Demon

Demon (pronounced dee-muhn (U) or dee-mon (non-U))

(1) An evil supernatural spirit; devil or fiend; an evil spirit resident in or working for Hell; a devil; a false god or idol; a Satanic divinity.

(2) An evil passion or influence.

(3) A most wicked, cruel or malevolent person; also (in weakened sense) a mischievous person, especially a child.

(4) A person who is extremely skillful in, energetic at, or devoted to a given activity, especially a sport.

(5) Of, pertaining to, characteristic of, or noting a demon.

(6) In computing, a part of a computer program, such as a help facility, that can run in the background behind the current task or application, and which will only begin to work when certain conditions are met or when it is specifically invoked; often styled daemon.

(7) A person's fears or anxieties (always in the plural and usually in the form “haunted by their demons” or “facing their demons”).

(8) In Greek mythology, a tutelary deity or spirit intermediate between the major Olympian gods and mankind, especially a deified hero or the entity which supposedly guided Socrates, telling him what not to do.

(9) In the thought experiments of both physics and philosophy, a hypothetical entity with special abilities postulated for the purposes required.

(10) A person's inner spirit or genius; a guiding or creative impulse (archaic).

(11) In card games, a type of patience or solitaire played in the UK & US.

(12) Any of various hesperiid butterflies of the genera Notocrypta and Udaspes.

Circa 1200-1250: From the Middle English demon (an evil spirit, malignant supernatural being, an incubus, a devil), from the Medieval Latin dēmōn, daemōn & daemoniumm (lar, familiar spirit, guardian spirit), from the Ancient Greek daimónion (thing of divine nature (though when used by Jewish and Christian writers: “evil spirit”)), neuter of daimónios, from δαίμων (daímōn) (deity, divine power; lesser god; guiding spirit, tutelary deity) and in both the Greek and Latin, the meanings sometime extended to souls of the dead and “one's genius, lot, or fortune”.  Ultimate root was the primitive Indo-European dai-mon (divider, provider (of fortunes or destinies)) from the root da (to divide).  The alternative spellings daemon & daimon was used in specialized senses and remain a favourite of the modern gaming industry; daimon was a transliteration of the Greek daimōn which was deployed to avoid the post-classical associations of demon (often in the adjectival form daimonic).  The demoness (female demon) dates from the 1630s.  Demon is a noun; the noun plural is demons.

Crooked Hillary Clinton depicted as a demon (believed to be digitally-altered image).

The malignant sense existed in English from the start because the Greek word was used (with daimonion) in Christian Greek translations and the Vulgate (the principal Latin version of the Bible, prepared mainly by the theologian Saint Jerome (circa 344-Circa 420) in the late fourth century, and (as revised in 1592) adopted as the official text for the Roman Catholic Church) for "god of the heathen, heathen idol" and also for "unclean spirit".  This was also part of the Jewish tradition where authors had used the Greek word in this sense, using it to render shedim (lords, idols) in the Septuagint and in Matthew 8:31 there appears daimones, translated as deofol in the Old English & feend or deuil in the Middle English.  A more evocative word in the Old English word was hellcniht (literally "hell-knight").  The inherited sense from the Ancient Greek (supernatural agent or intelligence lower than a god; a ministering spirit) appeared in English from the 1560s, written variously as daemon or daimon.  The meaning "destructive or hideous person" is from the 1610s and as "an evil agency personified" (ie the demon drink), from 1712.  In another sense in late fourteenth century English, the “Demon of Socrates” was a daimonion (a divine principle or inward oracle) although his accusers (and later the Church Fathers) represented this otherwise.  The Demon Star (1895) is Algol (variable star (Beta Persei)) in the constellation Perseus, documented in the late fourteenth century, which translates literally as "the Demon" from the Arabic al-ghul (the demon), from which is derived the modern ghoul.  It corresponds, in modern representations of the constellation, to the gorgon's head Perseus holds, but probably it was so called because it visibly varies in brightness every three days, which sets it apart from other bright stars.  In one of the most famous fragments of English verse, Samuel Taylor Coleridge’s (1772-1834) Kubla Khan (1798), there are the lines:

A savage place! as holy and enchanted

As e'er beneath a waning moon was haunted

By woman wailing for her demon-lover!

The noun demonarchy (rule or dominion of demons) first appeared in the 1640s while the noun demonology (the study of demons or beliefs about demons) had appeared in both secular and church documents as early as the 1590s, the related terms of the discipline being demonologer & demonological.  The adjective demonic (also daemonic) (devilish, of the nature of or pertaining to a demon), from the Latin daemonicus dates from the 1660s while demonical (from the Old English glossed daemonicus with deofelseoc (devil-sick) was from later in the century.  The adjective demoniac (possessed by a demon, insane) was from circa 1400 but several decades earlier there had been the noun demoniak, (one who is possessed, a lunatic), from the Late Latin daemoniacus, from the Greek daimoniakos (possessed by a demon), from diamond.  From the 1640s the adjective was used in the sense of "of or pertaining to demons or spirits" while by 1820 this had extended to a rather softened "devilish"; the related forms were demoniacal & demoniacally.

Lindsay Lohan in demonic pose to celebrate her twenty-third birthday, 2009.

The verb demonize (also demonise) (to make into a demon (literally or figuratively)) dates from 1778, either as a construct built from the noun or from the Medieval Latin daemonizare, all influenced by the Greek daimonizesthai (to be under the power of a tutelary deity) and the sense in the New Testament of "to be possessed by a demon”, the related forms demonized, demonizing & demonization all in use by the late eighteenth century.  The noun Pandæmonium (pandemonium the modern form) was in 1667 coined by John Milton (1608-1674) in Paradise Lost as the name of the palace built in the middle of Hell (the high capital of Satan and all his peers and the abode of all the demons), the construct being the Greek pan- (all) + the Late Latin daemonium (evil spirit) from the Greek daimonion (inferior divine power) from daimōn (in the sense of lesser god).

