Banister, Baluster & Balustrade

Banister (pronounced ban-uh-ster)

(1) The handrail on the side of a staircase.

(2) One of the vertical supports of a handrail; a baluster (often in the plural as banisters).

(3) The balustrade of a staircase (usually in the plural as banisters).

(4) To construct a banister.

(5) To act as a banister (only in the literal sense).

1660–1670: Of uncertain origin but thought most likely by dissimilation from the earlier ballester & the seventeenth century barrester, both corruptions of baluster.  As late a 1848 it was listed as “a vulgar term” but by the early twentieth century was an accepted part of the language of architecture and in the building trades. The surname Bannister was unrelated to the use in architecture and entered English from the Anglo-Norman Bannister, from the Old French banastre (basket); it was thus occupational and described a “basket-maker”.  Like many surnames, it also became a locality name.  The verb use in the sense of “to construct a banister” is a metal worker’s or carpenter’s term to describe “fabricating a banister” while the idea of “to act as a banister” is an allusion to some use of static uprights to support something.  There’s is no evidence it has been used figuratively in the way “pillar” or “buttress” are used metaphorically.  Minnie Bannister (voiced by Spike Milligan (1918–2002) & Henry Crun (voiced by Peter Sellers (1925–1980)) were two elderly characters in the BBC’s radio comedy series The Goon Show (1951-1960) which was, by the standards of the time, somewhat anarchic and a precursor to later ventures into surrealist television like Monty Python's Flying Circus (1969-1974).  The gags involving Henry Crun & “Modern Min” Bannister usually involved placing the two into roles wholly improbably for such a decrepit pair.  The spelling bannister (influenced presumably by the surname Bannister) is listed by most dictionaries as an alternative but it seems rare.  Banister is a noun & verb and banistering & banistered are verbs; the noun plural is banisters.

Baluster (pronounced bal-uh-ster)

(1) In architecture, any of a number of closely spaced uprights supporting a railing.

(2) Any of various symmetrical supports, as furniture legs or spindles, tending to swell toward the bottom or top (rare in US use).

1595–1605: From the French baluster, from the Middle French balustre, from the Italian balaustro (pillar shaped like the calyx of the pomegranate flower), from balausta (wild pomegranate flower), ultimately from the Latin balaustium, from the Ancient Greek βαλαύστιον (balaústion), probably from a Semitic language.  Iin Aramaic (the language of Christ), a balatz was “a wild pomegranate flower” and in Classical Syriac ܒܠܳܨܳܐ (blāṣā) was “a pomegranate shoot”.  In Roman architecture, uprights with lyre-like double curves (resembling the swelling form of the half-opened pomegranate flower) were most fashionable.  The spellings ballister & balluster are both (obsolete) while balustre is listed as an alternative (though not used in the US).  Baluster is a noun and balustered & balusterlike are adjectives; the noun plural is balusters.

Balustrade (pronounced bal-uh-streyd)

A railing with supporting balusters.

1635-1645: An unadapted borrowing from the French balustrade, from the Middle French balustre, from the Italian balaustro (pillar shaped like the calyx of the pomegranate flower), from balausta (wild pomegranate flower).  Balustrade is a noun and balustraded & balustrading are verbs; the noun plural is plural balustrades.

Of staircases and such

Lindsay Lohan in glomesh, on staircase.

The terms “banister”, “baluster” & “balustrade” are all used in the language of architecture and design, usually in the context of staircases or railing systems but all refer to different elements.  Banister is now used more loosely than in earlier times.  Mostly, banister refers to the handrail of a staircase, the part one is supposed to hold to stabilize one’s self when ascending or descending (or slide down if one is a child or drunken under-graduate) but it’s also sometimes use of the uprights attached to the rail.  Banister and “handrail” can thus be interchangeable but the former is almost universal in the US while in other parts of the English-speaking world (even Canada, usually a part of the US sphere of linguistic influence), handrail has become common.  Interestingly, one piece of global linguistic standardization seems to be the WH&S (workplace health & safety) signage: It’s always something like “use the handrail when using stairs”, never “use the banister”.

Joe Biden (b 1942; US president since 2021) tripping up (for the second time that assent) while climbing the stairs of Air Force One (despite following the WH&S warning and gripping the handrail).  Since the motor manifestations of his descent into senility have become more obvious, Mr Biden is no longer allowed to use the “big stairs” and is directed to the “baby stairs” in the plane’s nose.  Whether the small, angled brackets (some might call them flanges) which affix the handrail to the structure can be called balusters is debatable but that’s certainly their function.

President Biden should have taken one step at a time.

“Baluster” is the correct technical term for the uprights (the vertical posts or spindles supporting the handrail (a few of which are actually decorative with no structural function).  Whether decorative or structural, balusters are almost always arrayed in a series, either a cluster of identical units or with some variations as an architectural flourish.  In style, balusters can simple or ornate and constructed from just about any materials including wood, metal, stone or composites.  In some cases, balusters and banisters (handrails) will be of the same material and in others they will differ.  Some materials have fallen from favor because of the maintenance factor.  Brass was once widely used but keeping it polished proved a labor intensive business and in the hotels which once dripped with the stuff, there's now much more aluminium and stainless steel visible.

