Something Rhymes with Purple - Mausolos

Episode Date: September 21, 2021

Pick up your finest trowel and join us as we dig around the etymology of archaeology. Find out the link between helmet and hell, why we have an ancient king to thank for grand mausoleums, and why a th...esaurus is even more of a treasure trove than you might first think. Elsewhere Susie has some great examples of fossil words that you might like to bring back to life and Gyles gets passionate about Sutton Hoo.  Gyles and Susie also delve into the inbox to answer some more of your fantastic questions as well as receiving a slap on the wrist for making a walkie-talkie faux pas…  If you have a question or there’s a topic you’d like us to explore in a future episode then please email purple@somethinelse.com  A Somethin’ Else production.  Susie’s trio: Wheem - pleasant, gentle, or smooth Ponommerins - light, fleecy clouds that dapple the sky Shobbling - doing little odd-jobs around the house Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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Starting point is 00:01:04 Something else. Download Bumble and try it for yourself. Hello and welcome to another episode of Something Rhymes with Purple. It's a podcast all about words and language, and it's co-hosted by me, Giles Brandreth, and my friend and the person I describe as the world's leading lexicographer, because that's what she is, though she's very self-deprecating too, Susie Dent. Hi, Susie.
Starting point is 00:01:34 Hello. Well, it's just not true, but I love the fact that you are extremely biased in my favour, so thank you for that. Well, it is true, and I am biased in your favour. And today we're going to talk about archaeology. I have seen the film The Dig, and I have another reason for being interested in archaeology. Do you know anything about archaeology? Are you interested in it? Have you seen the film The Dig? I haven't seen it. It's Netflix, isn't it? And it is on my Netflix list for when I actually have
Starting point is 00:01:58 time. I'm fascinated by archaeology. I've always wanted to go on a dig and never quite managed it. about archaeology. I've always wanted to go on a dig and never quite managed it. But I just, I sense that from watching too many time teams, which I know is a bit of an obsession for a lot of people in Britain, is watching this fantastic TV series called Time Team, where archaeologists, what they do and what they discover. I just think it must be the sort of activity where you can totally lose yourself, where you leave all your troubles behind and just are totally focused on a fantastic goal. So that's how I imagine it. And I'm determined to do it at some point.
Starting point is 00:02:33 Have you been on a dig? I have, and only recently have I really got into this world. I've not been to any of the world's great digs like Machu Picchu, Petra. I've been to Petra, but not as an archaeologist. You know, the Colosseum in Rome, Stonehenge, Great Pyramid of Giza, all these great archaeological sites.
Starting point is 00:02:50 But I have a son-in-law who is an archaeologist. He's called Mark Evans. I give his name because he's recently been a bit in the news because he was a serving soldier in Afghanistan. And he wrote a book about his experiences in Afghanistan. And he wrote a book about his experiences in Afghanistan. And with the West's recent departure from Afghanistan, people have been rereading his book, which is called Code Black. And it's about a soldier's experience in Afghanistan. But he subsequently to leaving the army, has started a charity called Waterloo Uncovered. And this is, he was a Coldstream Guards soldier, officer, and this charity goes to the site of the Battle of
Starting point is 00:03:35 Waterloo and takes ex-soldiers, old soldiers, who have been wounded in some way, either mentally or physically, and they do archaeology there. They dig around in the site of the Battle of Waterloo, and they make interesting discoveries. Anyway, they do it because they're fascinated by the story of the Battle of Waterloo, and because they've discovered it's an amazing therapy for service people who have been injured, wounded in some way. They get together as a team again. The comradeship of being in the forces is reborn. And they also have the satisfaction of doing something as a team and revisiting old battles.
Starting point is 00:04:11 So what I've learned from my son-in-law is that our history is underneath our feet. It's fascinating. And of course, it's become popular of great interest because of this film, The Dig, which is about the Sutton Hoo treasure. Do you know anything about Sutton Hoo? I know it changed our understanding of Anglo-Saxon history. I know Anglo-Saxon has become a bit of a contentious term.
