Meconium

Meconium (pronounced mi-koh-nee-uhm)

(1) In medicine, the first fecal excretion of a newborn child, composed chiefly of bile, mucus, and epithelial cells; it accumulates in the fetal intestines, manifesting as dark green mucoid material.

(2) In zoology, a dark green mass, the contents of the fetal intestines during the later stages of mammalian gestation, that forms the first feces of the newborn

(3) In entomology, the fecal mass released at pupation by the larvae of some insects.

(4) The milky sap of the unripe seed pods of the opium poppy; crude opium, sometimes called opium juice.

(5) Slang for opium (obsolete).

1595–1605: From the New Latin, from Classical Latin mēcōnium (opium; excrement of a newborn child), from the Ancient Greek μηκώνιον (mēkṓnion) (poppy-juice; opium”), from μήκων (mḗkōn) (poppy).  The Ancient Greek mēkōnion & mēkōn may be related to the Old Church Slavonic maku & the German Mohn and many etymologists support this although it’s not impossible both are of pre-Greek origin, one noting the consensus among botanists that the opium poppy is of Mediterranean origin and the word may later have entered the primitive lndo-European at a later date.  The fecal discharge was so called by classical physicians for its resemblance to the pappy sap, the notion later adopted by entomologists and zoologists to describe the same phenomenon respectively in some insects and mammals.  In chemistry, meconin is an anhydride of meconinic acid (found in opium).  The adjective meconic was first documented in the sense of “pertaining to or derived from the poppy” in 1818 in reference to an acid obtained from opium, and the French meconine exists in the literature as an alternative to the English form meconin.  However, it’s noted meconic may long have been in oral use among physicians.  In Hellenic medicine, mēkōnion came to be used to describe an infant's first excrement because of similarity in colour to the sap of the opium poppy (mēkōn) which had long been so-named.  In human gestation (and of mammals generally & even some insects), a little of the substance called meconium collects lower in the intestines and is discharged at birth.  Meconium is a noun and meconic & meconial are adjectives; perhaps thankfully, there’s no adverb.  The noun plural is meconiums.

One charming linguistic coincidence is that the anagram of meconium (baby shit) is encomium which means, inter alia, “a formal speech delivering praise”, the connection between the two not unfamiliar to those who have heard many such insincere orations.  Economium was from the Latin encōmium (praise, eulogy), from the Ancient Greek ἐγκώμιον (enkṓmion) (laudatory ode, praise), from ἐγκώμιος (enkṓmios) (of or pertaining to the victor), from κῶμος (kômos), (festival, revel, ode).

One obstetrician nominated the Ferrari paint color Verde Medio Nijinsky (medium green Nijinsky (Italver)) as a fine way to illustrate to medical students the shade of green a healthy infant’s meconium should display.  It’s probably more pleasing than a photograph (and certainly a sample) of the real thing.

Lester Piggott in green, red & yellow silks, aboard Nijinsky, 1970.

The Ferrari factory named Verde Medio Nijinsky after Nijinsky (Nijinsky II, 1967–1992, by Northern Dancer out of Flaming Page), a Canadian-bred, Irish-trained Thoroughbred.  In 1970, trained by Vincent O'Brien (1917-2009) and ridden by Lester Piggott (1935–2022), he was the twelfth winner of the English Triple Crown (run since 1853 and comprising (1) the 2,000 Guineas Stakes (run over 1 mile (1,609 m) at Newmarket, (2) the Derby (1 mile, 4 furlongs & 10 yards (2,423 m) at Epsom & the St Leger Stakes (1 mile, 6 furlongs & 132 yards (2,937 m) at Town Moor)).  No horse has since won the English Triple Crown and Aidan O'Brien (b 1969), who in 1996 took over Vincent O'Brien’s Ballydoyle stables, was not related to his predecessor.  The link between horse and factory paint chart was in the colors of the silks worn by the jockey; Piggott’s shade of green chosen for Verde Medio Nijinsky.  Ferrari during the 1960s offered almost thirty colors named after Thoroughbreds, a few of the more lyrical being Bianco Tetratema (1.441.110), Grigio Ortello (2.443.813), Blu Caracalla (2.666.901), Blu Turchese Molvedo (2.443.632) & Verde Sea-Bird (2.665.902).

Major Count Francesco Baracca with his SPAD S-XIII (left), the prancing horse on the fuselage base of that on his family’s coat of arms (right).

The link between horses and the Cavallino Rampante ((little) prancing horse) escutcheon chosen by Enzo Ferrari (1898-1988) for both the Scuderia Ferrari team and later the cars he would build lies in a meeting il Commendatore had with the mother of Major Count Francesco Baracca (1888–1918), Italy's top fighter ace of the Great War.  The count had emblazoned on the side of his aircraft a horse rearing on its rear hooves, a stylized variation of that which appeared on his family’s coat of arms.  In Italian heraldry, the prancing horse was of some significance, dating from 1692 when it appeared on the standard of Victor Amadeus II (1666–1732; Duke of Savoy 1675-1730 & King of Piedmont-Sardinia 1720-1730) of Savoy’s Royal Piedmont cavalry regiment.  The horse on the fuselage was originally red, but was repainted black on one of the count’s surviving fighters following his death in aerial combat.  A myth later arose that Rolls-Royce had followed the precedent, switching the lettering on their radiator emblem from red to black to mark the death in 1933 of Sir Henry Royce (1863-1933).  Actually, although usually red, Rolls-Royce had often used black and other colors and the change is 1933 was aesthetic rather than romantic, the feeling that a dark hue would better suit the colors owners habitually choose and Sir Henry had endorsed the decision well before his death.  It was mere coincidence he died the same year as the change.

