Scrunchie

Scrunchie (pronounced skruhn-chee)

An elastic band covered with gathered fabric, used to fasten the hair, as in a ponytail (usually as scrunchie).

1987: The construct was scrunch +‎ -ie.  Scrunch has existed since the early nineteenth century, either an intensive form of crunch; ultimately derived from the onomatopoeia of a crumpling sound or a blend of squeeze +‎ crunch.  The suffix -ie was a variant spelling of -ee, -ey & -y and was used to form diminutive or affectionate forms of nouns or names.  It was used also (sometimes in a derogatory sense to form colloquial nouns signifying the person associated with the suffixed noun or verb (eg bike: bikie, surf: surfie, hood: hoodie etc).  Scrunchie is now used almost exclusively to describe the hair accessory.  Historically, the older form (scrunchy) was used for every other purpose but since the emergence of the new spelling there’s now some overlap.  Never fond of adopting an English coining, in French, the term is élastique à cheveux (hair elastic).  The alternative spelling is scrunchy (used both in error and in commerce).  Scrunchie is a noun; the noun plural is scrunchies.  The adjectives scrunchier & scrunchiest are respectively the comparative & superlative forms of scrunchy; as applied to scrunchies, they would be used to describe a scrunchie's relative degree of scrunchiness (a non-standard noun).

Mean Girls (2004) themed scrunchies are available on-line.

It's not unlikely that in times past, women took elastic bands (or something with similar properties) and added a decorative covering to create their own stylized hair-ties but as a defined product, the scrunchie appears to have first been offered as a commercial product 1963-1964 but the design was not patented until 1987 when night club singer Rommy Hunt Revson (1944–2022) named the hair accessory the Scunci (after her pet toy poodle), the name scrunchie an organic evolution because the fabric "scrunched up".  They were very popular in the 1990s although some factions in the fashion industry disparaged them, especially offended (some people do take this stuff seriously) if seeing them worn on the wrist or ankle.  The scrunchie is a classic case-study in the way such products wax and wane in popularity, something wholly unrelated to their functionality or movements in price; while the elasticity of scrunchies has remained constant, the elasticity of demand is determined not by supply or price but by perceptions of fashionability.  When such a low-cost item becomes suddenly fashionable, influenced by the appearance in pop-culture, use extends to a lower-income demographic which devalues the appeal and the fashion critics declare the thing "a fashion faux pas" and use declines among all but those oblivious of or indifferent to such rulings.  In the way of such things however, products often don't go away but lurk on the edges of respectability, the comebacks variously ironic, part of a retro trend or something engineered by industry, the tactics now including the use of the millions of influencers available for hire.          

The Dinner Scrunchie

A more recent evolution is the enlarged version called the Dinner Scrunchie, so named, the brand suggests, because it's "elevated enough to wear to dinner".  They're available from MyKitsch in black and designer colors and, covered with semi-sheer chiffon, they're eight inches (200mm) in diameter, about the size of a small dinner plate.  Breakfast and lunch scrunchie seem not to be a thing but those gaps in the market are catered to by the Brunch Scrunchie which while larger than most, is smaller and cheaper than the dinner version; it appear to be about the size of a bread & butter plate.    

Rita Ora (b 1990) in fluoro scrunchie, New York City, May 2014.

The most obvious novelty of the bigger scrunchies is of course the large size and because that translates into greater surface area, in the minds of many, thoughts turn immediately to advertising space.  There are possibilities but because of the inherent scrunchiness, they're really not suitable for text displays except perhaps for something simple like X (formerly known as Twitter) although Elon Musk (b 1971) probably thinks whatever else X may require, it's not brand awareness or recognition.  Where a message can be conveyed with something as simple as a color combination (such as the LGBTQQIAAOP's rainbow flag), the scrunchie can be a good billboard.

Emerge

Emerge (pronounced ih-murj)

(1) To come forth into view or notice, as from concealment or obscurity

(2) To rise or come forth from or as if from water or other liquid.

(3) To come up or arise, as a question or difficulty.

(4) To come into existence; develop.

(5) To rise, as from an inferior or unfortunate state or condition.

1560s: From the Middle French émerger from the Latin ēmergere (bring forth, bring to light (intransitively "arise out or up, come forth, come up, come out, rise"), an assimilated form of the construct ē- (a variant of the suffix ex- (out, forth)) + mergere (to dive, dip, sink).  The notion was of rising from a liquid by virtue of buoyancy.  The verb re-emerge (also as reemerge) (to emerge again or anew) dates from 1775 and other forms of this evolved: re-emerged (1778), re-emerging (1088) & re-emergence (1801).  The noun emergence dates from the 1640s, initially in the sense of "an unforeseen occurrence" from the French émergence, from the Middle French émerger, from the Latin ēmergere; the modern meaning (process of coming) emerged in 1704, the meanings co-existing until by circa 1735 the new had entirely replaced the old.  The noun emersion (reappearance, act of emerging) dates from the 1630s; it was a noun of action from past-participle stem of Latin ēmergere and originally was used of eclipses and occultations.  The adjective emergent was actually quite old, noted from the late fourteenth century in the sense of “rising from what surrounds it, coming into view", from the Latin emergentem (nominative emergens), present participle of ēmergere.  The present participle is emerging and the past participle emerged)

