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The Beguines – The First Women’s Movement?

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Beguines were women who chose to live together. The movement began over eight hundred years ago, mostly in the Low Countries – Holland and Belgium, but also elsewhere in Europe. Beguines were laywomen, not nuns, but they chose to follow a way of life in many ways similar to that of Jesus: voluntary poverty, care for the poor and the sick, and religious (Christian) devotion. They lived independently of men, earned their own money by finding work locally, and deliberately chose not to be a formalised movement.

Despite developing separately across many European countries, there were common elements that these medieval women shared, including their visionary spirituality, their unusual business acumen, and their courageous commitment to the poor and sick. Common to them also was their non-reliance on men, during a time when a woman normally passed passively from her father’s jurisdiction to that of a husband. Maybe the coincidence of the later Crusades, taking many men away from their home countries, allowed many women to grab some independence.

Beguines were essentially self-defined, and resisted the many attempts to control them. They lived in beguinages, which could be a single house for just a few women or even a solitary woman. But beguinages could also be much larger as in Bruges, Brussels, and Amsterdam, where hundreds of women lived together in walled-in groups of houses within a medieval town or city.

No men were allowed to live within the beguinages, though some permitted male visitors. Women were free to leave at any time and a number would leave, to set up their own households, to get married, or to go back home to care for sick relatives.

It would seem that the heyday of the beguines did not last long beyond the last Crusade. Suspicions swirled in some areas about what was going on within the walls of the beguinages. Marguerite Porete, for example, who lived in a beguinage in Paris, was accused of heresy and burned at the stake in 1310. Many others were accused of witchcraft.

Why these women were called Beguines is a mystery, and it may have originally been a pejorative term that the women decided to embrace. In colloquial medieval French, a beguin was a bonnet, and embeguiner was the verb – to wear a bonnet (it could also mean to have a crush on) The bequines certainly used to wear a fairly distinctive style of bonnet. However, it is possible that the origin was the other way around, with a beguine’s distinctive style of headwear becoming a new word for a bonnet.

In later centuries we have had Mary Wollstonecraft, an early feminist who wrote A Vindication of the Rights of Women in 1792, Suffragettes and Suffragists, and waves of feminism from the mid nineteenth century on, as women have always struggled to get and maintain legal, political and social rights on a par with, and independent from, men. But, in many respects, the beguines were there first!

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On Abers and Invers

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Aberdeen is a port city in Scotland situated where the rivers Dee and Don flow into the North Sea. It is also the name of a global investment company, Standard Life Aberdeen. The company changed its name to Abrdn 2021. With a straight face, the company declared that their name should continue to be pronounced Aberdeen, but that the name change would bring a ‘clarity of focus’ to the organisation.

That may have been a reason for this no doubt costly PR exercise. But maybe it was also something to do with the fact that the domain, Aberdeen.com, had already been taken; and, for some inexplicable reason, the abrdn.com domain was still available. Whatever the reasoning behind the decision, the name change was met with widespread derision – ‘an act of corporate insanity’ – was one of the kinder comments. In response the company played victim and accused the media (and the rest of us) of ‘corporate bullying.’

But how did Aberdeen – the city, not the company – get its name? Aber is the Celtic (Brittonic) word for river. The Brittonic speakers inhabited the south of England but were pushed west by the invading Romans into Wales a couple of millennia ago. Some Brittonic speakers moved as far afield as Scotland, taking the language with them. Celtic / Brittonic words segued into Welsh and many towns in Wales situated by rivers retain the word aber, such as Aberystwyth, Abergele, Aberdare, Aberaeron, Abersoch … Many other places in Wales, best known these days by their English names, start with Aber in the original Welsh/Brittonic. For example, Swansea, the city by the coast in South Wales situated on the banks of the river Tawe, is Abertawe in Welsh.

Celtic / Brittonic died out in Scotland so there are fewer example of the use of aber in place names. It was replaced by Gaelic, in which language the word for river is inver – as in Inverness.

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Collocations

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You may not be familiar with the term, but when speaking and writing we use collocations all the time. The word is closely associated with the verb, to collocate – to group or place items together in some system or order (like, if you still have them, your DVDs, CDs, cassettes or records). It can also mean the way we group together words in a sentence.

So, linguistically, what is collocation?

Collocation is ‘a predictable combination of words.’ For example, we can say ‘heavy rain,’ but not ‘strong rain’ because it does not sound right. Likewise, we tend to ‘do exercise’ but not ‘make exercise’. We talk about someone’s ‘cute little puppy,’ not her ‘little cute puppy.’

