Current mood:	mellow
Current music:	Emigrate - Emigrate
Entry tags:	forgotten english, forgotten words, vocabulary

Forgotten English: October 27th - November 1st

Monday's forgotten word:
Jack-o'-the-clock (noun) - In old clocks, a figure which struck the bell to mark the hours. --John Phin's Shakespeare Cyclopaedia and Glossary, 1902

Because of Whom the Bell Tolled - On this date in 1856, London's most familiar sonic landmark--the thirteenth bell atop Westminster's Houses of Parliament, known as Big Ben for Commissioner of Works Benjamin Hall--was first tested. Earlier that year a larger bell was cast, but it cracked irreparably while being tested. Over the objections of the foundry, designer Edmund Denison specified the mixture of metals to be fashioned into the nine-foot-diameter, fourteen-ton replacement--today's Big Ben. It also cracked shortly after being cast in 1858, but was deemed usable. Another component of this timepiece, the colossal clock, was also the subject of much debate. Royal astronomer George Airy insisted that the clock be accurate to one second per day, and to facilitate twice-daily monitoring he linked the mechanism to the Royal Observatory in Greenwich. The clock's hands turned out to be an important focus of the design and were streamlined to minimize interference from the wind.

Tuesday's:
Dhoze (noun) - A drink of intoxicating liquor; a bout of drinking. --Michael Traynor's The English Dialect of Donegal, 1953

Looney Liquor Legislation - America's Eighteenth Amendment, the National Prohibition Act, was passed by Congress on this date in 1918 and took effect in January 1920. In 1851, Maine became a pioneer in this dubious branch of regulation, being the first state to adopt laws to control the sale of intoxicants, including one that made it illegal for a person to buy beer unless standing up at the time. Ridiculous local laws were enacted before and after this landmark legislation, many of which are still technically on the books, including one in St. Louis making it a crime to drink beer from a bucket while sitting on a curb. In Ames, Iowa, a man is forbidden to take more than three gulps of beer while lying in bed with a lover. In Ojai, California, it is unlawful for a woman to stand within five feet of a bar when drinking in a public bar or restaurant. In Nebraska, bar owners are not allowed to sell beer unless they are also cooking a kettle of soup. And in Fairbanks, Alaska, a law prohibits giving alcoholic beverages to moose.

Wednesday's:
Figaries (pl. noun) - Showy or fantastic adornments. --G.F. Northall's Warwickshire Word-Book, 1896

London's Lord Mayor Shows were sometimes held on this date earlier in their eight-hundred-year history. Beginning in 1422 these displays were waterborne on the Thames, leading to the parade term float. Peter Ditchfield's Old English Customs (1896) offered more on these events: "The Lord Mayor's Show is a familiar sight to Londoners, the sole survivor of the old pageants which delighted our forefathers when England's heart was young. The Lord Mayor still rides in his chariot of state, and a few of the companies send pageants--cars elaborately decorated and made to represent the particular craft with which the company is associated. Masses of fruit and flowers adorn the Fruiterers' Company. A band of neatly-dressed maidens show the skill of the Framework Knitters. But these are only relics of the grand spectacles that once graced the streets of the City. Resplendent with gowns and hoods of diverse hues, the civic dignitaries, attended by the companies, used to march in procession through the streets to attend the services at St. Paul's Cathedral, and then entertained in their festal halls nobles and princes."

Thursday's:
John Roberts (noun) - A large jug. In 1886, Sunday closing of public-houses came into effect in Wales, mainly through the efforts of Mr. John Roberts, M.P. So an outsized tankard evolved which, it was claimed, would hold sufficient beer to carry thirsty customers over from Saturday night until Monday morning. --Edwin Radford's Encyclopaedia of Phrases and Origins, 1945

Puritanical Postscript - At the end of October 1787--more than a century after Puritan rule had been swept from England--a meeting took place in Royston Parish in Cambridgeshire "for the purpose of preventing and punishing profaneness, vice, and immorality." Alfred Kingston's Fragments of Two Centuries: Glimpses of Country Life When George III Was King (1893) recalled a number of "Sabbath laws" that emerged: "No drover, horse courier, waggoner, butcher, higlar [itinerant peddler] or other servants shall travel on Sunday. No fruit, herbs, or goods of any kind shall be exposed to sale on a Sunday. No person without a reasonable excuse shall be absent from some place of divine worship on a Sunday. Ordered, that the constables go to the public-houses to see that no tippling or drinking is done during divine service."

Friday's:
Awk (adjective) - Inverted or confused. Bells are "rung awk" to give alarm of fire. Ray's South and East Country Words [1691] says that awkward is opposed to toward. --Rev. Robert Forby's Vocabulary of East Anglia, 1830

Ordeals by Fire and Water are peculiarly Hallowe'en sports. The latter consists in ducking for an apple in a tub of water with the mouth, the hands being clasped behind the back. In the former, a small rod of wood is suspended from the ceiling with a lighted candle fixed at one end and an apple at the other. The stick is twirled round, and the company in turn try to catch the apple in their teeth at the moment it passes before them. At Whitbeck, in Cumberland, it is said that to whatever quarter a bull faces as he lies on All-Hallow Even, from thence the wind will blow during the greater part of the winter following. Another fiery ordeal consists in whirling before the face a lighted brand, singing the old verse Dingle, dingle, dowsie, the cat's in the well;/The dog's awa' to Berwick to buy a new bell. --William Henderson's Folklore of the Northern Counties of England, 1879

Saturday's:
Moak (noun) - Mist; fog. Moaky, dull, misty, dark weather. --Jabez Good's Glossary of East Lincolnshire, 1900

Weather Day - The United States Weather Bureau--originally part of the US Signal Corps--issued its first forecast on November 1, 1870. The bureau's superintendent became known as "Old Probabilities," sometimes shortened to "Old Prob." William Saunders wrote of this fledgling service in Through the Light Continent (1879): "The butchers slay or reprieve their cattle and pigs according to the indications. The doctor reads the forecasts before he sees patients and modifies his treatments accordingly. No picnic would be carried on without anxious reference to the statements issued by Old Probabilities. These reports will carry down to posterity when the ice broke up in certain ports, when swallows appeared or departed, when wild geese put in an appearance, when grasshoppers or winged ants became numerous." They also told "when auras, solar halos, lunar halos, or mirages were recorded, when cucumbers ripened, when blackberries were gathered, when jasmine blossomed and cherries were in bloom, when meteors were noticed, zodiacal light observed, earthquakes happened, and polar bands seen."