Cacestogenous: caused by unfavourable home environment (OU)
Calepin: a notebook; a dictionary, esp a polyglot dictionary [It. calepino, named after Ambrogio Calepino ((15th-16th cent. author of a Latin dictionary]
Callisteia: beauty prizes; originally a festival held by the women of the island of Lesbos, with a prize for the fairest beauty [name of the festival , named in honour of the Greek goddess of Callisto]
Callithumpian: a noisy band parade or demonstration [alteration of gallithumpian)
Cambist: one skilled in the science of financial exchange; a banker [from L. cambire (“to exchange”)]
Cambist (source: Gumpanat/Shutterstock.com)
Campestral: pertaining to or thriving in open countryside [L. fromcampester from campus (“field”; “plain”) + -al]
Canard: a fabricated anecdote; an unfounded sensational report; a phoney yarn; a hoax — or to put it in immediately-recognisable contemporary currency…fake news [Fr. canard (“duck”), in the sense of being a hoax] 🦆
Cancrine: reads the same backwards as forwards; palindromic [From Latincancer (“crab”) + -īnus]
Canatory: pertaining to a singer or singing [from It. cantata from L. cantare (“to sing”) + -ory] (cf. Cantatrice: female singer) 🎤
Caprine: pertaining to a goat; goat-like [L. caprīnus, from caper (“goat”)] 🐐
Carriwitchet: absurd, riddling question; a condundrum; a kind of hoax; pun [uncertain, possibly a humorous alteration of catechism]
Castrophenia: the belief that one’s thoughts are being stolen by one’s enemies (OU, castro- kastron-(?))
Catholicon: a universal remedy or fix; panacea [Gk. katholikós, (“universal”), from katá, “(according to”) + –hólos, “(whole”)]
Charientism: a figure of speech wherein an insult is disguised as or softened by a jest [from Gk. kharientismós]
Chimera: (also spelt Chimaera) imaginary monster; fanciful; impossible idea; a body; an unjustified fear [from Greek mythology: a fire-breathing she-monster having a lion’s head, a goat’s body, and a serpent’s tail]
Chimera (image: oldworldgods.com)
Circumforaneous: wandering from house to house, from place to place, from market to market [L. circumforāneus (“itinerant”), from circum- (“around”) + –forum (“marketplace”) + -aneus (“-aneous”)]
Claudicant: (Medic.) limping (L. claudicans from claudio (“to limp”) from claudus (“crippled”)]
Claudicant: I, Claudius?
Claviger: club-bearer; key-keeper or caretaker [L. from clavi- (“clavi”) – + -ger (“bearing, bearer”)] 🔑
Comiconomenclaturist: a connoisseur of humorous names; a specialist in the creation of funny names [from L. comicus (“of comedy”) from Gk. komikos (“of or pertaining to comedy”) + L. nōmenclātūra nomenclature (“naming”) + -ist]
Turnverein (Pl. “Turnvereine”) from German: turnen (“to practice gymnastics”) + –verein (“club” or “union”)
𖥠𖥠𖥠𖥠𖥠
The earnest pursuit or physical exercise and a healthy lifestyle isn’t the first thing you think of in regard to fast-foodified, modern America and Americans. But it was the case for many German-Americans in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. These immigrants and sons and daughters of immigrants formed themselves into Turnvereins (German gymnastic/athletic clubs) in the US which, inspired by pioneering early 19th century Prussian physical educationalist and nationalist, JFLC ‘Vater’ Jahn (“the Father of Gymnastics”), promoted physical culture, German cultural traditions, freethinking and liberal politics1⃞.
Cincinnati Turners, 1909 (source: Indiana University Library)
The members of these Turnvereins, known as “Turners”, played leading roles in sponsoring gymnastics as an American sport and a subject for school, helping to popularise physical exercise and callisthenics as a way of life. Turner gymnastics, the centerpiece of the societies’ activity, comprised distinctive calisthenics routines and apparatus exercises which emphasised masculine strength and agility [‘Milwaukee Turners’, Encyclopedia of Milwaukee, https://emke.uwm.edu]. The Turners’ clubs and associations (Vereininigte Turnvereins Nordamerika) spread out from the Ohio Valley throughout the US. At one point, around 1894, Turnerism reached its zenith with 317 societies and approximately 40,000 members. The Turnvereins performed a multi-functional purpose, aside from the physical activities they fulfilled a social role for recent arrivals from Germany, helping them to integrate into their new home while facilitating the retention of German culture (the societies’ halls (Turnhalles) were havens for social get-togethers). In so doing the Turners fostered a form of group solidarity among German-Americans by preserving their ethnic culture and identity [Annette R. Hofmann, ‘The American Turners: their past and present, Revista Brasileira de Ciências do Esporte’, Volume 37, Issue 2, 2015, Pages 119-127, ISSN 0101-3289, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.rbce.2014.11.020.]
