Something Rhymes with Purple - Best of SRWP Vol. 2

Episode Date: April 6, 2021

It’s our 2nd birthday here on Purple so the perfect opportunity to remind ourselves of what a brilliant year we’ve had - despite the obvious challenges and difficult global situation. This time last year we reverted to recording remotely but, if anything, this added to the intimate feel of the episodes and provided us with a weekly half-hour of stillness within an otherwise chaotic world. Within these clips of the best bits of the last year we set sail across the world’s oceans, take a walk through the garden, and sit down to a delicious plate of pasta (and baked beans for Gyles). We also ask ourselves who put the cock in cockroach, why Knightsbridge is a unique destination, and there’s another chance to hear a spectacular name-dropping anecdote involving the Sultan of Swoon. A Somethin’ Else production. If you have a question for Gyles and Susie or you have a topic you would like exploring in a future episode then please email us [e-mail] Susie’s Trio… how many of these did you remember? Thermopot - a lover of hot drinks Pollicitation - an offer made but not yet accepted Lanspresado - the person who turns up at the pub having “accidentally” forgotten their wallet Our fabulous new range of merchandise is now live at https://kontraband.shop/collections/something-rhymes-with-purple PLUS for this first week we are giving you 10% off all items if you use the code purple2021. So whether you’re buying a treat for yourself or a gift for a Purple loved one then now is the time to do it. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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Something else. Download Bumble and try it for yourself. Hello, and welcome to Something Rhymes with Purple, the award-winning podcast all about words and language that I, Giles Brandreth, host with my friend and colleague, Susie Dent. We've just celebrated our second birthday here on Purple, so we thought we'd take a look back over the last 12 months to bring you some highlights from the show. Remember, our full back catalogue is still available online, so if any of these clips whet your appetite for more word origins from the worlds of oceans, plants, doctors, pasta, furniture,

or anything else mentioned, do go back and listen to the full episodes. As ever, if you want to send Susie and me a wordy question, or argue with us, or if you have a topic you would like to discuss and want us to explore it further in a future episode, the address is simply purple at something else dot com. That's purple at something else dot com. That's purple at something else dot com. Something else spelt without a G, just to be a bit different. On to the clips now. Back in April last year, Susie and I were trading proverbs when a certain historical admiral decided to look the other way. To turn a blind eye, I've always believed this is something to do with Admiral Lord Nelson, the man who stands atop that mighty column in Trafalgar

Square, now deserted. Am I right? Yes, you are right. I think it's quite well known, this one, but I love it because it's just so literal. I think I've talked before on our podcast about how I love those idioms, which you think must be a metaphor, but actually began with really literal origins. This is one of them. So of course, turning a blind eye, we use it as a figurative turn of phrase these days, but it does go back to Horatio Nelson, who of course had one blind eye and just condense it really quickly. once during battle, the British forces signalled for him to stop attacking a fleet of Danish ships because surrender looked inevitable. He thought they still had a chance. So he held up a telescope to his blind eye and said,

I do not see the signal. So he persevered, he attacked and was victorious so his blind eye turned out to be extremely important wonderful um and i just love that and is he the nelson of the nelson touch you've heard that expression what's the nelson oh having the nelson my best touch but not nelson touch oh well what's that nelson touch means something rather special oh you've got the nelson touch now this did you when you were at school play cricket or have you played cricket since um i used to play french cricket with a tennis racket, but I've never actually played cricket. I've played cricket. They used to say Giles scores really well, meaning that I would lie in the long grass keeping the score, which is how I know that a Nelson in cricket is a score of 111, one, one, one, because at the end of his life, Admiral Lord Nelson

allegedly had only one eye, one arm and one leg, one, one, one. That's a Nelson for you. And sticking with the world of water, a life on the ocean wave, a life on the ocean wave. Okay. In our episode, by and large, Susie very kindly rattled off the peaceful, logical and earthside origins of the world's oceans. And you'll be relieved to know I'm not singing in this clip. Oh, gosh. Honestly, if you want to talk about nautical idioms and nautical vocabulary, we could genuinely be here for 24 hours at least, because English is awash, if you excuse the pun, with idioms and expressions from the high seas. So we'll only be able to even, you know, you wouldn't scratch the surface of the ocean. Should we not be saying dip a toe into the ocean rather than scratching the surface?

