I freely confess that neither word was known to me until some
years ago when I was reading a biography of Sir Richard Francis
Burton, who, as you probably already know, disguised himself as an
Arab and became, ostensibly, the first Caucasian to enter Mecca.
He described the direction of march around the Tomb of the Prophet
as proceeding widdershins. I immediately went for the unabridged,
where I learned both the meaning of widdershins and deasil. I
have prized them both ever since.
Though there's really no such entity, I have a corporate American
Express card in the name of Widdershins & Deasil. I pay the bill,
so they don't care.
Walt
---------- Original Message ----------------------------------
From: Chris Barker <ftog@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Reply-To: olympus@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Date: Fri, 2 May 2003 21:16:58 +0100
>Interesting word Walt, never heard of it (and "widdershins" is
from a
>long way back in my memory!).
>
>But "dexter" is indeed Latin for right - "dexterous" is derived
from
>it. Whereas "sinister" is Latin for left, and the derivation of
>"sinister" in English is that left was bad, right good; for that
reason
>the guest of honour sat on the host's right hand.
>
>The Latin-derived languages in South Europe still use descendants
of
>"dexter" and "sinister"; in Italian it's "destro" and "sinistro"
I
>believe; in Spanish "derecho" and "izquierdo" (had to look that
one up
>in the tourist dictionary); and in French "droit" and "gauche".
It is
>interesting (well I think so anyway ;-)) that "gauche" is a word
in
>English to mean awkward or even naive.
>
>Chris
>
>On Friday, May 2, 2003, at 16:21 Europe/London, Walt Wayman wrote:
>
>> "Deasil" just means clockwise. My dictionary indicates it comes
>> from the Latin "dexter," which apparently means "right hand," or
>> some such. I'm not a Latin scholar. The full definition is
>> simply, "Clockwise--compare widdershins."
><|_:-)_|>
>
>C M I Barker
>Cambridgeshire, Great Britain.
>
>+44 (0)7092 251126
>mailto:ftog@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
>http://www.threeshoes.co.uk
>http://homepage.mac.com/zuiko
>... a nascent photo library.
>
>
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