Something Rhymes with Purple - Best of SRWP

Episode Date: March 24, 2020

Join us this week as we look back over our first fifty episodes of Something Rhymes With Purple. This wouldn’t have been possible without you so thank you for listening and for keeping us on our toes with your questions and suggestions… please keep them coming! If you haven’t listened to all fifty episodes then now is the time to catch up and here are some clips to entice you and point you in the right direction. In this episode Susie and Gyles reveal which came first: orange the colour or orange the fruit; they uncover the initial trailblazers; they disclose the rather nasty origins of ‘hangdog expression’; and they raise a glass to the original tosspots… who weren’t as rude as you may think. Plus, Gyles has some handy 20-second poems for you to learn to aid hand washing and a quotation to inspire you throughout the week. If you have a question for Susie and Gyles then please get in touch: [e-mail] A Somethin’ Else production. Gyles' poems: Verse 1 of "The Owl and the Pussycat" by Edward Lear: The Owl and the Pussy-cat went to sea   In a beautiful pea-green boat, They took some honey, and plenty of money,   Wrapped up in a five-pound note. The Owl looked up to the stars above,   And sang to a small guitar, "O lovely Pussy! O Pussy, my love,   What a beautiful Pussy you are,         You are,         You are! What a beautiful Pussy you are!" "Invictus" by William Ernest Henley: Out of the night that covers me,      Black as the pit from pole to pole, I thank whatever gods may be      For my unconquerable soul. In the fell clutch of circumstance      I have not winced nor cried aloud. Under the bludgeonings of chance      My head is bloody, but unbowed. I am the master of my fate,      I am the captain of my soul. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

What's up y'all it's your man Mark Strong Strizzy and your girl Jem the Jem of all Jems and we're hosting Olympic FOMO your essential recap podcast of the 2024 Olympic Games in 20 minutes or less every day we'll be going behind the scenes for all the wins

losses and real talk with special guests from the Athletes Village and around the world you'll never have a fear of missing any Olympic action from Paris. Listen to Olympic FOMO wherever you get your podcasts. Make your nights unforgettable

with American Express. Unmissable show coming up? Good news. We've got access to pre-sale tickets so you don't miss it. Meeting with friends before the show? We can book your reservation. And when you get to the main event, skip to the good bit using the card member entrance. Let's go seize the night. That's the powerful backing of American Express. Visit

amex.ca slash yamex. Benefits vary by card. Other conditions apply. Annex. Benefits vary by card. Other conditions apply. Hello, and welcome to Something Rhymes with Purple. I'm Giles Brandreth, and with my friend Susie Dent, we bring you a weekly brand tub of wordy stuff. We just love words and language. We are verbivores. Usually, we're coming to you from Susie's sitting room in Oxford. Today, I'm in the attic at my home in London. Susie, well, I tried to get her on the line, but I didn't manage to. But don't worry, you're going to hear plenty of her in the next half hour or so,

and we're going to be together again, at least virtually, next week. Because like many of you, the Something Writes with Purple team are working from home for a while. So the podcasts may sound a little bit different. But fear not, we will continue recording to share with you our love of words and language. Last week was our 50th episode. So we thought it a perfect time to look back on some highlights from what we've done so far. And if you haven't listened to all 50 episodes yet, now is the ideal time to do so. And hopefully this will whet your appetite to go back and catch up.

We want to continue to answer as many of your questions as possible. So please do contact us at the usual address, purple at something else dot com. That's something without the G, purple at something else dot com. First, a language warning, because some people, of course, aren't at school anymore. A language warning. You'll know that every now and again we effing jeff, purely for the professional reason of studying the words etymology, of course. But if you are listening with your children, please note that there are some swears in this one. Fuck me, it happens now and again.

