had inflicted upon the would-be conquerors from Europe a brutal defeat on the battlefield at Adowa, seared in the memory of the Italian army as the headline “Ten-thousand dead and seventy-two cannon lost”.  Looking first at the map of the old Roman Empire, then the splendid possessions held by Britain and France and finally the few sparse deserts which made up “his” empire, the Duce decided on an African conquest.  Even in 1935 it was seen in other European capitals as an unfashionable venture, the idea of the conquest of other people’s lands no longer the respectable thing to do and there was an increasing awareness that nor was it any longer the profitable thing to do.  Mussolini however was convinced and embarked on what proved to be imperialism’s last great set-piece crusade.

David Low (1981-1963), 1936.

The world of 1935 however was a different place than that of the nineteenth century.  Not only was Ethiopia internationally recognized (including by Italy) as a sovereign, independent state but it was also a member of the League of Nations (1920-1946), the predecessor of the United Nations (UN), formed in an attempt to ensure there could never be another world war, the mechanisms of resolving conflict listed in its covenant. Central to the covenant was collective security and the settling of international disputes through negotiation and arbitration.  The League’s approach did not much commend itself the Mussolini who announced Ethiopia presented a military threat to the neighboring Italian possessions of Eritrea and Italian Somaliland and that anyway his historic destiny was to fulfil a civilizing mission which would “…help Africa to progress from its primitive state.”

David Low, 1936

Obviously the League of Nations could not countenance one of its members invading another and the Britain’s foreign secretary, Sir Samuel Hoare (later Viscount Templewood, 1880–1959; UK Foreign Secretary 1935), making what may have been the finest speech the unfortunate assemble ever heard, declared the UK was wholly committed to the principle of collective security and that acts of unprovoked aggression strenuously would be resisted.  Hoare’s principled stand lasted as long as the next cabinet meeting in London and as quickly it became clear that member nations of the League would not be imposing any economic or diplomatic sanctions which had any substantive effect, let alone threaten a military response, Mussolini invaded.  Able to deploy aircraft, chemical weapons, heavy artillery, tanks and other armored vehicles, the Italians slowly secured victory, culminating in the battle of Amba Aradam, the biggest and bloodiest battle of the imperial era.

David Low, 1936.

By then Hoare had been forced from office by the public outcry over his back-channel deal with the palindromic Pierre Laval (1883–1945, French prime minister 1935-1936 and later executed for his role in the Vichy administration (1940-1944)) which, although in the tradition of the League’s earlier acts of conciliation in the far east, is better remembered as a preview of the later techniques of appeasement which so failed to satisfy Hitler.  What Hoare and Laval had agreed was a deal under which two-thirds of Ethiopia would be ceded to Italy in exchange for the Ethiopians being granted a land-corridor to a nearby port.  Both the belligerents actually anyway rejected the deal and Hoare was the sacrificial scapegoat for a plan which had the cabinet’s support.

The affair revealed the European democracies as divided and the League of Nations as ineffectual and doomed.  Although the League would continue to talk, few now listened as Europe drifted to war and after hostilities began, the organization went into abeyance except for a skeleton administrative structure which ticked-over until the League was dissolved in 1946.  Of the many speeches made after the Italian invasion, the only one still remembered is that made in June 1936 the Emperor Haile Selassie I (1892–1975; Emperor of Ethiopia 1930-1974) in which he condemned the league for its inaction, prophesized war and warned the assembled delegates “It is us today.  It will be you tomorrow.”

Conglomerate & Agglomerate

Conglomerate (pronounced kuhn-glom-er-it or kuhng-glom-er-it (noun & adjective) and kuhn-glom-uh-reyt or kuhng-glom-uh-reyt (verb))

(1) Anything composed of heterogeneous materials or elements; mass.

(2) A corporation consisting of a number of subsidiary companies or divisions in a variety of unrelated industries, usually as a result of merger or acquisition.