This podcast is going to be full of the most horrible mixed metaphors, but yes, let's do that because it's a brilliant subject. Can we begin with the oceans? How many oceans are there and what are they called and why? Let's start with the word that because it's a brilliant subject. Can we begin with the oceans? How many oceans are there and what are they called and why? Let's start with the word ocean because that's quite interesting. Please. Oceanos came from the ancient Greeks and Okeanos for them meant great river. I mean, it may even be older than the ancient Greeks, but they believed in an earth that was disc shaped. And they saw the ocean as a single great river that ran around the whole of this giant landmass.

And it was only much later that distinctions came to be made between the different bodies of water. Naming them was, it wasn't arbitrary, it was a really big symbolic thing, but it was kind of informed by lots of different impulses, if you like, whether they were cultural or even personal in one case. So yeah, do you want me to run you through this? Yeah, please. Please. Can we start with the Atlantic? Atlantic, yes. That was named after the Atlas mountain range in Northern Africa. And of course, they in turn were named after the Titan who supported the heavens that you'll still see

on the front is a piece of old atlases. I don't know if modern ones have them. I don't think they do. So Atlas was a character in Greek mythology? Greek mythology. And he held up the heavens. So you would find on the fly leaf of old atlases, my school atlas included a picture of him holding up. And he is a virtually naked person wearing a little loincloth, who has got his arms in the air and he's supporting the globe. Yes. Remember I went to a convent, so, you know, a little went a long way. So that's the Atlantic.

The Indian Ocean is obviously just based on its topography and India itself is named for the Indus River. What else have we got? Pacific. Pacific is lovely. I love this one. Have you heard of the Magellan Straits? I have.

Yeah. Well, they were named after an explorer called ferdinand magellan yeah and apparently not all his sailors were well in around 1520 he was searching for a route through to the spice islands because of course the spice islands were the source of all these wonderful exotic treasures that were being imported back to europe and he was to kind of found what became known as the straits of magellan where he is he and his fleet they experienced really unpredictable winds and currents that wasn't easy and then they passed into the open waters of i think it was

known at the time as the sea of the south um but he was really struck by its serenity, really. And so it led him to name it Mar Pacifico, the Tranquil Sea. So Pacific is linked to pacifist. It means peaceful. Lovely. What about the Arctic? Arctic. Okay, this was named after the great bear, the Ursa Major. The Greek word for bear is arctos, and arctikos meant northern or literally of the great bear. So, the Antarctic Ocean is the not bear, if you prefer.

And that is why teddy bear enthusiasts are called arctophiles. Arctophiles, exactly. Arcto means bear, and ant, what is the ant in Antarctic? Octo means bear and ant, what is the ant in Antarctic? Opposite. So antipathy, antipodes, all of that means the opposite. So the Antarctic is opposite north or opposite bear. Makes sense? Yeah, I get it. What about ant and deck? Ant stands opposite deck, of course. Mediterraneanranean that's the other one mediterranean means sea in the middle of the earth um so mediterranean yes and do we know what the difference between a sea and an ocean is because the mediterranean is a sea isn't it not an ocean yeah that's a really

good point i'm going to look this up because i don't have a ready answer for that so i'm looking the oxford dictionary now and c it says the expanse of salt water that covers most of the earth's surface and surrounds its land masses um and ocean hear me tapping away a very large expanse of sea in particular each of the main areas into which the sea is divided geographically well so all the water is sea, but specifically there are oceans to designate where they are. And some parts that are not as big as oceans are called seas. It's a specific designation, yes. Being out on the water for that long sure can build up an appetite. Food has been a big part of Purple in the last year, whether it's armies marching on their stomachs or Italian generals scoffing biscuits, but nothing is quite as bizarre as

Giles's own culinary tastes. Do you believe him? My signature dish is baked beans on toast. But during lockdown, I've tried to simplify. Also, I'm trying to lose weight, so I'm trying to cut back on the carbs. So I've abandoned the toast. And so I just have the baked beans heated in the microwave. But I'm thinking that's maybe an excessive use of electricity. So I'm just having cold baked beans. There's almost an erotic charge. Can I say it's so delicious? And because I can't stand the washing up, I'm eating now out of the tin.

