Zedonk

Zedonk (pronounced zee-dongk, zee-dawngk or zee-duhngk)

The offspring of a zebra and a donkey.

1970-1975: A portmanteau word created from the first syllables of zebra and donkey (ze(bra) + donk(ey)).  Zedonk is a noun and the noun plural is zedonks; the alternative spelling is zeedonk.  According to zoologists, zedonk & zeedonk are popular creations and the correct terms are Zonkey (a blend of z(ebra) +‎(d)onkey (the noun plural being zonkeys)) if the offspring is sired from a male Zebra and a female Donkey and zebadonk (zeb(ra) + -a- + donk(ey)) if by a male donkey out of a female zebra.  Zonkey is pronounced zong-kee, zawng‐kee or zuhng‐kee.  The advantage of zedonk is it can be used to refer to any hybrid although the correct term is zebroid.  Like mules and ligers, zebroids are sterile creature so unable to procreate and while they can live in the wild, almost all known examples are in captivity.

Zebroids both: A zebadonk (left) and a zonkey (right).  Presumably, experts in such things can tell them apart.

Zebra (any of three species of subgenus Hippotigris (E. grevyi, E. quagga & E. zebra) with black and white stripes and native to Africa)) dates from circa 1600 and was from the Italian zebra, from the Portuguese zebra & zebro (zebra), from the Old Portuguese enzebro, ezebra & azebra (wild ass), from the earlier cebrario & ezebrario, from the Vulgar Latin eciferus, from the Latin equiferus (wild horse), the construct being equus (horse) + ferus (wild).  Being black and white, “zebra” was used in a 1970s CBS TV sitcom as a term of derision used by an African-American character directed at the offspring of an interracial couple (who were actually the first married interracial couple to appear on US network TV) although the word (acknowledged by dictionaries as a vulgar, derogatory, ethnic slur applied to a biracial person, specifically one born to a member of the Sub-Saharan African race and a Caucasian) in that context never gained traction in the general community.  Interestingly, prior to the twentieth century, the word was pronounced with a long initial vowel before the adoption of the initial short vowel.  Despite US phonetic imperialism, this latter use is still most prevalent in the UK and most Commonwealth nations while the long vowel form remains standard in Canadian and US English.

Zebraesque: Lindsay Lohan using Jimmy Choo Zebra Clutch as protection from the paparazzi (left), Lindsay Lohan with blow-up zebra, annual V Magazine black and white party, New York Fashion Week, September 2011 (centre) and Lindsay Lohan in zebra-print dress, GQ Men Of The Year Awards, September 2014.

In many sports, a black and white striped shirts was often reserved for umpires & referees and “zebra” was often applied as a nickname (they attracted other sobriquets too).  In clinical medicine, “a zebra” is slang for an improbable diagnosis, the origin lying to the advice given to medical students to at first instance assume the most common cause for symptoms: “When you hear hoofbeats, think horses, not zebras".)  Because of the distinctive appearance, the zebra lent its name to other branches of zoology.  In Ichthyology, it’s the informal name for a fish, the zebra cichlid (Amatitlania nigrofasciata, native to Central America).  In lepidopterology, the word is applied to any of a number of papilionid butterflies of the subgenus Paranticopsis of the genus Graphium, their distinguishing characteristic being the black and white markings.

Lindsay Lohan on Abbey Road zebra crossing with Natasha Richardson (1963-2009) in The Parent Trap (1998) (left) and one of Sydney City Council’s re-interpretation of the zebra crossing as the “rainbow crossing”, first installed in 2013 to mark Oxford Street’s role in the history of the gay movement.

The zebra crossing (Usually as marked crosswalk or crossing point in the US) (American English) is a pedestrian crossing marked with white stripes, the name adopted because road surfaces tend usually towards black.  Zebra crossings originated in England in the early 1950s to improve pedestrian safety and the idea quickly spread world-wide although as technology evolved, increasingly sophisticated means have been implemented to improve the concept.  In England, they were almost always accompanied by belisha beacons (upright poles on either side of the crossing with an illuminated, orange globe atop and named after Leslie Hore-Belisha (1893–1957; Liberal (and later Tory) MP & cabinet minister) who oversaw their introduction while minister of transport; they’re still used in England and some Commonwealth countries.

Lindsay Lohan meeting zebras while on safari in Mauritius, June 2016.

