Goblin

Goblin (pronounced gob-lin)

(1) In folklore, a small grotesque supernatural creature (depicted often as elf or sprite, regarded as mischievous and malevolent towards people.

(2) In modern fiction, one of various hostile supernatural creatures, in fantasy writing often depicted as malicious, grotesque and diminutive humanoids (sometimes also described as trolls or orcs.

1300–1350: From the Middle English gobelin & gobelyn (a devil, incubus, mischievous and ugly fairy), from the Middle French, from the Old Northern French gobelin (the source also of the Norman goubelin and the Walloon gobelin), perhaps a blend of the Old Dutch kobeholdo (goblin) (related also to the Dutch kabouter, the Middle High German kobold and the German Kobold) and the Late Latin cobalus (mountain sprite), from the Ancient Greek κόβαλος (kóbalos) (rogue, knave; goblin).  It displaced the native Old English pūca and was later picked up by some Easter European languages including Polish and Serbo-Croatian.  Goblin is a noun; the noun plural is goblins.

Curiously, in the twelfth century, there was also the Medieval Latin gobelinus, the name of a spirit haunting the region of Evreux, in chronicle of Orderic (Ordericus in the Latin) Vitalis) (1075-circa 1142) which etymologists say is unrelated either to the Germanic kobold or the Medieval Latin cabalus, from the Greek kobalos (impudent rogue, knave) & kobaloi (wicked spirits invoked by rogues), of unknown origin; it’s speculated it may be a diminutive of the proper name Gobel chosen for some reason (even as an in-joke) by the author.  Orderic’s Chronicles have been extensively cross-referenced against other primary and secondary sources and historians regard them as among the more reliable Medieval texts.  His other great work was the Historia Ecclesiastica, written in the last twenty years of his life (the bulk of the text composed between 1123-1132).  One interesting aspect of the history noted by etymologists was that although the French gobelin seems not to have appeared for over two centuries after the word emerged in English, it does appear in twelfth century texts in Medieval Latin and it’s thought few people who in some way adhered to folk magic used Medieval Latin.  John Wycliffe (circa 1328–1384) must have thought the word sufficiently well-known to use it in his translation of the Bible (published 1382-1395) intended to be read by (or more typically read to) a wide audience.  Psalms 91:5: Thou schalt not drede of an arowe fliynge in the dai, of a gobelyn goynge in derknessis.  Unfortunately, in the King James Version (KJV; 1611), the passage was rendered as the less evocative: Thou shalt not be afraid for the terror by night; nor for the arrow that flieth by day.

A goblin shark (left) and a 1962 Dodge Dart station wagon (right).

The horrid looking goblin shark (Mitsukurina owstoni, also knonw as the elfin shark), goblin shark a calque of its traditional Japanese name tenguzame (tengu a Japanese mythical creature often depicted with a long nose and red face).  The last survivor of ancient lineage and one that retains several "primitive" traits, it's been called a "living fossil" and despite the fearsome appearance, dwelling at great depth, there have been no reports of attacks on people.  There's nothing to suggest Dodge's stylists were in the early 1960s influenced by the sight of a goblin shark; within Chrysler, it was just their time of "peak weirdness".

The system works: A goblin shark eats a fish.  Things didn't work out so well for the 1962 Chryslers which received some hasty re-styles to achieve a more conventional look. 

Folklore (and latter-day fantasy writing) has produced a number of derived terms including gobbo, goblette, gobioid, gobony, goblincore, goblinish, goblinize, goblinkind, goblinry, goblinesque & goblinish.  The history of the goblin’s depiction as something grotesque attracted some in zoology who named the goblin spider (which doesn’t look much more frightening than most arthropods) and the truly bizarre goblin shark which does live up to the name.  The noun hobgoblin dates from the 1520s, the construct being hob (elf), from Hobbe, a variant of Rob (short for Robin Goodfellow, an elf character in German folklore) + goblin.  Hobgoblins & goblins are all supernatural and all regard humans with malicious intent.  Traditionally, they are depicted as human-animal hybrids with an appearance tending to the former and they were said to assail, afflict and generally annoy folk before retreating to their haunts under bridges on in secluded spots in forests; Shakespeare’s contrast being: “Be thou a spirit of health or goblin damn'd,” (Hamlet, act I, scene 4).  Gremlins are a more modern creation and are especially prevalent in machinery, breaking things and disrupting production, their cousins in software being bugs.

Goblins from Texas en masse (left) and the one-off Goblin, Perth, Australia, 1959.

Although there have been Demons and Ghosts, no car manufacture seems ever have been tempted to build a Goblin although one Texas-based operation does offer a minimalist kit-car with the name and an enterprising Australian in 1959 chose it for a home-made special.  The Antipodean Goblin was the bastard offspring of unpromising origins: the chassis of a 1928 Essex, the drive-train from a wrecked Holden 48-215 (aka FX, 1948-1953).  Unusually for the era in which aluminum or fibreglass was preferred by small-scale producers, the body was all steel and apparently recycled from the donor Holden (although the grill components appear borrowed from the later FJ Holden (1956-1956), re-shaped with lines which owed something to both the MGA and AC Ace, later to become famous as the Shelby American Cobra.  Its fate is unknown but, in the ways of such things, survival is unlikely.

