Hellacious
(pronounced he-ley-shuhs)
(1) Horrible,
awful, hellish, agonizing
(2) Nasty,
repellent.
(3) Formidably
difficult.
(4) In slang,
remarkable, astonishing, unbelievable, unusual.
1930s: US campus
slang, the construct being from hell + -acious. Hell dates from pre 900 and was from
the Middle English Hell, from the Old
English hel & hell (nether world, abode of the dead,
infernal regions, place of torment for the wicked after death). In the sense of “pour” it was cognate with
the Old High German hella & hellia (source of the Modern German Hölle), the Icelandic hella (to pour), the Norwegian helle (to pour), the Swedish hälla (to pour), the Old Norse hel & hella and the Gothic halja. It was related to the Old English helan (to cover, hide) and to hull.
The Old English gained hel
& hell from the Proto-Germanic haljō (the underworld) & halija (one who covers up or hides
something), the source also of the Old Frisian helle, the Old Saxon hellia,
the Dutch hel, the Old Norse hel, the German Hölle & the Gothic halja
(hell). The meaning in the early
Germanic languages was derived from the sense of a "concealed place",
hence the Old Norse hellir meaning
"cave or cavern", from the primitive Indo-European root kel (to cover, conceal, save). In sacred art, Hell, whether frozen or afire,
is often depicted as a cavernous place.
Hell is a noun & verb; hellman, hellcat, hellhound & hellfare
are nouns and hellish, helllike, hellproof & helly are adjectives; the noun
plural is hells.
In the
sense of “the underworld”, it was cognate with the Saterland Frisian Hälle (hell), the West Frisian hel (hell), the Dutch hel (hell), the German Low German Hell (hell), the German Hölle (hell), the Norwegian helvete (hell) and the Icelandic hel (the abode of the dead, death). The
English traditions of use were much influenced by Norse mythology and the
Proto-Germanic forms. In the Norse
myths, Halija (one who covers up or
hides something) was the name of the daughter of Loki who rules over the evil
dead in Niflheim, the lowest of all
worlds (from nifl (mist)) and it was
not uncommon for pagan concepts and traditions to be grafted onto Christian
rituals and idiom. Hell was used
figuratively to describe a state of misery or bad experience (of which there
must have been many in the Middle Ages) since the late fourteenth century and
as an expression of disgust by the 1670s.
In eighteenth century England, there were a number of Hellfire Clubs,
places where members of the elite could indulge their “immoral proclivities”. The clubs were said to attract many
politicians.
The suffix
–acious suffix was used to form adjectives from nouns and verb stems and
produced many familiar forms (audacious from audacity, sagacious from sage, fallacious from fallacy etc). There were also formations which became rare
or were restricted to specialized fields including fumacious ((1) smoky or (2)
fond of smoking tobacco), lamentacious (characterized by lamentation (sorrow,
distress or regret)), marlacious (containing large quantities of marl (in
geology, a mixed earthy substance, consisting of carbonate of lime, clay, and
possibly sand, in very variable proportions, and accordingly designated as
calcareous, clayey, or sandy), and punacious (an individual prone to punning
(making puns). The suffix
was attractive also when coining fanciful terms such as quizzacious (mocking or
satirical (based on the verb quiz (in the sense of “to mock”) and bodacious. Bodacious remains probably the best known in
this genre and seems to have begun as US slang, south of the Mason-Dixon Line
and was (as bodaciously) documented as early as 1837 but may previously have been
part of the oral tradition. Etymologists
conclude it was either (1) a blend of bold and audacious or a back-formation
from bodyaciously (bodily, totally, root and branch) which seems to have been
most prevalent is South Carolina where it was used in the sense of “the process
of totally wrecking something”. In the
US the word evolved to mean (1) audacious and unrestrained, (2) incorrigible
and insolent and (3) impressively great in size, and enormous; extraordinary. In the early twentieth century, apparently
influenced by campus use (presumably male students in this linguistic vanguard)
it was a synonym for “a sexy, attractive girl” and this may have influenced users
in the internet age who seem to have assumed first element came directly from “body”.
Of being
hungry in the heat: Fox News, July 2006.