The Dodge Demons

The 1969 Dodge Swinger 340 (left), a platform familiar in Australia where it was produced (1969-1971) in a variety of configurations including a two-door hardtop (a 1971 VG Regal 770 (centre)) and four-door sedans (a 1971 long-wheelbase VIP (right)).

The Dodge Dart of the mid 1960s was a compact (in US terms) economy car which fulfilled its role well, lasting indeed until the late 1970s when it turned out to be in many ways superior to its ill-fated replacements.  However, an unusual conjunction of economic, legislative and demographic factors in the late 1960s made the Dart an ideal platform for a cheap muscle car which could easily and quickly be built from the corporate parts bin.  Its humble origins were never entirely disguised and it always lurked behind the sturm und drang of the bigger, more illustrious models like the Charger, Challenger and Daytona but as a bargain-priced muscle car, it deserved success.  Dodge had tentatively dipped the Dart’s toe into the muscle car waters in 1967 when it introduced the Dart GTS which, fitted with a 273 cubic inch (4.4 litre) V8 performed admirably given its modest specification but it the next year it became available with a new 340 cubic inch (5.5 litre) V8 which, thought under-rated at 275 (gross) horsepower, was one of the best units of the era.  Able in most cases to match the performance offered by much of the bigger-engined competition, reviews were positive and in 1969 a separate line called the Swinger 340 was released, a package which convinced Dodge to abandon its brief flirtation with overkill, not renewing the availability of the 383 & 440 cubic inch (6.3 & 7.2 litre) V8 engines in the platform.  The big-block engines were really suitable only for a drag strip, the lighter 340 a better idea.

1971 Dodge Demon 340.

Demon decal with demonic pitchfork.

In 1971, the Dart received an additional body style, borrowed from their corporate companion Plymouth which had added the Duster coupé as a stylish addition to the Valiant line, their equivalent of the compact Dart.  However, Dodge’s marketing people in the early 1970s either smoked too much weed or didn’t get out enough because shortly after flirting with the idea of adding statutory grape to their paint colour charts, they decided to call their new high-performance compact the Demon.  That upset the Christian lobby, influential even then but remarkably, the marketing department was going to use the name Beaver until more worldly types told them about its use in slang.  The churches weren’t best pleased about Demon but, given the scriptural basis, they relented despite the cartoon devil on a decal stuck to the fenders.  The churches, not impressed with a marketing strategy which seemed to support the Antichrist weren’t convinced by the explanation that it was all about a play on words (Come in for a Demon-stration) and continued to protest.  Dodge persisted and although denied statutory grape, buyers could choose lurid colors like Go-Green and Citron Yella while for those intent on building the quickest version possible, there was the Demon Sizzler package which bundled a number of dress-up and high performance options.  It was a good combination at a low price but it was out-sold by the mechanically identical Plymouth Duster 340s possibly because the Christian lobby had actually organized the preaching of sermons condemning Dodge as doing the Devil’s work so in 1973 the Demon nomenclature (and the offending cartoon) was dropped, the thing re-branded to the bland Dart Sport, a line which ran for three years (although the once virile 340 would be detuned and then replaced with a much milder 360 cubic inch (5.9 litre) unit.  The Christian lobby thus claimed the demon’s scalp although they never managed to veto Dodge’s use of Swinger and today, the 1971 & 1972 Demon 340s are sought-after.  Production numbers were never high (10,098 & 8,700 respectively) and give its cheap, disposable nature, and the buyers attracted to such things over the decades, attrition rates were high and survivors are few although, as just about everywhere in the muscle car ecosystem, there’s a minor industry in creating clones.

Demon redux: 2018 Dodge Challenger Demon.  The yellow plastic guard on the leading edge of the front splitter was attached at the factory to deter damage during transport to dealerships.  The instruction was to remove them prior to sale but they picked up a cult following and many buyers insisted they be retained.

Chrysler reprised the Dodge Demon name in 2018 (and Swinger in 2022) apparently with little theological opposition.  The engine used in the new Demon was an evolution of the 376 cubic inch (6.2 litre) Hemi V8 which, in 2017’s Challenger Hellcat, was rated at 707 horsepower.  With production limited to 3300 units, the 2018 Demon used a supercharged Hemi which produced 808 hp but an optional package boosted that to 840.  So equipped, the Demon would cover a standing quarter-mile (400m) in 9.65 seconds at 140 mph (225 km/h) and cost was a remarkably modest US$86,091 including the optional package which, while not entirely suitable for driving on public roads, was completely street-legal.  It included a number of features which hinted at its real purpose, including the passenger and rear seats being no-cost options and, most intriguingly, a high-output mode which both increased power and disabled the cabin air-conditioning, routing its cooling flow instead to the induction system, a device that lowered the intake temperature by 18-odd degrees, thereby gaining a few more horsepower.  Although tuned for quarter-mile sprints and thus limiting top-speed to about 170 mph (270 km/h), it could be geared for top end performance and would easily exceed 200 mph (320 km/h).

Mad

Mad (pronounced mad)

(1) Mentally disturbed; deranged; insane; demented.

(2) Enraged; greatly provoked or irritated; angry.

(3) As madman or (metaphorically) mad dog, a person abnormally furious; ferocious (and can be applied literally to animals (mad bull etc), especially dogs afflicted with rabies (a rabid dog).

(4) Extremely foolish or unwise; imprudent; irrational.

(5) Wildly excited or confused; frantic (often as “in mad haste”).

(6) Overcome by desire, eagerness, enthusiasm etc; excessively or uncontrollably fond of (usually) someone; infatuated; (often as “madly in love”).