Central Turner Hall, Cincinnati, Oh.
The Turner societies were politically progressive, supporting the liberal brand of Republicanism in the 1850s and 60s.2⃞. Turners were strong abolitionists, both antebellum and during the Civil War, when many of the members fought for the Union side. Later, the Turnen associations embraced homegrown causes in the US such as the struggle to achieve women’s suffrage and equality3⃞ and workers’ rights under capitalism; in the interwar years the Turnvereins were vocal in their opposition to the rise of fascism and Nazism in Europe [‘The Milwaukee Turners at Turner Hall’, www.milwaukeeturners.org).
Milwaukee Turners (source: Encyclopedia of Milwaukee)
By the early 20th century the Turnverein impulse in America was losing its intensity, partly this was generational, the American-born Germans were increasingly less fluent in German and more attuned with the mainstream US culture. The associations were less radical and socialist and more conservative in their outlook and American government WWI hostility to Germany and Germans and Prohibition in the decade-plus after it were factors that further undermined Turner solidarity. The pull of assimilation and an inevitable “Americanisation” process severely weakened the cultural affinity with things Germans within the associations and the number of Turner societies dropped off dramatically from the 1920s on 4⃞ (Hofmann).
Today, the Turnen movement in America—massively diminished in size and influence with the number of active clubs having plummeted to under 50—and shorn both of its political activism and its Teutonic focus, maintains its existence as gymnastics (and other sports) clubs and social associations, while espousing the motto “a sound mind in a sound body” and still advocating the core virtues of physical fitness and exercise.
100th anniversary of Baltimore Turners (source: Indiana Memory Hosted Digital Collections)
Endnote: while the gym and physical fitness remains central to the societies’ ethos, the modern American Turner clubs have diversified their repertoire of group activities beyond the exclusive practice of gymnastics. The Riverside Turners (New Jersey) for instance offers a range of activities including darts, shuffleboard, horseshoes, basketball and golf, while the Milwaukee Turners provide members looking for something more challenging with rock and ice climbing walls.
Photo: Facebook, Milwaukee Turners
1⃞ unfortunately Jahn’s training regimen which tended towards the militaristic had a downside…it also directly influenced the Nazis and the Hitler Youth movement of the following century [‘A History of Gymnastics, From Ancient Greece to Tokyo 2020’, Meilan Solly, Smithsonian Magazine, 26-July-2021, www.smithsonianmag.com]
2⃞ in the 1850s the Turners found themselves in bitter conflict with the short-lived, nativist “Know-Nothing” party
3⃞ which contrasts starkly with the record of gender exclusion within the Turnen societies themselves…women were firmly ensconced in a subordinate role as the Turnvereins remained male preserves right up to recent times
4⃞ German culture was submerged under “Apple pie Americanism” with German references in the organisation’s names such as Demokratischer Turnerbund shelved…from 1938 the national movement officially and permanently became “American Turners”
Gladiator: Gladiatorius, from the Latin, gladius (“sword”)
We’ve all see gladiator movies, right? And most of us have probably seen either the eponymous Gladiator or its celluloid forebear Spartacus, or some inferior version of the cinematic sub-genre. A bunch of armed desperados fighting for their lives in the arena for the pleasure of Caesar and co. On the screen gladiators all seem much of a muchness with some variations of weaponry, but it may surprise some to discover that contrary to the world of movies, in reality there were a whole host of different types or classes of gladiatorial warriors plying their brutal and perilous trade in Ancient Rome.
