The great English etymologist Owen Barfield once wrote that "words may be made to disgorge the past that is bottled up inside of them, as coal and wine when we kindle or drink them yield up their bottled sunshine." When we uncap the sunshine that is stored inside the many words that relate to the Christmas season, we discover that the light that streams forth illuminates centuries of human history and customs.
The word Christmas derives from the Old English Cristes maesse, meaning "the festival mass of Christ." Christmas is a fine example of a disguised compound. a word formed from two independent morphemes (meaning-bearing elements) that have become so closely welded together that their individual identities have been lost.
Christmas is the only annual religious holiday to have received official and secular sanction by all the states. The word holiday itself is another disguised compound, descending from the Old English haligdaeg, "holy day." With the change in pronunciation has come a change in meaning so that holidays, such as Independence Day and Labor Day, are not necessarily holy. The day morpheme in holiday has also transmogrified so that one (especially if one is British) can go "on holiday" for more than one day.
In English-speaking countries, the day following Christmas Day is called Boxing Day. This expression comes from the custom which started in the Middle Ages around 800 years ago: Churches would open their alms boxes, in which people had placed gifts of money and distribute the contents to poor people in the neighborhood on the day after Christmas. The tradition continues today; small gifts are often given to couriers such as postal staff and children who deliver newspapers.
The name Christ is a translation of the Hebrew word messiah, "the anointed one," rendered through the Greek as Khristos. Jesus also reaches back to ancient Hebrew and the name Yeshua (Joshua), which is explained as "Jah (or Jahveh, i.e. Jehovah) is salvation."
We learn about Jesus through the gospels. Gospel is yet another disguised compound, from the Old English god, "good," and spel, "news." The four gospels spread the good news of the life and work of Christ. No surprise then that the four men who wrote the gospels are called evangelists, from the Greek euaggelion, which also means "good news."
The babe was born in Bethlehem, a Hebrew word variously interpreted as meaning "house of bread or food," "house of fighting," or "house of the god Lahamut." The Christ child was laid in a manger, a word related to the French verb manger, "to eat." Why? Because Jesus's crib was a large wooden box that had served as a trough for feeding cattle.
We call the worship of the new-born babe the Adoration, from the Latin adoratio: ad- "to," oro- "pray"; hence, "to pray to." Among those who came to worship were "wise men . . . from the East," magi, a Latin word for "magician." Magi were members of an ancient Persian priestly caste of magicians and sorcerers. Incidentally, the number of wise men is never specifically mentioned in the gospels; we infer three from the gifts bestowed on the Christ child.
The letter X is the first letter of the word Xristos, which in Greek is the word for Christ. Xmas, then, is actually a Greek derivative that does not eradicate the name of Christ from Christmas. But in reality it is really a legitimate term that is used within the Greek Orthodox church.
Yuletide as a synonym for the Christmas season dates back to a pagan and then Christian period of feasting about the time of the winter solstice, December 22. The origin of yule is uncertain. One suggestion is that yule comes from the Gothic giul; or hiul, which meant "wheel." In this context, yule signifies that the sun, like a wheel, has completed its annual revolution. The Gothic ol or oel and the Anglo Saxon geol, all meaning "feast," and the Middle English yollen, "to cry aloud," have also been considered as sources for yule.
Whence the tide in Yuletide? From an Old English word meaning "time," as in Eastertide and "Time and tide wait for no man."
Among the most fascinating Christmas etymologies are those for Santa Claus and Kriss Kringle. When the Dutch came to the New World, the figure of St. Nicholas, their patron saint, was on the first ship. After the Dutch lost control of New Amsterdam, to the English in the seventeenth century, Sinterklaas (a form of St. Nikolaas) gradually became anglicized into Santa Claus and acquired some of the features of the English Father Christmas.
Father Christmas is based on a real person, St. Nicholas. Nicholas was a Christian leader from Myra (in modern-day Turkey) in the 4th century A.D. He was shy and wanted to give money to poor people anonymously. It is said that one day he climbed the roof of a house and dropped a purse of money down the chimney. It landed in a stocking that a girl had put to dry by the fire. This explains the belief that Father Christmas comes down the chimney and places gifts in children's stockings.
Kriss Kringle reflects an even more drastic change from one language to another, The Germans and German-speaking Swiss who settled in Pennsylvania in the early eighteenth century held the custom that the Christ Child, "the Christkindl," brought gifts for the children on Christmas Eve. When these Pennsylvania German (also known as Pennsylvania Dutch) communities were joined by English-speaking settlers, the Christkindl became Kriss Kringle. By the 1840s, Kriss Kringle had irretrievably taken on the identity of St. Nicholas, or Santa Claus. Slogans like "Put the Christ back in Christmas" were coined in an effort to remind people of the holiday's origin.