1974 AMC Gremlin X.  Despite the ungainly look, it was a commercial success.

There was however a Gremlin, built between 1970-1978 by American Motors Corporation (AMC) (production in Mexico lasted until 1983 under AMC's Vehículos Automotores Mexicanos (VAM) subsidiary).  Created in the AMC manner (in a hurry, at low cost), the Gremlin was essentially a shortened AMC Hornet (1970-1977) with a kammback tail and was a successful foray into the sub-compact (in US terms) market, something well-timed given the importance the segment would assume during the difficult decade the 1970s became.  Purchased almost exclusively on the basis of cost-breakdown, the Gremlin did however attract the interest of the ever imaginative drag-racing crowd because, although AMC never fitted anything more powerful than a distinctly non-powerful (malaise-era) 304 cubic inch (5.0 litre) V8, because (like Pontiac), AMC used much the same block size for all second-generation V8s, fitting their 401 (6.6) to the Gremlin was simple.  Many were produced, some in small runs with factory support and, being relatively light and small, the performance was more than competitive with some of the notably more expensive competition.

De Havilland Goblin jet-engine schematic (left) and prototype Gloster Meteor (DG207G) with Goblin engines, de Havilland airfield, Hatfield, Hertfordshire, 26 October 1945.

The origin of the jet engine lay in designs by French and German engineers which in principle would have worked but, as the authorities at the time realized, the metallurgy of the time hadn’t advanced to the point where alloys light enough to be viable and able to withstand the temperatures to which they’d be subjected, hadn’t been developed.  Progress however was made and in 1931 an English engineer was granted a patent for what was the first recognizably modern jet engine although, bizarre as it seems in hindsight, the Air Ministry allowed the patent to lapse and it was the German Heinkel company which first flew a jet-powered aircraft when the He 178 took briefly to the air in August 1939.  Fortunately, the Luftwaffe high-command was as short-sighted as the Air Ministry (“the bloody Air Marshals” Lord Beaverbrook (1879-1964) called them while minister for aircraft production (1940-1941)) and, knowing their immediate need was for a capable, reliable fighter force within two years, declined to fund development of a project which would absorb at least three years of expensive development to be battle-ready.  The British however by then saw the potential and in June 1939 ordered production of experimental airframes and engines; it was these which would become the basis of the Gloster Meteor, powered by the de Havilland Goblin.  Both would enjoy surprisingly long lives, the Goblin in series production between 1944-1954 while the Meteor, although by then obsolescent, served with the Royal Air Force (RAF) until 1955, while in overseas service, some militaries didn’t retire their last planes until 1974.

Lindsay Lohan in goblin mode.

“Goblin mode” is a neologism for rejecting societal expectations and living in an unkempt, hedonistic manner without regards to self-image and Oxford University Press (OUP), publishers of the Oxford English Dictionary (OED), recently announced “goblin mode” as their 2022 word of the year.  Ignoring (as in the past) criticism from pedants they had picked a phrase rather than a word, OUP also provided a mini-usage guide, suggesting the most popular forms were “I am in goblin mode” or “to go goblin mode” and the meaning imparted was “unapologetically self-indulgent, lazy, slovenly, or greedy”.  This year’s award differs from OUP’s usual practice in that it was chosen by public vote from a choice of three selected by their lexicographers.  Unlike some recent elections, there can be no suggesting this one was “stolen”, goblin mode winning in a landslide with 318,956 votes, 93% of the valid ballots cast.  While it can’t be proven, the margin of victory might have been greater still had those already in goblin mode not been too lazy to bother voting.

The win has provoked some comment because, despite having been used on-line since first appearing (apparently on twitter) in 2009, it’s hardly been popular and some have speculated its success can be attributed to it being the one which most appealed to an audience with memories of COVID-19 lockdowns still raw, a goodly number of voters probably recognizing it was goblin mode into which many had lapsed during isolation.  The other choices OUP offered were “Metaverse” and #IStandWith”, both probably more familiar but, lacking novelty and the quality of self-identification, clearly less appealing.  OUP also noted the suggestion there may be in the zeitgeist, something of a rebellion against “the increasingly unattainable aesthetic standards and unsustainable lifestyles exhibited on social media”.

The Nightmare (1781), oil on canvas by the Swiss-English painter John Henry Fuseli (1741-1825), Detroit Institute of Arts.  It's a popular image to use to illustrate something "nightmare related".

When the political activist Max Eastman (1883–1969) visited Sigmund Freud (1856-1939) in Vienna in 1926, he observed a print of Fuseli's The Nightmare, hung next to Rembrandt's  (Rembrandt Harmenszoon van Rijn; 1606-1669) The Anatomy Lesson.  Although well known for his work on dream analysis (although it’s the self-help industry more than the neo-Freudians who have filled the book-shelves), Freud never mentions Fuseli's famous painting in his writings but it has been used by others in books and papers on the subject.  The speculation is Freud liked the work (clearly, sometimes, a painting is just a painting) but nightmares weren’t part of the intellectual framework he developed for psychoanalysis which suggested dreams (apparently of all types) were expressions of wish fulfilments while nightmares represented the superego’s desire to be punished; later he would refine this with the theory a traumatic nightmare was a manifestation of “repetition compulsion”.  The juxtaposition of sleeping beauty and goblin provoked many reactions when first displayed and encouraged Fuseli to paint several more versions.  The Nightmare has been the subject of much speculation and interpretation, including the inevitable debate between the Freudians and Jungians and was taken as a base also by political cartoonists, a bunch more nasty in earlier centuries than our more sanitized age.