No, I don't believe this for a second. I'm eating the baked beans out of the tin. I do not believe this. I'm using a fork or a spoon because I discovered you cut your lip if you try and eat, drink them straight. This is rubbish. This is rubbish. This is rubbish, purple people.

Yeah, I don't believe a word of this. It isn't rubbish. Keep life simple. I'm getting back to basics. I do do my other dish. I used to be, when I was a fish eater, I used to love a fish finger sandwich. Oh, yeah.

Two slices of bread. Oh, no, no, butter. Or garlic mayo. You or garlic mayo you need garlic how have we got onto this because we are trying because every novel this is to help you with your novel if you think it's getting a bit flat put in an eating scene that's what all the great novelists do put in a you know describe the crumpets oozing with butter describe your tarragon chicken i've already discovered crumpets, actually, this lockdown. Yes. Yeah. Anyway. There's not been much crumpet in my, I can tell you in my life during lockdown. Never mind. It's all true, Susie. And there will be purple

people out there screaming their smart speakers in agreement. Wherever you are in the world, there are few culinary pleasures quite like some cold baked beans straight from the tin. Or can. Give it a go, and you can thank me later. But on leaving the kitchen in this same episode, we went on a lovely walk through the garden to have a good look in the borders. Well, I thought I would start with flowers that are kind of shot with threads from mythology because there are so many beautiful legends attached to the names of flowers so the iris for example is a nod to the messenger of the gods personified by a rainbow but there's the hyacinth as well hyacinths are so highly scented aren't they can be a bit cloying sometimes but quite beautiful when they when they're fresh

and that also got a really darkly beautiful tale behind it. It goes back to Hyacinth, the handsome Spartan prince who was lover of the god Apollo, son of Zeus. And he was so handsome and he had many unsuccessful suitors, including the god of the south wind, Boreas, and Zephyrus, god of the south wind Boreas and Zephyrus god of the west wind who gave his Zephyr of course or Zephyr but his star-crossed relationship with Apollo is the one that kind of really counts and it had a tragic end because during a game of discus one day Apollo threw the discus high into the clouds and Hyacinth ran after it probably hoping to impress him. And the spurned Zephyr, the god of the wind, blows the discus off course. In other accounts, it's a bit of an unfortunate ricochet, but I think it was Ovid who thought this was a very deliberate action by the god of the wind. And anyway, the

discus kills the young Spartan, leaving a grief-stricken Apollo behind. And it's said that from Hyacinth's blood, Apollo created the flower, whose name we still know today, and inscribed upon its petals the lamentation, I, I, alas. And you can still see, if you look at the markings on a flower, you can still see, almost make out those words, which is just beautiful. Hyacinth. So the original Hyacinth was a bloke. So poor old hyacinth bouquet. She's named after a bloke. Yes. Although it's funny because the Greeks

associated the myth not so much with the hyacinth, but with a gladiolus, which also have really distinctive leafy markings. But anyway, it's just a beautiful story of a fallen hero. And it's a much better name than the more prosaic word, another name for the hyacinth. This is what we used to call it, croto. Goodness. You can't really make any poem out of that, can you? A croto is a hyacinth. And you're telling us that hyacinth, the flower,

is named after this young Greek personage, the handsome Spartan prince who had a thing with Apollo. And it all went wrong. This could be why Oscar Wilde, who I'm thinking about this year, because this is the 125th anniversary of his imprisonment in 1895. Oscar Wilde, in the letter he wrote in Reading Jail, De Profundis, Out of the Depths, he wrote a letter to his erstwhile boyfriend, Lord Alfred Douglas, and he spoke about the relationship between Hyacinth and Apollo

and likened his relationship, Oscar Wilde's relationship with Lord Alfred Douglas, to the relationship between Hyacinth and Apollo. And now you're telling me that this is a doomed relationship that ends in tragedy and blood being spilt. Yeah. Two, six, speak. That makes sense, doesn't it? Yeah. Two, six, speak. Absolutely. Very good. And from the Greeks, we stay with the classics to remind ourselves of the lovely explanation behind that weird squiggle people use instead of writing and.

