Conference 7.286::humor

922.0. "The Finger" by METALX::SWANSON () Fri Jan 24 1997 10:37

    Somebody sent me this...
    
    
 Historical and Etymological Origins of an Infamous Anglo-Saxon Gesture
 
 The 'Car Talk' show (on NPR) with Click and Clack, the Tappet Brothers
 have a feature called the 'Puzzler', and their most recent 'Puzzler'
 was about the Battle of Agincourt.  The French, who were overwhelmingly
 favored to win  the battle, threatened to cut a certain body part off
 of all captured English soldiers so that they could never fight again.
 The English won in a major upset and waved the body part in question at
 the French in defiance.  The  puzzler was:  What was this body part?  This
 is the answer submitted by a listener:
 
            Dear Click and Clack,
 
 Thank you for the Agincourt 'Puzzler', which clears up some profound
 questions of etymology, folklore and emotional symbolism.  The body
 part which the French proposed to cut off of the English after defeating
 them was, of  course, the middle finger, without which it is impossible to
 draw the renowned  English longbow.
 
 This famous weapon was made of the native English yew tree,  and so
 the act of drawing the longbow was known as "plucking yew".
 Thus, when  the victorious English waved their middle fingers at the
 defeated French, they  said, "See, we can still pluck yew!  PLUCK YEW!"
    
 Over the years some 'folk etymologies' have grown up around this
 symbolic gesture.  Since 'pluck yew' is rather difficult to say (like
 "pleasant mother pheasant plucker", which is who you had to go to for
 the feathers used on the arrows), the difficult consonant cluster at
 the beginning has gradually changed to a labiodental fricative 'f', and
 thus the words often used in conjunction with the one-finger-salute are
 mistakenly thought to  have something to do with an intimate
 encounter.
 It is also because of the  pheasant feathers on the arrows that the
 symbolic gesture is known as "giving  the bird".
 And yew all thought yew knew everything!