(7) Wildly lively and merry; enjoyably hilarious.

(8) Of extremes in climatic conditions (of wind, storms, etc), furious in violence.

(9) An angry or ill-tempered period, mood, or spell.

(10) As MAD, the acronym for mutually assured destruction: a theory of nuclear warfare deterrence whereby each side in a conflict has the capacity to destroy the other in retaliation for a nuclear attack.

(11) The acronym for the Militärischer Abschirmdienst, a counterintelligence agency of the German military (essentially the successor to the old Abwehr (1920-1944)).

(12) The acronym, in admiralty administration, for the Maritime anomaly detection in Global Maritime Situational Awareness, for avoiding maritime collisions

(13) The acronym, in astronomy, for the Magnetic anomaly detector which detects variations in Earth's magnetic field.

(14) The acronym, in high-energy physics, for the Methodical Accelerator Design, a CERN scripting language used in particle acceleration.

Pre 900: From the Middle English mad (adjective) & madden (an intransitive verb, derived from the adjective), from the Old English gemǣd, past participle of gemǣdan (to make mad), akin to gemād (troubled in mind; demented, insane, foolish).  It was cognate with the Old Saxon gemēd, the Old Norse meitha (to hurt, damage) and the Old High German gimeit (foolish, silly, crazy).  In the Old English, gemǣded was the past participle of gemǣdan (to render insane).  As an adjective, the comparative is madder and the superlative maddest but the strangest adjectival form is probably the very English maddish, suggesting some state between displeased and actually mad.  The ultimate root of the Old English forms was the Germanic adjective gamaidaz (changed for the worse, abnormal), the element “maid” from the primitive Indo-European moi-, a variant of the root mei- & moi- (to change, exchange, go, move), extended with a dental suffix (-d in Germanic; -t elsewhere).  The same suffixed variant moit- appears in the Latin mūtāre (to change, exchange, give and receive in exchange), familiar in COVID-19-era English as mutate.  The Sicilian Greek (a fork by virtue of geography always most likely to be influenced by Latin) has the noun moîtos (thanks, favor, reward), presumably a borrowing from the Old Latin moitus.  Mad is an adjective, verb & adverb; madder & maddeningness are nouns, adjectives & verbs, maddest, maddish & maddening are adjectives, madly & maddeningly are adverbs and madden & maddens are verbs; the noun use of mad is non-standard.

The synonyms for mad exist in its four senses (1) lunatic, maniacal, psychotic, crazed, crazy, nuts, kooky, nutty, insane, (2) furious, exasperated, livid, raging, wrathful, irate, (3) ill-advised; unsafe, dangerous, perilous & (4) absurd, fantastic, delirious, wondrous.  There is much overlap in the synonyms, insane historically meant “not sane, mentally unstable” but is now popular with the Instagram generation as a general expression of approval and "bonkers", while still meaning “not sane, mentally unstable” also (except in the US) has come to be used in an entirely non-pejorative way to suggest something astonishing in the sense of something or someone verging on the irrational but in some way inspiring; absurd works in a similar way.

Bonkers: 2023 Dodge Challenger SRT Demon 170.

Because it makes Greta Thunberg (b 2003) mad, the likes of the SRT Demon 170 won’t be seen again but an off-the-shelf machine which can generate 1,025 horsepower makes a fine swansong.  To make Ms Thunberg madder still, it’s noted the induction system is capable of providing more fuel flow per minute than the average US showerhead and in a nice touch the purchaser will receive a commemorative Demon 170 decanter set.  Thousand horsepower cars for the street have traditionally been the preserve of madmen but mad women should be encouraged to give one a try.   

The word appears often in idiomatic use including “mad as a March hare” which alluded to hares becoming especially active in spring their mating season; “mad as a meat axe”, an especially evocative piece of Australian slang which is self-explanatory to anyone who has seen an un-skilled operator use a meataxe on a carcass and “barking mad”, the origin of which is mysterious.  The best story links it with the existence of a medieval lunatic asylum in the grounds of the royal monastery Barking Abbey (located in what is now the London borough of Barking and Dagenham) but there’s no evidence of use before the early twentieth century and most etymologists have concluded there’s a link with the idea “mad dogs” incessantly bark.  The London slang use suggesting someone is “three stops past Barking” is thought to have be an opportunistic adoption referencing the “barking” and in the vein of something like “a picnic short of a sandwich” which suggests some degree of mental incapacity.  There was even “shorthand slang” based on this idea: were one to be called “daggers”, it meant one was “three stops past Barking”, Dagenham being three stations beyond Barking on the London Underground.

The original meaning of mad was “insane, demented, disturbed of mind”, a sense inherited with the word from the Germanic forms.  The progression in meaning seems to have begun circa 1300 when the senses (1) “mad dog” (dog afflicted with rabies (rabid)), (2) “foolish or unwise” and (3), “overcome by desire or eagerness” emerged; the meaning “enraged, angry” not recorded until circa 1400.  This sense of mad quickly became the usual colloquial term in the United States whereas “angry” long persisted as the popular form elsewhere in the English-speaking world although the increasing US cultural influence noted since the mid-twentieth century makes these distinctions probably less noticeable.  The sense “wildly lively, merry” is said to be an innovation of African-American English associated with jazz and dating from the 1940s.  For those learning English, “mad” must seem a strange word given the social difficulties engendered if one accidently mixes up being “mad about you” with “mad at you”.  So students should be given practical examples such as: "I am mad about him" (I would like to enjoy intimacy with him); "I am mad at him" (I am angry with him or I would like to kill him); "He is mad" (he appears mentally unstable).

Lindsay Lohan and her lawyer in court, Los Angeles, December 2011.