Alfa Romeo 8C Monza, Spa Francorchamps, Belgium, 1932.

Enzo Ferrari and Giulio Ramponi (1902–1986) in June 1923 won the first Grand Prix at the Savio Circuit in Ravenna, driving an Alfa Romeo RL-Targa Florio.  As part of the ceremony following the race, Count Enrco Baracca (1855-1936), father of the aviator, "entrusted" Ferrari with the image of the prancing horse to carry on the memory of his late son, later introducing him to the pilot’s mother, Countess Paolina Baracca.  It was the countess who suggested adding the symbol to his cars, assuring him it would bring good luck.  Alfa-Romeo’s corporate policies prevented an immediate use of the prancing horse but in 1929, Enzo Ferrari created Auto Avio Costruzioni (later to become Scuderia Ferrari) as a separate racing team although one still affiliated with Alfa Romeo and in 1932 permission finally was received for the symbol to adorn the cars.  On that day in 1932, fielding a pair of Alfa-Romeo 8C Monzas at Belgium’s Spa Francorchamps, the scuderia was again victorious, vindicating the faith the countess had shown and the prancing horse continued to be displayed until 1939 when Ferrari began his own car-making operation.  Squabbles and the war intervened but in 1947, Ferrari displayed the 125S (1.5 litre (91 cubic inch) Colombo V12, thus 125 cm³ per cylinder, the origin of the factory’s original naming convention) with the equine logo, although subtly modified, the tail now upturned (al la the Baracca coat of arms) the beast more sinuous and the background the canary yellow of Modena where il Commendatore had based his operation.  The prancing horse has adorned every Ferrari since.

1972 Ferrari 365 GTC/4 (Typo F101) in Verde Medio Nijinsky over beige leather (left) and Ferrari 365 GTB/4 Coupé (with Borrani wire-wheels) in Rosso Corsa over tan leather (right).

Although now regarded as a classic of the era, the 365 GTC/4 lives still in the shadow of the illustrious 365 GTB/4 with which, mechanically, it shares much.  The GTB/4 picked up the nickname “Daytona”, an opportunistic association given 1-2-3 finish in the 1967 24 Hours of Daytona involved three entirely different models while the GTC/4 enjoyed only the less complementary recognition of being labeled by some il gobbone (the hunchback) or quello alla banana (the banana one).  It was an unfair slight and under the anyway elegant skin, the GTB/4 & GTC/4 shared much, the engine of the latter differing mainly in lacking the dry-sump lubrication and the use of six twin-choke side-draft Weber carburetors (type 38DCOE59/60) rather than the downdrafts, this permitting a lower bonnet (hood) line.  Revisions to the cylinder heads allowed the V12 to be tuned to deliver torque across a broad rev-range rather than the focus on top-end power which was one of the things which made the GTB/4 so intoxicating.

Runner-up & winner, 2015 Miss Universe Contest.  Ariadna María Gutiérrez Arévalo (b 1993), Miss Colombia 2014 & first runner-up (left) and Pia Alonzo Wurtzbach (b 1989), Miss Philippines 2015 & Miss Universe 2015 (right).  

Criticizing the GTC/4 because it doesn’t quite have the visceral appeal of the GTB/4 seems rather like casually dismissing the model who managed only to be runner-up to Miss Universe.  The two cars anyway, despite sharing a platform with the same wheelbase and track, were intended for different purposes, the GTB/4 an outright high performance road car which could, with relatively few modifications, be competitive in racing whereas the GTC/4 was a grand tourer, even offering occasional rear seating for two (short) people.  One footnote in the history of the marque is the GTC/4 was the last Ferrari offered with the lovely Borrani triple-laced wire wheels; some GTB/4s had them fitted by the factory and a few more were added by dealers but the factory advised that with increasing weight, tyres with much superior grip and higher speeds, they were no longer strong enough in extreme conditions and the cast aluminum units should be used if the car was to be run in environments without speed restrictions such as race tracks or certain de-restricted public roads (then seen mostly in West Germany (FRG), Montana & Nevada in the US and Australia's Northern Territory & outback New South Wales (NSW)).  A Ferrari in Verde Medio Nijinsky is a rarity but does illustrate how well colors other than the dominant red can suit the lines.  A Ferrari in white or navy blue can be a revelation.

Cinderella.  As a design, the once neglected GTC/4 really should be compared with the other big 2+2 coupés of the era, exotic and otherwise.  Whatever the extent of the mechanical similarity, the GTB/4 was a thing of a certain time and place which both allowed and dictated something more uncompromising.  The still stunning GTB/4 was the evolutionary apex of its species; it can't be improved upon but the GTC/4 is no ugly sister and when contemplating quello alla banana, one might refect on the sexiness of the fruit.          

