Misplaced Pages

#20979

57-466: A charade was a form of literary riddle popularized in France in the 18th century where each syllable of the answer was described enigmatically as a separate word before the word as a whole was similarly described. The term charade was borrowed into English from French in the second half of the eighteenth century, denoting a "kind of riddle in which each syllable of a word, or a complete word or phrase,

114-539: A cabinet with doors to hide it; this sort of nightstand was known as a commode , hence the latter word came to mean "toilet" as well. For homes without these items of furniture, the chamber pot was stored under the bed. The modern commode toilet and bedpan , used by bedbound or disabled persons, are variants of the chamber pot. A related item was the bourdalou or bourdaloue , a small handheld oblong ceramic pot used in 17th- and 18th-century France to allow women to urinate conveniently. This item, similar in shape to

171-401: A chamber utensil or bedroom ware . Chamber pots were used in ancient Greece at least since the 6th century BC and were known under different names: ἀμίς ( amis ), οὐράνη ( ouranē ) and οὐρητρίς ( ourētris , from οὖρον - ouron , "urine" ), σκωραμίς / ( skōramis ), χερνίβιον ( chernibion ). The introduction of indoor flush toilets started to displace chamber pots in

228-593: A parlor game —and this was brought over to Britain by the English aristocracy. Thus the term gradually became more popularly used to refer to acted charades, examples of which are described in William Thackeray 's Vanity Fair and in Charlotte Brontë 's Jane Eyre . Thackeray snarked that charades were enjoyed for "enabling the many ladies amongst us who had beauty to display their charms, and

285-414: A Turk, his consort, and his black slave praying at sunrise when an enormous Egyptian head enters and begins singing . The answer— Agamemnon —is then acted out by Becky's husband, while she makes her (first) appearance as Clytemnestra . After refreshments, another round begins, partially in pantomime : the first scene shows a household yawningly finishing a game of cribbage and preparing for bed ;

342-410: A deep gravy boat , could be held between the legs and urinated into while standing or crouching, with little risk of soiling their clothing. At the time, women did not customarily wear two-legged underwear as today. " The Crabfish " is a 17th-century folk song about what is most likely a common lobster , stored in a chamber pot by an unwise fisherman. The moral of the song is that one should look into

399-797: A form of folk-literature, sometimes in verse. Riddles have also been collected in Tamil. While riddles are not numerous in the Bible, they are present, most famously in Samson's riddle in Judges xiv.14, but also in I Kings 10:1–13 (where the Queen of Sheba tests Solomon 's wisdom), and in the Talmud . Sirach also mentions riddles as a popular dinner pastime, while the Aramaic Story of Ahikar contains

456-570: A good riddle can furnish a good metaphor." Literary riddles were also composed in Byzantium , from perhaps the tenth century with the work of John Geometres , into the fifteenth century, along with a neo-Byzantine revival in around the early eighteenth century. There was a particular peak around the long twelfth century. Two Latin riddles are preserved as graffiti in the Basilica at Pompeii . The pre-eminent collection of ancient Latin riddles

513-660: A local scale, and across great distances. Kofi Dorvlo gives an example of a riddle that has been borrowed from the Ewe language by speakers of the neighboring Logba language : "This woman has not been to the riverside for water, but there is water in her tank". The answer is "a coconut". On a much wider scale, the Riddle of the Sphinx has also been documented in the Marshall Islands , possibly carried there by Western contacts in

570-733: A long section of proverbial wisdom that in some versions also contains riddles. Otherwise, riddles are sparse in ancient Semitic writing. In the medieval period, however, verse riddles, alongside other puzzles and conundra, became a significant literary form in the Arabic-speaking world, and accordingly in Islamic Persian culture and in Hebrew — particularly in Al-Andalus . Since early Arabic and Persian poetry often features rich, metaphorical description, and ekphrasis , there

627-661: A mixed setting, it is therefore advisable to clarify the rules before play begins. Common features of the modern game include: The following gestures are commonly used in the game: Some of these signs may be banned from some forms of the game. Riddle A riddle is a statement , question or phrase having a double or veiled meaning, put forth as a puzzle to be solved. Riddles are of two types: enigmas , which are problems generally expressed in metaphorical or allegorical language that require ingenuity and careful thinking for their solution, and conundra , which are questions relying for their effects on punning in either

SECTION 10

#1732790885021

684-487: A number of riddles, mostly apparently inspired by folk-riddles. Other Hebrew-writing exponents included Moses ibn Ezra , Yehuda Alharizi , Judah Halevi , Immanuel the Roman and Israel Onceneyra . In both Arabic and Persian, riddles seem to have become increasingly scholarly in style over time, increasingly emphasising riddles and puzzles in which the interpreter has to resolve clues to letters and numbers to put together