Another thing for them to learn was that wad was one of those words listed as a class-identifier by Professor Alan Ross (1907-1980), Professor of Linguistics at the University of Birmingham who in 1954 coined "U" (upper-class) and "non-U" (non-Upper-Class) to describe the differences social class makes in their use of English.  While his article included differences in pronunciation and writing styles, it was his list of variations in vocabulary which attracted most interest.  One difference he noted was the upper-class call the obviously unstable “mad” whereas the lower classes tend to label them “mental”.  Professor Ross published his illustrative glossary "U" and "non-U", differentiating the speech patterns in English social classes, in a Finnish academic journal and used extracts from Nancy Mitford’s (1904–1973 and the oldest of the Mitford sisters, all but one of whom society's more conventional types were apt to label "mad") 1945 novel The Pursuit of Love to provide examples of the patterns of speech of the upper class.  This pleased Nancy Mitford who interpolated the professor’s work into an article about the English gentry she was writing for Stephen Spender's (1909-1995) literary magazine Encounter (1953-1990).  Although not best-pleased that her discussion of the Ross thesis was the only part of her piece to attract attention, more amusing was the subsequent re-publication in 1956 in her Noblesse Oblige: an Enquiry into the Identifiable Characteristics of the English Aristocracy which, augmented with contributions from John Betjeman (1906–1984) and Evelyn Waugh (1903–1966), meant that for decades she was the acknowledged authority on upper-class speech, manners and ways.  Her class-conscious readers had taken it all more seriously than she had intended.

Until probably sometime in the nineteenth century, for all but a few specialists, the condition of madness was relatively simple: people were mad or sane and while it was noted one could become the other, once labeled as mad one was by most, probably always thought mad and the punchy succinctness of the word could produce a memorable phrase such as the one used by Lady Caroline Lamb (1785–1828) to describe her lover, Lord Byron (George Gordon Byron 1788–1824): "Mad, bad, and dangerous to know".  The only widely observed nuances were behavioral and that was because madness was an observational diagnosis; there were those who were mad, slightly mad, quite mad and barking mad, hardly clinically exact descriptors but it’s doubtful many misunderstood what was being conveyed.  Modernity’s advances in neurology and pharmacology allowed the creation of psychiatry which began to gain a grudging acknowledged respectability in the medical profession around the turn of the century and it been a growth industry since.  The American Psychiatric Association’s (APA) Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM), when first published (DSM-I, 1952) was a slim volume of 130 pages which listed 106 mental disorders but by the time the fifth edition (DSM-5, 2013) was released it had grown to 947 pages although interestingly, the number of specific diagnoses was reduced from 172 in DSM-IV (1987) to 157, something of an achievement given 15 new mental illnesses were added.  It is though bit of a definitional minefield and there are those who suggest that once deconstructed, there are really over 300 identifiable conditions, some of the official 157 categories better thought of as groups or clusters.  However the count is done, nobody is expecting DSM-6 to contain fewer pages, whatever method is used to define the conditions so it seems there must been more to madness than once convenient mad-sane binary.

How much the proliferation of diagnosed madness is mission-creep and how much better understanding is a debate, mostly outside the profession.  Some of it is certainly an attempt to secure market-share for the psychiatrists, some “conditions” once thought normal as part of the spectrum of the human condition now listed as a disorder to be referred for treatment and in some cases this is doubtlessly a good thing although quite how reassuring a diagnosis of “generalized anxiety disorder” (GAD) is for a patient may be questionable.  GAD may also be overkill, the psychoanalyst having long supplanted the priest for those who can afford the hourly-rate, market share seems well secured.

Some of Louis Wain's drawings of cats, all reputed to date from his time of incarceration in a mental hospital during the 1930s.

The English artist Louis Wain (1860–1939) was a noted painter of cats, sometimes naturalistic, sometimes stylized and often anthropomorphic.  In his sixties he was diagnosed with schizophrenia and confined to a series of mental institutions, settling eventually in Napsbury Hospital, north of London.  By the standards of the time it was a convivial place with a park and a colony of cats and while his condition worsened, the frequency of his psychotic episodes decreased but drawings of cats he continued to produce became increasingly abstract, intricate and bizarre.  After 1930, he would never again leave Napsbury and there, in 1939, he died aged 78.

For a long time his paintings of cats have been used to illustrate an artist's descent into madness, a theme popular in those circles in which the notion of the "disturbed genius" is a cult.  However, the thesis has been questioned, notably on the technical ground of chronology; being undated, it can't be guaranteed the sequence of drawings as they're usually assembled are an accurate lineal progression of his work and doubt has been case even on the diagnosis of schizophrenia, some speculating the then not well understood medication used in the era to treat the condition may have contributed to his symptoms.

Bonk

Bonk (pronounced bongk)

(1) A bump on the head (usually not severe).

(2) To hit, strike, collide etc; any minor collision or blow.

(3) In slang, a brief intimacy between two people, usually with a suggestion of infidelity; often modified with the adjective quick and only ever used where the act is consensual (less common in North America).

(4) In sports medicine, a condition of sudden, severe fatigue in an endurance sports event, typically induced by glycogen depletion (also in the phrase “hit the wall”).

(5) In snowboarding, to hit something with the front of the board, especially in midair.

(6) In zoology, an animal call resembling "bonk" (such as the call of the pobblebonk (any of various Australian frogs of the genus Limnodynastes)).

