Thoroughbred

Thoroughbred (pronounced thur-oh-bred, thur-uh-bred, thuhr-uh-bred)

(1) Of pure or unmixed breed, stock, or lineage, as a horse or other animal; bred from the purest and best blood; a pedigree animal; purebred.

(2) By analogy, a person having good breeding or education.

One of a breed of horses, to which all racehorses belong, originally developed in England by crossing three Arabian stallions with European mares (always initial upper case)

(3) By analogy, a machine built to exacting standards with mostly bespoke parts rather than something assembled from parts or components from other manufacturers.

1701: The construct wass thorough +‎ bred.  Through is traced to circa 1300, from Middle English thoruȝ & þoruȝ, an adjectival use of the Old English þuruh (from end to end, from side to side, a stressed variant of the adverb þurh), a byform of Old English þurh, from which English gained through.  The word developed a syllabic form in cases where the word was fully stressed: when it was used as an adverb, adjective, or noun, and less commonly when used as a preposition.  Bred is the past tense of breed.  Breed is from the Middle English breden, from the Old English brēdan (bring (young) to birth, procreate (also "cherish, keep warm), from the West Germanic brodjan (source also of the Old High German bruoten, & German brüten (to brood, hatch)) & the Proto-Germanic brōdijaną (to brood), from brod- (fetus, hatchling), from the primitive Indo-European bhreu (warm; to boil, bubble, effervesce, burn).  It was cognate with the Scots brede & breid, the Saterland Frisian briede, the West Frisian briede, the Dutch broeden, the German Low German bröden & the German brüten.  The etymological notion is incubation, warming to hatch.  The intransitive sense "come into being" is from circa 1200; that of "beget or bear offspring" from the mid-thirteenth century.  As applied to livestock, the meaning "procure by the mating of parents and rear for use" was standardised by the mid-fourteenth century.  The sense of "grow up, be reared" (in a family; clan etc.) is from the late 1300s, extended to mean "form by education" a few decades later.  Thoroughbreed (also as thorough-breed) is a now rarely used alternative form.  Thoroughbred & thoroughbredness are nouns; the noun plural is thoroughbreds.

Among the thoroughbreds:  Lindsay Lohan visiting Flemington Racecourse for the Spring Carnival, Melbourne, Australia, November 2019.  Melbourne Cup Day (left) and Derby Day (right).

The noun breed "race, lineage, stock from the same parentage" (originally of animals) dates from the 1550s, derived from the verb but wasn’t applied to people until the 1590s; the scientific use to define a “"kind or species" began to be used in the 1580s.  The noun half-breed (person of mixed race) is attested from 1760 and was used first as an adjective in 1762; now though offensive it appears to have been replaced by “mixed-race”  but even this is not recommend for use unless being applied self-referentially.  The verb cross-breed appeared in 1670, used in relation to dogs, livestock and plants and, surprisingly, appears not to have been a noun until 1774.  Underbred (of inferior breeding, vulgar) from the 1640s was an adjective which didn’t survive; it was applied to animals "not pure bred" after 1890.

Thoroughbred the adjective dates from 1701 in the sense of persons "thoroughly accomplished" and wasn’t used for horses until the concept was created in 1796; the noun is first recorded 1842 but it’s hard to believe if wasn’t earlier in use in the horse-racing business; the noun is first recorded in 1842.  Use to refer to racehorses soon became definitive and all other applications are now analogous.

Needs a trained eye.  Thoroughbred (Indy King by Mr Prospector out of Queena) on the left, Standardbred to the right.

Sometimes casually used to refer to any purebred horse, it’s correct to use the word only with the Thoroughbred breed.  If used with a lower-case "t", it technically may be applied to just about any object when appropriate but never with other horse breeds.  It can cause confusion or worse. 

The Thoroughbred was bred in seventeenth and eighteenth-century England when several dozen native mares were crossbred with three imported Oriental stallions, Byerley Turk, Darley Arabian and Godolphin Arabian; all Thoroughbreds can trace their pedigrees to these three.  Between the 1730s and the late nineteenth-century, the breed spread throughout the world, first arriving in Australia in 1802.  Bred mainly for (gallop but not trotting or pacing) racing, they are also used for show jumping, combined training, dressage, polo, and fox hunting.  Thoroughbreds born in the Northern Hemisphere are officially considered a year older on the 1 January each year; those from the Southern Hemisphere having their birthday on 1 August.  These artificial dates enable the synchronization of northern and southern competitions for horses within their age groups.  Thoroughbreds are bred for speed, and depending on their intended career, for endurance over distances less than a mile (1600m) or as long as four (6400m).  They have a reputation for being highly-strung, sometimes deserved, sometimes not.

A horse cannot be registered as a Thoroughbred unless conceived by natural means; any form of artificial insemination is banned.  The industry maintains there are all sorts of reasons for this but it’s really a restraint of trade designed to limit supply and maintain high prices.  One charming second career for a Thoroughbred stallion which has proven too slow to race is that of a teaser.  A teaser’s job is to be placed close to a mare, usually behind a fence, to see if she’s in the mood to mate.  If she proves receptive, the teaser is led (unwillingly one supposes) away and replaced with a fast stallion.  Nature is then allowed to take its course.