Emerge, emanate or issue all mean to come forth but differ in nuance.  Emerge is used of coming forth from a place shut off from view, or from concealment, or the like, into sight and notice in the sense the sun emerges from behind the clouds.  Emanate is used of intangible things, as light or ideas, spreading from a source and both gossip and rumors can emanate from sources reliable or otherwise.  Issue is often used of a number of persons, a mass of matter, or a volume of sound or the like, coming forth through any outlet or outlets; smoke is said to issue from a chimney, something, if it be white, associated with the emergence of a new Roman Catholic Pope 

Emerging from the magic circle

With Boris Johnson’s curious, slow-motion resignation as prime-minister of the UK, attention begins to turn to the way Conservative and Unionist (Tory) Party elects its next leader to become the latest custodian of one of the world’s nuclear arsenals.  These days, it takes longer than once it did for the Tories to do this for it’s now an exhaustive process consisting of (1) a multi-round contest in which all members of parliament (MPs) vote for however many of their colleagues have nominated, the unfortunate chap (and these days some Tory chaps are women) receiving the fewest voted dropping out so the next round may proceed until the field is whittled down to two at which point (2) that pair is submitted to the party membership at large to make their choice.  The winner will assume the party leadership and, with the Tories enjoying in the House of Commons the solid majority Mr Johnson secured at the last election, will go to the palace to kiss hands and be invited to become Her Majesty’s Prime-Minister of the United Kingdom & First Lord of the Treasury.

This democratic (and leisurely) process is relatively new to the Tory party, its leaders elected by a formal vote only since 1965 and even then, until 2001, it was only MPs who voted.  Prior to that, Tory leaders were said to “emerge” from what was known as a “magic circle” and although never as mysterious as some suggested, it was an opaque process, conducted by party grandees.  The classic example was in 1957 when the choice was between Harold MacMillan (1894-1986; UK prime-minister 1957-1963) and Rab Butler (1902-1982).  To his office in the House of Lords, the lisping (fifth) Lord Salisbury (1983-1972) summoned those he thought good chaps (women at this point hadn’t yet become chaps) and asked “Hawold or Wab?”  Hawold prevailed.

The change in process in 1965 came about at the insistence of Sir Alec Douglas-Home (1903-1995 and the fourteenth Earl of Home before disclaiming his peerage in 1963 to become prime-minister (1963-1964)).  Since 1957, the country had changed and there was much criticism of the murky manner by which Sir Alec had become party leader and there was a clamour, even within the party, both to modernize and appear more transparently democratic.  From this point, unleashed were the forces which would in 1975 see Margaret Thatcher (1925-2013; UK prime-minister 1979-1990) elected leader but the first beneficiary of the wind of change was Edward "Ted" Heath (1916-2005; UK prime-minister 1970-1974), a grammar school boy who replaced a fourteenth earl.  Notably, to appear more modern, Heath in 1965 didn't repair (as he had with MacMillan when he emerged in 1957), to the Turf Club for a celebratory meal of oysters, game pie and champagne which “…might have made people think a reactionary regime had been installed”.  It can be hard now to understand quite what a change Heath's accession in 1965 flagged; the Tory Party previously had leaders from the middle class but never the lower middle class.  The significance of what emerged in 1965 was less the new leader than a changed Tory Party in a changed country.     

So Tory leaders no longer emerge from a magic circle but a remarkable number are emerging to offer themselves as willing to be considered so clearly it’s thought still a desirable job although not what it was.  MacMillan once marveled that his predecessor, William Ewart Gladstone (1809–1898; four times UK prime-minister 1868-1894), prime-minister at a time when the British Empire spanned the globe, managed every year to spend four months at his country house, an arrangement one suspects Mr Johnson would have found most tolerable.  Ideologically, the indications are there will be little to choose between those on offer, the extent of the variation probably something like that once described by Georges Clemenceau (1841–1929; Prime Minister of France 1906-1909 & 1917-1920) as the difference between "a politician who would murder their own mother and one prepared to murder only someone else's mother".

Mr Johnson will no doubt reflect on his time in Downing Street and perhaps conclude a few things might have been done differently but, after all, he has been prime-minister, one of the few to make it to the top of the greasy pole.  When the office beckoned Lord Melbourne (1779-1848; UK prime-minister 1834 & 1835-1841), he was disinclined to accept, fearing it would be “…a damned bore” but his secretary persuaded him, saying “…no Greek or Roman ever held the office and if it lasts but three months it’ll still be worthwhile to have been Prime Minister of England”.  Having apparently appointed himself Prime-Minister Emeritus, as he sits in No 10, plotting and scheming ways to remain, Mr Johnson can at least remember and be glad.

For a brief, shining moment (2019-2021), the world had three leaders with nuclear weapons and outstanding haircuts.

Alexander Boris de Pfeffel Johnson (b 1964; Prime Minister of the United Kingdom 2019-2022 (probably)) (left).

Donald John Trump (b 1946-; President of the United States 2017-2021) (centre).

Kim Jong-un (b circa 1983; Supreme Leader of DPRK (Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (North Korea)) since 2011) (right).