Starting point is 00:04:36 But this part of English history, you know, I think it was originally seen as being quite sort of backwards. And in fact, the Sutton Hoo discovery showed it as being really quite cultured and really quite sophisticated and there's this amazing helmet isn't it which has almost become the icon of anglo-saxon history this gorgeous gold helmet which i think they had to reconstruct piece by piece it was absolutely shattered so i know that about it i know about the ship but I've never actually seen the amazing jewellery that they discovered, etc. How about you? I've only seen the film. And the film, I understand, is a slightly sort of prettified, romanticised version of the truth of it. One of the reasons it may be prettified is that it's about a character, a woman called Edith
Starting point is 00:05:20 Pretty. And in 1939, Edith Pretty, landowner at Sutton Hoo in Suffolk, she asked an archaeologist called Basil Brown to investigate the largest of several Anglo-Saxon burial mounds on her property. And the mound that they looked at revealed the imprint of a 27 metre long, well, they wouldn't have thought of it in metres, but they'd have thought in 1939, it would have been 86 feet ship. And it dated back to the early 600s. And it contained this burial chamber of treasures, the gold, the jewellery, a feasting set, and most famously, the ornate iron helmet that you mentioned. And no one is sure of the identity of who it was, but it could have been a king. Anyway, the film with Ralph Fiennes and Carey Mulligan is very compelling. It's there on Netflix.
Starting point is 00:06:13 Do give it a look. I will. Let's dig into the dig, Susie, and look at the origins of some of the words that we might find if we were digging away. Where does the word dig come from? Well, we've had so many discussions about dig, haven't we? You know, whether or not digs actually went back to, what was it, Diggins' book? So, we've talked about that a lot. But actually, to dig, appropriately enough, is Old English. And it is, I think it's Germanic. It goes back to a
Starting point is 00:06:40 word meaning a ditch. And it's related to ditch itself and it's related to dyke as well so it's something sort of dug out but I like to think that dig is slightly onomatopoeic it sounds it to me if you give it enough grunt you're digging deep you're digging for treasure where does the word treasure come from well treasure is related believe it or not to thesaurus because a thesaurus was actually a treasure house. And both treasure and Thesaurus are based on the old Greek for a treasure trove, if you like, a sort of store or a storehouse. So I love that, you know, a Thesaurus is a collection of valuable, really pleasing things that you find kind of unexpectedly that are sort of hidden. So I think that's a beautiful
Starting point is 00:07:21 hidden metaphor. Treasure trove? Trove? Trove is simply from the French trouver to find. If beautiful hidden metaphor. Treasure trove. Trove? Trove is simply from the French trouver to find. If you come upon a treasure trove, you have found it. And trove is almost always now kind of used in reference or in conjunction with treasure, isn't it? It's one of those things. And in Anglo-Norman French, trésor trouver was found treasure. So that's where it comes from. It's interesting that they buried these kings with all this stuff around them, because the one thing I think we do know is that you come into this world with nothing
Starting point is 00:07:51 and you will leave with nothing. So putting all this paraphernalia near you, there's not much point to it, except it can be dug up hundreds of years later. The word helmet was one of the words, helmet. Is that an easy word? It's actually interesting because it's got lots of surprising siblings, one of which is hell. And it descends from a really old root, which means to cover or hide. So it will give you hole. It'll give you a helmet, which covers your head. And it will give you hell as well, something that is underground and therefore covered. Very good. You know, we haven't touched on the very word archaeology. What's the origin of that?
