New Free Rice Words XV..The Fun Continues

The double use of the word quill in a recent essay, combined with the freerice.com use of the word pirn, brought me to that human activity of which I know little: weaving. Actually, in my notes I saw the word as pion, and so I guess I have to tell about that word, too. As we saw, a quill is a hollow shaft that could be used for a pen or for a straw, for example. But you could also roll things around it, which led to the art of quilling, detailed here. It involves the use of strips of paper that are rolled, shaped and glued together to create decorative designs. I found in amusing, and slightly telling, that in the 18th century it became popular among women of leisure in England because it was one activity, apart from reading, that was perceived not to be too taxing for their minds or dispositions.

But a quill, as we also know, is a spool around which yarn or thread can be bound. With that in mind, freerice.com defined pirn as a "quill bobbin." Well, this is correct, if a little obscure. The OED talks about a pirn as a "bobbin, spool, or reel, spec. a small cylinder on which thread, etc. is bound, usually made from a hollow reed or quill." Hence the freerice.com definition. I found this site, managed by Peg from South Carolina, which talks about 'pirn winding.' She actually distinguishes a pirn from a bobbin in that pirns are tapered but bobbins are not. She shares on that page all her troubles with getting thread to wind properly on pirns. A good break, indeed, from worrying about the Russians in Georgia or the Americans in Iraq...Thus, I know what a pirn is.

Pion

But before I actually decipered my writing as pirn (in my list of words), I thought I had written pion instead of pirn. I had to go check out that word. As expected, it takes us to the world of particle physics. Though I won the "laboratory science" award in high school, I think it was given improperly to me, since I didn't do that well either in chemistry or physics. In fact, I think the only way to study physics for most people is historically--as we follow the hypotheses and discovery of particles. This gives us a good introduction to the pion or pi meson, which is the collective name for three subatomic particles that play an important role in explaining low-energy properties of the strong nuclear force. The strong nuclear force is one of four fundamental interactions in physics, along with gravitation, the electromagnetic force and the weak interaction. But now we are in the world of quarks, antiquarks, and gluons and I think I will just leave it here.

Before moving on, however, I have to note throstle, also on the freerice.com site, because it relates to pirn. It has two definitions. The less common is a bird--the thrush or mavis (Turdus musicus--it is so called because of its melodious song) while the usual one is "a spinning machine for cotton, wool, etc...differing from a mule in having continuous action, the process of drawing, twisting and winding being carried on simultaneously." According to an 1877 quotation, the throstle derived its name from the "singing" or "humming" it made while operating. By the way, I never knew that a mule had anything to do with spinning, but if you look at that word you find a dizzying number of definitions. But mule is the right word for many technical applications which, like the animal itself, combine aspects of two different sources (as the mule results from crossing a male ass with a mare or, more rarely, a female ass with a stallion).

The "mule as spinning machine" was invented in 1779 by Samuel Crompton (1753-1827), and it was capable of spinning various strengths and thicknesses of yarn. Hence the name. Just as I am leaving the pion to the side, so I will reluctantly yield the woofs and warps, the quills and bobbins and spinning Jenny's and mules and pirns. The most you can hope for in life is to get a little taste of a few things...

A Quickie

I may never get through the list, and my expositions only point to the surface of the phenomenon. But you find that the more you do this, the more you build depth into your life and become able to understand and sympathize with people. So, I press on. Let's conclude with a term which has a medical connection. Parodititis is the same thing as parotitis, and means an inflammation of the parotid gland. The word comes from two Greek words, para, which means "alongside of" and ous, which means "ear." Thus, the parotid gland is alongside the ear. It secretes saliva through Stenson's duct (you wonder how these things become named) to the mouth. It is the largest of the three pairs of salivary glands, and is deeply situated near the ear in the recess behind the ramus of the jaw.

The word parotitis was first used in 1797: "The uncouth term Cynanche has been used for diseases so dissimilar, that I have divided them into Tonsillitis and Parotitis." Cynanche, by the way, is a term invented in 1706 for diseases of the throat in general that were characterized by inflammation, swelling, and difficulty of breathing. The Greek root is illuminating: cynanche is from kun (a dog) and anchein (strangle or throttle). When you have such an inflammation in your throat, it seems like you have a dog collar on... Well, that explanation isn't correct. Here is the reason for the invention of the term cyanche. From 1706: "Cynanche: the Squinancy, or Quinsey...This Disease is so call'd because it often happens to Dogs and Wolves."

This little exercise in word tracing is important when you become involved in conversations with people who are impatient with all the new words and medical conditions (especially psychological conditions) that are multiplied year by year. They say, "Well, we are just multiplying words and inventing conditions for the benefit of the medical and insurance communities." And maybe there is a bit of truth in that allegation. But, then again, we are inventing terms, as we developed parotitis from cynanche, to show more specifically the type of problem we face. Rather than just saying it is a "strangling feeling," medical science can point precisely to the problem. So, in general, I am a fan of specificity and specialization in terminology.

That's all there is time for now. Let's continue this amazing journey.

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