The Maserati 5000 GT (Typo 103, 1959-1966)

1957 Maserati 450S.

It’s never taken much to induce advertising agencies to describe a car as a “thoroughbred”.  Some have been more convincing than others but few have been as deserving of the appellation as the Maserati 5000 GT (Typo 103).  With coachwork fabricated by eight different Italian coach-building houses, all of the thirty-four built used a slightly tamed 4.9 litre (300 cubic inch) variant of the 4.5 litre (273 cubic inch) V8 last seen in the Maserati 450S with which the factory’s racing team contested the World Sports Car Championship.  It really was end of the era stuff, a shift to unitary construction soon dooming most of the specialist coachbuilders while increasingly interventionist governments were in the throes of passing a myriad of laws which would outlaw barely disguised racing cars being used on the road.

1959 Maserati 5000 GT (Shah of Iran) by Touring.

In keeping with the pedigree of its illustrious engine, the 5000 GT enjoyed a blueblood connection in its very origin.  Before the Ayatollahs ran Iran, it was ruled by the Shah (king) and he got a lot more fun out of life than his clerical successors, noted especially as a connoisseur and of fast, exotic and expensive cars, his collection including multiple models from Lamborghini, Mercedes-Benz, Rolls-Royce, Ferrari and Maserati among others.  In 1958 he’d driven Maserati’s then popular 3500 GT but thought it lacking in power and, because hundreds a year were sold to the (rich) public, a bit common.  Accordingly, after receiving material advertising both the 3500 GT and the remaining 450S race cars the factory wished to dispose of after withdrawing from racing, the shah decided he wanted a combination of the two, the race engine in the road car.  To have it created, essentially he sent Maserati a blank cheque and asked them to call when it was ready.

1962 Maserati 5000 GT by Allemano.

It wasn’t as simple as it sounded for the 450S V8 was not some adaption from a production car but a genuine racing engine designed for use nowhere but the circuits and only in the hands of skilled racing drivers. Robust and powerful it certainly was but it was also raucous, inclined to roughness at low speeds and not all that well behaved except when at racing speed when it was more raucous still, if a little smoother.  Taming such a beast for the road was a challenge but, with the shah’s buckets of money and some Italian ingenuity, remarkably, a relatively quiet and tractable engine (compared with that of a race car) was concocted.  The bore-stroke relationship was changed, the camshaft profiles softened and the porting was altered, which, combined with a lower compression ratio, improved torque and delivered the still ferocious power over a more usable range.

1959 Maserati 5000 GT by Allemano.

Italian house Carrozzeria Touring designed one of their signature superleggera (their clever technique of lightweight construction) frames, onto which they attached a hand-made skin of aluminum to create a strikingly modernist two-seater coupé, its lines and interior appointments influenced by Persian Baroque architecture.  Delivered to the shah (Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, 1919-1980) in 1959, it was almost a secret but when a second, commissioned by a South African customer,  was displayed at the 1959 Turin Motor show, it generated such interest that Maserati were soon fielding enquiries from rich commoners wanting what royalty had.  Priced stratospherically however, there weren’t enough rich folk on the planet to make it a viable option for their production lines so it entered the catalogue as a bespoke item, Maserati modifying the 3500 chassis which, frankly had been a bit over-taxed by the big V8 and tweaking the engine still further, slightly increasing the capacity but in a way that rendered it more docile, yet still a howler when stirred.  The chassis appeared in the list and buyers could choose their own coachbuilder and eventually eight produced their own interpretations, the most numerous being by Carrozzeria Allemano which, over the years, finished twenty-two, the Allemano cars thought also the most alluring.

1963 Maserati 5000 GT by Fura.

It was capable in some of the configurations in which it was supplied of 170mph (275 km/h), the fastest road car of its day, almost matching the 183 mph (295 km/h) achieved years earlier by the Mercedes-Benz 300 SLR “Uhlenhaut” coupé, which was little more than a Formula One car with a bigger engine and number plates.  The 5000 GT was quite something and even if the early versions weren't exactly suited to urban use, they were never anything less than exciting.  All the 34 built still exist, most percolating between private collections, high-end auction houses and the odd appearance at an appropriately exclusive Concours d'Elegance.

The Gordon-Keeble GK-1 (1964-1967)

1965 Gordon-Keeble GK-1.

Although elegant and capable, the Gordon-Keeble was no thoroughbred.  Using a square-tube space-frame purchased as part of the assets of a bankrupt company, it was clothed not in hand-formed aluminum but with the much cheaper fibreglass.  Using various bits and pieces taken from the parts-bins of many manufacturers, it was powered by a 327 cubic inch (5.3 litre) Chevrolet V8, essentially the same motor found in everything from Corvettes to pick-up trucks and while it may have lacked a pedigree, the purchase and the running costs were appreciably less than Maserati 5000 GT, one able to buy one for a fraction of the cost and, if the worst came to the worst, replace the engine and gearbox for less than the cost of an Italian cylinder head.

