Frock

Frock (pronounced frok)

(1) A gown or dress worn by a female, consisting of a skirt and a cover for the upper body.

(2) A loose outer garment worn by peasants and workers; a smock.

(3) A coarse outer garment with large sleeves, worn by monks in some religious orders; a habit.

(4) In naval use, a sailor's jersey.

(5) In military use, an undress regimental coat (now less common).

(6) To clothe (somebody) in a frock.

(7) To make (somebody) a cleric (to invest with priestly or clerical office).

(8) In US military use, to grant to an officer the right to the title and uniform of a rank before the formal appointment is conferred.

1300–1350: From the Middle English frok, frokke and froke and twelfth century Old French froc (a monk’s habit; clothing, dress), from the Frankish hrok and thought probably related to the Old Saxon and Old High German hroc (mantle, coat) which appears to have spawned the Old Norse rokkr, the Old English rocc, and Old Frisian rokk.  Most etymologists seem to think it’s most likely all ultimately derived from the primitive rug or krek (to spin or weave); the alternative view suggests a link with the Medieval Latin hrocus, roccus and rocus (all of which described types of coats) which they speculate was the source of the Old French from, again from the Old Frankish hroc and hrok (skirt, dress, robe), from the Proto-Germanic hrukkaz (robe, jacket, skirt, tunic).  That does seem at least plausible given the existence of the Old High German hroch and roch (skirt, dress, cowl), the German rock (skirt, coat), the Saterland Frisian Rok (skirt), the Dutch rok (skirt, petticoat), the Old English rocc (an over-garment, tunic, rochet), the Old Norse rokkr (skirt, jacket) and Danish rok (garment).  Another alternative (more speculative still) traces it from the Medieval Latin floccus, from the Classical Latin floccus (flock of wool).  The meaning "outer garment for women or children" was from the 1530s while frock-coat (also as frock-cost & frockcoat) dates from the 1820s, the garment itself fading from fashion a century later although revivals have been attempted every few decades, aimed at a rather dandified market ignored by most.  Frock & frocking are nouns & verbs, frocked is a verb and frockless, frocklike & frockish are adjectives; the noun plural is frocks.

Frocks and Brass Hats

The phrase “frocks and brass hats” was coined in the years immediately following World War I (1914—1918) in reaction to the large volume of memoirs, autobiographies and histories published by some of the leading politicians and military leaders involved in the conflict, the phrase derived from (1) the almost universal habit of statesmen of the age wearing frock coats and (2) the hats of senior military personnel being adorned with gold braid, emulating the physical polished brass of earlier times.  Many of the books were polemics, the soldiers and politicians writing critiques of the wartime conduct of each other.  Politicians no longer wear frock coats and although some of the hats of military top brass still feature a bit of braid, it’s now less often seen.  However, the term persists although of late, academics studying institutional conflict in government have extended it to “frock coats, mandarins and brass hats”, reflecting the increase in importance of the part played by public servants, especially the military bureaucracy, in such matters.  So structurally, the internecine squabbles within the creature of the state have changed, the most obvious causes the twin threads of (1) the politicization of the upper reaches of the public service and (2) the creation of so many organs of government as corporate entities which enable the frocks (the politicians) to distance themselves from unpalatable policies and decisions by asserting (when it suits them), the “independence” of such bodies.  Of course, such functionaries will find their “independence” counts for little if the frocks start to feel the heat; then brutally the axe will fall, just as it did on some of the Great War generals.

Men in frock coats: The “Big Four” at the Paris Peace Conference (1919-1920), outside the Foreign Ministry headquarters, Quai d'Orsay, Paris.  Left to right: David Lloyd George (1863–1945; UK prime-minister 1916-1922), Vittorio Orlando (1860–1952; Italian prime minister 1917-1919), Georges Clemenceau (1841–1929; French prime minister 1906-1909 & 1917-1920) and Woodrow Wilson (1856–1924; US president 1913-1921).

At the time, nothing quite like or on the scale of the Paris Peace Conference had ever been staged.  Only Orlando anticipated the future of fashion by preferring a lounge suit to a frock coat but he would be disappointed by the outcome of the conference, leaving early and to his dying day content his signature never appeared on the treaty’s final declaration, a document he regarded as flawed.  Not even John Kennedy (JFK, 1917–1963; US president 1961-1963) or Barack Obama (b 1961; US president 2009-2017) on their tours of European capitals received anything like the adulation Wilson enjoyed when he arrived in Paris in 1919.  His successors however were there more as pop-culture figures whereas Wilson was seen a harbinger of a "lasting peace", a thing of much significance to the French after four years of slaughter.  Ultimately Wilson's hopes would be dashed (in the US Senate as well as at the Quai d'Orsay's conference table) although, historians will likely continue to conclude his Nobel Peace Prize (1919) was more deserved than the one awarded to Obama (apparently on the basis he wasn't George W Bush (George XLIII, b 1946; US president 2001-2009)).  Lloyd George's ambitions in 1919 were more tempered by realism and he too regarded the terms of final document as a mistake, prophesying that because of the punitive terms imposed on the defeated Germany: “We shall have to fight another war again in 25 years' time.”  In that, he was correct, even if the expected wait was a little optimistic.  Only Clemenceau had reasons to be satisfied with what was achieved although, has his instincts been allowed to prevail, the terms of the Treaty of Versailles (1920) would have been more onerous still.  It was the Englishman Eric Geddes (1875–1937; First Lord of the Admiralty (the civilian head of the Royal Navy) 1917-1919) who coined the phrase "...squeeze the German lemon until the pips squeak." but it's doubtful that sentiment was ever far from Clemenceau's thoughts.

Lindsay Lohan in a nice frock.  V Magazine Black & White Ball, New York City, September 2011.