Poison & Venom

Poison (pronounced poi-zuhn)

(1) A substance with an inherent property that can impair function, cause structural damage, or otherwise injure or destroy life or impair health.

(2) Something harmful or pernicious, as to happiness or well-being.

(3) A slang term for alcoholic liquor.

(4) To administer poison to (a something living).

(5) To ruin, vitiate, or corrupt.

(6) In chemistry, a substance that retards a chemical reaction or destroys or inhibits the activity of a catalyst or enzyme).

(7) In nuclear physics, a substance that absorbs neutrons in a nuclear reactor and thus slows down the reaction.  It may be added deliberately or formed during fission

1200-1250: From the Middle English poisoun, poyson, poysone, puyson & puisun (a deadly potion or substance (and figuratively, "spiritually corrupting ideas; evil intentions,"), from the twelfth century Old French poison & puison (drink, especially a "medical drink" (later "a (magic) potion; a poisonous drink"), from the Latin potionem (nominative potio) (a drinking, a drink) (and also "a poisonous drink"), from potare (to drink), from the primitive Indo-European root poi- & po- (to drink).  The earliest Lastin forms were pōtiōn (drink, a draught, a poisonous draught, a potion), from pōtō (I drink) & pōtāre (to drink).   The Middle English forms displaced the native Old English ator.  The Latin pōtiōn is the stem of pōtiō, the derive forms being pōtio & pōtiōnis.

The evolution from Latin to French followed the pattern of other words (eg raison from rationem), the Latin word also the source of Old Spanish pozon, the Italian pozione and the Spanish pocion.  The modern and more typical Indo-European word for this is represented in English by virus and the slang sense of "alcoholic drink" is an Americanism dating from 1805.  Figurative use was first noted in the late fifteenth century although it appears not to have been applied to persons until 1910.  It was used as an adjective from the 1520s; with plant names from the eighteenth century.  Poison ivy first recorded 1784; poison oak in 1743, poison in 1915.  Poison-pen, the trolling of the time, was popularized 1913 by a notorious criminal case in Pennsylvania although the phrase dates from 1898.

The sense evolution was from "drink" to "deadly drink".  In some Germanic languages "poison" is aligned with the English gift (eg the Old High German gift, the German Gift, the Danish & Swedish gift and the Dutch gift & vergift).  This shift may have been partly euphemistic and partly the influence of the Greek dosis (a portion prescribed (literally "a giving")), used by Greek physicians to mean "a quantum of medicine".  Of persons detested or regarded as exerting baleful influence, poison and poisonous were in use by 1910 while the slang meaning "alcoholic drink" recorded as an an early nineteenth century invention of American English (as in "what's your poison?"); potus as a past-participle adjective in Latin meant "drunken".  The verb in the sense of "to poison, to give poison to" dates from the circa 1300 poisonen, from the Old French poisonner (to give to drink) and directly from the noun poison.  The figurative use in the sense of "to corrupt" emerged in the late fourteenth century.

Venom (pronounced ven-uhm)

(1) The poisonous fluid that some animals, as certain snakes and spiders, secrete and introduce into the bodies of their victims by biting, stinging etc.

(2) Something resembling or suggesting poison in its effect; spite; malice.

(3) Poison in general (inaccurate, now archaic).

(4) To make venomous; envenom (archaic).

(5) Malice, spite.

1175–1225: A variant of the Middle English venim & venym (poison secreted by some animals and transferred by biting) from the Anglo-Norman & Old French venim, venin (poison; malice), from the Vulgar Latin venīmen (source also of the Italian veleno and the Spanish veneno), from the Latin venēnum (magical herb or potion, poison (and in pre-Classical times "drug, medical potion" also "charm, seduction" probably originally "love potion")).  Root was the Proto-Italic weneznom (lust, desire), from the primitive Indo-European wenh (to strive, wish, love) from wen (to desire; to strive for).  Related are the Sanskrit वनति (vanati) (gain, wish, erotic lust) and the Latin Venus.   The variously deformations in post-Latin languages happened apparently by process of dissimilation.  The modern spelling in English was common by the late fourteenth century and the meaning "bitter, virulent feeling or language" dates from circa 1300.

Not interchangeable

A blue Pit Viper.

Poison and venom are often used interchangeably because once in the body, the chemicals can do similar damage, attacking the heart, brain or other vital organs but the meanings are different.  That said, there are many venoms which can be ingested without ill-effect because they are dangerous only if entering the bloodstream although that can happen through a minor cut in the mouth so the practice is not without risk.  Traditionally, venomous creatures bite, sting or stab their victims whereas for poisonous organisms to affect the living, they have to be bitten, inhaled or touched.  The venomous thus need a way in, like fangs or teeth.  The useful rule is if one bites something and one dies, what one bit contained poison; if something bites one and one dies, one was bitten by something venomous.

In late 2017, while on holiday in Thailand, Lindsay Lohan was bitten by a snake.  The creature was presumably not venomous, Lindsay Lohan surviving unaffected but there was no word on the fate of the snake.