Starting point is 00:08:28 Yeah, well, that came via Latin from Greek archaeologia, which meant ancient history. So archaeos meant ancient. So a logi or an ology, if you remember, is a kind of branch of knowledge. So it's a knowledge of the ancient. Very good. So archaeology gives us a knowledge of the ancients. Yeah. And it does, if you find treasure trove that includes helmets and swords. Sword, what is the origin of sword? Sword is simply Germanic. Again, so from our Germanic invaders, Schwert is the German. So Schwert became sword for us. And to go with the sword, became sword for us. And to go with the sword, you have a shield to protect you and the shield. Yes, you have a shield, which I think is again, Old English. And actually, in Old English, you were talking about shielding or it's S-C-Y-L-D-I-N-G. And that S-C when it was used
Starting point is 00:09:19 in names in Old English was pronounced sh. And actually, it's all related. But in Old English, a shield was exactly what it is today it meant to kind of divide or separate in other words it was something that you put in front of you that would separate you from your enemy. So in these either it's a ship or a tomb oh tomb it's a tomb where you bury somebody it's a tomb why is it called a tomb? That is Greek because the Greek tumbos which meant exactly that it was somewhere used for burial. So it's been consistent in its meaning all the way through. There's also mausoleum, which is amazing.
Starting point is 00:09:54 It has such a lovely story. So Mausolos was the name of a king of Caria, whose tomb in Halicarnassus, I think the name was originally applied. And there's a lovely story of his broken-hearted wife wanting something sort of fitting to revere him with, really. And she, I think, did live to see it actually come to fruition, but it was all because of the King Morsalos and her love for him. King Morsalos? Well done him. Yeah, he was a Persian king.
Starting point is 00:10:25 So Caria was in Asia Minor. I don't think he was particularly remarkable. It was just that he was adored by his wife, who was called Artemisia, I think. And there are lots of stories attached to that. So it's said that she was so bereft when he died that she added a portion of his ashes to her daily drink and she gathered all the best sculptors in the land and then had them construct this tomb in the memory of her
Starting point is 00:10:50 husband. Goodness. I think actually there is a statue of Morsloss in the British Museum. We must go to the British Museum actually. Yes, we should do a podcast from there. I think we should. That would be a fun thing to do actually actually. Now, when you're digging around, as well as finding artefacts like swords and shields and helmets and drinking vessels of different kinds, you occasionally find bits of bone, bits of skeleton. These are usually fossilised. Explain this. People say, oh, you know, we've discovered this great fossil. What is, I never know what a fossil is. Is it the real thing that's been fossilised, turned into stone? Or is it a skeleton of it? Explain all that to me.
Starting point is 00:11:29 Yeah, so it's the remains or impression of a prehistoric, usually, plant or an animal. And it's embedded in rock. And so it's preserved in petrified form. And in fact, I think we have a question about petrification later on. So that is where fossil comes from and actually it goes back to the Latin fossilis which meant dug up it brings us right back to to dig because fodere in Latin meant to to dig and it's interesting because a fossil I think was originally used for fossilized fish that were found in the earth. And in those days, before Darwin, people believed that fish lived underground as well. So yes, it's all related to kind of digging and sort of being
Starting point is 00:12:12 underground. The word relic, is that interesting? Relic is, well, only interesting in that appropriately enough, it is incredibly old. It goes back to the Latin for reliqui, meaning remains. it is incredibly old. It goes back to the Latin for reliqui, meaning remains. And that itself, I think, goes back to relinquere, which of course gave us relinquish as well, meaning to sort of leave. So relinquere meant to leave. You're always talking about the Rosetta Stone. Why? Yes. Well, I talk about Rosetta Stone because I use this language learning app called Rosetta Stone, which has helped me learn Spanish. So during lockdown, when, you know, I can't say I was the most motivated student to begin with,
Starting point is 00:12:52 but actually, thanks to Rosetta, I really came to love it. And it was a really nice thing to do every day. But it's named after a discovery that actually helped scholars finally crack the code of hieroglyphics, you know, the ancient Egyptian writing system. It's interesting that people criticise emojis and saying, you know, these are taking over our language and they're replacing the written word and this is an example of English being dumbed down, etc. I mean, in some ways, these kind of pictorial representations of words are no different to, you know, these ancient Egyptians' hieroglyphics. But anyway, it was engineers from the French army who were part of Napoleon's Egypt campaign. And they discovered the stone slab in the late
