Something Rhymes with Purple - Chandelier

Episode Date: January 10, 2023

Susie and Gyles are guiding us out of etymological darkness as they the light way to better understanding the world of light!  We’ll have many light bulb moments as we discover how extortion and contortion are twisted into the intriguing language of torches, what’s hiding in the sconce and why candles are candid.  Gyles shares his schoolboy days as a lighting technician of sorts whilst Susie continues to pull the plug on linguistic myths when answering this week’s Purple Peoples’ post. Susie and Gyles are guiding us out of etymological darkness as they the light way to better understanding the world of light!  We’ll have many light bulb moments as we discover how extortion and contortion are twisted into the intriguing language of torches, what’s hiding in the sconce and why candles are candid.  Gyles shares his schoolboy days as a lighting technician of sorts whilst Susie continues to pull the plug on linguistic myths when answering this week’s Purple Peoples’ post.  We love hearing from you, find us @SomethingRhymes on Twitter and Facebook, @SomethingRhymesWith on Instagram or you can email us here: [e-mail] We currently have 20% off at the SRwP official merchandise store, just head to: https://kontraband.shop/collections/something-rhymes-with-purple Want even more purple, people? Join the Purple Plus Club by clicking the banner in Apple podcasts or head to purpleplusclub.com to listen on other platforms' Don’t forget that you can join us in person at our upcoming tour, tap the link to find tickets: www.somethingrhymeswithpurple.com  Enjoy Susie’s Trio for the week: Peccable: Prone to sin. This is a rare example of a lost negative. Leucocholy: A white Melancholy, a good easy sort of a state. Uitwaaien (Dutch oot-vay-en): To clear the mind in windy weather. Gyles reads The Midnight Skaters by Roger McGough  It is midnight in the ice rink And all is cool and still. Darkness seems to hold its breath Nothing moves, until Out of the kitchen, one by one, The cutlery comes creeping, Quiet as mice to the brink of the ice While all the world is sleeping. Then suddenly, a serving-spoon Switches on the light, And the silver swoops upon the ice Screaming with delight. The knives are high-speed skaters Round and round they race, Blades hissing, sissing, Whizzing at a dizzy pace. Forks twirl like dancers Pirouetting on the spot. Teaspoons (who take no chances) Hold hands and giggle a lot. All night long the fun goes on Until the sun, their friend, Gives the warning signal That all good things must end. So they slink back to the darkness of the kitchen cutlery-drawer And steel themselves to wait Until it's time to skate once more. At eight the canteen ladies Breeze in as good as gold To lay the tables and wonder Why the cutlery is so cold. A Somethin’ Else & Sony Music Entertainment production.   Find more great podcasts from Sony Music Entertainment at sonymusic.com/podcasts     To bring your brand to life in this podcast, email [e-mail]  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

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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. Hello and welcome to Something Rhymes with Purple. And as the purple people know very well by now, this is a podcast about words and language. It's about your questions that have always vexed you over the years that you can then put to me and to Giles Brandreth, who is sitting opposite me on screen at least.

Hello, Giles. How are you doing? I'm doing very well indeed. I'm conflicted because now we're well into January. Most people I know have taken down their Christmas lights, but I'm keeping mine up. I'm keeping mine up until the 2nd of February. Yes, I've been quoting you about this because I had the dilemma. It's always after New York, New York, New Year falls, I then sort of think, is it time? Is it time? I know that's not the official time, but every single year you tell me that you and Michelle keep your tree up for weeks. And I kind of wonder how you stand it, but then equally, I'm quite envious that you

let yourself do that. So explain, what's the rationale? Well, the rationale is this. Most people think of the 12 days of Christmas coming to an end on 12th night, which is officially epiphany. It's a Christian feast day. It marks the arrival of the wise men, the magi, at the manger in the Bible story. And that's when Christmas comes to an end. And that's when traditionally people take down their Christmas decorations in the British Isles. There are parts of the world where Christmas isn't celebrated until the 6th of January epiphany. But normally people think that's when decorations come down by midnight on the 6th of January. But there is a school of thinking that the Christmas season, the festival goes on until Candlemas, which is the 2nd of February.