Collocations can be made up of any kinds of words such as verbs, nouns, adverbs and adjectives. Although people have attempted to draw up rules – adverb before adjective (or is it vice-versa?) – there are no hard and fast rules for collocations. They are just combinations of words that we become familiar with, and then use correctly without thinking. Because there are no rules, people who have not been immersed in the language since birth will sometimes get it wrong, giving us native English speakers a completely unjustified (and often very temporary) sense of superiority over foreigners.

Linguists also use the term, collocation, to refer to the regular association of one particular word with another. Several people I know can never be frank, they are always ‘brutally frank;’ many optimists are said to have ‘rose-tinted spectacles,’ English landladies in seaside towns will offer you a ‘hearty breakfast’ before you set off for a ‘bracing walk.’ What is ‘fish,’ without ‘chips’?

New collocations spring up regularly – is there now any other intelligence than artificial intelligence? Or fade out of use – who worries about addled eggs in these days of refrigeration?

Sometimes, the difference between a collocation and a cliché is pretty blurred – are ‘a time bomb,’ or ‘a ticking clock,’ happy collocations or irritating, over-used, phrases that slide into many articles on, for example, climate change / the economy / the crisis in the NHS ….?

NB: Collocation – from Latin – collocare (co – together, plus locare – place)

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Apostrophes

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Peter Trudgill writes a column about the origin of words in The New European and is the author of Dialect Matters: Respecting Vernacular Language. What he has to say about possessive apostrophes is therefore of interest, both etymologically and in regard to current usage. Forget the ‘grocer’s apostrophe’ – cucumber’s, carrot’s, etc – which is just plain wrong, doesn’t denote possession, and adds to the gaiety of life for many a pedant (including me). His interest is in how people use apostrophes to bring clarity to meaning, and whether even a properly used apostrophe is strictly necessary in all circumstances.

We can’t hear when an apostrophe is being used. For example, whether we are saying ‘dont’ or ‘don’t;’ ‘shes’ or ‘she’s; ‘James’s’ or ‘Jameses;’ there’s (theres) no special additional inflexion to show we have included an apostrophe. Unlike when we differentiate ‘he’ll from hell,’ or ‘we’ll from well.’

So, if we don’t need them when we are talking, why do we need them when we write? Or does it depend on how formal the writing is? After all, Twitter/X has become a virtually apostrophe-free zone as people try to keep their text under the character limit.

Trudgill argues that the overuse of the apostrophe in formal writing, often when dates are involved: the 1960’s for the 1960s etc; and in notices – see the ubiquitous grocer’s apostrophe – comes from the writer trying too hard to use the correct form. And, indeed, many people do struggle to get it right when it comes to the possessive apostrophe, despite the ‘rule’ that one is used before the ‘s’ to denote possession in the singular – Mary’s book, Thomas’s picture. Or after, for the plural – the girls’ table tennis team.

Trudgill is not in favour of rules, favouring listening to how English people actually speak, and taking it from there. Hence, he offers a rule of thumb for guidance in using a possessive apostrophe: if in doubt leave it out. But if you do use one, make sure you get it right. Maybe the same should apply to apostrophe use elsewhere too.

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Shrove Tuesday – Pancakes!!!!!!!!!!

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This year, Shrove Tuesday will be on 13^th February. Many will be marking the day with binge pancake eating. Some will be aware, as they find space for yet another pancake on Tuesday, of the religious significance of this particular indulgence.

The following day – Ash Wednesday – marks the start of Lent, when Jesus went into the wilderness for 40 days, where he was tempted by Satan, before returning with new resolution on Palm Sunday prior to a ‘trial’ and the ultimate sacrifice at Easter. Shrove Tuesday, for Christians, is the last day of eating rich food before giving up certain food for Lent. These days it is often chocolate that is given up – only to be eaten in abundance from Easter Sunday/Monday to mark Christ’s resurrection.

But why call it Shrove Tuesday? What does shrove mean?

Shrove is a form of the word shrive. To shrive, is mainly a Roman Catholic practice involving a priest hearing the confession of a penitent, or imposing a penance on the penitent, or both. Alternatively, it can mean to confess one’s sins and seek sacramental forgiveness from a priest.

If you are going to take Lent seriously, and forgo rich foods for some weeks, then it is wise to get rid of temptation in the form of the ingredients for cakes etc before Lent starts. What better way than to have a good old fry-up and get rid of all the milk and flour and eggs in the house (and accompany the ensuing hill of pancakes with sugar, and honey, and marmalade, and lemon, and raisons, and Cointreau – or is that just my household?).

These days Shrove Tuesday is inextricably linked to pancake day in many people’s minds, including those of other faiths and none, with tossing pancake competitions and pancake races taking place across the country. Enjoy!

Shrove / shrive – from Old English scrifan, Latin scribere – to write.