Ovoid

Ovoid (pronounced oh-void)

(1) Egg-shaped (an oval, but more tapered at one end).

(2) In botany (of a fruit or similar part), egg-shaped with the broader end at the base.

1817: From the French ovoïde, from the New Latin ōvoīdēs, the construct being the Classical Latin ōvum (egg) + the Ancient Greek -oeidēs (like) (akin to -oid).  The Latin ōvum (egg) is thought derived from the primitive Indo-European awi (bird) which may be the source of wyo & yyo, the primitive Indo-European words for "egg" although this is speculative.  The hypothetical “evidence” for its existence is provided by the Sanskrit vih, the Avestan vish, the Latin avis (bird), the Ancient Greek aietos (eagle), the Old Church Slavonic aja, the Russian jajco, the Breton ui, the Welsh wy, the Old Norse egg, the Old High German ei and the Gothic ada, all meaning "egg."  The –oid suffix was from the Ancient Greek -ειδής (-eidḗs) & -οειδής (-oeidḗs) (the ο being the last vowel of the stem to which the suffix is attached) from εἶδος (eîdos) (form; like; likeness) and was added to indicate the meanings “tending towards”, “similar to” or “like”).  Ovoid is a noun & adjective and ovoidal is an adjective; the noun plural is ovoids.  The adjective ovoidish doesn't exist and never should because something "ovoidish" is actually an ovoid.  Subovoid (apparently never as sub-ovoid) is a technical word used in mathematics and some disciplines of engineering.

Lindsay Lohan in sunglasses with lens in an irregular ovoid.  The irregular ovoid is a popular shape for the lens of spectacles of all kinds, simply because it conforms so well to the lacuna defined by the nose and eye socket.

The four common descriptors in diagnostic imaging (left to right), the round, the oval the ovoidesque irregular oval and the irregular.

Reflecting the frequency with which they occur, in radiology and other forms of diagnostic imaging, the three classic shapes of “masses of interest” are round, oval and irregular but a frequent descriptor of those which often resemble ovoids is the “irregular oval” used (a little misleadingly for non-clinicians) to describe everything which tends towards being an oval but is outside the defined tolerance.  The rationale in adding an adjectival “irregular” to “oval” seems to be to reflect the wide variation in the shapes, the only common characteristic being that to fit the description it must be vaguely ovoid in shape, distinguishing it not only from a round or oval but also from an irregular (ie everything else).

Headlights and Lobbyists

Mercedes-Benz 300 SL (W198, 1957-1963) roadster with composite headlights built for RoW (rest of the world (ie non US)) sale (left) and one with the less elegant assembly (right) used in the US market to accommodate the sealed-beam lights.

First seen two years earlier on the 300SL roadster the Lichteinheiten (light units) on the 1959 Mercedes-Benz 220 SE (W111) and subsequent 1961 300SE (W112) saloons were much admired, both for their elegance and quality of luminescence.  Ovoid in shape, they were first nicknamed “tombstone” but soon came to be called “European” because they were banned in the US, a saga which illuminates how crony capitalism works in the West.  The US headlight industry enjoyed a typically cosy relationship with the legislators who in 1940 had passed laws decreeing cars sold in the country had to have two circular, 7 inch sealed beam lights, optionally augmented by a maximum of two auxiliary 5 ¾ inch units.  In 1957, the car manufacturers, wishing to make quad headlights as the next styling trend, prevailed on the politicians to permit a total of four 5 ¾ inch sealed beam lights per vehicle, a profitable arrangement which pleased both industries but deprived US buyers of the much superior European lights which not only delivered better luminosity but, not being sealed units, required only the bulb to be replaced rather than the whole thing.  The US manufacturers had no interest in investing to re-tool their factories to produce something which would need to be replaced less often so arranged for the politicians to ban the newer product, thus for decades denying American drivers headlights of the quality enjoyed in Europe and much of the planet.

That wouldn't change until the 1970s and then as an unintended consequence of another government edict.  The first oil crisis of 1973-1974 was a genuine shock to the US (and world) economy and in response, in 1975, the congress passed legislation setting CAFE (corporate average fuel economy) standards.  The US industry in 1975 had in their line-ups lots of big, heavy machines with big, thirsty engines so there was plenty of scope to achieve much by down-sizing and this low-hanging fruit was the first picked: the way CAFE worked was neither directly to offer incentives for customers to choose fuel efficient vehicles or increase fuel prices but instead impose penalties making it more expensive for the manufacturers to build inefficient vehicles.  The CAFE standards however were designed to become more strict so there was lobbying to permit the fitting of smaller, rectangular headlights which would permit a lower hood (bonnet) line, producing better aerodynamics and thus lower fuel consumption.  Rectangular headlights first appeared in the US in 1975 although they remained exclusively sealed-beam units, even after the use of quartz-halogen bulbs was authorized three years later.  Not until 1983 were composite headlight assemblies with replaceable bulbs made lawful. 