She would blame the (missing) balustrades because there is always someone or something to blame: Crooked Hillary Clinton, slipping (twice) in India, March 2018.

Although often much admired for their intricacy, banisters, balustrades and such are an important safety feature of staircases.  In March 2018, while visiting (for some reason) the Jahaj Maha (Ship Palace) in Mandu, crooked Hillary Clinton (b 1947; US secretary of state 2009-2013), despite holding the arm of an aide, slipped while descending stone stairs.  Another aide quickly took the other arm to stabilize things and the descent resumed but she slipped again, illustrating the importance of handrails which weren’t so much of a thing in the sixteenth century when the palace was built.  Crooked Hillary might be used (at least when not slipping) as an example of the way Spaniards explain the meaning of the word “enigma”: “Were one to meet her on the stairs, one couldn’t be sure if she was going up, or coming down”.

Components of a staircase.

To an architect, a “balustrade” is the name for the whole apparatus (the handrail (banister) and the balusters assembled), added to which might be as base-rail below (although some balusters are mounted directly to the floor or the tread of the stairs.  So, the balustrade is the collective term for the whole railing system on a staircase, balcony, terrace, walkway, or other structure but a convention (by no means universal) seems to have evolved to use balustrade to describe structures other than those used on staircases (unless they’re outdoors).  A railing separating pedestrians from road traffic or a river would certainly be a balustrade and that might also be the term of choice for the apparatus on the staircase leading from the river.  Once inside however, it’s all banisters and handrails.

A glass "balustrade" is really a type of wall with the top-edge serving as a handrail.

"Glass balustrades" are a favorite of interior decorators and can be applied to both indoor and outdoor use.  In domestic use, there's sometimes some resistance because many people, understandably, associate glass with fragility but the glass used is a specialized tempered safety glass, rated at some 400% the strength of that typically used in windows.  An additional benefit is that other than cleaning, glass is an essentially zero-maintenance material and not susceptible to rot, rust or other forms of corrosion.  Depending on the desired effect, a hybrid approach can also be used in which there's a traditional banister (handrail) and base-rail with a small number of uprights (balusters), a glass panel taking the place of the rest.  This is essentially using the components as a window frame. 

Boomerang

Boomerang (pronounced boo-muh-rang)

(1) A bent or curved piece of tough wood used by some of the Indigenous peoples of Australian as a throwing stick (and for other purposes), one form of which can be thrown so as to return to the thrower.  Such throwing sticks have also been found in archaeological digs in other places.

(2) Based on the use Indigenous peoples of Australia, an object in the shape of a flat curved air-foil that spins about an axis perpendicular to the direction of flight, used for various purposes including sport, training and aeronautical purposes.

(3) In design, anything using the boomerang shape (not always symmetrically)

(4) Something which in flight assumes the shape of a boomerang, such as the “boomerang kick” in certain football codes.

(5) In theatre and other stage environments, a mobile platform (mobile and height-adjustable) used for setting or painting scenery.

(6) In theatre and other stage environments, a batten, usually suspended vertically in the wings, used for mounting lighting units.

(7) In theatre and other stage environments, a device for changing the color of a follow-spot(light).

(8) In psychology, as “boomerang effect”, a strong opposing response caused by attempts to restrict a person's freedom or change their attitudes.

(9) In pathology, as “boomerang dysplasia”, a lethal osteochondrodysplasia in which the bones of the arms and legs are congenitally malformed into the shape of a boomerang.

(10) In air force (originally Royal Air Force (RAF)) slang, the early return of an aircraft from an aborted mission, often attributer to mechanical or other technical problems.

(11) A cocktail made with rye whiskey and Swedish punsch.

(12) Figuratively, something or someone which come backs or returns (as the boomerang behaves when correctly thrown) and when applied to people used especially of those who habitually return (often as “serial boomeranger”).

(13) Something (physical and otherwise, such as a scheme, statement or argument) which causes harm to the originator (the idea of a “rebound” or “backfire”).

(14) The action of coming back, returning or backfiring:

1827: From būmariny (missile weapon used by Aborigines), the recorded phonetic form of a word in one of the now extinct languages spoken by the Dharuk people native to an area in New South Wales now known to geographers as the Sydent basin.  A word pronounced as wo-mur-rang was noted in NSW in 1798 which may have been related but there’s no documentary evidence.  Boomerang is a noun & verb; boomeranger is a noun, boomeranged & boomeranging are verbs, the noun plural is boomerangs.

Benson Microfibre Boomerang Pillow. The manufacturers claim the shape is adaptable to all sleeping positions and provides additional support for joints and relieves pressure points.  It’s also ideal for reading, tablet or laptop use in bed.

The verb use in the sense of “throw a boomerang” seems to have come into use in the 1800s while the figurative sense of “fly back or return to a starting point” was in use by the early twentieth century.  A “boomerang baby”, “boomerang child” or boomerang kid” is one who returns to live in the family home after a period of independent living and known collective as the “boomerang generation”, the phenomenon noted in many countries and associated with financial distress, related especially to the cost of housing.