(3) A coarse-grained sedimentary rock consisting of round rock fragments cemented together by hardened silt, clay, calcium carbonate, or a similar material. The fragments (clasts) have a diameter of at least 2 mm (0.08 inches), vary in composition and origin, and may include pebbles, cobbles, boulders, or fossilized seashells. Conglomerates often form through the transportation and deposition of sediments by streams, alluvial fans, and glaciers.

(4) Gathered into a rounded mass; consisting of parts so gathered; clustered.

(5) Consisting of heterogeneous parts or elements.

(6) Of or relating to a corporate conglomerate.

(7) In geology, of the nature of a conglomerate.

(8) To bring together into a cohering mass.

(9) To gather into a ball or rounded mass.

1565–1575: From the Latin conglomerātus, past participle of conglomerāre (to roll-up), from glomerāre (to wind into a ball), the construct being con- + glomer- (stem of glomus) (ball of yarn or thread) + -ātus (-ate).  The prefix con- was from the Middle English con-, from the Latin con-, from the preposition cum (with), from the Old Latin com, from the Proto-Italic kom, from the primitive Indo- European ḱóm (next to, at, with, along).  It was cognate with the Proto-Germanic ga- (co-), the Proto-Slavic sъ(n) (with) and the Proto-Germanic hansō.  It was used with certain words to add a notion similar to those conveyed by with, together, or jointly or with certain words to intensify their meaning and, later, to indicate being made from or bringing together of several objects.  The suffix -ate was a word-forming element used in forming nouns from Latin words ending in -ātus, -āta, & -ātum (such as estate, primate & senate).  Those that came to English via French often began with -at, but an -e was added in the fifteenth century or later to indicate the long vowel.  It can also mark adjectives formed from Latin perfect passive participle suffixes of first conjugation verbs -ātus, -āta, & -ātum (such as desolate, moderate & separate).  Again, often they were adopted in Middle English with an –at suffix, the -e appended after circa 1400; a doublet of –ee.  Related forms include conglomeratic, conglomeritic, conglomerated, conglomerating, conglomerateur, conglomeration & conglomeratize.

Agglomerate (pronounced uh-glom-uh-reyt (adjective & noun) and uh-glom-er-it (noun))

(1) To collect or gather into a cluster or mass.

(2) Gathered together into a cluster or mass.

(3) In botany, crowded into a dense cluster, but not cohering.

(4) In geology, a mass of angular volcanic fragments united by heat; distinguished from conglomerate.

(5) In meteorology, an ice-cover of floe formed by the freezing together of various forms of ice.

1675-1685: From the Latin agglomerātus, past participle of agglomerāre, the construct being ad- (to) + -glomerāre (to wind or add into a ball), from glomus (a ball; a mass), from globus (genitive glomeris), (a ball of yarn) of uncertain origin.  Related forms are the adjective agglomerative, the nouns agglomerator & agglomeration and the verbs (used with or without object), agglomerated & agglomerating.  The intransitive sense "grow into a mass" dates from 1730.

Conglomerate rocks are those compose of mostly rounded, gravel-size clasts, a matrix of finer grained sediments, such as sand, silt or compressed clay filling the gaps between the clasts, the form held together with calcium carbonate, iron oxide, silica, or hardened clay which acts as a natural cement.

Agglomerate rocks are large, coarse fragments associated with the lava flow ejected during explosive volcanic eruptions.  Although they resemble sedimentary conglomerates, agglomerates consist almost wholly of angular or rounded lava fragments of varying size and shape. Fragments are usually poorly sorted in a matrix, or appear in a mix of volcanic dust or ash that has turned to stone.

An agglomeration of Lindsay Lohan magazine covers.

Sonder

Sonder (pronounced sonn-duh)

The realization that each random passerby is living a life as vivid and complex as one’s own. 

2012: Coined by John Koenig and thus entered English.  From the Middle French sonder, from the Old French sonder (to plumb), from sonde (sounding line), from the Old English sund ((sounding), as in sundġierd (sounding-rod)), sundlīne (sounding-line, lead) & sundrāp (sounding-rope, lead), from sund (ocean, sea), from the Proto-Germanic sundą (a swim, body of water, sound), from the primitive Indo-European swem (to be unsteady, swim) and cognate with the Old Norse sund (swimming; strait, sound).  The words which most obviously capture the meaning are probably the modern German sonder (special) and the modern French sonder (to probe).