1931: A creation of Modern English, the origin remains uncertain but most suspect it was likely imitative of sounds of impact (like bong, bump, bounce or bang) and thus onomatopoetic.  As a slang term for an affaire de coeur, use was first noted in 1975 and has always, depending on context, carried an implication of something illicit or quickly done; purely recreational though always consensual.  The use in sports medicine describing the condition of glycogen depletion references a metaphorical impact as in “hitting the wall”, the first known use in 1952 in endurance sports medicine.  Bonkee, as a descriptor for a "woman of loose virtue", appears to have been a 2014 creation which never caught on which is a shame because there are all sorts of cases where the companion terms "bonker" & "bonkee" might have been handy .  The form "bonkers", referring to the deranged, dated from circa 1957 and was apparently unrelated to the earlier naval slang for “drunk” but alluded rather to what could be the the consequence of a “bonk on the head”.  The third-person singular simple present is bonks, the present participle, bonking and the simple past and past participle, bonked.  Bonk & bonking are nouns & verbs, bonker is a noun, bonky is an adjective, bonked is a verb and bonkers is a noun & adjective; the noun plural is bonks.

Bonkers: "Last Call" 2023 Dodge Challenger SRT Demon 170 in "plum crazy" (one of the retro colors which reprised those used by Chrysler in the "psychedelic era" of the late 1960s).  3300 were produced, many of which are now being advertised for sale at well above the RRP (recommended retail price).

The Demon 170 was released as part of Dodge’s “Last Call” programme which marked the end of the corporation's run of high-performance V8s, a tradition dating from the early 1950s.  Offered in a bewildering array of configurations in a process which was something like Nellie Melba's (1861-1931) "farewell" tours, the SRT Demon 170 was the most bonkers of a generally bonkers lot.  Rated at 1,025 hp (764 kW), the factory claimed it could accelerate from 0-60 mph (100 km/h) in 1.66 seconds with an elapsed time in the standing ¼ mile (400 metres for those who insist) of 8.91 seconds (terminal speed 151 mph (243 km/h)), setting the mark as the worlds quickest ever standard production car, a reasonable achievement for something weighing 4275 lbs (1939 kg).  By world standards it was also very cheap and on the basis of cost-breakdown vs performance, there was nothing like it on the planet.  In British (and other English-speaking regions although rare in the US) use, "bonkers" can and often is used in an entirely non-pejorative way to suggest something or someone verging on the irrational but in some way astonishing, admirable or inspiring.  Road cars with 600+ horsepower V8 & V12 engines are of course bonkers but we'll miss them when they're gone and it would seem the end is nigh.  Greta Thunberg (b 2003) has expressed no regret at the extinction of this species.  

Bonking Boris

Hand-turned fish bonkers on sale in Jaffray, a village in the south-western Canadian province of British Columbia (left) and the front page of The Sun (7 September 2018; right), a tabloid which rarely lets an alliterative opportunity pass by.  

The noun bonker is (1) a short, blunt hardwood club used by fishers efficiently to dispatch (ie bonking them dead) just-caught fish and (2) according to the Murdoch tabloid The Sun, the adulterous Boris Johnson (b 1964; UK prime-minister 2019-2022).  A bonk by Boris or the club and a not wholly dissimilar outcome ensues; a one-time employer called bonking Boris "ineffably duplicitous" and the estranged (now former) Mrs Johnson presumably agreed.  At the time, the former prime minister had "a bit of previous" in extra-marital bonking and when this one was announced, it was with an alliterative flourish not seen since the headline “BORIS BACKS BREXIT”.  His resignation from Theresa May's (Lady May, b 1956; UK prime-minister 2016-2019) government was unrelated to bonking (as far as is known) and came, in July 2018, three days after a cabinet meeting at Chequers (the prime-minister's country house), where agreement was reached on Mrs May’s Brexit strategy, a document compromised by the need to make a nonsensical impossibility look like good policy.  That can be done but it requires rare skill to be in Downing Street and it's been some time since that could be said. 

Freed by his resignation from the burdens of the Foreign Office, bonking Boris was clearly unconcerned at rumors his opponents in the party were assembling a dossier of some four-thousand words detailing his cheating ways, fondness for cocaine and failings of character and turned his attention to a campaign for the Tory leadership.  As wonderfully unpredictable as the politics of the time were fluid, nobody was quite sure whether he’d go into the inevitable election or second referendum as "leave" or "remain"; it would depend on this and that.  In the end, he remained a leaver and things worked out well, his election victory meaning that for one, brief, shining moment, the three world leaders with the best hair all had nuclear weapons at the same time.

Donald Trump (b 1946; US president 2017-2021; left), Boris Johnson (centre) and Kim Jong-un (Kim III, b 1982; Supreme Leader of DPRK (North Korea) since 2011; right).

Some hairstyles are more amenable than others to a quick post-bonk rectification.  Kim Jong-un's cut is probably quite good and would bounce back from a bonk with little more than a run-through with the fingers.  Donald Trump however would likely need both tools and product for a post-bonk fix.  Mr Trump usually appears well-fixed unless disturbed by breezes any higher than 2 on the Beaufort scale and even a perfunctory bonk is probably equal to at least 4 on the scale so it would have been interesting to see if Stormy Daniels (Stephanie Gregory, b 1979) lived up to her (stage) name although Mr Trump has denied that bonk ever happened.  Mr Johnson's hair so often looks post-bonk that either his conquests are more frequent even than has been rumored or he asks for a JBF with every cut.  One UK publication suggested exactly that, hinting his instruction was "not one hair in place".  That has the advantage for Mr Johnson in that it's a style essentially the same pre-bonk, mid-bonk and post-bonk and thus pricelessly ambiguous in that merely by looking at him, one couldn't tell if he was going to or coming from a bonk although, one assumes, whichever it was, a bonk would never be far from his mind.  Whatever the criticisms of Mr Johnson's premiership (and there were a few), it's to his eternal credit that in his resignation honours list Ms Kelly Jo Dodge (for 27 years the parliamentary hairdresser) was created a Member of the Most Excellent Order of the British Empire (MBE) for "parliamentary service".  In those decades, she can have faced few challenges more onerous than Mr Johnson’s hair yet never once failed to make it an extraordinary example in the (actually technically difficult) “not one hair in place” style.  Few honours have been so well deserved.