But there is poetry too. Yes, a couple of verses that last precisely 20 seconds. Poems that will help you achieve the exact time you need for thorough hand-washing. So, welcome to Giles and Susie's Purple Patches, linguistic highlights from our verbivore year. My gut feeling is this is going to be a lot of fun, so let's start there, in the gut, with a clip from our episode Cacafuego, which ran out in November of last year. I've got a gut feeling, that's where we should start. What's the origin of the phrase gut feeling? Well, I mean, it's quite interesting because language is obviously following society, I guess,

in that today modern medicine is hugely focused on the importance of the gut and our intestinal health and it's said that medicine in the future is going to be customised according to the bacteria that we have in our guts and what needs to be replenished. Fecal transplant, sorry to bring this in so early, the new hot cure for many many conditions. I'm so looking aghast. I'm not totally out of touch. Do you know about fecal transplants? I don't know about it. I didn't know about this obsession with the gut. The gut is our second brain, essentially. And this was clearly recognised in ancient times because the notion of the gut as the seat of our emotions rather than the heart goes all the way back to,

as I say, ancient times. And you can find it in medieval medicine as well. So the gut feeling is the seat of emotions. If you have a gut feeling, it's following your instincts entirely. And gut itself goes back to a really ancient word meaning to pour. So it's the idea of the fluids that are kind of circulating around your body. And you're now telling me that this ancient belief, circulating around your body. And you're now telling me that this ancient belief, which our language reveals, having that gut feeling, has some scientific basis and that now people are believing that get the gut right and everything's right. Is that true? Absolutely. But expressions referencing the gut, I mean, you'll find them all over English.

To have a person's guts for garters, to hate a person's guts for garters to hate a person's guts to sweat your guts out guts are kind of energy and verve and staying power and also we think of them as being long stringy things don't we so it's arse ropes remember you remember my fantastic phrase from centuries ago when they told it as it was and bollocks were bollocks they were your testicles um arse ropes were your intestines love that i can never i just never get enough and that's why you have guts for garters because these arse ropes literally serve as yeah could be stringy they could be they could be braces okay well we'll get yes or garters so that's guts i didn't realize it was the gut that was the source of everything there was a that obviously it was once upon a time then it became the Well, the heart is today considered to be the seat of emotion, isn't it? And heart, famously,

that the symbol to heart went into the Oxford English dictionary, but actually not the symbol itself, but the idea of hearting something, which is slipped into English, meaning I like, or I favourite, or it's all about emotion. Hearting, this is another of these verbalising of a noun. The verbing of a noun, which has to be said has been done since way before Shakespeare. Remember Shakespeare? Grace me, no grace, not uncle me, no uncle.

He did it all the time. So nothing new there. But again, it's quite similar to the guts and the intestines, actually. If you go back centuries, you will find that the heart was considered the seat of intelligence and intellectual ability as well. So when we learn something by heart, we are learning it in a way that we will then keep it

and contain it within our memory. To record has got the Latin cordis, meaning heart, in it, because if you're recording something, you are keeping it within your heart as something that you could then draw on in your thoughts. Well, talking of learning things by heart, it seems like the perfect time to introduce you to the first of my 20 second poems. Now, as you probably know, when it comes to washing your hands to keep the dreaded virus at bay, the rules are simple. Wet your hands with clean running water, warm or cold, it doesn't matter. Turn off the tap, apply the soap, plenty of it. Lather your hands by

rubbing them together. Don't forget the backs of your hands, between your fingers, under your nails. Keep at it for 20 seconds. It seems actually that the timing is key to the operation being successful. According to the experts, less than 20 seconds won't do the trick. So, how to time that perfect 20-second hand wash? A couple of weeks back, the Health Secretary's first suggestion proved controversial. Matt Hancock recommended singing the National Anthem while washing your hands. Hancock's next suggestion was to get your timing right by singing Happy Birthday twice. At this point, the government's PR people got involved and came to me and to the great Dame Judy Dench. Don't know why they didn't come to me and Susie. Anyway, they knew I was a poetry lover

and a propagandist for the benefits of learning poetry by heart. They reckoned that Dame Judy was not only a national treasure, but also the nation's most noted Shakespearean actress. She won awards, actually, for playing Lady Macbeth. She could have done, out, damn spot, out, I say. But instead, we chose to do The Owl and the Pussycat. What's lovely about this is that it lasts exactly 20 seconds. So, all right, are you ready for this? When we did it, and we actually tweeted our efforts, which we did in her kitchen, washing our hands side by side, we got into trouble for that. So please do your social distancing while you wash your hands, get the soap lathered up, and then you've got 20 seconds starting now.