The Dictionary of Obscure Sorrows

The Dictionary of Obscure Sorrows (Simon & Schuster (2021) pp 288, ISBN13: 9781501153648) is a multi-media project by John Koenig, encompassing a website, YouTube channel and, since 2021, a printed book.  Koenig’s purpose is to coin and define neologisms for emotions which, in English, do not have a single encapsulating word or brief phrase, the entries listed on the website and the companion volume with paragraph-length descriptions while the YouTube channel includes illustrative clips.  Koenig does not use free-form construction; not arbitrary, his words are crafted in a way not dissimilar to the manner in which English has for more than a thousand years created or absorbed words as they proved useful, his research exploring etymologies, prefixes, suffixes, and word roots.  Some may endure and some not, just how English has always evolved; for better or worse, not all tongues enjoy such linguistic promiscuity.

#freckles Opia: Looking into the eyes of Lindsay Lohan.

So there’s nothing unusual about the creation of words although in English, they’ve tended to be invented to describe new things (eg motherboard), fantastical imaginings (eg Lewis Carroll’s (1835—1898) Jabberwocky (1871)) or for literary purposes such as the whole lexicon created by Anthony Burgess (1917–1993) for A Clockwork Orange (1962).  It differs too from English’s traditional borrowing of foreign words if they do a more elegant job than that which in English demands a phrase and thus borrowed are zeitgeist (spirit of the age), schadenfreude (pleasure in the suffering of others) and fuselage (main body of an airframe).  Koenig decided to create the dictionary because, as a poet, he found the words needed to suit the rhythm of his verse simply didn’t exist.  In engineering or many other fields his approach would be uncontroversial but there may be poets (there certainly will be critics) who disapprove and suggest it’s cheating for one to create new words just because one can’t think a way to use one of the hundreds of thousands English already has.  In a similar vein, JRR Tolkien (1892–1973) criticized CS Lewis’ (1898–1963) The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe, the first of the seven volumes of The Chronicles of Narnia (1950–1956).  On more substantive grounds he’d issued a critique of the heavy-handed way Lewis interpolated Christian themes but his letters also reveal he rather looked down of what he thought was cheating or at least literary laziness: Tolkien took years to construct his geography; Lewis just said there was a door in the back of a wardrobe.

Fragments from The Dictionary of Obscure Sorrows

Adronitis: The frustration induced by the time it takes to get to know another.

Ambedo: A moment so mesmerizing, so enchanting, that one is compelled to experience it for its own sake.

Anecdoche: A conversation in which all are talking and none are listening.

Anemoia: A nostalgic longing for a time one has never known.

Chrysalism: The feeling of an amniotic envelopment if safe and warm inside while outside a thunderstorm rages.

Ellipsism: The sadness of knowing one will never know how history unfolds.

Énouement: The bitter-sweetness of having arrived in the future and knowing how things turned out but not being able to warn one's younger self.

Exulansis: The tendency to give up speaking of certain things because others never understand.

Jouska: A hypothetical conversation conduced wholly in one's own mind.

Kenopsia: The eerie, forlorn atmosphere of a place usually bustling but now deserted and silent.

Koinophobia: The fear of living an ordinary life.

Kuebiko: A state of exhaustion induced by acts of senseless violence.

Lachesism: A desire to be struck by disaster.

Liberosis: The desire to care less.

Lutalica: The realization one doesn’t need a label to belong.

Mauerbauertraurigkeit: The inexplicable to push away all, even those usually close to one.

Monachopsis: A subtle but persistent feeling of being out of place.

Nodus Tollens: The realization the track of one's life no longer makes sense.

Occhiolism: The awareness of the smallness of one in the universe.

Olēka: The awareness of how few days are truly memorable.

Onism: The awareness of how little of the world one will experience.