Furlong

Furlong (pronounced fur-lawng or fur-long)

A unit of distance, equal to 220 yards (201.168 m) or ⅛ mile (0.2 km).

Pre 900: From the Middle English from the Old English furlang or furh (length of a furrow), the construct being was furh (furrow) + lang (long).  The Middle English was forwe or furgh, the Old Frisian furch, the Old High German fur(u)h and the later German frche.  In Latin porca was the ridge between furrows.  For over a thousand years, accepted abbreviation has been fur.

Now used exclusively (though usually informally) in horse racing, the furlong had the same ad-hoc origin as much of the old English units of weights and measures (codified in 1925 as the Imperial System which replaced the Winchester Standards (1588-1825) and in official use in the British Empire from 1926).  The furlong (220 yards, 201.168 m) was based on the length of an average plowed furrow (hence “furrow-long,” or furlong) in the old English common-field (sometimes called open and typically of 10 acres) system. Each furrow ran the length of a 40 × 4-rod acre (660 feet).  

The standardization of linear units such as the yard, foot, and inch was undertaken by governments between 1266-1303, taking what were the historically acknowledged sizes of rods, furlongs, and acres as fixed and simply defining them as the newly standardized units. Thus, the furlong, often measured as 625 northern (German) feet, became 660 standard English feet, and the mile, always 8 furlongs, became 5,280 feet.  The medieval origins of what became the Imperial System of weights and measures was based often on the capacity of man and  beast, reflecting the priorities of the time, a furlong the distance a team of oxen could plough without resting and an acre the amount of land tillable by one man behind one ox in one day.

Grand National Course, Aintree Racecourse, Liverpool

Furlong was used from the ninth century to translate the Latin stadium (625 feet), one-eighth of a Roman mile, thus the English word came to be understood as "one-eighth of an English mile".  This meant the English mile was different in length from the Roman one but this had surprisingly few practical consequences because the mile was so rarely used in legal documents.  By comparison, furlong became one of the standard measures in property titles and land deed records.  For that reason it was the mile and not the furlong which was redefined during the reign of Elizabeth I (1533–1603; Queen of England and Ireland 1558-1603).

Although the UK has substantially abandoned the use of imperial measures, they remain substantially in use in the US, Myanmar (Burma) and Liberia although industrial use in the US has long switched to metric.  Having "got Brexit done", Prime-Minister Boris Johnson (b 1964, UK prime-minister since 2019), freed from the oppression of bureaucrats in Brussels, recently permitted nostalgic grocers again to price their products in pounds and ounces alongside kilograms and grams, a human right long denied by EU diktat.  Other hold-outs include international aviation which is a mix, aircraft now all made with metric measurements (although in casual use, wingspans etc are often spoken of in imperial) yet fuel loads are measured exclusively in kilograms and altitude always in feet (and all radio communication is English, reflecting the influence of the US in the 1940s when the regulations were drafted).  That may also explain why computer monitors are still measured in inches are are the wheels of cars (despite the occasional efforts of the French to nudge this niche to things metric).

Cacophony

Cacophony (pronounced kuh-kof-uh-nee)

(1) A harsh discordance of sound; dissonance.

(2) The use of inharmonious or dissonant speech sounds in language.

(3) In music, the frequent use of discords of a harshness and relationship difficult to understand.

1650-1660: From the sixteenth century French cacophonie (harsh or unpleasant sound) from the New Latin cacophonia, from the Ancient Greek κακοφωνία (kakophōnía) (ill or harsh sounding), from kakophonos (harsh sounding), the construct being being κακός (kakós) (bad, evil) + φωνή (phōnḗ) (voice, sound) from the primitive Indo-European root bha (to speak, tell, say).  The source of kakós was the primitive Indo-European root kakka (to defecate), something which may have been in mind in that notable year 1789, when first cacophony was used to mean "discordant sounds in music".  Cacophony is a noun, cacophonic & cacophonous are adjectives, cacophonously an adverb and the noun plural is cacophonies.  The most natural antonym is harmony although musicologists tend to prefer the more precise euphony.

Noise as music

There were twentieth century composers, all of whom thought themselves both experimental and somewhere in the classical tradition, who wrote stuff which to most audiences sounded more cacophonous than melodic.  Some, like Béla Bartók (1881–1945) and Arnold Schönberg (1874–1951) had a varied output but for untrained listeners seeking music for pleasure rather than originality or the shock of something new, the work of Karlheinz Stockhausen (1928–2007), Charles Ives (1874–1954) and Philip Glass (b 1937) was no fun.  Some critics however, trained or otherwise, claim to enjoy many of these cul-de-sacs of the avant-garde and find genius among the noise.  Comrade Stalin (1878-1953; Soviet leader 1924-1953) would have called them formalists.