Starting point is 00:13:33 18th century. So I think it was 1799. Well, they were making repairs to a fort near the town of Rashid, Rosetta. And then it came into the possession of the British after they defeated the French. This code was originally displayed in a temple, then it was later moved to Rosetta, and it was eventually uncovered by the French. And there's a decree on the stone that's written in hieroglyphics, which were used by priests, ancient Egyptian vernacular or demotic, demotic being a language used for everyday people, and ancient Greek. And because it died out, you know, it was a total mystery to scholars. And then the hieroglyphic inscriptions were analysed. I think it was ultimately a French linguist who deciphered
Starting point is 00:14:16 the Rosetta Stone and cracked the code, but incredibly important. And you can find it again in London, in the British Museum this time. It's been there for quite a long time, except during World War I, I think, the First First World War when it was moved to a kind of secret location to preserve it. You mentioned hieroglyphics glyph means word doesn't it something that's written? Yes writing exactly yeah it means writing and the hiero bit that's a really good question okay this I should know the hieroit of hieroglyphic so the hierobit actually means sacred um and the glyph here is a script or a carving because of course if you go back to the ancient runes these were inscribed upon they were kind of scratched upon
Starting point is 00:14:58 much as graffiti also means scratched it comes from the latin for scratched because ancient graffiti that you'll find in cave art was literally scratched with a knife or similar sharp object upon the walls. We've dug about a bit in the world of digging. I recommend the movie. And also, if you want to know more about the charity for ex-soldiers who are getting better through archaeology, just go to waterloouncovered.com and you can read all about it. Let's take a break and then maybe talk about some of the language
Starting point is 00:15:30 that's been fossilized. Oh, yeah. This episode is brought to you by LEGO Fortnite. LEGO Fortnite is the ultimate survival crafting game found within Fortnite. It's not just Fortnite Battle Royale
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Starting point is 00:16:26 That's the powerful backing of American Express. Visit amex.ca slash yamx. Benefits vary by card. Terms apply. Welcome back to Something Rhymes with Purpleware. We are talking about all things archaeological. And while we're on this subject, Giles, I thought it would be fun to look at fossils that are kind of in the linguistic sense of the word. So not actually artefacts necessarily that you would find in the ground, but artefacts that you will find in our language. And when we talk about fossil words,
Starting point is 00:16:56 these are words that we only ever use in a particular phrase or with a particular kind of linguistic companion and they're no longer kind of current in a general sense and they're quite fun. Give me an example. So for example you'll never see a wend these days without a way so you can wend your way to a shopping centre through a crowd but you don't say I'm wending to bed now but that's exactly how it used to be used English speakers would wend to all kinds of places and it was just another word for go and the past tense of wend was you've guessed it went oh how
Starting point is 00:17:30 wonderful which is what we use all the time rather than goad but people they like to use both and then go became the preferred verb but we kept went that stayed with us still so i went to bed yeah is i was actually winding my winding to bed you were wending wending your way to bed is, I was actually winding my, winding to bed. You were wending, wending your way to bed. We don't need to say your way. So, I was wending to bed. Yeah. Has now been modernised as went to bed. Yeah.
Starting point is 00:17:52 Oh, that's gripping. Have you got another one? You can give me another fossilised term. Yeah. So, if you talk about your just desserts, you will never, I mean, most people now will write that as, well, a lot of people will write that with a double S, as if, you know, getting a nice dessert from the sweet trolley is what you deserve. But actually, it's nothing to do with that kind of sweet post dinner kind. It comes from an old French word for deserve.
Starting point is 00:18:15 And actually, again, it's a past tense of deserve, that which is deserved. So when you get your just desserts with one S, you get your due. But you would never use desserts these days in that sense without just. So it's become fossilised. That's gripping. I've learnt two things there. One is that I've always been misspelling it and I'm so hot on spelling. Oh, have you?
Starting point is 00:18:37 Oh, interesting. I've been spelling desserts as in pudding. As in, you know, my favourite pudding, whatever it may be, the chocolate mousse or the eaten mess. Yeah. Just desserts, what you deserve. Yes. Wow. Yes.