And people now use an ampersand instead of writing out the word and. Is that right? Isn't ampersand that funny eight-looking figure like an eight? Yeah, it's like if you think of M&S, between M and S. I think there are M&S's across the world now, so hopefully people will know what we're talking about. It's a store. You will see the ampersand. And why is it called an ampersand? So the ampersand is lovely, actually, because it goes back to the late 18th century when kids were learning their alphabet.

And they'd hold up these paddle, they were called paddle books. So they were these basically arrangements of letters on this big tablet that would have a handle. And they'd hold the handle, the tablet would be covered with this kind of transparent horn of an animal. It was called a horn book. And they would learn their alphabet, have to recite it off by heart again and again and at the end of their alphabet was the symbol we know today as the ampersand but they would read it because they would just you know they were probably really bored and they would read it by rote and it would go and by itself is and but they'd say this in Latin, which is per se,

and per se, and, and per se, and, and per se, and, and per se, and. And that eventually became heard as ampersand. Wow. Yeah. That's amazing. I know. It's interesting. But the symbol itself is based on the Roman shorthand symbol for the Latin et, and.

So there you go. Next time you're in M&S or B&Q or for our American contingent, you're making a call on AT&T, you won't forget the and per se and. Obviously, there's been a lot of medical news over the past year, but in July, Giles and I walked the halls of medical terminology to uncover the dark humour running through much of doctors' lingo. When you were with them, because you spent time professionally with them, when you were doing your thing on tribal language, how different groups have a way of speaking one to another, a kind of an inclusive way of talking so that they understand one another and it's a way almost of keeping outsiders out.

What did you learn from the doctors? How did they talk? Why was their speech different from that of other mortals? I don't know if it's particularly different apart from the strain of dark humour that runs through everything. And, you know, quite rightly so. And a lot of it is jokey. And, you know, you only have to go online and you will find pages and pages and pages of silly acronyms for things that doctors use many of which i think are apocryphal but ones that i came up with um were oap for over anxious parent definitely recognize that one p-a-d-e paid i have actually seen that on uh on a set of notes pissed and denies everything um and according to phil hammond who regularly comes on countdown there's also

teeth, T-E-E-T-H, which means tried everything else, try homeopathy. But the people, they call themselves by different terms. And you can see this, if you've ever read Adam Kay's Brilliant, This Is Gonna Hurt, you will hear some of these as well. So the bonehead is the orthopedist, otherwise known as an orthopod. You've got the fanny mechanic, who's the gynecologist. Good grief. The lancelot, apparently one who, sorry about this, one who drains abscesses, and are known in the US as a Pokemon. Then you've got millions of different versions of things like NFB, which is normal for Banbury,

that kind of thing, you know, depending on where you are. Shadowgazer is a radiologist. The Rear Admiral is a proctologist. Bones and Groans is the general ward. The Stream Team, the urology department. And Ward X, rather darkly, is the morgue. Don't!

Yeah, that's not where you want to go, ever. That is a bit grim. Ah, good afternoon mr brandon i'm afraid your mother has been moved toward x oh dear and then you've got pfo piston fell over smurf sign a patient who felt who goes blue vip i've seen this one as well very intoxicated person that's quite a regular one i think oh and so it goes on there's a lovely one again i don't know if this is true but acute pneumoencephalopathy pneumoencephalopathy for an airhead i love their knowledge of medical terminology is second to none but they they clearly have to have this this kind of shorthand in order to relay what type of patients we really are as always we've received

thousands of emails and tweets from the Purple people over the year, and we love answering as many of your questions as we can. So please do keep them coming to purple at somethingelse.com. Or you can find us on Twitter at GilesB1, or I am at Susie underscore Dent. What is the origin of cockroach? What's the cock doing there? That's another Twitter query. Yes, there is no cock in cockroach. This is one of the ones where we couldn't get our mouths around a foreign tongue. Remember the Jerusalem artichoke? That has nothing to do with Jerusalem and goes back to the French girasol, a sunflower, because the artichoke is in the sunflower family, because we couldn't pronounce it girasol. We said, because the artichoke is in the sunflower family, because we couldn't