According to linguistic trend-setters
Fox News, “hellacious” is the best word to describe the state of being “hot & hungry” so it’s not a portmanteau like “hangry” (one who is “hungry & angry”,
the construct being h(ungry) + angry) but Fox News says it’s the best word so
it must be true. Hellacious was likely
from the tradition of audacious, sagacious, vivacious etc and came to be a word
with intensive or augmentative force.
Because it can mean something negative (horrible, awful, hellish,
agonizing, nasty, repellent etc), something challenging (formidably difficult)
or (used as slang) something positive (remarkable, astonishing, unbelievable, unusual),
the context in which it’s used can be important in determining quite the sense
intended. Even then, if there’s not
enough to work with, an author’s meaning can be ambiguous. Fort the fastidious the comparative is “more
hellacious” and the superlative “most hellacious” and the (rare) alternative
spellings are helatious & hellaceous.
Hellacious is an adjective, hellaciousness is a noun, hellaciously is an
adverb.
Google
ngram (a quantitative and not qualitative measure).
For technical reasons this
should not be taken too seriously but Google’s ngram appears to suggest use of
“hellacious” has spiked every time the US has elected as president the
Republican Party nominee, sharp increases in use associated with the terms of Richard
Nixon (1913-1994; US president 1969-1974), Ronald Reagan (1911-2004; US
president 1981-1989), George W Bush (George XLIII, b 1946; US president
2001-2009) and Donald Trump (b 1946; US president 2017-2021 and since 2025). Political junkies can make of this what the
will. Because of the way Google harvests
data for their ngrams, they’re not literally a tracking of the use of a word in
society but can be usefully indicative of certain trends, (although one is
never quite sure which trend(s)), especially over decades. As a record of actual aggregate use, ngrams
are not wholly reliable because: (1) the sub-set of texts Google uses is
slanted towards the scientific & academic and (2) the technical limitations
imposed by the use of OCR (optical character recognition) when handling older
texts of sometime dubious legibility (a process AI should improve). Where numbers bounce around, this may reflect
either: (1) peaks and troughs in use for some reason or (2) some quirk in the
data harvested.
“Hellacious”
appears in many lists of obscure words, often with an explanatory note with a parenthesized
“rare” although nobody seem yet to classify it “archaic” and it’s certainly not
“extinct”. Improbably (or perhaps not),
the word made a rare appearance when an E-mail from Sarah, Duchess of York
(Sarah Ferguson; b 1959) to convicted paedophile Jeffrey Epstein (1953–2019) was
published in England by the tabloid press and what was of interest was (1) her
choice of words, (2) the date on which those words were written and (3) her
previously expressed views on the man. What
prompted her in 2011 to write the E-mail was Epstein’s reaction to the duchess
having a few weeks earlier, in an interview with the Evening Standard, publicly
distanced herself from the disgraced financier, apologizing, inter-alia, for
having accepted his gift of Stg£15,000, declaring she would “have nothing ever
to do with him” again, that her involvement with him had been a “gigantic error of
judgment”, adding “I abhor paedophilia and any sexual abuse of children”. She promised never again to make
contact. Just to ensure she got the
message across, she concluded: “I cannot state more strongly that I know a terrible,
terrible error of judgement was made, my having anything to do with Jeffrey
Epstein. What he did was wrong and for
which he was rightly jailed.”
He had been handed a three year sentence for soliciting prostitution
from a minor.
The Duchess
of York, who did not say the “P word”.
Despite that unambiguous statement, some
weeks later she sent him an E-mail assuring the convicted paedophile she had
not in the interview attached the label “paedophilia”
to him: “As
you know, I did not, absolutely not, say the 'P word' about you but understand
it was reported that I did”, adding “I know you feel hellaciously let down by me.
You have always been a steadfast,
generous and supreme friend to me and my family.” As it transpired, “generous was a good choice
of word. Immediately details of the
E-mail were published, the duchess’s office went into SOP (standard operating
procedure) “damage control mode”, a spokesperson asserting the E-mail was
written in an attempt to counter a threat Epstein had made to sue her for
defamation, explaining: “The duchess spoke of her regret about her association with
Epstein many years ago, and as they have always been, her first thoughts are
with his victims. Like many people, she
was taken in by his lies. As soon as she
was aware of the extent of the allegations against him, she not only cut off
contact but condemned him publicly, to the extent that he then threatened to
sue her for defamation for associating him with paedophilia.”
