Sample Funny Canadian Sayings. Click here.
Saturday, March 20, 2010
new column for the first day of Spring
The Vernal WordSpring! In spring's first hour the sun transits the celestial equator to signal the vernal equinox, a day half daylight and half night that is the advent of springtime. The Latin adjective vernalis ‘in springtime’ derives from an earlier adjective vernus ‘in spring’ from a Latin noun ver, veris ‘spring’ cognate with ancient Greek ear ‘spring’, possibly cognate with Hebrew aor ‘light, sun’; but certainly cognate with Old Norse var ‘spring’, Sanskrit वसर् vasar , ‘morning ’ and वसन्त vasantá ‘spring ’ , Old Persian vahar, Old Armenian garun ‘spring’ and Old Church Slavonic вєсна vesna ‘spring’, all stemming from a Proto-Indo-European root *wesr’ ‘spring.’ Equinox is Latin aequus ‘level’ or ‘equal’ + Latin nox, noctis ‘night.’
“Is Thy Name Wort?” Why is a Plant Named St. John’s Wort? With the etymology of a flower name, St. John’s Wort, shall we celebrate spring. Its very name is a demonstration of how powerful an erroneous folk etymology can be. Wort as an Ending of Flower Names First we’ll do some etymological spade work in the loam of Old English on that intriguing wort that subtends so many old English plant names: birthwort, liverwort, lousewort, lungwort, pennywort, pepperwort and sneezewort. The Oxford English Dictionary lists hundreds of common “–wort” names for flowers. The Old English word for root or any plant, herb or veggie useful as food or medicine was wyrt, Germanic relative of the modern German noun Wurz ‘root’ and related to the Scandinavian word urt for ‘root. Wort is related to our word root, to Old Norse rot, to Latin radix, to Greek rhiza, all meaning ‘root of a plant.’
Hypericum & Botanical Name Sources The Scientific Latin name of St. John’s Wort, that is, the genus name, is Hypericum. In Greek it was hypereikos or in a later spelling by Dioscorides and Galen, two famous Greek-born doctors of imperial Rome hyperikon. See my short biography of Galen at the end of this column. The first Greek form appears to contain the Greek word for heath or heather, ereike, preceded by hyper Greek ‘above,’ ‘over,’ ‘super’. Thus the prime meaning may be growing ‘above or through the heath plant.’ But the second root could also be eikon Greek ‘picture, image’ from which current English derived icon, holy image of a saint or deity. This derivation was widely believed by early Christians, hence the habit of hanging a sprig of St. John’s Wort above holy images, particularly above icons depicting saints on their feast days. Get Thee Way Behind Me, Satan! Yet another meaning of eikon produced yet another use of this plant. A common secondary meaning of eikon in ancient Greek was ‘ghost, phastasm, ethereal spirit.’ Hyper means ‘over’ in Greek; thence a folk belief developed that hyperikon meant ‘over a ghost’ and so the herb would keep away “ghoulies and ghosties and things that go bump! in the night.” Now the leaves of St. John’s Wort have little oil glands that give them a dotted look.
Folk superstition said that the devil was so angry about St. John’s Wort driving off his evil minions that he pierced the leaves with these dots in a fit of satanic pique. From the immemorial past, Midsummer’s Eve was a night when witches, goblins and volant sprites took flight and flapped on leathern wing or slithery broom to do nefarious deeds.
