Album

Album (pronounced al-buhm)

(1) A bound or loose-leaf book consisting of blank pages, pockets, envelopes etc, for storing or displaying photographs, stamps, or the like, or for collecting autographs.

(2) A digital collection of photographs, stored on a computer or mobile device for viewing, displaying, or sharing.

(3) A record or set of records containing several musical selections, a complete play or opera etc.

(4) The package or container for such a record or records:

(5) A collection of audio recordings released together as a collected work:

(6) A printed book containing an anthology of writings, reproductions of photographs or artwork, musical compositions etc.

(7) In Ancient Rome, a white tablet or register on which the praetor's edicts and other public notices were recorded.

1645–1655: From the late Middle English albo (souvenir book), from the Classical Latin album (a board calked or painted white, onto which was inscribed in black, certain public notices, most notably the Annales Maximi, compiled by the Pontifex Maximus, high priest of the Collegium Pontificum (College of Pontiffs) which listed the year’s most significant events and appointments).  In Latin, the literal meaning of album was "white in color; whiteness", a noun use of the neuter of the adjective albus (white).

Album of Frederick Handel's (1685-1759) Messiah (1741) on 18 x 78 rpm shellac records; Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, under Sir Thomas Beecham (1879-1961), RCA Victor, 1947. 

The word was revived in Prussia circa 1645 by German scholars whose custom was to keep an album (amicorum) of colleagues' signatures, the meaning later expanded to include "book with blank leaves meant to collect signatures and other souvenirs" and according the entry in Samuel Johnson’s (1709-1784) A Dictionary of the English Language (1755), the album was "…a book in which foreigners have long been accustomed to insert autographs of celebrated people."  Photographic albums (in which people mounted photographs) were first advertised in 1859 and in 1882, the publisher Stanley Gibbons added to their catalogue the “stamp album” to meet the demand from the increasingly popular (and sometime profitable) hobby of philately.  The word became the popular descriptor of the (twelve-inch (300 mm)) 33⅓ rpm LP (long-playing) record in the 1950s although the term had earlier been used of (what would later be known as “boxed sets”) the bundled collections of 78 rpm records which, for certain recordings, demanded dozens of disks.  The use of “album” was an allusion to the resemblance of the paper sleeves, in which the shellac (and later polyvinyl chloride (PVC and usually called “vinyl”)) disks were stored, to the pages of autograph or stamp albums.

Lindsay Lohan's discography: Speak (Casablanca, 2005) & A Little More Personal (Raw) (Casablanca, 2005).

The Grateful Dead, Anthem of the Sun (1968).

The twelve-inch vinyl LP was an ideal format for commercial music distributors because it allowed 40-50 minutes of product to be packaged on the one disk, thereby permitting even long opera performances to be released as an album which required usually no more than 3-4 disks.  In popular music, the 50 minute limit (which technology did later permit to be extended to about an hour) was perfect and there many releases which barely troubled the lower end of the limit, format allowing acts to release several albums a year, each with perhaps a dozen songs (“tracks” as they came to be called).  This corresponded well with both creative output and the occasional release of a live performance and when required, double albums could be recorded and by the 1970s, there were even some triple and quadruple-disk albums.

The Incredible String Band, The 5000 Spirits or the Layers of the Onion (1967).

The eight-track cartridge and the much more successful cassette tape proved handy as portable media but operated less as a competitor than an adjunct to the vinyl product and it wasn’t until the compact disc (CD) gained critical mass in the mid-1980s that the 12 inch format came to be supplanted.  The CD was another format which proved ideal for the industry, particularly during the first decade-odd of its existence when the duplication hardware was for most (unlike cassette decks which were bundled with mainstream (3-in-1) stereo systems), prohibitively expensive.  The CD didn’t add greatly to the duration available for recording but the sound quality was superior (some vinyl audiophiles still dispute that), unit production and distribution costs were lower and windfall profits were raked in as the early CDs were sold at high prices and many consumers actually duplicated at least some of their vinyl collection as well as buying new releases.  Thus the “album age” lasted until displaced by the digital era which made possible the consumer’s (probably long-standing) preference to purchase the individual tracks they prefer.

Iron Butterfly, In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida (1968).

Until largely displaced by the smaller CD, the twelve inch album sleeve existed as a form of pop-art which attracted its own school of criticism.  Between the mid-1960s and late 1980s, small industries arose to create the artwork and there was even a niche in specialist publishing which produced compilations, the more psychedelic efforts especially popular and the “gatefold covers” used for the double and triple albums even permitted a wider vista; the results sometimes good, sometimes not.  The so-called “concept album” appeared to have had little effect on the album cover artwork which is surprising given it was such an obvious way to encapsulate a “concept”.  However, the definition of the “concept album” was always vague and while there were plenty with some discernible theme, it could with others be difficult to work out just what the “concept” was supposed to be.  Still, it was a word which suggested ambitions beyond a collection of three-minute singles and in the 1960s there was a growing industry of earnest critics, anxious to find meanings and ready to fill in the gap if none was immediately obvious.  Sometimes they would write as if influenced by TS Elliot, sometimes they'd just gush and if the idea had been delayed a generation, they would probably have called them "paradigm albums".     