1965 Gordon-Keeble GK-1.

All but one of the one-hundred Gordon-Keeble GK-1s were built in England between 1964- 1967 by engineers once associated with the Peerless company, one of quite a few briefly to flourish during the 1950s producing low-volume runs of swoopy-looking fibreglass bodies atop custom frames, using a variety of power-plants.  It was a simpler time.  The genesis of the GK-1 was a request in 1959 from a US Air Force (USAF) pilot then stationed in England to fit a Peerless with a 283 cubic inch (4.6 litre) Chevrolet Corvette V8.  The concept, essentially the same as that Carol Shelby (1923-2012) famously and historically would pursue by mating the AC Ace with the Ford V8 to create the Cobra (1962-1967), so impressed the engineers they took a V8 Peerless to Carrozzeria Bertone in Turin, Italy where a steel body designed by Giorgetto Giugiaro was built, appearing on Bertone’s stand at the 1960 Geneva Motor Show where it was well received.

1964 Gordon-Keeble GK-1.

After long delays related to securing contractual relationships with external component suppliers, the show car was finished to a point close to the standard required for regular production and, after testing which convinced the engineers it was a commercially viable proposition, sent to Detroit as a proof-of-concept for General Motors to evaluate.  Suitably impressed, Chevrolet agreed to supply the Corvette engines and gearboxes for the first production run.  Visually, the GK-1 differed little from the prototype, but structurally and mechanically, there were changes.  Most obvious was the switch of the body construction from steel to fibreglass, the engineers’ preference for aluminum prohibitively expensive and the Corvette engine was the newer 327 cubic inch (5.3 litre) unit introduced in 1962.  Mechanically, the GK1 was ready and reliable and, with its space-frame, De Dion rear axle, four wheel disk brakes, twin fuel tanks and a host of internal fittings hinting at a connection with aviation, the specification was tempting.  Released in 1964, the critical response was overwhelmingly positive (although nobody had a good word for the steering) and demand seemed initially strong.

1965 Gordon-Keeble GK-1.

However, the back-shed curse, which afflicting many small-scale British manufacturers in the era, struck.  Under-capitalized, the company was unable to successfully to link its cash flow with the demands of external suppliers upon which production depended and, whatever the engineering prowess available, the accounting skills required successfully to operate as a trading organization were lacking; a retail price under Stg£3,000 was unrealistically low and inadequate to support the actual cost of production and development.  By 1965, with ninety GK1s having been sold, the company was perilously close to insolvent and was sold but the new owners proved no more adept than the old.  After struggling to complete another nine cars (one more was added to the total in 1971, assembled the previous year from the residual spare parts when the factory was liquidated), operations finally closed, hopes of a US-based revival proving abortive.

Clan Gordon emblem.

One quirky footnote in the Gordon-Keeble story was the creature on the marque’s badge: a tortoise.  That may seem a curious choice for a vehicle designed for high-speed but the beast ended up on the badge because of a boardroom dispute.  Bertone’s prototype at the 1960 Geneva Motor Show had featured a badge with a stag's head, the emblem of the Scottish Clan Gordon to which belonged one of the founders of Gordon-Keeble.  Because the clan’s motto was Bydand (abiding or remaining) which, in modern parlance translates as something like “durable, immortal, steadfast & everlasting”, it was thought appropriate for the GK-1, which did live up to the motto better than most, some ninety-two of the one-hundred said either to be in running condition or undergoing restoration.

Gordon-Keeble corporate logo.

However, because of the long delays before production began, it was necessary to seek bridging finance and this brought the inevitable managerial disputes and as a result, Mr Gordon left, contractually obliged to allow the project to continue using his name but he withdrew the right to use the clan emblem.  With everything else going on, that wasn’t given much thought until late 1963 when, with a debut finally close, a photo-shoot was arranged so brochures and other promotional material could be prepared.  At just the moment the absence was noticed, a tortoise happened to be wandering in the garden chosen as the backdrop and the meandering Testudinidae, unaware of the minor role it was about to play in UK corporate history, was picked up and placed on the hood (bonnet), everyone amused at the juxtaposition of one of nature’s slowest creations adorning one of mankind’s fastest.  The tortoise was returned to the flower-beds and adopted as the emblem, appearing on the escutcheon of every Gordon-Keeble.

Triple

Triple (pronounced trip-uhl)

(1) Threefold; consisting of three parts (matching or not).

(2) Of three kinds; threefold in character or relationship.

(3) Three times as great; multiplied by three (numbers or quantities in general).

(4) In international law or international relations, as triple entente, triple alliance etc, a treaty or some state of arrangement between three states.

(5) In baseball (also called the three-base hit), a hit which enables the batter safely to reach third base.

(6) In (ten-pin) bowling, three strikes in succession.

(7) In basketball, a three-point field goal.

(8) In curling, takeout shot in which three stones are removed from play.