In idiomatic use, “frock” has proved as serviceable as the garment.  A “frock flick” is a film or television production noted for the elaborate costuming and most associated with costume dramas (typically sixteenth-nineteenth centuries) in which the frocks of the rich are depicted as big & extravagant.  To “frock up” is used by young women to describe “dressing-up” for some event or occasion and in the (male) gay community to refer either to much the same thing or cross-dressing.  A “cock in a frock” (“cocks in frocks” the collective) is a type of trans-woman (one without the relevant medical modification) and what used to be called a transvestite (a once technical term from psychiatry now (like “tranny”) thought derogatory except in historic use).  A “smock frock” was a garment of coarse, durable material which was worn over other clothing and most associated with agricultural and process workers (and usually referred to either as “smock” or “frock”.  In fashion there’s the “sun frock” (one of lightweight material which exposes more than the usual surface area of skin, often in a strappy or strapless style.  A “housefrock” was a piece of everyday wear form women which was self-explanatory: a simple, practical frock to be worn “around the house” and well suited to wear while performing “housework”.  “Underfrock” was a now archaic term for a slip or petticoat.  The A coat with long skirts, worn by men, now only on formal occasions.  The “frock coat” (also listed by some as the “Prince Albert coat”) is characterized by a knee-length skirt cut all around the base, ending just above the knee.  Among the middle & upper classes, it was popular during the Victorian and Edwardian eras (1830s–1910s) although they were widely into the 1920s.  Although some fashion houses may have had lines with detail differences, there was really no difference between a “cocktail dress” and a “cocktail frock” except the latter seems now to be used only humorously.

Variations on the theme of the cocktail dress: Lindsay Lohan in vintage Herve Leger at Arrivals For Cartier’s Declare Your Love Day VIP cocktail reception, Cartier Store, New York, June 2006 (left) and in black Dion Lee cocktail dress with illusion panels and an off-the-shoulder silhouette, January 2013 (right).

A cocktail dress does however differ from a cocktail gown because they straddle the gap between daywear and ball gowns.  Intended to be worn at formal or semi-formal occasions (classically of course, the “cocktail party”) including wedding receptions or dinner parties, they’re typically shorter in length than a gown, the hemline falling somewhere between just above the knee to mid-calf.  There’s no exact template for a cocktail dress but they should be identifiable by their simplicity and elegance, thus the utility of their versatility.  While not exactly post-modern, they appear in many fabrics and just about any style including empire, bandage, A-line or sack, featuring a range of necklines, sleeve lengths, and embellishments.  Historically, befitting the sophistication once associated with the cocktail party, the dresses were characterized by modesty and severity of line, the classic motif the tailored silhouette, relatively uncluttered by details.  Vogue magazine labeled the accessories (shoes, jewelery, a clutch and sometimes a wrap) the “cocktail dress ensemble” but in recent decades there’s been a rise in stylistic promiscuity and some discordant elements have intruded.

Men of the frock: Cardinal George Pell (1941-2023; left) and Benedict XVI (1927–2022; pope 2005-2013, pope emeritus 2013-2022; right) at an inter-faith meeting in Sydney, Australia, July 2008.

A “man of the frock” is a clergyman of some description (almost always of some Christian denomination) and the apparent anomaly of nuns never being described as “women of the frock” (despite always wearing something at least frock-like) is explained presumably by all women once being assumed to wear frocks.  To “defrock” (literally “to divest of a frock”) is in figurative use used widely to mean “formally to remove the rights and authority of a member of the clergy” and by extension this is casually applied also to “struck-off” physicians, lawyers etc.  “Disfrock” & “unfrock” are used as synonyms of “defrock” but none actually appear in Roman Catholic canon law, the correct term being “laicization” (ie “returned to the laity).  Despite the popular impression, the Vatican has revealed most acts of laicization are pursuant to the request of the priest and performed because they feel, for whatever reason, unable to continue in holy orders (ex priests marrying ex-nuns a thing and there must be some theological debate around whether they’ve been “brought together by God” or “tempted by the Devil”).  Defrock dates from the 1580s in the sense of “deprive of priestly garb” and was from the fifteenth century French défroquer, the construct being from de- (used her as a negative prefix) + froque (frock) and familiar also as the verb “defrocked”.  The modern English verb “frock” (supply with a frock) seems to have come into use only in the 1820s and was either a back-formation from defrock or an evolution from the noun.  The verb was picked up by the military and “to frock” is used also as a jocular form of “to dress”.

Mojito

Mojito (pronounced moh-hee-toh)

A cocktail of Cuban origin, made with white rum, sugar-cane juice, lime juice, soda-water and mint.

1930–1935: From American-infused Cuban Spanish, perhaps a diminutive of the Spanish mojo (orange sauce or marinade) from mojar (to moisten; make wet) from the (hypothetical) Vulgar Latin molliāre (to soften by soaking), from the Latin molliō (soften), from mollis (soft).  The noun plural is mojitos.  The origin of the name mojito is disputed.  The most popular is that the name relates mojo, a Cuban seasoning made from lime and used to flavour dishes.  The alternative view is it’s a derivative of mojadito ("a little wet" in Spanish), the diminutive of mojado (wet).  Mojito is a noun, the noun plural is Mojitos and by convention, it seems mostly to appear with an initial capital.

Ingredients

Juice of 1 large lime.
1 teaspoon granulated sugar.
Small handful of mint leaves, plus extra sprig to serve.
60ml white rum.
Soda-water to taste.

Method

(1) Muddle lime juice, sugar & mint leaves in small jug, progressively crushing mint.  Pour into tall glass, adding handful of ice.

(2) Using chilled glass, pour over rum, stirring with long-handled spoon.  Top-up with soda water, garnish with mint and serve.

To create a virgin mojito, omit rum.

Lindsay Lohan enjoying ice-cream and (an allegedly virgin) mojito, Monaco 2015.

Where Hemmingway sat: Havana’s La Bodeguita del medio.  The red car pictured on the wall is a 1959 "bat wing" Chevrolet Bel Air convertible, emblematic of the "frozen in time" fleet of US cars which for more than two decades formed the backbone of the island's fleet, Washington's economic embargo meaning the importation of newer machinery was banned.  The survivors (now often re-powered with a variety of engines including diesels) are still used to take tourists sightseeing.