Source of Common English Name Midsummer Eve is the night of June 24, called Walpurgisnacht in German. Saints’ icons were protected on this night by hanging St. John’s Wort over them. This is also the origin of the English common name, for in the calendar of saints, the feast of St. John the Baptist is June 24, a date on which the plant was supposed to be in bloom. Another wisp of herbal folklore said that dew falling on the plant overnight could be collected on the morning of June 24 and rubbed on the eyes, which would safeguard one’s peepers from disease. St. John’s Wort is a Long-Time Favorite of Herbalists Elizabethan gardener and famous writer on plants, John Gerard,in his The Herball, or General Historie of Plants published in 1597 waxes positively ecstatic about the virtues of St. John’s Wort. With modern caution in mind, we quote a smidgeon: “S. Johns wort with his floures and seed boyled and drunken, provoketh urine, and is right good against the stone in the bladder, and stoppeth the laske [diarrhea]. The leaves stamped are good to be layd upon burnings, scaldings, and all wounds; and also for rotten and filthy ulcers. The leaves, floures, and seeds stamped, and put into a glasse with oyle Olive, and set in the hot Sunne for certain weeks together, and then strained from those herbs, and the like quantitie of new put in, and sunned in like manner, doth make an oyle of the colour of bloud, which is a most precious remedy for deepe wounds, and those that are thorow the body, for sinews that are prickt, or any wound made with a venomed weapon.”
Species Native to British Columbia and possible to use there as a pleasant groundcover is Hypericum anagalloides (Botanical Latin, like Scarlet Pimpernel or Anagallis, said of the tiny leaves). A noxious, introduced weed in much of southern Canada is Hypericum perforatum (Latin, with holes through it, said of the apparent holes in the surface of the leaf and at the edge of the petal, in fact these dots are the transparent oil glands). Light-colored animals may be poisoned by some of the glucosides in the plant. They are phototropic, being turned by light into toxic nasties. The most common garden subject, also good for groundcovers in mild climates, is Hypericum moserianum hybridized by a botanist named Moser. Called Goldflower, it blooms in one of nature’s prettiest yellow hues. Another common name of a related St. John’s Wort species is Aaron’s Beard. Some botanists state that St. John’s Wort belongs to its own plant family Hypericaceae, a family of about eight genera and 350 species, more than 300 being Hypericum species. About 50 of these are native to North America.
Galen: One of History’s Most Influential Doctors Galen Γαληνός ‘Galēnos’ (129 CE – 199 CE) was a gifted doctor who was court physician to the Roman emperor and philosopher Marcus Aurelius, and to his successor emperors Commodus and Septimus Severus. Galen’s writings, in a pure, clear and serene Attic Greek, influenced daily medical practice for more than 1,000 years. Some of Galen’s Greek medical terms are still alive in the international language of Western medicine, words like hematopoietic are in use today, although with different meanings. Roman law made the dissection of human corpses punishable by death. Although they advanced prodigiously in many fields of human endeavour there is a crude core of Roman beliefs that belong to an ignorant Italian peasant tradition stretching back to a time when, before conquering the world, Romans were tending goats and worshipping thunderstorms. To this era belongs their fastidious reserve about autopsy and vivisection. Thus Galen throughout his medical training had to dissect pigs and monkeys. He made many good discoveries about human anatomy but there are bits and pieces found in pigs and monkeys that Galen placed inside humans in his anatomical theories. In fact, ancient physicians had to hurry to battle scenes the day after the victory to study soldiers’ corpses freshly dead on the field. It was not illegal Galen’s anatomical studies were not surpassed until 1543 when Andreas Vesalius published his illustrations of anatomy. Vesalius of course could perform post mortem autopsies on cadavers, which Galen could not do. Galen’s theories on the circulation of blood, though wrong, endured until 1628 when William Harvey showed that blood circulated, pumped through veins and arteries by the great muscle bag of the heart. One of the insights Galen bequeathed to the practice of medicine was direct observation wherever possible, after or rather than, merely reading about a disease or lesion. Galen was also the authority on wounds and their healing.
The surviving Greek and translations of Galen’s work amount to more than 3,000,000 words. Although his eternal fame came long after his death, even in his lifetime, Galen received his just guerdon of renown. One of the greatest Roman philosophers and an emperor, Marcus Aurelius, wrote of Galen that he was “primum sane medicorum esse, philosophorum autem solum” ‘a clear first among doctors and, given that, unique among philosophers too.’ Galen’s influence was twofold. A collective noun arose, Galenism, that was both laudatory and insulting. His theories and practical clinical instruction were so pervasive and influential that for centuries Galenic medicine thwarted all experimentation and stifled medical progress. Too many doctors said that if it was in Galen it was the truth and there was no need to challenge it. Today we recognize that a challenge to orthodoxy is perhaps the prime duty of the true scientist.