Rectilinear & Curvilinear

Rectilinear (pronounced rek-tl-in-ee-er)

(1) Forming or formed by straight lines.

(2) In geometry, as rectilinear grid, a tessellation by rectangles or rectangular cuboids (also known as rectangular parallelepipeds) that are not, in general, all congruent to each other.

(3) Of, pertaining to or characterized by straight lines.

(4) In, moving in, or characterized by a movement in a straight line or lines.

(5) In architecture, as the rectilinear style, the third historical division of English Gothic architecture.

1650–1660: From the post-Classical Latin, either from rectilīneāris or from rectilīneus (the source also of rectiline) + -ar, in either case the ultimate sources being rectus (straight) + līnea (line).  Rectus was from the primitive Indo-European root reg- (move in a straight line) with derivatives meaning "to direct in a straight line".  The suffix -ar is from the Latin from -ālis with dissimilation of “l” to “r” after roots containing an “l” thus āris and used to form adjectives (usually from a noun) to convey the sense of a relationship or “of; pertaining to”.  The English adjectival suffix –ar (of, near, or pertaining to) is widely appended, usually to nouns and is not restricted to those of Latin origin (the synonymous forms including -al, -an, -ary, -ese, -ic, -id, -ish, -like, -oid, -ory, -ous & -y).  Rectilinear came to be used in the sense of “a figure bounded by straight lines" by 1728, an evolution of the earlier meaning “straight lined”.  Rectilinear & rectilineal are adjectives, rectilinearity is a noun.

Curvilinear (pronounced kur-vuh-lin-ee-er)

(1) Consisting of or bounded by curved lines.

(2) Forming or moving in a curved line.

(3) Formed or characterized by curved lines.

(4) Of lines, having bends; curved.

(4) In mathematics, a set of coordinates determined by or determining a system of three orthogonal surfaces

1690s: From the Latin, derived from curvi (a combined form of the Latin curvus (crooked, bent, curved) + līneāris, from līnea (line).  The construct of līneāris was līnea (line) + -āris (the adjectival suffix).  The Latin curvus was ultimately from the primitive Indo-European sker & ker (to bend, curve, turn) + -wós (before it became associated with perfect stems, the suffixes -wós- & -us- had a more general function, forming athematic verb participles with the meaning "having x-en").  The earlier form was curvilineal, dating from the 1650s.  Curvilinear is an adjective, curvilinearity a noun and curvilinearly an adverb.

A juxtaposition of curvilinearity and rectilinearity: Lindsay Lohan, Vanity Fair shoot, October 2010.

In engineering, as in nature, matters of rectilinearity and curvilinearity tend to be products variously of inheritance, circumstance, economics or necessity.  In design however, sometimes fashion is allowed (indeed sometimes encouraged) to prevail over function and in automotive styling, the rectilinear (known in its most extreme form as knife-edge or razor-edge design) was a motif which came and went.  In the early days when things were truly little more than starkly functional, straight lines were dominant but the industry also inherited many of the traditions of the architecture of the horse-drawn carriage and embellishments could be quite curvaceous.  Line and curve co-existed in the inter-war years and as interest grew in streamlining to improve aerodynamics, the curves actually assumed a functional purpose.  At the same time, severity of line became itself a defined style, associated with formality and wealth, structurally because the straight lines tended to exaggerate size so the bigger cars appeared larger still and perhaps psychologically because they conveyed a message of casual disregard for something like streamlining, relying instead on power.  The big, bustle-backed limousines of the pre-war years were the exemplars.

Rolls-Royce Phantom IV (1950-1956 (left)), Triumph 1800-2000 Renown (1946-1954 (centre)) & Triumph Mayflower (1949-1953 (right)).

In the post war-years, in Europe and US, designers were attracted to the new.  In Europe that meant the avant-garde while across the Atlantic it could mean anything from restrained formalism to macropterous absurdity.  In England however, there was still a hankering for the familiar and among the coachbuilders (and Rolls-Royce which had begun building its own “standard” bodies) it was “business as usual” and, barely updated, the razor-edged lines returned.  Remarkably, as a niche, the style would be produced in tiny numbers until the 1990s even as modernity overtook the land.  So clearly, on a big scale it worked for the small, exclusive market at which it was targeted, a rolling denotation of wealth and power and this was what attracted others to apply the rectilinear lines on a smaller scale, at a lower price.  The leading proponents were Standard-Triumph which in 1946 released their middle-class 1800 as a kind of shrunken (though no less angular) Rolls-Royce or Bentley.  Generally, it was judged an aesthetic success although it quickly became dated and before long, the company was emulating American cars, their shrunken versions of those rather less pleasing.  The 1800 however maintained sufficient popularity to remain in production for eight years and that encouraged the idea the motif might translate well to something even smaller.  Hence in 1949, the Triumph Mayflower, small, stubby and wholly unsuited to a style which worked only at scale; the only thing more absurd than its existence was that the company designed it with the US market in mind.  The advertising agency suggested advertising it as “the watch charm Rolls-Royce” but whether that was vetoed by threats from Rolls-Royce or watch charm makers isn’t recorded.  A failure in every market in which it was offered (conspicuously so in the US), it was replaced by an anonymous-looking blob which might have designed by someone French in an unimaginative moment or an Italian on a bad day.