It’s not uncommon for the origin of the names of cocktails to be both obscure and contested.  Before the modern era, something like a cocktail could be uniquely regional, something well known in one part of a city yet unknown in another and around the world, because what seemed an appealing combination of drinks in one place would likely be tried in others, it’s a certainty many cocktails would independently have been “invented” many times.  So it’s impossible to know when, where or by whom a great number were first concocted and the contested history tends to be as much about the names as the recipes.  The Mojito, which has gained a new popularity in the twenty-first century, has a typically murky past and there are a number of stories which claim to document its origin, the best-known of which centres on Havana’s La Bodeguita del medio, a restaurant in which Nobel literature laureate Ernest Hemingway (1899–1961) spent many hours, sitting in the bar; Hemmingway lent lavish praise to Bodeguita del medio’s version of the Mojito and he was a fair judge of such things.  The restaurant claims to be the first place on the planet to have served the drink, the recipe coming from African slaves working the Cuban sugar cane fields who created the mix from aguardiente de cana (literally “firewater of the sugar cane”).  In this telling it thus started life as a simply distilled spirit from the cane cuttings and the name Mojito fits this tale, the Spanish mojo meaning “to place a little spell”.  That lacks the documentary evidence etymologists prefer but points are gained for romance.

A brace of Mojitos with environmentally friendly stainless steel straws.  The earliest mixes may have been called El Draque.

Sir Francis Drake (circa 1540–1596) was a English sailor remembered for his role in defeating the Spanish Armada in 1588 but he was also a pirate (the English preferred the term “privateer”, pirates being “foreigners”), an aspect of his character which appealed to many including Hermann Göring (1893–1946; leading Nazi 1922-1945, Hitler's designated successor & Reichsmarschall 1940-1945) who reckoned the decline of England was due to pillaging buccaneers like Drake being replaced by “shopkeepers” (as he would characterize Westminster politicians).  One of Drake's ventures was a plan to take Havana harbor from the Spanish and sack the city of its gold, the holdings there known to be vast but a survey of the place’s formidable defences led him to abandon that idea.  By then however many of his crews were suffering scurvy and dysentery which threatened the continuation of his voyage anywhere so, because Cuba’s native populations were known to have effective remedies for many diseases, Drake sent ashore a landing party to trade this and that for the ingredients for a medicine. The sailors returned with aguarediente de cana (mint leaves mixed with lime juice & the spirit distilled from sugar cane) and the tonic proved efficacious.  As the Admiralty would later understand, it was the lime juice which was most effective (and it would later be supplied on ships to end the problem of scurvy by providing the needed daily dose of vitamin C) but it would have been the spirit which made the potion more palatable to seamen.  A cocktail made with a similar mix was widely served in Cuba in the years after the abortive raid and this may have been the first commercially available Mojito although it didn’t use the name: it was called the El Draque.  It’s thus possible African slaves may not have mixed the first version but they may be responsible for the Mojito moniker, the Spanish mojadito (a little wet) and the Cuban lime-based seasoning mojo the other candidates.  Whatever the source, all agree it was the foundation of the Bacardi company in the mid nineteenth century which started the spread and Hemmingway’s imprimatur from the comfort of Bodeguita del medio’s bar stools was enough for it to begin its rise to the point where the Mojito is among the most popular modern cocktails.

Bedchamber

Bedchamber (pronounced bed-cheym-ber)

A now archaic word for bedroom; the alternative form was bed-chamber.

1325–1375:  From the Middle English bedchaumbre, the construct being bed + chamber.  Bed was from the Middle English bed or bedde, from the pre-1000 Old English bedd (bed, couch, resting-place; garden-bed, plot), from the Proto-Germanic badją (plot, grave, resting-place, bed) and thought perhaps derived from the Proto-Indo-European bhed (to dig).  It was cognate with the Scots bed and bede, the North Frisian baad and beed, the West Frisian bêd, the Low German Bedd, the Dutch bed, the German bett, the Danish bed, the Swedish bädd, the Icelandic beður and perhaps, (depending on the efficacy of the Proto-Indo-European lineage), the Ancient Greek βοθυρος (bothuros) (pit), the Latin fossa (ditch),the Latvian bedre (hole), the Welsh bedd (grave), the Breton bez (grave).  Any suggestion of links to Russian or other Slavic words is speculative.

Chamber dates from 1175-1225 and was from the Middle English chambre, borrowed from Old French chambre, from the Latin camera, derived from the Ancient Greek καμάρα (kamára) (vaulted chamber); the meaning “room”, usually private, drawn from French use.  As applied to anatomy, use emerged in the late fourteenth century; it was applied to machinery in 1769 and to ballistics from the 1620s.  The meaning "legislative body" is from circa 1400 and the term chamber music was first noted in 1789, not as a descriptor of any musical form but to indicate that intended to be performed in private rooms rather than public halls.

The Bedchamber Crisis, 1839

A Lady of the Bedchamber, a position held typically by women of noble descent, is a kind of personal assistant to the Queen of England.  A personal appointment by the Queen, they’ve existed for centuries, their roles varying according to the relationships enjoyed.  Most European royal courts from time-to-time also adopted the practice.

The 1839 bedchamber crisis is emblematic of the shifting of political power from monarch to parliament.  Although the eighteenth-century administrative and economic reforms created the framework, it was the 1832 Reform Act which, in doing away with a monarch’s ability to stack parliaments with ample compliant souls, shattered a sovereign’s capacity to dictate election results and within two years the new weakness was apparent.  In 1834, William IV (1765–1837; King of the UK 1830-1837)  dismissed the Whig Lord Melbourne (1779–1848; Prime Minister of the UK 1834 & 1835-1841) and appointed the Tory Sir Robert Peel (1788–1850; Prime Minister of the UK 1834–1835 & 1841–1846).  However, the King no longer enjoyed the electoral influence necessary to secure Peel a majority in the Commons and after being defeated in the house six times in as many weeks, the premier was obliged to inform the palace of his inability to govern, compelling the king to invite Melbourne to form a new administration, one which endured half a decade, out-living William IV.  The king's exercise in 1834 of the royal prerogative proved the last time the powers of the head of state would be invoked sack a prime-minister until an Australian leader was dismissed in 1975 by the governor-general (and in a nice touch the sacked PM had appointed the clearly ungrateful GG).