And because I love the idea of Christmas lights and I like to see the Christmas tree getting balder and balder as the weeks go by. We just keep ours up until the 2nd of February. But you can do whatever you fancy. Do you replant your Christmas tree? We have done in the past. This year, we are not. But I'm hoping, because our street is littered with Christmas trees, I'm hoping that they're recycled in some way. Do you think they are? Yes, I do. I do. I think the councils have been amazing, actually, because they have collection points, don't they? So yes, I do think they are recycled. Do you know, we had, of course, we had a New Year disaster. I woke up and there was this beep, beep, beep going on in the background. And I went down to the basement and I discovered that in the boiler room where the boiler lives, there was carbon monoxide escaping and the carbon

monoxide machine was beeping. I couldn't turn it off, so I had to remove the battery. But there was not really smoke, but there was kind of fog in the air and an unpleasant smell. And it turned out that something had gone wrong with the boiler. So we managed to turn it all off. Thank goodness for the alarm. Yeah, thank goodness for the alarm. It shows turn it all off but of course for the alarm yeah thank goodness for the alarm it shows it's worthwhile yeah of course we couldn't raise any any plumber immediately so we are still uh but it's quite exhilarating we've turned off the boiler so we don't have hot water um but we do we well i don't quite know how it works we do have a tap that

emits boiling water so you're bathing in the sink. Otherwise, you're experiencing that cuglaf, remember? The shock of cold water. Cuglaf, remember? The Scots word for the shock of cold water as it hits you. Well, I want us to talk today about light. Light and flame. And it's still dark. Whether we have our christmas lights up or down whether the boiler's working or not how grateful we are for for illumination aren't we so have we discussed this before we ever talked about well we did do an episode on energy which covered light briefly it was called electric and that had lots of things about light sources etc but this time we're talking more about fixtures, the kind of basics, aren't we? Good.

It sounds very boring, but actually there's some lovely etymology here. Good. Well, I mean, we couldn't start with the very word flame, could we? The reason I think of that is I had to get down on my hunkers to see if the light was still burning in the boiler. The pilot light, yeah. The pilot light was burning in the boiler. And that's a little flame that flickers where does the word flame come from yeah so we've got pilot and flame here so the flame is simply from the romans flamma which is why we have flammable and inflammable and that you know perennial question why do they both mean the same thing which we talked about before and it's because the in there is an

intensifier not a negator and the pilot is simply it's just like a TV pilot, really. It's the idea of something leading the way. In other words, it's the beginning of something. And the pilot light, of course, is essential to the workings of your heating and hot water, etc., as you have discovered. Do you remember, in our childhood, it happened much, much more that we would have power cuts. I used to find them so romantic. I used to actively look forward to power cuts because out would come the torches and the candles. And do you remember? It was something quite, oh, just quite wonderful and enchanting for me, obviously not for my parents. But yeah, a torch, I think we did possibly cover in Electric. It comes from the Latin torquere, to twist, because if you think about it, the original torches, if you imagine a sort

of ancient Greek or ancient Rome drama, you will see some sort of twisted hemp or fibre that had been soaked in a flammable or inflammable substance and then lit to give light. So it comes from the idea of twisting. And from that, we also get extorting, extortion, twisting something out of someone else. We get a retort, which is the idea of twisting back. You get torture, which is twisting or torment. You get contort, torment. Oh, you get so many things from that one verb, torquere. Well, torquere, talk of torquere, with our torch, you do have to, it's a battery torch.

You do have to twist the top of it to turn it on. I think you're just putting the bulb so that it actually touches the battery. You twist it to turn it on. It's a nightmare when the fuse goes. But I remember as a child when the fuse went, you had to actually redo the fuse yourself. There was a kind of wire, a filament that you put through. I can picture my father doing it.

That was when I pronounced myself an independent woman, was when I could first do that and connect the brown wire to the, you know, to earth it and all of those. That's when I just thought, okay, I'm all right now. I can stand on my own two feet. Brilliant. All I do now is there's a switch, I seem to think. When it goes, you come down with a torch, you wave it around at the box and you find the switch that's gone down. You push it up again and you hope the lights go on. Yes. Okay.