1967 Cadillac Eldorado (left), 1971 Fiat 130 Coupé (centre) and 1983 Volvo 760 GLE (right).

Until the oil shocks of the 1970s forced just about everyone to take aerodynamics seriously, the rectilineal would come and go as a fashion trend.  Cadillac’s 1967 Eldorado was an outstanding example and has aged better even than its curvier companion, the Oldsmobile Toroando of a year earlier but probably the high point of the modern razor-edge was Pininfarina’s Fiat 130 Coupé, its dimensions a stylistic sweet-spot which proved as suited to the saloon and shooting brake the designer world later exhibit; regrettably, neither reached production and the coupé proved a commercial failure, albeit one much admired.  That wasn’t something often said of one of Europe’s less successful straight-edged ventures, the 1982 Volvo 700 series.  Looking something like an earnest but uninspired student at a technical college might have submitted for assessment, Volvo at the time claimed it would remain timeless over the years to come while the rounded shapes around it soon became dated.  In that they were certainly wrong, the competition becoming more curvilinear still and soon Volvos nip-and-tuck specialists were finding ways to smooth the corners, not an easy task given the shape the patient was in and something really not possible until the re-skinned 900 was released in 1990.  The 700 had, by Volvo’s standards, a short life but it’s remembered for a bon mot from another designer who mused that it “…might be a good-looking car when they take it out of the packing-case”.

1953 Jaguar C-Type (XK120-C) continuation (left), 1957 Jaguar XKSS (centre) & 1961 Jaguar E-Type (XK-E) (1961).

Curves can be mere styling devices and in the 1960s General Motors (GM) actually created a motif they called cokebottle, summoning the idea of a Coca-Cola bottle on its side, itself evocative of the female form supine.  Plans to trademark the word were abandoned when the lawyers assured everyone using a lowercase “c” and claiming it to be a portmanteau word would fool neither the Coca-Cola company nor the judge.  Sometimes though, the curves were functional, Jaguar in 1950 shaping the aluminum skin on the XK120-C (C-Type) simply to be as low and aerodynamic as possible, the curves bulging only where necessary to provide coverage for the wheels and tyres.  On the subsequent D-Type (and the road-going derivative the XKSS), the impression was that the curves had become exaggerated, bulging more sensually still.  It’s not entirely an optical illusion but the shape is wholly functional, the designers actually lowering the centre, a revised mounting of a now dry-sumped engine permitting a lower bonnet (hood) line and thus a smaller frontal area.  The wheels and tyres remained much the same height so the curvature of the skin enveloping them is so much more obvious on a body otherwise lower.  The remarkably small frontal area did the job at Le Mans; the D-Type nearly 20 mph (32 km/h) faster than Ferrari's far more powerful 375.  By the time the E-Type was released in 1961, it could actually have been done with a little less curvature but we should all be grateful it looks as it does.

1960s original (left), 2022 modern (centre) & 2022 retro (right).

Objects like refrigerators offer designers a little more scope given that a low drag coefficient hardly matters although the modern, rectilinear versions presumably optimize space efficiency, offering the highest internal volume relative to external dimensions.  That said, there’s clearly still some demand for fridges which emulate the rounded style most associated with the 1950s and 1960s, several manufacturers with a retro line and they’re available in the pastel shades of the era.

Pile

Pile (pronounced pahyl)

(1) An assemblage of things laid or lying one upon the other.

(2) Slang for a large number, quantity, or amount of anything.

(3) A heap of wood on which a dead body, a living person, or a sacrifice is burned; pyre the more common form.

(4) Slang term for a lofty or large building or group of buildings.

(5) In metallurgy, a bundle of pieces of iron ready to be welded and drawn out into bars; fagot.

(6) In electricity, slang for a voltaic pile.

(7) To gather, accumulate, or rise in a pile or piles (often followed by up).

(8) In construction, a long column of timber, concrete, or steel that is driven into the ground to provide a foundation for a vertical load (a bearing pile) or a group of such columns to resist a horizontal load from earth or water pressure (a sheet pile)

(9) In heraldry, an ordinary in the form of a wedge or triangle coming from one edge of the escutcheon, from the chief unless otherwise specified.

(10) In archery, the sharp head or striking end of an arrow, usually of metal and of the form of a wedge or conical nub.

(11) A fabric with a surface of upright yarns, cut or looped, as corduroy, Turkish toweling, velvet, and velveteen.

(12) In nuclear physics, a structure of uranium and a moderator used for producing atomic energy; nuclear reactor.

Pre 1000: Middle English pile from Old English pīl (shaft) derived from the Latin pīlum (javelin) and pīla (pillar or mole of stone).  Variations emerged in Late Middle English, pyles from 1375–1425 was a plural of the Latin pilae (literally, balls) and from 1300–50 piles (hair, plumage) from the Latin pilus (hair), the -i- short in Latin but long in Anglicized school pronunciation.  The Middle English pyl (reverse of a coin) was a special use of the Medieval Latin pīla.  Word actually passed to English from the Old French pyle. 

