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The Write Way 12 September 2003 How Long Is a Piece of String? Greetings, I knew there had to be a story out there somewhere about how Gettysburg got its name, and thanks to Sandi from Wisconsin, we all know now. This is what she found: "Though Gettysburg is internationally known as a Civil War Battle site and location of President Abraham Lincoln's Gettysburg Address, the town was already seventy-seven years old in 1863. The Borough of Gettysburg is located on the site of Samuel Gettys' farmstead, part of the Marsh Creek Settlement. This settlement was carved out of the wilderness between 1736 and 1760 by Scots-lrish families in the northern part of the county, and German families in the southern areas. " " And Dave (from California) debunks another great story: "By the way, that's an urban legend about Abraham Lincoln writing the Gettysburg address on the back of an envelope. It was short, true, but it was not written on an envelope. The speaker just before him took two hours, so when Honest Abe got up and down in a matter of a few minutes it was blessing to all." That sort of rings true, doesn't it? I can't imagine anyone being able to write anything on the back of an envelope with a pen and ink - especially not while travelling in a rattly old train ...
You know, it makes you realise just how soft we are these days when you consider what people like Lincoln accomplished - without the aid of all the wondrous technology we take for granted. There really must have been more hours in a day before the 20th century, don't you think? Whenever we go for a decent walk (as opposed to our morning constitutionals along the waterfront), I always draw my husband's attention (as you do) to what it would be like if we were doing the same walk carrying the full pack of a Roman legionnaire - you know the whole 28 kilo (60 lb) kit and caboodle of armour, clothes, weapons, cooking gear etc etc ... "The legion's soldiers were extremely well protected. Each soldier wore a type of cuirass called the lorica segmentata, and a helmet called a galea which by Trajan's time had evolved to include neck and cheek guards. Leg armor was sacrificed for the sake of mobility, but the legionnaires could easily protect their legs with the shield they carried, the scutum. This was a large, rectangular shield made of layered plywood and faced with leather; it had a metal boss in the center which protected the grip, as well as metal-rimmed edges and gilded or silvered decorations around the boss. "The soldiers were also well armed. Each legionary carried a short stabbing sword called a gladius, supplemented by a pugio (dagger), and two pila (javelins.) A legionnaire could throw a pilum more than 60', and the weapon was designed to bend or break on impact, making it impossible for an enemy to turn it around and use it against the legion." http://www.everything2.com/index.pl?node=Imperial%20Roman%20Legion This is what your well-dressed legionnaire looked like when he was all decked out in his fighting best: http://abacus.bates.edu/~eklose/Equipment.html Then there were his clothes, which included the subarmalis, a padded garment worn over the tunic and underneath the armour - this nifty little garment was designed to pad the body from the weight and metal edges of his armour. The sagum (cloak) was oval or rectangular, made of either brown, yellowish-brown, reddish brown or deep red wool. These were blanket size and pinned at the throat or over the left shoulder using a Fibulea - they also came in handy on those chilly nights out in the field and made excellent bed-rolls. As well as his heavy armour and clothes, the legionnaire on campaign in enemy territory also carried his own eating utensils (made of iron or wood); a canteen for his water (made from leather or a gourd); net bags on a T-pole for carrying fruit and bread; leather satchel for personal items - toiletries etc and usually a post for the fortifications for the night's camp. Each soldier also had digging tools to dig the ramparts and ditches and anything else required to protect them in their camp, which was constructed every night (this was built even when in friendly territory). The Roman army's regular pace was about 100 paces/minute, and the quick march was 120 paces/minute. This works out to a speed of approximately 4.5 kmh (or 2.8 mph). After marching 20 or 30 kilometres on a normal day then setting up their camp (which took between 3-4 hours depending on the terrain), they would often then have to prepare to fight a battle the following day! Huh! And you think your life is hard ... Then, when Caesar had finished his day, he sat down and wrote his commentaries ... Read Caesar's own account of his campaigns here: http://mcadams.posc.mu.edu/txt/ah/Caesar/ Speaking, as we were, about distances, leads me naturally to ponder the origin of the words we use to describe those distances. In my part of the world, we