Some might
think it strange one would fear being sued for defamation by a convicted paedophile
on the basis of having said “what he did was wrong and for which he was rightly jailed”
but a quirk of defamation law is one can succeed in every aspect of one’s
defense yet still be left with a ruinously expensive bill so the spokesperson’s
claim the “…E-mail
was sent in the context of advice the Duchess was given to try to assuage
Epstein and his threats” may be true. Epstein died by suicide while in custody
(despite the rumours he may have been one of the many victims of “Arkancide”
and murdered on the orders of crooked Hillary Clinton (b 1947; US secretary of
state 2009-2013) there is no evidence to support this) and the duchess’s unfortunate
communication was but one of the consequences of Epstein’s conduct, the ripples
of which continue to disturb the lives of his many victims and, allegedly, the
rich, famous and well-connected who may have been “supplied” with under-age
sexual partners from Epstein’s “stock”.
Tellingly there appears to be much more interest in identities of the
latter than concern for the former.
Peter Mandelson, 8 August 1988, cibachrome print by Steve Speller (b 1961), Photographs Collection, National Portrait Gallery, London. In
a coincidence, the duchess’s eldest daughter (Princess Beatrice, Mrs Edoardo
Mapelli Mozzi) was born on 8 August 1988 and in the weird world of the astrologers,
the date 8/8/88 is “linked with abundance and is one of the most powerful
dates for manifestation in the calendar”. The date
8/8/88 is also a rather tawdry footnote in Australian political history. Early in October 1987, the National Party's
embattled Sir Joh Bjelke-Petersen (1911–2005; premier of Queensland 1968-1987)
convened a press conference at which he announced he intended to retire on “the eighth of the
eighth of eighty-eight”, the significance being that would mark 20
years to the day since he'd been sworn in as premier. As things turned out, his support within the
party collapsed as revelations continued to emerge from an on-going enquiry
into corruption in the state and on 1 December 1987 he was compelled to resign,
jumping while being pushed along the plank as it were. Although
he was in 1991 tried for perjury and corruption, the trial was abandoned after
the jury was unable to agree on a verdict.
It soon emerged that while eleven jury members found the Crown's case as
convincing as just about anyone else who heard the evidence, one did not and that
was the jury foreman (Luke Shaw, b 1971) who was a member of the “Young Nats”
(the National Party's youth wing). In
1992, the special prosecutor announced the Crown would not seek a second trial
on the grounds that, at 81, Sir Joh was “too old”.
Sometimes one gets lucky.
Claims the
duchess's former husband (Prince Andrew, Duke of York, b 1960) sexually abused
a woman he was introduced to by Epstein were settled out of court (with no
admission of liability and the payment of an “undisclosed sum”) and recently,
the UK government sacked its erstwhile Ambassador to the US (Lord Mandelson
(one time New Labour luminary Peter Mandelson (b 1953)) after revelations
emerged confirming his association with Epstein was rather different than what
he’d previously disclosed (there has been no suggestion Epstein supplied Lord
Mandelson with males younger than the statuary age of consent). Quite what else will emerge from documents in the hands of a US congressional panel remains
to be seen but there’s a groundswell of clamour for complete disclosure and the
renitence of the authorities to do exactly that has led to much speculation
about “who is being protected and by whom”. Noting that, many of Epstein’s victims have
been in contact with each other and are threatening to compile a list “naming names”; when that is leaked (or
otherwise revealed), it will be among the more keenly anticipated documents of
recent years.