In popular (sic) culture, Lou Reed (1942–2013) in 1975 released Metal Machine Music, either (1) to fulfil a contractual obligation to a record label with which he no longer wished to be associated, (2) to annoy critics and others he didn’t like, (3) as a piece of electronic music, (4) to win a bet with Andy Warhol (1928-1987) or (5) because he was suffering an amphetamine induced psychosis.  Known as MMM or 3M by fans and categorized by most as noise, drone, industrial or minimal, it’s about two hours of modulated feedback running at different speeds.  Despite the derision attracted at the time, it’s since built a cult following and has been performed live, one approving reviewer suggesting MMM is best understood as “…electricity falling in love with itself”.  The original release was a double album on twelve-inch vinyl and featured a “locked grove” on the final track meaning the noise endlessly would loop, theoretically forever.  This trick couldn’t be done on the new medium of the CD but there were no complaints the omission detracted from the experience.

Stubborn

Stubborn (pronounced stuhb-ern)

(1) Unreasonably obstinate; obstinately unmoving.

(2) Fixed or set in purpose or opinion; resolute; obstinately maintaining a course of action regardless of circumstances.

(3) Something difficult to manage or suppress.

(4) An object which is hard, tough, or stiff (stone, timber etc) or wood and thus difficult to shape or work; an object such (as a tightly fastened bolt) which is difficult to move; any problems which prove resistant to attempts to secure a solution.

(5) In the slang of the citrus industry, as stubbornness, a disease of citrus trees characterized by stunted growth and misshapen fruit, caused by Spiroplasma citri.

1350–1400: From the Middle English stiborn, stiborne, styborne, stuborn & stoborne, of obscure origin; the Oxford English Dictionary (OED) noting the earliest known form as stiborn.  Stubborn is an adjective, stubbornly an adverb and stubbornness a noun.

Stubborn is one of a remarkably large number of words in English with an unknown origin and is thus self referential, itself unreasonably obstinate in an unwillingness to disclose its source.  Deconstruction (stub + born) is no help because the spelling seems to have evolved merely to respect the pronunciation (something which in English can’t always be relied upon) and however tempting might seem a link with “stub” (a short, projecting part or remaining piece) (from the Middle English stubbe (tree stump), from the Old English stybb, stobb & stubb (tree stump), from the Proto-West Germanic stubb, from the Proto-Germanic stunjaz& stubbaz and related to the Middle Dutch stubbe, the Old Norse stubbr and the Faroese stubbi (stub), from the primitive Indo-European steu (to push, stick, knock, beat) & stew- (sharp slope)), a thing often immovable and unyielding, there’s simply no evidence.

More correctly, there’s simply no verified evidence.  As modern English coalesced during the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, lexicography became more industry than art and there was great interest (and competition) in the production of dictionaries, some of which included etymological detail in their entries.  At this time, it was thought the origin of stubborn was known, the accepted method of the time being to look for similar constructions in Hebrew, Latin and Greek on the basis it was supposedly from these ancient tongues that the words of modern languages were derived.  That supposition wasn’t entirely accurate but was true enough for many of the words in English at the time fully to be understood.  Because the Greek adjective στι-βαρóς (obstinate, stubborn) enjoyed such a similarity of sound with stubborn, that was thought conclusive, hence the entries in early dictionaries.  However, later scholarship proved the two words unrelated and no research has ever offered a plausible alternative.

According to the manufacturers of detergents, the most recalcitrant stains are "stubborn stains".

That stubbornness is a frequently encountered part of the human condition is perhaps indicated by the numbers of words and phrases (most famously “stubborn as a mule”) in English associated with the idea including adamant, determined, dogged, headstrong, inflexible, intractable, ornery, persistent, perverse, relentless, rigid, single-minded, steadfast, tenacious, tough, unshakable, willful, balky, bloody-minded, bullheaded, contrary, refractory, unyielding, obdurate, wayward, obstinate, disobedient, insubordinate, undisciplined & rebellious.

In the interview which accompanied her 2011 Playboy photo-shoot (and Playboy once commissioned research to prove people really did read the text), Lindsay Lohan admitted she “…should have listened to her advisers” and had she done so she would likely have avoided the “problems” so well documented by the tabloid press.  “My stubbornness at 18 and 19-years old got in the way” she added, acknowledging that “…ultimately we are responsible for ourselves and our own actions.”  She returned to the theme in a Vogue interview in 2022 discussing her roles in The Parent Trap (1998) revealing one consequence of her stubbornness complicated things for the production crew.  Her (clearly non-negotiable) demand was that she had to wear a certain nail polish while playing the part of one of the identical twins and that was “Hard Candy” in blue.  Ms Lohan said at the time it was “a big deal” and when it comes to fashion, pre-teen girls are an opinionated and uncompromising lot.  It was of course not a good idea because, with the one actor playing both twins, the distinctive enamel had to be removed with each switch of character.  “It was a nightmare for everyone” she admitted.

In use, stubborn, dogged, obstinate & persistent imply some fixity of purpose or condition and resistance to change, regardless of changing circumstances or compelling evidence.  There are however nuances, stubborn and obstinate both imply resistance to advice or force but stubborn is more suggestive of an innate quality and is used almost exclusively when referring to inanimate things; by convention, to be obstinate seems to demand there be some process of thought or at least character (mules presumably difficult in nature rather than in any way thoughtful).  One who is dogged might be both obstinate and stubborn but dogged can also imply tenacity, a pertinacity and grimness of purpose in doing something, especially in the face of difficulties which seem insurmountable and one who persists in seeking to solve an apparently insoluble problem can be lauded for their, dogged, stubborn determination.  Persistent implies having a resoluteness of purpose, one who perseveres despite setbacks and discouragement.  Some insist stubborn describes an extreme degree of passive obstinacy and while that tends to be true when the word is used of objects, among the sentient, stubbornness can manifest as anything but passive.