A bandaged Lindsay Lohan waking dazed and confused after a bonk on the head in Falling for Christmas (2022; left) and on the move in Irish Wish (2024).   

In May 2021, Netflix & Lindsay Lohan executed what became a three movie deal, the first (Falling for Christmas) released in the northern winter of 2022, just in time for the season.  She played the protagonist, a pampered heiress who loses her memory after suffering a bonk on the head, waking up to a new life.  The second Netflix release opens in February 2024 and in Irish Wish, the plotline involves her spontaneously wishing for something, subsequently waking up to find the wish granted.  So it’s a variation on the theme of the first (though without the bonk on the head), the twist being in the theme of “be careful what you wish for”.

Bonking Barnaby and the bonk ban

Malcolm Turnbull (b 1954; prime-minister of Australia 2015-2018), a student of etymology, was as fond as those at The Sun of alliteration and when writing his memoir (A Bigger Picture (2020)) he included a short chapter entitled "Barnaby and the bonk ban".  As well as the events which lent the text it's title, the chapter was memorable for his inclusion of perhaps the most vivid thumbnail sketch of Barnaby Joyce (b 1967; thrice (between local difficulties) deputy prime minister of Australia 2016-2022) yet penned:

"Barnaby is a complex, intense, furious personality.  Red-faced, in full flight he gives the impression he's about to explode.  He's highly intelligent, often good-humoured but also has a dark and almost menacing side - not unlike Abbott (Tony Abbott (b 1957; prime-minister of Australia 2013-2015)) - that seems to indicate he wrestles with inner troubles and torments."

Mr Turnbull and Mr Joyce in parliament, House of Representatives, Canberra, ACT.

The substantive matter was the revelation in mid-2017 the press had become aware Mr Joyce (a married man with four daughters) was (1) conducting an affair with a member of his staff and (2) that the young lady was with child.  Mr Turnbull recorded that when asked, Mr Joyce denied both "rumors", which does sound like a lie but in the narrow sense may have verged on "the not wholly implausible" on the basis that, as he pointed out in a later television interview, the question of paternity was at the time “...a bit of a grey area”.  Mr Joyce and his mistress later married and now have two children so all's well that end's well (at least for them) and Mr Turnbull didn't so much shut the gate after the horse had bolted as install inter-connecting doors in the stables.  His amendments to the Australian Ministerial Code of Conduct (an accommodating document very much in the spirit of Lord Castlereagh's (1769–1822; UK foreign secretary 1812-1822) critique of the Holy Alliance) banned ministers from bonking their staff which sounds uncontroversial but was silent on them bonking the staff of the minister in the office down the corridor.  So the net effect was probably positive in that staff having affairs with their ministerial boss would gain experience through cross-exposure to other portfolio areas although there's the obvious moral hazard in that they might be tempted to conduct trysts just to engineer a transfer in the hope of career advancement.  There are worse reasons for having an affair and a bonk for a new job seems a small price to pay.  It's been done before.

Bonk in progress, California State Polytechnic University, Humboldt, May 2024.

Bonk in the sense of “a blow to the head” was in May 2024 adapted for use in memes and other publicity tools associated with the protests staged on US university campuses demanding the institutions’ administrators divest from economic and other engagements with Israel and in support of the cause of the Palestinian people for (variously) statehood or freedom from repression.  The scenes were reminiscent of Vietnam War era protests but the emergence of the water-cooler jug as an icon of political dissent was an unexpected moment of levity.  The origin of that was a viral (“bonk, bonk, bonk”) video clip showing an unidentified protester at the California State Polytechnic University, Humboldt bonking a uniformed law-enforcement officer on the helmet with an empty jug (believed to be a capacity of 5 US gallons (19 litres)) of the type which sits atop a water cooler.

Although recalling the similarly alliterative “burn baby, burn” slogan chanted during the Watts race riots in Los Angeles in August 1965, the “bonk, bonk, bonk” was more a symbol of, if not exactly passive resistance, then certainly something short of actual violence although in a legal sense it may have been an instance of both assault and battery as well as other offences.  Around the country, stickers, posters and the inevitable T-shirts appeared within hours with slogans such as “Water Jug, Come and Take It” and “This machine bonks fascists”, a reference to the “THIS MACHINE KILLS FASCISTS” message the left-wing US folk singer Woody Guthrie (1912–1967) wrote on his guitars.  Whether the water jug (bonking and not) will endure as a symbol of protest will depend, like many aspects of language, on whether it gains a sustained critical mass of use.

The "bonk, bonk, bonk" viral video.  In the conventional sense the production values weren't high but that very quality of authenticity accounted for its success.

Ghost

Ghost (pronounced gohst)

(1) The soul of a dead person, a disembodied spirit imagined, usually as a vague, shadowy or evanescent form, as wandering among or haunting living persons.

(2) A mere shadow or semblance; a trace; a remote possibility; a faint trace or possibility of something.

(3) A spiritual being; the principle of life; soul; spirit (sometimes initial capital letter).

(4) A secondary image, especially one appearing on a television screen as a white shadow, caused by poor or double reception or by a defect in the receiver (also called ghosting).

(5) In photography, a faint secondary or out-of-focus image in a photographic print or negative resulting from reflections within the camera lens (also called ghost image).

(6) In optics, a series of false spectral lines produced by a diffraction grating with unevenly spaced lines.

(7) In metalworking, a streak appearing on a freshly machined piece of steel containing impurities.

(8) In pathology, a red blood cell having no hemoglobin.