Mercedes-Benz 280 SE 3.5 Coupés (W111), the "tombstone" or "European" headlight assemblies (left) and the "Californian" version developed for the US market (right).  Such was the international admiration for the "Californian" interpretation, rapidly availability was extended globally.   

That is how politics in the US operates: it’s in the congresses, state and federal, where things are hammered out and deals done.  Most of the world fixates on presidential politics because of the drama and the cults of personality but domestically, it’s in the legislatures that lobbyists do their work and that’s where they make "campaign contributions" in exchange for getting the legislation which most benefits the corporations employing them.  “The business of America is business” is how former president Calvin Coolidge (1872–1933; US president 1923-1929) summed it up.  It’s not wholly dissimilar to the development of the English constitution; it took centuries to evolve but essentially, in exchange for getting the money he needed to fight his wars, the king of England approved the laws the politicians wished to pass.  In the US, the dynamic relationship is between politicians & corporations, mediated by the lobbyists and between the two sides, there's much interchanging of personnel which is why the system is sometimes described by political scientists as "incestuous".  The dynamic of the system does of course shift; sometimes the congress has dominated the president and sometimes he has dominated them so in that sense the second administration of Donald Trump (b 1946; US president 2017-2021 and since 2025) is just a phase the system is going through.

1957 Imperial Crown Convertible in single headlight configuration (left) and 1957 Imperial Crown Sedan with the quad layout (right).

One quirk of the introduction of the quad headlight look for the 1957 season was the languid legislators in South Dakota and Tennessee lingered so long over the bills that it was clear it would be the next year before four headlights would be lawful in those two states.  What that meant was new cars could be registered if so equipped so the manufactures were, for a few months, forced to make available models with two headlights instead of four.  Some restricted these to the two recalcitrant states while others extended availability but very few were ordered in other states.  What the late creation of the variations with only two headlights required was the creation of different chrome bezels and fittings around each lamp as well as a wider grill.  So while it wasn’t complex engineering, for the industry it was an unwelcome resource allocation, all because of bureaucratic lag or politicians missing their legislative window (the blame attributed variously).

1957 Imperial (left) and Mercury (right) advertising.

As well as the tiresome matter of having to tool up to produce a small number of cars with single headlights grafted, sometimes a little unhappily, onto designs only ever intended to accommodate a matching pair, the advertising copy also had to be revised.  Mercury called the new look “Quadri-Beam headlamps” and their brochures (in the small print) noted they were “Standard equipment except in South Dakota and Tennessee.”  The use of “quadri” was a pleasing linguistic flourish and presumably everyone got the point there were now four where there once had been two, the borrowing most directly from the Classical Latin quadri where it meant “make four-cornered, square, make square” and was from quadrus (square), from quattuor (four).  In French, the noun quadri (the plural quadris) was an (informal clipping of quadrimestre (a term of four months) while in Italian it was the plural of quadro (square).  

Unfortunately, US regulations proved disfiguring as well as dimming because the simple solution of integrating the turn-signal indicators ("flashers" to many) and side-marker lamps into the assembly didn’t comply.  As explained by automotive lighting expert Daniel Stern, the lit area was probably compliant (the rules specified a minimum 3½ square inches (22.5 cm²) but the intensity and inboard visibility angles would have been inadequate.  A turn signal with its centre 4 inches (100 mm) or closer to the low-beam lamp had to provide at least 500 candela on-axis, which, with the technology then available, would be close to impossible for a lamp with this construction; turn signals more than 4 inches from the low-beam needed only to provide a minimum 200 candela.  The RoW cars (left) were supplied with the original elegant design while for the US market some rather ugly after-market lamps were crudely added to the gaps next to the grill (centre).  Late in the 1960s, the aesthetics were improved somewhat by using a larger unit (right) which emulated the look of a fog-lamp, the US cars by then also suffering the addition of "stuck-on" side-marker lights front & rear.

A variation on the ovoid theme was revealed with the debut of the 600 Grosser (W100, 1963-1981, left).  The solution to comply with US legislation (right) was more unhappy even that that used on the 300 SL and called to mind a high-school project which deservedly would have been graded "F".

The design created for the US market W111s adopted a vertically stacked arrangement with four 5¾ inch sealed beams which, ironically, was much to influence US designers in the decade to come.  When the 300 SEL 6.3 was introduced in 1967, Europeans were offered the choice of either style, four of the newer quartz-halogen bulbs generating even more light than the ovoid system.  Europeans, who nicknamed the stacked lights “Californian” (California apparently the most American thing imaginable), came to admire the style, prompting Mercedes-Benz to offer buyers the option world-wide.  Unfortunately, this was the factory's only ascetically successful adaption for the US market, most of the others being ghastly.  In the mid-1960s, the factory again used “California” when the W113 (the 230/250/280 SL "pagoda" (1963-1971)) was for some years offered with just a hard-top, presumably because, viewed from often gloomy Stuttgart, California must have seemed permanently sunny.  The W111’s stacked headlamps later spread to other models (W112, W108 & W109) but the W113 hard-top only configuration remained a one-off.  It was one of only three occasions a production SL would be offered without a folding top and one of two with only a fixed roof.