The origin of donkey ((a domestic animal, Equus asinus asinus, similar to a horse)) is obscure and it first emerged in the late eighteenth century as a slang term.  It’s thought most probably from the Middle English donekie (a miniature dun horse), a double diminutive of the Middle English don, dun & dunne (a name for a dun horse), the construct being dun (a brownish grey colour) + -ock (a diminutive suffix) + -ie (a diminutive suffix).  There was also the Middle English donning (a dun horse) and the English dunnock and donkey in modern use came largely to replace the original term ass (memorable because it’s one of the Bible’s Ten Commandments that (thou shalt not covet thy neighbor’s ass) because of the homophony and partial merger with arse.

1955 Daimler DK400 Golden Zebra.  The last of the Docker Daimlers, the Golden Zebra was a two-door fixed head coupé (FHC) with coachwork by Hooper, built on the existing DK400 chassis.  The interior was finished with an African theme, the dashboard of ivory and the upholstery in zebra-skin while external metal trim was gold-plated.  Lady Docker personally chose the zebra skin, claiming mink was unpleasantly hot.  It was first shown at the 1955 Paris Motor Show, the French apparently appalled and it's of note this stylistic relic appeared in the same building used for the debut of the Citroën DS.

In idiomatic use, donkey was used to suggest “a stubborn person”, something extended with greater frequency to “mule” and it meant also “someone bad at something”, a use which seems to have begun at the poker table but applied also in many fields to both people and machines which perform less impressively than was hoped.  In admiralty jargon a donkey-engine was a small, auxiliary engine used to run things like pumps or winches and the term was later picked up by the hot-rod community in the US where it was shortened to “donk” and applied to engines large and small (although in that community the attitude was usually “the bigger the better”).  In the sail age, donkey in admiralty slang was a box or chest (especially a toolbox) and it’s though donkey-engine evolved from this because the small engines were often installed in the spots where the boxes sat.

Big donk: Scania DC16 (16.4 litre (1000 cubic inch) diesel V8).

Herringbone

Herringbone (pronounced her-ing-bohn)

(1) A pattern, the weave resembling the skeleton of a herring fish, consisting of adjoining vertical rows of slanting lines, any two contiguous lines forming either a V or an inverted V, used in masonry, textiles, embroidery etc and .  Also called chevron, chevron weave, herringbone weave; a type of twill weave having this pattern.

(2) A fabric constructed with this weave.

(3) A garment made from such a fabric, applied especially to jackets and coats.

(4) In skiing, a method of going up a slope in which a skier sets the skis in a form resembling a V, and, placing weight on the inside edges, advances the skis by turns using the poles from behind for push and support.

(5) A type of cirrocumulus cloud.

1645–1655: The construct was herring + bone.  Herring was from the Middle English hering, from the Old English hǣring, from the Proto-West Germanic hāring (herring) of unknown origin but it may be related to the Proto-Germanic hērą (hair) due to the similarity of the fish’s fine bones to hair. It was cognate with the Scots hering & haring, the Saterland Frisian Hiering & Häiring, the West Frisian hjerring, the Dutch haring, the German and Low German Hereng & Hering, the French hareng, the Norman ĥéren and the Latin haringus; all borrowings from the Germanic.  Bone is from the Middle English bon, from the Old English bān (bone, tusk; bone of a limb), from the Proto-Germanic bainą (bone), from bainaz (straight), from the primitive Indo-European bheyhz (to hit, strike, beat).  It was cognate with the Scots bane, been, bean, bein & bain (bone), the North Frisian bien (bone), the West Frisian bien (bone), the Dutch been (bone; leg), the Low German Been & Bein (bone), the German Bein (leg), the German Gebein (bones), the Swedish ben (bone; leg), the Norwegian and Icelandic bein (bone), the Breton benañ (to cut, hew), the Latin perfinēs (break through, break into pieces, shatter) and the Avestan byente (they fight, hit). It was related also to the Old Norse beinn (straight, right, favorable, advantageous, convenient, friendly, fair, keen) (from which Middle English gained bain, bayne, bayn & beyn (direct, prompt), the Scots bein & bien (in good condition, pleasant, well-to-do, cozy, well-stocked, pleasant, keen), the Icelandic beinn (straight, direct, hospitable) and the Norwegian bein (straight, direct, easy to deal with).  The use to describe a type of cirrocumulus cloud dates from 1903.  The alternative form is herring-bone (not herring bone which would be a bone of a herring).