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Remembering The Holocaust 2024

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Saturday 27^th was Holocaust Memorial Day. And we all have a good idea what the word, holocaust, means: great destruction or loss of life; the source of such destruction, especially in a fire; and, more rarely, burnt offering.

Holocaust relates specifically to the period between 1941 and 1945 when over six million Jews across German occupied countries gassed or shot in extermination camps, such as Auschwitz-Birkenau and Treblinka, with their bodies often being burnt afterwards. Those Jews that could, escaped before those dreadful events. Many Jews that survived the Holocaust felt that, despite Germany losing the war, they too were still not welcome in mainland Europe, so did not return to their countries of birth. They emigrated to North and South America, the UK, and the Zionist communities that had started to spring up in what became Israel in 1948.

Holocaust is a term applied uniquely to the proposed (and substantially successful) extermination of the Jewish race by the Nazis*. In fact, by the 1970s the Jewish holocaust became simply The Holocaust as it was felt there was no longer any need for any explanatory adjective. That is, The Holocaust was recognised as the default term for the destruction of European Jews in the 1940s.

Of course, the Nazis are known for the mass murder of other groups – the disabled, Roma/gypsies, and homosexuals (though not, apparently, transgender and cross-dressing males who regularly featured in photographs of the more risqué Nazi social gatherings. The four known deaths of trans identifying men, they also happened to be Jewish or gay). Despicable though all these murders were, the motivation was what has been termed by some historians ‘biological’ rather than the attempted genocide** of an entire race, in this case Jews.

The distinction in how we talk about The Holocaust and other mass murdering sprees has become blurred of late. As has the use of the term Nazi. These days, a ‘Nazi’ is often used as a term of abuse for anyone who disagrees with your point of view on topical social or political issues. Both expansions of definition diminish the power of the original understanding of the words. So this weekend has been an opportune moment to remember their original meanings and the true awfulness of The Holocaust in the early 1940s.

(NB: *Nazi – originally the National Socialist German Workers Party. **Genocide – the policy of deliberately killing a nationality or ethnic group. A twentieth century word using the Greek, genus – race. And –cide – killing (as in homicide, suicide etc.))

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What Have the Scots Ever Done for Us?

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I won’t get into the number of eminent Scottish poets, writers, scientists, engineers, architects, businessmen (and women), religious thinkers, prime ministers (the list goes on …) because most people on both sides of Hadrian’s Wall and across the pond know this already.

What isn’t so well known is the number of words in everyday English that are Gaelic in origin and have gravitated south from Scotland – and presumably across the Atlantic also.

Words like:

Sporran – from the Gaelic Sporan (purse)

Whisky – from uisge beatha (water of life)

Caber – from caber (tree trunk)

Ben – beinn (mountain)

Glen – gleann (valley)

Grotty – grod (rotten)

Smashing – S math sin (that’s good!)

Shoot (as in speak!) – suithad (go on!)

Clan – clann (child/family)

War cry / slogan – slaugh graim (host-army shout)

Gob – gob (mouth / beak)

Twig (as in understand) – tuig (to understand)

Galore (abundance) – gu leor (sufficiency)

Pet – peata (tame animal).

Almost all these words are in common usage, though some, like twig and gob, are more likely to be spoken than to appear in formal written documents. Not many, as far as I am aware, appear in book or film titles.

Apart, that is, from Whisky Galore, a comedy based on the 1947 novel by Compton Mackenzie about a shipwreck off the Outer Hebrides in which the enterprising islanders ‘re-homed’ as much of the cargo of whisky bottle crates they could get their hands on before the ship sunk. Here not one, but two, words of Gaelic origin made their way into the title.

Sticking with the Scottish theme, here’s a footnote about a Scottish poet and wig-maker, who perhaps deserves to be better known south of the border.

The Origins of the Lending Library as we know it: Allan Ramsay’s poetry is still read and appreciated in Scotland, but is not well known elsewhere. However, Ramsay also made a social contribution that many of us still continue to enjoy today.

In 1718 Ramsay opened a bookshop in Edinburgh. Books were expensive luxuries in those days and few people could afford to buy them. To make books more accessible for less wealthy readers, Ramsay decided to try loaning them out. For a modest subscription, patrons of Ramsay’s shop could borrow books, read them, and return them without having to buy them. His innovation was soon copied throughout Britain, and America followed shortly afterwards.

In 1731, Benjamin Franklin and other members of the Junto Club in Philadelphia built on Ramsay’s model. They pooled their money and bought enough books to create a respectable library, with all the members being allowed use of the books. Later, they also allowed non-members to borrow the books, provided they left a deposit equal to the value of the book, which was given back to them when they returned the book.

