History: the Ultimate Fandom

Black and British: A Forgotten History 

- Neck of a snake

- body of a leopard

- haunches of a lion

- feet off a hart (deer)

So is it

Or….

This was a general central/northeastern Europe thing. The original Indo-European root for bear seems to be *h2rktos, which gives us ursus in Latin, arktos in Greek, and arth in Welsh. (Plus the name Arthur.)

So you would expect, knowing a thing about the neogrammarian principle, that the Proto-Germanic word ought to be *urhtaz, the Proto-Balto-Slavic word *irktas. But what we actually see is that in Germanic languages, the word for bear derives from the same word as brown; in Baltic languages, a word related to “hairy, shaggy”; and in Slavic, some variation on medu-ed, “honey-eater.”

Meanwhile, the Proto-Finnic word for bear, karhu, is either the PIE *h2rktos borrowed, or a Proto-Uralic word meaning “rough, coarse.” The same is true of other non-PIE languages in the region, like Estonian, Karelian, etc.

In other words, these people were so fucking scared of bears that they didn’t even dare say the word bear. They used euphemisms – “the brown one, the honey-eater, the shaggy boy” – until those euphemisms just because the word for bear, and the original word was lost. (Interestingly, the Sanskirt reflex of *h2rktos is rakshas, so that word itself might’ve been a euphemism – “the Destroyer” – replacing an even older word for bears.)

Bears were fucking scary if you lived in northern Europe, guys.

the idea that thousands of people are calling alexander hamilton a slut

calling any founding father a slut

the idea that people are SHAMING Alexander Hamilton for being Such A Slut he is being SHAMED for being such a naughty little tart, SPREADING HIS LEGS FOR EVERYONE IN CONGRESS

that this was probably prompted by people expression dissaproval for Alexander Hamilton cheating on his wife - that the OP thinks “slut shaming” and “Isnt it gross that he cheated on his wife” are the same thing

Alexander Hamilton has been dead for 210

210 slutty, slutty years

the way that this is presented in such a CHECKMATE SJWS way when they’re talking about a founding father who cheated on his wife and has been DEAD FOR 210 YEARS

the fact that the words “Slutshaming” and “Alexander Hamilton” have been used in the same sentence

i mean just apply what we’d traditionally think of as “slut shaming” to Alexander Hamilton.

His frock coat is too tight, his breaches are so short, have you SEEN how often he powders his wig??? I heard he gave Thomas Jefferson a handy behind the stables AND that he got fingered by John Hancock

Since then, I’ve gotten a new job (not an amazing job, but they treat me better), and now I actually make London Living Wage! Which should be amazing! I should be able to (just barely) pay my way! 

Except here’s the thing. 

I’ve been living in London for 3 years, and have not worked a London Living Wage job this entire time. Before I moved here, I took out a credit card knowing I would have this problem. My credit card limit was $12,000. 

In these three years of needing to use credit in order to survive, I’ve amounted so much credit card debt that I have about $120 left in credit. out of $12,000. Because of this, I owe around $300 every month just to get past the minimum (most of which is fees). Which of course means that that’s around 225 GBP from my just livable paycheck each month that goes to paying my credit card MINIMUM, which is 225 GBP I don’t have, which basically is the difference between my previous job and my current one, maybe a little more?  Then of course because it’s a vicious cycle I end up needing to use my credit card because I have no money, and the cycle continues.

I need to get out of this cycle. If I can get out of this cycle, then I can actually start paying the real people whom I owe money to back, can put myself back together. If I can lower my minimum down to something manageable, I won’t have to pay that horrid amount every month and I can actually start paying it off myself. 

So this is where I ask y’all for help again. Here’s a link to my paypal.me. Every little bit counts, and any help I get will go straight into my credit card debt. If anyone can offer anything it would mean the world to me. 

broadway antique market

If I were before your face I would like to shake hands with you, for I feel that I would like you. I would like to call you Comrade and to talk to you as men who are not poets do not often talk. I think that at first a man would be ashamed, for a man cannot in a moment break the habit of comparative reticence that has become a second nature to him; but I know I would not long be ashamed to be natural before you. You are a true man, and I would like to be one myself, and so I would be towards you as a brother and as a pupil to his master. In this age no man becomes worthy of the name without an effort. You have shaken off the shackles and your wings are free. I have the shackles on my shoulders still—but I have no wings.

[…]

If you care to know who it is that writes this, my name is Abraham Stoker (Junior). My friends call me Bram. I live at 43 Harcourt St., Dublin. I am a clerk in the service of the Crown on a small salary. I am twenty-four years old. Have been champion at our athletic sports (Trinity College, Dublin) and have won about a dozen cups. I have also been President of the College Philosophical Society and an art and theatrical critic of a daily paper. I am six feet two inches high and twelve stone weight naked and used to be forty-one or forty-two inches round the chest. I am ugly but strong and determined and have a large bump over my eyebrows. I have a heavy jaw and a big mouth and thick lips—sensitive nostrils—a snubnose and straight hair. I am equal in temper and cool in disposition and have a large amount of self control and am naturally secretive to the world. I take a delight in letting people I don’t like—people of mean or cruel or sneaking or cowardly disposition—see the worst side of me. I have a large number of acquaintances and some five or six friends—all of which latter body care much for me.

[…]

It is vain for me to try to quote any instances of what thoughts of yours I like best—for I like them all and you must feel that you are reading the true words of one who feels with you. You see, I have called you by your name. I have been more candid with you—have said more about myself to you than I have ever said to any one before. You will not be angry with me if you have read so far. You will not laugh at me for writing this to you. It was with no small effort that I began to write and I feel reluctant to stop, but I must not tire you any more. If you ever would care to have more you can imagine, for you have a great heart, how much pleasure it would be to me to write more to you. How sweet a thing it is for a strong healthy man with a woman’s eyes and a child’s wishes to feel that he can speak so to a man who can be if he wishes father, and brother and wife to his soul. I don’t think you will laugh, Walt Whitman, nor despise me, but at all events I thank you for all the love and sympathy you have given me in common with my kind.

Three weeks later–which, considering the speed of transatlantic mail at the time, pretty much means immediately–Walt Whitman wrote back. He had, at the time, been recovering from a paralytic stroke three years earlier that had left him, in his own words, “entirely shattered—doubtless permanently, from paralysis and other ailments,” but he still found the time to respond with a much briefer but still very affectionate letter, the opening paragraph of which read as follows:

My dear young man, Your letters have been most welcome to me—welcome to me as Person and as Author—I don’t know which most—You did well to write me so unconventionally, so fresh, so manly, and so affectionately, too. I too hope (though it is not probable) that we shall one day meet each other. Meantime I send you my friendship and thanks.

[letter source]

Despite Whitman’s parenthetical remark about the improbability of meeting, Stoker did eventually manage to call on Whitman a couple of times some years later, and expressed that 

I found him all that I had ever dreamed of, or wished for in him: large-minded, broad-viewed, tolerant to the last degree; incarnate sympathy; understanding with an insight that seemed more than human.

WWII —- Indian pilots who flew Birmingham built Spitfires during The Battle of Britain