The English Language—part 1 of 2

 

The English language (or at least the American branch of the language) is often confusing even to those who were born here.  I can't imagine trying to learn it as a second language.  Where other languages seem to have set rules, English has rules that are filled with exceptions and sometimes even those exceptions have exceptions.

A good example is the spelling rule for the order of i and e within a word. i before e is the rule. Except after c (exception to rule), or when sounded as a, as in weigh (exception to the exception).

We'll begin with a box and the plural is boxes, but the plural of ox is oxen, not oxes.

One fowl is a goose, but two are called geese, yet the plural of moose should never be meese.

You may find a lone mouse or a nest full of mice, yet the plural of house is houses, not hice.

If the plural of man is always called men, why shouldn't the plural of pan be called pen?

If I spoke of my foot and show you my feet, and I give you a boot, should a pair be called beet?

If one is a tooth and a whole set are teeth, why shouldn't the plural of booth be called beeth?

One may be that and three would be those, yet hat in the plural would never be hose. And the plural of cat is cats, not cose.

We speak of a brother and also of brethren, but though we say mother, we never say methren.

The masculine pronouns are he, his and him, but imagine the feminine as she, shis and shim.

Some reasons to be grateful if you grew up speaking English rather than learning it as a second (or even third) language. Imagine needing to figure out the differences in pronunciation and meaning of these identically spelled words:

1)         The bandage was wound around the wound.

2)         The farm was used to produce produce.

3)         The dump was so full that it had to refuse more refuse.

4)         We must polish the Polish furniture.

5)         He could lead if he would get the lead out.

6)         The soldier decided to desert his dessert in the desert.

7)         Since there is no time like the present, he thought it was time to present the present.

8)         At the army base, a bass was painted on the head of the bass drum.

9)         When shot at, the dove dove into the bushes.

10)       I did not object to the object.

11)       The insurance was invalid for the invalid.

12)       There was a row among the oarsmen about how to row.

13)       They were too close to the door to close it.

14)       The buck does funny things when the does are present.

15)       The seamstress and the sewer fell down into a sewer line.

16)       To help with planting, the farmer taught his sow to sow.

17)       The wind was too strong to wind the sail.

18)       After a number of Novocain injections, my jaw got number.

19)       Upon seeing the tear in the painting I shed a tear.

20)       I had to subject the subject to a series of tests.

21)       How can I intimate this to my most intimate friend?

22)       I spent last evening evening out a pile of dirt.

How many of you had to go back and read any of those 22 examples a second time to get it right?  :)

Let's face it—English is a crazy language.  There is no egg in eggplant nor ham in hamburger; neither apple nor pine in pineapple.  English muffins weren't invented in England.

We take English for granted. But if we explore its paradoxes, we find that quicksand can work slowly, boxing rings are square and a guinea pig is neither from Guinea nor is it a pig.  And why is it that writers write but fingers don't fing, grocers don't groce and hammers don't ham?

Doesn't it seem crazy that you can make amends but not just one amend?

If you have a bunch of odds and ends and get rid of all but one of them, what do you call it, an odd or an end?

If teachers taught, why didn't preachers praught?

If a vegetarian eats vegetables, what does a humanitarian eat?

In what language do people recite at a play and play at a recital?  Ship by truck and send cargo by ship?  Have noses that run and feet that smell?  How can a slim chance and a fat chance be the same, while a wise man and a wise guy are opposites?

You have to marvel at the unique lunacy of a language in which your house can burn up as it burns down, in which you fill in a form by filling it out, and in which an alarm goes off by going on.

If dad is pop, how come mom isn't mop?

Are you totally confused yet?  Check back next week when I continue with the eccentricities of the English language in part 2.

Middle Ages/Medieval Times part 3of3

This week is part 3 of my 3-part blog series about the Middle Ages/Medieval times. This period in history has many documented tales of truly barbaric treatment. But, unlike the message we get from Hollywood's entertainment industry and many novels, Medieval times overall weren't as barbaric as we've been led to believe. And with that thought in mind, here's a list of the ten biggest myths about justice in Medieval times.