Also intriguing is whether Lord Mandelson (who has a history of "comebacks from adversity" to rival that of the Duchess of York), might wash up in Gaza as some part of the "interim governing body" Sir Tony Blair (b 1953; UK prime-minister 1997-2007) has offered to lead. Pencilled-in as Gaza's "supreme political and legal authority" for up to five years, reports suggest Sir Tony would preside over a seven person board and a secretariat of two-dozen odd so, given how highly he valued "Mandy's" presence while in Downing Street, he might find somewhere to "slot in" Lord Mandelson. Of course his Lordship would not be an ideal "cultural fit" for Gaza but as he'd tell Sir Tony, fixing that is just a matter of "media management". Middle East politics is one thing but what's of interest
to the English tabloids and celebrity gossip magazines is whether the (latest)
downfall of the Duchess of York is this time “final”. It was Benjamin Disraeli (1804-1881, later
First Earl of Beaconsfield; UK prime-minister Feb-Dec 1868 & 1874-1880) who
famously observed “finality is not the language of politics” and
on countless occasions he’s been proved right but so frequent have been the
duchess’s indiscretions the press is (again) asking whether this time there can
be no comeback. The extent of Epstein’s “generosity”
was illustrated by uncontested revelations the duchess accepted from him not
only the Stg£15,000 to which she admitted but also a further Stg£2 million ($A4
million), needed at the time to stave off bankruptcy. Despite it all, it still can’t be certain
this really is the end of her remarkably durable career as a public figure
which has survived many scandals including:
(1) In 1992
(while still married), she was photographed having her toes sucked by a man
(not her husband) while enjoying some topless sunbathing. Interestingly, sex therapists do recommend
toe sucking (and other “toe & foot” play) because (1a) the nerves in the
feet are sensitive and (1b) toe sucking is likely to be a novel sexual experience,
something rare for most jaded adults. They
do however caution the feet should be immaculately clean, prior to beginning
any sucking.
(2) In 2010
she was filmed (with a hidden camera) while offering to sell “access” to the
Duke of York (for a reputed US$1 million in 2010) before departing the room
with a briefcase filled with cash.
Sister
Princess Eugenie (Mrs Jack Brooksbank; b 1990, left) and father Prince Andrew (right) looking
at Princess Beatrice's soon to be (in)famous Philip Treacy fascinator, Westminster Abbey, London, 29 April 2011. Until she appeared wearing this construction, most photographs of Princess Beatrice had focused on her lovely sanpaku eyes. Opinion in the celebrity gossip magazines was
divided on whether Eugenie's glance suggested envy or scepticism.
(3) In
2011, she did not prevent her eldest daughter attending the wedding of Prince
William (b 1982) and Catherine Middleton (b 1982) while wearing a “distinctive”
fascinator by Irish society milliner Philip Treacy (b 1967). It was derided as a “ridiculous wedding hat” which
seems unfair because it was a playful design which wasn’t that discordant upon the head on which it sat and was the only
memorable headgear seen on the day, added to which it was symmetrical which is
these days is genuinely a rarity in fascinators. It was later sold at a charity auction for
US$131,560 (said to be a record for such creations) so there was that. Interestingly, some two years after the princess's fascinator made such an impression, the milliner gave an interview to the UK's Sunday Times in which he proclaimed: “The fascinator is dead and I’m delighted.” Asked why his view had changed, he explained: “The word fascinator sounds like a dodgy sex toy and what’s so fascinating about a fascinator? Mass production means that they became so cheap to produce that now they are no more than headbands with a feather stuck on with a glue gun. We’re seeing a return to proper hats.” Clearly, association with a "cheap" product worn by chavs was no place for a "society milliner" although the journalist did suggest the Mr Treacy's change of heart may have followed Elizabeth II (1926-2022; Queen of the UK and other places, 1952-2022) in 2012 banning fascinators from the Royal Enclosure at the Royal Ascot, meaning the creations were not just passé but proscribed. If thinking back to that day in Westminster Abbey, the journalist may have been tempted to suggest Mr Treacy write a book called: The Fascinator, My Part in its Downfall but any temptation was resisted. Despite the obituary, the fascinator seems alive and well and the fashion magazines provide guidance to help race-goers and others pick "a good one" from "a chav one".
Since the 2011
E-mail’s publication, charities, some of which have, through thick & thin, for decades maintained their association, rushed to sever ties with the duchess. Whether this time it really is the end of her
“public life” remains to be seen but if the worst comes to the worst, can always resort to a nom de
plume and write another book. A
prolific author, she has published more than two-dozen, mostly children’s
titles or romances for Mills & Boon and, despite the snobby views of some,
those two genres do require different literary techniques.
Gaza
Nobody
seems to have used the word “hellacious” in relation to the state of armed
conflict (most having abandoned that euphemism and just calling it a “war”)
which has existed in Gaza since October 2023 but, used in the sense of “horrible,
awful, hellish or agonizing”, few terms seem more appropriate. Over the last quarter century odd, the word
“Hell” has often appeared in discussions of the Middle East and the events in
Gaza have made terms like “Hell on Earth”,
“Hellscape” and “Hellish” oft-heard. In a
sense, the war in Gaza is just one more rung on the ladder down which the
region has descended ever since many wise souls counseled George W Bush (George
XLIII, b 1946; US president 2001-2009) that were the US to invade Iraq, that
would be “opening
the gates of Hell”. One can
argue about just when it was since then those gates were opened but in Gaza it
does appear they’ve not just been flung open but torn from the hinges and cast
to the depths. What has happened since
October 2023 has provided a number of interesting case studies in politics,
military strategy and diplomacy, notably the stance taken by the Gulf states
but given the extent of the human suffering it does seem distastefully macabre
to discuss such things in clinical terms.