Indigenous Australian boomerangs from the collections of the Australian National Museum: In pigmented wood (left), a hooked, "number 7" by Yanipiyarti Ned Cox (centre) and with carving of horse and cow (right).

For the Indigenous (Aboriginal) peoples of Australia, the boomerang is as old as creation and since white settlement it has become also a symbol of the enduring strength of Aboriginal culture.  Although no written form of language (in the structured sense used elsewhere) evolved among them, an oral tradition now known “the Dreaming” (apparently no longer “Dreamtime”) extends from the past into the present. In the Dreaming, many of the physical formations of the (lakes, rivers, rock structures, mountains etc) were created when Ancestors threw boomerangs and spears into the earth.  Although the boomerang of the popular imagination is the familiar chevron shape, during the nineteenth century almost 300 language groups were identified by anthropologists and the construction of boomerangs varied, the divergences dictated mostly by the prevailing environment: Larger, heavier boomerangs were associated with inland and desert people while the lighter versions were thrown by coastal and high-country inhabitants.  Despite the perceptions, most were of the non-returning variety and were used as hunting weapons for the killing of birds and game including emu, kangaroo and other marsupials.  Not only was the boomerang a direct-impact device but the technique was also noted of a hunter making a boomerang ricochet off the ground to achieve an ideal angle.  The early observers recorded in skilled hands (and over thousands of years those skills would have been well-honed) the boomerang could be effective when hunting prey at a range up to 100 yards (90 m).

Back To Me (Cavalier's Boomerang Club Mix, 2020) by Lindsay Lohan.

Combination tactics were also observed.  When hunting for birds, a returning boomerang might be thrown above a flock of ducks to simulate the effect of a hovering bird of prey, inducing fright which would make the birds fly into nets set up in their flight path or, if within range, a hunter could cast a non-returning boomerang in the hope of a strike.  A special application and one which relied on a design with none of the famous aerodynamic properties was in the harvesting of fish, heavy boomerangs effective killing weapons of in areas of high tidal variation where fish became trapped in rock pools.   They were also Battle-weapons, used both to throw from some distance and in close combat, the types seen including small, hand-held “fighting sticks” device and some even two yards (1.8 m) in length.  Remarkably, the much the same implements served also as digging sticks used to forage for root and could be used to make fire, the familiar idea of “rubbing sticks together”.  Although these practical may have declined in significance as Western technology has been absorbed, boomerangs remain a prominent feature in Aboriginal dance and music.

Since the techniques developed for the shaping of Perspex and other plastics were (more or less) perfected during World War II (1939-1945), they’ve been widely adopted in industrial mass-production, for better and worse.  One thing made possible was boomerang-shaped taillights on cars which for years were about the most avant-garde of their type although of late, designers have been unable to resist the contortions and complexity made possible by the use of LEDs (light emitting diode).  Some critics insist the “boomerang” tag should be applied only to something in the shale of the “classic” boomerang and that anything asymmetric is properly a “hockey stick” but most seem content with the label.

Top row, left to right: 1969 Pontiac Bonneville, 1970 Hillman Avenger and 1967 Plymouth Barracuda.  Those which point "up" probably work better than those pointing "down" because the latter imposes a "droopiness".

Middle row, left to right: 1967 Chrysler Valiant VE Safari (Wagon), 1967 Chrysler Valiant VE Sedan and 1962 Pontiac Bonneville.  Strangely, although the sedan and wagon versions of the VE Valiant both used the boomerang shape, the moldings were different.

Bottom row, left to right: 1958 Edsel Bermuda station wagon, 1960 Chrysler New Yorker and 1975 Mazda RX-5.  The Edsel's tail lights worked as indicators and because the boomerang shape had link with the detailing on the rear quarter panels, when flashing, they actually "point" in the direction opposite to which the car is turning.  It was a harbinger of the Edsel's fate.

Louis Vuitton’s Fall 2014 campaign shoot with 1972 Maserati Boomerang, Giardini della Biennale, Venice.

The photo-shoot for Louis Vuitton’s Fall 2014 campaign at Venice’s Giardini della Biennale featured the 1972 Maserati Boomerang concept car.  Coordinated by Nicolas Ghesquière (b 1971; LV's women's creative director since 2013) and shot by German photographer Juergen Teller (b 1964), it was a rare appearance of the Boomerang which, designed by Giorgetto Giugiaro (b 1938), had first appeared at the Turin Motor Show as a static mock-up in Epowood (a versatile epoxy used for forming shapes) before being engineered as a fully-finished and working vehicle, built on the underpinnings of a Maserati Bora (1971-1978).  In that configuration it was displayed at the 1972 Geneva show where it was understood as one of the “high-speed wedges” of an era which included the original Lancia Stratos, the Lotus Esprit and, most influentially of all, the Lamborghini Countach, the cluster defining the template around which exotic machines would for decades be built, the design motif still apparent in today’s hypercars.  Eye-catching from the outside, the interior also fascinated with a steering wheel and gauge cluster built as a single console emerging from a distant dashboard, the wheel rotating as the gauges remained stationary.