The herringbone shape (left) and a herring's bones (right).

The herringbone pattern picked up its rather fanciful name because of a resemblance to the fine bones of the fish.  First used in masonry, the motif has for centuries been used in wallpaper, mosaics, upholstery, fabrics, clothing and jewellery.  In engineering, the pattern is found also in the shape cut for some gears but this functionally deterministic.

Roman herringbone brickwork, Villa Rustica, Mehring, Trier-Saarburg, Rhineland, Germany.

The original herringbone design was a type of masonry construction (called opus spicatum, literally "spiked work”) used first in Ancient Rome, widely adopting during medieval times and especially associated with Gothic Revival architecture; it’s commonly seen today.  It’s defined by bricks, tiles or cut stone laid in a herringbone pattern and is a happy coincidence of style and structural integrity.  Although most associated with decorative use, in many cases the layout was an engineering necessity because if tiles or bricks are laid in straight lines, the structure is inherently weak whereas if built using oblique angles, under compression, loads are more evenly distributed.  One of the reasons so much has survived from antiquity is the longevity of the famously sticky Roman concrete, the durability thought in part due to chemical reactions with an unusual Roman ingredient: volcanic ash.

Lindsay Lohan in herringbone flat-cap.

Of gears

Although the term “herringbone cut gears” is more poetic, to engineers they’re known as double helical gears.  In both their manufacturing and operation they do present challenges, the tooling needed in their production demanding unusually fine tolerances and in use a higher degree of alignment must be guaranteed during installation.  Additionally, depending on use, there is sometimes the need periodically to make adjustments for backlash (although in certain applications they can be designed to have to have minimal backlash).  However, because of the advantages the herringbone structure offers over straight cut, spur or helical gears, the drawbacks can be considered an acceptable trade-off, the principle benefits being:

(1) Smoothness of operation and inherently lower vibration:  The herringbone shape inherently balances the load on the teeth, reducing vibration and generated noise.

(2) A high specific load capacity: The symmetrical design of herringbone gears offers a high surface area and an even distribution of load, meaning larger and more robust teeth may be used, making the design idea for transmitting high torque or power.

(3) A reduction in axial thrust: Probably the reasons engineers so favour the herringbone is that axial thrust can be reduced (in certain cases to the point of effective elimination).  With helical gears, the axial force imposed inherently acts to force gears apart whereas the herringbone gears have two helical sections facing each other, the interaction cancelling the axial thrust, vastly improving mechanical stability.

(4) Self-regulating tolerance for misalignment. Herringbone handle small variations in alignment better than spur gears or single helical gears, the opposing helix angles assisting in compensating for any axial misalignment, contributing to smoother gear meshing and extending the life of components.

(5) Heat dissipation qualities: The symmetrical structure assists heat dissipation because the opposing helices create a distribution of heat through a process called mutual heat-soak, reducing the risk of localized overheating, something which improves thermal efficiency by making the heat distribution pattern more uniform.

Gears: helical (left), herringbone (or double helical) (centre) and straight-cut (right).  Although road cars long ago abandoned them, straight-cut gears are still used in motorsport where drivers put up with their inherent whine and learn the techniques needed to handle the shifting.

Micturate

Micturate (pronounced mik-chuh-reyt)

(1) The desire to urinate (classical meaning).

(2) The act of passing urine; urination (modern use).

1835–1845: From the Latin micturīre (to have the urge to urinate), from mictūrus, from meiō (urinate), from the primitive Indo-European hemeygh (to urinate), the construct being mict(us), the past participle of mingere (to urinate) + -ur- (the desiderative suffix) + -ī- (inserted as a thematic vowel) + -re (the infinitive ending) + -ate (a word-forming element used in forming nouns from Latin words ending in -ātus, -āta, & -ātum (such as estate, primate & senate).  Those that came to English via French often began with -at, but an -e was added in the fifteenth century or later to indicate the long vowel.  It can also mark adjectives formed from Latin perfect passive participle suffixes of first conjugation verbs -ātus, -āta, & -ātum (such as desolate, moderate & separate).  Again, often they were adopted in Middle English with an –at suffix, the -e appended after circa 1400; a doublet of –ee).  Micturate is a verb, micturitional & micturient are adjectives, micturition is a noun and the derived intermicturition (being between acts of urination).