10)  Go Directly To Jail?

Most Medieval communities actually had a judge and jury type of system, although it was much quicker than today's long drawn out sessions. Court generally lasted less than half an hour. At the judge's discretion, he could ask a few simple questions and deliver a verdict without consulting the jury.

9)  The Lawless Middle Age Villages?

Earlier Medieval communities had much more social responsibility than today.  If one member claimed to be wronged, every resident had to join in the hunt and persecution of the criminal, otherwise they would all be held responsible.

8)  Those Strict Church Types?

The pious Middle Ages were serious about religious offenses. Each town's church usually ran its own kind of court to investigate everything from bad attendance to heresy. However, the concept of sanctuary was also well known with the church as a place where criminals could avoid sentencing or punishment.

7)  Out Of Sight, Out Of Mind?

Criminals who committed lesser offenses were often subject to a policy of three strikes and you're out—literally. Repeat offenders were often simply banished from a city and not allowed back rather than killing them or having them clutter up the prisons. Humane and cost effective.

 6)  Executions: Left, Right, and Center?

According to Hollywood, Medieval evil-doers were killed on whim and often in public squares for even the slightest of offenses. In reality, capital punishment was used only in the most serious cases which included murder, treason, and arson with the guilty usually hanged.

 5)  Royal Highnesses High Above the Law?

Medieval nobles did enjoy certain privileges when it came to bending laws or making new ones to serve their purposes. However, most European countries had legislation preventing their kings and queens from running wild, such as England's Magna Carta signed by King John in 1215.

4)  Public Beheadings as Weekly Spectacle?

Beheading was swift and painless—as long as the axe was sharp. It was considered a privileged way to die and reserved primarily for the nobility. Treason was the crime of choice with the beheadings usually taking place inside castle walls rather than in public. Henry VIII had two of his wives beheaded—Catherine Howard and Anne Boleyn.

3)  The Burning Times?

A few witches, as proclaimed by their accusers, were burned at the stake during Medieval times. But it was during the following Reformation period (beginning approximately in 1550) that burning witches at the stake really took off. However, in England witches were rarely burned. They were hanged instead. At the Salem witch trials in the U.S., most of the accused who were actually put to death were hanged.

2)  Off With Your Ear?

Mutilation—severing of an ear or hand—was occasionally used as a punishment for serious crimes, especially in larger jurisdictions such as London. But more often, Medieval law enforcement used it as an empty threat rather than actually doing it. 

1)  Rack 'Em Up?

Immortalized in the film Braveheart, the most famous torture device of all time was the rack. It probably wasn't used in England until the very end of the Medieval period. It was used extensively along with other devices beginning in the torturous days of the 1500s when Queen Elizabeth I, and other European monarchs, began purging religious opponents.

So, next time you're watching a high budget film set during Medieval times filled with bloody and torturous actions, remember—there's a good chance it didn't really happen that way. 

Middle Ages/Medieval Times part 2of3

This is part 2 of my 3-part blog about the Middle Ages/Medieval times. Last week I presented 11 Bizarre Medieval Trends. This week it's 9 Surprising Facts.

1)  They weren't all knights or serfs or clergy

Although some medieval writers described their society as divided into three parts—those who prayed, those who fought, and those who labored. That became an increasingly inaccurate description after the beginning of the 12^th century. The population of Europe increased considerably during the 12^th and 13^th centuries, with cities and towns becoming much bigger. In the cities, people had all kinds of jobs—merchants, salesmen, carpenters, butchers, weavers, food sellers, architects, painters, jugglers…

In the countryside, everyone was not an impoverished serf (someone not free who was tied to the land). Many peasants were free men and women who owned their own land, while others who were to some degree not free bought and sold land and goods, much like other free men. There certainly were poor, oppressed serfs, but it wasn't a universal condition.