The word carol came from a Greek dance called a choraulein, which was accompanied by flute music. The dance later spread throughout Europe and became especially popular with the French, who replaced the flute music with singing. People originally performed carols on several occasions during the year. By the 1600s, carols involved singing only, and Christmas had become the main holiday for these songs.
Most of the carols sung today were originally composed in the 1700s and 1800s. They include "O Little Town of Bethlehem" and "Hark! The Herald Angels Sing." The words of the famous carol "Silent Night" were written on Christmas Eve in 1818 by Joseph Mohr, an Austrian priest. Franz Gruber, the organist of Mohr's church, composed the music that same night, and the carol was sung at midnight Mass. "O Holy Night" was introduced at midnight Mass in 1847. Adolphe Adam, a French composer, wrote the music. Popular nonreligious carols include "Jingle Bells" and "White Christmas."
Of the various plants associated with the Christmas season, the poinsettia possesses the most intriguing history etymologically. A Mexican legend tells of a penniless boy who presented to the Christ Child a beautiful plant with scarlet leaves that resembled the Star of Bethlehem. The Mexicans named the plant Flor de la Noche Buena, "Flower of the Holy Night," for Dr. Joel Roberts Poinsett, the first U.S. minister to Mexico, discovered the Christmas flower there in 1828 and brought it to this country, where it was named in his honor in 1836. The poinsettia has become one of the most popular of Christmas plants -- and one of the most misspelled and mispronounced (pointsettia, pointsetta, poinsetta) words in the English language.
Another botanical Christmas item is the pear tree. In the seasonal song "The Twelve Days of Christmas," have you ever wondered why the true love sends not only a partridge but an entire pear tree? That's because in the early French version of the song the suitor proffered only a partridge, which in French is rendered as une pertriz. A 1718 English version combined the two -- "a partridge, une pertriz" -- which, slightly corrupted, came out sounding like "a partridge in a pear tree." Through a process known as folk etymology, the partridge has remained proudly perched in a pear tree (une pertriz) ever since. A Merry Christ Mass and Happy Holy Days to all!
© Richard Lederer
The use of witches, ghosts and cats in Halloween celebrations originates with the Druids. The Druids were an order of priests in ancient Gaul and Britain who believed that ghosts, spirits, fairies, witches, and elves came out on Halloween to harm people. They thought that cats had once been human beings, but were changed as punishment for their evil deeds. Sharpen your pun cells now, and please join me for some spirited punnery about ghosts. The annual Halloween ball was a site for soirees. The spirit moved hundreds of specters from ghost to ghost to travel to the gala event. The spectral partygoers danced sheet to sheet to some haunting melodies and also boo-gied. They put on their boos and shocks and came up with all sorts of imaginative costumes.
One of the apparitions was dressed in red and green. He was a Christmas wraith. Another came donned a badly torn sheet. She was a holy terror. A third dressed up as a chicken and came as the poultrygeist. A fourth was in a deer costume and called himself Bamboo. Yet another costumed herself as a small hotel so she could be the inn-specter. The ghostly children came dressed up in white pillow cases and spent much of the evening playing hide and shriek and peek-a-boo.
A number of the ghosts raised their goblets of boos as ghost toasts to dampen the spirits. As they became increasingly drunk and disorderly, one of the specters observed, "Just like when he was alive working as a bicycle mechanic, the bartender got the spooks too tight."
Some of this group made overtures to females present to accompany them elsewhere. Noting this, one of the matronly chaperoning angels warned a pretty winged novice in her charge: "You may partake of the punch, or even the nectars of the bar, but stay away from the Djinn and Chthonics."
The "X-Files" staff wished to take a picture of one of the ghosts at the Halloween ball. Because the event took place during darkest night, they decided to use flash photography. The ghost agreed to have its picture taken, but the photographer couldn't get the flash to work. The spirit was willing but the flash was weak. As a result, all the "X-Files" staff was able to develop was the Prints of Darkness.
What's a ghost's favorite breakfast cereal? Ghost Toasties.Now that the ghost is clear and we've come to a dead end, I hope that your Halloween will be hallowed, not hollow.
Favorite singer: Awraitha Franklin.
Favorite song: Ghost Riders in the Sky.
Favorite daytime talk show host: Phantom of the Oprah.
Favorite children's games: Hide and shriek and peek-a-boo!