(9) In musical time or rhythm, having three beats in each bar

(10) As triple crown, in various sporting competitions (Rugby Union, thoroughbred racing, motor sport et al), a (sometimes informal) acknowledgement of victory in three specific events (use based on the triple crown (sometimes as triple tiara) once used for the coronation of the Roman Catholic Pope).

(11) In internal combustion engines (ICE), an engine with three pistons or rotors.

(12) One of three; a third (obsolete and the source of some misunderstandings when found in historic texts).

(13) In programming theory, as Hoare triple, a description of how the execution of a piece of code changes the state of the computation in Hoare logic, consisting of (1) a command to be run, (2) a pre-condition that holds true beforehand, and (3) a post-condition that holds true afterwards.

(14) In mathematics, a sequence of three elements or 3-tuple.

1325-1375: From the Middle English triple (there was also þripell), from the Old French triple or the Medieval Latin triplare (to triple) from the Latin triplus (threefold, triple), from the primitive Indo-European tréyes.  Triple is a noun, verb & adjective, tripled is a verb, tripling is a noun & verb, triply is an adverb and triplet is a noun; the noun plural is triples.

In English, the Latinate multiplier “triple” is but one of many ways the value three (3) is in some way expressed or applied.  “Three” is the highest value, single digit cardinal number, as an ordinal it’s “third” (the Latinate ordinal is “tertiary”), the adverbial form is “thrice” (or the more mundane “three times”, as a multiplier the term is “threefold” (also as “three-fold”), the distributive is “triply”, the collective “tripartite”, “trio” or “threesome” (ménage à trois a popular version which has tended to limit the utility of “threesome” for other purposes), the multiuse collective “triplet”, the Greek or Latinate collective “triad”, the collective prefix (from both Latin & Ancient Greek (the latter also had “trito”)) was “tri”, the fractional expression is “third” (the Latinate fractional prefix was “trient-”, the elemental “thrin” & “triplet” and a period of three years is a triennium.  However, while there are weeks, fortnights & months, there’s no accepted term which express a measure of 21 days although three months is often described as “a quarter” although in the context of the nine month gestation associated with human pregnancy, the three month blocks are "trimesters" (first, second & third).  The use in obstetrics extended to education and in systems where academic years exist in four semesters (or terms), there is also the "fourth trimester".

Boss & Co SxSxS 16-bore triple-barrel shotgun #4690.

Originally an adjective, the noun emerged in the early fifteenth century.  The use in baseball dates from 1880 while the various uses of triple-deck, triple-decker etc (a development of the earlier double-decker) for cakes, sandwiches, bunk-beds etc all came into use in the early 1940s.  Triple-barrel carburetors were rare but did exist, Porsche for example using them on their flat sixes.  Rugby Union in 1883 was the first to use “triple crown”, awarded in the UK to the side which won the three “home countries” (England, Ireland, Scotland & Wales) matches.  That was based on the use of the papal triple crown (sometimes as triple tiara) then used for the coronation of the Roman Catholic Pope and was later picked up in US thoroughbred racing: The Kentucky Derby, the Preakness Stakes, and the Belmont Stakes comprise the Triple Crown which was first officially awarded in 1919 although the term didn’t become widely used until the 1930s.  In motorsport, despite the popular perception, it’s never been an official award and many branches of the sport have their own triple crowns, most barely known outside of the small circle of their cognoscenti.  The three events which comprised the classic triple crown were (1) the Indianapolis 500 (first run in 1911), the 24 Hours of Le Mans (first run in 1923) and the Monaco Grand Prix (first run in 1929) and it’s been achieved only once.  That was by Graham Hill (1929–1975) who completed the set at Le Mans in 1972 and although he and others have suggested the Formula One World Championship should be included instead of the Monaco Grand Prix, the original arrangement seems still the accepted triple crown.

The Triple Alliance and Triple Entente were diplomatic arrangements formed in Europe in the decades prior to the First World War (1914-1918).  The Triple Alliance between Germany, Austria-Hungary & Italy was signed in 1882 as a defensive system directed entirely against France.  It was an integral part of the series of treaties and agreements variously negotiated or imposed by Otto von Bismarck (1815-1989; chancellor of the German Empire (the "Second Reich") 1871-1890) and needs to be understood in the way it interacted with other cogs in the Bismarck machine.  That machine, a collection of inter-locking treaties and agreements (some of them secret) worked to further the interests of (1) the German Empire and (2) a general peace in Europe and was a good device in Bismarck’s capable hands but it proved lethal when less competent practitioners (who didn’t fully understand the implications) inherited the tool.  The Triple Entente was between France, Russia and the UK and was formed in 1907; in the narrow technical sense it was not a formal military alliance but an “understanding” between the three to counter the growing power of Germany and the Triple Alliance.  The Ottoman Empire and Bulgaria would become attached to the Triple Alliance with the onset of war although Italy initially remained neutral before (in what would continue to be an Italian tradition) switching sided in 1915 to join the Alliance.  Both the Alliance and the Entente played their parts in the escalating tensions which culminated in the outbreak of hostilities which would trigger the chain reaction of declarations of war.  Had Bismarck still been in Berlin, it’s unlikely things would have been allowed to assume their own momentum.