In the Bible there are passages which suggest stubbornness in the doing of God's work is a virtue but the trait was sometimes clearly a sin.  In the Book of Deuteronomy (21:18-21 as part of the Deuteronomic Code), the penalty of death by stoning is specified as a punishment for a stubborn and delinquent son.  The text is an interesting example of the usefulness of the Bible as a historic document, the inclusion in the Deuteronomic Code an attempt to reform the breakdown in family life characteristic of an era in which the absolute power parents had once exercised over their children had dissipated, hence the notion that the authority of a village's elders must be both invoked and exercised.  As a solution (though perhaps without the executions), it sounds like many modern suggestions to solve the problem of youth crime and juvenile delinquency.  

Deuteronomy 21:18-21 (King James Version (KJV 1611))

18 If a man have a stubborn and rebellious son, which will not obey the voice of his father, or the voice of his mother, and that, when they have chastened him, will not hearken unto them:

19 Then shall his father and his mother lay hold on him, and bring him out unto the elders of his city, and unto the gate of his place;

20 And they shall say unto the elders of his city, This our son is stubborn and rebellious, he will not obey our voice; he is a glutton, and a drunkard.

21 And all the men of his city shall stone him with stones, that he die: so shalt thou put evil away from among you; and all Israel shall hear, and fear.

The 1967 Oldsmobile Delmont 88 (it's an myth spread by Gore Vidal (1925–2012) that the Kennedys drove only Buicks) driven by Senator Ted Kennedy (1932-2009) in which Mary Jo Kopechne (1940-1969) died.  The accident happened at close to midnight, the pair having left a party on Chappaquiddick Island, off the east coast of Martha's Vineyard, Massachusetts. Kennedy survived, having left the scene of the crash in circumstances never satisfactorily explained.  The car in which he left the young lady to die belonged to his mother.  By the the time of the accident, Oldsmobile had ceased to use the Delmont name which was offered only in the 1967 & 1968 model years. 

As recent events and judicial decisions illustrate, in the United States there is a tension created by the dynamics which existed from the first days of white settlement, the competing lust to live free from oppression versus the undercurrent of a muscular, puritanical religiosity.  The Old Testament force of the latter in November 1646 prevailed upon the General Court of the Massachusetts Bay Colony, inspiring a law providing, inter alia, for the capital punishment of male children found disobedient to their parents.  Although the death penalty was later removed (though punishment for recalcitrant daughters was added in an early example of gender equality), the law was not repealed until 1973 although, as the troubled life of Massachusetts senator Ted Kennedy might suggest, enforcement had by then long fallen into disuse.  Similar laws were enacted in Connecticut in 1650, Rhode Island in 1688, and New Hampshire in 1679.

The Massachusetts statute: "If a man have a stubborn or rebellious son, of sufficient years and understanding sixteen years of age, which will not obey the voice of his Father, or the voice of his Mother, and that when they have chastened him will not harken unto them: then shall his Father and Mother being his natural parents, lay hold on him, and bring him to the Magistrates assembled in Court and testify unto them, that their son is stubborn and rebellious and will not obey their voice and chastisement, but lives in sundry notorious crimes, such a son shall be put to death."

King Manuel II (standing, third from left) in May 1910, European royalty gathered in London for the funeral of Edward VII and among the mourners were nine reigning sovereigns, the image colorized from a sepia-toned original.  Dom Manuel II ("The Unfortunate" 1889–1932) reigned as the last King of Portugal and the Algarve 1908-1910, his brief tenure occasioned by the Lisbon regicide of 1908 in which his father and elder brother were murdered.

Counter-intuitively, considering the blood-soaked histories of Europe’s squabbling dynasties, of all the hundreds of cognomina (names appended before or after the person's name which are applied to identify their nature) attached to kings and princes, it seems only to have been Louis X of France (1289–1316; King of France 1314-1316 & King of Navarre (as Louis I) 1305-1316) who was informally styled "The Stubborn" (Louis le Hutin), although, just to stress the point, he was known also as "Louis the Quarrelsome" & "Louis the Headstrong".  Because in royalty names are so often recycled (John, Frederick, Louis, Charles etc), cognomina are genuinely helpful to historians and are for readers, probably more mnemonic that Roman numbering (Louis XI, XII, XIII etc).  While there has been much use of the usual suspects (the Brave, Great, Good, Bad, Cruel, Victorious etc) and some have been merely descriptive (the Fat, Bald, Tall, Hairy etc (although some of these were ironic)), some were evocative:

There was the Abandoned (John I of Aragon), the Accursed (Sviatopolk I of Kiev), the Affable (Charles VIII of France), the Alchemist (John, Margrave of Brandenburg-Kulmbach), the Apostate (Julian, Emperor of Rome, the Arab (Phillip I, Emperor of Rome), the Astrologer (Alfonso X of Castile), the Bad (applied to many but famously associated with Emund of Sweden), the Bastard (of which there have been many more than those to whom the sobriquet was attached, the best known being William I (better known as the Conqueror)), the Beer Jug (John George I, Elector of Saxony), the Bewitched (Charles II of Spain), the Bloodaxe (Eric I of Norway), the Bloodthirsty (doubtless a widely used adjective but the most cited seems Ismail of Morocco), Bloody (Mary I of England (and the well known Vodka cocktail)), the Cabbage (Ivaylo of Bulgaria), the Crosseyed (Vasili Kosoi, a Muscovian usurper), the Devil (Robert I, Duke of Normandy), the Indolent (Louis V of France (also the Sluggard which in this context imparts much the same meaning)), the Drunkard, (Michael III, Byzantine Emperor although one suspects he was one of many), the Dung-Named (Constantine V, Byzantine Emperor), the Executioner (Mehmed I of the Ottoman Empire, again one of many), the Fat (most associated with Charles III, Holy Roman Emperor), the Fowler (Henry I of Germany, a notable figure of the First Reich), the Hairy (Wilfred I of Urgel), the Impaler (the infamous Vlad III of Wallachia (Basarab Ţepeluş cel Tânăr of Wallachia was the Little Impaler)), the Impotent (Henry IV of Castile), the Mad (of which there should have been more than there are and associated (fairly or not) with Lorenzo de' Medici of the Florentine Republic), Minus-a-Quarter (Michael VII Dukas, Byzantine Emperor (and apparently the only regal sobriquet derived from monetary policy)), the Priest Hater (Eric II of Norway), the She-Wolf (Isabella of France), the Be-shitten (James II (of England and Ireland and James VII of Scotland)), the Stammerer (Louis II of France), the Terrible (a popular one but best remembered for Ivan IV of Russia), the Unfortunate (which could fairly be applied to many but seems linked only with Manuel II of Portugal and the Algarve (who was unfortunate (o Desaventurado) but it could have been worse (he survived to see out his years in Twickenham) and he was known also as the Patriot (o Patriota)).

Dimple

Dimple (pronounced dim-puhl)

(1) A small (permanent or transient) natural indentation in the chin, cheek, or sacral region, probably due to some developmental fault in the subcutaneous connective tissue or in underlying bone (but can manifest as a result of trauma or the contraction of scar tissue).

(2) Any similar slight depression.

(3) To mark with or as if with dimples; to produce dimples in.

(4) In metalworking, to dent a metal sheet so as to permit use of bolts or rivets with countersunk heads; to mark a metal object with a drill point as a guide for further drilling.

(5) In glassmaking, a bubble or dent in glass.

1350-1400: From the Middle English dimple & dympull (natural transient small dent in some soft part of the human body) from the Old English dympel & dyppan (a dip, a hollow in the trail or road), probably from the Proto-Germanic dumpila- (sink-hole), probably related to the Proto-Germanic dumpilaz & dumpa- (hole, hollow, pit), from the primitive Indo-European dhewb- (deep, hollow), a construct of the dialectal dump (deep hole or pool) +‎ -le (the diminutive suffix).  It was akin to the Old High German tumphilo (pool) from whence German gained Tümpel (pool), the Middle Low German dümpelen and the Dutch dompelen (to plunge).

The noun was the original form, describing a small dent in some part of a person's surface soft tissue (skin), applied especially to that produced in the cheek of a young person by the act of smiling and was always associated with youthful attractiveness rather than being some sort of flaw although it was all based on the less attractive "pothole", hence the link with words of Germanic origin which tend to this meaning.  From the Proto-Germanic dumpilaz also came other forms meaning "small pit, little pool" including the German Tümpel (pool), the Middle Low German dümpelen and the Dutch dompelen (to plunge).  The verb dates from the 1570s (implied in dimpled), as the intransitive, "form dimples", derived from the noun and the transitive sense "mark with dimples" emerged circa 1600.

Use as a proper noun actually pre-dates the descriptor of the physical characteristic, Dimple as a place name noted circa 1200 and as a surname from the late thirteenth century.  The extension of the meaning to a generalized "slight indentation or impression in any surface" is from the 1630s.  The related noun philtrum (dimple in the middle of the upper lip), first noted 1703, is medical Latin, from a Latinized form of Greek philtron, (literally "love charm").  Dimple is a noun; the verbs (used with object) are dimpling & dimpled (which is also an adjective).  Synonyms (applied to non-human dimples) include divot, hollow, concavity, cleft, dent, pit & depression.

Young lady with dimple.  A dimple will always draw the eye.

TERF & Terf

TERF & Terf (pronounced turf)

(1) The acronym for trans-exclusionary radical feminist (trans-exclusionary radical feminism), a fork of the fork of radical feminism which maintains a trans woman’s gender identity is not legitimate and rejects the inclusion of trans people and the gender-diverse in the feminist movement.

(2) In genetics as (1) TERF 1 (Telomeric repeat-binding factor 1), a protein which in  humans is encoded by the TERF1 gene & (2) TERF 2 (Telomeric repeat-binding factor 2), a protein present at telomeres throughout the cell cycle. 