pronounce it girasol. We said, oh, it sounds a bit like Jerusalem. We'll call it that. And it's the same for the cockroach because it comes from the Spanish cucaracha. I can't, my Spanish is not very good. Cucaracha. So C-U-C-A-R-A-C-H-A. But because we couldn't pronounce that, and I've just given you ample illustration of that, we changed the spelling because it sounded a bit like cock and then roach. Even though roach is a freshwater fish and it doesn't look like a cock. Excuse me. Well, there we are. You've led a fairly sheltered life.

Yeah, I've not seen the right ones. Right. The water has boiled, so I'd better get the pasta into the pot. But will I go for spaghetti, linguine, fusilli or farfalle? Right. The water has boiled, so I'd better get the pasta into the pot. But will I go for spaghetti, linguine, fusilli, or farfalle? What do they all mean? And am I pronouncing them correctly? Join me in just a few moments to find out. Oh, golly, would you pass me the parmigiano?

What do I mean parmesan? Oh, dear. Squeezing every drop out of the last day? How about a 4 p.m. late checkout? Just need a nice place to settle in? Enjoy your room upgrade. Wherever you go, we'll go together. That's the powerful backing of American Express. Visit amex.ca slash yamx. Benefits vary by card. Terms apply. Are you ever minding your own business and start to wonder,

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Welcome back to Something Rhymes with Purple, where this week we've thrown open the archives to bring you some of the best bits of the show from the last 12 months. That break has given me just enough time to get my pasta cooked, because I like it al dente. Susie, have you any ideas on how I should serve it? Spaghetti. Have you ever had spaghetti puttanesca? No. Spaghetti puttanesca is absolutely gorgeous as well. So this is a sauce with garlic, black olives, and I'm not a huge anchovy fan, but you can put anchovies in there as well so this is a sauce with garlic black olives i'm not a huge anchovy fan but you can put anchovies in there as well and tomatoes and it goes back to the italian putana meaning

prostitute so it's linked to the french putain and the sauce is said to have been created by prostitutes because it could be cooked very quickly between clients visits spaghetti puttanesca and it's interesting that there's so much of that kind of thing behind english words like fornicate one theory is that it goes back to the latin fornix meaning oven and it said that prostitutes would gather at night by the ovens in ancient rome in order to keep warm and of course, that became linked to their trade and fornication. But that's one theory. I mean, it's not completely set in stone. But yes, it's the idea of an arch.

And the ovens were often arched and vaulted chambers. And then later that became associated with brothels. So there you go. Just thought I'd throw that one in. But I think that's completely gripping. This is why I love this programme. I learn things. and vaulted chambers and then later that became associated with brothels so there you go just thought i'd throw that one in but i think that's completely gripping this is why i love this program i learned things fornication it never occurred to me that would be to do with ovens no in brothels and the poor prostitutes keeping themselves warm before they had their what was it again that pasta was called putanesca putanescaesca. Puta being prostitute, as in puta. Yes, exactly. Very good.

Give me some other ones. What about, I'll tell you what I do like. I like linguine. Yes. Oh, that's a nice one. Linguine means little tongues. So it's linked to linguist, language, all sorts. Tagliatelle? Tagliatelle means little strips so tagliare in italian is to cut so it almost looks like you're cutting ribbons doesn't it and in fact that's what fettuccine means fettuccine means little ribbons as well which is quite cool farfalle which is a favorite here as well farfalle they look like little bow ties don't they but actually they are originally butterfly shaped it goes back to the italian for butterflies fafale ah what about fusilli fusilli those are the ones that look they're slightly corkscrew shaped and it goes back we think to the italian fuso meaning spindle so

little spindles is the idea there penne which I think is probably the most popular pasta, isn't it? Penne goes back to penne meaning feather. So little feathers, I think it is. And actually that then is related to the pen that we use to write things because, you know, of course, they had quills. And also if you're penne, you have feathers, etc. So, yeah, penne meant quill originally or feather penne is with two ends penne is with two ends so not like the pens that we write with gnocchi is a nice one do you like gnocchi i discovered those when i don't like gnocchi is that the one