In Latin, micturate originally meant “a desire to urinate” but it’s now more often used to mean “the act of urination”, the medical profession seeming to like it, presumably because the somewhat obscure “micturate” and “micturition” better demonstrate superior learning than the well-known “urinate” and “urination”.  That’s probably true and at the other end of linguistic respectability there are other alternatives.  Rightly fearing the worst for his own case during the Nuremberg Trial (1945-1946), Hermann Göring (1893–1946; leading Nazi 1922-1945, Reichsmarschall of Germany, 1940-1945) decried an attempt by another defendant to offer arguments in mitigation by saying it was dishonorable “…just to want to piss out the front and shit out the back for a while longer”.

However, though Modern English borrowed micturate from Latin in the mid nineteenth century, the root of the word existed in Old English as (from which the Early Middle English gained miȝen), which then meant “to urinate” (both the Old and Middle English forms appearing in folk-tales recording how lakes and rivers came about from arose from the micturition of a giant or fairy.  So there’s a long history of parallel meanings (to want to go & to go) but urination seems to cover the latter well enough that no synonym seems necessary (and the reichsmarschall’s lead is there to follow if something earthier is needed) so if would be useful if English reserved micturate for the former.  Surely that distinction would be handy especially for the doctors?

Vertical integration: Lindsay Lohan demonstrates the possibility of combining micuration, urination and the assuaging of esurience, Mean Girls (2004).

Halloween

Halloween (pronounced hal-uh-ween or hal-oh-een)

The evening of 31 October, historically was celebrated mostly in the UK, Canada, the US and Ireland but it spread to Scandinavia and Australia and can now be found in many countries, some participants presumably unaware of its history.

Circa 1745: From the festivals All Hallows Even (also as Hallow-e'en & Hallow e'en), celebrated as a popular holiday on the last night of October (the eve of All Saints Day).  All Hallows’ Eve was the evening before All Saints’ Day, from the Old English ealra halgena mæssedæg (All Hallows' Mass-day) and the literal meaning is "hallowed evening" or "holy evening", derived from the Scottish term Allhallowe'en although throughout the British Isles it had long been noted in the calendar as "the evening before All-Hallows".  In Scots, the word eve is even, and this became contracted to e'en or een, eventually to become Hallowe'en.  Hallow was from the otherwise-obsolete Middle English noun halwe (holy person, saint), from the Old English halga, which is from the source of the verb hallow.

A traditional Jack O'Lantern, hung throughout Scotland and Ireland to ward off evil spirits.  Pumpkins came later which were bigger and easier to carve but aesthetically, a turnip makes sense because the shape tends to more closely resemble that of a human skull.

The idea of "All Hallows'" existed in Old English but "All Hallows' Eve" didn’t appear until 1556.  All-Hallows is from the Middle English al-halwe, from the late Old English ealra halgan (all saints, the saints in heaven collectively) and this was both the name of the feast day and of individual churches.  In the regions of the British Isles the fests were celebrated on various days (influenced as in pagan times by the rhythm of the seasons and the demands placed on the allocation and location of labor) but in the Church records the date 31 October was being described as alle halwe eue by the early twelfth century.  The term “Hallow-day” for "All-Saints Day" is from 1590s, replacing the late thirteenth century halwemesse day.  The consequential Hallowtide (the first week of November) emerged in the mid-fifteenth century.

In pagan times it was the last night of the year in the old Celtic calendar, where it was Old Year's Night (a night for witches) and Halloween is thus another of the pagan festivals essentially taken over and re-branded by Christianity.  Because of the association with witches the day was always associated with magic and sorcery and it was this tradition which inspired Robert Burns’ (1759-1796) poem Halloween, penned in 1785 and first published in 1786 in the Kilmarnock Volume (1786).  Of twenty-eight stanzas (epic length by Burns’ standards) and written in a mix of Scots and English, it shows the clear influence of the twelve stanza on Hallow-E'en (1780) by John Mayne (1759–1836) and the spirit of the evening is captured in Burns’ words which suggest Halloween is "thought to be a night when witches, devils, and other mischief-making beings are all abroad on their baneful midnight errands".

Off to the party.  Lindsay Lohan entering the Cuckoo Club Halloween Party, 31 October 2018.

Although most associated with children going door-to-door in costume demanding candy with the (usually implied) menace of some minor prank if denied (hence trick-or-treat), this aspect is of US origin and dates only from the 1930s.  In these modern, litigious times, children are encouraged to be pragmatic, cut their losses and seek more treats from the more generous rather than visit tricks upon the parsimonious.