And then you've got 20 seconds starting now. The owl and the pussycat went to sea in a beautiful pea-green boat. They took some honey and plenty of money, wrapped up in a five-pound note. The owl looked up to the stars above and sang to a small guitar. Oh, lovely pussy. Oh, pussy, my love. What a beautiful pussy you are. You are. You are. What a beautiful pussy you are. Well, that was the first verse of The Owl and the Pussycat by Edward Lear.

And we'll make sure, actually, any of the poems that we do include in the programme, scroll down, you should be able to find them. They're in the notes. Now, what's in a name? What's in a name? In March 2019, in our episode, Gilden Bollocks, Susie revealed the importance of surnames and how they've served as useful records over the years. She also laughed and swore a lot. And it was all frightfully unprofessional. But it is fascinating. I mean, he's talking about first names there, but with surnames, I mean, some people lived and literally died for their names.

William's conquering army, going back to 1066, about a third of them apparently were Flemings. And that meant somebody from Flanders and traditionally associated with trade, etc. But there are still Flemings. There are still Flemings. There is the Fleming banking family of which Ian Fleming, of course, the creator of 007 James Bond, was a member. But when English merchants started to resent the new competition, the results were quite dramatic. And going back to David McKee's wonderful study of surnames, he relates how many of the Flemings who settled in London were actually hunted down by mobs because they were called Flemings. And they were forced to say words like bread and cheese. And if their response was a little

bit like brood and kiss, they would be set upon and slaughtered. So surnames can have fairly dramatic consequences. You know, what's also really interesting for a linguist is that very often a surname will give you the first record of a name. So the Oxford English Dictionary will give you a surname. I think it was called Roger. I always call everybody Roger. And it was called Adam. Adam Bilberrylip is the first quotation we have for Bilberry. And that was in a court roll of 1584 in Nottingham. And Squibb is first recorded in a court roll of 1584 in Nottingham. And Squibb is first recorded in a nickname.

Even the F word is recorded in surnames from the 13th century. So we've got a Mr. Windfuck in 1287. Why would anyone be called Windfuck? Because, do you remember, you've forgotten our swearing episode in which I told you that fucking was all about hitting someone originally, not about loving someone or having sex with them. It's to do with striking. So it was striking. So Windfucker, do you remember, was a name for the Kestrel.

So Mr. Windfuck probably took his name from the wind fucker kestrel there's also um in the 13th century there was a mr fuck butter all to do with the butter monger knocking butter of blocks oh my goodness knocking blocks of butter uh so butter into blocks for sale that's what we think that one is oh fuck butter so fuck butter. So it was somebody, as you know, when you made like a portion of butter for someone to buy, there's a great vat of it. You take it out.

And put it into blocks. You beat it into place. Yeah, and it was all about beating. And the word fuck actually means beat. You were beating the butter into place. So he is the local fuck butter. And just to finish off, you've got Alice Charwoman.

That's the first record we have of Charwoman. Alice Charwoman. And Ralph Bullfinch. Oh, I like the sound of Ralph Bullfinch. I wonder what a group of Bullfinches could be called. Maybe a Ralph or a Rafe. Well, in the episode, Oxtocog, last June, we delved into the fascinating world of collective nouns.

Oxtocog last June, we delved into the fascinating world of collective nouns. Most people think of collective nouns in relation to animals, don't they? I mean, I think I'm right in saying that when it comes to jellyfish, it's a smack of jellyfish. People know it's a seat of badgers. I think that's right. C-E-T-E of badgers. Curiously, it's a deceit, spelled differently, of lapwings. It's a parliament of owls. That's quite nice, isn't it? Because they all sit.