Queen Mary's State Bed Chamber, Hampton Court Palace (1819) by Richard Cattermole (1795–1858).

By 1839, Melbourne felt unable to continue and the new Queen Victoria (1819–1901; Queen of the UK 1837-1901), reluctantly, invited Sir Robert Peel to assume the premiership, a reticence some historians attribute as much to her fondness for the avuncular Melbourne as her preference for his Whig (liberal) politics.  Peel, knowing any administration he could form would be nominally in a minority, knew his position would be strengthened if there was a demonstration of royal support so asked Victoria, as a gesture of good faith, to replace some of the Whig Ladies of the Bedchamber with a few of Tory breeding.  Most of the ladies were the wives or daughters of Whig politicians and Sir Robert’s request made sense in the world of 1839.

Victoria rejected his request and prevailed upon Melbourne to continue which he did, until a final defeat in 1841.  By then it was clear only Peel could command a majority in the Commons and he insisted on his bedchamber cull, forcing Victoria to acquiesce to the parliament imposing on her the most intimate of her advisors.  This is the moment in constitutional history where the precedent is established of the parliament and not the Crown determining the formation and fate of governments.  Since then, the palace can warn, counsel and advise but not compel.

A lady in, if not of, the bedchamber.  A recumbent Lindsay Lohan in The Canyons (IFC Films, 2013).

Bulge

Bulge (pronounced buhlj)

(1) A rounded projection, bend or protruding part; protuberance; hump; to swell or bend outward; to be protuberant.

(2) Any sudden increase, as of numbers, often used in economics or demography.

(3) In the maritime sciences, a rising in small waves on the surface of a body of water, caused by the action of a fish or fishes in pursuit of food underwater.

(4) As bulging, to describe a box or similar container, the shape of which is distorted by being filled beyond its nominal capacity.

(5) In colloquial use, the outline of male genitals visible through clothing, a form especially popular in the states & micro-states of Melanesia and used also (by analogy with the bulge caused by a wallet) as a descriptor of wealth.

1200-1250: From the Middle English bulge (leather bag; hump), from the Old Northern French boulge & bouge (leather bag), from the Late Latin bulga (leather sack), from the Gaulish bulga & bulgos, from the Proto-Celtic bolgos (sack, bag, stomach).  It was cognate with the various English forms bilge, belly, bellows & budget, the French bouge, the Irish bolg (bag) and the German Balg; a doublet of budge.  Ultimate source was the primitive Indo-European bhelgh (to swell), an extended form of the root bhel (to blow, swell).  The sense of "a swelling, a rounded protuberance" is first recorded in the 1620s and it’s likely the later bilge is a nautical variant.  The later, more familiar military meaning "bulging part of a military front" was first noted in 1916, the Admiralty variation to refer to the shape a warship’s hull assumed after the addition of anti-torpedo armor appearing in the records of naval architects a year later.  The famous phrase "battle of the bulge" has been re-purposed by the weight-loss industry.  Synonyms and related words include wart, lump, nodule, protrude, swell, sag, bloat, projection, bump, swelling, promontory, growth, excrescence, dilation, bunch, protrusion, salient, hump, sac & blob.  Bulge, bulger & bulginess are nouns, bulging & bulgy are adjectives, bulged is a verb and bulgingly is an adverb; the noun plural is bulges.

Increasing bulginess: Lindsay Lohan's baby bump.  English phrases emerge organically and women seem much to prefer "baby bump" to "baby bulge", a Google search for the former returning 33,300,000 hits against a mere 35,000 for the latter.  "Baby bulge" does however have (usually unwanted) role in the process, the "postpartum baby bulge" a description of an abdomen which stubbornly resists post-delivery inducements to return to it's pre-pregnancy shape.

The hood (bonnet) bulge

1957 Jaguar XKSS (left), 1955 Mercedes-Benz 300 SLR (W196S) Uhlenhaut coupé) (centre) and Mercedes-Benz 300 SL (W198, 1954-1963, right).

A hood (bonnet) bulge differs from a hood scoop in that the former exists purely for the purpose of providing clearance for some piece of machinery beneath.  What needs to be accommodated typically will be an inconveniently tall part of the engine, a supercharger or some other component in the induction system.  Jaguar added a bulge to the D-Type (1954-1957) because after lowering the profile of the hood in the quest for aerodynamic efficiency, the XK-six wouldn't quite fit, even with the addition of a dry sump which gained a few inches.  The bulge was carried over to the XKSS, the road-going version of the D-Type.  On the Jaguars, the bulge was centrally placed but Mercedes-Benz, adopting the same expedient for the 300 SLRs needed theirs to exist on only one side where it also acted as an air-intake for the mechanical fuel-injection, an example of a bulge doing also some scooping.  Asymmetry is common on racing cars where function rules but the factory apparently couldn't in those days bring themselves to do it on road cars.  Although the 300 SLs (both the gullwings and the roadsters) needed only the bulge on the right-hard side (the tall, dry-sumped engine canted 50^o to the left) to accommodate the fuel-injection's ram-tubes, a matching bulge was included, thus ensuring the symmetry prized by the Germans.

MG MGC-GT (1967-1969, left), Iso-Grifo Can-Am (1968-1972, centre) and Ford Falcon BA XR8 (2002-2004, right).