1972 Maserati Boomerang by Giorgetto Giugiaro.

It was Italdesign, founded by Giorgetto Giugiaro which designed the Maserati 3200 GT (Tipo 338; 1998-2002), a car which, although not exciting in a way many of the marque’s earlier models had been, was an important element in the establishing Maserati’s twenty-first century reputation for functionalism and quality.  Importantly, although in production for only four of the transitional years during which ownership of the brand passed from Fiat to Ferrari and the solid underpinnings would be the basis for the succeeding Coupé and Spyder (4200 GT, Tipo M138; 2001-2007).

Maserati 3200 GT (left) and 1973 Dino 246 GTS (C&F) by Ferrari.  Round lights are better than other shapes.

It was on the 3200 GT that Italdesign used tail-lights in the shape of a boomerang, much comment upon at the time but also a landmark in that they were the first production car to be sold with taillights which were an assembly of LEDs, the outer layer the brake lights, the inner the directional indicators (flashers).  Following the contours of the bodywork and integrated with the truck (boot) lid, they were the most memorable feature on what was otherwise an inoffensive but bland execution which could have come from any factory in the Far East.  They generated much publicity but it’s hard to argue they’re better looking than the classic four round lenses known from many of the best Italians.  Like architects, designers seem often drawn to something new and ugly rather than old yet timeless, the former more likely to attract the awards those in these professions award one-another.

Northrop YB-49 in flight, California, 1952.

The aerodynamic properties of the “flying wing” have long intrigued aircraft designers.  The USAF (United State Air Force) even contemplated putting into production on of Northrop’s design but in the mid-1940s, needing a delivery system for its nuclear bombs which was a known, reliable quantity, opted instead for the Convair B-36 which they acknowledged was obsolescent but would provide a serviceable stop-gap until wings of the upcoming Boeing B-52 could be formed.  That doubtlessly was the correct decision and in the decades since, neither a military or civilian case has been made for the “flying wings”, the machines which have entered service really variations on the proven delta-wing concept but the big Northrop YB-49 & XB-35 possessed an undeniable beauty and it’s a shame all were scraped by 1953.  The air force personnel actually preferred to call them “bat bombers”.

Atlas

Atlas (pronounced at-luhs (U) or At-lass (non-U))

(1) A bound collection of maps, named after the Greek god. Since the sixteenth century, pictures of Atlas and his burden have been used as decorations on maps.

(2) A detailed visual conspectus of something of great and multi-faceted complexity, with its elements splayed so as to be presented in as discrete a manner as possible whilst retaining a realistic view of the whole.  Most associated with anatomy, especially of the human body, it’s long been used to describe detailed collections of drawings, diagrams etc of any subject.

(3) In anatomy, the top or first cervical vertebra of the neck, supporting the skull and articulating with the occipital bone and rotating around the dens of the axis.

(4) In stationery, a size of drawing or writing paper, 26 × 33 or 34 inches (660 x 838 or 864 mm); in some markets sold in a 26 x 17 inch (660 x 432 mm) form.

(5) In architecture, a sculptural figure of a man used as a column; also called a telamon (plural telamones or telamons) or atlant, atlante & atlantid (plural atlantes).

(6) A mountain range in north-west Africa.

(7) In classical mythology, a Titan, son of Iapetus and brother of Prometheus and Epimetheus, condemned for eternity to support the sky on his shoulders as punishment for rebelling against Zeus: identified by the ancients with the Atlas Mountains.

(8) A very strong person or who supports a heavy burden; a mainstay.

(9) In rocketry, a liquid-propellant booster rocket, originally developed as the first US intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM), used with Agena or Centaur upper stages to launch satellites into orbit around the earth and send probes to the moon and planets; also used to launch the Mercury spacecraft into Earth orbit.

(9) in military use (US rocketry) & astronautics, the SM-65, an early ICBM (inter-continental ballistic missile), re-purposed as the launch platform for orbital vehicles (satellites) and later used with Agena or Centaur upper stages to send probes to the moon and planets; also used to launch the Mercury spacecraft into Earth orbit.

(10) In astronomy, a small satellite of Saturn, discovered in 1980.

(11) In astronomy, a crater in the last quadrant of the moon.

(12) In astronomy, a triple star system in the Pleiades open cluster (M45) also known as 27 Tauri.

(13) In psychiatry, as Atlas personality, a term used to describe the personality of someone whose childhood was characterized by excessive responsibilities.

(14) As the ERA Atlas, the original name for the UNIVAC 1101 computer, released in 1950.

(15) In differential geometry & topology, a family of coordinate charts that cover a manifold.

(16) A rich satin fabric (archaic).