I suppose that's because the picture of them all sitting around on trees looking like a parliament of owls. Parliament goes back to the Latin for speaking and talking. So the parlor was the place where people would go and talk. And the parliament is where people do a lot of talking. So this is probably, you know, the collective noun for owls because they make a lot of hoots, I imagine. A pride of lions. Yeah.

That's well known. That's good. A flight of swallows. A pitying of turtle doves. I love that. A covey of partridges, a gam of whales. Have you come across that one before? I haven't. I like that one. They're good. They're all to do with animals, or most of them are to do with animals. There's a, I like this, a yap of chihuahuas, a kindle of kittens. That's quite well known.

Are these old? Are these new? Are they invented? How do they come about? Well, this is what's so strange. So, as you know, I've mentioned before on our podcast that people long for an authority in English. So people want a government telling us what's correct and what's not. And failing that, because we don't have an academy and they look to the dictionary and so often I am asked for what's the proper collective noun for I don't know a group of radio engineers for example and they want to know what the official term is and the truth is there are no official terms it's essentially as with all of our languages I've explained before much to people's discuss quite often it's democracy, so usage is king.

But what's so strange about collective nouns is that they go back half a millennium to something called the Book of St Albans, and that is the primary source for our hit. The Book of St Albans, as in the place St Albans? As in the place, yes. And what does this book contain? So the book contains, it was basically a manual

for noblemen of the time on hunting and hawking and other aristocratic pursuits. And it was reprinted over and over and over again. And they just sort of slipped into the language as a result. So it was attributed to a nun called Dame Juliana Burns, or Barnes, sorry. But it was sometimes written Burners, so various spellings. This is, we have to remember this just before the time when Shakespeare's name was written in about 10 different ways, including by himself twice on a single document, his will.

He spelt his name differently. Because? Because spelling was chaotic. It was printing, really. It was Caxton's printing press that gave us our standard language. And before that, it was basically phonetic. It was all over the place. And I love that.

It was happily chaotic. Anyway, she lived near the town of St. Albans. There's various doubts over whether she was the true identity. She was the true author, sorry. We do know that she was responsible for the section on hunting and hawking. And that's pretty much where these terms came from. But how extraordinary that these are the ones that slipped into the language. So superfluity of nuns, for example. A superfluity of nuns? Have you heard of that? I've heard the

phrase. It was because women who were considered to be spinsters, who were unmarried, who were, you know, without a sort of firm vocation in life, were encouraged to join convents. And there were so many of them that there literally weren't enough convents to house them all, hence the superfluity of nuns. Is there a collective noun for a collection of nuns? I mean, I asked... What's a collective noun for a collective noun? I asked my friends on Twitter to send me some possibilities,

and they came up with a confusion of collectives, a bunch of collectives, a whimsy of collectives, a clutch of collectives, a bunch of collectives, a whimsy of collectives, a clutch of collectives, a gathering of collectives, a catch of collectives, a cacophony of collectives. But the one I thought was most clever, but it's got a kind of historical period feel to it, a Soviet of collectives. Because older listeners will recall that when there was the Soviet Union, there were lots of collective farms. So

a Soviet of collectives. That's very clever. I think I like cacophony. You like cacophony? Yeah, just for the sound. Now, while we relish the creativity involved with naming groups of animals, in the episode Dog's Body we found that elsewhere in the language some animals

get rather a raw deal. We love animals. What I want to ask you is why, when we use animals in our language, is it always negative? If you say somebody are catty, okay, you say somebody they're batty, you say somebody, you know, your dog tired, sick as a pig, blind as a bat, timid as a mouse, all these things are negative. Sick as a parrot. Sick as a parrot. Should we be reporting the English language to the RSPCA? How has this come about? It's really interesting you should say that. Well, I think it's partly because historically animals weren't treated in the same way as they may be today. So this is, you know, abattoirs in the food industry aside,

we adore our cats and dogs for the most part, don't we? And we are appalled as English-speaking nations when they're mistreated. But in the past, they really were. So if you have a hang dog expression, for example, that looks back to when dogs were literally tried in courts for any misdemeanour. So if a dog pinched some sausages from a butcher's, say,