There were great moments in album covers but, unfortunately, the memorable cover for Svetlana Gruebbersolvik's My Lips are for Blowing was a fake.  Beginning in the 1960s, the album cover with its standardized 12 x 12 inch (300 x 300 mm) format became a sub-genre of pop-art, the movement lasting until the smaller media of the CD rendered the packaging obsolete.  The twelve inch format has enjoyed something of a twenty-first century revival but the volumes are too low to support the scale of graphic-art industry which once flourished. 

Concerto

Concerto (pronounced kuhn-cher-toh or kawn-cher-taw (Italian))

(1) A composition for an orchestra and one or more principal instruments (ie soloists), usually in symphonic form. The classical concerto usually consisted of several movements, and often a cadenza.

(2) An alternative word for ripieno.

1519: From the Italian concertare (concert), the construct being con- + certō.  The Latin prefix con- is from the preposition cum (with) and certō is from certus (resolved, certain) +‎ -ō; the present infinitive certāre, the perfect active certāvī, the supine certātum.  Concerto grosso (literally “big concert”; plural concerti grossi) is the more familiar type of orchestral music of the Baroque era (circa 1600–1750), characterized by contrast between a small group of soloists (soli, concertino, principale) and the full orchestra (tutti, concerto grosso, ripieno). The titles of early concerti grossi often reflected their performance locales, as in concerto da chiesa (church concerto) and concerto da camera (chamber concerto, played at court), titles also applied to works not strictly concerti grossi.  Ultimately the concerto grosso flourished as secular court music.  Concerto is a noun; the noun plurals are  concertos & concerti.

The origin of the Italian word concerto is unclear although most musicologists hold it’s meant to imply a work where disputes and fights are ultimately resolved by working together although the meaning did change over the centuries as musical traditions evolved.  Concerto was first used 1519 in Rome to refer to an ensemble of voices getting together with music although the first publication with this name for works for voices and instruments is by the Venetian composer Andrea Gabrieli (circa 1532-1585) and his nephew Giovanni Gabrieli (circa 1555-1612), a collection of concerti, dated 1587. Up to the first half of the seventeenth century, the term concerti was used in Italy for vocal works accompanied by instruments, many publications appearing with this title although initially, the Italian word sinfonia (from the Latin symphōnia, from the Ancient Greek συμφωνία (sumphōnía) was also used.  It was during the Baroque era the concerto evolved into a recognizably modern form.

Deep Purple and the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra under Malcolm Arnold: Concerto for Group and Orchestra, 24 September 1969.

Although pop groups playing with orchestras is now not rare, there’s never been anything quite like Jon Lord’s (1941-2012) Concerto for Group and Orchestra, performed on 24 September 1969 at the Royal Albert Hall by Deep Purple and the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra under Malcolm Arnold (1921-2006).  The work was a true concerto in three movements: Energico, Lento and Con Fuoco; an attempt to fuse the sound of an orchestra with that of a heavy metal band.  It proved a modest commercial success and has been performed on several occasions.

Cover of the original Tetragrammaton pressing of Deep Purple's second album The Book of Taliesyn (1968).

Although something very different from what most rock bands were doing in 1969, Jon Lord's concerto really was a synthesis of some of the material two of the bands previous three albums, both of which contained threads in the tradition of the German classical music in which Lord Had been trained.  Recorded during their early quasi-psychedelic period, the title of their second album had been borrowed from The Book of Taliesin (Llyfr Taliesin in the Welsh), a fourteenth century manuscript written in Middle Welsh which contains some five dozen poems, some pre-dating the tenth century while the third owed some debt to the seventeenth & eighteenth.  The Concerto for Group and Orchestra was very much in the vein of Deep Purple's early output but what was at the time unexpected was that less than a year after the performance, the band released the album In Rock, a notable change in musical direction and one decidedly not orchestral.  Prior to In Rock, Deep Purple's output had been eclectic with no discernible thematic pattern, a mix of influences from pop, blues and psychedelia, delivered with the odd classical flourish so suddenly to produce one of the defining albums of heavy metal was unexpected in a way the Concerto was not.  For the band however, it was the performance at the Royal Albert Hall which proved the anomaly, In Rock providing the template which would sustain them, through personnel changes and the odd hiatus, well into the twenty-first century.

Cover of the original Harvest pressing of Deep Purple's fourth album: Concerto for Group and Orchestra (1969).

Lord wasn’t discouraged by the restrained enthusiasm of the music press, describing critics as “…an archaic, if necessary, appendage to the music business” and pursued variations of the concept for the rest of his life.  The most noted was Windows (1974), a collaboration with German conductor and composer Eberhard Schoener (b 1938) which included Continuo on B-A-C-H (B-A-C-B# in musical notation), a piece which built on the unfinished triple fugue that closed Johann Sebastian Bach's (1685–1750) Art of the Fugue, written in the last years of his life.  Although not included with the original release on vinyl, the band did perform some of their other material just before the concerto began including a song which would appear on In Rock.  That was Child in Time, a long and rather dramatic piece with some loud screaming which must have been quite unlike anything which some of that night's older critics might previously have enjoyed and perhaps it affected them.  Unlike pop music’s fusions with jazz, attempts to synthesize with classical traditions never attracted the same interest or approbation, the consensus seemingly that while a cobbler could create a hobnail boot for a ballerina, it was hard to imagine why.