Allan Ramsay, poet, playwright, wigmaker, shopkeeper, and creator of the first lending library, died in January1758, forty years after opening his first bookshop-library.

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Buried Alive – And how to stop it

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Who doesn’t have a lingering fear of being buried before being properly dead? It is the stuff of horror films and many a country anecdote. George Washington, no less, was so worried about the prospect that he is said to have made a dying request that his body was not to be put in the vault until three days after his supposed death. Just in case.

People, mainly women, have been buried alive as punishment, and earthquakes and similar natural disasters have accounted for many such unfortunate internments. But does it ever actually happen unintentionally at a formal burial after someone has wrongly been pronounced dead?

There are a few recorded cases, mainly in the nineteenth century, and it was during that era that measures to ensure such mistakes weren’t made increased.

For example, in London in the early 1800s, bodies were taken to mortuaries and held there for several days waiting for signs of putrefaction to become were visible to be sure the person was dead. Hospitals began to leave the dead on the wards, and nurses watched over the bodies looking for putrefaction before taking them to the morgue. To mask the smell of rotting human flesh, which might unsettle other patients, flower arrangements were placed beside each bed.

To address people’s fears – and make a tidy profit in the process – several inventors developed a range of so-called ‘safety coffins’ – with assorted bells, ropes, keys, whistles, and quick-release lids. As far as I am aware, there are no records of these contraptions actually being put to use.

Some words and phrases are thought to be associated with this concern about burying someone alive. Dead ringer, Hell’s bells, saved by the bell, the graveyard shift are four of them, and you can see the link. On closer examination though none of them have anything to do with premature burial.

A dead ringer is not a bell put in the coffin, but is someone who looks just like someone else (and comes from attempts to fix horse races by substituting one horse for another that looked identical).

Hells bells isn’t a bell for the coffin either, but is rhyming slang from the nineteenth century – a semi acceptable expression of anger.

Neither is saved by the bell a record of someone who has been successfully resurrected. It is when a boxer who has been knocked down is spared from being pronounced the loser (at least for that round) by the bell to end the round.

The graveyard shift is not, as has been said, the time someone sits by a recent burial so as to alert the authorities if they hear noises coming from below ground. It is a colloquial term for the night shift in a factory when all around is as quiet as a graveyard.

An Irish wake, these days, is usually held after the burial. But in the past they were held soon after the death, with family, friends and neighbours coming in to pay their respects to the recently departed. Eating, drinking and singing around the coffin were all part of the wake, and the noise would be enough, some said, to waken the dead – especially if they weren’t dead after all.

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The Origins of Panettone

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I’m told many people in the UK abandoned the traditional Christmas pudding this year for the Italian panettone. Not a switch I made or plan to make any time soon as I find panettone rather bland and dry. This may be because, as the top chef, Giorgio Locatelli, says, a panettone under £25.00 isn’t worth eating. £25.00?? When you can buy a perfectly decent pud in the local supermarket for under a fiver???

The first mention of ‘pan di Natale’ was in a book published by a Bolognese physician, Vincenzo Tanara, in 1761. He recorded the ingredients used by the local peasantry to make a sweet bread – flour, honey, raisins, candied pumpkin, and yeast.

A ‘gateau de Milan,’ with similar ingredients is also referenced in the sixteenth century as something served in the French court when Caterina de Medici was married to the French king, Henri 11, and presumably was allowed to take an Italian chef or two with her to France.

A more romantic, though no doubt historically inaccurate, story behind the origin of the name of this cake comes from a story about a fifteenth century aristocratic Italian family that came to live in Milan. Their villa was near to a poor baker called Toni. He had – you guessed it – a beautiful daughter, Adalgisa. One of the sons of the aristocratic family, Ughetto, fell madly in love with Adalgisa, disguised himself, and got a job as a delivery boy at the bakery. Once employed he discovered the bakery was in financial difficulties, and Adalgisa was always sad and worried about her father’s business failing.

Ughetto, went home, searched his father’s library and discovered a forgotten recipe for a cake made of flour, honey, eggs, candied fruit and yeast. He bought the ingredients for the old baker, who baked a batch of the cakes and put them out for sale straight from the oven. They sold like, well, hot cakes and he baked another batch, and another, and another …

Soon everybody wanted to get their hands on Toni’s cakes – or panne di Toni – and the rest is history.

Panettone has increased in popularity beyond Italy in recent decades. But if you received a tin of panettone this year that is now passed it’s best (or was a bit disappointing in the first place), rather than throw it out – re-cook it. Apparently it makes a delicious bread pudding that you can offer as a tasty dessert after a New Year’s Day feast of left-over turkey, stuffing, and other Christmassy bits lingering in the back of the fridge.

HAPPY NEW YEAR. Be with you again in 2024

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