I'm probably talking about more heinous crimes than this, but it's quite possible that it would be tried in court and sentenced to death. Excuse me, a dog would be pulled into the court of law and a magistrate, I imagine it's just sausages, or a judge if it was something more serious, if it attacked a human being, the animal itself would be put on trial.

Yes. Not the owner of the animal. Not the owner. Now, in modern law, it would be the owner of the animal. Quite right. They're not looking after animals properly. Yes, yes.

But in those days, they could try. And so a hanged dog is because it was sentenced. The judge put on the black cap, as it were, and I sentenced this dog to be hung. Was it hanged? H because it was sentenced. The judge put on the black cap, as it were, and I sentenced this dog to be hung. Was it hanged? Hanged. Hanged. You can explain that to me in a moment.

To be hanged by the neck until he, she is dead. It's awful. And they will take it away and string up the dog. It's awful. It's awful. And this is fact. It's not urban myth. No, it's not.

It's absolute fact. So it's a dog's life is another one. Dog's dinner, you know, quite negative, as you say, idioms associated with dogs. Before you go on to the other ones, can I just quickly... In the doghouse, mind you, that's Peter Pan. Yes. I want to come back now, but just to clear a G, else, all one word, dot com. Hung and hanged. I know that when somebody is hanged by the neck because they're going to be executed, it is hanged. I know when something is well hung, it's different.

You know, when something is well hung, it's different. What is the difference between hung and hanged? And why can't you say he was hung when somebody was executed? I think it's purely a distinction from the past. It is actually very useful to us because it does offer, as I say, you know, it offers that sort of differentiation. So it's very clear what's been used. But I'm correct. It is hanged when executed. It is hanged. And I wouldn't be remotely surprised if that does change over time.

I think I've even used, I mean, I say even I, but, you know, I supposed to know what I'm doing. I have used them interchangeably wrongly on occasion when I haven't been thinking about it. But, yes, it's very, very specific now. Hang tight. It's time for a break. Bumble knows it's hard to start conversations. Hey, no, too basic. Hi there. Still no. What about hello, handsome? Who knew you could give yourself the ick? That's why Bumble is changing how you start conversations. You can now make the first move or not.

With opening moves, you simply choose a question to be automatically sent to your matches. Then sit back and let your matches start the chat. Download Bumble and try it for yourself. You know that feeling when you're like, why isn't there more of this? This show is so good. That was how I felt when I started to get really hooked on Black Butler that I think is just incredible. Oh, we, yeah, it's coming back.

It's coming back. He's like, I'm on top of it. I got it. I'm very excited. After like a 10-year hiatus. And this is The Anime Effect, the show that allows celebrities to nerd out over their favorite anime, manga, or pop culture.

The Akatsuki theme song. You know what it is. I listen to that one all day. That thing go crazy. That thing keep being the gym going. And they're like, what is he listening to? Oh, it's not even in the gym. I be on the field.

I'm Nick Friedman. I'm Lee Alec Murray. And I'm Leah President. Find out which live-action anime adaptations David Dostmalchian is praying he'll get to star in. Or how Jamal Williams uses the mindset of Naruto for his NFL career. Listen to Crunchyroll Presents The Anime Effect every Friday, wherever you get your podcasts. Welcome back to this Best of Purple podcast. Before we crack on with some more highlights,

after our break, of course, it's important to wash those hands, and we know we've got to do it in 20 seconds. I've been thinking about Prince Harry, or rather Harry, as we now have to call him this week, because he's just announced that the Invictus Games for this year have got to be cancelled. No Invictus Games till next year. He to be cancelled. No Invictus Games till next year. He nicely joked that at least that gave the guys and girls another year to get up to speed.