Six-pack: Lindsay Lohan re-imagined as one of identical triplets.

The word is used also as a modifier as required such as triple-barreled (used with three-element surnames and in various manufactured items but best known in shotguns), triple-headed (again widely used but probably still most associated with creatures from mythology, tripledemic (a term used in public health and epidemiology to describe the simultaneous outbreak of three epidemics or pandemics), triple fault (in computing a third (and fatal) error instance in a CPU attempting a graceful recovery from a double fault, triple jump (an athletic (track & field) event involving three different types of jump), triple goddess (a female deity who is either three goddesses in one or one who is triune (both three and one at the same time) and triple X syndrome (a chromosomal variation characterized by the presence of an extra X chromosome in each cell of a human female).

The papal triple tiara

Pius XII (1876-1958; pope 1939-1958) in the papal triple tiara, at his coronation, 12 March, 1939.

The papal triple tiara is a crown which has been worn by popes of the Roman Catholic Church since the eighth century.  Traditionally it was worn for their coronation but no pontiff has been so crowned since Saint Paul VI (1897-1978; pope 1963-1978) in 1963 and he abandoned its use after the Second Vatican Council (Vatican II, 1962-1965).  The name tiara refers to the entire headgear and it has used a three-tiered form since a third crown was added during the Avignon Papacy (1309–1378).  It's also referred to as the triregnum, triregno or Triple Crown.  In a piece of one- (or perhaps four-) upmanship, Suleiman I (Süleyman the Magnificent, 1494-1566, Sultan of the Ottoman Empire 1520-1566) commissioned from Venice a four tier helmet to show, in addition to the authority claimed by popes, he could add the symbol of his imperial power.  Often put on display as the centrepiece of Ottoman regalia to impress visitors, there's no documentary evidence the sultan ever wore the four layer tiara, crowns not part of the tradition and, fashioned from gold and gemstones, it would anyway have been extraordinarily heavy.

A representation of the triregnum combined with twocrossed keys of Saint Peter continues to be used as a symbol of the papacy and appears on papal documents, buildings and insignia.  Remarkably, there’s no certainty about what the three crowns symbolize.  Some modern historians link it to the threefold authority of the pope, (1) universal pastor, (2) universal ecclesiastical jurisdiction and (3) temporal power.  Others, including many biblical scholars, interpret the three tiers as meaning (1) father of princes and kings, (2) ruler of the world and (3) vicar of Christ on Earth, a theory lent credence by the words once used when popes were crowned:  Accipe tiaram tribus coronis ornatam, et scias te esse patrem principum et regum, rectorem orbis in terra vicarium Salvatoris nostri Jesu Christi, cui est honor et gloria in saecula saeculorum (Receive the tiara adorned with three crowns and know that thou art father of princes and kings, ruler of the world, vicar on earth of our Savior Jesus Christ, to whom is honor and glory for ever and ever).

Lindsay Lohan triple-pack DVD offer.

Documents in the Vatican Archive suggest by 1130 the papal tiara had been modified to become a conventional (and temporal) symbol of sovereignty over the Papal States.  In 1301 during a dispute with Philip IV (Philip the Fair, 1268–1314, King of France 1285-1314), Pope Boniface VIII (circa 1230–1303; pope 1294-1303) added a second layer to represent a pope’s spiritual authority being superior to an earthly king’s civil domain.  It was Benedict XII (1285–1342; pope 1334-1342 (as the third Avignon pope)) who in 1342 who added the third, said to symbolize the pope’s moral authority over all civil monarchs, and to reaffirm Avignon’s possession.  A changing world and the loss of the Papal States deprived the triple crown of temporal meaning but the silver tiara with the three golden crowns remained to represent the three powers of the Supreme Pontiff: Sacred Order, Jurisdiction and Magisterium.

Not since 1963 has a pope worn the triple crown.  Then, the newly-elected Pope Saint Paul VI, at the end of his coronation, took the tiara from his head and, in what was said to be a display of humility, placed it on the altar.  In a practical expression of that humility, the tiara was auctioned; the money raised used for missionary work in Africa although, keeping things in house, the winning bidder was the Archdiocese of New York.  Popes Benedict XVI (1927–2022; pope 2005-2013, pope emeritus 2013-2022) and Francis (b 1936; pope since 2013) received tiaras as gifts but neither wore them.  Benedict’s, in a nice ecumenical touch, was made by Bulgarian craftsmen from the Orthodox Church in Sofia, a gesture in the name of Christian unity.  Benedict would have appreciated that, having always kept a candle burning in the window to tempt home the wandering daughter who ran off to Constantinople.

The Mercedes-Benz triple rotor Wankel

The original (although there was a prototype rendered in the tradition of functional brutalism) Mercedes-Benz C111 with triple rotor Wankel engine (1969).