2)  People had the vote

Well, some people had the vote—not a vote for national, representative government. That was not a medieval thing. But they did have a vote in local politics. In France, in the 12^th and 13^th centuries and beyond, many towns and villages were run at a local level as a commune, and there were often annual elections where most of the male inhabitants could vote. Women could not usually stand as officials and could not vote, but some of them were noted in the agreed charters of liberties that French towns proudly possessed.

3)  The church didn't conduct witch hunts

The large-scale witch hunts and collective paranoid response to the stereotype of the evil witch is not a medieval creation. It was an early modern phenomenon found mostly in the 16^th and 17^th centuries. There were some witch trials in the Middle Ages, and these became more widespread in German-speaking lands in the 15^th century. But those doing the prosecuting were almost always civic authorities rather than the church.

For much of the Middle Ages, the main message that churchmen gave in regard to magic was that it was foolish nonsense that didn't work. The infamous Malleus Maleficarum in the late 15^th century was written to persuade people of the reality of witches. In fact, the book was initially condemned by the church, and even in the early 16^th century, inquisitors were warned not to believe everything that it said.

4)  They had a Renaissance and invented experimental science

When people talk about the Renaissance, they usually mean literature, art, architecture, and learning found at the end of the Middle Ages. This is usually taken to be one of the ways in which we moved from medieval to early modern thinking. But medieval intellectuals also had a renaissance of classical learning and rhetoric. This was in the 12^th century and depended particularly on the works by Aristotle and other classical authors. One of the outcomes was an inquiring approach to the physical world, and it led Roger Bacon and others to think about observing and experimenting with the physical world to learn more about it.

5)  They traveled and traded over very long distances

The majority of medieval people, particularly those who lived in the countryside, rarely traveled very far from where they were born. That would be the case with lots of people in much later ages as well. It is not the case, however, that medieval people never traveled. Many went on pilgrimage, sometimes journeying thousands of miles to do so. And those involved in trade certainly traveled, linking parts of the world together with merchandise.

6)  They had some great 'folk' customs

Much of the public culture of the Middle Ages was molded by Christianity. There were also some curious customs, usually tolerated by the church, but which may have had older roots. One was the practice of rolling burning barrels down a hill on Midsummer's Eve. Another was to throw wheat over the heads of a newly married couple. It was also common to raise money for charity by holding a 'help ale'—brewing up a batch of ale, having a big party to drink it, and collecting donations.

7)  Most great medieval authors didn't write

We tend to think of literacy as one thing, but in fact it combines various different skills with the physical act of writing being only one. For much of the Middle Ages, working as a scribe was seen as a kind of labor and was not something that important people like theologians and intellectuals would bother doing themselves. Instead, a scribe would usually write down what the author dictated.

8)  Some people weren't very religious

The Middle Ages famously features great examples of extreme religious devotion—mystics, saints, the flagellants, mass pilgrimage, etc.  But it would be wrong to assume that people were always very focused on God and religion and definitely wrong to think that medieval people were incapable of skeptical reflection.

There is solid evidence of some ordinary people who looked suspiciously at particular beliefs—at the miracles performed by saints, or the nature of the Eucharist, or what was said to happen after death. There is also ample evidence of people just not bothering very much with religion, most of all not going to church on Sunday.

9)  They didn't believe the world was flat

Columbus was not battling a society who believed the world was flat when trying to finance his voyage across the Atlantic to what he believed would be a route to China and Japan. It was a generally accepted belief that the world was round. Most people probably know this already, along with the fact that Viking helmets did not have horns. Both are bits of Victorian myth about the period. What makes studying medieval history fascinating is that you have to grapple with both the puzzle of extracting information from difficult and often fragmented surviving records, and the challenge of constantly checking your own thinking for assumptions that you might be inadvertently inserting into the information as fact.

Next week is part 3 of my 3-part blog series about the Middle Ages/Medieval times. In part 3, I'll be unraveling some of the wide spread commonly held myths about Medieval torture.