1580-1590: From the Latin Atlas, from the name of the Ancient Greek mythological figure Ἄτλας (Átlas) (Bearer (of the Heavens)), from τλῆναι (tlênai) (to suffer; to endure; to bear).  The traditional translation of the Greek name as "The Bearer (of the Heavens)" comes from it construct: a- (the copulative prefix) + the stem of tlenai (to bear), from the primitive Indo-European root tele- (to lift, support, weigh) but some etymologists suggest the Berber adrar (mountain) as a source and argues it’s at least plausible that the Greek name is a "folk-etymological reshaping" of this. Mount Atlas, in (then) Mauritania, featured in the cosmology of Ancient Greece as a support of the heavens.  Atlas had originally been the name of an Arcadian mountain god before being transferred to the mountain chain.  In Arabic script atlas was أَطْلَس‎ and Atlas Mountains جِبَال ٱلْأَطْلَس, Romanized as jibāl al-ʾaṭlas.  The Atlas mountain range lies in north-west Africa and separates the Mediterranean and Atlantic coastlines from the Sahara.  The noun plural is atlases for the collection of maps and atlantes for the architectural feature.  Atlas is a noun and atlas-like is an adjective; the noun plural is atlases.  When used as a proper noun to refer to the figure of mythology, it's with an initial capital.

The first use of the word atlas (in English translation) in the sense of a "collection of maps in a volume" is thought to have the 1636 edition of the 1595 Atlas Sive Cosmographicae Meditationes de Fabrica Mundi et Fabricati Figura (Atlas or cosmographical meditations upon the creation of the universe, and the universe as created) by Flemish geographer & cartographer Gerhardus Mercator (1512-1594).  An impression of the Titan Atlas holding the globe was imprinted on the frontispiece and many subsequent atlases followed, creating a tradition which has endured until today. Mercator died prior to publication of the atlas, the first edition of which he had already largely complied and assembled; the final editing was undertaken by his son who would also pursue a career in cartography.

The adjective (resembling or pertaining to Atlas) was atlantean which from 1852 extended to “pertaining to Atlantis".  The mythical island (even sometimes a continent) become widely known in Europe only after circa 1600 after translations of Plato’s Timaeus and Critias (both written circa 360 BC) became available.  Even then, like some previous medieval scholars who knew the texts, many thought regarding Plato as a historian as dubious and considered Atlantis entirely an invention, a device used to illustrate a political cautionary tale.  Still, given a long history of earthquakes and sea-level rise since the last peak of the ice-age (in which we’re still living), it’s not impossible there are buried settlements which would, by the standards of the time, have been thought large.  The Greek Atlantis (literally "daughter of Atlas”), is a noun use of the feminine adjective from Atlas (stem Atlant).

A brace of Atlantes at the tomb of Louis Phélypeaux (1598–1681), seigneur de La Vrillière, marquis de Châteauneuf and Tanlay (1678), comte de Saint-Florentin, church of Saint Martial of Châteauneuf-sur-Loire.

In European architectural sculpture, an atlas (also known as an atlant, atlante & atlantid (plural atlantes)), was a (usually decorative) support sculpted in the form of a man and either part of or attached to a column, a pier or a pilaster.  The Roman term was telamon (plural telamones or telamons), from a later mythological hero, Telamon, one of the Argonauts, the father of Ajax.  Pre-dating the alantes in Classical architecture was the caryatid, an exclusively female form where the sculpture of a woman stands with each pillar or column.  Usually in an Ionic context, they were traditionally represented in association with the goddesses worshiped in the temples to which they were attached and rarely were they full-length forms, usually crafted as a conventional structural member below the waist, assuming the female lines above.  One difference between the male and female renderings was the atlantes often bore expressions of strain or had limbs bent by the effort of sustaining their heavy load.  The caryatids were almost always purely decorative and carved to show a nonchalant effortlessness.

Tower of the Koutoubia Mosque (1943), oil on canvas by Sir Winston Churchill (1974-1965).

In January 1943, Winston Churchill (1874-1965; UK prime-minister 1940-1945 & 1951-1955) and Franklin Roosevelt (1882-1945; US president 1933-1945) met at Casablanca to discuss Allied political and military strategy.  One of the critical meetings of the war and one which tends to be neglected compared with the later tripartite conferences (which included Comrade Stalin (1878-1953; leader of the USSR 1924-1953) at Tehran, Yalta and Potsdam, it’s remembered for a statement which emerged almost casually at the end of the ten day session: that Germany, Italy and Japan must surrender unconditionally.  The phrase "unconditional surrender" came from the president and surprised many (including Churchill) and it proved a gift for the ever-active Nazi propaganda machine. 

Churchill prevailed on the president to stay another day before returning to Washington DC, insisting one couldn’t come all the way to Morocco without visiting Marrakech and seeing the sun set over the Atlas Mountains.  They stayed at the Villa Taylor on 24 January and the next day, after the American delegation had departed, the prime-minister painted his view of the Tower of the Koutoubia Mosque, framed by the Atlas Mountains.  He’d visited Marrakech during the 1930s and completed several paintings but this was the only one he would paint during the war.  It was sent it to Roosevelt, as a present for his birthday on 30 January.  Churchill was a keen amateur painter, even having published Painting as a Pastime (1922) but never rated his own skills highly, often when speaking with other amateurs cheerfully admitting their work was better but he did think the 1943 effort was “a cut above anything I have ever done so far”.  He would have been surprised to learn that on 1 March 2021, Tower of the Koutoubia Mosque sold at auction at Christie’s in London for Stg£8,285,000 (US$11,194,000).

