An Interlude on Pogonotrophy

Relentless review of words from a Bee can enervate even the most committed wordsmith. Sometimes you run into a word used in the Bee, and then you want to learn all about it, its relatives and other words that live nearby. Such was the case with the word pogonotrophy. It was spelled correctly in the 2005 Bee. But I decided to follow upon this word, and it led me on a most bracing journey. Here is a little of that journey.

Pogonotrophy

Let's begin where the Bee began, with this word. If you know the Greek behind it, the word is easy. It means "bearing or wearing a beard." It probably isn't a necessary word, but it is there nevertheless. I love an 1883 quotation using it (the word was coined in 1854): "There appears to be some necessary correlation between Hippophagy (horse-eating), Pogonotrophy, and perhaps Paganism." What? Interesting sentence, but it is taken from a book on ancient archaeology, and so the author's suggestion has to be interpreted in that connection. But I chuckled because of some of the allegations levelled at barbate colleagues in the early 1970s--these "hippies" must be "pagans" or irreligious people.

Buy now that we know that pogon (long o's) is the Greek word for beard, we are ushered into a whole theater of pogon-clad words for our viewing enjoyment. But let's start with one that has nothing to do with a beard: pogonip. It isn't in the OED, but it appears in the Unabridged, is derived from the Southern Paiute, and means "a dense winter fog containing frozen particles that is formed in deep mountain valleys of the western US." No wonder the OED doesn't want the word. There is even a pogonip web site that has something to do with eight miles of hiking trails in Santa Cruz, CA. Let's begin our pogon-wandering. Most arresting is pogoniasis, not in the Unabridged, but present in the OED and Century, which means an "excessive growth of a beard, especially on a woman." Or, in the elevated language of the OED, "female hirsutism." Thus, if you hear whispered among your friends that someone suffers from pogoniasis, you know what is going on. Is there such a thing as a transvestite who experiences pogoniasis or is such a cross-dresser already male so the word can't apply? I met one (i.e., a transvestite) in a bookstore last week, and I didn't have the quickness of wit, or the unmitigated gall, to pose the question.

Let's do a few more fun terms before descending to the tough ones. The pogonion is the "foremost point on the midline of the chin" (I suppose the place where the beard begins). That is, the pogonion is to be differentiated from the gnathion in that the former is the point at which your chin juts out the most at the top of it, while the latter is the lowest point on the chin directly below the pogonion. The best diagram I found of it is in the Unabridged (Webster's Third New International) under "craniometry." These two anatomical features are at the top and bottom of the dimple. I wonder if the science of cephalometry or the practice of phrenology stood at the fountainhead of these terms. After all, if you wanted to draw conclusions about someone by the shape of his/her skull, you would have to ascertain precise measurements. Skull measurement was important for racial theories as well as for attempts to determine "idiocy and imbecility," as the terms were then known. Much more briefly, I will mention pogonotomy, which is the cutting of the beard. Pogonology is the study of beards, and a pogonologist studies them. The first attestation of pogonology was in 1786 where someone made reference to a "treatise" called Pogonologia, or a philosophical essay on beards, translated from the French. After we stop laughing, we might consider how beards have often functioned as a social or personal statement and not merely as a cosmetic choice. Since the French book came out in 1786, the natural question to ask is the relationship of the beard to the French Revolution. I hope I am not barbing--oops, barking--up the wrong tree. Let's conclude this section by reference to "Pogonate," a nickname or designation of a certain king, Constantine Pogonate, who died in 685. I guess he had a beard. Nineteenth century writers often confused Constantine Pogonate with Constantine the Great, who called together the Council of Nicea in 325, and converted to Christianity on his deathbed in 337.

Bridging Over to the Natural World

The way to get to all the species of things with a "pogon"-prefix is through the word pogoniate. It is a term from ornithology and means "webbed, as a feather; having webs or pogonia; vexillate." Oops, we could get even further afield by going down the road of vexillate, but I will only say that vexillum is the Latin for "flag" or "standard" and that in "bird-talk," a vexillum is "the vane or web of a feather." [I didn't realize before today that a vexillary was one of the oldest class of veterans in the Roman army, serving under a special standard. Thus, instead of, like the Psalmist who says, "There go the ships" (Ps. 104:26), people in antiquity might have said, "there go the vexillaries"].

But let's conclude this essay by showing how pogon has combined with many other terms to describe an array of plants/animals in the natural world. A Pogonia is a "genus of terrestrial orchids of the tribe Neotlicae." It is characterized by usually erect sepals, a long wingless column and a three-lobed lip. Online pictures abound. Pogonias is derived from ichthyology, and refers to a genus of sciaenoids, having numerous "barbels" on the lower jaw. Hence, the name. There is a phylum Pogonophora, "comprising very long, worm-like, deep-sea invertebrates, " and I suppose they have things that look like beards someplace on their faces.

Though this exhausts the OED, we have a few more "pogo-s" to brighten your day. There is a Pogonorhynchinae, a subfamily, and the genus Pogonorhychus (a rhynchus, as you may know, is a snout or beak) which is a "genus of African barbets" (there is the beard we are looking for), having a large "sulcate and dentate beak which is strongly pogoniate." These birds, related to the woodpecker, hardly ever descend to the ground and spend their days among trees and bushes where they feed on fruit and insects. One beautiful picture is online. Ah, the life of a Pogonorhynchus. You've heard that lament before, I am sure.

Conclusion

Now that you are thoroughly familiar with "beard-type" words, we don't really need to go much further. There is the pogon iris, the pogonomyrmex (a "bearded" ant) and a pogonomys (a New Guinea prehensile-tailed rat--imagine that). You may now consider the word "pogon" a friend or, possibly an enemy. In the latter case, you might say, "We have met the pogon, and it is us."

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