Starting point is 00:18:50 All the best things in life go in threes. Can you just give me one third example of a fossilised phrase? OK, so kith, unless you've got a lisp, you'll never speak of kith as in kith and kin. But that kith comes from an old English word which meant knowledge or acquaintance and it also could mean the place that you were most acquainted with so kith and kin originally meant your country and your family but then later came to have that sort of sense of friends and family but no one uses kith anymore without kith and kin this is, if I may say so, every week I have to see you, Susie Dent, because you never cease to amaze me with the things I learn. That went is the past tense of wend seems to me
Starting point is 00:19:35 to be completely gripping. That kith is a place, as in kith and kin. I never knew who the kith were. I just thought it was, as you rightly say, members of the family who couldn't speak properly. But in fact, you're fantastic. That's why people keep in touch. That's why the Purple People are listening. And thank you very much for listening. And thank you for contacting us. You can do so.
Starting point is 00:19:57 It's purple at somethingelse.com, something without a G. Who's been in touch this week, Susie? Well, we have a correction, actually, that we need to announce. And this is part of the reason why we love the purple people, because we often say, well, if we're not completely sure, maybe the purple people will know better. And often they do. And a number of you have been in touch since our recent episode about flying, which was called Icarus, about something we need to correct, the phrase over and out. Now, we, Giles, referred to it as a method to end radio communication,
Starting point is 00:20:28 you know, over and out. This is Giles, over and out, over and out. Yes. Roger, roger, over and out. Roger for received, and then over and out. But in fact, these two words apparently must never be used at the same time over a radio because they are contradictory. So when over is used at the end of a radio message,
Starting point is 00:20:44 you are saying that the sender then wants to hear back from the receiver. So over. is used at the end of a radio message, you are saying that the sender then wants to hear back from the receiver. So over. Oh, as in over to you? Yes. Over to you. Very good. Over. But when out is used, it means the conversation has ended and you don't want to reply. So over and out seems to be something that is slipped into the kind of vernacular. I'm not sure it would ever be used legitimately by the military, but we just think it's, you know, maybe through popular culture and films, et cetera, that this is the way to say it.
Starting point is 00:21:11 I'm going to blame Tony Hancock. When I was a boy, I seem to remember an episode of Hancock's Half Hour. This is, if you are a purple person, not from the United Kingdom, there was a radio and television performer, comic in the 1950s and 1960s called Tony Hancock. And there's an episode where he is on a shortwave radio
Starting point is 00:21:29 communicating with the world. And I feel sure I can see him at the microphone going over and out, Roger, over and out. I may have imagined this, but that's probably where it's taken root. So never say over and out. In fact, if you overhear the pilot of your aeroplane when you're getting on board saying over and out, yank him or her out of her seat and get her off the plane because
Starting point is 00:21:50 anything could happen. You either say over if you want to reply or you say out when you don't want to. You never say them together unless you're an absolute amateur. Exactly like us. And we have to thank Mick and Mark and Jackie and Will and Rob amongst all the other brilliant purple people who took the time to write in. And Mick, you know, he said how excited he is to see you in Yeovil next February the 18th, Susie. So watch out. You'll have someone sitting in the middle of the front row who knows more about these things than you do. Exactly. I have to give him a shout out because we've both got tours, haven't we? In fact, yours is sooner than mine, I think. I'm going on 35 different dates. Wow. Have you got a winnebago i'm going to no i'm good well some i'm going by car and coming home the same evening if it's within reach of home others i will be going
Starting point is 00:22:37 and staying the night usually at whatever the hotel is where my friend lenny henry turns down the beds. Yes. Or at least he does the commercials. I've never seen him there, but it's quite convenient. So I'm going all over the country. If people want to look up where they can see you, where do they go? Oh, if anyone's on Twitter, I have it now on Twitter. But also they can go to my fantastic tour company, which is no3rd.co.uk,
Starting point is 00:23:08 and they will have details of the tour on there how about you giles brandreth that's g y l e s brandreth b r a n d r e t h dot com and but even better we'll be doing solo shows which are yes but we're also going to be doing i think some something rhymes with Purple live podcasts. So keep listening. Watch this space and we will tell you. Meanwhile, over but not out. Exactly. Over but not out.