(9) In tax-avoidance and other frauds, a fictitious employee, business etc, fabricated especially for the purpose of manipulating funds.

(10) In literature (and especially quasi-literature), as ghost-write, to write a book, speech etc for another often without attribution.

(11) In engraving, to lighten the background of a photograph before engraving.

(12) In informal use (often associated with social media), suddenly to end all contact with a person without explanation, especially a romantic relationship; to leave a social event or gathering suddenly without saying goodbye.

(13) In digital technology, to remove comments, threads, or other digital content from a website or online forum without informing the poster, keeping them hidden from the public but still visible to the poster.

(14) In bibliography, as ghost edition, an entry recorded in a bibliography of which no actual proof exists.

Pre 900: From the Middle English gost, gast & goost (breath; good or bad spirit, angel, demon; person, man, human being", in Biblical use "soul, spirit, life”), from the Old English gāst (breath, soul, spirit, ghost, being), related to the Old High German gaist & geist (spirit) and the Sanskrit hēda (fury, anger).  The Proto-West Germanic gaist was derived from the Proto-Germanic gaistaz (ghost, spirit, (source also of the Old Saxon gest, the Old Frisian jest, the Middle Dutch gheest, the Dutch geest & the German Geist (spirit, ghost))), from the primitive Indo-European ǵhéysd-os, from ǵhéysd- (anger, agitation) and was cognate with the Scots ghaist (ghost), the Saterland Frisian Gäist (spirit), the West Frisian geast (spirit), the Dutch geest (spirit, mind, ghost), the German Geist (spirit, mind, intellect), the Swedish gast (ghost), the Sanskrit हेड (héḍa), (anger, hatred) and the Persian زشت‎ (zešt) (ugly, hateful, disgusting).  There’s no documentary evidence but the ultimate root is conjectured to be the primitive Indo-European gheis-, used in forming words involving the notions of excitement, amazement, or fear (source also of Sanskrit hedah (wrath), the Avestan zaesha- (horrible, frightful), the Gothic usgaisjan and the Old English gæstan (to frighten).  Ghost is a noun & verb (and used imaginatively as an adjective), ghoster is a noun, ghostly & ghosty are adjectives, ghosting is a noun & verb and ghosted is a verb & adjective; the noun plural is ghosts.

Ghost is the English representative of West Germanic words for "supernatural being" and in Christian writings in Old English it was used to render the Latin spiritus, a sense preserved by the early translators of the Bible in “Holy Ghost”.  The sense of a "disembodied spirit of a dead person", especially imagined as wandering among the living or haunting them, is attested from the late fourteenth century, a meaning-shift which returned the word to what was its probable prehistoric sense.  Most Indo-European words for "soul or spirit" also double with reference to supernatural spirits.  Many have also a base sense of "appearance" (the Greek phantasma; the French spectre; the Polish widmo, from Old Church Slavonic videti (to see), the Old English scin, the Old High German giskin (originally "appearance, apparition”), related to the Old English scinan & the Old High German skinan (to shine)).  Other concepts exist, including the French revenant (literally "returning" (from the other world)), the Old Norse aptr-ganga, (literally "back-comer") & the Breton bugelnoz (literally "night-child”).  The Latin manes (spirits of the dead) was probably a euphemism.

The gh- spelling appeared early in the fifteenth century in Caxton, influenced by Flemish and Middle Dutch gheest, but was rare in English before mid-1500s.  The sense of a "slight suggestion, mere shadow or semblance" (as in ghost image, ghost of a chance etc) is noted from the 1610s; the sense of "one who secretly does work for another" is from 1884 and ghost-write was a 1922 back-formation from the earlier (1919) ghost-writing.  The American Indian ghost dance was first noted in 1890, ghost town is from 1908, ghost story dates from 1811, the now extinct ghost-word (apparent word or false form in a manuscript due to a blunder) is from 1886.  The “ghost in the machine” was English philosopher Gilbert Ryle's (1900-1976) 1949 description of René Descartes' (1596-1650) mind-body dualism and the phrase "to give up the ghost" (to die or prepare to die) was well-known in Old English.  Synonyms include phantom, devil, demon, soul, shadow, spectre, vision, vampire, apparition, revenant, appearance, haunt, visitor, shade, spook, poltergeist, phantasm, wraith, daemon & manes.  There are a surprising number of uses of ghost, ghosted, ghosting etc said to be associated modern or internet slang covering fields as diverse as linguistic techniques and the art & science of smoking weed.  However, the most commonly used describes someone with whom one has been in contact suddenly stops responding, disappearing, as it were, like a ghost.  This can happen in conjunction with unfriending etc but can be an act in isolation.

One day, there may be Lindsay Lohan: The autobiography.

Ghostwriters (also as ghost-writer) are professional writers hired to create content (books, columns, posts or any other text-focused item), the authorship of which will ultimately will be credited to another.  Ghostwriters are used for a number of reasons including constraints of time, a lack of interest in the project (though not the profits) or, typically, a lack of the necessary skill with the written word.  Ghostwriting contracts can vary but focus on including terms of payment, non-disclosure of involvement, the notional author’s exercise of veto over all or some of the content and the rights to the finished work.  Donald Trump (b 1946; US president 2017-2021) is known to have used ghostwriters on several occasions and the arrangements are not always concealed, Paris Hilton (b 1981) in her 2023 memoir's acknowledgments thanking the ghostwriter who “helped me find my voice”.  Mr Trump made no mention of his ghostwriters.    

Holy Ghost vs Holy Spirit in Blblical Translation

Pentecostés (Descent of the Holy Spirit) (circa 1545), oil on canvas by Tiziano Vecelli (or Vecellio), (circa 1489-1576; known in English as Titian), basalica of Santa Maria della Salute, Venice.