Favorite children's toy: A haunted doll house.
Favorite amusement rides: The scare-ousel and the roller ghoster.
Favorite mode of transportation: Scareplane.
© Richard Lederer
The first vampire said, "I'll have a mug of blood."
The second vampire said, "I'll have a mug of blood."
The third vampire shook his head at his companions and said, "I'll have a glass of plasma."
The barmaid called out to the bartender, "Two bloods and a blood light!"
Then they all toasted each other by shouting, "This blood's for you!"
Vampires love to drink blood because they find it thicker than water. In fact, we know a vampire who was fired as night watchman at a blood bank. They caught him drinking on the job, thus making too many unauthorized withdrawals. And he took too many coffin breaks. Long ago vampires sailed to the United States in blood vessels and set up their own terror-tories. Many of them settled in the Vampire State, and others went west and became batboys for the Colorado Rockies' Horror Picture Show. Some went on to college and earned a place in Phi Batta Cape-a. Others perfected their skills at sucking blood by attending law school.
Vampires from all over the world gather each fall deep in the forests of Transylvania to renew their commitment to their calling. Here in their neck of the woods they reverently view the scroll, written and signed in blood, that contains their history and lists their rites and responsibilities. Then, at midnight, they stand at attention and swear allegiance to the Draculation of Vein Dependence.
The most famous of all vampires is, of course, Count Dracula, the notorious neck-rophiliac. He can be a real pain in the neck, but he can get under your skin. Even if he pays for dinner, he'll still put the bite on you.
Dracula once fell in love at first fright with the girl necks door. She was six feet tall, and Dracula loves to suck up to women. But he's remained a bat-chelor his whole life because anytime he courts another vampire, they end up at each other's throats. And any mortal woman to whom Dracula is attracted soon realizes that life with him will be an unfailingly draining experience, so she's not likely to stick her neck out for him. It's hard to get a good night's sleep with him because of the terrible coffin.
Moreover, Dracula isn't a very attractive fellow, in large part because he can't see himself in the bat room mirror and so is unable to brush his teeth, comb his hair, or tie his tie. This causes bat breath and the disease Dracula fears most - tooth decay. The fiend went to the dentist to correct his bite, but he still ended up with false teeth, which for him are new-fangled devices that, like Dracula himself, come out at night.
Dracula finds his victims in any neck of the woods. Whenever the police come after him, the count simply explains that he is a law-a-biting citizen. He loves the deep plots and grave setting of a cemetery, especially when the temperature rises above 90 degrees. Dracula often sighs, "There's nothing like a cold bier on a hot day." Sometimes Dracula has to wait interminably to emerge from his coffin. To him it seems that the sun never sets on the brutish vampire.
Now it's time to say goodbye to Dracula and his batty friends: "So long, suckers!"
© Richard Lederer
TAKE THE MONEY ENRONIn the trailer for the film "Collateral Damage," the villain asks Arnold Schwarzenegger, "What's the difference between you and I?" I figure that in the film itself, Arnold will answer, "I know how to use pronoun case, but you have a tendency to hypercorrect. Big mistake," and then blow the scum away.
The difference between "lie" and "lay"
Has fallen into deep decay.
But now we know from Enron's shame
That Lay and "lie" are just the same.
-- Richard Lederer
I'll bet you've wondered why the coming attractions of movies are called "trailers," especially when they appear before the feature film begins?
Hark back, if you will, to the days (I remember them well) when movies were shown continuously in theaters and audiences were allowed to sit through multiple showings of the same movie. The start times were published, and if you came in late, you simply sat through the next showing until you arrived at the point where you came in.
The coming attractions reel would be spliced onto the end of the last reel of the movie. That's why we have a cinematic meaning for "trailer," which dates from 1928. From the perspective of the audience member who arrived on time or a little early, the coming attractions would appear before the feature, even though technically they come at the end.
Another grammar gaffe from the media comes to my attentiion through Marilyn Riley, of San Diego, who writes:
"Here it is--the worst TV grammatical error ever. As you might know, Frasier is a pompous, insecure, but basically decent psychiatrist who has taken his father, Martin, a disabled former police officer, into his home. Martin is Frasier's opposite -- a down-to-earth man with common sense and no pretensions.
"Frasier and Martin are discussing the possibility that the latter's live-in physical therapist might be moving out. Martin tells Frasier, 'I guess it's just you and I.' Frasier then responds with his trademark condescending tone, 'You and me, dad.' "So that is it. Aren't you amazed that no one on that set realized what the real mistake was?"