that's got it isn't really pasta it's a made of a different sort of potato yeah they're made from potato often or semolina so they are more dumplings and those go back because if you think of their shape it goes back to the italian nocchio without the g meaning a knot in wood so you know you get those sort of walls w-h-o-r-l-s in wood gnocchis are sort of slightly shaped like that the knots that you would find in a grain of wood baked beans is a yes and gnocchi is a no. Useful to know for the next time Giles and I are able to record in the same location again and it's my turn to cook lunch. Regular listeners will know that whatever the

topic, Giles has a word game or a quiz question up his sleeve just to keep me on my toes and our sudging around the streets of London was no different, especially when we arrived in Giles's neck of the woods. I love Chelsea. One of the parts of London I was brought up in was Chelsea. Part of my love of Oscar Wilde comes from the fact that he lived in Chelsea, not far from us in Tite Street. I lived for a while in Oakley Street, opposite house where Lady Wilde, Oscar Wilde's mother, lived. So I walked the streets of Chelsea as a child

and I used to get my haircut at Harrods. There was a children's hairdresser's at Harrods next to, not the toy department, but to the zoo. Harrods had a zoo and pet shop in the 1950s.

Seriously? And you would go in there and you'd get your haircut and then you'd go round and you'd meet the turtles and the monkeys and the snakes. Isn't that extraordinary? Yeah. Anyway, the point is, Harrods is near

and the tube station for it is Knightsbridge. Yes. Why is Knightsbridge a unique English place name? Well, oh gosh, is this my quiz question? That's your quiz question. And please, purple people, see if you can answer it before Susie Dent does. Knightsbridge. What is unique about the name Knightsbridge?

Why is it the most remarkable name of any place in the English language? Knightsbridge. Just look at the word. K-N-I-G-H-T-S-B-R-I-D-G-E. Don't know. What's special about it? Let me reveal it. Okay. It's the one name that has in the middle of it six consecutive consonants.

Oh, of course. Isn't that extraordinary? G-H-T-S-B-R. Oh, I love that. I know that the name is possibly based on the fact that there was a bridge there that may have been used by the knights and the ladies, the wealthy people, the aristocracy of London. That's one theory for it. But oh, that's a really good one. And I should know that as a linguist. Thank you for that. Can I tell you about Charing Cross? Please. We've mentioned Charing Cross before, I think, because it's just such a lovely,

has such a lovely story. Because Charing goes back to an old English word meaning a turn such a lovely, has such a lovely story because charring goes back to an old English word meaning a turn or a bend, either referring to a bend in the River Thames at this point or the bend in the old Roman road that existed. But the cross refers to the Eleanor Cross erected here and in several other places actually by Edward I to commemorate his first wife, who's Eleanor of Castile, and her funeral procession went from cross to cross. So it's got a lovely story of love behind it, Charing Cross. Sorry, can you hear my radiators creak? Yeah, it's your radiators, is it? I thought it was your brain slowly coming to life.

Yeah, or slowly going back to sleep again. Am I right in thinking that people think that the centre of London is Charing Cross? When you see a sign when you're approaching London, on whatever motorway it is, and it says seven miles to central London, it is seven miles to Charing Cross. Absolutely right. All distances calculated from there, which is nice. Susie's radiator's rudely creaking away in the background there but that's been some

of the joy of recording remotely at home during the lockdowns we've all been part of wherever you are in the world. We've been heckled by posters knocking at the door, online grocery deliveries, cats on the keyboard and even my wife doing what sounded like an Irish jig in clogs in the room above me. But it did get me wondering, where does the word heckle come from? Did we ever talk about the origin of heckling? No, I've been the victim of it in my time. I want to hear the origin. It was really strange. It takes us back to the kind of legalisation of trade unions, I guess, in the early 19th century, when, you know, growing numbers were joining the fight for better pay, better working conditions, etc. And sort of unlikely byproduct of trade unionism is, in fact, heckling, because it's said to have originated with a particularly