The Trinity is one of Christianity’s central doctrines, the unity of Father, Son, and Holy Spirit as three persons in the one Godhead.  One of the most important Christian affirmations about God, it’s rooted in the idea God came to meet Christians in a threefold figure: (1) as Creator, Lord of the history of salvation, Father, and Judge, as revealed in the Old Testament; (2) as the Lord who, in the incarnated figure of Jesus Christ, lived among human beings and was present in their midst as the “Resurrected One”; and (3) as the Holy Spirit, whom they experienced as the helper or intercessor in the power of the new life.  In the Roman Catholic Church, the Sign of the Cross is made in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.

It’s a myth that prior to the Second Vatican Council (Vatican II; 1962-1965), the Third Person of the Trinity was always referred to in English as the Holy Ghost and one of the council’s decisions was to replace this with Holy Spirit.  Although it’s true Pope Pius XII (1876–1958, pope 1939-1958) authorized several bilingual rites which included Holy Spirit, this was merely procedural and a formalization of processes for the publishing of new editions of existing works. Well before the twentieth century, the shift to Holy Spirit had become almost universal in translation although use of the older form persisted because of the reverence for tradition among some congregations (if not always the clergy) and a fondness, particularly in the Anglican community, for earlier translations, especially the Book of Common Prayer (1549-1622) and the King James version of the Bible (KJV: 1611).

The change reflects the evolution of words. In the theological context, Holy Ghost and Holy Spirit mean exactly the same thing.  The early translators were influenced by ghost being of Germanic origin and, as the Old English gast inherited the original meaning “soul, life, breath, good or bad spirit, angel or demon”, they used gast to translate the Latin Spiritus, thus Holy Ghost.  Although the more modern sense of a disembodied dead person dates from the late fourteenth century, it long remained rare and when translating the Bible into English the scholars behind the KJV opted mostly to use Holy Ghost which enjoys ninety entries compared with seven for Holy Spirit.  Either as literature or theology, there’s nothing in the texts to suggest any difference of meaning between the two, the conclusion of biblical scholars being the choices were wholly arbitrary and probably an unintentional consequence of the KJV being translated from the Greek into English by different committees.  One committee translated hagion pneuma as Holy Spirit while the other preferred Holy Ghost and when the work of the two bodies was combined, the differences remained.  In English, the meaning shift of ghost was induced essentially by its adoption in literature and popular culture, the sense long universally understood to be that of the spectre of a deceased person or a demonic apparition, hardly an association the church found helpful.  It hasn’t wholly been replaced however, some editions of the Book of Common Prayer still are printed with the phrase “He may receive the benefits of absolution, together with ghostly counsel and advice, to the quieting of his conscience.”

Unrelated to etymological matters however, there is one fine theological point about the Trinity.  It took some time for the Patristic Fathers (the early Christian writers of the period generally considered to run from the end of New Testament times or end of the Apostolic Age (circa 100 AD) to either the Council of Chalcedon (451 AD) or the Second Council of Nicaea (787 AD)) to work out the Trinity was three persons, but one God.  The Old Testament foretold the visit to earthly life of the Messiah, but did not name him explicitly as Jesus, seeing the Holy Spirit as a manifestation of God, but did not see Him as a separate person of the one Godhead.  Despite the implications of that, at least since Augustine (354–430), it’s never been an orthodox view the Old Testament should be thought incomplete.  Benedict XVI (1927–2022; pope 2005-2013, pope emeritus 2013-2022), always one to find a fine theological point, noted “Christians do not read the Old Testament for its own sake but always with Christ and through Christ, as a voyage to Truth through continuing Revelation.”

A century apart: Rolls-Royce Silver Ghost (left) and Paris Hilton's Rolls-Royce Ghost (Right).

The Rolls-Royce Silver Ghost (1906-1926) was the car which cemented the company's reputation and sometime during its production, it may well have deserved to be regarded "the best car in the world", at term which long ago ceased to be useful but Rolls-Royce have probably always deserved to be thought "the best-made cars in the world".  Some might have matched the quality of the fit and finish but it's doubtful any have ever done it better and such was the reputation the Silver Ghost quickly gained that the name overtook the line.  Originally, the Silver Ghost had been but one model in a range available on their standard (40/50 hp) chassis but the name so captured the public imagination that eventually, the factory relented and when the first of the Phantom line was release in 1926, Silver Ghost for all the 40/50 cars it became.  Perhaps surprisingly, although in the subsequent century there were many uses of the "silver" adjective (Silver Wraith, Silver Dawn, Silver Cloud, Silver Shadow, Silver Spirit, Silver Spur & Silver Seraph), it wasn't until 2009 the "Ghost" name was revived and it remains in production still, the line augmented in 2011 by the Ghost Extended Wheelbase (EWB).

RAF Rolls-Royce Silver Ghost armored car, Iraq, circa 1936.

The Silver Ghost also had what may seem an improbable career as a military vehicle, the factory eventually building 120 armored cars on the chassis which was famously robust because of the need to survive on the often rough roads throughout the British Empire.  Although the period of intended service on the Western Front was shortened when the war of movement anticipated upon the outbreak of hostilities soon gave way to the effectively static trench warfare, the machines proved ideally suited to operations in the Middle East, the most famous the squadron used by TE Lawrence (Lawrence of Arabia; 1888–1935) in battles against the Ottoman forces during World War I (1914-1918).  Lawrence remarked the Rolls-Royces were “more valuable than rubies” in desert combat and that he’d be content with one for the rest of his life were it to be supplied with tyres and petrol, the big, heavy Ghosts chewing rapidly through both.  In many parts of the empire, numbers of the armoured cars remained in service well into the 1930s, valued especially by the Raj in India.  The last one was retired from service with the Irish Free State in 1944, new tyres being unobtainable.