Take us through some more of these words to do with light and darkness and turning things on. Well, the history of street lighting is something I have been looking into because I'm not sure I really knew the whole history of it. So, obviously, you know, lamps, torches, etc. have been used since ancient civilizations, really. So they've been used for security and to protect people from tripping up or keeping robbers at bay. So we had oil lamps. And in the ancient times, particularly in Roman times, you would have a slave who was exclusively responsible for lighting the oil lamps in front of the villas. And then in medieval times, you would have so-called link boys. And these escorted people from one place to another. So literally, they would be hired, if you like, much like a cabbie, to accompany someone going out with a torch so

that they would light their way. And then public street lighting, I think really began in Paris because the Parisian parliament said that a torch had to be lit at every intersection of the road. And then again, you would hire a lantern bearer. I think it was Louis XIV who then sort of actually authorised proper legislation that said that lighting must be installed and then it must be maintained etc and so that was really the beginning and then in France again there was an oil lantern corduroy verbert which produced a much brighter light and they were attached to the top of lampposts and then the first lights with gas, I think, was demonstrated in Palmao in 1807. And then today, of course, we have high intensity, what's called discharge lamps,

apparently, although we are experimenting with LED and induction lights. I think Milan was the first to have those. So it's been quite a journey. I always feel more comfortable when there are street lamps. I mean, I just, I feel more secure. And I also, I tell you what I also love is I love elegant street furniture. And today's, the modern street lamp for me is not as beautiful. Living in London as I do, I'm often walking across the great bridges that traverse the Thames. And on many of the older ones, they still have Victorian and maybe even pre-Victorian street lamps. Really ornate, aren't they? Yeah, they're beautiful. I've heard of, I know that there's a Davy lamp. Is that something to do with mining? And obviously,

there was a person called Davy. Was it something to do with the sea? Which is it? Oh, yeah. No, nothing to do with the sea. I loved this period of history. I remember the history of mining and the safety of mining, et cetera. So the Davy lamp was invented in 1815 by Sir Humphrey Davy. And essentially it's a wick lamp, but the flame is enclosed inside a mesh screen. And it was created to reduce the very real danger of explosions from methane and other flammable gases called fire damp. So it was the kind of the mesh screen, essentially, that would protect the flame and then that would flicker or go out according to the presence of these gases.

Susie, can I ask you something? Did you just tell me the origin of lantern? Have you just told me that? I know. I don't think I did tell you the origin of lantern. Oh, good. Because I thought, oh, this is terrible. I want to know what the origin of lantern? Have you just told me that? I know. I don't think I did tell you the origin of lantern. Because I thought, oh, this is terrible. I want to know what the origin of lantern is. And I thought, maybe she told me five minutes ago. I have a feeling my mind is going, you know.

But fortunately, in this instance, it isn't. Tell me, what is the origin of the word lantern? So I don't think I actually told you about lamp either, which goes back to the Greek lampada and the Latin as well. So again, from ancient times. And that also- Forgive me to the Greek lampada and the Latin as well. So again, from ancient times. And that also... Forgive me, what does lampada mean? Lampada goes back, as does lantern, to a Greek verb meaning to shine. So that's all about shining. Do you remember at school, Bunsen burners? How were you at chemistry? I was appalling at chemistry, but I do remember

the Bunsen burner. And that, like Davy, it's an eponym, isn't it? Named after somebody Bunsen. It is. And once again, we've covered this in our, we had a chemistry episode where you and I struggled a little bit, but it was quite entertaining. Purpurium, it was called. And yeah, Bunsen burner is an eponym named for Robert Bunsen or Robert Bunsen. He was a German chemist who introduced it in 1855. Although he probably did modify an earlier design by Michael Faraday. So yes, I loved that.

Mentioning school days takes me back to my first torch that I remember having as a child. I was sent to boarding school when I was quite young and I had my torch with me. And my torch was one that had three different colours. It was yellow, that was the main colour, you know, like a normal light. And then you could twist it and a green bulb came on, or maybe it was a green filter that made the light look green. And there was a red as well. What I loved, after lights out, which happened quite early, I would hide under the bedclothes with my torch and read a book.