Triptych

Triptych (pronounced trip-tik)

(1) In fine art, a set of three panels or compartments side by side, bearing pictures, carvings, or the like.  Panels are sometimes hinged so the two wing panels fold over the larger central one; historically, they were often used as altarpieces.

(2) By extension, any group of three people or things, if representative of a particular field or theme.

(3) A hinged, three-leaved tablet, written on, in ancient Greece and Rome, with a stylus.

(3) In philately, a set of three se-tenant (from the French se tenant (holding each other), the present participle of se tenir (to hold each other) postage stamps that form a composite picture.

(4) In film production, a film or video sequence intended to be shown on a triple screen with the use of linked projectors.

(5) In figurative use, any set of three closely connected ideas or concepts with a constant thematic link.

1731: From the Ancient Greek τρίπτυχος (tríptukhos) (consisting of three layers, threefold; of three plates), the construct being τρι- (tri-) (three) + ptych (stem of ptýx) (plate) and ptykhos, genitive of ptyx, (fold or layer) (and influenced by πτυχή (ptukhḗ) (a fold).  The use to describe three-part altar-piece carvings or pictures hinged together was first noted in 1849 and was based on the Italian triptica (which substituted tri- (three) on model of diptych (from the Late Latin diptycha (plural), from the Ancient Greek, neuter plural of δίπτυχος (díptukhos) (folded; double), the construct being δι- (di-) + πτυχή (ptukhḗ) (fold, layer).

The Descent from the Cross (1614) by Peter Paul Rubens (1577-1640).

A triptych is a specific form of the polyptych, the term for all multi-panel works.  Traditionally, the centre is the largest but works can be constructed from identically sized pieces or may be wholly asymmetric.  Triptychs can be an integrated work, thematically connected in some other way, or three unrelated panels.  Origin of the layout is in the sacred art of the early Christian church, and triptychs attained great popularity in the medieval Byzantine church.  Artistic merit aside, the hinged-triptychs were a good design because they could be folded into a type of self-contained packing crate for ease of transportation, probably the main reason for the common 25/50/25% aspect ratio.  The format migrated, first to Islam and Buddhism, later to secular art including sculpture and jewelry.  Structurally, the critical point about the triptych is that it should be displayed with the three components joined together.  If their pieces are intended to be shown together but hung with a gap between, that properly is called "sectional art". 

Yes, Yessongs (1973), polyptych created with two diptychs 

In the era of the 12 inch vinyl long-playing (LP) album, record album, the covers were a sub-genre of pop-art and gatefold covers (two sleeves hinged at the centre) were sometimes used, even when the product shipped as a single piece of vinyl.  Sometimes there were even triple albums (finding that not enough, Chicago issued a set of four), described sometimes by critics as the "dreaded triple album" but in the era, there was little attempt to take advantage of the inherent structure of the packaging to create triptychs, something which seems surprising given the emphasis which was put on the cover art.  Yes, with the release of Yessongs (1973) was one of the few to take up the idea but they used four-fold packaging, creating a sort of polyptych with a pair of diptychs.

Studies in monochrome in three aspects of Lindsay Lohan smoking (2014).

New Zealand photographer Jane Trotter deconstructed the history of the triptych and identified four categories by which they may be classified.  The first is the Three Part Narrative, there images telling a story, the implication of course the beginning, middle and end of the three-act play.  Such a triptych is inherently sequential with each panel contingent upon the other, the whole story not fully revealed unless all three are viewed together.  The second category is Transformation, often the representation of the passing of time or a depiction of something symbolic.  A typical example is the one flower shown as a bud, in full bloom and finally withered, a metaphor of life and death, the transience of beauty and impermanence of life.  Third is what she calls Reconstruct to give New Meaning.  It sounds ominously post-modern but it really describes giving the viewer a new perspective of perhaps familiar objects by using fragments of a whole and re-assembling them in a novel way or having them juxtaposed with something unexpected.  Once something is reconstructed to give new meaning, it is possible some of the new meaning will come from the viewer and that it may differ between individuals who might see different connections between objects or afford some a prominence to the extent others are ignored.  Her final category is Expand Visual Connections.  Sometimes, she notes, a single image isn’t enough to encapsulate or complete the whole visual conception of a work.  This can be done by using three images to create something unified or they can act as agents of disassociation, depending on the effect the artist is trying to achieve.

The Garden of Earthly Delights, oil on oak panels by Hieronymus Bosch (circa 1450–1516)

One of the best known triptychs is the much re-produced The Garden of Earthly Delights (believed to have been painted between 1490-1510) by Hieronymus Bosch; the title is a modern designation and nothing has survived which gives any clue about what the artist intended it to be called.  The three panels represent (1) the Garden of Eden, (2) a fantastical imagining of life which is not Earth yet not quite Heaven and often thought to be the artist’s conception of a utopia and (3) Hell, a subject which Bosch painted several times.  Theologians, art critics, psychoanalysts and others have over the centuries written extensively on the work and while opinion will vary about what their thoughts reveal about the intent of the artist, their pieces can be an insight into their own world view. 