Starting point is 00:23:36 So we've had some fantastic questions come in, as we always do. Emily Egan from Dublin wants to know about the origin of OK. One of the most used words, and that's so true. I mean, I don't think any of my emails are ever sent without the word okay in them. But she has no idea if it stands for something or is it a shortened word. And it's a really enduring conversational tool. So just saying okay, and then you know that I use okay in an email might set some logger files pulse racing in all the wrong ways, because it's still seen by many as this kind of very informal slapdash thing. But actually, it first appeared in 1839. And even then,
Starting point is 00:24:14 they had these kind of humorous abbreviations that you used to find in kind of tech speak. And OK stood for all, O-R-L, correct, K-O-R-Rr-e-k-t and that was a joking alteration of all correct so it indicated that something was more than just all right it was outstanding it was near perfect and then it gained popularity during a u.s presidential election campaign in 1840 the next year and there was the incumbent president called martin van buren and he was a democrat from Kinderhook in New York state and he adopted the initials OK as a nickname for himself it stood for old Kinderhook it was used by his campaign team you know obviously they were saying he was near perfection and if he did really well in a particular state they would also use it um for old kinderhook new york's favorite son
Starting point is 00:25:05 they said and because of that campaign it became so popular that it slipped into the language and has lost its moorings now and is used by all of us on a possibly uh over frequent basis i would say well i think we could have done a whole episode maybe one day we will on the whole okay dilemma i think i'm right in saying it's now been established. I was once told there was a Choctaw word, a North American word, OK, which meant it is from OK meaning yes. I don't think that's right. Some people said it came from grading words for furniture making. The best oak being OK.
Starting point is 00:25:42 It's not a bad one, is there? No, I think it's one of those ones that has attracted so many theories, possibly because we haven't been able to nail it down. But I think if I was to look in the OED now, I'm not sure there is much debate over the old kinderhook. I think some people dispute your old kinderhook story, because that was Martin Van Buren's birthplace, wasn't it? Old Kinderhook. Yes. I was told by some learned Americans that in New England, a couple of hundred years ago,
Starting point is 00:26:12 there was a craze for abbreviations. And OK first appeared in print in various Boston newspapers, along with lots of other abbreviations. RTBS was Remains to be Seen. SP was Small Potatoes. OFM was Our First Men, and inevitably a number of the abbreviations had to be explained for the benefit of uninitiated readers. So on the Boston Morning Post of June the 12th, 1838, and I've seen a facsimile of this, spoke of a dual, W-O-O-O-F-C with one of our first citizens. Anyway, the craze went so far as to produce abbreviations of international spellings,
Starting point is 00:26:52 N-G for no go, A-R for all right. So OK for all correct. Well, yes. I mean, there's no doubt that OK was used in that presidential election. And it seems to be that it was popularized by that election, but also, you know, it was always was that humorous alteration of all correct. So I'm looking at the OED now, Giles, and it says other suggestions, e.g. that it represents the Choctaw word that you said, or the French oké, meaning at the platform, or the Scots oké, all lack any form of acceptable documentation. So what they're saying is that there are no printed records as yet to support these. But it also says that
Starting point is 00:27:30 competing theories as to the origin of the expression have been in evidence almost since its first appearance. I'm now in love with the idea of it being okay, I'm down on the platform, okay, the French, okay, I'm going to start doing it with the French accent. OK. OK. I think my youngest story says okey. Okey. So that's what I get. Emma from Liverpool has written to ask,
Starting point is 00:27:57 is there any connection between the word petrify when referring to trees and also the sensation of being frightened? It's certainly a very evocative way to describe a forest when thinking of the latter. Yes, you're frightened as you go down into the wood. Yes. You're petrified, petrified of the trees. Yes. Yes, they are absolutely linked. So we have to look back to the Latin petra, meaning a rock or a stone. So to petrify something in the scientific sense is to convert it into stone or into a stony substance and to petrify someone so to instill such alarm in them is to almost turn them into stone they
Starting point is 00:28:33 are rendered immobile by their fear and their terror so they absolutely are linked and linked to that of course one of my favorite words and actually it's really gained a lot of popularity now on the internet is petrichor do you remember this one i do yeah petrichor which is that incredibly distinctive pleasant smell that accompanies the first rain after a long period of dry weather and that is from petri again stone and ichor which it or petra i should say and ichor which was said to be the ethereal essence that flowed through the veins of the gods. Beautiful. I love it. Very beautiful. Speaking of beautiful, you introduce us to three beautiful words each week. Petrichor could have been one of them.