vociferous, vocal, shall we say, union in Scotland. And what happened there was a heckling shop now a heckling shop was a place in the textile industry where knots and dirt would be removed from flax or hemp fibres so this is before the process became mechanised and a heckle or a hackle as it was also called was a steel comb used for smoothing out this knotted material. And one such heckling shop in the Scottish town of Dundee was incredibly ill-ventilated, really unpleasant, you know, back-breaking work. And in fact, Robert Burns was among those who carried out this hour upon hour of heckling in the establishment. And apparently, by 1880, these people had had enough in the heckling shop, and they established a union to fight for better conditions. Using their strength in numbers, it said they did a fair amount of shouting and they got a reputation for activism. And it's through that link with the heckling shop where they were combing out textiles and fabric and their kind of, you know, shouting for better working conditions that heckling transferred over into this idea of shouting and clamouring for their voices to be heard. Whenever I wonder, will Charles have an

anecdote for this topic? The first phrase that often pops into my head is, well, is the Pope a Catholic? And in this clip, those two worlds collide, but you might not want to look up. Litter is another one. Can you guess what word might be behind litter? Litter. Well, I do know, having a love of carry-on films, one of my favourites is the one set in the French Revolution, where Kenneth Williams, I think, plays Le Grand Fromage, the big cheese. And I think he's brought on in a litter. It's a kind of like a sedan chair. Why is it called a sedan chair?

You can tell me that because it comes from sedan, I suppose. You sit in a box. No, it comes from sedere, to sit. So it simply goes back to that Latin root. Fine. So it's a chair, a sedan chair. You're sitting, well, it's actually tautological, isn't it? It's two words.

Lying on it, really. Yeah. So you're sitting in a chair and you're carried in and that was sometimes called a litter the pope when he's crowned and comes into st peter's square he is carried on a litter isn't he yes guys with big big biceps have carrying him and his chair is on top of a platform, which is carried along. That is a litter. Yeah, think of your French here, because it goes back to the French lit, meaning a bed. And it's actually a fairly sad story in that it looks back to people who couldn't afford

proper beds, so would make them out of straw, paper, whatever they had handy. And that would be then discarded the following day because it would make them out of straw, paper, whatever they had handy. And that would be then discarded the following day because it would be considered soiled, which is where we get the idea of litter being rubbish. But ultimately, it goes back to that idea of a bed. And when we talk about the litter of puppies, it is the idea, again, of sort of lying down and just sort of curling up, I suppose, and then giving birth from that point of view. But it's all to do with lying down on beds. So you're lying down on a bed, and when you were brought in on a litter, it meant you were like a

kind of Roman emperor. You'd be lying back on your bed, and the bed would be carried into the room. Yes. And the litter on which the Pope sat was carried in once he'd become pope, the reason that I'm conscious of it is I do remember there was controversy hundreds of years ago when they thought they'd elected somebody who turned out to be a woman, Pope Joan. Do you know about this? There was briefly a pope called Pope Joan, and she was female, but she was actually elected pope. So she must have been a cardinal, and they made her pope. They didn't want this to happen again. And so what they did, whenever a new pope was elected, and we're going back to pre-medieval times, they would put the pope on the litter

in his papal robes, and they would carry him in so he was, as it were, above, he was being held up, and there would be a hole cut in the bottom of the litter. And the cardinals would walk underneath the papal litter and gaze upward at the Pope's nether regions to make sure that it wasn't a woman, that it was a man. And as they would go under, they would say, they would stop, they would gaze up, and they would say, in Latin, of course, testiculus habit et bene pendentes. Oh, my goodness. He's got them and they're hanging nicely. And then they would walk on.

And that's how they would know that the Pope was a bloke. And it was all thanks to the papal litter with a hole cut through the middle of it. What an extraordinary story. Anyway, cut through the middle of it. What an extraordinary story. Anyway, that's the joy of language. It takes you to places that one would not think of. Now jazz is in full flow, it would be remiss of me to exclude from our best of episode one of the finest name drops in purple history,

featuring Old Blue Eyes himself. Did I ever tell you about being in the wings at the Royal Albert Hall with Frank Sinatra? Does this ring a bell? I would remember. No. Well, I was sent to interview Frank Sinatra on his last tour when he came to the Royal Albert Hall to sing.