For very good, practical reasons, an artist will often focus more on their relationships with their patron or their critics and less on the viewers of their works.  However, modern technology now allows an objective measure of at least one aspect of the viewers’ reaction to art and a heat-map of the public exhibition space in the gallery of the Prado museum in Madrid The Garden of Earthly Delights revealed visitors spent most time looking at right-hand panel: Hell.  Clearly, eternal damnation draws the eye more than the paradise of prelapsarian Eden or the pleasantly sinful life of man in the world after the fall.  A reasonable conclusion of the meaning of the triptych is that “for everything one does there’s a price to be paid” and it may have been this theme which focused the mind.

Researchers from the Miguel Hernández University in Alicante used spectacles with sensors to track eye movements and responses in a sample of 52 visitors and found that on average, 16 seconds per square metre were devoted to the left panel, 26 seconds per metre to the centre and a winning 33.2 seconds to each square metre of Hell.  The work typically absorbed four minutes of each viewer’s time.  What was also discovered was that the pupils of females contemplating the Eden panel swelled from 5.2 to 5.4 mm when observing the delights panel and reached 5.8 when contemplating Hell.  In contrast, the pupils of men reacted in a different way, at their most dilated (8.6mm) when looking at the delights, followed by the Hell which scored 6.8 and Eden at 6.4.

Three studies of Isabel Rawsthorne (1966) by Irish artist Francis Bacon (1909–1992).

Very

Very (pronounced ver-ee)

(1) In a high degree; extremely; exceedingly (used as an intensive emphasizing superlatives or stressing identity or oppositeness).

(2) Actual, precise; particular.

(3) Mere (in certain contexts) or sheer; utter (depending on context).

(4) Being such in the true or fullest sense of the term; extreme.

(5) True; genuine; worthy of being called such; rightful or legitimate.

(6) Pure, simple, plain.

1200–50: From the Middle English verray & verrai (true, real, genuine (and in the fourteenth century "actual, sheer")), from the Anglo-French verrai, from the Old French verai (true, truthful, sincere; right, just, legal) (from which French gained vrai), from the (assumed) Vulgar Latin vērācus, an alteration of the Classical Latin vērāx (genitive veracis) (truthful) from vērus (true (and source of the Italian vero)); the construct of vērāx was vēr(us) (true (and cognate with the Old English wǣr & the German wahr (true, correct)) + -āx (the adjectival suffix).  The ultimate source was the primitive Indo-European weh- (true, benevolent), source also of the Old English wǣr (true, correct), the Dutch waar (true), the German wahr (true) and the Icelandic alvöru (earnest).  It displaced the native Middle English sore & sār (very), from the Old English sār (grievous, extreme) which was related to the German sehr, the Dutch zeer, the Middle English wel (very (from the Old English wel (well, very)).  Other links include the German wohl, the Dutch wel, the Swedish väl, and the Middle English swith (quickly; very), from the Old English swīþe (very).  Very is an adverb & adjective and the adjectival forms verier & veriest are obsolete.  The adverb verily is effectively obsolete except for ecclesiastical use where if remains familiar in ritualistic phrases such as “verily I say unto you”.

Circa 1914 Webley & Scott Mark 1 British Royal Flying Corps (RFC) Very Pistol, brass frame with steel barrel, composition grips and 1½ inch (40mm) bore.  The short barrel design was unusual and permitted the pistol to be fitted to a mount on the side of the aircraft.

Very (as a proper noun) is spelt with an initial capital if referring to the most common type of flare gun, named after US Navy Lieutenant Edward W Very (1847–1910) (although the devices are sometimes spelt Verey).  Lieutenant Very’s invention was a large caliber single-shot pistol with a single action firing mechanism, designed fire into the air flares to signal position, usually to indicate distress and the need for assistance.  The older Very pistols were always metal and typically built with a one inch (50 mm) bore while more modern versions are often fabricated in plastic with a 12 gauge (¾ inch (19 mm) bore.  The plastic versions are usually brightly colored to make them easier to find in an emergency and to distinguish them from handguns.  The flares are available in red, green and "white star", use governed by rules which vary according to use (aviation, at sea, when using explosives etc).

It was the misuse of a Very pistol which provided the inspiration for Smoke on the Water, the most famous song by the band Deep Purple.  In December 1971, the band were in Montreux, Switzerland to record an album at an entertainment complex attached to the town’s casino.  The evening before recording was due to begin, as part of the Montreux jazz festival, Frank Zappa and the Mothers of Invention were playing a concert in the casino theatre, during which a member of the audience fired a flare gun, igniting the ceiling, the crowd initially thinking the pyrotechnics were part of the show.  The fire burned the casino to the ground and the members of Deep Purple, watching the blaze from across the lake were inspired to write Smoke on the Water which was released three months later on the Machine Head album.

Frank Zappa and the Mothers

Were at the best place around

But some stupid with a flare gun

Burned the place to the ground

The adverb verily (in truth) dates from the early fourteenth century, the construct being the Middle English verray (true, real), from verray (true, very) + -ly.  The –ly prefix was from the Middle English -ly, -li, -lik & -lich, from the Old English -līċ, from the Proto-West Germanic -līk, from the Proto-Germanic -līkaz (having the body or form of), from līką (body) (from whence Modern German gained lich); in form, it was probably influenced by the Old Norse -ligr (-ly) and was cognate with the Dutch -lijk, the German -lich and the Swedish -lig.  It was used (1) to form adjectives from nouns, the adjectives having the sense of "behaving like, having a likeness or having a nature typical of what is denoted by the noun" and (2) to form adjectives from nouns specifying time intervals, the adjectives having the sense of "occurring at such intervals".  The feminine proper name Vera is from the Latin (where literally it meant “true”)

Lindsay Lohan in very low-cut dress, New York Fashion Week, 2011.

