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Mick Harper
Site Admin
In: London
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It's news to me about the extent of Galician tin. That's another theory I'll have to revise. Thanks a bundle.
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Mick Harper
Site Admin
In: London
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What do you do with surplus bison in Yellowstone Park? No, you can't kill 'em. Are you kidding, these are national treasures. Here's what you do:
1. Look for an area totally unsuited to bison--semi-desert, high altitude etc.
2. And unsuited for everything else--so there won't be any local opposition to speak of.
3. It has to be big, unfenced and so devoid of life not even hunters go there.
4. You finally come up with the Henry Mountains in southern Utah.
5. You shove the bison into the backs of trucks and drive them to the Henries.
6. You let them out, making sure not to leave any feed or water to tide them over.
7. You drive off, leaving the bison to 'die of natural causes'.
Job done? You prolly noticed there's only seven points, not the statutory ten...
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Mick Harper
Site Admin
In: London
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8. The bison herd is now four hundred strong
9. The Henry Mountains are buzzing with newly arrived fauna and flora
10. There is no bison herd.
It is this last point that is of special interest to Megalithic Imperialists. Remember, these are bison that have been deliberately excluded from human contact. (The whole thing was more by way of a deliberate experiment than the way I characterised it. Full story: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7Ayj3_uVjt0 )
The original bison immediately split up and explored their range as individuals or in small units. They set about creating all kinds of new habitats by
(a) nibbling grass rather than tearing it up as, say, cattle do
(b) constantly seeking out fresh pastures rather than favouring old ones as, say, cattle do
(c) churning up the soil, thereby creating myriad micro-niches rather than having little surface effect as, say, cattle do.
In short, natural bison are a keystone species, without which all natural environments either die or require vast inputs of artificial assistance to keep alive. But bison do this--it would seem--by acting as individuals or in small groups rather than in grotesquely large herds.
What all this portends vis à vis the story given in Megalithic Empire (and in my next but one book) is something I haven't begun to grapple with. Nor, at this rate, ever will.
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Mick Harper
Site Admin
In: London
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British rivers have either lost all their salmon or numbers are down to very low levels. What's the harm? Just a few toffee-nosed gits can't fish for salmon, right?
Wrong! It turns out the entire upriver eco-system requires thousands of decomposing salmon bodies (they all die after their one spawning episode) to release shedloads of Atlantic carbon and other suchlike goodies. Not just the river itself but the trees and stuff near the river.
Come back, toffee-nosed gits, we needed you after all.
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Mick Harper
Site Admin
In: London
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| Pete wrote: | | Jesus is referred to as a 'stumbling block' in the New Testament. The Greek word used is skandalon meaning 'snare or trap'. A thing that you ought to leap over? A thing that forces you to leap over it? |
This is clearly a reference to Megalithic methods. A stumbling block is designed to halt the progress of an animal -- presumably at pace -- so that it can be taken unharmed by a waiting human. It is quite different from a snare or trap, which imprisons an animal and does not need a one-to-one operative.
This suggest the prey is particularly valuable. But how a stumbling block works I leave to others more familiar with the rural world.
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Pete Jones
Site Admin
In: Virginia
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AI sayeth:
Yes, the phrase "stumbling block" was a very common idiom in 1611, largely because it was popularized by the most famous book published that exact year: the King James Bible.
Historical Background
Coined in 1534: Scholar William Tyndale actually invented the phrase "stumbling block" when translating the New Testament.
The original Greek word: He needed a translation for the Greek word skandalon, which referred to the trigger stick of an animal trap.
Adapting for English speakers: Because 16th-century Englishmen didn't know what a skandalon was, Tyndale combined "stumble" and "block" (which meant a large tree stump) to create a visual image of tripping over a stump on a path.
Thanks for nothing, AI.
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Mick Harper
Site Admin
In: London
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Yes, this is potty.
| The phrase "stumbling block" was a very common idiom in 1611, largely because it was popularized by the most famous book published that exact year: the King James Bible. |
Could somebody point me to another common idiom that was popularised by the King James Bible? If it was common it wouldn't have needed to be popularised. Still it's good to know we have a phrase in the English language whose meaning was known to everyone in the seventeenth century but not to a living soul in the twenty-first.
| Coined in 1534: Scholar William Tyndale actually invented the phrase "stumbling block" when translating the New Testament. |
It would be interesting then to know what idiom Wycliffe used the century before. Someone look it up.
| The original Greek word: He needed a translation for the Greek word skandalon, which referred to the trigger stick of an animal trap. |
Technically nobody knows what the Classical Greeks called the trigger stick of an animal trap. We don't have a name for it in English. Is there an entomologist in the house who can tell us whether any other language has such a word.
| Adapting for English speakers: Because 16th-century Englishmen didn't know what a skandalon was, Tyndale combined "stumble" and "block" (which meant a large tree stump) to create a visual image of tripping over a stump on a path. |
What about skandalon, Mr Tyndale?
Just put 'trigger stick of an animal trap'.
We can't compare Our Lord with the trigger stick of an animal trap.
It doesn't scan.
It doesn't make any bloody sense.
What about 'a snare and a delusion'.
Poetic but not quite right.
What about a block that makes an animal stumble?
I've never heard of anything like that.
Why would you want to make an animal stumble?
What kind of an animal stumbles over a block?
Where did you get this from, Old Church Slavonic?
I had 'blockhead' and 'stumblebum' churning around in my mind and came up with 'stumbling block'.
You wanna watch it, sonny Jim. But alright we'll use it. We can't spend all day on one word, we've got the whole ruddy bible to get through before the Counter-Reformation arrives.
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Pete Jones
Site Admin
In: Virginia
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| Mick Harper wrote: | | Could somebody point me to another common idiom that was popularised by the King James Bible? |
Per the Internet: "powers that be"
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Mick Harper
Site Admin
In: London
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I'm not referring to the elevation of common words and phrases for effect. The English Bible contains hundreds of these. Comparable only to Shakespeare.
I'm talking about apparently mundane words being used as striking metaphors and then, so far falling out of favour, no-one knows what they are any longer. Like 'stumbling block', for instance. I've got several in the garden shed just in case a Jehovah's Witness quotes the verse and I can sell him one. 'Don't go. What about two for the price of one?'
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