The Farnese Atlas (left) which historians concluded was a Roman copy (circa 150 AD) in marble of (second century BC) work typical of the style of the Hellenistic period.  It depicts Atlas holding the world on his shoulders and is the oldest known representation of the celestial spheres and classical constellations, Napoli, Museo archeologico nazionale (National Archaeological Museum, Naples, Italy).  Lindsay Lohan (right) reprises the look in an aqua swimsuit, Mykonos, Greece, July 2017.

After the war Churchill was amused to read that but for a misunderstanding, he may never have got to paint in Morocco at all.  The wartime meetings of the leaders were all top-secret but in something of a coup by North African agents of the Abwehr (the German military-intelligence service 1920-1944), the details of the meeting at Casablanca were discovered and Berlin was advised to consider a bombing mission.  Unfortunately for the Abwehr, the decoders translated “Casablanca” literally as “White House” and the idea of any action was dismissed because the Germans had no bomber capable of reaching the US.  Casablanca had originally been named Dar al-Baiḍā (دار البيضاء (House of the White) in the Arabic, later renamed by the Portuguese as Casa Branca before finally being Hispanicized as "Casablanca".

Group photograph of the political leaders with the Combined Chiefs of Staff Committee, Casablanca Conference, Morocco, 14-24 January 1943.  It was at this conference the president unexpectedly announced the allied demand for "unconditional surrender" by the Axis powers and historians have since debated the political and military implications, one theory being it was something which mitigated against the possibility of any attempt within Germany to depose Adolf Hitler (1889-1945; Führer (leader) and German head of government 1933-1945 & head of state 1934-1945).

Sitting: Franklin Delano Roosevelt (FDR, 1882–1945, US president 1933-1945) (left); Sir Winston Churchill (1875-1965; UK prime-minister 1940-1945 & 1951-1955) (right).

Standing, left to right (retirement ranks used): General Brehon B Somervell (1892–1955; head of US Army Service Forces 1942-1946); General of the Air Force Henry H "Hap" Arnold (1886–1950; head of US air forces 1938-1947); Fleet Admiral Ernest J King (1878–1956; US Chief of Naval Operations 1944-1945); General Lord (Hastings "Pug") Ismay (1887–1965; chief of staff to the prime-minister in his capacity as minister of defence 1940-1965); General of the Army George C Marshall (1880–1959; US Army chief of staff 1939-1945); Admiral of the Fleet Sir Dudley Pound (1877–1943; First Sea Lord 1939-1943); Field Marshal Lord Alanbrooke (1883–1963; Chief of the Imperial General Staff (CIGS) 1941-1946); Marshal of the Royal Air Force Lord (Charles "Peter") Portal (1893–1971; Chief of the RAF Air Staff 1940-1945); Admiral of the Fleet Lord (Louis) Mountbatten (1900–1979; First Sea Lord 1955-1959).

Deliquesce

Deliquesce (pronounced del-i-kwes)

(1) In physical chemistry, to become liquid by absorbing moisture from the atmosphere and dissolving in it (best illustrated by the behavior of certain salts).

(2) To melt away; to disappear (used literally & figuratively).

(3) In botany, branching so the stem is lost in branches (as is typical in deciduous trees).

(4) In mycology (of the fruiting body of a fungus), becoming liquid as a phase of its life cycle.

1756: From the Latin dēliquēscere (to become liquid), the construct being dē- + liquēscere (to liquefy; liquescent).  In scientific literature, the adjective deliquescent (liquefying in air) is the most commonly used form.  It was from the Latin deliquescentem (nominative deliquescens), present participle of deliquescere (to melt away), the construct being de- + liquesco (I melt) and familiar in French also as déliquescent.  The de- prefix was from the Latin dē-, from the preposition dē (of, from (the Old English æf- was a similar prefix).  It imparted the sense of (1) reversal, undoing, removing, (2) intensification and (3) from, off.  In French the dé- prefix was used to make antonyms (as un- & dis- function in English) and was partially inherited from the Old and Middle French des-, from the Latin dis- (part), the ultimate source being the primitive Indo-European dwís and partially borrowed from Latin dē-.  The figurative sense of “apt to dissolve or melt away” was in use by 1837 while the verb deliquesce appears not to have been used thus until the late 1850s.  In scientific literature, the adjective deliquescent (liquefying in air) is the most commonly used form.  It was from the Latin deliquescentem (nominative deliquescens), present participle of deliquescere (to melt away), the construct being de- + liquesco (I melt) and familiar in French also as déliquescent.  The figurative sense of “apt to dissolve or melt away” was in use by 1837 while the verb deliquesce appears not to have been used thus until the late 1850s.    Deliquesce, deliquesced & deliquescing are verbs, deliquescent is an adjective, deliquescence is a noun and deliquescently is an adverb; the noun plural is deliquescences.

Deliquesce 1, oil on canvas by Tammy Flynn Seybold (b 1966).

This was the first in the Deliquesce Series, a group of works exploring the themes of transformation and conservation of energy in human forms, the artist noting being intrigued by the deceptively ephemeral nature of materials: “We think of objects - human forms included - as decaying, degrading or ‘disappearing’ but, as we know from the laws of thermodynamics, all energy is conserved - like matter, it is merely transformed from one form to another.  This work, painted with pastel-hued oils was made directly from a live model, the drips allowed organically to happen from her languid form and by using light, bright hues, I hoped to bring a spirit of optimism to this transformative process.”