Like a number of the festivals in the Christian calendar, it’s a borrowing from pagan rituals, this one the last night of the year in the old Celtic calendar, where it was Old Year's Night, treated as a night for witches, hence the tradition of the costumes in this theme with pumpkins carved in demonic form (although the original Jack O'Lanterns in Scotland were turnips rather than pumpkins).  The Christian feast of 31 October begins the three-day observance of Allhallowtide which, in the western liturgical calendar, is dedicated to the remembrance of the dead, including saints (hallows), martyrs, and all the departed faithful.  The view that Halloween is a lineal descendant of old pagan festivals, especially the Gaelic Samhain, is generally accepted as being one of many Christianized by the early Church which found it more profitable to accommodate rather than suppress popular, unthreatening traditions.  However, there’s always been a purist sect within the Church which has denied the pagan link and insists Halloween’s origins are wholly Christian.  Modern capitalism is neutral on this, the day just another secular event during which much stuff can be sold and one unusual in that in United States, it’s the only event on the calendar free from some sort of moral or spiritual baggage.  Many abstained from meat on All Hallows' Eve, a tradition which endures in the vegetarian dishes of this vigil day such as potato pancakes, toffee-apples and soul cakes.

Pumpkin carving can reflect many influences including pumpkin ∏ (pi) (left), Leggo (centre) and Kim Kardashian (right).

Upon that night, when fairies light
On Cassilis Downans dance,
Or owre the lays, in splendid blaze,
On sprightly coursers prance;
Or for Colean the route is ta'en,
Beneath the moon's pale beams;
There, up the cove, to stray and rove,

Among the rocks and streams
To sport that night.
Among the bonny winding banks,
Where Doon rins, wimplin' clear,
Where Bruce ance ruled the martial ranks,
And shook his Carrick spear,
Some merry, friendly, country-folks,
Together did convene,
To burn their nits, and pou their stocks,
And haud their Halloween
Fu' blithe that night.

Opening stanzas of Halloween by Robert Burns.

Samhainophobia trigger: posters for the 1978 movie Halloween.

One general principle (certainly in the West) which may be gleaned from the work of phenomenologists is that where a cultural practice exists, there may be an associated phobia.  The morbid fear of Halloween is known as samhainophobia, the construct being the Celtic samhuin (the construct being sam (summer) + fuin (end)) + phobia.  The suffix -phobia (fear of a specific thing; hate, dislike, or repression of a specific thing) was from the New Latin, from the Classical Latin, from the Ancient Greek -φοβία (-phobía) and was used to form nouns meaning fear of a specific thing (the idea of a hatred came later).  The name of the festival Samhuin was from the earlier Samfuin, from the Old Irish.  Samhainophobia can be triggered by many things including the general fear of ghosts, witches, skeletons, spiders, black cats, bats, vampires and any of the other spooky stuff associated with Halloween; the representations in popular culture (axe murderers and such) presumably reinforce these fears.  Although the research seems sparse, it seems likely the symptoms of the condition would be not dissimilar to those suffered by patients afflicted by victims of related phobias including phasmophobia (fear of ghosts), wiccaphobia (fear of witches and witchcraft), sanguivoriphobia (fear of vampires), chiroptophobia (fear of bats), nyctophobia (fear of darkness), arachnophobia (fear of spiders), skelephobia (fear of skeletons), placophobia (fear of tombstones), and michaelmyersphobia (fear of Michael Myers).

Belt

Belt (pronounced belt)

(1) A band of flexible material, as leather or cord, used for encircling the waist, historically to in some way secure a garment (coat or trousers) but also as a decorative or functional (tool belt, utility belt, gun belt etc) item.

(2) In any context, any encircling or transverse band, strip, or stripe.

(3) In geography, an elongated region having distinctive properties or characteristics.

(4) In machinery, an endless flexible band passing about two or more pulleys, used to transmit motion from one pulley to the other or others or to convey materials and objects.

(5) In (usually military) ballistics, a cloth strip with loops or a series of metal links with grips, for holding cartridges fed into an automatic gun.

(6) A band of leather or webbing, worn around the waist and used as a support for weapons, ammunition etc.

(7) In naval architecture, a series of armor plates forming part of the hull of a warship.

(8) In construction, a broad, flexible strip of rubber, canvas, wood, etc., moved along the surface of a fresh concrete pavement to put a finish on it after it has been floated.