Mercedes-Benz may have been disturbed by asymmetry but it didn't worry the pragmatists at MG who, having shoe-horned into the MGB (1962-1980) a big iron lump of a straight-six which necessitated using a torsion bar arrangement for the front suspension, found even their first attempt at a bulge still wasn't enough.  A dry sump would have solved the problem but that would have been expensive so a "blister" was added at the offending point on the bulge; a bulging bulge as it were.  Apparently a matching blister on the right was never considered and the MGC has one of the industry's more admired bonnets although that feeling didn't extend to the rest of the car, the model not even a modest success in the market and it lasted but two seasons.  The later V8 version (1973-1976) was both a better car and one that needed no bulge at all but it fell victim to the first oil shock.  There are those who claim the rectilinear protrusion on the hood of the big-block Iso Grifos can't be called a bulge at all and many etymologists might agree but such pedantry should be agreed with and ignored.  Nicknamed the "penthouse", the neo-brutalist construction is one of the industry's great bulges and it's entirely functional, affording clearance to the induction system and providing airflow, in & out.  Not functional at all was the bulge Ford in Australia added to the XR8 Falcons when the BA model was released in 2002.  Cheerfully admitting it was unnecessary and there just for looks, the factory later took advantage of its presence to advertise things like the V8's power output, a juvenile pleasure much appreciated by the target market.

Battle of the Bulge, Dec 1944-Jan 1945

The Ardennes Offensive, (Wacht am Rhein (Watch on the Rhine) was the German code-name) popularly known in the West as the Battle of the Bulge, was the last major German strategic offensive of World War II and ironically, Watch on the Rhine was the title of a play by Lillian Hellman (1905-1984) which debuted on Broadway in 1941, the theme being the need for an international alliance to oppose the Nazis.  After many delays, it began on 16 December 1944 and lasted officially until 25 January but had been repulsed by Allied forces weeks earlier.  It wasn't the first use of "bulge" in a battlefield context, the phrase documented in June 1940 in discussions about the German offensive in France and many generals over the centuries would have seen bulges represented on their situation maps.  One especially well-known One of the best known was Unternehmen Zitadelle (Operation Citadel), the German operation conducted in July 1943 against Soviet forces in the Kursk salient although, unlike the Ardennes Offensive, the Battle of Kursk was staged along a very long front and is best understood as a series of shifting bulges and the theatre evolved rapidly into a huge, dusty, swirling mass of tanks, artillery assaults and air attacks.  It remains history's largest tank battle.  

The bulge, December 1944.

Because of the disparity in military and economic strength between the German and Allied forces, in retrospect, the Ardennes Offensive appears nonsensical but, at the time, it made strategic and political sense.  Adolf Hitler (1889-1945; Führer (leader) and German head of government 1933-1945 & head of state 1934-1945) knew, confronted as he was by attacks from the west, east and south, continuing to fight a defensive war could only delay the inevitable defeat.  An offensive in the east was impossible because of the strength of the Red Army and even a major battlefield victor in the south would have no strategic significance so it was only in the west that opportunities existed.

For many reasons, by late 1944 the Allied advance in the west had stalled after remarkable progress since the D-Day landings 6 June 1944) and defensive lines had been formed, the most lightly defended being those in the Ardennes Forest, the very region which had been the conduit for the German’s stunningly successful blitzkrieg campaign in 1940.  Despite that history, 1944’s rapid advance through collapsing German lines had convinced Allied intelligence their enemy was no longer capable of major offensive operations.  It was this compliancy which made the German attack possible and in military colleges this problem, created by what in the psychology literature is called "Bayesian perception" (from the probability theories developed by English statistician Thomas Bayes (circa 1700-1761)), is often more helpfully described as "top-down processing" which tends to overwhelm the inherently more accurate "bottom-up processing".  The idea is that a "Bayesian brain" will use prior knowledge and assumptions which will influence perceptions meaning we see what we expect to see and fail to observe what is not expected and the more intensely something is focused upon, the more acute becomes the tendency.  Thus, because the phrase "Paris in the spring" is so well known, a single glance will confirm the brain's perception and the duplicate "the" will remain unseen.

In the last great example of the professionalism and tactical improvisation which was a hallmark of their operations during the war, the Wehrmacht (the German military) secretly assembled a large armored force, essentially under the eyes of the Allies and staged a surprise attack through the Ardennes, aided immeasurably by the cover of heavy, low clouds which precluded both Allied reconnaissance and deployment of their overwhelming strength in air-power.  Hitler’s audacious strategic objective, which, given the forces available, none of his generals though possible, was to advance to the Belgium port of Antwerp, splitting the Allied lines in a pincer movement, destroying their four armies.  This he hoped would force the Western Allies out of the war, permitting the Germans to focus their entire strength against the Soviet Union in the east.

Initially successful, the Wehrmacht’s advance punched several holes in the line, the shape of which, when marked on a map, lent the campaign the name Battle of the Bulge.  Within days however, the weather cleared and the Allies were able to unleash almost unopposed their overwhelming superiority in air power.  This, combined with their vast military and logistical resources, doomed the Ardennes Offensive, inflicting losses from which the Wehrmacht never recovered.  From mid-January on, German forces never regained the initiative, retreating on all fronts until the inevitable defeat in May.

The IDF, Hamas and the Hezbollah, October 2023

Mr Netanyahu.  His friends, (both of them) call him "Bibi".

Already, comparisons with 1944 are being made with the apparent failure of the much vaunted Israeli intelligence machine, either to detect or act upon indications of the activities which would have been a prelude to the audacious attacks launched on 7 October 2023 by the Hamas into Israeli territory.  Although low-tech by comparison with a conventional military operation, the scale of what the Hamas managed to stage would still have demanded movements of materiel and personnel, an exercise in logistics which should have been noticed.  In an echo of the Yom Kippur War (6-25 October 1973), presumably, some activity would have been noticed but clearly it wasn't interpreted as an imminent threat so the inevitable review will have to focus on both the gathering and analysis of intelligence and one thing which will be considered is whether, as in the winter of 1944, assumptions were allowed to prevail over facts on the ground.  Any inquiry can be expected to be rigorous but only within the terms of reference the government will provide and those parameters are unlikely to allow any consideration of the consequences of the recent actions of Benjamin Netanyahu (b 1949; Israeli prime minister 1996-1999, 2009-2021 and since 2022).  Mr Netanyahu has for some time been attempting to make structural changes to Israel's courts, allegedly because he wishes to avoid any judicial scrutiny of the corruption charges which he faces.  The proposed changes to the courts are would actually align the way things are done in Israel with those used in many Western, democratic nations but it's the political context which has made them controversial and part of the widespread and long-lasting public protest has included large numbers of military reservists (on which the security of the Jewish state depends) refusing to serve while the government continues the legal manoeuvres which would have the effect of shielding the prime minister from prosecution.  Mr Netanyahu is one of the great survivors of modern politics and his longevity in office has been a remarkable achievement in one of the world's more difficult neighborhoods but it's unpredictable whether he can turn the shock of the Hamas incursion to his advantage and that is likely to depend upon managing any perception his being distracted by his own legal difficulties made Israel unusually vulnerable.