741-522: A point of playing with conceptual boundaries and crossing them for the intellectual pleasure of showing that things are not quite as stable as they seem" — though the point of doing so may still ultimately be to "play with boundaries, but ultimately to affirm them". The modern English word riddle shares its origin with the word read , both stemming from the Common Germanic verb * rēdaną , which meant 'to interpret, guess'. From this verb came

798-505: A recent research project uncovered more than 100,000 early modern German riddles, with the most important collection being that Strassburger Rätselbuch , first published around 1500 and many times reprinted. This is one of the most famous riddles of that time: Es kam ein Vogel federlos, saß auf dem Baume blattlos, da kam die Jungfer mundlos und fraß den Vogel federlos von dem Baume blattlos. Chamber pot A chamber pot

855-522: A schoolbook. It is thought that the world's earliest surviving poetic riddles survive in the Sanskrit Rigveda . Hymn 164 of the first book of the Rigveda can be understood to comprise a series of riddles or enigmas which are now obscure but may have been an enigmatic exposition of the pravargya ritual . These riddles overlap in significant part with a collection of forty-seven in

912-517: A series of riddles posed by a nature-spirit ( yaksha ) to Yudhishthira . The first riddle collection in a medieval Indic language is traditionally thought to be the riddles of Amir Khusrow (1253–1325), which are written in Hindawi , in verse, in the mātrika metre . As of the 1970s, folklorists had not undertaken extensive collecting of riddles in India, but riddling was known to be thriving as

969-644: A strict sense. About 150 survive in Middle High German , mostly quoted in other literary contexts. Likewise, riddles are rare in Old Norse : almost all occur in one section of Hervarar saga ok Heiðreks , in which the god Óðinn propounds around 37 riddles (depending on the manuscript). These riddles do, however, provide insights into Norse mythology , medieval Scandinavian social norms, and rarely attested poetic forms. By contrast, verse riddles were prominent in early medieval England , following

1026-609: A walking stick. This type includes riddles along the lines of this German example: Zweibein sass auf Dreibein und ass Einbein. Da kam Vierbein und nahm Zweibein das Einbein. Da nahm Zweibein Dreibein und schlug damit Vierbein, dass Vierbein Einbein fallen liess. Two-legs sat on Three-legs and ate One-leg. Then Four-legs came and took One-leg from Two-legs. Then Two-legs took Three-legs and with it struck Four-legs, so that Four-legs let One-leg go. The conceit here

1083-407: Is a portable toilet , meant for nocturnal use in the bedroom. It was common in many cultures before the advent of indoor plumbing and flushing toilets . "Chamber" is an older term for bedroom. The chamber pot is also known as a Jordan , a jerry , a guzunder , a po (possibly from French : pot de chambre ), a potty pot , a potty , a thunder pot or a thunder mug . It was also known as

1140-500: Is a collection of 100 hexametrical riddles by Symphosius which were influential on later medieval Latin writers. The Bern Riddles , a collection of Latin riddles clearly modelled on Symphosius, were composed in the early seventh century by an unknown author, perhaps in northern Italy. Symphosius's collection also inspired a number of Anglo-Saxon riddlers who wrote in Latin. They remained influential in medieval Castilian tradition, being

1197-653: Is a natural overlap in style and approach between poetry generally and riddles specifically; literary riddles are therefore often a subset of the descriptive poetic form known in both traditions as wasf . Riddles are attested in anthologies of poetry and in prosimetrical portrayals of riddle-contests in Arabic maqāmāt and in Persian epics such as the Shahnameh . Meanwhile, in Hebrew, Dunash ben Labrat (920–990), credited with transposing Arabic metres into Hebrew, composed

SECTION 20

#1732790885021

1254-400: Is called "Indications". As a long-lived and informal game, charades' rules can vary widely. Common features of the game include holding up a number of fingers to indicate the number of syllables in the answer, silently replying to questions, and making a "come on" gesture once the guesses become close; some forms of the games, however, forbid anything except physically acting out the answer. In

1311-449: Is difficult for children to maneuver themselves up onto the normal toilet; in addition the larger opening in the regular toilet is much too wide for a child to sit over comfortably and can be intimidating when they first start learning. The size of a potty chair means they can be packed away in a bag for days out or when camping with young children. A chamber pot might be disguised in a sort of chair (a close stool ). It might be stored in