"Not over my dead body will they raise your taxes!" famously proclaimed George W. Bush early this year.
The Grammar Police immediately issued a moving violation ticket, cackling that the president had said the opposite of what he meant.
But let's not forget that negative constructions are remarkably unstable and ambiguous in English. We say, or even write:
© Richard Lederer
James Fenimore Cooper wrote about the life of Santa Claus. Naturally he titled it The Deer Sleigher. He could have also called it The Abdominal Snowman. On the inside cover appears a photograph of Santa taken with his North Polaroid camera.
In the pages of this expose, you'll find out that Santa's primary language is North Polish. You'll learn that Santa and Mrs. Claus live in an icicle built for two and that he loves tending his three gardens and exulting, "Hoe, hoe, hoe!"
You'll also discover that St. Nicholas is the main Claus. His wife is a relative Claus. His children are dependent Clauses. Their Dutch uncle is a restrictive Claus. As a group, they're all renoun Clauses.
Santa's elves are subordinate Clauses. As they make toys, they sing "Love Me Tender." That's why they're known as Santa's little Elvis.
They feel that all their strenuous efforts getting ready for Christmas are just like a day at the office. They do all the work, and the fat guy with the suit gets all the credit. And anytime he wishes, Santa can give them the sack.
A group of rebellious elves --along with their elf uncles and elf aunts -- have banded together to protest the terrible conditions they've been working under. They are known as the Santanistas -- and they're striving for higher elf esteem. On Christmas Eve, Santa eats a jolly roll, leaps into his sleigh, and urges his toys to hop in the sack. Santa's sleigh always comes out first because it starts in the Pole position. It also gets terrific mileage because it has long-distance runners on each side.
Kriss Kringle especially loves all his reindeer because every buck is deer to him. On the way to delivering gifts, he lets his coursers stop at the Deery Queen. For this they offer him their Santapplause and sing "There's Snow Place Like Home for the Holidays" and "Freezer Jolly Good Fellow!"
On one night before Christmas, Santa Claus's sleigh team came up one member short because of a sudden illness. An inflatable plastic reindeer was used to fill the void in the team so no one would take notice of the missing animal. Regis, Chief of Elves, asked Santa, "Is that your vinyl Prancer?"
When traveling in the sleigh in inclement weather, Santa gets icicles in his beard. Real chin chillas, those. Occasionally, cosmetics fly out of the bag and into Santa's beard, causing it to known as the beard of Avon. He sometimes removes all the bells from his sleigh and travels silently through the night. One day he hopes to win a No Bell prize.
Santa is so Santa-mental that he sometimes spends all his money on the toys that he brings to children everywhere. At those times, he's called St. Nickeless. Children all over the world await Santa's gifts, even the children of ghosts, who sing to Santa, "We'll Have a Boo Christmas Without You." After all, toys will be toys.
Santa often guides his sleigh to Cape Canaveral. We know this because A SANTA AT NASA is a palindrome -- a statement that reads the same forwards and backwards.
What's red and white and black all over? Santa Claus entering a home through a chimney. He loves sliding down chimneys because it soots him. But he actually has a fear of getting stuck. That fear is called Santa Claus-trophobia. The way to get him out of the chimney is to pour Santa Flush on him. Occasionally Santa falls down a chimney. Then he's Santa Klutz.
Then on December 26, Santa is a beat Nick.
And never forget the five ages of man:
© Richard Lederer
But when you line up proverbs that spout conflicting advice, you have to wonder if these beloved aphorisms aren’t simply personal observations masquerading as universal truths:
Quite apparently, whichever side of an argument one takes, one can usually find a proverb to support it. That’s why Miguel Cervantes wrote, “There is no proverb that is not true,” while Lady Montagu proclaimed that “general notions are generally wrong.” © Richard Lederer
I can remember rushing off to a friend's house every Tuesday night to watch Uncle Miltie's Texaco Star Theater on Tuesday nights. ("We are the men of Texaco./We work from Maine to Mexico./There's nothing like this Texaco of ours./Our show tonight is powerful./We'll wow you with an hour full/Of howls from a shower full of stars!") Ultimately our family, like so many others, purchased a small-screen (Philco) television set, primarily to laugh at Uncle Miltie's weekly antics, as we sat in the dark. Berle was single handedly responsible for the sale of millions of early sets. As he himself quipped, "My brother-in-law sold his set. My neighbor sold his set . . . "
Milton Berle was born Mendel Berlinger in New York's Harlem on July 12, 1908. He thus joined dozens of other Jewish entertainers whose original names were "Americanized."