Securing any advantage will of course depend on Israel gaining what can be presented as a victory, something which in recent conflicts, north & south, has been as elusive on the battlefield as on social media.  Nor is the Hamas attack the only thing which will absorb the resources of the Israeli Defense Force (IDF).  In the north, there is the even more formidable Hezbollah and few in the intelligence community have cast doubt on reports the Shi'ite militia (which out-guns the armed forces of Lebanon and has more political influence) have some hundred-thousand short & medium range rockets available for deployment south of the Litani River (the Qasimiyeh or River Leontes).  Within hours of the Sunni Hamas launching their operation, the Hezbollah targeted Israeli military positions in the disputed Shebaa Farms, announcing it was acting "in solidarity" with the Palestinian people and in response, the IDF responded with artillery barrages.  No casualties were reported and at this stage the attack in the north seems to be thought a supportive gesture rather than anything strategic and the consensus is the Hezbollah will act at scale only if the situation in Gaza evolved to offer a particularly attractive opportunity and even then it would require approval from Tehran; in an unsubtle waring directed at the Ayatollahs, the Pentagon announced the movement of an aircraft carrier into the region.  The Hamas have seemingly timed their high-risk attack with some thought.  With the war in Ukraine demanding much military, political and financial support from the West (something already beginning to fray as Moscow predicted it would in any battle of attrition), the US government in political & fiscal paralysis and Israeli support for its own government at a historic low, the Hamas will have sniffed blood.  Nor will they be unaware the most long-lasting legacy of the Yom Kippur War fifty years earlier was the Arab oil embargo and the spike in the price which ended the long post-war prosperity in the West and triggered the political and economic upheavals which would last a decade.  The structure of the world economy and the imperatives of governments are not in 2023 quite what they were in 1973 but these things will be on the minds of many in many places.

In the short term, within the Israeli intelligence establishment, there will be an admission the military specialists will have to share more of the space with the political analysts.  With a death toll on both sides already in the thousands, the focus is of course on bullets and bombs but what Hamas has also done is stake their claim for support (1) in the region, (2) among the Arab & Palestinian diaspora and (3) from those governments willing to fund proxies for their campaigns against the West.  In this sense, the Hamas is advertising themselves as a muscular resistance to Israeli (ie Western) oppression and occupation, contrasting themselves with Fatah, the faction controlling the Palestinian Authority which exercises nominal authority over what is left of the Left Bank territories.  The Hamas regard Fatah as as least accommodative while some use the slur "collaborators".  Thus positioning the contrast as something like the Marquis vs Vichy, October's assault has a political aspect and in that they identified their target market rather as the Republican Party's "House Freedom Caucus" focused on those dissatisfied with the direction of their own leadership.

What Hamas are practicing is politics with a high civilian death toll, the rationale for that being every Palestinian who is killed will have died a martyr's death with all that implies, theologically and socially.  As a tactic, what Hamas are doing is a kind of political intervention into what they see as the increasingly disturbing trend of Arab nations moving towards normalization of relations with the state of Israel without any settlement of the "Palestinian problem".  If the IDF can be induced to respond with such severity that the civilian death toll in Gaza rises to the point where the pressure from the so called "Arab street" is of such intensity that Arab states are forced to retreat from their recent rapprochements, for Hamas, that would be progress.  There was a time when the strategists in Gaza might have imagined the regional reaction would be something more tangible on the ground but as they've noticed, winds of change can blow in both directions and now it's only in Tehran there's much support for their long-standing position that the only final solution for the Palestinians is the destruction of the state of Israel.

Sabbatical

Sabbatical (pronounced suh-bat-i-kuhl)

(1) Of or pertaining or appropriate to the Sabbath (initial uppercase).

(2) Of or relating to a sabbatical year which can be formal or informal (initial lowercase).

(3) Bringing a period of rest (initial lowercase).

(4) As sabbatical leave, an extended period of leave from one's customary work (initial lowercase).

(5) In academia, denoting a post that renders the holder eligible for such leave (initial lowercase).

1605–1615: From the Ancient Greek sabbatikós (sábbat(on)), the construct being Sabbath + -ikos or -ic).  Sabbath is from the Middle English sabat, sabbat & sabath, from the Old English Sabat, from the Old French sabat & sabbat and its etymon Latin sabbatum, from the Ancient Greek σάββατον (sábbaton) (Sabbath), from the Hebrew שַׁבָּת‎ (shabát) (Sabbath).  That the spelling ended -th was probably influenced by the traditional transliteration of the Hebrew as shabbāth, being attested since the fourteenth century and in widespread use since the sixteenth.  sabbatical is a noun & adjective and sabbatically is an adverb (only in the context of the sabbath); the noun plural is sabbaticals.  Some sources list the noun sabbaticalness but it's treated by others as non-standard.  