Triple cylinder engines in cars were something of a niche in the early post war years but of late they’ve achieve a new popularity, improvements in electronics and combustion chamber design meaning three cylinders can now achieve what once required four and even with an equivalent displacement their efficiency is inherently greater because of the reduction in internal friction.  Obviously compact, they’ve proved an ideal power-plant in hybrid vehicles.  One quirky triple was the Mercedes-Benz C111 which first appeared in 1969 with a 1.8 litre (110 cubic inch) three-rotor Wankel engine, something then thought to have a great future; it seemed a good idea at the time.  The C111, although produced in a small run and finished in some cases to production car standards was only ever a test bed, not only for the doomed rotary engine but also developments in suspension design, anti-lock braking (ABS; Anti-Bloc System) and safety engineering.  The gullwing body really was designed by an Italian-born stylist but so long had he been in Germany that Teutonic ways had entered his soul so the C111 was less lovely than what might have emerged from a studio in Turin but at the time it still caused a stir, even though finished in what the factory called “safety orange”, their standard high-visibility paint for prototypes and test-beds.  Later versions were fitted with a four-rotor Wankel, a variety of diesels and even a 4.8 litre (292 cubic inch) V8, the fastest of the rotaries said to be capable of 300 km/h (188 mph) while the V8 version (C111-II-D) in 1976 set a new closed-course record on the Nardò Ring in Italy, clocking in at 403.978 km/h (251.815 mph).

Triple carburetors

1966 Ferrari 275 GTB/C (Gran Turismo Berlinetta Competizione (denoting a grand touring coupé built to competition-specification)).

When submitting to the Fédération Internationale de l'Automobile (the FIA; the International Automobile Federation) the application to homologate the 275 GTB/C for sports car racing, there was some glitch in the factory’s administrative processes because the document certifying the existence of a six-carburetor option for the 275 GTB wasn’t part of the paperwork enclosed.  That meant the 275 GTB/C could appear on the grid only with triple carburetors so to compensate, Ferrari had Weber produce a run of 40 DF13 units which in addition to their higher flow-rate featured lightweight magnesium bodies instead of the aluminium housing and were distinguished also by the distinctive, rearward-facing inlet trumpets.  As might be expected, original Weber 40 DF13s now command a premium price.  Twelve 275 GTB/Cs were built and the model was a turning point in being the last Ferrari built for racing to use the classic Borrani wire wheels.  Such had been the advances in tyre technology that by 1966 the grip generated transferred stresses so acute that in extreme conditions the spokes could break, a tendency exacerbated by the wheels’ additional width (7 inch front 7½ rear); there were accidents.  Such was the concern the two 275 GTB/Cs built as road cars were factory-fitted with aluminum-alloy wheels although the lovey Borranis continued to be made available for the later and much heavier 365 GTB/4 (Daytona, 1968-1973) and 365 GTC/4 (1971-1972).  In truth, using a 275 GTB/C on the road was a dubious proposition because as, a weight-saving measure, the body panels had been fabricated in thin 20-gauge aluminium; about half the thickness of the metal used for the road cars, it could be dented just by being touched and the dainty bumperettes (which offered at least some protection on the standard other variants of the 275 GTB) were wholly fake and merely affixed to the panels with no underlying structure.

1960 Jaguar XK150S 3.8 (left) and schematic of typical installation of Jaguar's auxiliary enrichment thermo-carburetor (right).

The last in the XK series (XK120 (1948-1954), XK140 (1954-1957) & XK150 (1957-1961)), the Jaguar XK150 was introduced in 1957 with a version of the twin carburetor 3.4 litre XK-Six used since 1948.  Increased weight had blunted the XK150's performance, something not wholly off-set by the slight increase in power coaxed from the engine and in 1958 the option of an "S" specification was made available as the XK150S, restoring the pace of the earlier cars, the raised output achieved with a revised cylinder head and triple carburettors (seen earlier in the 1950son the C-Type, D-Type & XKSS).  The final and fastest of the species was the 3.8 litre version of the XK150S, introduced in 1960; the engine in essentially this configuration would later be shared with the early E-Types (XKE) and Mark X, the triple carburetor arrangement carried when the 4.2 litre versions were released in 1964.  The triple carburetor engines were in 1968 withdrawn from the US market because the anti-emission regulations made the cost of certification prohibitive although, while in North America buyers had to be content with twin-carburetor units, the triples continued for RoW (rest of the world) vehicles exported to other places or sold in the home market.  When the last of the six-cylinder E-Types was made in 1971, that was the end of the line for the triple carburettor Jaguar.  It is however misleading to suggest the XK150S, E-Type and Mark X/420G were the only series-production Jaguars with triple carburetors because on some cars during the 1950s & 1960s, the factory fitted a smaller electromagnetically controlled “auxiliary carburetor” the main pair of carburettors.  The unusual arrangement acted as a choke but it was a complicated solution to a simple problem and, while performing faultlessly in testing, in the real world with gas (petrol) of varying quality and in different climatic conditions, it sometimes proved troublesome and there were owners who gave up and installed a conventional choke.