1368-508: Is enigmatically described or dramatically represented". Written forms of charade appeared in magazines and books, and on the folding fans of the Regency . The answers were sometimes printed on the reverse of the fan, suggesting that they were a flirting device, used by a young woman to tease her beau. One charade composed by Jane Austen goes as follows: When my first is a task to a young girl of spirit, And my second confines her to finish

1425-455: Is its least that it gives its name to my first; my whole may I never catch!" and "My first is company; my second shuns company; my third collects company; and my whole amuses company." with the answers being tartar and conundrum . In the early 19th century, the French began performing "acting" or "acted charades"—with the written description replaced by dramatic performances as

1482-522: Is that Two-legs is a person, Three-legs is a three-legged stool, Four-legs is a dog, and One-leg is a ham hock. An example of Four Hang; Two Point the Way , to which the pre-eminent solution is 'cow' is given here in thirteenth-century Icelandic form: Fjórir hanga, fjórir ganga, tveir veg vísa, tveir hundum varða, einn eptir drallar ok jafnan heldr saurugr. Heiðrekr konungr, hyggðu at gátu! Four are hanging, Four are walking, Two point

1539-638: The Adevineaux amoureux (printed in Bruges by Colard Mansion around 1479); and Demandes joyeuses en maniere de quolibets , the basis for Wynkyn de Worde 's 1511 Demaundes Joyous . Riddles survive only fragmentarily in Old High German : three, very short, possible examples exist in manuscripts from the Monastery of St Gallen , but, while certainly cryptic, they are not necessarily riddles in

1596-477: The Greek Anthology , which contains about 50 verse riddles, probably put into its present form by Constantine Cephalas , working in the tenth century CE. Most surviving ancient Greek riddles are in verse. In the second chapter of Book III of Aristotle's Rhetoric , the philosopher stated that "good riddles do, in general, provide us with satisfactory metaphors: for metaphors imply riddles, and therefore

1653-514: The Atharvaveda ; riddles also appear elsewhere in Vedic texts . Taylor cited the following example: '"Who moves in the air? Who makes a noise on seeing a thief? Who is the enemy of lotuses? Who is the climax of fury?" The answers to the first three questions, when combined in the manner of a charade, yield the answer to the fourth question. The first answer is bird ( vi ), the second dog ( śvā ),

1710-468: The West Germanic noun * rādislī , literally meaning 'thing to be guessed, thing to be interpreted'. From this comes Dutch raadsel , German Rätsel , and Old English * rǣdels , the latter of which became modern English riddle . Defining riddles precisely is hard and has attracted a fair amount of scholarly debate. The first major modern attempt to define the riddle in modern Western scholarship

1767-471: The 19th century, but they remained common until the mid-20th century. The alternative to using the chamber pot was a trip to the outhouse . In China, the chamber pot (便壶 (biàn hú) was common. A wealthy salt merchant in the city of Yangzhou became the symbol of conspicuous excess when he commissioned a chamber pot made of gold which was so tall that he had to climb a ladder to use it. Chamber pots continue in use today in areas lacking indoor plumbing. In

Charades - Misplaced Pages Continue

1824-567: The King's white hall. Here, a snowflake falls from the sky, and is blown off by the wind. The riddle was at times a prominent literary form in the ancient and medieval world, and so riddles are extensively, if patchily, attested in our written records from these periods. More recently, riddles have been collected from oral tradition by scholars in many parts of the world. According to Archer Taylor, "the oldest recorded riddles are Babylonian school texts which show no literary polish". The answers to

1881-499: The Philippines, chamber pots are used as urinals and are known as arinola in most Philippine languages , such as Cebuano and Tagalog . In Korea, chamber pots are referred to as yogang (요강). They were used by people who did not have indoor plumbing to avoid the cold elements during the winter months. The term "potty" is usually used to refer to the small, toilet-shaped devices made especially for children training to use

1938-467: The Russian phrase "Nothing hurts it, but it groans all the time" can be deployed as a proverb (when its referent is a hypochondriac) or as a riddle (when its referent is a pig). Much academic research on riddles has focused on collecting, cataloguing, defining, and typologising riddles. Key work on cataloguing and typologising riddles was published by Antti Aarne in 1918–20, and by Archer Taylor . In

1995-668: The Stars , Celebrity Charades , Showoffs and Body Language ; the British Give Us a Clue ; the Canadian Party Game and Acting Crazy ; and the Australian Celebrity Game . On Britain 's BBC Radio 4 , I'm Sorry I Haven't a Clue performs a variant of the old written and spoken form of the game as Sound Charades . In the 1939 movie The Mystery of Mr. Wong , the game