Starting point is 00:29:16 It could. Apricity was one of them, the sensation of that warmth on your back, the apricity. What trio have you got for us today? Well, speaking of that gorgeous sensation of the sun, you might call it weem, weem, W-H-E-E-M, which means pleasant, gentle, or smooth. And it kind of sounds like it, I think, weem, which is beautiful. And staying with nature, there's a lovely word from Cheshire. Not sure it's used very much anymore, but ponomerins, from Cheshire. Not sure it's used very much anymore, but ponomerins, ponomerins. So that's P-O-N-O-M-E-R-I-N-S. And they're light fleecy clouds that dapple the sky. Isn't that beautiful? Ponomerins. Wonderful. And my last one is, I love this one. If you like to potter around the house and do odd jobs, you are shobbling. Shobbling, an old dialect word for going around and repairing certain things and doing little odd jobs around the house.
Starting point is 00:30:09 Shobbling. Shobbling. Shobbling. Yes. I've got a lot of shobbling to do here at home. Don't we all? But I'm actually lying doggo. What's the origin of the phrase lying doggo? Well, I guess you are then sort of lying down, lying flat flat remaining hidden as a dog has this sort of incredibly light
Starting point is 00:30:27 sleep so that's why we talk about dog sleep it's the kind of incredibly light sleep that a dog might have and that also gives us dog watch good whole nother conversation that a whole nother conversation but it actually the reason i mention it is the poem i want to read to you is called lying doggo and it's written by a friend of mine, a wonderful actor called Simon Williams, who's been around for donkey's years. Now on the arches. Of course. And I remember him going as far back as upstairs downstairs. I remember that too.
Starting point is 00:30:55 Well, he's written plays. He's actually the son of playwrights. And this is a poem called Lying Doggo. And it's about the challenge facing an actor when he or she is cast as a corpse. And I've been going back to the theatre, and one of the plays I'm looking forward to seeing, I think for the fourth time, is The Mousetrap, which is a murder mystery, in which, I won't tell you who done it, but I will tell you, there is a corpse. The poem is called Lying Doggo. done it, but I will tell you there is a corpse. The poem is called Lying Doggo. Actors have a dread of having to play dead. If you are poisoned, stabbed or shot, you'd better find a comfy spot. What's really best to go for is a death behind the sofa, where you can blink or breathe or think, hidden from the stalls, at least until the curtain falls.
Starting point is 00:31:45 I love that. And of course, that's where we get the idea of corpsing, isn't it? So you're pretending to be dead and then you can't stop laughing. I love that. That comes from the theatre. Brilliant. Thank you. Thank you, Simon Williams. And thank you, everybody, for listening.
Starting point is 00:31:58 Please recommend us to friends if you've enjoyed the podcast. If you want to get in touch with us, it's purple at somethingelse.com without the G in something. Something Right with Purple is a Something Else production produced by Lawrence Bassett and Harriet Wells with additional production from Steve Ackerman, Jen Mystery, Jay Beale and the slightly petrifying... Yes, but always lying doggo because we never see him. Gully!

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