And if it was something like Sherlock Holmes, I would read it using the yellow light, unless I got to a grisly bit when I turned on the red light. Or if I got to a spooky bit, I turned on the green light. So I created my own lighting effects while reading the book under the bedclothes. What I didn't know was that I could be seen reading because the light shone through the red. And so apparently Matron would come in and would see that one was reading under the bedclothes. But if it was only 8.30, you were allowed to. And then she came back at nine o'clock. And if you were still reading, then she would say, come on now, lights out.

And you had to turn out the torch as well. And then sneak it back on at midnight? No, funnily enough, I was always a bit of a goody-goody. So when Matron said, lights out after that extra half hour, I obediently turned off my light, pretending I didn't acknowledge her presence. I mean, she just stood at the door and said, lights out now. And I turned off the torch and tucked it under the pillow. Well, back to candles, because candles have inspired lots of different idioms, really, given their importance in life. I suppose that's not surprising.

So just a reminder that the Latin candela, which gave us candle, looks back to candere, to be white or shine or glisten. And we talked about candidate a lot. which gave us a candle, looks back to canderae, to be white or shine or glisten. And we talked about candidate a lot. Political candidate used to be a white toga wearer in Roman times. But we also get the chandelier. As I was growing up, I think it was some parents' ultimate ambition to have a chandelier somehow. So is a chandelier the same thing as a candelabra? It's just a different version of the same word?

It absolutely is. Yeah. So both of them from latin and actually ceremonial sort of lighting it's also important we should we should probably mention that so you remember the ornamental brackets that are called sconces they're sort of candle holders attached to a wall if you like that goes back to a latin word abscondere to hide which of course gave us abscond as well, because it was essentially a lantern with a device for concealing the light originally. So almost this sort of early version of turning it on and off. You have the menorah, the candelabrum used in Jewish worship.

Worth pointing out, by the way, that candelabrum, if you want to be a stickler for your grammar, that is the singular. So it's a candelabrum and a candelabra, strictly speaking, is the plural. Is that really a candelabrum? Is it like a candlestick? It's just got one candle? Yes. And candelabra, as I say, more than one. We also have, just talking about devices, we have the pricket.

And the pricket candle is a sharply pointed candlestick so on its sharp metal point a candle is stuck to hold it in its place again that reminds me of sort of ancient times really where you would see prickets and those sconces everywhere it's very romantic isn't it having sort of you know flaming light in fact many people on their christmas trees actually light candles don't they in? In a ceremonial way. Well, when I was a child, I don't know, it was our home. Home must have been the most terrible fire hazard because on the Christmas tree, we had little pegs, like clothes pegs, attached to which were candles. And we lit my father with his cigarette lighter, because I'm afraid he was a smoker, which is why he's no longer here. He would light the candles with his cigarette lighter all over the tree.

No, I went to a friend's this very Christmas and saw exactly the same thing. And I don't think I'd ever seen it, but it was glorious. If you can suspend your slight anxiety, it is a glorious sight, really, when you switch all the lights off and have these candles. But in terms of idioms, you can't hold a candle to someone else., you can't hold a candle to someone else. So if you can't hold the candle to someone else, it means you're nowhere near as good as them. And that's simply a nod to an assistant standing next to their superior with a candle, much like those street lantern holders, to provide light to work by essentially. And so the idea of holding a candle to someone else became synonymous with helping them in a sort of menial way or in a subordinate way. And if you are not worth the candle, it means that you're not even good enough

to hold a candle for someone else, if that makes sense. I think it may be time for a break. Let's take a little break. As far as I'm concerned, you glow in the dark. What have I eaten? Yes, she's radioactive. I'm Nick Friedman. I'm Lee Alec Murray. And I'm Leah President. And this is Crunchyroll Presents The Anime Effect.

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Welcome back to Something Reminds of Purple, where Giles and I are talking about, well, lighting fixtures. But we laughed when we read out that title because we thought it sounded like going to the upper floors of John Lewis. But actually, etymologically, I think they are quite fascinating. And what we haven't mentioned, Giles, is the components that you might find on those upper floors, like plugs and fuses and bulbs, et cetera. We talked about the fuse and how, you know, we once had to know the inner workings of a plug. Nowadays, we just literally flick out the fuse

and put one back in. It actually goes back to a Latin word meaning spindle, not connected to the fuse in fusion, which actually is from the Latin fundere, to melt, because when something fuses together, it almost melts together, which means that fusion and fondue, strangely, are siblings. But the fuse in a light fixture is from that Latin word meaning spindle because of the shape and the function.