Below are 70 Jewish names as they appeared on birth certificates. Identify the stage name that each became. The answers, which repose at the end of today's column, will sometimes surprise you. Did you know, for example, that Bronco Billy Anderson, the first cowboy movie star was born Max Aaronson or that Michael Igor Peschkowsky and Elaine Berlin transmogrify into Mike Nichols and Elaine May?
1. Abraham Isaac Arshawsky
2. Israel Baline
3. Fanny Borach
4. Nathan Birnbaum
5. Aaron Chwatt
6. Howard Cohen
7. Jacob Cohen
8. Catherine Conn
9. Issur Danielovitch
10. Michelle Dusick
11. Albert Einstein
12. Bernice Frankel
13. Jacob Jules Garfinkel
14. Lyova Geisman
15. Emmanuel Goldenberg
16. Elliot Goldstein
17. Joseph Gottlieb
18. Jason Greenspan
19. Ira Grosell
20. Melvyn Hesselberg
21.- 23. Moses, Samuel and Jerome Lester Horowitz
24. Winona Horowitz
25. Edward Israel Iskowitz
26. Leon Jacobs
27. Rosetta Jacobs
28. Sophia Kalish
29. Joseph Katz
30. Simone-Henriette Kaminker
31. David Daniel Kamisky
32. Pinkus Leff
33. Sidney Liebowitz
34. Melvin Kamisky
35. Hedwig Eva Maria Kiesler
36. Allen Stewart Konigsberg
37. David Seth Kotkin
38. Benjamin Kublesky
39. Isaiah Leopold
40. Joseph Levitch
41. Harold Lipshitz
42. Laszio Lowenstein
43. Walter Matuschanskavasky
44. David Meyer
45. Joan Sandra Molinsky
46. Alvin Morris
47. Michael Orowitz
48. Betty Joan Perske
49. Borge Rosenbaum
50. Leonard Rosenberg
51. Lyova Rosenthal
52. Paul Rubenfeld
53. Leonard Schneider
54. Shirley Schrift
55. Bernard Schwartz
56. Robert Segal
57. Fanny Rose Shore
58. Jerome Silberman
59. Howard Silverblatt
60. Belle Silverman
61. Laruschka Mischa Skikne
62. Milton Supman
63. Judith Tuvim
64. Harvey Muni Weisenfreund
65. Erich Weiss
66. Asa Yoelson
67. Bernard Zanville
68. Larry Zeigler
69. Bobby Zimmerman
70. Henry Zuckerman
Answers
1. Artie Shaw
2. Irving Berlin
3. Fanny Brice
4. George Burns
5. Red Buttons
6. Howard Cosell
7. Rodney Dangerfield
8. Kitty Carlisle
9. Kirk Douglas
10. Michele Lee
11. Albert Brooks (yes, that was his original name!)
12. Bea Arthur
13. John Garfield
14. Lee Grant
15. Edward G. Robinson
16. Elliot Gould
17. Joey Bishop
18. Jason Alexander
19. Jeff Chandler
20. Melvyn Douglas
21.-23. Moe, Shemp and Curly Howard (the Three Stooges)
24. Winona Ryder
25. Eddie Cantor
26. Lee J. Cobb
27. Piper Laurie
28. Sophie Tucker
29. Joel Grey
30. Simone Signoret
31. Danny Kaye
32. Pinky Lee
33. Steve Lawrence
34. Mel Brooks
35. Hedy Lamarr
36. Woody Allen
37. David Cooperfield
38. Jack Benny
39. Ed Wynn
40. Jerry Lewis
41. Hal Linden
42. Peter Lorre
43. Walter Matthau
44. David Janssen
45. Joan Rivers
46. Tony Martin
47. Michael Landon
48. Lauren Bacall
49. Victor Borge
50. Tony Randall
51. Lee Grant
52. Pee-Wee Herman
53. Lenny Bruce
54. Shelley Winters
55. Tony Curtis
56. Robbie Benson
57. Dinah Shore
58. Gene Wilder
59. Howard da Silva
60. Beverly Sills
61. Laurence Harvey
62. Soupy Sales
63. Judy Holliday
64. Paul Muni
65. Harry Houdini
66. Al Jolson
67. Dane Clark
68. Larry King
69. Bob Dylan
70. Buck Henry
© Richard Lederer
Love is a many-splendored thing, and so is language. How do we love thee, language? Let us count the ways. Today we'll count 16 ways that the word love hides in our words. Using the definitions below, identify each word that starts with love, that is, the letters l-o-v-e:
© Richard Lederer
Top of Page
Home