Anyway, I thought I'd read a bit of Invictus, 20 seconds worth of it. This is the poem that inspired Prince Harry, as he then was, to create the Invictus Games. It's by somebody called William Ernest Henley, who lived from 1849 to 1903. And when you hear the poem, you'll see why it was such an inspiration to Prince Harry. Out of the night that covers me, black as the pit from pole to pole. I thank whatever gods may be for my unconquerable soul. In the fell clutch of circumstance, I have not winced nor cried aloud. Under the bludgeonings of chance, my head is bloody but unbowed. I am the master of my fate. I am the captain of my soul. the master of my fate. I am the captain of my soul. Okay, now, as we purple people know, the wonderful thing about podcasts is they can take you anywhere, transport you to somewhere you'd rather be. So even though I'm sitting here up in the attic at home, I'm going to close my

eyes, pop on the episode Nemophilism, and go for a walk in the woods. The vocabulary of nature just, I feel, is kind of ebbing away slightly and it needs to be pulled back, particularly for our kids. And there's been so much debate about it recently, which we'll come to in terms of, you know, the vocabulary of nature dropping out of junior dictionaries

and whether or not that's a good thing. But hopefully we will touch on some of the beautiful, resonant, evocative vocabulary that we have. So you're taking us for a walk in the woods. I am. Are you a wood lover? I was brought up in a town. I'm happy. I'm a townie. Occasionally I've been to the country, not for very long.

I like the idea of going into a wood if there are bluebells there. Ah, beautiful. But that's about it. You're an urbanite. You are urbane. I can't see the wood for the trees. What's the origin of that? Can't see the wood for the trees. Oh gosh, that I think has been in English for quite a long time. And the idea is obviously that you can't see the whole picture because there are,

you can't see the whole forest or the whole wood because of the trees that are standing in the way. Personally, I love trees. There is a word for a lover of trees and a lover of woods and forests. A lover of trees is a dendrophile, and a lover of forests is a pneumophilist. Isn't that beautiful? What's the difference between a wood and a forest? Do you know, I'm actually genuinely not sure.

I just imagine that a forest is much denser and larger. If you want the official dictionary definition, I can give it it to you it's not something I've ever pondered before do you know that's what I love about my job is that every single day there will be at least questions where I think I really should know the answer to that and I don't okay so wood originally meant it comes from German and it meant a tree and then it was applied to a kind of collective a collection of of trees and a grove or a cop so it's always been slightly smaller French gave us forest from their fire so that would have come over after 1066 with the Normans and it's an extensive tract of land

so I think it is all about size as ever yeah all comes back down to size but actually that forest I would just throw in here, ultimately goes back to the Latin, as so many French words do, forest meaning out of doors. And that idea of being outside gave us foreigner as well. Foreigner goes back to that same root. Forest and foreigner have the same root? Yes. Meaning?

A foreigner is somebody who's sort of other, and so outside the kind of general community. They are strangers. And a foreigner is somebody who's sort of other and so outside the kind of general community they are strangers and a forest is a forest it just goes back to that latin for outdoors or outside gosh yeah you'll be excited to know that in a newspaper this week we have been described something rhymes with purple our podcast as a trailblazing podcast really yeah which is i think rather flattering and exciting and delightful. And they particularly like you, it must be said, but I got a bit of a mention too.

But I was then intrigued by the phrase trailblazing. What's the origin of that? I love the story behind this because, as you know, I'm a great advocate of American English, which is not a new infestation. There are some things I don't like, but some things I absolutely adore. And trailblazing goes back to the early settlers, the people who set sail on the Mayflower or just after, and had to mark out their own settlements, literally go through the woods in order to find areas where they could set up habitations.