(9) A road, railroad, or the like, encircling an urban center to handle peripheral traffic (as beltway also used in political discourse).

(10) In slang, a hard blow or hit (often in the forms belted or belting), either a person or an object (the latter noted especially in bat & ball sports).

(11) In slang, a shot of liquor, especially as swallowed in one gulp (often in the form “a quick belt”).

(12) In tyre technology, strip of material used in tyre construction, placed between the carcass and the tread for reinforcement (in the forms steel-belted & fabric-belted).

(13) In sport, in a color based ascendency (brown, black etc), a ranking system in various martial arts).

(14) In sport (notably boxing), a form of trophy worn by the holder of a title (WBO Heavyweight Belt, IBF Cruiserweight Belt etc).

(15) As seat belt, an apparatus used in air, sea & land vehicles to secure a passenger, pilot, driver etc in place.

(16) To gird or furnish with a belt.

(17) To surround or mark as if with a belt or band.

(18) In slang, as “belt out”, loudly (though not necessarily pleasingly) to sing or, as “belting along”, rapidly to proceed.

(19) In cricket, as “belter”, a description of a placid pitch ideal for batting and offering little assistance to bowlers.

(20) In astronomy, a collection of small bodies (such as asteroids) which orbit a star; one of certain girdles or zones on the surface of the planets Jupiter and Saturn, supposed to be of the nature of clouds.

(21) In baseball, the part of the strike zone at the height of the batter's waist.

(22) In music, a vocal tone produced by singing with chest voice above the break (or passaggio), in a range typically sung in head voice.

(23)To invest a person with a belt as part of a formal ceremony (even one where as physical belt is not involved or even a historic part).

Pre 1000: From the Middle English belt, from the Old English belt (belt; girdle; broad, flat strip or strap of material used to encircle the waist), from the Proto-Germanic baltijaz (girdle, belt) (source also of the Old High German balz, the Old Norse balti & belti and the Swedish bälte), an early Germanic borrowing from the Latin balteus (belt, girdle, sword-belt) which may be of Etruscan origin.  It was cognate with the Scots belt (belt), the Dutch belt, the German Balz (belt), the Danish bælte (belt), the Swedish bälte (belt, cincture, girdle, zone) and the Icelandic belti (belt).    Synonyms vary according to context including circle, girdle, surround (to encircle), buckle, fasten, strap (to fasten a belt); bash, clobber, smack, wallop. strap, thrash, whip (to hit with a belt); gulp, slurp, guzzle (rapidly to drink); speed, whiz, zoom (rapidly to move).  Belt is a noun & verb, belted is a verb & adjective, belting is a noun, verb & adjective and belter is a noun; the noun plural is belts.

Lindsay Lohan in trench coat, the belt tied and not buckled.

The verb emerged in the early fourteenth century in the sense of “to fasten or gird with a belt” and was derived from the noun.  The meaning "to thrash (as with a belt)" was from the 1640s while the general sense of "to hit, thrash" seems not to have been used until 1838. The colloquial meaning "to sing or speak vigorously" dates from 1949 and was first used in the US, south of the Mason-Dixon Line.  As a development, the noun meaning "a blow or stroke" dates from 1885.  The transferred sense of "broad stripe encircling something with its ends joined" dates from the 1660s while that of a "broad strip or tract" of any sort, without notion of encircling (as in the “wheat belt") emerged by 1808.  As a mark of rank or distinction (sometimes associated with a specific honor in the form of a belt or sash), use began in the mid-fourteenth century and in pugilism, boxing championship belts were first awarded in 1812.  The use in mechanical engineering (drive belts, pulley belts, serpentine belts etc) was first noted in 1795.  The sword-belt dates from the early fourteenth century while the Old English had sweordfætels (sword-belt).  The adjective beltless came from the fashion industry to describe a style without a belt and was from 1854, the belt-loop (through which a belt passes) noted the following year (although such things had existed for centuries).  In the sub-culture of the trench coat, the military tradition was always to use the buckle to secure the belt while true fashionistas prefer to tie, bucklers thought a bit naff.

Lindsay Lohan demonstrates the possibilities offered by belts.