The Middle English suffix –ik, like the Old French –ique and the –icus is from the primitive Indo-European -ikos, formed with the i-stem suffix -i and the adjectival suffix -ko.  Related are the Ancient Greek -ικός (-ikós), the Sanskrit श (śa), क (ka) and the Old Church Slavonic -ъкъ (-ŭkŭ); doublet of -y.  The suffix on noun stems carried the meaning “characteristic of, like, pertaining to” and on adjectival stems it acted emphatically.  The –al suffix of the adjectival (and most familiar) form is from the Latin -ālis, or the French, Middle French and Old French –el & -al  It’s thought likely the Latin suffix was formed from the Etruscan genitive suffix -l (as in Etruscan ati (mother) / atial (mother's)) + adjectival suffix -is (as in fortis, dēbilis, etc).  The origins of the sabbatical lie in the Biblical practice of shmita, a practice of agriculture which defined (Leviticus 25) when productive lands must lie fallow.  It stipulated the Jews in the Land of Israel must take a year-long break from working the fields every seven years.  The practice still exists in some types of modern agriculture although typically not on seven year-cycles

Lindsay Lohan enjoying a sabbatical, Los Angeles, August 2012.

Until recent decades, the sabbatical was most associated with a period of leave granted to senior tenured academics, traditionally every seven years.  Until the re-structuring of universities in the 1980s, the sabbatical was essentially the private right of the professor concerned and could be used for composition, calculation or convenience.  By convention, it was thought bad form to ask a professor how he spent his sabbatical; politeness demanded one had to wait for him to raise the matter.  Of late however, institutions offer fewer sabbaticals and those which do have tended increasingly to create structured programmes, sometimes exchange schemes with other universities and it's not unknown for institutions to expect some tangible outcome from a sabbatical.  The word has also entered commerce and some corporations offer (and sometimes compel) extended periods of leave under various terms and conditions.  Popular reasons for these corporate "holidays" include (1) being under investigation for sexual harassment, (2) being charged with some crime, (3) being suspected of insider trading and (4) being someone the corporation would like for some reason to sack but fear exists about the consequences.

Sad

Sad (pronounced sad)

(1) Affected by unhappiness or grief; sorrowful or mournful; depressed, glum, melancholy; feeling mentally uncomfortable, discomforted, distressed, uncomfortable.

(2) Expressive of or characterized by sorrow.

(3) Unfortunate; unsatisfactory; shabby; in poor condition.

(4) Of color, somber, dark, or dull; drab; lacking brightness.

(5) Of music, an identifiable set of characteristics in composition which humans (with some cultural variations) perceive as evoking melancholy; poignant, touching.

(6) In slang, unfashionable; socially inadequate or undesirable deplorably bad; lamentable (probably interchangeable with “lame”).

(7) In slang (New Zealand), strongly to express displeasure.

(8) In baking (pastry, cakes et al) not having risen fully; heavy, soggy (no rare except regionally).

(9) As SAD, seasonal affective disorder.

(10) Heavy; weighty; ponderous; close; hard (obsolete).

(11) Valiant, firm or steadfast (obsolete).

(12) Dignified, serious, grave (obsolete).

(13) Sated, having had one's fill; satisfied, weary (obsolete).

(14) Naughty; troublesome; wicked (obsolete).

Pre 1000: From the Middle English sad, from the Old English sæd (grave, heavy, weary (originally “sated, full; having had one’s fill of food, drink, fighting etc)), from the Proto-Germanic sadaz (sated, satisfied), the source also of the Old Norse saðr, the Middle Dutch sat, the Dutch zad, the Old High German sat, the German satt and the Gothic saþs (satiated, sated, full)), akin to the Old Norse sathr, the Latin satis (enough) & satur (sated), and the Greek hádēn (enough), from the primitive Indo-European seto or seh- (to satiate, satisfy) from the root sa- (to satisfy).  Synonyms include unhappy, despondent, disconsolate, discouraged, gloomy, downcast, downhearted, depressed, dejected & melancholy; the antonyms including happy, cheerful, gleeful, upbeat & joyous.  Sad & saddening are nouns, verbs & adjectives, sadness is a noun, saddenest, sadded & sadding are verbs, sadly is an adverb, sadder & sadest are adjectives and sadden is verb & adjective; the noun plural is sads.  The special noun use of sad (plural sads) is as an alternative form of saad (the letter ص in the Arabic script which is the 14^th letter of the Arabic alphabet).

In Middle English & early Modern English the prevailing senses were "firmly established, set; hard, rigid, firm; sober, serious; orderly and regular but such notions (except in dialect) survive only among some bakers where the word is used to describe anything which has failed to rise and remains soggy, heavy and lacking fluffiness.  Etymologists assume the sense development was based on a transference of the idea of “heavy, ponderous” to Being “full” mentally or physically (ie “weary; tired of).  By the early fourteenth century, the familiar modern use to suggest “unhappy, sorrowful, melancholy, mournful” was established although a less supported alternative path of the change traces a course through the common Middle English sense of “steadfast, firmly established, fixed” (sad-ware described some notably tough pewter vessels) and “serious” to “grave.”  In the way sad is most used in Modern English, ultimately it replaced the Old English unrot which was the negative of rot (which confusingly to modern ears, meant “cheerful, glad”.  By the mid fourteenth century, the dominant meaning was to express “sorrow or melancholy” while the meaning “very bad, wicked” dates from the 1690s; that use faded but re-emerged in the late twentieth century, use the same way “lame” is deployed to describe the unfashionable or socially lamentable, a variation on the slang sense of “inferior, pathetic”, documented since 1899.  The “sad sack” (a usually miserable person)” dates from the 1920s and was popularized by World War II (1939-1945) era cartoon character published in US military magazine Yank, assumed by all to be a euphemistic shortening of the alliterative armed forces slang phrase sad sack of shit.

The verb sadden picked up the meaning “to make sorrowful” in the 1620s; until around circa 1600 it had meant “to make solid or firm” and the early verb was the simple sad, from the Middle English saden (become weary or indifferent (also “make (something) hard or stiff”, from the Old English sadian which may be the source of the modern verb but the history is tangled.  The intransitive meaning “to become sorrowful” dates from 1718.  The noun sadness developed from the early fourteenth century Middle English sadnesse (seriousness) and the reason it’s not entirely clear when the meaning shift to “sorrowfulness, dejection of mind” evolved is probably because there was such regional variation but it appears to have unfolded over the fifteenth & sixteenth centuries; throughout Middle English the word usually referred to “solidness, firmness, thickness, toughness; permanence, continuance; maturity; sanity”.  The adjective sadder (more sad) was from the Middle English sadder and saddest persist as the comparative & superlative forms.  The adverb sadly originally meant “heavily” & “solidly”, the use to convey “sorrowfully” emerging by the mid-fourteenth century.