The word very is common and familiar in English and in most of the ways it’s used, well understood.  Most past participles which have become established as adjectives can (like almost all adjectives in English) be modified by the adverb but this does not extend verbs although there are of course sentences where it’s not immediately clear if a certain past participle is adjectival and thus able to be modified by very without an intervening adverb.  In practice however, whatever the objection of the grammar Nazis, such sentences usually manage to convey the intended meaning although the adverb tends to be superfluous and detracts from the elegance of expression.  Technically, adverbs of degree such as very, too & quite should be used only to qualify adjectives and not to qualify past participles that follow the verb to be, since they would then they would be qualifying verbs.  With the exception of certain participles (disappointed, tired et al) that have come to be regarded as adjectives, all other past participles are qualified by adverbs such as much, greatly & seriously et al.

As an adverb synonyms (depending on context) can include extremely, exceedingly, exceptionally, especially, tremendously, immensely, vastly. hugely, extraordinarily, extra, excessively, overly, over, abundantly, inordinately, singularly, significantly, distinctly, outstandingly, uncommonly, unusually, decidedly, particularly, eminently, supremely, highly, remarkably, really, truly, mightily, thoroughly, most, très, right, terrifically, awfully, terribly, devilishly, madly, majorly, seriously, desperately, mega, ultra, stinking. damned, devilish, hellish, frightfully, well, bloody, jolly, dirty, fair, real, mighty, powerful, awful, darned, bitching & exceeding.  As an adjective synonyms (depending on context) can include actual, precise, exact, actual, particular, specific, distinct, ideal, perfect, appropriate, suitable, apt, fitting, fit & right.

As an intensifier, very is used to add emphasis to adjectives that have some quality of variation (long, big et al) and while hardly adding precision, the adverb can, if thoughtfully applied, enhance the meaning.  What the grammar Nazis don’t like is where very is used to modify words of single or absolute value and the one which most excites their interest is probably “unique”.  Unique does of course suggest a one-off and that meaning, noted since the 1610s remains current but the once erroneous sense of "remarkable, uncommon" had become common since the late nineteenth century, especially in commerce and has become so prevalent it can no longer be thought wrong except if used in a way deliberately deceptive or misleading.  In that sense using “very” to modify unique functions in a different manner than it operates upon words like “tall” or “capacity” et al; it exists as emphasis rather than intensify.  For that reason “most” or “quite” are also often used (especially in commerce) to modify unique.

Maiden

Maiden (pronounced meyd-n)

(1) A girl or young unmarried woman; a maid (archaic but still in literary and poetic use).

(2) A female virgin (archaic); used also of unmarried young females in the sense of a “bachelorette” (a spinster being “a maiden aunt”).

(3) In horse racing, a horse which has never won a race.

(4) In horse racing, a race open only to maiden horses.

(5) As “clothes maiden”, a northern English dialect form describing a frame on which clothes are hung to dry (a clothes horse).

(6) A machine for washing linen (obsolete).

(7) An instrument resembling the guillotine, once used in Scotland for beheading criminals.

(8) As “maiden name”, a woman’s surname, prior to taking that of her husband upon marriage.

(9) In land management, as virgin soil, virgin forest etc, an area in its natural state; unexploited.

(10) In pre-modern agriculture, the last sheaf of grain harvested, decorated with ribbons and regarded as a talisman (by extension the end of the harvest) (archaic).

(11) In botany, a tree or shrub grown from seed and never pruned.

(12) In cricket, as “maiden over”, for a bowler to complete an over (now six legitimate deliveries) without conceding a run; a “wicket maiden” is an over in which a wicket fell with no runs being scored (thus double-wicket maiden & hat-trick maiden).

(13) Of, relating to, or befitting a girl or unmarried woman (archaic but preserved in phrases such as “her maiden virtues”. “a maiden blush” et al).

(14) Of an unmarried woman, older than a certain age (generally past middle age), often in the form “maiden aunt”.

(15) Something made, tried, appearing etc, for the first time (maiden flight, maiden speech, maiden voyage etc).

(16) In military slang, an untested (or untried in battle) knight, soldier or weapon; a fortress never captured or violated.

Pre-1000: From the Middle English mayden & meiden, from the Old English mæden  & mægden (unmarried woman (usually young); virgin; girl; maidservant), originally a diminutive of mægð or mægeð (virgin, girl; woman, wife), the construct being mægd, mægth or mægeth, from the Proto-West Germanic magaþ, from the Proto-Germanic magaþs & magadin (young womanhood, sexually inexperienced female) (and cognate with the Old Norse mogr (young man), the Old Irish maug & mug (slave), and the Gothic magaths) + -en (the diminutive suffix).  The Proto-Germanic was the source also of the Old Saxon magath, the Old Frisian maged, Old High German magad (virgin, maid), the German Magd (maid, maidservant), the German Mädchen (girl, maid) from Mägdchen (little maid), the feminine variant of the primitive Indo-European root maghu- (“young of either sex; “unmarried person” and the source also of the Old English magu (child, son, male descendant), the Avestan magava- (unmarried) and the Old Irish maug & mug (slave)).  Maiden is a noun & adjective, maidenly is an adjective, maidenship & maidenhood  are nouns and maidenish is an adjective; the noun plural is maidens.

