An Assemblage of Grandiose and Bombastic Grandiloquents

Ahoy, my sea whisperers, and welcome back! Today we go to the depths of the Arctic seas, to explore a creature both mystical and beautiful - sometimes referred to as the sea unicorn, today’s word is: narwhal.A narwhal is a type of whale found in Canadian Arctic, Greenlandian, and Russian waters, that is distinctive due to the tusk that protrudes from its head. It is, in fact, a canine tooth that projects from the left side of the upper jaw, through the lip, and forms a left-handed helix spiral. The tusk is found in around fifteen percent of female narwhals but is far less common. It has been deduced that the tusk has no critical function, as females live to be the same age or longer, but proposed functions include use of the tusk as a weapon, for opening breathing holes in sea ice, in feeding, and as an acoustic organ. They have been known to dive as deep as 800 meters up to fifteen times a day, and have been recorded diving as deep as 1500 meters, one of the deepest known dives of all marine animals. Narwhals do not have a dorsal fin, which is perhaps an evolutionary adaptation to swimming easily under ice, to facilitate rolling, or to reduce surface area and heat loss.The word ‘narwhal’ comes from the Old Norse word ‘nár’, meaning ‘corpse’ and ‘hvalr’ meaning ‘whale’. This is supposedly in reference to the whale’s pigmentation, which is grey and mottled, similar to that of a drowned sailor. Adding to the comparison of this cheery image is the narwhal’s summertime habit of ‘logging’, where the whale will lie still at or near the surface of the sea. The scientific name, ‘Monodon monoceros’, is of Greek derivation, and means ‘one-tooth, one-horn’, where ‘mono’ means ‘one’, ‘don’ means ‘tooth’ - as in orthodontist, and ‘ceros’ means ‘horn’ - as in rhinoceros. (the ‘rhino’ in rhinoceros means ‘nose’ as in ‘rhinoplasty’.)  Isn’t language wonderful?Written by Taylor Davidson, Read by Zane C WeberSubscribe to us on ITUNES, STITCHER, SPOTIFY, or your podcatcher of choice.Find us on FACEBOOK or TWITTERBecome a Patron of That’s Not Canon Productions at Patreon!Email us at Grandiloquentspodcast@gmail.com Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Good day to you, sparkling people of the word, and welcome back! Today’s word is for my social butterflies, my people persons, and my extroverts. Don’t worry my darling, introverts, you can listen to this one too, but today’s word might not be one you associate with, as today’s word is: anthropophilia.Anthropophilia is a biological word which means ‘to prefer human beings over animals.’ More specifically, it can refer to a parasite or dermatophyte preferring humans over animals, such as mosquitoes, who prefer the blood of humans, or dermatophytic fungi, that prefers to grow on humans. It can also refer to animals that prefer to live close to humans rather than in nature, such as geckoes or cockroaches. The word ‘anthropophilia’ comes from the Ancient Greek ‘anthropo’ meaning ‘man or human’ and ‘philia’ meaning ‘fraternal love’, thus, the love of humans. Cute? Gross? You be the judge.Sexual anthropophilia is a sexual attraction to humans developed by birds or mammals who imprint when being raised by humans in close contact. One example is a female giant panda from the London Zoo named Chi Chi, who refused to mate with a male panda when taken to the Moscow Zoo, but made a ‘full sexual self-presentation’ to a zookeeper.A similar word, ‘anthophilia’, is used to refer to the colloquial ‘furries’, or ‘sexual attraction to non-human but humanoid creatures’. Urban Dictionary states that ‘extreme cases of anthrophilia cause the impure to disregard gender when it comes to their sexual preference, and may cause them to find human men/women boring in comparison thereby removing sexuality from humans.’ Hopefully that made more sense to you than it did to me.Isn’t language wonderful?Written by Taylor Davidson, Read by Zane C WeberSubscribe to us on ITUNES, STITCHER, SPOTIFY, or your podcatcher of choice.Find us on FACEBOOK or TWITTERBecome a Patron of That’s Not Canon Productions at Patreon!Email us at Grandiloquentspodcast@gmail.com Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Hello my little lambs, and thanks for being with me once again! Today I ask you to dig out your valuables, take down those old paintings, and find that weird tchotchke Nanna gave you for your sixteenth birthday, because who knows? It might be worth something. We may just find out as we explore today’s word: impignorate.Impignorate is a word meaning ‘to pawn or mortgage something’ and comes from the Latin ‘pignoration’, which is from ‘pignoratio’ from ‘pignerate’ meaning ‘to pledge’. For example, you might say, ‘I wish to impignorate this weird tchotchke from my Nanna, as I cannot tell whether it is a naked lady or a melted Empire State Building, and I would prefer the money in any case.’ Next time, perhaps think to clarify with your Nanna when she gives it to you.Robert Louis Stevenson, uses the word in what might be called a fair better example, used here in a letter to a friend from Honolulu in 1889: ‘I have got the yacht paid off in triumph, I think; and though we stay here impignorate, it should not be for long, even if you bring us no extra help from home.’A similar word, ‘pawn’ means ‘to pledge, stake or wager’ comes from Middle French ‘pan’ meaning ‘pledge or security’ and is comparable to Middle Dutch ‘pant’, and Old High German ‘pfant’. Similarly, there is ‘hock’ meaning ‘to leave with a pawnbroker as security for a loan’, which comes from the Dutch word ‘hok’ meaning ‘hutch, hovel, jail, pen, or doghouse’. It’s also comparable to the Middle English ‘hukken’ meaning ‘to sell; peddle; sell at auction’. Anyone else ready for an episode of ‘Pawn Stars’, the reality TV series from 2009 that ran for a whole seventeen seasons? Yep, me too. Isn’t language wonderful?Written by Taylor Davidson, Read by Zane C WeberSubscribe to us on ITUNES, STITCHER, SPOTIFY, or your podcatcher of choice.Find us on FACEBOOK or TWITTERBecome a Patron of That’s Not Canon Productions at Patreon!Email us at Grandiloquentspodcast@gmail.com Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Servus, my lovely literary loves, and thank you for listening in once again! You may have guessed by European greeting, that we are once again heading to the wonderful land of Germany, to explore today’s nifty word: treppenwitz.Treppenwitz is a German word meaning ‘a clever remark that comes to mind when it’s too late to say it’. You might, for example, be lying in bed one night, when the rap battle of the previous day drifts to mind, and you experience treppenwitz, as you suddenly think of a better rhyme than you first uttered to fit the first line about your opponent’s dog looking like a squashed bagel. Ah well. You’ll get ‘em next time. The word ‘treppenwitz’ comes from the German words ‘treppe’ meaning ‘stairs’ and ‘witz’ meaning ‘wit or joke’; thus, staircase wit, or a remark thought of only too late. It is a calque produced from the French expression ‘l’esprit de l’escalier’ which means ‘mind of the staircase’. During a dinner at the home of a statesman, Denis Diderot was left speechless by a remark made to him. He wrote, ‘a sensitive man, such as myself, overwhelmed by the argument levelled against him, becomes confused and can only think clearly again at the bottom of the stairs’, and thus the idea of the ‘staircase mind’ - thinking of something only when the moment has passed. ‘Espirit’ in French means ‘mind’ or ‘immaterial or incorporeal substance’ and ‘escalier’ means ‘stairs’. If we return to the German, the word ‘treppe’ comes from Middle High German ‘trappe’, which is from Old High German ‘trappa’, and possibly from Proto-Indo-European ‘*dremb-’ meaning ‘to run’. ‘Witz’ comes from the from Old High German ‘wizzi’, from Proto-Germanic ‘*witją’, in turn from Proto-Indo-European ‘*weyd-’ which means ‘see or know’. And it all makes sense.Isn’t language wonderful?Written by Taylor Davidson, Read by Zane C WeberSubscribe to us on ITUNES, STITCHER, SPOTIFY, or your podcatcher of choice.Find us on FACEBOOK or TWITTERBecome a Patron of That’s Not Canon Productions at Patreon!Email us at Grandiloquentspodcast@gmail.com Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Salutations, you beautiful thing, you, and thank you for joining me once again. No, I’m not sick, and it’s not the mumps. In fact, cast the viral infection that affects the salivary glands, easily preventable by vaccination FAR from your mind, as we explore today’s word: mumpsimus.‘Mumpsimus’ is a word to describe ‘a stubborn person who insists on making an error in spite of being shown that it is wrong’. Okay, bring the mumps back into your mind as I provide you with this example: you might say, ‘Geraldine is being a real mumpsimus - she insists on not vaccinating young Sammy for mumps even though we’ve given her numerous pamphlets detailing scientific research, procedures and outcomes!’. Okay, you can forget the mumps again now. Thank goodness none of us know a mumpsimus like that, right?The origin of this word is rather clever - it’s a malapropism, or incorrect but amusing adaption of the word ‘sumpsimus’ which means ‘adherence to or persistence in using a strictly correct term in rejection of a more common, but technically incorrect, form. The story goes that an illiterate priest used ‘mumpsimus’ instead of ‘sumpsimus’ during mass, and when someone attempted to correct him, he replied that he ‘would not change his old mumpsimus for his critic’s new sumpsimus’. Perhaps the first time we see it in writing is 1530, where William Tyndale's book ‘Practice of Prelates’ states that the men whom Cardinal Wolsey had asked to find reasons why Catherine of Aragon was not truly the wife of King Henry VIII of England were "all lawyers, and other doctors, mumpsimuses of divinity”’. An excellent use, I think you’ll agree. In 1883, John Burgon commented on errors in translations in the bible, ‘If men prefer their 'mumpsimus' to our 'sumpsimus', let them by all means have it: but pray let them keep their rubbish to themselves—and at least leave our SAVIOUR's words alone.’ Oof. Heated stuff. Isn’t language wonderful?Written by Taylor Davidson, Read by Zane C WeberSubscribe to us on ITUNES, STITCHER, SPOTIFY, or your podcatcher of choice.Find us on FACEBOOK or TWITTERBecome a Patron of That’s Not Canon Productions at Patreon!Email us at Grandiloquentspodcast@gmail.com Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