Many languages adopted belt including those of the Raj, the Hindi being बेल्ट (belṭ), the Bengali বেল্ট (belṭ) & the Urdu بیلٹ‎ (belṭ); Afrikaans picked up belt from the Dutch and other variations were the Assamese বেল্ট (belto), the Irish beilt (Welsh & Scots picked up belt), the Japanese: ベルト (beruto) and the Oriya ବେଲ୍ଟ୍ (belṭ).  If used as a proper noun (a surname or place-name), it appears always with an initial capital.  In astronomy, there’s no initial capital when used as a general descriptor but one is used when referring to a specific region (eg as an ellipsis of Main Asteroid Belt).  The Belt and Road Initiative (BRI, or B&R and known originally as One Belt One Road (OBOR)) of the People’s Republic of China (PRC) is a trans-national infrastructure project (the strategy of which depends on who is providing the interpretation) dating from 2013 and integral to the PRC’s foreign policy.  As physical infrastructure, it’s analogous with the old Silk Road, the ancient trade route which linked China with the West, carrying goods and (more dangerously) ideas between the two great civilizations of Rome and China.

Lindsay Lohan beltless  (or un-belted).

In idiomatic use, “below the belt” means “not in accord with the principles of fairness, decency, or good sportsmanship” and was drawn from the rules of boxing where restrictions were maintained on blows to the genitals.  To have something “under one's belt” is to have something in one’s literal or figurative (a qualification or achievement) possession.  To tighten one’s belt is “to be more frugal; to undergo hardship patiently” and is often used as an injunction by politicians (directed at others).  Charlie Chaplin (1889-1977) invented “tighten the belten” for the faux German used in his film The Great Dictator (1940).  The use to describe specific regions can be literal (wheat belt, corn belt etc), meteorological (sun-belt, snow-belt) or more figurative (mortgage belt, Bible belt etc), the latter probably more accurately described as “zones” but the meaning is well-understood and some have emerged recently (such as rust belt which refers to once vibrant industrial areas now in economic decline).  A beltway is a road system which encircles (not necessarily in a circular design) a city and is intended to reduce congestion in the inner region; the phrase “beyond the beltway” is US political slang to differentiate the interests and priorities of those “within the beltway” of Washington DC (ie the political class (executive government, the congress, the upper reaches of the civil service etc)) and the general population.  The US term references Interstate 495 around Washington DC (the Capital Beltway, opened in 1964), the figurative use (the culture of the political class) dating from 1978, exclusively in the negative.

Lindsay Lohan demonstrates more possibilities offered by belts.

Seat belts, although began in any volume to be fitted only in the 1960s although they’d been used in ships (both by fishermen and in the navy) and in the early day of aviation without ever becoming standardized fittings although, in a sense, as a safety restraint they were known even in Antiquity.  In Greek mythology, the Sirens were deadly creatures who used their lyrical and earthly feminine charms to lure sailors to their death; attracted by their enchanting music and voices, seafarers would sail their ships too close to the rocky coast of the Siren’s island and be shipwrecked.  Not untypically for the tales from antiquity, the sirens are said to have had many homes.  The Romans said they lived on some small islands called Sirenum scopuli while later authors place them variously on the islands of Anthemoessa, on Cape Pelorum, on the islands of the Sirenuse, near Paestum, or in Capreae.  All were places with rocky coasts and tall cliffs.  It was Odysseus who most famously escaped the sirens.  Longing to hear their songs but having no wish to be ship-wrecked , he had his sailors fill their ears with beeswax, rendering them deaf and to be certain, Odysseus ordered them to tie him to the mast, thereby inventing the seat-belt.  Sailing past, when he heard their enticing voices, he ordered his men to release him but they tightened the knots, not releasing him till the danger had passed.  Some writers claimed the Sirens were fated to die if a man heard their singing and escaped them and that as Odysseus sailed away they flung themselves into the water and died.

Lindsay Lohan demonstrates still more possibilities offered by belts.

Knocking back a bracer: Crooked Hillary Clinton enjoys a quick belt of Crown Royal Bourbon Whiskey, Bronko's restaurant, Crown Point, Indiana, Saturday 12 April, 2008.

In the late 1940s, the rising death toll attracted interest but few cars were at the time fitted with seat-belts and research was difficult with such small sample sizes although it was indicated there was some positive although instances were also noted of injuries being caused by the belts’ then primitive and unregulated design and it was these findings which encouraged the first “inertial reel” (retractable) designs.  A couple of US manufacturers during the 1950s dabbled with the concept, either installing seat belts as standard or offering them as an extra-cost option but the take-up rate was low and some buyers ever returned the cars to dealers to have them removed.