adopted the metric system some years back and, wouldn't you know it, many of the words come from Latin! The basis of the metric system is the metre (OK - that's your cue to say "Duh!") and a metre is 39.37 inches. "The French, who originated the metre in 1792, decided that any basic unit of measure should, 'naturally' be based on the size of the Earth. Unfortunately the surveyors and mathematicians, rather than using the Equatorial circumference, chose the distance from the Equator to the North Pole. "If the Earth were a perfect sphere then the metre would be a natural unit of measure. The Earth is not a sphere: the Equatorial circumference is some forty nautical miles greater than the Polar. The original metre was defined as one ten-millionth of the distance from Equator to Pole but, as no allowance was made for the flattening at the Poles, this was useless for navigation. As recently as 1960 the metre was re-defined (for the third time), and became 1,650,763.73 wavelengths of the reddish-orange light emitted by the isotope krypton-86 in vacuo." http://www.shaunf.dircon.co.uk/shaun/metrology/inch.html "In 1983 the General Conference on Weights and Measures discarded the krypton standard and redefined the meter in terms of the speed of light--what might be called a theoretical definition. The meter is now officially 1/299,792,458 the distance traveled by light in a vacuum in one second." http://www.sciam.com/askexpert_question.cfm?articleID=000C35E3-B7EF-1C71-9EB7809EC588F2D7 Now, if you thought the French were going to have dibs on the metric system, you've overlooked the staying power of the Romans! We use Latin roots for all the bits that are shorter than a metre: Deci means tenth A tenth of a unit of measure will have the prefix deci in front of the unit so a tenth of a metre will be stated as a decimetre; a hundredth of a metre is a centimetre; a thousandth of a metre is a millimetre. But, if the unit of measurement is bigger than a metre, we turn to the Greeks: Deka means ten. (I couldn't
think of an example for this ...) There you go - more fascinating trivia! The one thing you can say for the metric system is that it beats the pants off bushels and roods and furlongs and leagues and that other crazy system (invented by some loony) that we were all forced to learn in primary school. This week's quiz: What can you remember of the Old Ways? Match up these crazy measurements with the bits they measure: fathom, shackle, balthazar, momme, schooner, demisemiquaver, faggot, rood, ell, perch 1. area that covers exactly 272.25 square feet or about 25.292 85 square metres 2. a traditional unit of volume for firewood; 3 feet in length and 2 feet in circumference 3. large tumbler or drinking glass holding about 400 millilitres or 13.5 U.S fluid ounces 4. a traditional unit of area used to measure land; 40 square rods (or perches), which equals 1210 square yards, or 10 890 square feet 5. a large wine bottle holding about 12 litres, 16 times the volume of a regular bottle 6. a unit of relative time in music equal to 1/32 whole note or 1/64 breve 7. a traditional unit of length used for measuring the lengths of nautical cables and chains, especially anchor chains 8. traditional unit used to measure the "weight" (density per unit area) of silk 9. a traditional unit of distance equal to approximately 1.829 metres 10. a traditional unit of length used primarily for measuring cloth; exactly 1.143 metres Speaking of measurements reminds me of one of my favourite Monty Python sketches called simply The String Sketch. What's that? You've never heard it? You've missed a treat. A bit of a search on my best mate google.com came up trumps ... The scene is an advertising agency office ... the characters are the ad man, Adrian Wapcaplet and the would-be client, Mr Simpson: W: Aah. Now, I understand you want us to advertise your washing powder. S: String. W: String, washing powder, what's the difference. We can sell *anything*. S: Good. Well I have this large quantity of string, a hundred and twenty-two thousand *miles* of it to be exact, which I inherited, and I thought if I advertised it-- W: Of course! A national campaign. Useful stuff, string, no trouble there. S: Ah, but there's a snag, you see. Due to bad planning, the hundred and twenty-two thousand miles is in three inch lengths. So it's not very useful. W: Well, that's our selling point! "SIMPSON'S INDIVIDUAL STRINGETTES!" S: What? W: "THE NOW STRING! READY CUT, EASY TO HANDLE, SIMPSON'S INDIVIDUAL EMPEROR STRINGETTES - JUST THE RIGHT LENGTH!" S: For what? W: "A MILLION HOUSEHOLD USES!" S: Such as? W: Uhmm...Tying up very small parcels, attaching notes to pigeons' legs, uh, destroying household pests... S: Destroying household pests?! How? W: Well, if they're bigger than a mouse, you can strangle them with it, and if they're smaller, you flog them to death with it! S: Well *surely*! ... W: "DESTROY NINETY-NINE PERCENT OF KNOWN HOUSEHOLD PESTS WITH