A warm and sunshiney day to you, dear listener, and thank you for joining me once again! Today, we’re thinking sunflowers, we’re thinking lemons, we’re thinking rubber ducks, taxis and bananas! Have you guess it? Today’s word is: yellow.Believe it or not, the word for the colour yellow has a long and tangled evolution. Hope you’re wearing your best yellow boots, because here comes the etymology of ‘yellow’: from Middle English ‘yelwe’ or ‘yelou’, from Old English ‘ġeolwe’, which is an oblique form of of Old English ‘ġeolu’, which is in turn from Proto-West Germanic ‘*gelu’, which itself is from the Proto-Germanic ‘*gelwaz’, which, in turn, is from the Proto-Indo-European ‘*ǵʰelh₃wos’ meaning ‘gleam or yellow’. Still with me? There’s more! You can compare the origins of yellow to: the Welsh ‘gwelw’ meaning ‘pale’, Latin ‘helvus’ meaning ‘dull yellow’, the Irish ‘geal’ meaning ‘white or bright’, the Ancient Greek ‘khlōrós’ meaning ‘light green’, and the German ‘gelb’, meaning, of course, yellow. These words can be traced back to a few different ideas or meanings, including gold and shining. The word yellow can also be used to describe a coward, or someone weak or scared. The origins of this are debated, and rather unclear. Some surmise that it comes from yellow-bellied birds such as the sapsucker, or even eels or fish. Some say it goes back to a derogatory slang for certain races, or as a way to describe people living in remote areas with a pale or sickly complexion. Another guess is that it refers to a gut related illness or even jaundice, describing the colour of...well, certain biles or bodily fluids. It’s anyone’s guess, really.Yellow can also be used in conjunction with journalism, to describe a kind of false storytelling, usually bundled with sensational headlines, exaggerated facts, rumours, and even scare tactics. Isn’t language wonderful?Written by Taylor Davidson, Read by Zane C WeberSubscribe to us on ITUNES, STITCHER, SPOTIFY, or your podcatcher of choice.Find us on FACEBOOK or TWITTERBecome a Patron of That’s Not Canon Productions at Patreon!Email us at Grandiloquentspodcast@gmail.com Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Hola my little prickly pears! Thank you for joining me as we take a trip to Mexico to explore one of the world’s favourite fruits and today’s word: . I’m sure you’re familiar - avocado is a fruit with a soft, squishy centre, often mushed to make guacamole or spread on toast with a smattering of feta and offered for an increasingly high price by small cafe owners. The word ‘avocado’ is from the Spanish ‘aguacate’, which in turn comes from the Nahuatl word ‘āhuacatl’. This Nahuatl word could also mean ‘testicle’, likely due to the similarities between the fruit and the body part in shape and appearance. This word can be combined with other words - for example ‘ahuacamolli’, meaning avocado soup or sauce, from which the word guacamole derives. Today’s English word ‘avocado’ comes from a rendering of the Spanish ‘aguacate’ as ‘avogato’, first written in English in 1697 as ‘avogato pear’. This was later corrupted to ‘alligator pear’, a term still used by many to describe avocados in the Southern USA and the Caribbean. Some guess that ‘alligator’ also refers to the likeness of texture or rough green skin of both alligators and avocados. Because the first translation ‘avogato’ sounds like ‘advocate’, many languages reinterpreted the word avocado to share this meaning. The French word for avocado is ‘avocat’, which also means lawyer, comparable to the Dutch word ‘advocaatpeer’. In India, the avocado is referred to as ‘butter fruit’. In Australia, avocado is commonly shortened to ‘avo’, a colloquialism that has also become popular in South Africa in the United Kingdom, but one that also causes confusion between the regularly used ‘arvo’ - an Australian abbreviation for afternoon. Afternoon on toast anyone?Isn’t language wonderful?Written by Taylor Davidson, Read by Zane C WeberSubscribe to us on ITUNES, STITCHER, SPOTIFY, or your podcatcher of choice.Find us on FACEBOOK or TWITTERBecome a Patron of That’s Not Canon Productions at Patreon!Email us at Grandiloquentspodcast@gmail.com Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Good day to you, my sweet smelling flowers of language! Today we journey to the centre of your very face, to the nose! To explore today’s word: macrosmatic. ‘Macrosmatic’ is a word meaning ‘to have a good sense of smell.’ You know that one person who goes, ‘Has Terrence been over lately? I swear I can smell his eau de cologne’, when in fact Terrence hasn’t been over in at least five weeks. Creepy.‘Macrosmatic’ is made up of ‘macro’ meaning ‘large or long’ and ‘osmatic’ meaning ‘relating to the sense of smell’; thus, large sense of smell. Macro comes from the Ancient Greek ‘makrós’ meaning ‘long’. You might, for example, have had the misfortune of studying macroeconomics in your first year of business studies, which relates to the ‘branch of economics concerned with large-scale or general economic factors, such as interest rates and national productivity.’ ‘Osmatic’ comes from the French osmatique, supposedly coined by one Paul Broca, and from the Greek ‘osmē’ meaning ‘smell, scent, odor’. One can also be microsmatic: having little sense of smell, or anosmatic: lacking the sense of smell entirely.Let us take a moment to examine the word we use to describe the place all smells are smelt - the nose! ‘Nose’ comes from Old English ‘nosu’, from Proto-Germanic ‘*nusō’. My favourite comparison is to the Norwegian ‘nos’ meaning ‘snout’. ‘Nos’ in Norwegian can also refer to a steep protruding point on a mountain. The word ‘nose’ can be used as a verb in many different ways, including to snoop, detect, push or to move cautiously somewhere. It can also mean ‘the bulge on the side of a piece of a jigsaw puzzle, that fits into the hole of its adjacent piece.’ Who knew? Isn’t language wonderful?Written by Taylor Davidson, Read by Zane C WeberSubscribe to us on ITUNES, STITCHER, SPOTIFY, or your podcatcher of choice.Find us on FACEBOOK or TWITTERBecome a Patron of That’s Not Canon Productions at Patreon!Email us at Grandiloquentspodcast@gmail.com Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Hello hello my shining stars! And thank you for joining me this glowing day and/or night. Today, we are shooting for the stars, aiming for the moon, and flying high in the sky as we look at today’s word: constellate.‘Constellate’, though related to the word ‘constellation’ does not necessarily relate to astronomy, but means ‘to combine as a cluster’. It comes from the Latin ‘constellatus’ meaning ‘starred’, ‘Constellate can also mean ‘to shine with united radiance, or one general light’. Now isn’t that lovely?The related word ‘stellar’, meaning ‘of, pertaining to, or characteristic of stars’, comes from the Latin ‘stēllāris’, which comes from the Proto-Italic ‘*stērolā’ meaning ‘star’. The word ‘constellation’ is similarly derived, and refers to ‘an arbitrary pattern of stars forming in the sky, especially those identified by astronomers.’ It can also refer to astrology, in terms of where the planets are located at one’s time of birth, as used for determining one’s horoscope. ‘The twelve equal divisions of the zodiacal region into signs or houses, each named for a prominent constellation in the region’ is called the ‘zodiac’, or your star sign. The word ‘zodiac’ comes from Old French ‘zodiaque’, from the Latin ‘zōdiacus’, which in turn is from Ancient Greek ‘zōidiakós’ meaning ‘circle of little animals’. In astronomy, however, ‘zodiac’ means ‘the ecliptic: the belt-like region of the celestial sphere corresponding to the apparent path of the sun over the course of a year.’Let us take, for example, my zodiac! I am an aquarius. Aquarius is the 11th zodiac sign from the Latin ‘aquarius’, a loan translation of the Greek ‘Hydrokhoos’ meaning ‘the water-pourer,’, which is also the old Greek name of the constellation for which the house is named. Aquarians were a group of Chistians who drank water instead of wine at the Lord’s Supper, and the ‘Aquarian Age’ is an astrological epoch thought to have begun in the 20th century embodying the traits of this sign and promoting world peace and human brotherhood. You might recognise this concept from the popular song ‘Age of Aquarius’ from 1967, featured in the hit musical ‘Hair’. Isn’t language wonderful?Written by Taylor Davidson, Read by Zane C WeberSubscribe to us on ITUNES, STITCHER, SPOTIFY, or your podcatcher of choice.Find us on FACEBOOK or TWITTERBecome a Patron of That’s Not Canon Productions at Patreon!Email us at Grandiloquentspodcast@gmail.com Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

A wonderful welcome to you, language lovers, and thank you for joining me today! Today we explore a kind of person, and we have all met one of these - I’m sure you know the type. Annoying, grating, the kind that makes you want to roll your eyes at the nature of the situations they seem to put themselves into. I trust of course, dear listener, that today’s word does not apply to you! Today’s word is: lickspittle.A lickspittle is described as ‘a fawning subordinate; a suck-up’. The kind of person, say, who might pipe up in class to ask a confusing and unnecessary question about the non-required reading, just to prove to the teacher and the class that they actually bothered to do it. Or perhaps it’s the kind of person who inexplicably carries your bag, brings you coffee, and shines your five dollar Kmart shoes, when you don’t require any of these things to be done at that moment, and certainly not by them. The word ‘lickspittle’ is a compound word, made up of ‘lick’ and ‘spittle’, the latter having the meaning ‘saliva’. ‘Spittle’ is an alteration of dialectal ‘spattle’ which comes from the Old English ‘spātl’, which in turn is related to ‘spǣtan’ which can mean ‘to spit’ or ‘to squirt’. Ew. The word ‘lick’ comes from Old English ‘liccian’, from Proto-West Germanic ‘*likkōn’, and can be compared to Old Irish ‘ligid’, the Latin ‘lingō’ or ‘ligguriō’ meaning ‘to lap or lick up’, and the Ancient Greek ‘leíkhō’. ‘Lick’ has multiple meanings as both a noun and a verb, and can be used to connote a range of things from the literal ‘licking of an ice cream’ to the more musical ‘guitar licks’ all the way to describing something small, like ‘a lick of good luck’. Isn’t language wonderful? Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Good day to you, or should I say good evening to you, my little literary dreamers. Get your coziest pyjamas on, your bunny slippers, your favourite teddy bear and take a deep breath, as we prepare to take on today’s word: somniphobia.‘Somniphobia’ is the fear of going to bed, or extreme anxiety with the thought of sleeping or falling asleep. It is also known as hypnophobia, clinophobia, sleep anxiety, or sleep dread. It can be related to a fear of the unknown, concern with a ‘lack of control’ whilst sleeping, or worrying that one might not hear a loved one call out in pain or trouble whilst one is asleep. Sleep paralysis and nightmare disorders are two of the causes of somniphobia, although it is linked to many other forms of anxiety and fears. Common symptoms of somniphobia include a feeling of fear when thinking about sleeping, experiencing distress at bedtime, avoiding going to bed altogether, having panic attacks when it’s time to sleep, irritability or mood swings, and having a hard time remembering things. There can also be physical symptoms, including nausea, a tightness in the chest, and sweats, chills or hyperventilation. Children with somniphobia will often cry, become clingy, and ask not to be left alone. The word ‘somniphobia’ comes from the Latin words ‘somnus’ and ‘phobia’. ‘Somnus’ means ‘sleep’ or ‘drowsiness’, and comes from Proto-Italic ‘*swepnos’, meaning ‘to sleep’. It can also take on the figurative meaning ‘death’. Though not quite an antonym, chronophobia is a related fear - the fear of time. Chronophobia is an irrational fear of both time and the passing of time, and can include a fear of watches, clocks and other timepieces. It comes from the Latin word for time - ‘chronos’. Isn’t language wonderful?Written by Taylor Davidson, Read by Zane C WeberSubscribe to us on ITUNES, STITCHER, SPOTIFY, or your podcatcher of choice.Find us on FACEBOOK or TWITTERBecome a Patron of That’s Not Canon Productions at Patreon!Email us at Grandiloquentspodcast@gmail.com Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Goooooooooooood daaaaaaaaaaaaay to youuuuuuuuu, listeneeeeeeerrrrrr and thaaaaaank you for joining usssssssss today. You might think I’m speaking rather oddly, or even slowly today, dear listener, and you would be right, as I have been inspired by today’s word: sloth.The ‘sloth’ is a type of mammal noted for their slow movement, who live in the tropical rainforests of Central and South America. They spend most of their lives hanging upside down in trees, and are closely related to anteaters. With a low metabolism, sloths have a low-energy diet of leaves, and though they are terrible on the ground, can hang from trees easily and even swim. They have a shaggy coat with grooved hair, and host green algae which helps them to camouflage, hiding from predatory hawks and cats. The word ‘sloth’ comes from  the Middle English ‘slouthe’ or ‘slewthe’ meaning ‘laziness’, from the Old English ‘slǣwþ’, also meaning ‘laziness’ or ‘indolence’, which in turn is from the Proto-Germanic ‘*slaiwiþō’ meaning ‘slowness’ or ‘lateness’. As well as being the word for the aforementioned mammal, ‘sloth’ can also mean ‘laziness; slowness in the mindset; disinclination to action or labour’, or more rarely, is used for the collective noun for bears, as in ‘a sloth of bears came by and attacked the camping ground.’ No official collective noun for a group of sloths is recorded, although some that are used include a ‘slumber’ of sloths, a ‘snuggle’ of sloths, or my personal favourite, a ‘bed’ of sloths. Sloth is also one of the seven deadly sins - a Catholic list of cardinal sins from the 13th century. It is described as the ‘sin of omitting responsibility’ in contrast to the other sins, which are generally speaking immoral in nature. Isn’t language wonderful?Written by Taylor Davidson, Read by Zane C WeberSubscribe to us on ITUNES, STITCHER, SPOTIFY, or your podcatcher of choice.Find us on FACEBOOK or TWITTERBecome a Patron of That’s Not Canon Productions at Patreon!Email us at Grandiloquentspodcast@gmail.com Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Ciao ciao, my bellas! I hope you’re ready for some pizza and pasta, for today we journey to Italy, to explore the word: cantastoria.‘Cantastoria’ is an Italian word which is a ‘theatrical form where a performer tells or sings a story while gesturing to a series of images. These images can be painted, printed or drawn on any sort of material.’ The word comes from the Italian for ‘story-singer’; ‘canta’ meaning ‘to sing’ and ‘history or story’. ‘Cantare’ comes from the Latin ‘canō’ meaning, ‘I sing’, and with the suffix ‘tō’ becomes ‘cantō’ which means ‘I sing’, but can also mean ‘I exchange, or call forth by charms, chant’. ‘Storia’ is from the Old Italian ‘istoria’, which in turn is from the Latin ‘historia’, from Ancient Greek ‘historía’, which means ‘learning through research’. Though the word is Italian, ‘cantastorias’ originated in 6th century India, where religious tales called ‘saubhikas’ were performed by storytellers who travelled from house to house with banners painted with pictures of Gods. ‘Yamapapaka’ was a similar style of storytelling, where performers with vertical cloth scrolls sung stories of the afterlife. Some of these stories continue to be performed by the Chitrakar women of West Bengal today.Heading back to 16th century Italy, prayers would be sung next to illuminated scrolls as ‘cantastorias’, whilst the secular folks created ‘cantambanco’ or ‘singing bench’, where the performer would point to pictures with a stick whilst standing on a bench. Up until the 19th century there were blind men in Spain with a young ‘helper’ who would make their living by displaying illustrations whilst the blind man would sing a story, often about crimes, while his helper pointed at each illustrations. These were known as ‘romances de ciego’ or ‘blind man stories’.Isn’t language wonderful?Written by Taylor Davidson, Read by Zane C WeberSubscribe to us on ITUNES, STITCHER, SPOTIFY, or your podcatcher of choice.Find us on FACEBOOK or TWITTERBecome a Patron of That’s Not Canon Productions at Patreon!Email us at Grandiloquentspodcast@gmail.com Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Ciao ciao, my bellas! I hope you’re ready for some pizza and pasta, for today we journey to Italy, to explore the word: cantastoria.‘Cantastoria’ is an Italian word which is a ‘theatrical form where a performer tells or sings a story while gesturing to a series of images. These images can be painted, printed or drawn on any sort of material.’ The word comes from the Italian for ‘story-singer’; ‘canta’ meaning ‘to sing’ and ‘history or story’. ‘Cantare’ comes from the Latin ‘canō’ meaning, ‘I sing’, and with the suffix ‘tō’ becomes ‘cantō’ which means ‘I sing’, but can also mean ‘I exchange, or call forth by charms, chant’. ‘Storia’ is from the Old Italian ‘istoria’, which in turn is from the Latin ‘historia’, from Ancient Greek ‘historía’, which means ‘learning through research’. Though the word is Italian, ‘cantastorias’ originated in 6th century India, where religious tales called ‘saubhikas’ were performed by storytellers who travelled from house to house with banners painted with pictures of Gods. ‘Yamapapaka’ was a similar style of storytelling, where performers with vertical cloth scrolls sung stories of the afterlife. Some of these stories continue to be performed by the Chitrakar women of West Bengal today.Heading back to 16th century Italy, prayers would be sung next to illuminated scrolls as ‘cantastorias’, whilst the secular folks created ‘cantambanco’ or ‘singing bench’, where the performer would point to pictures with a stick whilst standing on a bench. Up until the 19th century there were blind men in Spain with a young ‘helper’ who would make their living by displaying illustrations whilst the blind man would sing a story, often about crimes, while his helper pointed at each illustrations. These were known as ‘romances de ciego’ or ‘blind man stories’.Isn’t language wonderful?Written by Taylor Davidson, Read by Zane C WeberSubscribe to us on ITUNES, STITCHER, SPOTIFY, or your podcatcher of choice.Find us on FACEBOOK or TWITTERBecome a Patron of That’s Not Canon Productions at Patreon!Email us at Grandiloquentspodcast@gmail.com Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

A bright and wonderful day to you, my little chickens! Take a trip to the farm with us today, down on the ol’ homestead, as we discuss today’s word: cockalorum.Cockalorum is a word meaning ‘a boastful and self-important person; a strutting little fellow’. For example, one might say, ‘Look at that cockalorum, eating all the cheese as if he had paid for it himself!’. The origin is not confirmed - it likely comes from the English word ‘cock’ meaning ‘rooster’, with -a- and Latin -lorum suffixed as a fanciful elaboration. It could also originate from a Dutch onomatopoeic dialect term ‘kockeloeren’ which is a word for the cry of a rooster, comparable to ‘cock-a-doodle-doo’. Cockalorum can also mean ‘boastful speech or crowing’ or ‘a game similar to leapfrog’. Come and join me for a game of cockalorum this afternoon, won’t you?The word ‘cock’ itself has over eighteen different recorded meanings, including, ‘a male bird, such as a rooster or pigeon’, ‘the circle at the end of a rink in curling’, ‘a boastful tilt of the hat or head’, and of course, ‘vulgar slang for penis’. The word originated from Old English ‘cocc’, from Proto-Germanic ‘kukkaz’, probably of onomatopoeic origin. This is reinforced by the Old French word ‘coc’, also of imitative origin. The associating of the word ‘penis’ is attested since at least the 1610s, with the compound ‘pillicock’ also meaning ‘penis’ confirmed since 1325. ‘Cock’ can also be used as verb, with several different meanings including ‘to prepare a gun or crossbow to be fired’, ‘to turn something upwards or to one side’, ‘to strut or swagger’, and my personal favourite, ‘to turn the eye obliquely and partially close its lid, as an expression of derision or insinuation’. Isn’t language wonderful?Written by Taylor Davidson, Read by Zane C WeberSubscribe to us on ITUNES, STITCHER, SPOTIFY, or your podcatcher of choice.Find us on FACEBOOK or TWITTERBecome a Patron of That’s Not Canon Productions at Patreon!Email us at Grandiloquentspodcast@gmail.com Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Howdy hey there, partner! Get on down and welcome to An Assemblage of Grandiose and Bombastic Grandiloquents! Now did that greeting seem a little odd? Perhaps even crazy? Good! That is precisely what I was going for, as I explain today’s word: pandemonium.The most common usage of pandemonium is the definition stating ‘chaos; tumultuous or lawless violence’, or even ‘an outburst; loud, riotous uproar, especially that of a crowd.’ However, the archaic, and slightly more fantastical meaning is ‘a place where all demons live; hell’. The word was coined John Milton in ‘Paradise Lost,’ and comes from the Ancient Greek ‘pan’ meaning ‘all’ and the Late Latin ‘daemonium’ meaning ‘evil spirit’ or demon’. Thus, we have pandemonium, or ‘all of the evil spirits’.The word ‘demon’ itself comes from Middle English, borrowing from Medieval Latin ‘dēmōn’ meaning ‘familiar spirit’, which in turn is from the Ancient Greek ‘daímōn’ meaning ‘dispenser, god, protective spirit’. Interestingly, the word demon can be used to refer to both an evil supernatural spirit, or a neutral supernatural spirit. The word ‘spirit’ can also be used to describe the soul of a person, or a supernatural being, whether good or evil. ‘Spirit’ comes from the Latin ‘spīritus’ meaning ‘breath; spirit’, which in turn is from Proto-Indo-European ‘*(s)peys-’ meaning ‘to blow’. It can be compared to the English words ‘respire’ as in ‘respiratory system’ and ‘inspire’, ‘to fill with an urge to do something’, both of which originate from the Latin spīrō meaning ‘I breathe, blow, respire’. Thus, spirit relates back to being filled with air or life.Isn’t language wonderful?Written by Taylor Davidson, Read by Zane C WeberSubscribe to us on ITUNES, STITCHER, SPOTIFY, or your podcatcher of choice.Find us on FACEBOOK or TWITTERBecome a Patron of That’s Not Canon Productions at Patreon!Email us at Grandiloquentspodcast@gmail.com Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Good day to you, humble friend, and a kind and calm welcome to today’s journey to An Assemblage of Grandiose and Bombastic Grandiloquests. Straighten that posture, get into position, and get ready to pray, because today’s word is: mantis.Mantises, or ‘praying mantises’ as they are more commonly known, are an order of insects distributed worldwide in temperate and tropical habitats. They have triangular heads with bulging eyes supported on flexible necks, and may or may not have wings. All mantises have forelegs that are greatly enlarged and adapted for catching and gripping prey, and are known for their upright posture, while remaining stationary with forearms folded, thus looking as if they are praying. They have stereo vision, and locate their prey by sight, feeding typically on live prey within their reach. They can stalk their prey slowly, or remain stationary and wait for their prey to approach them. Some larger mantises eat smaller individuals of their species, and can even eat lizards, frogs, small birds and fish.The word ‘mantis’ comes from the Greek meaning ‘prophet’ or ‘soothsayer’. This in turn comes from the Ancient Greek word ‘maínomai’ which means ‘I am mad, raving’. Make of that what you will. Mantises were considered to have supernatural powers by early civilisations, including Ancient Greece, Ancient Egypt, and Assyria. For the Greeks, it had the ability to show lost travelers the way home; in the Ancient Egyptian Book of the Dead the ‘bird-fly’ is a minor god that leads the souls of the dead to the underworld. Today, they are often kept as pets, and are commonly bred by their owners, as they have a lifespan of about one year in total.Isn’t language wonderful?Written by Taylor Davidson, Read by Zane C WeberSubscribe to us on ITUNES, STITCHER, SPOTIFY, or your podcatcher of choice.Find us on FACEBOOK or TWITTERBecome a Patron of That’s Not Canon Productions at Patreon!Email us at Grandiloquentspodcast@gmail.com Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Welcome welcome, kind friends! And thank you for joining me for today’s episode of An Assemblage of Grandiose and Bombastic Grandiloquents. Today we are getting a little scientific, and a little philosophical, so strap yourselves in and prepare to think hard as we discuss today’s word: hylozoism.Hylozoism is ‘the doctrine that all matter has life’ or ‘any system that views all matter as alive, either in itself or by participation in the operation of a world soul or some similar principle.’ I told you we were getting deep today! This view dates back as early as 5th and 6th century Greek philosophers, who considered the magnet to be alive because of its attractive powers, or air as divine because of its spontaneous power of movement, or because of its essentiality for life in animals. The word itself comes from the late 17th century, from ‘hylo’ meaning ‘matter’ and the Greek ‘zōē’ meaning ‘life’.Hylozoism is distinguished from the concept of ‘hylopsychism’ or possessing a mind. This is also known as ‘panpsychism’, which is ‘the view that the mind or mind-like feature is a fundamental and ubiquitous feature of reality.’ These two concepts become hard to distinguish in practice, however, because ancient hylozoists regarded the ‘spirits’ of plants and materials alive, and thus conscious. ‘Panpsychism’ comes from the Greek ‘pan’ meaning ‘all, everything, whole’, and ‘psyche’ meaning ‘soul, mind’. The use of psyche is sometimes regarded as controversial in this context because it is often synonymous with ‘soul’, which also gives supernatural connotations. More commonly found words to describe psyche include mind, mental properties, mental aspect, and experience.Isn’t language wonderful?Written by Taylor Davidson, Read by Zane C WeberSubscribe to us on ITUNES, STITCHER, SPOTIFY, or your podcatcher of choice.Find us on FACEBOOK or TWITTERBecome a Patron of That’s Not Canon Productions at Patreon!Email us at Grandiloquentspodcast@gmail.com Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Wie geht’s Jungs! Or, how’s it going guys? And welcome to another round of An Assemblage of Grandiose and Bombastic Grandiloquents. Today, we’re going on a trip to the woods, to connect with nature and become one with ourselves, et cetera, et cetera. Join us, for today’s word is: Waldeinsamkeit.Waldeinsamkeit is a German word meaning ‘the feeling of solitude in the woods’. It is made of the German words ‘wald’ meaning ‘forest’ and ‘einsamkeit’ meaning’ loneliness; thus, ‘forest-loneliness’. The word ‘wald’ comes from Middle High German ‘walt’, from Old High German ‘wald’, which is from the Proto-Germanic ‘walþuz’. It can be related to the Dutch ‘woud’, Old English ‘weald’, and the Old Norse ‘vǫllr’. The word ‘einsam’, meaning ‘lonely’, is made up of the German words ‘ein’ meaning ‘one’ and the suffix ‘sam’ which is used to form adjectives from verbs, nouns and other adjectives. For example, ‘slowly’ in German is ‘langsam’ which comes from ‘lang’ meaning long, and literally translates to ‘long-ly’, which honestly, just makes a lot of sense. The suffix ‘sam’ comes from the Old High German samo, meaning ‘the same’, and also ‘sama’ meaning ‘similarly’. It is comparable to the English suffix ‘some’, as in ‘lonesome’.A related word, ‘zweisamkeit’ means ‘togetherness’ or ‘intimacy between two persons, most often romantic’. This word comes from the word ‘einsamkeit’ but replaces ‘ein’ meaning ‘one’ with ‘zwei’ meaning ‘two’. Sort of romantic if you think about it! ‘Twoliness’...maybe we’ll stick to German.Isn’t language wonderful?Written by Taylor Davidson, Read by Zane C WeberSubscribe to us on ITUNES, STITCHER, SPOTIFY, or your podcatcher of choice.Find us on FACEBOOK or TWITTERBecome a Patron of That’s Not Canon Productions at Patreon!Email us at Grandiloquentspodcast@gmail.com Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

A good day to you, fellow literary lover, and welcome to today’s episode of An Assemblage of Grandiose and Bombastic Grandiloquents. We are going to get a little existential here today, so strap yourselves in and prepare for today’s word: onism.‘Onism’ is a rather complex, created word meaning ‘the frustration of being stuck in just one body, that inhabits only one place at a time, which is like standing in front of the departures screen at an airport, flickering over with strange place names like other people’s passwords, each representing one more thing you’ll never get to see before you die—and all because, as the arrow on the map helpfully points out, ‘you are here’.’ That definition, taken from our friends at The Dictionary of Obscure Sorrows, is a rather poetic definition of the word. If we look at the structure, we find that ‘onsim’ is a portmanteau of ‘monism’ and ‘onanism’. ‘Monsim’ is a theory or doctrine that denies the existence of a distinction or duality in a particular sphere, such as that between matter and mind, or God and the world; in other words, the belief that only one supreme being, or God, exists. It comes from modern Latin ‘monismus’, which in turn is from the Greek ‘monos’ meaning ‘single’. ‘Onanism’, on the other hand, has a rather succinct meaning: masturbation. It comes from the early 18th century, from French ‘onanisme’ or modern Latin onanismus’, which comes from the name Onan, of the bible verse Genesis 38:9, who practised coitus interruptus.One could suppose, then, that the joining of these two words forms the belief in being or using one body permanently. Another definition for onism is that sudden dreadful realization that you are you, and only you, and stuck in your body and you're not omniscient and the universe is filled with other people just like that but you still can't live their lives and they can't live yours. I told you it was going to get heavy.Isn’t language wonderful?Written by Taylor Davidson, Read by Zane C WeberSubscribe to us on ITUNES, STITCHER, SPOTIFY, or your podcatcher of choice.Find us on FACEBOOK or TWITTERBecome a Patron of That’s Not Canon Productions at Patreon!Email us at Grandiloquentspodcast@gmail.com Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.