You've been plugging your book quite a lot. Do you remember plugging? I have. Well, indeed, and we must plug our live shows in a moment. Plug. The plug that goes into the wall that gives you the electricity from the appliance, from the electric socket, is that the same plug as when we're out plugging our wares? It is really. So plug itself in the object sense, that goes back to a German word, plugger, which can get more dramatic than that. Ultimately, we don't know where that comes from. But when we plug our books or our wares, the idea is that you are literally kind of putting energy into it and showing, you know, casting light upon it, actually, if we talk about light. So it's kind of giving it

some fizz, giving it some energy. So it is actually connected and of this metaphorical application there. A bulb is so named simply because of its shape goes back to the greek word bulbous which means an onion or some kind of bulbous root vegetable so again you know shape wise and filament i talked about how lighting is threading its way through our language or filament goes back to the latin philum, simply meaning a thread. Good. Speaking of plugging things, you very kindly gave a little plug to the puzzle that I've devised, which I'm calling Full Rainbow, that I put online. I began it on Boxing Day. And it's just, it's for people who like anagrams. There's no commercial element to it at all. I just thought this is a fun puzzle. Why don't we give it a go? There's no commercial element to it until the New York Times buys it, let's say.

Oh, yeah. Well, rest assured, I'll let you, when that happens, maybe even the Pontifract Observer. Please can I have a half a percentage? Indeed, absolutely. You heard it here first. Half a percentage is yours. No problem whatsoever. It's just, I love rearranging letters to form words. And sometimes you do it in a clever way. Like my favorite one is to take the six letters in the word Monday, M-O-N-D-A-Y, and rearrange them to form the word dynamo. But this is much simpler. I just take seven letters of the alphabet and present them in alphabetical order and invite whoever wants to play the game to arrange those letters

to form an everyday English word. And it's so unmistakably yours as well. I smiled when it was onwards because every email you ever send me, it finishes with onwards exclamation mark. You're right. I have thought of all the words myself, which is including tosspot. No, I haven't seen tosspot. Was that in there? Maybe it hasn't appeared yet. I mean, I've had to do 365 words. I've done a year's worth.

And my wife said, you can't include tosspot. I said, I can. I did that as we know, innocent beginnings. It's a good word. But she didn't allow me pisspot. But she said, because I think that's hyphenated. And it probably is. So there's no pisspot where there's a tosspot.

I don't think it is, actually. But I oh really i could have piss pot oh well i think um i'm not sure the new york times would be interested if you if you actually include words like that yeah no not hyphenated well it's just a vulgar sign it's been great fun doing it and all people have to do is go online www.fullrainbow those those two words, fullrainbow, together, all one word,.co.uk, and you find the puzzle. And there's a sort of training ground where you can have a go at it. And then you just play it, a different one every day. And have you done it a few times? I've done it every day. I haven't done today's one, actually. I have to say, I found it a little bit, there was one at the beginning. There were some that have been sort

of fairly obvious, like support, I think was quite an easy one. But there was one at the beginning that really foxed me and I had to get a clue. I can't remember which one it was. But then you get into the rhythm of it. Oh, well done. You haven't had any rain boos yet. If you don't get any, you get a rain boo. But you do get a little nugget of philosophy from me. With your answer, as well as choosing my 365 words, I chose 365 little sayings, quotations. Oh, I haven't seen those. I think I've missed those. Oh, if you share.

If you share. Oh, I don't share. Yeah. Well, you can share with me. Then you're sharing with a safe friend. You'll find you're sharing a little nugget of wisdom. Oh, that's nice. From everybody.

And then A to Z. It's literally from Aristotle to Benjamin Zephaniah. They're all in there. Okay, sounds like our bonus podcast episode. So that's a bit of fun. Fullrainbow.co.uk. That's enough plugs and that's probably enough light.