PRE-SLICED, RUSTPROOF, EASY-TO-HANDLE, LOW CALORIE SIMPSON'S INDIVIDUAL EMPEROR STRINGETTES, FREE FROM ARTIFICIAL COLORING, AS USED IN HOSPITALS!" S: 'Ospitals!?!?!?!!? W: Have you ever been in a Hospital where they didn't have string? S: No, but it's only *string*! W: ONLY STRING?! It's everything! It's...it's waterproof! S: No it isn't! W: All right, it's water resistant then! S: It isn't! W: All right, it's water absorbent! It's...Super Absorbent String! "ABSORB WATER TODAY WITH SIMPSON'S INDIVIDUAL WATER ABSORB-A-TEX STRINGETTES! AWAY WITH FLOODS!" S: You just said it was waterproof! W: "AWAY WITH THE DULL DRUDGERY OF WORKADAY TIDAL WAVES! USE SIMPSON'S INDIVIDUAL FLOOD PREVENTERS!" S: You're mad! W: Shut up, shut up, shut up! Sex, sex sex, must get sex into it. Wait, I see a television commercial - There's this nude woman in a bath holding a bit of your string. That's great, great, but we need a doctor, got to have a medical opinion. There's a nude woman in a bath with a doctor--that's too sexy. Put an archbishop there watching them, that'll take the curse off it. Now, we need children and animals. There's two kids admiring the string, and a dog admiring the archbishop who's blessing the string. Uhh...international flavor's missing...make the archbishop Greek Orthodox. Why not Archbishop Macarios? No, no, he's dead... never mind, we'll get his brother, it'll be cheaper... So, there's this nude woman... Classic! Last week's quiz: Choose the odd word in each set: 1. accost, waylay, IGNORE, confront 2. DENY, allege, claim, assert 3. responsive, INTRACTABLE, amenable, agreeable 4. indifference, unconcern, PASSION, apathy 5. aptitude, AWKWARDNESS, talent, gift 6. stratagem, TRUTH, trick, artifice 7. AGGRAVATE, assuage, soothe, alleviate 8. mental, PHYSICAL, intellectual, cognitive 9. complete, round out, complement, DETRACT 10.complicity, DISTANCE, conniving, scheme If you've ever spent time at the chalk-face, you'll enjoy this item from Deirdre: The Progress of Modern Education from the Journal Of Irreproducible Results, 39, 5, by John R. Clark, U. South Florida.
Sigh ... that's so true it's not funny ... Add your pin to the map of the world: http://pub37.bravenet.com/guestmap/view.php?usernum=3170114826 If you received this newsletter from a friend and you'd like to have your very own copy delivered to you on Friday, just click here: mailto:WritingTips-subscribe@yahoogroups.com and why not spread the word? Send your friends a copy and invite them to join our merry band - we number over 7,000 now. When I was teaching at my previous school (a Catholic College) we had this pinned on our staff room wall:
A Little Something Extra Need a word to describe a measurement? Any measurement? Then you need the Dictionary of Units of Measurement: http://www.unc.edu/~rowlett/units/index.html Word of the week: Platonic Year - "a unit of time used in astronomy. The earth's axis of rotation is not fixed in space; the attraction of the moon causes it to slowly trace out a circle in the sky. This motion, called precession, changes the orientation of the sky as seen from the earth's surface: the poles appear to shift their locations and the sun's point of crossing the equator slowly rotates through the constellations of the Zodiac. The Platonic year is the length of time required for one complete precessional rotation: about 25 800 years. The unit is named for the ancient Greek philosopher Plato (ca. 428-348 BCE). It is sometimes called the great year." (Dictionary of Units of Measurement) Oxymoron of the week: approximately 3.97786 This week's Latin phrase to use next time you're at the market place ... Aio, quantitas magna frumentorum est. (Yes, that is a very large amount of corn.) Got a question about grammar, punctuation or any other language matter? Here's the place to go: http://pub37.bravenet.com/forum/show.php?usernum=3170114826 Regards, Jennifer P.S. Want to donate to the upkeep of this newsletter? Here's how: 1. Pay by PayPal:
2. Click here to subscribe for a full year OR 3. Use your credit card on my secure order form: http://www.write101.com/fund.htm (You can also access the PayPal subscription link from this page if the link above didn't work for you. With PayPal, you can use your credit card, PayPal account or pay online using your own cheque account.) OR 4. Send a cheque (made payable to Jennifer Stewart): http://www.write101.com/fund.htm To unsubscribe from this list, send a blank email to: mailto:WritingTips-unsubscribe@yahoogroups.com or go to the web site, at http://groups.yahoo.com/group/WritingTips This menu will also let you change your subscription between digest and normal mode. |
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Copyright 200 |
After
the Revolutionary War, James Gettys, Samuel's middle son, purchased a 116 acre
tract from his father's 381 acre farmstead. By 1786 he had laid out 210 lots
around the Square, which still remains as the center of town. Thus Gettysburg
was born.