1966 Pontiac 2+2 421 HO Tri Power.

The early carburetors were all single throat (later also as “choke” or “barrel”) device and almost all were gravity-fed and it wasn’t until the 1930s the first two-barrel (then called a “duplex”) units appeared.  That design was such an advance because the duplexing allowed “fuel separation” manifolds which more accurately sent the mixture to the most distant cylinders; the adoption if this technology in 1934 allowed the output of Ford’s then new “flathead” V8 to rise from 60 to 85 horsepower (HP).  Buick in 1941 created what was, in effect, the first four-barrel system by installing two two-barrel units, the second becoming active only when the throttle had been opened far enough to operate the progressive linkage. The advantage being economy of operation in most circumstances, the additional fuel-burn required only on demand; it was an approach Detroit would use until 1971.  Four-barrel carburettors which operated on the same model appeared at scale in the 1950 and became an industry standard, some even installed in pairs on the highest-performance vehicles.  Ideal in many ways for the V8 layout, the problem for the manufacturers was the engines grew at a much greater rate than the carburetors and while the dual four-barrel configuration was suited to some, a better compromise for many was to use triple two-barrels.  Pontiac and Oldsmobile chose that path in 1957 and Chevrolet and Cadillac followed in 1958.  Ford flirted only briefly with the triple two-barrel before switching for a few years to dual four barrels for their high performance V8s and in 1958 three were bolted onto even the big, heavy 430 cubic inch (7.0 litre) MEL V8 although in that form it appeared only on one Mercury for that single season.  As higher-volume four-barrel carburetors became widely available, the rationale for the triple option faded and Chevrolet ceased use for all but the full-sized line and the Corvette; the last triple carburetor corvettes were built in 1969.  Chrysler was last to adopt the idea and the last to offer it, Trans-Am themed 340 cubic inch (5.5 litre) Plymouth ‘Cudas and Dodge Challengers made in 1970 while the 440 cubic inch (7.2 litre) (advertised variously as “Six Pack” by Dodge and “Six Barrel” by Plymouth) was available in several models between 1969-1971 although its last appearance was in the Jensen SP, the last of which was built in 1973.

"Triple" is used of many things: Lindsay Lohan and her lawyer in court, Los Angeles, December 2011.

Of taillights and exhaust tips 

1957 DeSoto Adventurer Convertible.

DeSoto's signature triple stacked taillights were a footnote in Detroit's macropterous era of the late 1950s, the style making possible the distinctive vertical arrangement.  Chevrolet would for years make triple taillights a trademark of their more expensive lines (although, apart from the odd special built for the show circuit, they resisted the temptation to add a third to the Corvette (the additional rear apertures on the abortive 1963 Corvette Grand Sport (GS) were for air extraction)) but they appeared always in a less memorable horizontal array.  DeSoto's motif was Chrysler's most successful use of the fins but it wasn't enough to save the brand  which was crowded out of the mid-priced market, not only by competition from General Motors (GM) and Ford but also by intra-corporate cannibalization, squeezed from below by Dodge and from above by Chrysler's new Newport line.  Demand for DeSotos collapsed and that so many were built in 1960 was simply to use up the large inventory of the few parts still exclusive to the brand.  The last of the line, heavily discounted, were not sold until well into 1961.

More sharing of stuff than before: 1960 DeSoto Fireflite four-door hardtop (left) and 1960 Chrysler New Yorker four-door hardtop (right).  Note the New Yorker's larger rear window.  Remarkably, the 1960 Chryslers offered two different designs of rear glass, the more panoramic described in the brochures as “Extra large rear window” which was standard on all two-door hardtops & New Yorker four-door hardtops and optional on the Saratoga and Windsor four-door hardtops.  It was a time when such a flourish was at the whim of designers whereas now it would require a separate programme of crash-testing several vehicles.

By 1959 the writing was on the wall for the once popular DeSoto and the 1960 range would prove its swansong, the last of the breed barely modified Chryslers and the only real hint of the past was the taillight's triple frets.  On the DeSoto the ridges were a modest attempt to retain brand identity but in optics such things have a purpose and are known as “Fresnel lenses” or “Fresnel ribs”, the name from French civil engineer Augustin-Jean Fresnel (1788–1827), remembered for his research into optics which led eventually to the near-unanimous acceptance of the nature of light being a wave (he was half-right but light was later proved to possess a wave-particle duality).  His more enduring Fresnel lens used the catadioptric (reflective/refractive) principle and what the “stepped” design did was extend the reach of lighthouse beams, doubtlessly saving the lives of many seafarers.  Fresnel’s invention was a refinement of the dioptric (refractive) stepped lens, a concept first published by the French cosmologist and mathematician Georges-Louis Leclerc, Comte de Buffon (1707-1788) and Fresnel’s enhancements better distributed and directed the light, improving visibility from longer distances and a greater range of angles.

By 1960 (left) the DeSoto's taillights were a shadow of the way the triple-stack motif had been defined in 1959 (right): This juxtaposition is DeSoto Red Tail Lights in Black and White by Paul Ward.  Many designers probably will prefer the later interpretation but there's a charm to the triple stack. 