The familiar modern three-point (lap & sash) belt evolved in the late 1950s with much input from US designers but it was Swedish manufacturers which first made them a standard fitting, Scandinavia being often dark and icy, drivers sharing the roads with large elk.  The modern seatbelt design (conceptually unchanged to this day) is credited to Swedish mechanical engineer Nils Bohlin (1920–2002) who was employed by Volvo which made them a standard fitting in 1959, following the example of Saab which had added them the previous year.  During the 1960s, US states gradually imposed a requirement they be fitted until, in 1969, federal law mandated the rule for all cars sold in the country.  The laws requiring them actually to be worn proved more difficult to implement but other countries quickly made both the fitment and wearing of seat-belts compulsory, initially only for those seated in the front seat(s) but before long it extended to all seats.

Instruction sheet for Child Bed (1961 Chevrolet Corvair), Chevrolet Division of General Motors (GM) part-number 985359.

Attitudes to motor vehicle safety were different in 1959 when Chevrolet first started making the Corvair (1959-1969).  At the time, apart from improving the quality of roads (which actually meant higher speeds) the government had done little about either safety or pollution but both the rising highway death toll and the worsening air quality in cities was attracting attention and things would soon be different, decades of legislation soon to unfold.  The Corvair however was a product of a substantially unregulated age and in that spirit Chevrolet thoughtfully offered the “child bed” as an accessory so one’s baby could sleep (unsecured) on the parcel shelf beneath the rear window, the additional benefits of the placement said to be that being rear-engined, the warmth and soothing vibration from the engine gently would lull the infant to sleep.  It was another world.

An early Chevrolet Corvair with swing axles, swinging.

The Corvair was doomed by decisions made even before production began.  It was anyway the twilight of the rear-engined era and although swing axles in Europe proved surprisingly persistent (usually because the design provided a relatively cheap way to implement an independent rear suspension) few installed them on a car as heavy and powerful as the Corvair.  Mercedes-Benz, which was an adherent (despite their experience with the superior De Dion layout) was still producing a handful of 600s (the W100 Grosser) with swing axles as late as 1981 but the Germans tamed the behavior with special anti-squat & anti-dive geometry as well as a compensating centre spring.  Chevrolet did not and with a weight distribution which was even more exaggerated rearward by its relatively heavy and long engine, the Corvair’s handling could be unpredictable, something which the engineers wanted to alleviate by fitting a handful of parts (the cost under US$40) but this the accountants vetoed.  The ensuing crashes, death toll and law suits attracted the interest of consumer lawyer Ralph Nader (b 1934) who wrote Unsafe at Any Speed (1965), a critique on the industry generally although in the public mind it’s always been most associated with the failings of the Corvair which the author made the subject of the opening chapter.

The Corvair before and after.  GM applied a fix in 1963 which rectified the worst of the characteristics and a full re-design was undertaken and released in 1965.  For the Corvair's reputation it was too late.

Actually, the problems as described applied only to the Corvairs built between 1959-1963 but the damage was done, neither its reputation or sales figures ever recovered and it was only the corporation’s desire to save face which saw the much improved car restyled for 1966, production lingering on until 1969 although it may be Nader’s book actually prolonged things, competition in the compact sector notably more intense that in 1960s.  It was unfortunate because the restyled Corvair was one of the better-looking machines of the era, only the truncated length of the bodywork forward of the cowl detracting from the elegance.

The lovely, Italianesque lines of the second generation Corvair (1966-1969).

Curiously, after its demise came a coda.  In 1970, responding to pressure from Nader, the Nixon administration commissioned a study comparing the 1963 Corvair with five “similar” vehicles and a report was in 1972 issued by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) which concluded, inter alia, the Corvair’s handling and propensity to roll was comparable with that of “other light domestic cars.”  Nader dismissed the study as “a shoddy, internally contradictory whitewash” and accused the NHTSA of using “biased testing procedures and model selection.”  He noted they assessed on the 1963 Corvair which Chevrolet significantly had modified to correct the deficiencies found in those built earlier.  The Nixon administration ignored him, presumably taking the view that “what was good for General Motors was good for the country”.

Lindsay Lohan demonstrates yet more possibilities offered by belts.  A belt will usually include a loop next to the buckle, used to keep the end of the belt in place.  This is called the "keeper".