So my neck of the woods goes back to those very early days where presumably they described the land that they settled on according to its shape and it looked like an animal's neck so they called it my neck of the woods they also used to go through the forest and they would chip off a bit of bark from the trees in order to show the trail that they were taking so that others could follow and find them and so they were literally, those were called blazers because they shone brightly. So those exposed bits of flesh on the bark of a tree were the blazers that would then show you the trail.

So they were the first trailblazers. Do you know who the real trailblazers are though? You, the purple people. Every day we do get lots of emails from you posing all sorts of questions to keep us on our toes. Well, mainly Susie on her toes, because she's the real lexicographer. I just, you know, chip in and try not to talk over her too much.

Anyway, you also suggest word games we can play, and I like word games. And anyway, it's a way of connecting the Purple community from right across the globe. Thank you, and please keep in touch. We do love hearing from you wherever you are. Purple at somethingelse.com. Purple at somethingelse.com. Here, from the episode Gobby Linus, Susie takes on some big hitters. OK, listeners' questions. Shall I kick off? You please kick off.

I have one from Helen Atkinson, who contacted us on Twitter. She said she's curious to know the origins of kibosh. She uses it often and it always seems to attract a wry smile well helen's chosen one of the big etymological mysteries of our time we'd actually know completely where it comes from it turned up if you trace the history it's quite interesting because it turned up in a number of london newspapers written it was about 1834 and it followed a case of two chimney sweeps who were convicted of touting for business publicly which they were not allowed to do and one of the newspapers reported that the judge put a kibosh

on their plans but quite what it is we think it may have been a form of kosh one idea is that it was the name for a clog maker's tool which was a heated hot iron a heated iron rather used to soften leather could also be used as a weapon so if you put the kibosh on it you might just sort of beat it down but we're not completely sure it sounds japanese it sounds it's it's oh it sounds faintly yiddish i mean there's just so many possibilities so we don't know still don't know we are stumped by kibosh. So if you know definitively, do let us know. It's purple at somethingelse.com. Any other queries, Ross? Yes.

Tron the First. Hi, Tron. I'm not sure. This is your Twitter handle, obviously. I'm not completely sure this is how you wanted to be named, but you didn't give me your name, so I'm sorry about that. But you ask, which came first when it comes to orange, the colour or the fruit?

Very easily answered this one. The fruit definitely came first when it comes to orange, the colour or the fruit? Very easily answered this one. The fruit definitely came first. It was recorded about the 14th century when it kind of began to be imported into Britain. Orange came after. Before the colour orange was named, people borrowed terms and mixed them together like yellow and gold and brown and red and things. They didn't actually have a word for that colour. Or amber, as in the traffic lights.

Red, amber, green. And they were called Belisha beacons. No, that's something else. Those are the crossings, aren't they? Belisha beacons at crossings were named after Leslie Hoare Belisha, who was the Minister of Transport when they were introduced in the 1930s. And they, do they still have them? They were on sort of striped poles,

and it was a kind of flashing orange light at the top. Yeah, you still get them at pedestrian crossings, but you get them at zebra crossings sometimes. Correct. So orange the fruit came before orange the colour. Yes, and orange is quite interesting for linguists because it's an example of what is boringly called metanalysis, in which the first letter of a word shifts to the end of the preceding word. So these are quite famous in English. Slow us down.

Okay. Meta what? Metanalysis. You don't need to remember that. Well, I'd like to. Meta. Give me some examples. M-E-T-A.

Yeah, meta-analysis. So an apron used to be a napron, a napron from the French nap, which also meant a tablecloth. An umpire used to be a numper, which was a non-peer. Oh, I love it. It wasn't somebody who was on the same level as the players. An adder used to be a nadir. And an orange. What does nadir mean?

Do you know, I was thinking that as I was saying it. I actually genuinely can't remember. N-A-D-E-R is what an adder was before. Yeah, I think it's just an old English word for an adder. But where that comes from, I'm going to let you know. And then an orange was a naranja. It comes from the Sanskrit. And eventually the N just fell off. Well, it kind of joined the adder.