A footnote to the addition of deliquesce to scientific English is a tale of the chance intersection of politics and chemistry.  Dr Charles Lucas (1713–1771) was an Anglo-Irish physician who held the seat of Dublin City in the Irish Parliament and was what now would be called “a radical”, dubbed at the time “Irish Wilkes” (a nod to the English radical politician John Wilkes (1725–1797).  His early career was as an apothecary and he was shocked discover the fraud and corruption which permeated the industry and in an attempt to reform the abuses published A Short Scheme for Preventing Frauds and Abuses in Pharmacy (1735) which much upset his fellow apothecaries who were the beneficiaries of the crooked ways but the parliament did respond and created legislation regulating standards in medicines and providing for the inspection of the products; it was the first of its kind in the English-speaking world and the ancestor of the elaborate framework of rules today administered by entities such as the US FDA (Food & Drug Administration.  Encouraged, he later published Pharmacomastix, or the Office, Use, and Abuse of Apothecaries Explained (1741), the contents of which were used by the parliament to make certain legislative amendments.

However, as well as a radical, Lucas was a idealist and while the establishment was content to support him in matter of pills and potions, when he intruded into areas which disturbed the political equilibrium, they were less tolerant and, facing imprisonment, Lucas fled to the continent where he’d decided to study medicine, graduating as a doctor in 1752.  One of his first projects as a physician was a study of the composition of certain mineral waters, substances then held to possess some remarkable curative properties (something actually not without some basis).  To undertake his research he visited a number of sites including Spa, Aachen in what is now North Rhine-Westphalia and Bath in the English county of Somerset.  The material he assembled and published as An Essay on Waters. In three Parts: (i) of Simple Waters, (ii) of Cold Medicated Waters, (iii) of Natural Baths (1756) and it was in this work that the verb “deliquesce” first appeared.  Ever the “disturber” Dr Lucas’s tract upset the medical establishment in much the same way two decades earlier he’d stirred the enmity of the apothecaries, the cluster of physicians clustered around the Bath spa angered the interloper hadn’t consulted with them on a topic over which they asserted proprietorship.

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

In chemistry, the companion word of deliquescence is hygroscopy, both describing phenomena related to the ability of substances to absorb moisture from the surrounding environment, but they differ in extent and behavior.  Hygroscopy refers to the ability of a substance to absorb moisture from the air when exposed; hygroscopic substances can attract and hold water molecules onto their surface but tend not to dissolve.  Many salts behave thus and a well-known example of practical application is the silica gel, which, in small porous packages, is often used as a desiccant to absorb moisture in packaging. Deliquescence can be thought of an extreme form of hygroscopy (hydroscopy taken to its natural conclusion) in that a substance which deliquesces not only absorbs moisture from the air but also absorbs it to the point where it dissolves completely in the absorbed water, forming a solution.  In the natural environment, this happens most frequently when the relative humidity of the surrounding air is high and the classic deliquescent substances are salts like calcium chloride, magnesium chloride, zinc chloride, ferric chloride, carnallite, potassium carbonate, potassium phosphate, ferric ammonium citrate, ammonium nitrate, potassium hydroxide, & sodium hydroxide.  Presumably because deliquescence is the extreme form of hydroscopy it was the former which came to be used figuratively (dissolving into “nothing”) while the latter did not.

At the chemical level, hygroscopy (a class in which scientists include deliquescence as a sub-set) describes the phenomenon of attracting and holding water molecules via either absorption or adsorption (the adhesion of a liquid or gas on the surface of a solid material, forming a thin film on the surface.) from the surrounding environment.  Hygroscopy is integral to the biology of many plant and animal species' attainment of hydration, nutrition, reproduction and/or seed dispersal.  Linguistically, hygroscopy is quirky in that the construct is hygro- (moisture; humidity), from the Ancient Greek ὑγρός (hugrós) (wet, moist) + -scopy (observation, viewing), from the Ancient Greek σκοπέω (skopéō) (to see (and the source of the Modern English “scope”) yet unlike other forms suffixed by “-scopy”, it no longer conveys the sense of “viewing or imaging”.  Originally that was the case, a hygroscope in the late eighteenth century understood as a device used to measure humidity but in a wholly organic way this use faded (“dissolving deliquescently to nothing” as it were) while hygroscopic (tending to retain moisture) & hygroscopy (the ability to do so) endured.  The modern instrument used to measure humidity is hygrometer, the construct being hygro- + -meter (the suffix from the Ancient Greek μέτρον (métron) (measure) used to form the names of measuring devices.

Irrefragable

Irrefragable (pronounced ih-ref-ruh-guh-buhl)

(1) Not to be disputed or contested (as assertion).

(2) Not able to be denied or refuted; indisputable (as fact).

(3) That which cannot or should not be broken; indestructible (archaic and probably extinct).

(4) Of a person, someone obstinate; stubborn (obsolete except as a literary device).