The score? 1 out of 8.  Top row: W198 Roadster (1957-1963, left) and W111 & W112 Coupé & Cabriolet (1961-1971, right).  Second row: W100 (1963-1981, left) and W113 (1963-1971, right).  Third row: W114 & W115 (1968-1976, left) and R107 & C107 (1971-1989, right).  Fourth row: W116 (1972-1980) and W123 (1975-1986).

One genuine aesthetic success in eight attempts was not encouraging and one might be tempted to wonder if the Germans decided to punish the Americans for coming up with silly rules.  The battering-ram styled bumpers bolted on in the era also attracted derision but in fairness, some others were worse.  Interestingly, as well as admiring the US market implementation on the W111 & W112, there is in Europe a small but noticeable cult following for the headlight fittings used on the US market R107 & C107, possibly because the factory competition department fitted them to the 450 SLC 5.0s (1977-1980) used in rallies.  The heavy cruiser was one of the more improbable rally cars but it enjoyed some success in its brief career, victorious in long distance events in Africa and it was both the first V8 and the first car with an automatic transmission to win a European rally.  However, whatever the attraction of the headlights, the Europeans have shown no interest in the bumpers.

Boulevard

Boulevard (pronounced bool-uh-vahrd or boo-luh-vahrd)

(1) A broad avenue in a city, usually with areas at the sides or in the center planted with trees, grass, or flowers, often used as a promenade.

(2) A strip of lawn between a sidewalk (footpath) and the curb (a regionalism from the upper Midwest US & Canada, also called a boulevard strip).

(3) As loosely applied in street names in many cities, usually for wide thoroughfares.

(4) The centre strip of a road dividing traffic travelling in different directions (rare and sometimes applied also to the landscaped sides).

1769: From the French boulevard (broad street or promenade planted with rows of trees), from the Middle French boulevard, bollevart, boulevars, bolevers & bollewerc (promenade, avenue, rampart), either from the Middle High German bolewerc & bolwerc (which endures in modern German as Bollwerk) or the Middle Dutch bolwerc & bollewerc (“bulwark, bastion”), the latter from the Picard, Walloon in the sense of “rampart, avenue built on the site of a razed rampart”, so called because the structures were originally often built on the ruins of old ramparts.  The apparently strange transition from the Middle Dutch bolwerc (wall of a fortification) to the French boulevard, originally (top surface of a military rampart, used as a thoroughfare) is explained by the linguistic tangle of translation, the French language at the time having no “w”, hence the early attempts including boloart, boulever, boloirque & bollvercq.  There is no standard abbreviation, blvd, bd & bl used variously).  Boulevard is a noun, boulevardier is a noun & verb, boulevardlike is an adjective and boulevardize, boulevardizing & boulevardized are verbs; the noun plural is boulevards.

Lindsay Lohan (during "blonde phase") leaving Boulevard3 nightclub, Los Angeles, 2009.

Although there’s now usually no direct relationship, the idea of boulevards being wider than most streets and with associated landscaping dates from the early promenades being laid out atop demolished city walls, structures which were much wider than the usually narrow urban streets.  The word was adopted in English because there was a frank admiration of the layout of Paris and the Americans picked it up as an obvious differentiation for some of the widest streets of their newer cities although there was sometimes also an element of a wish to emulate European style.  The word is used in many countries with the same French spelling adopted in English although there are variants including the Spanish bulevar and the Turkish bulvar and in Italian the word is sometimes used in the otherwise archaic sense of embankment (a direct inheritance of the sense of “rampart”).  The noun boulevardier dates from 1856 and deconstructed literally means “one who frequents the boulevard”, the implication being ”man-about-town, a city dweller, part of café society”.  Boulevardier was later adopted (also as boulevard cruiser & boulevard car) to describe cars which ape the style of high-speed machines but sacrifice performance for comfort and ease of operation.  In urban cartography & town planning the most common abbreviation is blvd. but bd. & bl. are also used.  Boulevard is a noun and boulevardier is a noun & adjective; the noun plural is boulevards.

The Boulevardier cocktail

Erskine Gwynne (1898-1948) between 1927-1932 was the publisher of Paris Boulevardier, an English-language magazine in the vein of the New Yorker, its market the then quite large colony of Anglo-American expats living in Paris.  While in Paris, Gwynne created a cocktail called the Boulevardier which he suggested was the ideal drink for his readership but it was after it was included in Harry MacElhone’s (1890-1958) book Barflies and Cocktails (1927), that it became popular on both sides of the Atlantic.

Made with whiskey, sweet vermouth and Campari, the Boulevardier is a variation of the classic Negroni, renowned when properly mixed for its deft balance of bitter, boozy and sweet (although some anthologies of cocktails asterisk a proviso that women often prefer them with more vermouth and thus sweeter).  However, while the gin-based Negroni is crisp and refreshing, the whiskey-rich Boulevardier is rich and warming, very much a drink for dark evenings.  Traditionally, it was made with bourbon but there are recipes which use the spicier rye whiskey and, unlike a Negroini where classically the ingredients are in equal parts, a Boulevardier mixes the whiskey in a slightly higher proportion.  It’s served on ice, stirred and garnished with an orange twist.

