piffling and eld and piffling eld and witter and dither

Several fascinating and difficult-to-spell words appear in these pages. We are finished with the "phy's," and must leave the friendly confines of Greek-derived words. In this essay I will briefly discuss pibroch, pickeer, picot, and piffling. I really am not making lots of progress through the dictionary, if progress is defined as trying to cover as many words as possible as quickly as possible, but I hope we are both sinking in some deep words of understanding here.

1. Pibroch. Pronounced PEE brak, pibroch is defined by the Collegiate as "a set of martial or mournful variations for the Scottish Highland bagpipe." The OED says that the term can also refer to the bagpipes themselves, though it calls this usage "rare." I thought the word itself was rare but let's confine ourselves to the "tune" definition. We can take the issue much further, however. Such a pibroch consists of a "ground-theme," called the urlar, followed by several variations, called siubhals, and concluding with a final quick movement, called the creanduidh (though this word isn't attested in the OED or on the Internet at all). We can say more. As the Century says: "Pibrochs usually increase in difficulty from the beginning to the end, and are profusely ornamented with grace-notes called warblers." The purpose of the pibroch is usually to excite the martial spirit, and their names usually reflect that reality, such as "The Raid of Kilcrhist" composed by Macdonald of Glengarry.

You have to enter into things Scottish to realize how much knowledge resides in the world of bagpiping. The student newspaper of Sterling College in Kansas, a Presbyterian college which is proud of its Scottish heritage, is called "The Skirl." What is a skirl? Not a small furry animal, but the high-pitched sound of the bagpipe. And when I was a pastor of a large Presbyterian congregation, we had the Clan Macleay Pipe Band come in and play each year at the time of the Highland Games. The bagpipes really do sound best when they aren't playing "Amazing Grace."

2. Pickeer. This word can either be a noun or a verb, but the Collegiate only lists it as a verb meaning to skirmish or to scout in advance of a skirmish. I like the 1688 listing of synonymous words: "Skirmishing, Fray, Velitation, pickeer." The Collegiate doesn't have velitation, but the OED kindly informs us that velitation was used quite frequently in the 17th century to mean a "wordy skirmish or encounter; a controversy, debate or dispute not carried to extremes." Two later attestations of velitation ought not to be missed. From Wollaston in 1722: "That question in Plato may have place among the velitations of philosophers; but a man can scarce propose it seriously to himself." And, from Sir Walter Scott in 1824: "While the ladies..were engaged in the light snappish velitation, or skirmish, which we have described..." To show how conventional, rather than "natural," are the rules of spelling, I will conclude my treatment with three brief quotations using pickeer." (1) From the London Gazette of 1691: "Several of our young Gentlemen passed over towards the Enemies Camp, and picquer'd with some of the French." From 1719: "When bold Dragoons have been pickering there." And, from 1905: "We did little from day to day save meet and picquer with small bodies of the rebel horse." Makes perfectly good sense, doesn't it, that the word is spelled pickeer?

3. Picot. This is "one of a series of small ornamental loops forming an edging on ribbon or lace." The OED calls it "any of a series of small loops of twisted thread, usually larger than purls, forming an ornamental edging to lace, ribbon or braid." Nice to know it is larger than a purl. This is reminiscent to me of Malvolio's statement in Twelfth Night: "Not yet old enough for a man, nor young enough for a boy; as a squash before 'tis a peascod, or a codling when 'tis almost an apple." Thus, it's a purl before it's a picot. There are lots of nice pictures of "picot lace" online, but I will let you discover them.

4. Piffling. I will finish this essay with a few thoughts on the not inconsequential word piffling. I don't believe I have ever used it before, but now I think I will. Oh, by the way, this adjective means "inconsequential, trivial; derisory." The adjective derives from the verb piffle, which made its first appearance in the langauge in 1847 and means "to talk or behave in an ineffectual way; to talk nonsense; to witter; to dither or fiddle...to fritter away." Isn't that serious of words--piffle, witter, dither, fiddle and fritter--an onomatopoeic feast? Just be sure you differentiate these from whiffle, ditter and friddle, if they even exist. I just looked up witter, which means to "mutter or grumble or speak with annoying lengthiness on trivial matters." If we can associate positive adjectives with various people--generous, humorous, handsome, accomplished--why not various two syllable verbs? I can see an essay coming about these words..

Let's conclude with a few quotations using piffling. From 1991: "I think I ought to look for a useful job. I mean really useful, not just waiting about for the next piffling part." Or, from 1927: "The Bench consider that this is a piffling offence, and..that a warning should have been sufficient." Finally, from the late 19th century: "He seems to have convinced himseolf that he is an old man, and settled down to a piffling eld." A piffling eld. Now that is a wonderful phrase. "Instead of pursuing his vigorous lifestyle in retirement, he settled into a piffling eld" (eld means "old age").

My, the useful phrases and clauses seem endless.

1875