Iron Maiden is a heavy metal band active since 1975, their eponymous album in 1980 the debut release of studio-recorded material.  Their album cover-art has become something of a motif and is widely reproduced in posters, T-shirts and such, their music is said to possess a similar consistency.

In thirteenth century Middle English, “maiden” could be used as a slur to refer to “a man lacking or abstaining from sexual experience” and in Scotland it was the official term for a guillotine-like device used to behead criminals.  In horse racing, a maiden horse is one which has never won a race (although in the mid-eighteen century it was sometimes used of horses which had not previously contested a race.  A maiden race is one restricted to maiden horses (which can be mares, stallions or geldings).  The figurative sense of "new, fresh, untried” (maiden flight, maiden speech, maiden voyage etc) seems first to have been used in the 1550s.  The idea of the maiden name (a woman’s surname, prior to taking that of her husband upon marriage) dates from the 1680s.  The noun maidenhood (state of being a maiden; state of an unmarried female; virginity) was from the Old English mægdenhad while the adjective maidenly (like a maid, becoming to a maid; gentle, modest, reserved) was first documented in the mid 1600s.

Headbanger Lindsay Lohan in Iron Maiden T-shirts.

The term Hiroshima maiden (or A-bomb maiden) was in the 1950s used to refer to the Japanese & Korean women disfigured by the radiation from the A-bombs dropped on Hiroshima or Nagasaki in August 1945, the term coming into use in 1955 when they were sent to the US for reconstructive plastic surgery.  In Norse mythology, the billow maidens were any of the nine daughters of the sea-god Ran and a skjaldmær (shieldmaiden) was a female virgin who had chosen to fight as a warrior in battle.  In several tales from mythology, an ice maiden was one of the ice people (or people of the ice), a woman from a place of snow and ice (in popular culture, the idea was borrowed in fantasy writing.  In idiomatic use, an ice maiden (also ice princess or ice queen) is a beautiful but cold (heartless) woman.  In Westminster parliamentary systems, the maiden speech of a member is their first substantive address to a chamber.  By convention it is (1) uncontroversial and (2) listened to by the house in polite silence although in cases where the member has not followed the convention, there have been some famous interjections.  Maiden ventures by machinery have sometimes become infamous.  Ships have sunk on their maiden voyages including RMS Titanic (1912) and the Wasa (or Vasa), a Swedish warship at the time one of the fastest and most heavily gunned in the world (1628).  In aviation, many aircraft have crashed on their maiden flights (test pilots are truly intrepid types) although it’s a myth that included the Supermarine Spitfire.  Less fortunate was the German industry in the later stages of World War II (1939-1945) when development was being rushed and at least two prototypes are known to have either crashed or suffered severe damage during their maiden test flights including the Heinkel He 162 Volksjäger (People's Fighter).  In the case of the He 162 the maiden flight actually ended without incident and it was only a subsequent investigation of the airframe (after another prototype He 162 had crashed) which revealed the adhesive used to bond wooden components was so acidic it caused the timber to disintegrate.

An iron maiden towering above other instruments of torture.

The infamous torture chamber known as the iron maiden is now though to be mythical and an invention of those who wished to characterize the Middle Ages as a time of barbarism and savagery.  It was said to be a solid iron cabinet with a hinged front, large spikes fitted throughout the interior and designed to be large enough to accommodate an adult human.  Once the door was closed, it was said to be impossible to avoid being “spiked” and with every movement, one became “more spiked”.  Although their existence has been disproved, iron maidens (most apparently built in the nineteenth century) are a popular exhibit in “museums of torture”, some probably genuine “torture coffins” to which the spikes were a latter addition.  Quite why it was felt necessary to “invent” the iron maiden given there were so many examples of equally gruesome Medieval torture devices isn’t clear but it may be there was some desire to exonerate the torturers of Antiquity who really did use such things; among post Renaissance historians, such was the veneration for the Classical world that wherever possible, things were blamed on the Middle Ages.

In the English legal system, maiden assize came to mean an assize (periodic courts with on a circuit basis were conducted around England and Wales until 1972,) at which there were no criminal cases to be heard although originally it was an assize at which no prisoner was condemned to die.  There used to be some ritualism attached to the declaration of a maiden assize and the tradition wasn’t unknown in the US:  If a judge, upon opening a session of their assize found there were no cases to be heard, the clerk of the court would present him with a pair of white gloves, the marker of a maiden assize, the significance being that judges, as a mark of submission to the Crown, were always gloveless when executing the royal commission.

Package

Package (pronounce pak-ij)

(1) A bundle of something, usually of small or medium size, that is packed and wrapped or boxed; parcel.

(2) A container, as a box or case, in which something is or may be packed.

(3) Something conceived of as a (usually) compact unit having particular characteristics.

(4) The packing of goods, freight etc.