Opia: Of the ambiguity of brief, intense eye contact and our reaction to it happening.

Rubatosis: The unsettling awareness of the beat of one's own heart.

Rűckkehrunruhe: Realizing a recent, intense, immersive experience is rapidly fading from memory.

Socha: The hidden vulnerabilities in those around you.

Sonder: The realization that each random passer-by is living a life as vivid and complex as one’s own.

Vellichor: The gentle charm of shops which sell old books.

Vemődalen: The frustration felt when having composed an extraordinary photograph, one discovers a myriad of similar images already exist.

Yù Yī: A desire to again experience intensely.

Shibboleth

Shibboleth (pronounced shib-uh-lith or shib-uh-leth)

(1) A belief, principle, or practice which is commonly adhered to but which is thought by some people to be inappropriate or out of date.

(2) A custom, phrase, or use of language that acts as a test of belonging to, or as a stumbling block to becoming a member of, a particular social class, profession etc.

(3) A slogan; catchword.

Circa 1300s: From the Hebrew שִׁבֹּלֶת (shibbólet) (ear of grain (the part of a plant containing grain, such as the head of a stalk of wheat or rye) (and more rarely "stream, flood or torrent")).  The word was used as a password by the Gileadites as a test to detect the fleeing Ephraimites, who could not pronounce the sound sh (Judges 12:4–6).  From this emerged by the 1630s the figurative sense of "watchword", the additional meaning "outmoded slogan still adhered to" noted by 1862.

The Ephraimites and the Gileadites

The story behind the word is in the Old Testament’s Book of Judges (12:1-15).  In ancient Hebrew, shibboleth translated literally as “ear of grain” (stream, flood or torrent in some translations), some groups pronouncing it with a "sh" sound, but speakers of related dialects pronounced it with a hard s.

In the story, two Semitic tribes, the Ephraimites and the Gileadites, fight a great battle.  The Gileadites defeat the Ephraimites, and set up a blockade across the Jordan River to catch the fleeing Ephraimites who were trying to get back to their territory.  The sentries asked each person who wanted to cross the river to say the word shibboleth. The Ephraimites, who had no "sh" sound in their language, pronounced the word with a hard s and were thereby unmasked as the enemy and slaughtered.

12:4 Then Jephthah gathered together all the men of Gilead, and fought with Ephraim: and the men of Gilead smote Ephraim, because they said, Ye Gileadites are fugitives of Ephraim among the Ephraimites, and among the Manassites.

12:5 And the Gileadites took the passages of Jordan before the Ephraimites: and it was so, that when those Ephraimites which were escaped said, Let me go over; that the men of Gilead said unto him, art thou an Ephraimite? If he say Nay;

12:6 Then said they unto him, Say now Shibboleth: and he said Sibboleth: for he could not frame to pronounce it right. Then they took him, and slew him at the passages of Jordan: and there fell at that time of the Ephraimites forty and two thousand.

As a technique to identify foreigners, the use may have predated  the biblical tale of the Gileadites and Ephraimites and there are many instances in history.  The Italians used the test-word cicera (chick pease) to identify the French during the massacre called the Sicilian Vespers (1282).  

1941 Chrysler New Yorker Three Passenger Coupe.

During WWII, while conducting training exercises on Pavuvu and Guadalcanal, the Marines improved battlefield security not with a password, but by an identification procedure described as "sign and countersign", the technique being sequentially to interrogate an unknown friend or foe with the name of an automobile which required the "L" sound in vocalization.  The response was required to be a cognomen for another automobile uttered in the same manner and in an accent definitely American; those who answered call out "Chryswer" or "Cadiwac" likely to be shot.

A loaf of Ukranian palyanitsa.

The ancient use of a shibboleth to allow the detection of enemies within was revived in 2022 during the Russian invasion of Ukraine.  Ukrainians, if suspecting someone might be a Russian, challenge them to say the word “palyanitsa”, a soft wheat bread with a crispy crust, natives of the two nations pronouncing it differently and it's said to be difficult for Russians to master the Ukrainian form.