Spartacus (1960)
The first record of gladiatorial contests in antiquity dates to 264BC and there’s some evidence that the Etruscans were forerunners to the Romans in this combative pastime. By the time of the opening of Rome’s Colosseum (80AD) the gladiatorial games (Munera gladiatoriaⓐ) were a serious business, with prize money and betting on matches the norm. Gladiators served a two-year internship with one of four special arena-schools (ludus) that specialised in training new gladiators of different types. With the fights strict rules and etiquette applied in the arena (pompa), and careful planning went into the bouts. The organisers sought to put on strategic contests with well-matched opponents…these promotions were above all entertainments, and no one involved with the promotions wanted them to end too quicklyⓑ.
Let’s look first at the types of gladiators that we’re probably most familiar with thanks to Hollywood, Cinecittà, etc. before moving on to other ones that film-makers didn’t bother to research. Moviegoers will recognise the lightly-armoured gladiator wearing a manica (arm guard) who fights with a weighted net (rete), dagger (pugio) and three-pointed trident (fuscina or tridens), trying to ensnare his sword-wielding opponent within his net and skewer him. The movies are not big on the typology of gladiators, tending to lump them altogether under the generic name, but this arena net-fighter in the Roman world—resembling and modelled on a fisherman—was called a Retiarus (pl: Retiarii). It would be very unusual for a Retiarus to fight another Retiarus, gladiators of the same class did not normally fight each otherⓒ, it was much more interesting to see a gladiator tests his skill and weapons against an opponent with a distinctly different set of weaponry. In particular Romans were fascinated by the prospect of a lightly-armed gladiator and a heavily-armed gladiator going head-to-head, the former testing his speed and agility against the skill and precision of the latter (Marlee Miller).
Retiarius (Lower right)
Secutor (Bas-relief with secutores. National Museum of Rome, Baths of Diocletian, Rome. 2nd-3rd century AD)
Symbolic battle of the sea The Retiarus would usually be matched, for contrast, against a heavily armed gladiator with a helmet, long sword and shield. This was the Secutor (“follower” or “chaser”)ⓓ or the similar Murmillo. The Secutor held a scutum (large oblong shield) and gladius (short sword, 64-81cm in length) with protection on his right arm and left leg. The full-visor helmet worn by both the Secutor and the Murmillo had a fish-like appearance, imbuing the Retiarus v Secutor/Murmillo contest with the symbolism of a battle between angler and fishⓔ.
Murmillo: Murmillo stands triumphant, in a 4th century CE mosiac from Torrenova, Southern Italy. (Source: Corbis / Getty Images)
The Retiarus seems to have provided the inspiration for another entrapment style of gladiator, the Laquerius (= “snarer”). Laquerii pursued a similar strategy and tactics as the net-man but used a lasso or noose to catch and subdue his opponent. The “snarer” in the illustration below is armed with a trident though his usual weapon would be a poniard or sword. The Veles (= “skirmisher”), armed with a spear, sword and parmula shield, was another lower-level gladiator with a similarly indirect style of fighting.
Laquerius: “The Snarer” (image: escenarys.com)
Barbarian vs Greco-RomanThe Thraex (Thracian) gladiator was a bit of a variation on the Secutor theme…entire head enclosed in a broad-rimmed helmet, a parmula shield (small, circular, lighter but still made of steel), armoured greaves (leg guards) and a Thracian short curved sword (a sica) about 34cm-long. The Thraex was usually up against the Hoplomachus (so-named for his equipment which resembled the Greek hoplite soldier), whereas the Murmilloⓕ tended to be matched with both. The Hoplomachus (“armoured fighter”) wore heavy protective gear and a bronze helmet and was armed with a small concave shield, sword and spear (hasta).
Proto-gladiator The Samnite gladiator (from Samnium in southern Italy), thought to be the first type of Roman arena fighter, was the prototype of the Secutor, Murmillo, etc., with similar apparel and weaponry, short sword, rectangular shield and rimmed helmet. The Samnite was very popular during the Roman Republic, but when Samnium became an important ally of Rome under Augustus, the Samnites stopped featuring in the contests.
Scissor (Tombstone bas-relief to Scissor Muron. Louvre Museum, Paris. 1st–2nd century AD)
There was also the gladiator types who used an unusual weapon, the Scissor…his fighting instrument had two parts, a long tube that protects the gladiator’s arm, and at its end, a thin cylindrical pipe with a crescent-shaped blade. Scissores were often pitted against Retiarii, which could be to his advantage if he could get close enough to cut his opponent’s net with the pincer movement of his open scissors. Another, minor type of gladiator, the Arbelas, utilised a weapon, the Arbelos, which resembled a cobbler’s semi-circular blade.