What soon
became apparent was that Benjamin Netanyahu (b 1949; prime-minister of Israel
1996-1999, 2009-2021 and since 2022) had grasped what he regarded as a “once-in-a-lifetime” military and
political environment created by the atrocities committed by the Hamas on 7
October 2023; were it not for the historical significance of the term, he’d
likely have referred to his strategy as the “final solution to the Palestinian problem” (which at least some of
his cabinet seem to equate with “the Palestinian
presence”). The basis of that
strategy is the basis also for the dispute which has to varying extents existed
since the creation of the state of Israel in 1948: There are two sides, each of
which contains a faction which holds a “river
to the sea” vision of national exclusivity which demands the exclusion of
the other from the land. Both factions
are a minority but through one means or another they have long been the conflict’s
political under-current and, on 7 October 2023, they became the central
dynamic. That dynamic’s respective world
views are (1) the Palestinian people will not be free until the eradication of
the state of Israel and (2) Jews and the state of Israel will not be safe until
the removal of Palestinians from the land.
Mr Netanyahu’s cabinet expresses this as “the dismantling of the Hamas” but
what they do is more significant than what they say.
Donald
Trump (left) and Benjamin
Netanyahu (right), the White House, Washington DC, March 25, 2019.
In Mr Netanyahu’s
cabinet there is a spectrum of opinion but what appears now most prevalent is
the most extreme: That the Palestinians wish to see the Jews eradicated (or
exterminated or eliminated) from the land of Israel and as long as they are
here the Jews cannot in their own land be safe so the Palestinians must go
(somewhere else). The gloss on the
“somewhere else” long has been the mantra “there
is already a Palestinian state; it is called Jordan and they should all go and
live there” but in the region and beyond, that’s always been dismissed as
chimerical. The “somewhere else”
paradigm though remains irresistible for the faction in Israel which, although
once thought cast adrift from the moorings of political reality, finds itself
not merely in cabinet but, in the Nacht
und Nebel (night and fog) of war, able to pursue politics by other means in
a way never before possible, the argument being the Hamas attack of 7 October
meant the IDF (Israeli Defence Forces) were fighting a “just war”, thus the Old Testament style tactics.
In
political discourse, the usual advice, sensibly, is that any comparisons with
the Third Reich (1933-1945) should be avoided because the Nazis were so bad
(some prefer “evil”) that comparisons tend to be absurd. Historians have however pointed out some
chilling echoes from the past in the positions which exist (and publically have
been stated by some) in the Israeli cabinet.
Much the same world view was captured in a typically tart Tagebücher (diary) entry by Dr Joseph
Goebbels (1897-1975; Nazi propaganda minister 1933-1945) on 27 March 1942:
“A judicial
sentence is being carried out against the Jews which is certainly barbaric but
which they have fully deserved. In these
matters, one cannot let sentimentally prevail.
If we do not defend ourselves against them, the Jews would exterminate
us. It is a life and dress struggle
against the Jewish bacillus. No other
government and no other regime could muster the strength for a general solution
of this question. Thank God the war
affords us a series of opportunities which were denied us in peacetime. We must make use of them.”
Mr Netanyahu
and his cabinet understand what the Hamas did on 7 October created “a series of
opportunities” they never thought they’d have and, as the civilian death
toll in Gaza (reckoned by September 2025 to be in excess of 65,000) attests, the
IDF has made muscular use of the night and fog of war. Of course the “somewhere else” fantasy of some Israeli politicians remains very different to the mass-murder alluded to by Goebbels or explicitly
described by Heinrich Himmler (1900–1945; Reichsführer SS 1929-1945) in his
infamous speech at Posen in October 1943 but what Mr Netanyahu has called his “historic and spiritual mission” of “generations”
is creating a poison which will last a century or more. For what is happening in Gaza, there seems no
better word than “hellacious”.