(5) A finished product contained in a unit that is suitable for immediate installation and operation, as a power or heating unit.

(6) A group, combination, or series of related parts or elements to be accepted or rejected as a single unit.

(7) A complete program produced for the theater, television, etc or a series of these, sold as a unit.

(8) In computing, a set of programs designed for a specific type of problem in statistics, production control etc, making it unnecessary for a separate program to be written for each problem.

(9) In computing, software distributed with a (sometimes optional) routine which enables a number of components to be installed and configured in the one action, meaning the end-user doesn’t have to be acquainted with pre-requisites, co-requisites etc.

(10) In computing, an alternative name for a “software suite” which provides a structured installation and configuration of what are (historically or nominally) separate programs.

(11) In vulgar slang, the male genitalia.

(12) To make or put into a package.

(13) To design and manufacture a package for (a product or series of related products).

(14) To group or combine (a series of related parts) into a single unit.

(15) To combine the various elements of (a tour, entertainment, etc.) for sale as a unit.

1530s: The original form of the word was in the sense of “the act of packing”, either as the construct of the noun pack + -age or from the cognate Dutch pakkage (baggage).  Pack was from the Middle English pak & pakke, from the Old English pæcca and/or the Middle Dutch pak & packe, both ultimately from the Proto-West Germanic pakkō, from the Proto-Germanic pakkô (bundle, pack).  It was cognate with the Dutch pak (pack), the Low German & German Pack (pack), the Swedish packe (pack) and the Icelandic pakka & pakki (package).  The suffix -age was from the Middle English -age, from the Old French -age, from the Latin -āticum.  Cognates include the French -age, the Italian -aggio, the Portuguese -agem, the Spanish -aje & Romanian -aj.  It was used to form nouns (1) with the sense of collection or appurtenance, (2) indicating a process, action, or a result, (3) of a state or relationship, (4) indicating a place, (5) indicating a charge, toll, or fee, (6) indicating a rate & (7) of a unit of measure.  The familiar modern sense of “a bundle, a parcel, a quantity pressed or packed together” dates from 1722 while that creation of modern commerce, the “package deal” (a transaction agreed to as a whole) emerged in 1952.  As a verb meaning “to bundle up into a pack or package” it was in use by at least 1915 and was a development of the noun.  The noun packaging (act of making into a package or packages) seems to have come into use in 1875.  Derived forms are created as needed (mispackage, subpackage, repackage, unpackage et al). As a modifier, package is now most associated with the “package deal” in its many advertised forms (package holiday, package saver, package tour et al).  Package & packaging are nouns & verbs, packager is a noun, packaged is a verb and packageable is an adjective; the noun plural is packages.

DVD Package deal.

The concept of the "package deal" is to sell two or more items at a list price which is less than the total nominal value.  It's used for a variety of purposes, often to use a popular product to shift surplus copies of one less successful.  It's a popular concept but does need to be done with care.  In 2014, Apple did a deal with the Irish rock band U2 which for many iTunes users had the consequence of an unrequested downloading to their devices the band's latest album.  Many people take pop music very seriously and were apparently offended by the notion of an unwanted album by a boomer band being forced upon them.  Apple haven't since repeated the packaging experience.

Detroit, the option lists and the packages

1967 Chevrolet Impala SS 327.

When in the late 1950s computers migrated from the universities and defense industries to commerce, among the early adopters were the US car manufacturers; they found intriguing the notion that with a computerized system in place, each vehicle could be built to a customer’s individual order.  This had of course for decades been done by low-volume manufacturers catering to the upper class but the administrative and logistical challenges of doing it at scale on a rapidly moving production line had precluded the approach for the mass-market.  Computerization changed that and what happened was: (1) a customer visited a dealer and ticked what they wanted from what suddenly became a long and expanding options list, (2) the dealer forwarded the list (on paper) to the manufacturers central production office (CPO) where, (3) a data entry operator typed the information into a machine which stored it on a punch card which (4) subsequently produced (on paper) a “build sheet” which went to the assembly line foreman who ensured his workers produced each car in accordance with its build sheet.

Option list for 1967 full-size Chevrolet range (Biscayne, Bel Air, Impala & Caprice).

The system actually worked and within its parameters was efficient but accountants were not impressed by the complexity and while they acknowledged a system with dozens of options per model could be done, they said it shouldn’t be done because it would be more profitable to assemble often-ordered combinations of options into a bundle which could be sold as a package.  What this meant was production runs would become more efficient because thousands of identically configured cars could be made, reducing the chance of error and avoiding the need for each line to be supplied with optional parts not included in the set specification.  The other attraction was that people would end up paying for things they might not have wanted, simply because the “package” was the only way to get the stuff really desired.  The classic examples was the various “executive” packages which included power-steering, automatic transmission and air-conditioning and some packages proved so popular they were sometimes further commoditized by becoming a stand-alone model such as Chevrolet’s Caprice which had in 1965 begun life as a bundle of “luxury” items (packaged as Regular Production Option (RPO) Z18 for the Impala) before the next year becoming a separate model designation which wasn’t finally retired until 2017.  Under the pressure of (1) packaging and (2) increasing levels of standard equipment, the option lists shrunk in the 1970s and were soon trimmed to a handful of items, most of them fitted by dealers rather than installed by the factory.     