Gladiator vs the animal kingdomTwo very different types of gladiators shared the arena with captured animals. One type, called Bestiarii (“beast-fighters”) fought wild animals like lions, leopards and bears in the amphitheatres, but with the odds massively stacked against them. As condemned criminals or prisoners-of-war they were basically “thrown at the beasts as punishment or spectacle”, most with nil chance of survival (Encyclopedia Romana). The second, the Venatores (“hunters”) were much more fortunate, they were fully armed and got to hunt down an assortment of beasts.
Venator vs leopard: Roman mosaic, Galleria Borghese, Roma, 4th century AD. (source: Henry Yad Henry/Pinterest)
The Dimachaerus (Greek for “bearing two knives”) fought their opponents (often the Hoplomachus) using two swords (usually a pair of curved scimitars). These ambidextrous gladiators were considered by the elite and the people alike as having low prestige, due to the general disapproval of their method of fighting and reliance on dual weaponry (the sica), which the Roman populace considered sneaky (‘The Roman Guy”).
Other gladiator classes tended to be even more bizarrely left-field – the Andabata gladiator was drawn from the noxii (criminals who had been sentenced to death in the arena). These unfortunates armed with a gladius were forced to fight blindfolded (ie, they wore a helmet which was devoid of any aperture rendering them effectively sightless). The Essendarius romped spectacularly into the arena aboard a war chariot (called an essendum), but whether he immediately dismounted and fought on foot or initially from the chariot is a matter of speculation. The Cestus seems more boxer than gladiator, he had no body armour and his only weapon was a padded glove containing pieces of iron, blades and spikes. The Bustuarius (= “tomb-fighter”) fought not in the arena but about the funeral pyre as part of the ceremony honouring the newly deceased. Accordingly he was given even lower status than other gladiators.
The Crupellarius was a kind of despised apprentice gladiator. He fought weighed down by heavy armour that comprised a “bulky continuous shell of iron”. Historian Tacitus described the Crupellarii “as a contingent of Gaulish, slave, trainee gladiators”, adding that “they were too clumsy for offensive purposes but impregnable in defence” (Book III, 43, 46 in The Annals of Tacitus, Loeb, 1931).
Stone tablet of a pair of gladiatrices (Photo: De Agostini/Getty Images)
Women’s place in the arena?: Did the Gladiatrix (woman gladiator) exist in the ancient world? Yes! It was very rare and typically met with male censure but there was some Roman gladiatrices who were active in the sport. Sources for the gladiatrix are very threadbare however…historian Cassius Dio makes reference to Emperor Titus permitting female gladiators to perform but on the proviso they were of “acceptably low class”ⓖ (there is however some evidence of elite women, as well as from other classes of Roman society, participating as gladiatrices including as Venatrixes from the 1st century BC). Where they did take part in amphitheatre fights a gladiatrix fought against her own sex – with the single exception mentioned by Cassius Dio, that Emperor Domitian staged night games which pitted gladiatrices against dwarfs.
Sideshow to the main event Gladiatorial combats in the Colosseum, like Shakespeare’s Tragedies, were deadly serious affairs, but like the Tragedies it was considered prudent to include an outlet for comic relief. In the pompa this was provided by performances by the Paegniarii, pseudo-gladiator entertainers who fought “burlesque duels” with blunted or mock weapons, especially during the midday break (‘List of Roman Gladiator Types”). The appearance of dwarf (pumilus) gladiators in the amphitheatres were probably also part of the light entertainment fare for the spectators.
Editor: this was the producer who financed or sponsored the gladiatorial spectacles
Lanista (manager): the owner-trainer of a troop of gladiators (known as a familia); involved active player in the trade of slave-gladiators; rented gladiators to the editor for contest events
Lorarius: an attendant who whipped reluctant combatants or animals into fighting
Rudis: the referee; a senior referee was called summa rudis
𖡒 𖡒 𖡒 𖡒 𖡒
A gladiator who won his freedom was awarded a rudis (“wooden sword”) and was known accordingly as a Rudiarius. Some retired gladiators became trainers or Doctores (“instructors”), assistants or referees. Some gladiators or ex-gladiators hired themselves out as bodyguards for wealthy and important Romans.