Ingredients

1 ¼ ounces bourbon whiskey

1 oz Campari

1 oz sweet vermouth

Garnish: orange twist

Instructions

Add bourbon, Campari and sweet vermouth into a mixing glass with ice and stir until well-chilled.  Strain into a rocks glass over fresh ice.  Garnish with an orange twist.

Boulevard cars

1961 Chevrolet Impala SS.

The idea of the “boulevard car” was concocted to describe cars which ape the style of high-speed machines but sacrifice performance for comfort and ease of operation, usually at a lower price; for show rather than go as it were.  Chevrolet had actually institutionalized the concept with what became their popular SS (Super Sport) option pack, released in 1961 as a bundle available for Impalas with high-performance V8s.  It featured both suspension modifications and dress-up items including unique body and interior trim, power steering, power brakes with sintered metallic linings, full wheel covers with a three blade spinner, a passenger grab bar, a console for the floor shift, and a tachometer on the steering column.  In that year, Chevrolet built close to half a million Impalas but only 453 buyers opted for what was (at US$53.80) the bargain-priced SS package, an indication the marketing needed to be tweaked.  The problem was that Chevrolet had intended the 1961 SS live up to its name and it was available only with the 348 & 409 cubic inch (5.7 & 6.7 litre) V8s which could be quite raucous and were notably thirstier than many were prepared to tolerate.  The dealers noted how buyers were drawn to the style but were put off by the specification which demanded much more from the driver that the smaller-engined models which wafted effortlessly along, automatic transmissions by now the default choice for most Impala buyers.

1967 Chevrolet SS427.

So the sales barrier was the implication of the costs attached to the SS bundle rather than the attractiveness.  The headline number of US$53.80 actually included only the "spinner" wheel covers, SS badges, a shiny floor plate for the four-speed's shifter and a Corvette-style grab-bar for the glove-box (Ralph Nader (b 1934) noted that one).  However, ticking the SS option box triggered a list of "mandatory options" (a seeming oxymoron Detroit came to adore) including wider tyres (with compulsory narrow-band whitewalls), PAS & PB, (power assisted steering & power brakes), LPO (Limited Production Option) 1108 (Police Handling Package, a bundle including HD (heavy-duty) suspension components and sintered metallic brake linings), a steering column mounted 7000 rpm tachometer and a padded dashboard (the last unlikely much to impress Mr Nader).  Having agreed to pay for all that, the buyer then had to decide whether to opt (at progressively increasing cost) for the 348 (with 305, 340 or 350 horsepower (HP)) or 409 (360 HP).  The Powerglide two-speed  automatic transmission was available only with the mildest of the 348s, further limiting the sales potential, the three or four-speed manual otherwise obligatory.  In 1961, it was much more expensive to buy a SS Chevrolet than the US$53.80 on the brochure suggested and however pleasing, it was a long way removed from Chevrolet's traditional place as the low-priced rung on the "Sloan ladder".  The decision was thus taken for 1962 to make the "show" available without the "go" and the SS became an "appearance package", available with even six-cylinder engines.  Sales skyrocketed and between 1962-1969 some 920,000 SS packages were sold for the full-sized line.

1973 Porsche 911T-Lux Targa (left) and 1973 Porsche 911S Targa (right).  The driving experiences were very different but visually, unless closely inspected, it took a well-trained eye to tell the difference. 

GM had noted the dress-up bits were just Chevrolet part-numbers which could be ordered by dealers, some of which received customer requests separately to fit the trim pieces so some 1961 Impalas did to some extent resemble the SS cars though without the high-performance equipment.  It was therefore clear there were more buyers who wanted their Impala to look like a a fast one than were able or prepared to pay for the experience and Chevrolet’s “SS appearance package” proved influential, the approach becoming a a template for the whole industry, spreading internationally, the Porsche 911T Lux (1972-1973) an example.  The entry level 911T was the least powerful of the range and lacked some of the luxury fittings of the more expensive and more powerful 911E & 911S but for those who wanted the fittings but had no desire for the horsepower, the 911T-Lux was created which combined the mechanical specification of the "T" with the trim of the "S", the factory doing exactly what so many of Chevrolet's SS customers settled on after 1962.

Façade of Sydney Boulevard Hotel, 90 William Street, Sydney, NSW, 2011 Australia.

Located between the once vibrant Kings Cross and the city's CBD, The Sydney Boulevard Hotel was long a favorite of visiting federal politicians, attracted by the convenient location and "government rates" adjusted to be cognizant of the "TA" (daily travelling allowance).  The TA remains one of the more lucrative rorts because unspent funds are trousered by the recipient as tax-free income.  For politicians able to arrange their travel to coincide with free or low-cost accommodation and meals (by tactics which are in themselves sometimes good stories), a carefully-managed TA regime can have an extraordinary multiplier effect on after-tax income.  For most people, a political career is an easier path to wealth than working for a living and in Australia it seems only politicians and political journalists who parrot the line they're in the game in the interests of the country rather than themselves.  While some journalists might be that gullible, most are obliged to "stick to the script" because it's from politicians they gain most of their "stories", MPs (members of parliament) being a breed anxious to leak scuttlebutt (true and not) about their colleagues (who are their real opponents rather than the official "opposition" who are just "the other side").    