We've shed enough light on the matter. Yes, because we have some correspondence. And the first one that's come in is from Emma Burns. Dear Susie and Giles, greetings from Sydney, Australia. I've been relaxing during the merineum by reading a wonderful book called The Vanishing Half by Brit Bennett. At one point in

the book, the author describes a character as plumb scared, plumb spelt P-L-U-M-B. Why do we say plumb scared? Is it related to plumbing or the element lead? Would love to hear any insights or stories. Thank you so much for the podcast. The show is my favorite to listen to during walks with my dog, Jasper. All the best, Emma. Oh, I like the sound of Emma and I like the sound of Jasper too. That's the sort of name to have for a dog. Jasper, Jasper, sit, sit, Jasper. Plum, what's the answer to this one? Well, Emma's kind of halfway there, really, because she says, is it related to plumbers and to lead? And with those two thoughts, she has actually connected us to Roman plumbers and

medieval plumbers because they dealt in and worked with lead, which was called plumbum. And it wasn't until the 19th century that plumber was applied solely to people trained in fitting and repairing water pipes which of course were originally made of lead as well. So it is that idea of plum that gives us the original meaning of plum itself which is a ball of lead attached to a string that was used to determine a vertical line at sea or you know sounding lead used for measuring the depth of water particularly a vertical line at sea or, you know, sounding led use of measuring the depth of water, particularly a plumb line. And to plumb the depths of a body of water was to measure its depth in this way. So, plummet also goes back to that meaning to sort of drop straight

down to plunge, which I guess, you know, it's not something you would necessarily connect. which I guess, you know, it's not something you would necessarily connect. If you do something with a plum, you are doing it straight as a plum line. And this is where we get the idea of something which is plum scared, plum anything really, as Emma has asked, because it means directly, vertically, or exactly, as straight as a plum depth going into the water. So if you are plum scared, you are directly, definitely, and precisely scared, if that makes sense. And there's no connection with the fruit at all, P-L-U-M?

None at all. No, no, none at all. So it's plum as from plombere. Silent bee. And you'll remember that it was probably Renaissance scribes translating from Latin into English who saw the word plumber and thought, well, we have to show off its Latin heritage. So they inserted a B and we've never pronounced it, of course, but they wanted to show that it goes back to plumbum because they wanted to, you know, keep the integrity and purity and classical history of our language. So hence the silent B. But thanks, Emma. That was a lovely question. Thank you, Susie. You know so much. It's fantastic. If you want to be in touch, it's simply, you can email us. It's purple at somethingelse.com

and something is spelt without a G just for reasons of perversity. Who's next in touch? Oh, Ricky Wainwright. Hello, Giles and Susie. Listening to Giles, it occurred to me that waxing lyrical is a strange expression, and I wondered where it came from. Love the show. I enjoy name-dropping stories, and I'm amazed how many people Giles has met. Well, Ricky, now I've met you, in a roundabout sort of way. Here on Something Rhymes with Purple. Well, waxing lyrical. What's the origin of that? Well, this is not the same as waxing your legs, waxing your skis, etc. This means growing or becoming. And for anyone who knows their German, this will make sense because the German wachsen, W-A-C-H-S-E-N, means to grow. And it's used for the tide, the tide waxes and wanes. It grows and then it recedes.

So does the moon. That's an optical illusion. So when you wax lyrical, you are becoming or growing or becoming growingly lyrical. So increasingly effusively. So it's all about more rather than less. That is why we wax lyrical. We become or we grow lyrical. So we have the Germans to thank for

that. Gosh. Now look, Susie, a question you're often asking people, I imagine, because you do your own shows, I know. And do you find that people are asking the same sort of questions time and again? Yes, I do. And I thought it would be lovely to put some of these in. I'm not going to credit them because I am bound to leave out so many people who have asked me this question. But this is the sort of slot which I think we can introduce whereby I just try to answer one of the most popular questions, if you like, which many, many people have asked me over the years. Countdown viewers, Radio Times readers, and of course, the wonderful purple people. And this is about a white elephant. Why do we call an unwanted but troublesome gift a white elephant? And it's got a slightly curious and lovely history,