2008: Coined by Australian feminist writer Viv Smythe (@vivsmythe (fka @tigtog, @hoydenabouttown & @GFIComedy) although Ms Smythe suggests the acronym may previously have been in use but her blog entry is the oldest instance extant, hence the credit.  By virtue of use, TERF has become a word and thus the noun terf (and its variations) is correct.  The use in genetics dates from the 1990s , the definitions written as part of the project which decoded the human genome (the complete results of which weren't released until March 2022).   

TERF was said first to have been coined as a “deliberately neutral” descriptor of a certain intellectual position among certain feminists, CISgender women who self-identify as feminist but who oppose including transgender women in spaces (physical, virtual & philosophical) which their construct of feminism reserved for those assigned female at birth.  Implicit in this is the denial that trans women (or anyone anywhere on the trans gender spectrum) are women; they regard them as men and because, by definition, men cannot coexist with their feminist construct, they must be excluded.  However, though TERF was of the feminists, by a feminist, for the feminists, once in the wild it is public property and TERF didn’t long stay neutral, soon used as a slur, applied as a term of disparagement by those sympathetic to trans rights and just as quickly embraced by some TERFs in an act of reclamation (a la slut, the infamous n-word etc).  In use online since at least 2008, TERF has different connotations, depending on who is using it but even when it’s been applied as something purely descriptive, feminists who have been labeled TERF have called the term a slur because it has come to be associated with violence and hatred.  It is a loaded term.

Sainte Jeanne d'Arc (Saint Joan of Arc) (1903) by Albert Lynch (1860–1950).  Joan of Arc with proto TERF bangs: latter day TERFs arouse such hatred there have probably been whisperings of burnings at the stake.

The coining of TERF inspired some neologisms.  TERF bangs (existing only in the plural and noted since 2013 although use didn't trend until 2014) is a sardonic reference to a woman's hairstyle with short, straight, blunt-edged bangs (historically called baby bangs and a variation of what's known by some hairdressers as the "Joan of Arc" fringe), especially when paired with a bob and claimed to be associated with TERFs, the link impressionistic and possibly an example of a gaboso (generalized association based on single-observation).  The link is thought to be part of the opposition to transphobia, the TERF bangs noted for their relationship to the Karen (speak to the manager) bob and all Karens are assumed to be transphobic.  TERFdom is either (1) the holding (and expression) of trans-exclusionary feminist views or (2) being in some way present in the on-line TERF ecosystem.  TERFism is the abstract noun denoting variously the action, practice, state, condition, principle, doctrine, usage, characteristic, devotion or adherence to TERFDom.  TERfturf is an expression variously of the physical, virtual or philosophical space occupied by TERFdom.  TERFy, TURFish & TERFic are adjectives (usually applied disparagingly) which suggest someone or something may be tending towards, characteristic of, or related to trans-exclusionary feminism or those who hold such views.  It's tempting to ponder TERFery, TERFed & TERFistic and the use to which they might be put but there's scant evidence of use.

TERF also provided the model for the back-formation acronym SWERF (sex worker exclusionary radical feminist), describing the position of those radical feminists opposed to the sex industry (including pornography), regarding all aspects of the business as exploitative and that women who participate are victims of coercion, any assertion of agency or willing participation a form of false consciousness.

TERF, TWERF and others

Whatever the life TERF subsequently took, Ms Smythe’s original piece was a critique of the undercurrent of transphobia in the UK British media, something hardly hard to detect nor restricted to the most squalid of the tabloids.  However, as she noted, regardless of her purpose or the context of the text, TERF has became a weaponized device of the culture wars which, in the way of the battle, assumed its identities at the extremes of the trans-inclusion & trans-exclusion positions and it could hardly have followed a different course, the notion, however applied, hardly one amenable to subtle nuances (although some have tried).  That it had the effect of being an inherently schismatic force in radical feminism seemed especially to disturb Ms Smythe and later she would suggest a more accurate (or certainly less divisive) acronym would have been “…TES, with the “S” standing for separatists”, adding that many “…of the positions that are presented seem far too essentialist to be adequately described as feminist, let alone radical feminist.”  Of course, that view was in itself exclusivist and a kind of assertion of ownership of both “radical” and “feminist” but that’s entirely in the tradition of political philosophy including the strains which long pre-date modern feminism, gatekeepers never hesitant in lowering the intellectual portcullis, intruders rarely welcome.

Still, it wasn’t as if feminism had been immune from the fissiparousness which so often afflicted movements (secular and otherwise), the devolution into into competing doctrinal orthodoxies of course creating heretics and heroes and to think of the accepted structure of the history (first wave, second wave etc) as lineal is misleading.  Nor was the process organic and it has been claimed there are TERFs (notably some of the self-described) for whom the identification with feminism became attractive only when it seemed to offer a intellectual cloak under which push transphobia, an accusation leveled at members of the US organization Gender Identity Watch (GIW).   Described variously as a “hate group” and the “Republican party in sensible shoes”, GIW’s best known activities include lobbying and monitoring legislatures and courts to try to ensure those who are transgender are not granted either the status of women or whatever rights may accrue from that.  Their basis was simply definitional, those designated male at birth (DMaB) can never be anything beyond men in disguise (MiD) and thus have no place in women’s spaces.