Bibliography of my works published in book form
Learn Some Quebec Sayings
If you know Canadian or other sayings you would like to share, English ou des expressions québécoises, email them to me. If you want your name listed below the saying as contributor, tell me so in your email. Sayings can also appear anonymously. canadiansayings@mountaincable.net
copyright © 2010 William Gordon Casselman
Any comments, corrections, emendations, additional word lore, orders for my books? Please email me at canadiansayings@mountaincable.net
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
Click Titles Below to Read My Recent Columns
Cowgirl & Cowboy Words like Lasso Galilee: Origin of a Hebrew Place Name & The God Pan Foxing a Horse on Prince Edward Island Inauguration: Etymology & Latin Roots of the Word
My books of Canadian Sayings (previewable here by clicking on Books to Sample just under the title at the top of this page) contain hundreds of Canadian expressions, both in English and in French.
Order new or used online from amazon.com “The book is wonderful!” says a buyer of my Dictionary of Medical Derivations at amazon.com
Need a Document Written or Edited? A Speech Made Humorous? Is Your Company's Annual Report Embarrassing? We'll Fix It.
Click to visit Camp Diamond website details and prices for 2010 available soon Camp Diamond is a multilingual site: des informations en français - - - y tambien en español --- und auch auf Deutsch --- и на русском языке
Sales of my books support the continuance of this website.
order online from Chapters/Indigo $10.95 in all Canadian bookstores Says one reader on the Chapters website: “If you're Canadian you gotta read this book. This book made me laugh till I cried. Things I thought only I heard during my youth were there in print before my eyes! I love this book. Everyone I show it to has the same reaction. Different sayings tickled my funny bone on different days - so they never get boring. Keep up this wonderful treasure-trove of Canadiana, Bill.” — Angie Plamondon published by McArthur & Company, Toronto, Canada
Click here to sample all three Canadian Sayings books To order any of these books online, visit Indigo.
I invite you to tour my site and select from the hundreds of word stories here. To begin, click on the Word List banner below. Then perhaps browse the site map with its links to every page of my website.
If you want to share some wonderful Canadian sayings, both in English and in Québec French, you will find more than 3,000 Canadian expressions in my three sayings books. Each of my three volumes of Canadian Sayings contains about 1,200 zesty phrases used by Canadians both today and throughout our history. Remember that profits from the sale of my books keep this website online.
order online from Chapters/Indigo
This new book is available from November 2007 and can be ordered at any bookstore in the world. Among the essay contributors in Readings for Technical Communication are George Grant, Marshall McLuhan, C.P. Snow, George Orwell, Stephen Strauss, William Zinsser and, yours ever in abject humility — Bill Casselman. Order "Readings" at a discount from Chapters/Indigo
If you can't find my books online or in stores, order them directly from the author. Just send me an email canadiansayings@mountaincable.net
ORDER MY BOOKS ANYWHERE IN THE WORLD ONLINE AT
Visit this roundup of CanNews at www.bourque.org
Description of Site Contents Bill Casselman's Canadian Word of the Day™ & Words of the World features thousands of entries about Canadian phrases, words, expressions, and folk sayings. Canadian French expressions, idioms and folk sayings are featured and explained in English. The latest, newest French Canadian slang is deciphered. Québécois joual phrases and jokes are explained in English. My newest, latest, unpublished word stories and studies appear here on this website. Canadian English is the focus but English spoken and written all over the world and throughout the history of the language interests me as well. Words of the World spotlights non-Canadian English words and their origins from languages all over the world and permits me to venture on etymological journeys well beyond the pleasant confines of my native Canada.
Other Places to Visit on My Website Casselman's Canadian Words / Casselmania Canadian Garden Words /Canadian Food Words What's In a Canadian Name? / Canadian Sayings Canadian Sayings 2 / Canadian Sayings 3 A Dictionary of Medical Derivations Bill Casselman's Other Writings As The Canoe Tips: Comic Scenes from Canadian Life Canadian Words & Sayings 2006 edition
The 2 devices below count only visitors to this page, picked up by rather skimpy hit/pageview collectors. According to another, better web server log file analysis program,Webalizer, throughout 2009, so far, this website receives more than 125,000 hits per day.