1969 Dino 206 GT by Ferrari in Azzurro Metallizzato (left), 1974 Ferrari 365 GT4 in Rosso Corso (centre) and 1975 Ferrari 365 GT4 BB in Verde Germoglio.

Unexpectedly, in the early 1970s, Ferrari had a flirtation with triple taillights and they doubled-down for the 365 GT4 BB (better known as the Berlinetta Boxer), adding a pair of triple tail-pipe apparatuses (thus a count of six rather than the usual four) for the 4.4 litre Flat-12.  Before the decade was out it must have been decided four of either was enough and the factory decided for a while (mostly) to stick to the classics: as designs like the Dino 206 GT illustrate, less can be more.  Since the BB however, Ferraris have also appeared with two and three tailpipes (some in the 1970s had but one) and in the twenty-first century many cars come with just a minimalist pair of taillights.  Ascetically, no arrangement works as well as the traditional template: four lights, four pipes.

The fetish of motorcycle exhaust systems

1980 Laverda Jota 1000 (3-into-2, far left), 1973 Suzuki GT750 "Water Buffalo" (3-into-4, centre left), 1972 Kawasaki 750 Mach IV (H2) (3-into-3, centre right) and 2017 MV-Augusta Dragster 800Rc (3-into-3, far right).

Triple cylinder engines have been a feature of motorcycle engines for decades and different manufacturers have taken various approaches to the exhaust systems, an item which exerts upon riders a special fascination.  It’s not unusual to fit single systems (3-into-one) but there are also some which “siamesed” the central header pipe, the derived pair joining the two outer pipes to duct into two mufflers.  Unusually, Suzuki for a while offered 380, 550 & 750 cm³ machines with 3-into-4 systems, the central header again “siamesed” the central header but had the novelty of terminating the two pipes in separate mufflers thereby emulating the appearance of a four-cylinder machine.  It was a curious arrangement which Suzuki abandoned and other manufacturers choose not to follow (although there had been after-market suppliers which concocted 2-into-4 systems which exchanged the "advantage" of "the look" for the drawback of additional weight and needless complexity).  Greatly at the time, Suzuki must have valued symmetry.

1973 Kawasaki H2 Mach IV 750 (left) and 1975 Triumph X-75 Hurricane (right).

Somewhat earlier, asymmetry hadn’t frightened Kawasaki which used pragmatic 3-into-3 engineering for their range (250, 350, 400, 500 & 750 cm³) of charismatic, highly strung two-strokes, one pipe to the left, two to the right and it was a distinctive feature which, although sometimes seen on the track, remains rare on the road.  In the same era, Triumph on their X75 Hurricane took 3-into-3 asymmetry to its logical conclusion, its three pipes arranged in a radically upswept stack on the right.  It looked dramatic and was much admired but didn’t catch on although there’s the odd revival, the Italian house MV-Augusta engineering a particularly aggressive interpretation on their Dragster 800Rc.

1969 Triumph Trident T150.

So there have been triple-cylinder motorcycles with exhaust systems configured as 3-into-1, 3-into-2, 3-into-3 & 3-into-4 but the early versions of the Trident and BSA Rocket 3 (1968-1975) offered a unique take on things with a design which had the three headers ducted into two mufflers, each of which terminated with three exhaust stubs so it can be described as a 3-into-2-into-6 which seems at least one layer of complication too many.  The styling on the early Trident and Rocket wasn’t well received and was revised for 1971.  Neither motorcycle was a commercial success because they arrived too late; had the pair been released in 1966 as was planned, things might have been better because genuinely they were fast and offered a level of refinement beyond the parallel twins which for years had been a mainstay of the British industry.  As it was, within weeks of their debut, Honda’s epoch-making 750-Four was on the market, a generation (or more) advanced compared with the competition and when the Kawasaki 900 later followed, even the (slight) performance advantage enjoyed by the British triples vanished.

2022 Triumph Rocket 3 GT in triple black.

When Triumph announced the Rocket 3 in 2019, most attention was on the numbers, the 2458 cm³ (150 cubic inch) triple being the largest displacement engine available in a motorcycle and the (163 ft-lb) (221 N⋅m) torque generated also industry leading, topping even the big Ducatis and the straight-six BMW.  Triumph since 2004 been at the top of the displacement tree with the Rocket III’s 2294 cm³ (140 cubic inch) engine and the updated model was very much a modernization exercise, something which may account for the decision to switch from the traditional Roman numerals to a digitally compliant “3”.  Being a triple there were of course options for how to handle the exhaust ducting and for the GT model Triumph opted for the asymmetric on the model of the old Kawasaki two-strokes rather than reprise its own X-75 Hurricane of nearly half a century earlier.  Unlike Kawasaki, Triumph didn’t make asymmetry a signature feature, choosing to route the third exhaust, almost inconspicuously, just under the swing-arm on the left side, a curious juxtaposition with the visual statement of intent made by the two on the right.  Doubtlessly the engineering behind the decision was sound and to add a bit of high-tech bling, some Rocket 3’s had carbon-fibre exhaust tips and most conspicuously they were carbon-fibre.