Care packages

Care packages were originally a private initiative of US based charities which organized the assembly of items (with an emphasis on food-stuffs with a long shelf-life which didn’t demand refrigeration) which could be shipped to Europe to aid the civilian population, many of who were malnourished in the aftermath of the war.  Initial discussions focused on post-war planning were held in 1944 and CARE was formed late the next year, the first shipment of packages beginning in the second quarter of 1946, one of the early sources of supply the large stockpile of Army ration-packs which were produced for the amphibious invasion of the Japanese mainland but never used because the conflict was ended by the use of atomic bombs.  What CARE shipped was an example of the use of the adjective pre-packaged (packaged at the site of production), a form which is documented from 1944 although the date is coincidental to the formation of CARE.  The name was originally an acronym: Cooperative for American Remittances to Europe, but in 1959, reflecting what for some time had been the reality of CARE’s operations, it was changed to Cooperative for American Relief Everywhere.  In 1993 it was again changed to Cooperative for Assistance and Relief Everywhere, cognizant both of what would now be called “political optics” and the organization’s now international structure.

North Korean Freedom Coalition care package price list.

News that Kim Jong-un (Kim III, b 1982; Supreme Leader of DPRK (North Korea) since 2011) had banned Christmas in the DPRK so upset Christian activists that they redoubled their efforts to undermine the regime, advertising a list of “care packages” which could be launched into the Yellow Sea in bottles, the currents carrying them to the shores of the hermit kingdom, good Christian folk encouraged to donate between US$17 (which buys a small, concealable Bible) and US$1500 (a cell phone including roaming charges).  The activists operate from the Washington, DC-based North Korean Freedom Coalition (NKFC) which, in addition to challenging the “godless” Supreme Leader with teachings from Jesus, hopes practical care packages containing items such as shortwave radios and propaganda leaflets will destabilize the Kim dynasty.  The NKFC call the strategy “Operation Truth” and say it's modeled on the Berlin Airlift (1948-1949) which forced the Soviet Union to lift its blockade of West Berlin.  The most obviously practical of the packages contain enough rice to feed a family of four for a week, as well as a Bible on a flash drive and a US$1 bill, a much-sought after item in the DPRK.  In a clever twist which turns post-modernism against itself, the USB flash drives contain some North Korean music but with the lyrics altered from singing the praises of Kim Jong-un to lines worshiping God.  Decadent K-Pop songs are also loaded but the content of those (like the US movies also included) will be carefully checked to ensure nothing un-Christian is shipped.  Those who provided recorded messages included senators Jim Risch and Tim Kaine, & representatives Michael McCaul and Gregory Meeks; as if K-Pop wasn’t bad enough, that does sound like “cruel and unusual punishment”.  The packages are being supported by Fox News, the audience of which hates communists, atheists, Kim Jong-un and Joe Biden.

Moved to tears: The Supreme Leader sobbing when thinking of the lack of fecundity among his women, Pyongyang, December 2023.  

One who may deserve a care package is the Supreme Leader himself who recently was moved to tears as he implored his faithful female subjects to have more babies and raise them to love their country.  Kim Jong-un was filmed daubing is eyes with an immaculately pressed white handkerchief while addressing thousands of women gathered at a national mothers meeting in Pyongyang, the first such assembly in over a decade and one convened amid rising concerns over a fall in the DPRK’s birth rate.  “Stopping the decline in birthrates and providing good child care and education are all our family affairs that we should solve together with our mothers” the Supreme Leader was quoted as saying and with a rumored three children, he’s certainly done his bit.  Kim II went on to remind mothers their “primary revolutionary task” was to drill “socialist virtues” into their offspring and instil loyalty to the ruling party, adding that “…unless a mother becomes a communist, it is impossible for her to bring up her sons and daughters as communists and transform the members of her family into revolutionaries”.  Possibly fearing how they might be led astray by listening either to K-Pop or Senator Tim Kane, he warned the adoring women to be vigilant about any foreign influence on young minds, telling them to send their children to perform hard labour for the state to correct bad behaviour that is not “our style”.  The demographic problem isn’t restricted to the DPRK; in the region, policy-makers in both Japan and the RoK (the Republic of Korea (South Korea)) are also alarmed at the increasingly flaccid trend-line of population growth but for the DPRK, with its reliance on manual labour and military service, things rapidly could deteriorate.

Package deal: With every election of Bill Clinton, voters received a free copy of crooked Hillary.

There were suggestions the dictatorial tears were an indication of the uniqueness of the crisis and while it was true the dynasty had no tradition of lachrymosity, neither Kim Il-sung (Kim I, 1912–1994; Great Leader of DPRK (North Korea) 1948-1994) nor Kim Jong-il (Kim II, 1941-2011; Dear Leader of DPRK (North Korea) 1994-2011) ever having been seen crying but Kim Jong-un had shed a public tear in the past: In 2020, he cried as he issued an apology for failing to guide the reclusive country through turbulent economic times at the outset of the COVID-19 pandemic.  So unexpected and unusual were the words of regret that the tears weren’t widely reported but at the military parade held in July 2023 to mark the 70th anniversary of the end of the Korean War that divided the peninsula, the Supreme Leader proved he could also shed tears of joy, his eyes watering as the big missiles passed under his gaze.