Copyright © 1996 -2010 William Gordon Casselman
etymology of Canadian words and phrases phrases of Canada word history of Canada Canadian talk Canadian way of speaking Canadian speech where Canadian words come from funny Canadian sayings humorous Canadian expressions Canadian catchwords Canadian epigrams Canadian mottoes Canadian stock sayings learning Canadian English learning Canadian French expressions learning Quebec folk sayings introduction to etymology Canadian English as ESL slang and Canadian English slang learn Canadian English Canadian English word power learn Canadian words Canadian English word lists . words used by Canadians Canadian lingo Kalan Porter pictures photographs photos Kalan Porter word lore Canadian sayings for ESL William Gordon Casselman, Canadian author Bill Casselman's books Canadian words folk sayings of Canada Canadian expressions Canadian phrases words used by Canadians Bill Casselman's Canadian Word of the Day archives etymology of Canadian words etymology examples of Canadian word origins Canadian English place names of Canada word stories funny Canadian sayings Canadian books books about Canadian words word roots Canadian vocabulary Canadian language Canadian lingo Canadian turn of phrase Canadian way of speaking French-Canadian words French-Canadian words in English Quebec words Quebec French Canadian surnames Canadian last names funny expressions of Canada Canadian word derivations Casselman's Canadian Words Casselmania Canadian Food Words Canadian Garden Words What's in a Canadian Name? Canadian Sayings Canadian Sayings one Canadian Sayings two Canadian Sayings 1 Canadian Sayings 2 Canadian Sayings 3 Canadian Sayings three dictionary of medical derivations etymology of medical terms what medical words mean origin of medical vocabulary medical word stories Canadian food words culinary terms of Canada where food names come from Canadian English words about Canada bill casselman bill casselman books etymology Canadian origins of words Acadian words Acadian food terms Acadian vocabulary Canadian Word of the Day™ word power word lore fun with words where words come from Canadian Word of the Day™ Bill Casselman's Canadian Word of the Day™ Canadian Word of the Day Bill Casselman's Canadian Word of the Day Canadian French as a second language Bill Casselman's Canadian Word of the Day™ Canadian Word of the Day Canadian words words from Canada Canadian English Learn Canadian sayings Learn Canadian English Canadian English as a second language Canadian English study Canadian English as ESL ESL tips with Canadian English expressions Learning English ESL from Canadian English speaking Canadian English learning about Canada through Canadian English Canadian unique words unique Canadian terms words used in Canada Words that are Canadian phrases terms sayings words original Canadian original Canadian words terms phrases Canadian idioms ESL tips for learning Canadian English Canadian ESL phrase books funny folk sayings in English Canadian slang Canadian patois patois Canadien ESL sayings ESL funny sayings ESL teaching tips Canadian funny expressions Canadian English words special phrases in Canadian English words unique to Canada English in Canada Old Canadian Expressions Historical sayings of Canada old sayings in Canada Canadian historical sayings expressions and proverbs of Canada origin of Avril Lavigne's surname words of Canada . . Canadian terms Canadian language French Canadian sayings books on Canadian English books teaching Canadian English English in Canada ways of speech Canadian talk in English . unique words of Canada unique Canadian phrases unique sayings of Canada . word origins Canada unique expressions of Canada
funny sayings Canadian expressions Canadian French expressions Canadian French words Canadian French idioms explained in English Canadian French sayings explained in English Ca . nad |
to gently lift the lungs out of a sliced-open soldier. When he was 28 years old, Galen got himself appointed as chief surgeon to the gladiatorial school of his hometown, 
Pergamum. For another method of studying the innards of the human body was the care and therapy of horrible gaping wounds in the bodies of barely living men clawed open by lions and pierced by spears with skulls cracked by iron balls during gladiatorial combat. 