quite a famous one really, so I'm sure some of the purple people will know. So pale elephants were once highly revered and when born or found, particularly in Thailand or Siam as it used to be called, it became the immediate property of the king. So precious was it considered to be. And a picture of a white elephant was actually the emblem of the Siamese flag until 1917. And then the monarch wanted to have a symmetrical design that worked at any angle because he had seen the original flipped on its head. So he had an elephant on its head. So he decided that he wanted something a little bit more flexible or versatile. But back to the white elephants, they may have been highly prized, but they were also from one point of view, and certainly not from an animal lover's point of

view, but from a monetary point of view, they were worthless because they had this special status that meant they couldn't become working animals, thankfully. And they also required a high level of maintenance and expense. And so it may be legend, but the story goes that successive kings of Siam would make a gift of a white elephant to anybody that they didn't particularly like or who had displeased them. And they did it in the full knowledge that keeping the animal would actually probably eventually bankrupt the recipient because they couldn't do anything with it. But they had to pay for this, you know, this present from the king. They couldn't just neglect this poor animal.

So to this day, a white elephant is any useless endeavour that essentially is more trouble than it's worth. Very good. You are very good. You know so much. And I hope you have three special words that you know about that we possibly don't, that you can share with us to help us increase our vocabulary. Yes, I will definitely try. Well, you know how I talk endlessly about the lost positives of language and how we need to bring those back. Well, actually, there are a few examples of lost negatives so remind about the lost positives it's things like ruth gorm wieldy pecunious etc persona grata all the ones that you could once be

but which we abandon in favor of the negatives well you could also be peccable meaning you were prone to sin so this joins maculate now maculate means stained. Basically the macula of your eye is almost like a stain in the middle of it. So you could want to be maculate and you could be peccable, prone to sin. So forget impeccable and immaculate. These are rare examples of lost negatives. And I think we are all peccable, highly highly flawed and it's a word that we should remember now one of the words that I mentioned in my emotional dictionary I love and it's one of my resolutions really for this new year is to do this more often and it's from the Dutch and which is U-I-T-W-A-A-I-E-N. Utvein. Say that again, U-I-T.

Yeah, W-A-A-I-E-N. Now, I know people aren't necessarily going to embrace that word, but hopefully they'll embrace the concept because it means to clear the mind in windy weather. It means to go to the top of the hill and we would say have the cobwebs blown away. It's essentially to stand in the face of the wind and feel invigorated and refreshed.

And I love the idea of that. Oh, I love it. Blowing away all those. That's so good. Yeah, it's gorgeous. And finally, I'm going to end with Luke. And that's quite hard to say. Luke Col- Luke Col-

Luke Col- How am I going to say this? Luke Col- This is amusing. Leucocoli. This is Susie Den giving her word of the week. She can't even get it out. Leucocoli.

Sounds a bit rude now. So this is only ever appeared once. So L-E-U-C-O. L-E-U. C-O. Yeah. C-H-O-L-Y. And it appears to have been the creation of the 18th century poet Thomas Gray

and was used by him in a letter and essentially was always his. And he says, mine you are to know is a white melancholy or rather leucocally for the most part, though it seldom laughs or dances, nor ever amounts to what one calls joy or pleasure. It is a good, easy sort of state and a sanalesco de samuse. In other words, it's a kind of okay, contented kind of state. So this he calls a white melancholy, and that gives you the clue because the L-E-U-C-O means white, and you will find it in leukemia, for example, as well, which is all about white blood cells but i like the idea that there is a state that isn't quite melancholy it's just

just such a very quiet state of being and i think that's also quite a nice ambition for this year i think that's a very useful word because one doesn't always need to feel high and you hope you don't feel melancholic because that's a bit sad but actually you could yes that's the word isn't it that's it you're right not lucocoli lucocoli yes lucocoli is a sense of it's it's not melancholy it's it's calmer than that it's just a moderate feeling of of quietness and stillness a white mood oh i like that a white mood and um i should have next next time i will uh look up in the oed how to actually pronounce one of my trios um because i'm going to play it here oh he says leucoccoli in the oed and it's as i say got one one record only from 1742 but as you

say it's neither dancing nor reveling it's just simply a calm state of being and new cockley is an amusing way to say it how are you feeling oh touch of the you you like now i can't say oh my goodness let's move on do you have a poem for us i have a poem and this is being this particular podcast we download them on a tuesday and this is being downloaded this particular podcast, we download them on a Tuesday. And this is being downloaded on the 10th of January, 2023. But many people may be listening to it at some point in the future. If you're listening to it right now, on this particular day in January, got lots to look forward to because we're going to be going back to the Fortune Theatre.