Gladiator Mosaic (Panel 4) from Torrenova, Southern Italy
Gladiator movies’ legacy of lingering myths If you were to rely solely on English and Italian language gladiator movies as a representation of historical accuracy you would come to certain conclusions. One would be that all of the arena fighters seemed to be infames, eithercriminals or enslaved “barbarian” prisoners-of-war who were pressed into the profession against their will. Initially this was the case, however by the end of the Roman Republic the demographics had shifted to the extent that volunteer gladiators, known as Auctoritas, comprised half of the amphitheatre fighters (Encyclopedia Romana)ⓗ. A second conclusion to draw from viewing examples of the sub-genre on screen is that gladiators fought to the death and therefore there was a high casualty rate in the arena. The reality was quite different. Sine missio (👎🏼 no mercy given) contests were rare, it was much more common occurrence for bouts to end with a missio outcome (👍🏼 mercy granted). Often economics rather than compassion swayed the outcome, gladiators were a very valuable commodity to the editor/owner and the rich and powerful had a vested interest in protecting their investment (Miller). Historians vary in their estimates of the numbers who died as a result of the combats but the concensusis that it was low. According to Suetonius(Life of Nero, XII. 1), in one full year in Nero’s Campus Martius amphitheatre no one died. It needs to be remembered that the Rome’s gladiatorial games constitutedonly a small window of the year, about 10 to 12 days and that most gladiators only fought about twice in that period (Encyclopedia Romana), which in itself would limit the death toll.
Secutor vs Retiarius (illustration source: forums.taleworlds.com/)
ⓐ Munera gladiatoria was part of the system that required Roman citizens of high status and wealth to provide public works and entertainment for the pleasure of the Rōmānī people
ⓑ for the combatants too, there was no virtue perceived in easily defeating a weaker opponent (Encyclopedia Romana)
ⓒ an exception to this was the Provocator (= “challenger”) who wore heavy legionary armature and fought other Provocatores
ⓓ the Secutor was so named because he would pursue the lightly armed Retiarus – from sequor (“I follow, come or go after”)
ⓔ Retiarii tended to be derided as a type of gladiator—they were seen as an effeminate (low) class because of their indirect fighting style—the net-man was described derogatorily as Retiarius tunicatus (“tunic”), despite the fact that he was one of the most successful gladiators in the arena
ⓕ introduced to replace the Gallus, “barbarian” prisoner-gladiators from Gaul
ⓖ that many Romans thought the gladiatorial profession was suitable only for the lower, especially criminal (infames), classes, is a recurring theme, notwithstanding this some middle-upper class citizens did fight in the arena. Known as Eques, these lightly-armoured knights fought on horseback but were only permitted to pit their skills against other members of the Eques
ⓗ even one Roman emperor, the egocentric Commodus, “volunteered” to participate in the Colosseum gladiatorial combats as a Secutor (and Venator) sparking widespread disapproval among Romans
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Reference materials, articles and blogs consulted
‘Types of Gladiators That Fought In The Colosseum’, The Roman Guy, www.theromanguy.com
‘The Roman Gladiator’, Encyclopedia Romana, http://penelope.uchicago.edu
‘Gladiators: Types and Training’, Marlee Miller, The Met, August 2023, www.metmuseum.org
‘5 Famous Ancient Roman Gladiators’, Michael Waters, History, Upd. 07-Jun-2023, www.history.com
‘The Roman Scissor: Gladiator, Weapon, or…? (AKA: Return of the Arbelos’, (Alessandro Bettinsoli), Eleggo.Net, 18-Dec-2016, www.eleggo.net
With hundreds and hundreds of feature films being churned out of Hollywood every year, I suppose it shouldn’t surprise too much when two separate and unrelated production companies find themselves working on a version of the same thing. Nonetheless it does seem something of an oddity, or at least a novelty, when it does occur, which isn’t very often in cinema history.