Chevrolet’s solution was to become a template for the whole industry which would spend the next decade making, advertising (and, in relatively small numbers, selling) the so-called "muscle cars" which would become so storied.  The muscle-car ecosystem of those years is better documented and more celebrated than any other phase through which Detroit passed yet the numbers of the genuine high performance machines produced was tiny compared to total production of the models upon which they were based.  The experience of 1961 convinced Chevrolet that what most people wanted was not a tyre-melting muscle car (which came with a thirsty, noisy and sometimes cantankerous engine along with what would become prohibitively expensive insurance rates) but one which looked like one.  Splitting the market between drag-strip monsters and boulevard cruisers which could be made to look much the same proved a great success.  For some reason though, late in the decade Chevrolet briefly offered the stand-alone SS 427 in an Impala body but without the Impala badge while, confusingly, the actual Impala could be ordered with both the SS package and the 427 cubic inch (7.0 litre) V8.  Thus there was the SS 427 and the Impala SS 427, the former rather more special and much sought after today so many clones of both have been concocted, leading to a small industry of specialists able to pick real from fake, the difference a matter (in the collector market) of tens of thousands of dollars.

1958 Mercedes-Benz 300 SL Roadster. 

Manufacturers had been pursuing the concept even before Chevrolet formalized it in the marketing manual.  Even in the interwar years the coincidently named SS cars (which after 1945 become Jaguar) offered essentially the same racy looking machines in a variety of configurations, some of which delivered the performance the lines promised and some did not, the former thought of as genuine sports cars, the latter we would now call boulevard cruisers.  Jaguar considered pursuing the strategy in the early post-war years before deciding sports cars really should all be sporty and although their saloons would come with engines small and large, the roadsters and coupés would be about both show and go.  Mercedes-Benz understood the attraction the 300SL gullwing (W198) had for buyers but knew also it, and the planned roadster version which would be its replacement, were always going to be too expensive for most and that few of them anyway needed a car which could hit what was in the 1950s a most impressive 150 mph (240 km/h).  What they wanted was a stylish machine which recalled the 300 SL in which to cruise along wide boulevards.

1955 Mercedes Benz 190 SL.

Thus was crafted the 190 SL (W121; 1955-1963), built on the modest platform of the company’s small, four cylinder saloon rather than the exotic space-frame of the 300 SL.  Eschewed too were costly features like dry-sump lubrication and fuel-injection and the engine was barely more powerful than in the saloon but for a boulevard cruiser that was perfect and over an eight-year run, it out-sold the expensive 300 SL roadster a dozen-fold.  There were plans even for a 220 SL, using the 2.2 litre (134 cubic inch) six cylinder from the “pontoon” saloon and prototypes were built but the continuing success of the 190SL and capacity constraints first postponed and finally doomed the project.  Even this had been an attempt not to create a true sports car but instead make the little roadster cruise the boulevards more smoothly and, in the decades which followed, this indeed was the historic course subsequent generations of the SL would follow.  It would not be until the 1990s some SLs again became genuinely fast and in the twenty-first century the factory returned to making versions for which a racetrack would seem a native environment.

Hilt

Hilt (pronounced hilt)

(1) The handle of a sword or dagger.

(2) The handle of many weapons and tools.

(3) In anatomy, the base of the penis.

(4) To furnish with a hilt.

(5) As the idiom “to the hilt”, to the maximum extent or degree; completely; fully.

Pre 900:  From the Middle English hilt, from the Old English hilt & hilte (handle of a sword or dagger); cognate with the Middle Dutch hilt & hilte, the Old Norse hjalt, the Old Saxon helta (oar handle) and the Old High German helza (handle of a sword).  Source was the Proto-Germanic helt, heltą, heltǭ, heltō & hiltijō, probably from the primitive Indo-European kel- (to strike, cut).  One form of the idiom which died out was “up to the hilts”, the plural having exactly the same meaning as the still familiar singular; first noted in the 1670s, it was extinct by the mid-eighteenth century except in Scotland and the border regions of northern England where it survived another hundred-odd years.  The vivid imagery summoned by the expression “to the hilt” is of a dagger stabbed into someone’s heart, the blade buried all the way to the hilt.  The phrase is used to suggest one’s total commitment to something although those training British commandos in such things during World War II (1939-1945) did caution that a blade buried in a victim "to the hilt" could be "difficult to get it out", such were "the contractions of the sinews".  Hilt is a noun & verb, hilting is a verb, hilted is a verb & adjective and hiltless is an adjective; the noun plural is hilts.

Consisting of the pommel, grip & guard, hilt was a European swordsmith’s technical name for the handle of a knife, dagger, sword or bayonet; the once used terms haft and shaft have long been obsolete.  The pommel is the large fitting at the top of the handle, originally developed to prevent the weapon slipping from the grasp but during the late medieval period, swordsmiths began to add weight so they were sufficiently heavy to be a counterweight to the blade.  This had the effect of shifting the point of balance closer to the hilt, the physics of this assisting swordsmanship.  The pommel could also be used as a blunt instrument with which to strike an opponent, something from the German school of swordsmanship known as the Mordhau (or Mordstreich or Mordschlag (literally “murder-stroke” or “murder-strike” or “murder-blow”)) method, a half-sword technique of holding the sword inverted, with both hands gripping the blade while striking one's opponent with the pommel or cross-guard.  The technique essentially makes as sword function as a mace or hammer and in military training was envisaged for use in armoured combat although in the hands of a skilled exponent it could be deadly in close combat.  Some hilts were explicitly designed for this purpose.  Pommel was from the Middle English pommel (ornamental knob or ball, decorative boss), from the Old French pom (hilt of a sword) & pommel (knob) and the Medieval Latin pumellum & pōmellum (little apple), probably via the Vulgar Latin pomellum (ball, knob), diminutive of the Late Latin pōmum (apple).  The use in weaponry came first, the sense of "front peak of a saddle" dating from the mid 1400s and in fifteenth and sixteenth century poetry it also sometimes meant "a woman's breasts".  The gymnast's pommel horse (vaulting horse) is so called by 1908, named for the removable handles, which resemble pommels of a saddle, the use in saddlery noted first in 1887.