2052-430: The basis for the second set of riddles in the thirteenth-century Libro de Apolonio , posed by Apolonio's daughter Tarsiana to her father. The perhaps eighth- or ninth-century Veronese Riddle is a key witness to the linguistic transition from Latin to Romance, but riddles are otherwise rare in medieval romance languages. However, in the early modern period, printed riddle collections were published in French, including

2109-571: The book, the scenes were subsequently considered models of the genre. By the time of the First World War , "acting charades" had become the most popular form and, as written charades were forgotten, it adopted its present, terser name. Thackeray's scenes—even those said to be "in pantomime"—included dialogue from the actors but truly "dumb" or " mime charades" gradually became more popular as well and similarly dropped their descriptive adjectives. The amateurish acting involved in charades led to

2166-417: The case of ancient riddles recorded without solutions, considerable scholarly energy also goes into proposing and debating solutions. Whereas previously researchers had tended to take riddles out of their social performance contexts, the rise of anthropology in the post-War period encouraged more researchers to study the social role of riddles and riddling, highlighting their role of re-orienting reality in

2223-653: The conventions of Old English heroic and religious poetry. While medieval records of Germanic-language riddles are patchy, with the advent of print in the West, collections of riddles and similar kinds of questions began to be published. A large number of riddle collections were printed in the German-speaking world and, partly under German influence, in Scandinavia. Riddles were evidently hugely popular in Germany:

2280-660: The face of fear and anxiety. However, wide-ranging studies of riddles have tended to be limited to Western countries, with Asian and African riddles being relatively neglected. Riddles have also attracted linguists, often studying riddles from the point of view of semiotics ; meanwhile, the twenty-first century has seen the rise of extensive work on medieval European riddles from the point of view of eco-criticism , exploring how riddles can inform us about people's conceptualisation and exploration of their environment. Many riddles appear in similar form across many countries, and often continents. Borrowing of riddles happens both on

2337-483: The fewer number who had cleverness, to exhibit their wit". In his Vanity Fair , the height of Rebecca Sharp 's social success is brought on by her performances of acting charades before the Prince Regent . The first scene—"first two syllables"—displays a Turkish lord dealing with a slaver and his odalisque before being garroted by the sultan 's chief black eunuch ; the second—"last two syllables"—finds

Charades - Misplaced Pages Continue

2394-552: The last two centuries. Key examples of internationally widespread riddles follow, based on the classic (European-focused) study by Antti Aarne . The basic form of the writing-riddle is 'White field, black seeds', where the field is a page and the seeds are letters. An example is the eighth- or ninth-century Veronese Riddle : Se pareba boves alba pratalia araba albo versorio teneba negro semen seminaba In front of him (he) led oxen White fields (he) ploughed A white plough (he) held A black seed (he) sowed. Here,

2451-675: The only Old English riddle to be attested in another manuscript besides the Exeter Book). Unlike the pithy three-line riddles of Symphosius, the Old English riddles tend to be discursive, often musing on complex processes of manufacture when describing artefacts such as mead ( Exeter Book Riddle 27 ) or a reed-pen or -pipe ( Exeter Book Riddle 60 ). They are noted for providing perspectives on the world which give voice to actors which tend not to appear in Old English poetry, ranging from female slaves to animals and plants, and they often subvert

2508-470: The oxen are the scribe's finger(s) and thumb, and the plough is the pen. Among literary riddles, riddles on the pen and other writing equipment are particularly widespread. The year-riddle is found across Eurasia. For example, a riddle in the Sanskrit Rig Veda , from around 1500–1000 BCE, describes a 'twelve-spoked wheel, upon which stand 720 sons of one birth' (i.e. the twelve months of

2565-591: The piece, How hard is her fate! but how great is her merit If by taking my whole she effects her release! The answer is " hem-lock ". William Mackworth Praed 's poetic charades became famous. Later examples omitted direct references to individual syllables, such as the following, said to be a favorite of Theodore Roosevelt : I talk, but I do not speak my mind I hear words, but I do not listen to thoughts When I wake, all see me When I sleep, all hear me Many heads are on my shoulders Many hands are at my feet The strongest steel cannot break my visage But

2622-565: The question or the answer. Archer Taylor says that "we can probably say that riddling is a universal art" and cites riddles from hundreds of different cultures including Finnish, Hungarian, American Indian, Chinese, Russian, Dutch and Filipino sources amongst many others. Many riddles and riddle-themes are internationally widespread. In the assessment of Elli Köngäs-Maranda (originally writing about Malaitian riddles, but with an insight that has been taken up more widely), whereas myths serve to encode and establish social norms, "riddles make