Source: pastposters.com
At least three instances of identical subjects being simultaneously made into features spring to mind. Who doesn’t know that the mythical or semi-mythical (depending on your point of view) English hero of Medieval fable and legend, Robin Hood, has been the subject of American and British feature films almost too many times to count? Ever since the early days of silent movies the silver screen (and later the TV screen) has been awash with iterations of Robin and his Lincoln green-daubed coterie of “Merry Men” locking horns with the Sheriff of Nottingham, Sir Guy of Gisborne and other assorted knaves and villains. But in the year 1991 moviegoers got two Robin Hood sagas🄰 to choose from, a big budget Hollywood number, Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves with Kevin Costner in the eponymous role. In a film stolen by Alan Rickman’s outrageously over-the-top, campy Sheriff of Nottingham🄱, apple pie American Costner’s non-attempt as an appropriate English accent was a talking point of the film. The behind-the-scenes scuttlebutt was that his initial plan to try to pull off a passable English accent was vetoed by the director (‘Actors who gave up on accents halfway through a movie’, Ben Falk, Yahoo, 13-Nov-2020, www.uk.movies.yahoo.com).
Flashy ‘Prince of Thieves’ vs gritty, shadowy ‘Robin Hood’
The other 1991 RH vehicle, simply entitled Robin Hood, a UK production, was a smaller scale, more modest affair than ‘Prince of Thieves’. The two filmic versions—Hollywood vs Britain, Kevin Costner vs Patrick Bergin—were expected to go head-to-head in a battle at the box-office, but this was averted when the producers of the UK Robin Hood decided to send their version straight to cable (Fox) TV.
A surprising lack of rivalry existed between the two concurrently-working production teams. Because a number of the shoot locations were reasonably close to each other (Buckinghamshire, Cheshire, West Yorkshire, North Wales) there was a good bit of collaboration, eg, crew swaps between each movie’s SFX and stunt teams (‘The Surprise Cooperation between 1991’s two Robin Hood films’, Dan Cooper, Film Stories, 09-Apr-2021, www.filmstories.co.uk).
🏹 🏹 🏹
𝔻𝕦𝕖𝕝𝕝𝕚𝕟𝕘 ℍ𝕒𝕣𝕝𝕠𝕨𝕤: ℂ𝕒𝕣𝕠𝕝 𝕧 ℂ𝕒𝕣𝕣𝕠𝕝𝕝
𓃯𓃯𓃯
Two films about Hollywood’s original “Platinum Blonde”
1965 saw the release of two biopics about Jean Harlow, star Hollywood actress and screen sex symbol of the 1930s, both were titled simply Harlow. The first, a Magna Distribution Corp TV biopic starred Carol Lynley in the titular role and the second, from Paramount released five weeks later with a budget more than double. Carroll Baker played the Thirties sex siren. Magna and Paramount subsequently countersued each other alleging unfair competition. Both movies were critical and box office failures with nary a good word to say by anyone about either of them…DVD Talk summed them up as “two smutty movies” with little resemblance to the real Jean Harlow (‘Harlow (1965) v Harlow (1965)’, www.realtoldmovies.blogspot.com).
𓃭𓃭𓃭
Dual Doomsday message
The third concurrent double act on the screen has the most interesting relationship. In 1964 Hollywood made two Cold War-inspired films with a storyline about the US military launching a Doomsday bomb aimed at the Soviet Union. The tones of the respective movies are diametrically opposite however, Dr Strangelove is a farce and satire, comically lampooning the absurdity of the global nuclear standoff, whereas Fail Safe is a grimly serious dramatic thriller which plays it very straight. Dr Strangelove director Stanley Kubrick was alarmed to discover that Sidney Lumet was making a near identical movie…so concerned was Kubrick that Fail Safe with its similar content might undermine his pet project he got the production company Columbia Pictures to buy the distribution rights to Lumet’s film in order to delay its release for nine months. The wash-up from this head-start was that Dr Strangelove did far better business at the box office than the similarly themed Fail Safe and is the much better-known of the two movies today.
Images: Columbia Pictures
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🄰 there were actually three Robin Hoods in the works simultaneously at that time. The third RH intended to have Liam Neeson in the role ended up being canned prior to production starting
🄱 as one critic summed it up, “While Costner had been robbing from the rich, Rickman had been stealing the movie“, ‘Behind-the-scenes trouble during ”Robin Hood”’, Garth Pearce, Entertainment Weekly, 21-Jun-1991, www.ew.com