The meaning "mass or heap" was universal by the early fifteenth century, originally "pillar, pier of a bridge," from Middle French pile and directly from Latin pila "stone barrier, pillar, pier"; the development in Latin from "pier, harbor wall of stones," to "something heaped up" and the meaning "large building", common by the fourteenth century is probably the same word.  The "heavy pointed beam" is from the Old English pil (stake), as "arrow" is from the Latin pilum (heavy javelin of the Roman foot soldier, literally pestle), source of the Old Norse pila, the Old High German pfil, and the German pfeil (arrow).  Of all these, origin is uncertain.  The meanings as applied to fabrics and downy plumage are from the Anglo-French pyle or the Middle Dutch pijl, both from Latin pilus (a hair), source of the Italian pelo and Old French pel.  Phonological evidence rules out transmission of the English word via the Old French cognate peil and poil; meaning "nap upon cloth" emerged in the 1560s.  The most familiar modern meeting (to heap up) is from the mid fourteenth century while the figurative verbal expression “pile on” (attack vigorously, attack en masse) is an Americanism from 1894.

Chicago Pile-1

The atomic pile was the original name for a nuclear reactor, a device used to initiate and control a self-sustained nuclear chain reaction.  Chicago Pile-1 (CP-1) was the world's first nuclear reactor and on 2 December 1942, the first human-made self-sustaining nuclear chain reaction was initiated.

Chicago Pile-1, 1942                          

CP-1 was built with 45,000 graphite blocks weighing 360 tons used as neutron moderators, fueled by 5 tons of uranium metal and 45 tons of uranium oxide which, despite the bulk, produced only a tiny amount of power, about one-half watt. The original design intended the shape to be spherical but, during construction, it was calculated the critical mass required for a chain-reaction could be achieved with a smaller pile.  Disassembled in 1943, CP-1 was reconfigured to become Chicago Pile-2 (CP-2) and it operated in that form until 1954 when it was dismantled and buried.

A pile of granite blocks (left) and Lindsay Lohan with several stacks of pregnancy books (right), out-take from Labor Pains (2009).

The term "atomic pile" is a historic artefact from the early years of the science but essentially they were the first nuclear reactors, the term derived from what the physicists at the time visualized as a "pile" of the graphite blocks used to moderate the nuclear reaction.  Why the word "pile" was chosen as a descriptor doesn't seem to have been recorded but it must at the time have seen an obvious choice although, the convention in English would have been to use "stack" because although "pile" and "stack" both refer to agglomerations of objects (although can figuratively also be used of the non-physical), the two have slightly different connotations.  A pile tends to be an unordered heap of items, placed without much care to produce a random or shape ("pile of clothes on the floor", "pile of leaves in the yard" etc).  By contrast, a stack is a more orderly arrangement of items placed atop each other ("stack of books on a table", "stack of plates in a cupboard" etc), suggesting something and structured (although the stuff in the stack could in some ways be quite haphazard (ie not in alphabetical order etc).   So, a pile tends to appear to be disordered or unstructured, while a stack suggest some sense of deliberate organization.  None of that suggest the early, pioneering theorists and researchers were wrong in their choice of word.  The first nuclear reactors were called a pile to reflect the basic, rather unrefined way the components were "piled together"; these really were scientific experiments and not without risk, a number of scientists and engineers who worked in close proximity to Chicago Pile-1 dying prematurely from internal cancers, including Italian-American physicist Enrico Fermi (1901–1954), the device's designer & builder.

Flatware

Flatware (pronounced flat-wair)

In catering, an omnibus term covering (1) cutlery such as the knives, forks, and spoons used at the table for serving and eating food & (2) crockery such as those plates, saucers, dishes or containers which tend to flatness in shape (as opposed to the more capacious hollowware).

1851: The construct was flat + ware.  Flat dates from 1275–1325 and was from the Middle English flat from the Old Norse flatr, related to Old High German flaz (flat) and the Old Saxon flat (flat; shallow) and akin to Old English flet.  It was cognate with the Norwegian and Swedish flat and the Danish flad, both from the Proto-Germanic flataz, from the primitive Indo-European pleth (flat); akin to the Saterland Frisian flot (smooth), the German flöz (a geological layer), the Latvian plats and Sanskrit प्रथस् (prathas) (extension).  Source is thought to be the Ancient Greek πλατύς (platús & platys) (flat, broad).  The sense of "prosaic or dull" emerged in the 1570s and was first applied to drink from circa 1600, a meaning extended to musical notes in the 1590s (ie the tone is "lowered").   Flat-out, an adjectival form, was first noted in 1932, apparently a reference to pushing a car’s throttle (accelerator) flat to the floor and thus came to be slang for a vehicle’s top speed.  The noun was from the Middle English flat (level piece of ground, flat edge of a weapon) and developed from the adjective; the US colloquial use as a noun from 1870 meaning "total failure" endures in the sense of “falling flat”.  The notion of a small, residential space, a divided part of a larger structure, dates from 1795–1805; variant of the obsolete Old English flet (floor, house, hall), most suggesting the meaning followed the early practice of sub-dividing buildings within levels.  In this sense, the Old High German flezzi (floor) has been noted and it is perhaps derived from the primitive Indo-European plat (to spread) but the link to flat as part of a building is tenuous.