2679-420: The riddles are not preserved; the riddles include "my knees hasten, my feet do not rest, a shepherd without pity drives me to pasture" (a river? A rowboat?); "you went and took the enemy's property; the enemy came and took your property" (a weaving shuttle?); "who becomes pregnant without conceiving, who becomes fat without eating?" (a raincloud?). These may be riddles from oral tradition that a teacher has put into

2736-556: The second opens on the household bustling with activity as daybreak prompts bells ringing, arguments over receipts, collection of the chamber pots , calls for carriages, and greetings to new guests ; the third closes with a ship's crew and passengers tossed about by a storm with strong winds . The answer— nightingale —is then (somewhat mistakenly) acted out by Becky in the role of a singing French marquise, recalling both Lacoste 's 1705 tragic opera Philomèle and an arriviste lover and wife of Louis XIV . Apart from its importance in

2793-658: The seminal composition of one hundred and one riddles by Aldhelm (c. 639–709), written in Latin and inspired by the fourth- or fifth-century Latin poet Symphosius . Aldhelm was followed by a number of other Anglo-Saxons writing riddles in Latin. This prestigious literary heritage contextualises the survival of nearly one hundred riddles in the tenth-century Exeter Book , one of the main surviving collections of Old English verse. The riddles in this book vary in subject matter from ribald innuendo to theological sophistication. Three, Exeter Book Riddle 35 and Riddles 40/66 , are in origin translations of riddles by Aldhelm (and Riddle 35

2850-501: The softest whisper can destroy me The quietest whimper can be heard. The answer is "an actor". In the early 20th century, the 11th edition of the Encyclopædia Britannica offered these two prose charades as "perhaps as good as could be selected": "My first , with the most rooted antipathy to a Frenchman , prides himself, whenever they meet, upon sticking close to his jacket; my second has many virtues, nor

2907-537: The third sun ( mitra ), and the whole is Vishvamitra , Rama 's first teacher and counselor and a man noted for his outbursts of rage'. Accordingly, riddles are treated in early studies of Sanskrit poetry such as Daṇḍin 's seventh- or eighth-century Kāvyādarśa . Early narrative literature also sometimes includes riddles, prominently the Mahabharata , which for example contains the Yaksha Prashna ,

SECTION 50

#1732790885021

2964-493: The toilet, also called potty training , which are similar to chamber pots. These "potties" are generally a large plastic bowl with an ergonomically designed back and front to protect against splashes. They may have a built-in handle or grasp at the back to allow easy emptying and a non-slip bottom to prevent the child from sliding while in use. Some are given bright colors, and others may feature gentle or unoffensive drawings or cartoon characters. In many cases they are used since it

3021-508: The way out, Two ward the dogs off, One ever dirty Dangles behind it. This riddle ponder O prince Heidrek! The cow has four teats, four legs, two horns, two back legs, and one tail. The featherless bird-riddle is best known in Central Europe. An English version is: White bird featherless Flew from Paradise, Perched upon the castle wall; Up came Lord John landless, Took it up handless, And rode away horseless to

3078-600: The word which is the riddle's solution. Riddles have been collected by modern scholars throughout the Arabic-speaking world. Riddles are known to have been popular in Greece in Hellenistic times, and possibly before; they were prominent among the entertainments and challenges presented at symposia . Oracles were also represented as speaking in often riddlic language. However, the first significant corpus of Greek riddles survives in an anthology of earlier material known as

3135-532: The word's use to describe any obvious or inept deception, but over time "a charade" became used more broadly for any put-on (even highly competent and successful ones) and its original association with the parlor game has largely been lost. The acted form of charades has been repeatedly made into television game shows , including the American Play the Game , Movietown, RSVP , Pantomime Quiz , Stump

3192-416: The year, which together supposedly have 360 days and 360 nights). The most famous example of this type is the riddle of the Sphinx . This Estonian example shows the pattern: Hommikul käib nelja, lõuna-ajal kahe, õhtul kolme jalaga It goes in the morning on four feet, at lunch-time on two, at evening on three The riddle describes a crawling baby, a standing person, and an old person with

3249-550: Was by Robert Petsch in 1899, with another seminal contribution, inspired by structuralism , by Robert A. Georges and Alan Dundes in 1963. Georges and Dundes suggested that "a riddle is a traditional verbal expression which contains one or more descriptive elements, a pair of which may be in opposition; the referent of the elements is to be guessed". There are many possible sub-sets of the riddle, including charades , droodles , and some jokes . In some traditions and contexts, riddles may overlap with proverbs . For example,

#20979