Other theorists developed their own form of exclusivism.  The idea behind the back-formation TWERF (Trans Women Exclusionary Radical Feminist) was that it was "pure womanism", the needs of trans women being not only different from “real” women but irrelevant too, again by definition because trans women are still men and even if in some way defined as not, were still not “real” women.  The distinctions drawn by the TWERFs was certainly a particular strain of radical feminism because they raised no objection to the presence of trans men, the agender and even some other non-binary people into at least some of their women-only spaces although the rationale offered to support this position did seem sometimes contradictory.  Some however seemed well to understand the meaning and they were the transsexual separatists, apparently a cause without rebels, support for the view apparently close to zero.  The transsexual separatists argue that they need to be treated, for the purposes of defined rights, as a separate category, a concept which received little attention until the Fédération internationale de notation (Fina, the International Swimming Federation) in June 2022 announced a ban on the participation of transgender women from elite female competition if they have experienced “…any part of male puberty beyond Tanner Stage 2 or before age twelve, whichever is later."  As something a workaround designed somehow to combine inclusion and exclusion in the one policy, Fina undertook to create a working group to design an “open” category for trans women in “some events” as part of its new policy.  The transsexual separatists may not have expected Fina to be the first mainstream organization to offer a supporting gesture but what the federation has done may stimulate discussion, even if the work-around proves unworkable.

Discursiveness is however in the nature of feminist thought, the essence of the phases of renewal which characterized progress, formalized (if sometimes misleadingly) as waves and it’s unrealistic to imagine trans-related issues will be resolved until generational change allows a new orthodoxy to coalesce.  It really wasn’t until the high-water mark of second wave of feminism in the early 1980s that some of the early radical feminists began to attempt to distance the movement from the issues pertaining to trans people, reflecting the view that the implications of what was characterized as the transgender agenda would only reinforce sexual stereotyping and the gender binary.  Even then, the position taken by radical feminists was not monolithic but it was the exclusionists who attracted most interest, inevitable perhaps given they offered the media a conflictual lens through which to view the then somewhat novel matter of trans rights, until then rarely discussed.  Third wave feminism was a product of the environment in which it emerged and thus reflected the wider acceptance of transgender rights and few would argue this has not continued during the fourth wave, the attention given to TERF (and its forks and variations) an indication of the interest in the culture wars and the lure of conflict in media content (whether tabloid or twitter) rather than any indication a generalized hardening of opposition among feminists.

Asunder

Asunder (pronounced uh-suhn-der)

(1) To separate into parts; in or into pieces.

(2) Things apart or widely separated:

Pre-1000: From the Old English sundrian & syndrian (to sunder, separate, divide), from sundor (separately, apart), from the Proto-Germanic sundraz & sunder (source also of the Old Norse sundr, the Old Frisian sunder, the Old High German suntar (aside, apart) and the German sondern (to separate), from the primitive Indo-European root sen- & sene- (apart, separated (source also of the Sanskrit sanutar (away, aside), the Avestan hanare (without), the Greek ater (without), the Latin sine (without), the Old Church Slavonic svene (without) and the Old Irish sain (different)).  It was cognate with the Danish sønder, the Swedish sönder, the Dutch zonder, the German sonder, the Icelandic sundur, the Faroese sundur and the Norwegian sunder & sønder (akin to the Gothic sundrō).  The adverb asunder (into a position apart, separate, into separate parts) was a mid-twelfth century contraction of the Old English on sundran, the construct being on (preposition) + sundran (separate position) and in Middle English was used in the sense of "distinguish, tell apart".  The related forms are sundered & sundering. 

Marriage and divorce

Although it appears also in Mark 10:9, the phrase “what therefore God hath joined together, let not man put asunder” is best known from Matthew 19:6 and it became part of the Christian wedding ritual, for long preceded at some point by the injunction “should anyone present know of any reason why this couple should not be joined in holy matrimony, speak now or forever hold your peace”.

The formalization of the ritual during the middle ages reflected the medieval church’s regulation of rules within which people could marry.  By the twelfth century, the “consent theory” of marriage had emerged by which a couple married by exchanging certain words, regardless of whether witnesses or a priest was present.  If they exchanged vows without witnesses, the marriage was said to be “clandestine” and while legal (a valid, binding sacrament) it was not licit (allowed), a binary distinction that would appear in the development of the law of both contract and equity. 

Thus the Fourth Lateran Council (1215) forbid clandestine marriages and began the codification of the forms and processes of formal marriage, requiring an announcement of the impending marriage to be “…read or published on three successive Sundays prior…” to the actual ceremony to ensure that impediments to be raised, thus preventing invalid marriages.  Including this in the ceremony was a final chance to object before the marriage was declared, after which it could not be torn asunder.

Torn asunder.  The 2016 Brexit (British exit from membership of the European Union (EU)) referendum was narrowly won by the "leave" campaign.  It was a very bad outcome and one intended to serve the interests of a tiny elite, the members of which stoked the hatreds, fears and prejudices of those less socially sophisticated, inducing them to vote against their own interests.  No good will come of this.