Is it this? I think it's this Sunday, isn't it? And then we're going again next month as well. This is the Fortune Theatre in Covent Garden. So do come and join us there. It's a live show where we do this show, but live with real people. And purple people come from all over London, indeed all over the country, and sometimes from all over the world. So please come along and you can find out more about it simply by putting in Something Rhymes with Purple, live show, Fortune Theatre, and it'll pop up on your screen.

Yeah. But this means it's the 10th of January. We're three days away from the 13th of January, which is St. Hillary's Day. Now, do you know anything about St. Hillary's Day? I only know that it would probably have inspired Hillary term in Oxford. Am I right? You are right there. Okay.

Absolutely. It's the day of St. Hilary, the 13th of January. It's traditionally in this country known as the coldest day of the year. Oh. Not because it always is, but because remarkably icy conditions mark the history of the day. And the nickname of the coldest day of the year for St. Hilary's Day, can be traced back to the great frost of 1086. But it is the big freeze of 1205 that cemented the day's reputation. And I know all this because I've been dipping into one of my favorite books, which is called A Poem for Every Day of the Year, edited by Ali Asiri and published by Macmillan. And it's one of those books I keep by the bedside because it has literally got a poem for every day of the year. And for the 13th of

January, it's got one of my favourite poems by one of my favourite poets, who is also a neighbour of mine, and that's the great Roger McGough. So the weather was so icy at this time of the year in days gone by that people held frost fairs and the River Thames regularly froze over. Londoners were able to skate on its surface. So the idea of St. Hilary's Day being the coldest day of the year goes back to at least the big freeze of 1205. But this is a more contemporary poem. It's called The Midnight Skaters. It is midnight in the ice rink, and all is cool and still. Darkness seems to hold its breath, nothing moves until, out of the kitchen one by one, the cutlery comes creeping, quiet as mice to the brink of the ice, while all the world is sleeping. Then suddenly a serving spoon

switches on the light and the silver swoops upon the ice, screaming with delight. The knives are high-speed skaters. Round and round they race, blades hissing, sissing, whizzing at a dizzy pace. Forks twirl like dancers, pirouetting on the spot. Teaspoons, who take no chances, hold hands and giggle a lot. All night long the fun goes on until the sun, their friend, gives the warning signal that all good things must end. So they slink back to the darkness of the kitchen cutlery drawer and steel themselves to wait until it's time to skate once more.

At eight, the canteen ladies breeze in as good as gold to lay the tables and wonder why the cutlery is so cold. Oh, I love that. That's a brilliant poem for children, actually, as well. It's a great poem for children, for older people. It's so evocative and it's by the great Roger McGough. Anyway, if you want to read more of our poems and if you are struggling with any of the spelling of Susie's trio ever, you can find in the programme description, which is beautifully

put together by Harriet each week. There's a blurb which goes and tells you everything you need to know, the title, the author of the poem and all the rest of it. And also to point you in the right direction

of our live shows. So that's it for another one. We're coming up to our 200th, you know, it's amazing. That is incredible. We hope that you will join us. And we know we have so many loyal listeners

for whom we are incredibly grateful. So please do join us on the 31st of Parliament who said about Clement Freud, who said about giving up smoking and drinking. You don't live longer. It just feels longer. You feel we've done 2,000 episodes. We've got a long way to go before we've done 2,000. We will soon have done 200. That's quite enough to be going on.

I do apologise. I'm feeling a bit giddy. But please continue to follow us wherever you do get your podcasts. And we are on social media at Something Rhymes on Twitter and Facebook or at Something Rhymes With on Instagram. Something Rhymes with Purple is a Something Else and Sony Music Entertainment production. It was produced by Harriet Wells with additional production from Chris Skinner, Olly Wilson, Jen Mystery, Jay Beale, Teddy Riley. Well, he's not here, is he? No!

He is the master of Leucoccoli and the very peckable Gully.