Oh, that really was an episode full of fascinating facts. Or should that be an episode? Anyway, that's nearly it for this look back at the first 50 episodes of Something Rhymes with Purple. All the episodes are available for you to download. So if you've just joined us recently, do go back and start again from the beginning. Why not? In every episode, Susie gives us a trio of words, words that have fallen out of favour, words that perfectly sum up a feeling, words that she likes and she thinks we might like, and they're always brilliant.

So before I leave you, I'd like to raise a glass to you, our purple listeners. What's Susie's history over this week? Right. The first, of course, pub-related shot clog. Shot, S-H-O-T-C-L-O-G. Yes. The pub companion who you only put up with

because they're buying the next round. Oh, he's a shot. Centuries old, that one. He's a shot clog. He's a bit of an obstruction, but we'll put up with him because he's paying. How awful. Now, you're not one of theseuries old, that one. He's a shock. He's a bit of an obstruction, but we'll put up with him because he's paying. How awful. Now, you're not one of these, but I'm one.

And Paul and Lawrence, who are with us, are also. We are Tosspots. Because the original Tosspots were simply drinkers who tossed back their bottle of beer and then usually asked for another one. So we're not, yeah, they were kind of habitual drinkers. But the idea is you're tossing it off, is it? Exactly. But you're tossing off your drink.

Yes. So call someone a tosspot is not actually as rude as you might think. Tosser is slightly different. Oh, tell us the difference between tosspot and tosser. Tosser is all about masturbating and tosspot is all about drinking. This is the charm of something wrapped with purple. We tell it as it is. What's the next one?

The third one is the friend who always turns up whenever they hear a cork popping or a beer can opening, and that is a lick spigot. Lick spigot as opposed to lick spittle. Oh, yes, lick spittle's another good one. We should mention that on the political level. What is a lick spittle? A lick spittle is somebody who just,

it's a bit like a fart catcher that we mentioned in our politics episode. Oh, you lick up somebody else's spittle. Yeah, horrible. You're so admiring them. Oh, their very spittle is attractive. Let me lick your spittle. That's a lick spittle. Gross, I'm really, really old, though.

This is a lick spigot. One who licks the spigot, this is 1600, so 1599, a contemptuous name for a tapster or drawer. So it can be applied to a publican, but most often somebody always turns up when there's a smell of alcohol around. And we haven't even mentioned Cocker Hoop. Cocker Hoop. Well, look, I'm feeling Cocker Hoop now. Let's end on Cocker Hoop. Cocker Hoop goes back apparently to setting the cock on the hoop, which is apparently to turn on the tap and let the liquor flow. And the result is you are cock-a-hoop.

And always when Susie's given us her trio of words, I give you my quotation of the week. And this week I've been dipping into Albert Camus' famous novel La Peste. I've been reading it in translation. And I came across this line. In the depth of winter, I finally learned that within me there lay an invincible summer. I hope during the coming weeks,

they may be trying, whatever you are, good luck, keep healthy, well done, whatever you're doing, particularly if you're working, you know, in one of the special services that are helping us at this time, whatever service you happen to be doing, whatever you're doing. I know you're being brilliant at it. Well done. And if you're at home feeling a bit strange and discombobulated, then download our first live episode, which went out on January the 21st, to find out more about the word discombobulated. That's it for this week. Don't forget to give us a nice review if you've enjoyed it. Recommend us

to a friend at a safe distance. Next week, I shall still be in London, and Susie will be giving me a bell from Oxford. We'll be apart, but very much united as we uncover the words and language behind the technology that's going to make that possible. So please join us then. Something Rhymes with Purple is a Something Else production. It was produced by Lawrence Bassett with additional production from Steve Ackerman, Grace Laker and Gully. Oh, Gully, I must say, I've discovered this week exactly what you do. You're the fellow who pulls the knobs, swivels the levers.

You've made this happen. You could actually even cut me off in...