[lit-ideas] The Philosophy of Handkerchiefs
- From: "" <dmarc-noreply@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> (Redacted sender "Jlsperanza@xxxxxxx" for DMARC)
- To: lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
- Date: Thu, 22 Jan 2015 07:06:07 -0500
In a message dated 1/21/2015 6:47:56 P.M. Eastern Standard Time,
profdritchie@xxxxxxxxx writes:
The shape of hankies, BTW, according to the not-very-reliable Lilian
Eichler (Customs of Mankind), was decreed by Louis XVI on June 2, 1785,
supposedly at the request of Marie Antoinette. She thought square was, "more
convenient." More convenient than what? A hankie with a hole in the middle?
One in the shape of a Venn diagram? The crotchet or quaver-shaped hankie?
I think this proves only that comparatives without points of
reference--"the new Jeep Macho is bigger, better, buffer"--are not new.
The test here seems Meinongian.
He said, "They say squares are square; therefore, I deem a 'round square'
something that _is_, but does not _exist_." The existence of Meinongian
objects constitutes what Grice calls a 'Meinongian jungle'.
The attesting, in Google, of phrases like "triangular handkerchief" (a),
"rectangular handkerchief" (b), and "round handkerchief" (c), proves that
Marie Antoinette was being facetious.
(a)
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But of course no etymythological query can be resolved "until we get to the
root of it", as Geary puts it, where he uses 'root' linguistically.
The English handkerchief is first attested in 1520, and it obviously
derives from from "hand" and "kerchief", "cloth for covering the head."
Thus it is, as Geary puts it (in "Linguistic Notes On "This" and "That"):
"a one-word contradiction in terms", or oxymoron, for short. "The fact that
the French are usually deemed ultrarational has nothing to do with the fact
that they often incur in the occasional solecism, malaprop, or
'contradictio in terms'").
"What is particularly ironic, from a historic point of view," Geary
continues, "is that Marie Antoinette was so obsessed with this piece of
head-covering apparel, seeing that she lost it" (He implicates the head, _her_
head).
By-form handkercher was in use 16c.-19c. A dropped handkerchief as a token
of flirtation or courtship is attested by mid-18c. A picked-up handkerchief
that has been dropped is the counterpart of that token of flirtation. Cfr.
the dropping of a glove which is not a token of flirtation but of being
offended.
The root here, as Geary notes, is the "kerchief" ("never mind the confusing
affix 'hand-"), early 13c.. In fact, it is short for "kovrechief", a
piece of cloth used to cover part of the head," especially a woman's headcloth
or veil, from Anglo-French courchief, Old French couvrechief, literally
"cover head," from couvrir "to cover" (see cover (v.)) + chief "head" (see
chief).
We expect that Marie Antoinette KNEW all this since she spoke a form of
modern Anglo-French -- and the fact that she implicated all this to her
husband can only be taken as an _otiose_ 'conversation piece', as the French
call
it.
From late 14c. as "piece of cloth used about the person" generally, and
from c.1400 as "piece of cloth carried in the hand" to wipe the face, etc.,
"handkerchief."
The Cockneys have solved the problem by what they call 'truncation',
referring to the thing as a 'hanky', and thus getting rid, as Antoinette
eventually did too, for more tragical reasons, of the 'chief' or 'head'.
Cheers,
Speranza
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