1525–1535: A learned borrowing from Late Latin irrefrāgābilis (irrefragable) with the English suffix –able appended.  The suffix -able was from the Middle English -able, from the Old French -able, from the Latin -ābilis (capable or worthy of being acted upon), from the primitive Indo-European i-stem forms -dahli- or -dahlom (instrumental suffix); it was used to create adjectives with the sense of “able or fit to be done”.  The construct of irrefrāgābilis was the Latin ir- (a variant of in- (used a prefix meaning “not”)) + refragā(rī) (the present active infinitive of refrāgor (to oppose, resist; to gainsay, thwart)) + -bilis (the suffix used to form adjectives indicating a capacity or worth of being acted upon).  Because of the paucity of documentary evidence, the ultimate source of the Latin refrāgor remains uncertain, but the construct may have been re- (the prefix used in the sense of “again”) + fragor (a breaking, shattering; a crash; din, uproar (from frangō (to break, shatter), ultimately from the primitive Indo-European bhreg- (to break)), formed as an antonym of suffrāgōr, the first-person singular present passive indicative of suffrāgō (to support; to vote for).  The sixteenth century French form was irréfragable, also from the Late Latin.  The meanings related to “indestructible objects” fell from use as early as the mid-seventeenth century while the figurative sense of “someone stubborn or obstinate” endured into the twentieth and, as a literary device, probably still tempts some and for those so tempted, the better style guides help by telling us to stress the second syllable.  The spelling irrefragible is obsolete.  Irrefragable is an adjective, irrefragability & irrefragableness are nouns and irrefragably is an adverb; the noun plural is irrefragabilies.

In English, irrefragable didn’t survive in common use for no better reason than people for whatever reason preferred the alternatives (literal & figurative) including (depending on the context): undeniable, indubitable, unassailable, indisputable, unambiguous, unquestionable, irrefutable, incontestable, immutable and unanswerable.  All those synonyms convey much the same thing for most so usually, the only thing the use of “irrefragable” is likely to engender is bafflement; few people will know what it means.  That can be fun between consenting word-nerds but it otherwise tends just to annoy.  There are structuralists who claim “irrefragable” is (or at least can be) different form a word like “unquestionable” because the former should specifically be associated with logical or argumentative strength while the later can be used in any context without necessarily emphasizing the same rigorous logical support.  So, because the underpinning of the scientific method is the disproving stuff, to say a scientific theory is irrefragable does not mean it cannot be argued against or disproven or that it’s beyond doubt or uncertainty; it means only that it cannot be refuted based on the current evidence.  By contrast, in some schools of theology, many things are unquestionable, not because they can be proved or disproven but because they must be accepted as matters of faith.  In the Roman Catholic Church, this is formalized: If a pope (invoking his infallibility in matters of dogma), declares something to be thus, it is, as a matter of canon law, both irrefragable & unquestionable.  The ancient idea of papal infallibility has been invoked only once since it was codified in the proceedings of the First Vatican Council (Vatican I 1869-1870) but since the early post-war years, pontiffs have found ways to achieve the same effect, John Paul II (1920–2005; pope 1978-2005) & Benedict XVI (1927–2022; pope 2005-2013, pope emeritus 2013-2022) both adept at using what was in effect a personal decree a power available to one who sits at the apex of what is in constitutional terms an absolute theocracy.  Critics have called this phenononom "creeping infallibility" and its intellectual underpinnings own much to the tireless efforts of Benedict XVI while he was head of the Inquisition (by then called the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith) during the late twentieth century.

Defragable: Defragmentation in action under MS-DOS 6.22.  On a nearly full big drive (say 320 MB) on which defragmentation had been neglected for a while, the process could take literally hours.  True obsessives would add the relevant command to their autoexec.bat to start every day with a defrag, the sequence being: (1) switch on, (2) go and get coffee and (3) hope it was done upon return.

Before installable file systems (IFS) began to gain critical mass in the 1990s, disk defragmenters were something of a fetish among nerds because, at the software level, there were few quicker (a relative term) and cheaper ways to make things run faster.  Fragment was from the late Middle English fragment, from the Latin fragmentum (a fragment, a remnant), the construct being frangō (I break) +‎ -mentum, from the suffix -menta (familiar in collective nouns like armenta (herd, flock)), from the primitive Indo-European -mn̥the.  The tendency of the early file systems to increasing sluggishness was because the File Allocation Table (FAT) was an up-scaled variant of that used on floppy diskettes where the cluster sizes (the segments into which the media was divided) were small and thus less prone to fragmentation.  However, because of the arcane math which dictated how many clusters there could be under the various implementations of FAT, the only way to accommodate the increasing size of hard disk drives (HDD) was to make the clusters larger, the consequence of which was a file of 1 KB or less absorbed all of a 32 KB cluster, something both an inefficient use of space and inherently prone to fragmentation.  What defragmenters did was re-allocate files to make data both as contiguous and un-fragmented as possible.  Modern file systems (HPFS, NTFS et al) still have limits but the numbers are very big and contemporary operating systems now handle defragmentation dynamically.  Although it remains a useful system on USB pen drives and such because of the wide system compatibility and ease of use, it’s doubtful even the more nostalgic nerds have fond memories of FAT on HDDs; a corrupted FAT could be a nightmare.