Acronym Finder lists an impressive 104 acronyms or initialisms, some of the more memorable being Sex, Alcohol, Drugs; Social Anxiety Disorder; Search and Destroy; Seasonal Affective Disorder; Schizoaffective Disorder; Separation Anxiety Disorder; Stand Alone Dump; Single, Available & Desperate; Single Awareness Day (ie Valentine's Day); System Administrator (they prefer sysadmin or syscon); Scotland Against Drugs and Sullen, Angry, Depressed.

Seasonal Affective Disorder (SAD)

Avoiding SADness: Lindsay Lohan soaking up some sun in Prussian blue bikini with high-waist brief and halter-style top.

Seasonal affective disorder (SAD) is a particular instance of depression which is sometimes referred to as seasonal depression or winter depression.  SAD was first described in 1984 and included in the revision to the third edition (DSM-III-R (1987)) of the American Psychiatric Association's (APA) Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM) as a “seasonal pattern”, a modifier applied to recurrent forms of mood disorders, rather than as an independent entity.  In the DSM-IV (1994), its status as a standalone condition was changed, no longer classified as a unique mood disorder but instead a specifier (called “with seasonal pattern”) for the “recurrent major depressive disorder that occurs at a specific time of the year and fully remits otherwise”.  In the DSM-5 (2013), although there were detail changes in terminology, the disorder was again identified as a type of depression (Major Depressive Disorder with Seasonal Pattern).  The symptoms of SAD often overlap with the behaviors & mood changes noted in clinical depression, the novelty being the condition manifesting usually during the fall (autumn) & winter when temperatures and lower and the hours of sunlight fewer, the symptoms tending to diminish with the onset of spring.  While notably less common, there are those who experience SAD during the summer and in either case it’s seen more frequently in women. SAD appears to be possible at any age but is most typically suffered in the age range 18-30.  In the US, the dynamic of the condition is illustrated by the diagnosis of SAD ranging from 1.4% of the population in sunny Florida to 9.9% in often gloomy Alaska and, after some initial sceptism, the condition was accepted as legitimate by most of the profession although there has been some contradictory research.  Although in a sense SAD has for centuries been documented in the works of poets and artists, it wasn’t until the mid-twentieth century that structured research began and it has been linked to a biochemical imbalance in the brain prompted by exposure to reduced hours of daylight and a reduction in sunlight.  It’s thought that as the seasons go by, some experience a shift in their internal “biological clock” (circadian rhythm) which induces the mechanism to become asynchronous with their daily schedule.  SAD appears more prevalent among those living far from the equator where the conditions in winter are exaggerated.

Common symptoms of SAD include fatigue (even among those who increase their daily hours of sleep) and the weight gain associated with overeating and carbohydrate cravings.  The symptoms can vary from mild to severe and in many cases are little different to those associated with major depression including:

(1) Feeling sad or having a depressed mood.

(2) Loss of interest or pleasure in activities once enjoyed.

(3) Changes in appetite; usually eating more, craving carbohydrates.

(4) Change in sleep patterns (usually sleeping too much).

(5) Loss of energy or increased fatigue despite increased hours of sleep.

(6) Increase in purposeless physical activity (eg inability to sit still, pacing, handwringing) or slowed movements or speech (to be clinically significant these actions must be severe enough to be observable to others).

(7) Feelings of worthlessness or guilt.

(8) Difficulty thinking, concentrating, or making decisions.

(9) Thoughts of death or suicide.

Risking SADness: Lindsay Lohan's strangely neglected film Among the Shadows (Momentum Pictures, 2019) was also released in some markets as The Shadow Within.  It's a gloomy piece, shot almost wholly in darkness and revolves around murderous werewolves and EU politicians (two quite frightening species).

There are several treatments for SAD including light therapy, antidepressant medications & talk therapy, sometimes used in combination.  Light therapy involves sitting in front of a light therapy box which emits a very bright light (while filtering-out harmful ultraviolet (UV) rays), usually for at least 20 minutes per day, typically first thing in the morning, during the winter months.  Most report some improvement after undergoing light therapy within 1-2 weeks of beginning treatment but the best results are obtained and relapse is most often prevented if the treatment is continued through the winter.  This is definitely a treatment rather than a cure and many re-start the therapy in the early fall to prevent any onset.  Talk therapy, particularly cognitive behavior therapy (CBT), has been used to treat SAD and the results appear to be similar to those suffering other forms of depression.  Selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs) are the anti-depressants most commonly used to treat SAD.

Rjukan's three-mirror array, reflecting the Sun's rays on the town square below.  Each mirror is 17²m (183 square feet).

The Norwegian town of Rjukan sits some 3 hours north-west of the capital, Oslo and is famously one of the darkest inhabited settlements on Earth, wholly without sun for five months of the year.  Some 3400 souls live in Rjukan, the town created by Norsk Hydro, the electricity company which built a hydro-electric plant on the nearby falls to generate large quantities of electricity.  The reason it spends so long in darkness is because it sits in a valley, surrounded by mountains which block the light.  In 1928, Norsk Hydro built a cable car to permit the town's residents to travel to the mountain top to enjoy some sunshine but recently, the town spent 5 million Norwegian Kroner (US$4.95 million) to install an array of moving mirrors to direct sunlight to the town square.  Solar-powered, the mirrors sit 450-metres up the slope and track the movement of the sun.  Not only has the innovation brought light into the lives of the locals but the motorized mirrors have become a tourist attraction.  The idea of such a mirror was actually not new and had been discussed since 1913 but one was installed only in 2013.

Citizens in the reflected Sunshine.