Grips still are made almost always of wood or metal and once were usually wrapped with shagreen (untanned tough leather or shark skin) but this proved less durable in climates with high-humidity and in these regions, rubber was increasingly used from the mid-nineteenth century.  Whatever the material, it’s almost always both glued to the grip and wrapped with wire in a helix.  The guard sits between grip and blade.  The guard was originally a simple stop (a straight crossbar perpendicular to the blade (later called a quillon)) to prevent the hand slipping up the blade but later evolved into an armoured gauntlet to protect the wielder's entire hand from an opponent’s sword.  By the sixteenth century, guards became elaborate, now often decorative as well as functional, the innovation of this time being a single curved piece alongside the fingers (parallel with the blade and perpendicular to any cross-guards); it became known as the knuckle-bow.

Lindsay Lohan with saw-tooth edged dagger held at the hilt; from a Tyler Shields (b 1982) photo session, 2013.

The “blood” in this photograph is believed to be “fake blood” of the type used in film & television production; it's a substance with an interesting history.  Before the introduction of color film, the liquid was not red but black or a deep blue because those were the hues which, when using monochrome (ie black & white) or sepia film stock, those were the shades which looked convincingly “red” while true red did not.  In the industry, the stuff variously is called “stage blood”, “theatrical blood”, “Prop blood”, “FX blood” or “SFX blood”.  “FX” is the general term for “effects” while “SFX” refers to “special effects” and there’s also “VFX” which, meaning “visual effects” doesn’t have a blood department.  Chemically, the mix is interesting stuff because there are a number of flavours including (1) edible blood which is safe (though not necessarily pleasant) to ingest (made from water, corn syrup & vegetable-based food coloring, etc), (2) non-edible blood used on clothing and props (it can include detergents, thickeners and even sand), (3) rapid-drying blood designed to simulate dried or clotted blood and (4) flowing blood which is used in scenes with active bleeding so realistic viscosity is needed, the mixes ranging from “squirting” to “flowing”.  Historically, each variety was tailored to the specific lighting conditions in use but with post-production digital editing of brightness, color saturation and such now routine, that’s now less critical.

Great moments in elaborately carved hilts: Ivory hilt for ceremonial sword carved in 1801-1802 by the London firm Rundell, Bridge and Rundell for George IV (1762–1830) King of the United Kingdom 1820-1830).

George IV’s ivory hilt (left) depicts the rescue of Andromeda by Perseus, who descended on his winged horse Pegasus to destroy the fierce dragon tormenting his captive.  The artisans were thought to have been influenced by the ivory carvings which emerged during the mid-seventeenth century from workshops in the Netherlands city of Maastricht when large volumes of ivory were being imported by the Dutch East India Company.  The hilt consists of four separate pieces: (1) pommel and grip (with Perseus and the chained Andromeda), (2) knuckle-guard (with the long neck and mouth of the dragon), (3) quillon-block and rear quillon (the dragon's back and tail) and (4) the (somewhat diminished) shells, carved with the dragon's wings and feet.  The wavy-edged blade was sometimes a feature of ceremonial swords.  In London, the most accomplished of the artisans who worked with ivory were members of the Worshipful Company of Cutlers.

Great moments in elaborately carved hilts: Ivory hilt for hunting sword carved circa 1740 and attributed to German artisan Joseph Deutschmann (1717-1787) for Maximilian III Joseph (1727–1777; Prince-elector of the Holy Roman Empire and Duke of Bavaria 1745-1777).

Prince Maximilian’s ivory hilt is a classic example of the Rococo ornamentation of the era (some were more extravagant) and is thought also to be a piece of unsubtle political messaging, the lion a top the grip holding a crescent moon in its claws, an allusion to recent European victories over the Ottoman Turks on the battlefields of Eastern Europe and, despite being crafted as a “hunting sword”, this blade almost certainly was reserved for ceremonial purposes.  Hunting swords were one-handed weapons which in the mid-twelfth century emerged in Europe as a distinct class.  They were characterized by a relatively short blade and were essentially a sidearm carried when hunting big (and sometimes dangerous) game, their size and weight making them a convenient weapon able quickly to be drawn and swung.  Many single-edged hunting swords featured a saw-like serrated pattern on the back edge; this was another convenience item as hunters utilized this for slicing or sectioning the catch.  The blade shape evolved over the centuries to become narrower on the first two-thirds of its length before at the end widening.  Hunting swords remained in general use well into the eighteenth century.