And he was quite an old man by then. And they explained to me, you're going to be talking to Mr. Sinatra after the show, but you can stand in the wings to see him go on. But you mustn't come within 10 meters of Mr. Sinatra. He concentrates before going on stage. So you can stand there, but don't go within 10 meters of him. Is that understood? So I stood in the wings and Sinatra arrived in the wings about to go on the stage. The orchestra was already playing the come on music. And there

was Frank Sinatra looking exactly like Frank Sinatra. It was incredible. He was shorter, I suppose, than I imagined, a bit stockier, but it was Frank Sinatra. There was something electric about him. There was charisma. And I thought, this is amazing. And then I realized that he didn't have any trousers on. He was standing there in his shirt, wearing a bow tie, but in his shirt with boxer shorts. And I think what the Americans call suspenders, what we would call, no,

no, they'd kept keeping his socks up. Oh, okay. Things to keep his socks up. So he was wearing shoes and socks. It's not a particularly sexy image. Well,

the music was playing and he was moving towards the edge of the stage. I thought this man's going to go onto the stage at the Royal Albert Hall. Thousands of people there. And I'm the only person here in the wings. This poor man is going to go on the stage in his underpants. And I thought, well, maybe he's older than, you know, he's older than I. Oh, good. Has he gone a bit? Has he lost it? Is this going to be the most humiliating moment in Frank Sinatra's life? And I thought, I cannot let this happen.

And literally, as he was about to walk onto the stage, I'm afraid I decided I had to stop him. So I began to walk towards Frank Sinatra, ready, if necessarily, to do a rugby dive to prevent him going onto that stage. And as I was about to throw myself upon him, two minders lifted me out of the way. And Frank Sinatra's dresser stepped towards him with trousers. He stepped into the trousers. He then put on the jacket and he turned towards me. And he said to me, those guys out there have paid a lot of money to see me. I wear a new suit for every show I ever perform. They deserve the best. They paid for it. They're going to get it. And then he walked on. It was amazing. I'm more impressed that anyone can actually put on a pair of trousers whilst wearing shoes.

You're right, Susie. And with all that dexterity, it's just a surprise he didn't record more soul music. Get it? Soul. S-O-L-E as opposed to S-O-U-L. Forget it. That's nearly it from this rummage through the Purple Archives. But before we go, here are three wonderful words to take with you this week. You heard them before, back in September. Can you remember any of them? Okay, so if you were a thermopot, I don't know if you remember, I mentioned a theist, which obviously means devoted to a god, but which has a secondary meaning of addicted to tea drinking, as used by Shelley of himself. If you were a thermopot, you were a drinker of hot drinks. So that one will encompass coffee drinkers as well, which I quite like. Yeah, who don't want their coffee luke.

Exactly. Absolutely right. You're a thermo pot then. So, polycitation. This is P-O-L-L-I-C-I-T-A-T-I-O-N. A polycitation is an offer made but not yet accepted. So if you've invited your friends round and they might be waiting for a better offer, they have taken your polycitation but haven't yet responded oh polycitation very good yes i like that one

and um okay so then the other one remember last uh in the last program we talked about a lance corporal and how it came to it went back to someone who had worked so hard and who had seen such battle that their lance was broken and showed the life that they had led. Well, it actually comes, it does come from that, but the original word was a lanspresado. So it's L-A-N-S-P-R-E-S-A-D-O, a lanspresado, which occurs in a 1736 dictionary of thieves slang where it's defined as he that comes into company with but two pence in his pocket in other words it's the person who turns up in the pub and accidentally has forgotten their wallet oh i love that a lance prosado how do we spell it again l-a-n-s-p-r-e-s-a-d-o i know quite a few of those lance prosado yes

and there are certainly a couple of lance prosados lurking in this list of credits I'm about to read out. Because that's all we've got time for on this trip through the archives. Join us next week for more wordy wonders and confusing cliches. But until then, Something Rhymes with Purple is a Something Else production. Produced by Lawrence Bassett with assistance from Steve Ackerman, Harriet Wells, Ella McLeod and a man who made a lot of fans very happy by popping up on screens at our recent live stream event. Of course it's Gully.