Ware was from the Middle English ware & war, from the Old English waru & wær (article of merchandise (originally “protection, guard”, the sense probably derived from “an object of care, that which is kept in custody”), from the Proto-Germanic warō & Proto-West Germanic war, from the Proto-Germanic waraz, the Germanic root also the source of the Swedish vara, the Danish vare, the Old Frisian were, the Middle Dutch were, the Dutch waar, the Middle High German & German Ware (goods). All ultimately were from the primitive Indo-European root wer- (perceive, watch out for)  In Middle English, the meaning shifted from "guard, protection" to "an object that is in possession, hence meriting attention, guarded, cared for, and protected".  Thus as a suffix, -ware is used to form nouns denoting, collectively, items made from a particular substance or of a particular kind or for a particular use.  In the special case of items worn as clothing, the suffix -wear is appended, thus there is footwear rather than footware.  In the suffixed form, ware is almost always in the singular but as a stand-alone word (meaning goods or products etc), it’s used as wares.  Ladyware was a seventeenth century euphemism for "a woman's private parts" (the companion manware etc much less common) and in Middle English there was also the mid-thirteenth century ape-ware (deceptive or false ware; trickery).

Hardware and software were adopted by the computer industry, the former used from the very dawn of the business in the late 1940s, borrowing from the mid-fifteenth century use which initially described “small metal goods” before evolving to be applied to just about everything in building & construction from tools to fastenings.  Apparently, software didn’t come into use until the 1960s and then as something based on “hardware” rather than anything to do with the mid-nineteenth century use when it described both "woolen or cotton fabrics" and "relatively perishable consumer goods"; until then there was hardware & programs (the term “code” came later).  The ecosystem spawned by the industry picked up the idea in the 1980s, coining shareware (originally software distributed for free for which some payment was hoped) and that started a trend, begetting:

Abandonware: Software no longer updated or maintained, or on which copyright is no longer defended or which is no longer sold or supported; such software can, with approval pass to others for development (takeoverware) or simply be purloined (hijackware).  Abandonware is notoriously associated with video game development where there’s a high failure rate and many unsuccessful projects later emerge as shareware or freeware.

Adware: Nominally free software which includes advertising while running.  Adware sometimes permits the advertising to disappear upon payment and is popularly associated with spyware although the extent of this has never reliably been quantified.

Baitware: Software with the most desirable or tempting features disabled but able to be activated upon payment; a type of crippleware or demoware.

Freeware: Free software, a variation of which is “open source” which makes available also the source code which anyone may modify and re-distribute on a non-commercial basis.  Google’s Chrome browser is a famous example, developed from the open source Chromium project.

Censorware: An umbrella term for content-filtering software.

Demoware: A variation of crippleware or baitware in that it’s a fully-functional version of the software but limited in some critical way (eg ceases to work after 30 days); also called trialware.  The full feature set is unlocked by making a payment which ensures the user is provided with a code (or "key") to activate full-functionality.  The fashionable term for this approach is "freemium" (a portmanteau of free & premium, the idea being the premium features cost something.

Donationware: Pure shareware in that it’s fully-functional and may be used without payment but donations are requested to support further development.  A type of shareware.

Postcardware: Developer requests a postcard from the user’s home town.  This really is a thing and the phenomenon is probably best explained by those from the behavioral science community; also called cardware.

Ransomware: Software which “locks” or in some way renders inaccessible a user’s data or system, requiring a payment (usually in crypto-currency) before access can be regained; malware’s growth industry.

Spyware: Software which furtively monitors a user’s actions, usually to steal and transmit data; antispyware is its intended nemesis.

Malware: Software with some malicious purpose including spyware and ransomware.

Bloatware: Either (1) the programs bundled by manufacturers or retailers with devices when sold, (often trialware and in some notorious cases spyware) or (2) software laden with pointless “features” nobody will ever use; also called fatware, fattware and phatware.

Vaporware: Non-existent software which is either well behind schedule or has only ever been speculative; also called noware.

Ford flathead V8 with heads removed (right), a pair of (flat) heads (centre) and V8 with (aftermarket Offenhauser) heads installed.

Flat as a noun, prefix or adjective has also been productive:  Flat white can be either a coffee or a non-gloss paint.  Flatway and flatwise (with a flat side down or otherwise in contact with a flat surface) are synonymous terms describing the relationship of one or more flat objects in relation to others and flat-water is a nautical term meaning much the same as "still-water".  The flat universe is a cluster of variations of one theory among a number of speculative descriptions of the topological or geometric attributes of the universe.  Probably baffling to all but a few cosmologists, the models appear suggest a structure which include curves while as a totality being of zero curvature and, depending on the detail, imply a universe which either finite or infinite.  In internal combustion engines, a flathead engine (also called the sidevalve or L-Head) is one where the poppet valves are built into the engine block rather than being in a separate cylinder head which has since the 1950s been the almost universal practice (overhead valve (OHV) and overhead camshaft (OHC)).  Until the 1950s, flatheads were widely available in both cheap and expensive vehicles because they used relatively few moving parts, were simple (and thus economic) to manufacture and existed in an era of low-octane fuels which tended to preclude high engine speeds.  During the Second World War (1939-1945), decades of advances in design and metallurgy were effectively accomplished in five years and flathead designs were phased out of production except for non-automotive niches where simple, cheap, low-revving units were ideal.  The classic flathead was the Ford V8 (1932-1953 in the US market although, remarkably, production overseas didn’t end until 1993) which encompasses all the advantages and disadvantages of the design and was so identified with the concept that it’s still known as “the Flathead”, the name gained because the “head”, containing no valve-gear or other machinery, is little more than a piece of flat steel, providing a sealing for the combustion process.

Flat Earth Society factional options.

Members of the Flat Earth Society believe the Earth is flat but there's genuine debate within the organization, some holding the shape is disk-like, others that it's conical but both agree we live on something like the face of a coin.  There are also those in a radical faction suggesting it's actually shaped like a doughnut but this theory is regarded by the flat-earth mainstream as speculative or even heretical.  Evidence, such as photographs from orbit showing Earth to be a sphere, is dismissed as part of the "round Earth conspiracy" run by NASA and others.  The flat-earther theory is that the Arctic Circle is in the center and the Antarctic is a 150-foot (45m) tall wall of ice around the rim; NASA contractors guard the ice wall so nobody can fall over the edge.  Earth's daily cycle is a product of the sun and moon being 32 mile (51 km) wide spheres travelling in a plane 3,000 miles (4,800 km) above Earth.  The more distant stars are some 3100 miles (5000 km) away and there's also an invisible "anti-moon" which obscures the moon during lunar eclipses.

Lindsay Lohan in Lanvin Classic Garnet ballet flats (ballet pumps in the US) (Lanvin p/n: FW-BAPBS1-NAPA-A18391), Los Angeles, 2012.

Ballet flats are shoes which either literally are or closely resemble a ballerina’s dancing slippers.  In the US, ballet flats are almost always called ballet pumps and this use has spread, many in the industry also now calling them pumps, presumably just for administrative simplicity although the standardization does create problems because the term “pump” is used to describe a wide range of styles and there’s much inconsistency between markets.  A flat-file database is a database management system (DBMS) where records are stored in a uniform format with no structure for indexing or recognizing relationships between entries.  A flat-file database is best visualized as the page of a spreadsheet which no capacity for three-dimensionality but, in principle, there’s no reason why a flat-file database can’t be huge although they tend for many reasons not to be suitable to use at scale.

The Flatiron building (circa 1904) oil on canvas by Ernest Lawson (1873-1939).

The Flatiron Building is a 22 storey, 285 foot (86.9 m), tall building with a triangular footprint, located at 175 Fifth Avenue in what is now called the Flatiron District of Manhattan, New York City.  Opened in 1902 and originally called the “Fuller Building”, the Flatiron was one of the city’s first skyscrapers and gained the nickname which stuck because people compare the shape to the cast-iron clothes irons then on sale although, viewed from ground level, the shape is deceptive; whereas an iron is symmetrical, the Flatiron is an irregular triangle: a wedge.  A striking example of modernist design, it was designated a National Historic Landmark in 1989.

Flatware

Flatware in its historic sense is now rarely used outside of the categorization systems of catering suppliers except in the US where it vies with “silverware” & “flatwaresilverware” to describe what is in most of the English-speaking world called cutlery.  In modern use, a term which covers some utensils and some dishware seems to make no sense and that’s correct.  The origin of flatware belongs to a time when those to whom an invitation to dinner was extended would bring their own “flatware” (knife, fork, spoon, plate, goblet) because in most houses, those items existed in numbers sufficient only for the inhabitants.

Jacob Rees-Mogg taking a dish of tea.  Mr Rees-Mogg (b 1969), a noted member of Boris Johnson's government since 2019, is sometime referred to as "the right honourable member for the eighteenth century".

As applied to crockery, flatware items were in the fourteenth century those plates, dishes, saucers which were "shallow & smooth-surfaced", distinguishing them from hollowware which were the larger items (steel, china, earthenware) of crockery used to cook or serve food (onto or into flatware to be eaten with flatware).  The seemingly aberrant case of the cup (something inherently hollow) being flatware is that what we would now call a mug or goblet, like a knife, fork or plate, was an item most people would carry with them when going to eat in another place.  The issue of cup and saucer existing in different categories thus didn’t exist and in any case saucers were, as the name suggests, originally associated with the serving of sauce, being a drip-tray.  The cup and saucer in its modern form didn’t appear until the mid eighteenth century when a handle was added to the little bowls which had been in use in the West for more than a hundred years (centuries earlier in the East) and reflecting handle-less age, the phrase “a dish of tea” is still an occasionally heard affectation.

Elizabeth II farewelling Bill & crooked Hillary Clinton, Buckingham Palace, 2000.

Almost universally, flatware is referred to as "the silver".  Eating and drinking has long been fetishized and adopted increasingly elaborate forms of service so (except for the specific sense in the US) the term flatware is now of little use outside the databases of catering suppliers, crockery and cutlery now more useful general categories which can accommodate what is now a huge number of classes of wares.  Flatware is a noun and the noun plural is flatwares.