Religiosity penetrates language like mold veins an exceptionally blue cheese. This is true for the English language in general but is particularly pronounced when it comes to profanity. This fact is not remotely surprising if you take even a second to think on it. The word profanity itself is a religious one for Christ’s sake! ⊕ Were it not for the act of measuring all utterances against God’s hair-trigger wrath, there would, strictly speaking, be no such thing as “profanity.” 

Profane,  from the Latin profanare “to desecrate,” from profanus “unholy, not consecrated,” from pro fano “not admitted into the temple (with the initiates).

The term has been broadened, in modern usage, to encompass any “naughty” words not fit for “polite” company ⊕ Even so, the desire to have something forceful to say, which properly utilizes a good long row of exclamation points ⊕, when we stub our toe, or cum, or get punched in the neck, or open a cable bill while in public has lead us to coin a plethora of seemingly benign substitution expletives.

Today these substitutes, so numerous as to vastly outnumber the “curses” they stand-in for,  are mostly the kind of limp, forceless words you associate with grandparents, cartoon characters, and 7 year-olds. They are also the kind of words that are so ingrained in our language and minds that we never give a thought to their origins or what they are actually standing-in for. A euphemistic substitute of this kind has a name, if you were not aware, and that name is “minced oath.” ⊕

Minced Oath.  A semi-technical term for a specific kind of euphemism or disguise mechanism, whereby an offending term or taboo phrase is modified so as to be used without giving offense. Periphrasis or circumlocution is the most common modification, that is, to “speak around” a profane word, implying it without saying it.

While there have long been linguistic taboos associated with the scatological and the sexual ⊕ it will not surprise you to learn minced oaths are, as a group, overwhelmingly Religious in origin.

Just a few examples:

Gosh darn it — God damn it
Jeepers Creepers — Jesus Christ
Tarnation — Damnation
Dad gum — God damn
Doggone it— God damn it
Jiminy Cricket — Jesus Christ
For Pete’s sake — For St. Peter’s Sake
By golly — By God’s body
By Jove — By Jupiter/Jehovah
Judas Priest — Jesus Christ
Good gravy — Good God
Drat — God rot it
For crying out loud — For Christ’s sake
Goodness gracious — Good God
Holy mackerel — Holy flesh
Jumping Jehosaphat — Jumping Jesus
Suffering succotash — Suffering saviour
Blimey — God blind me
Dangnabbit — God damn it
Gee whizz / geewhillikers — Jesus’ whiskers
Good grief — Good God
Egad — Oh God
Gadzooks — God’s hooks
Zounds — God’s wounds +
Etc…

That there are so very many of these types of minced oaths is actually somewhat comical, not to mention quite revealing in regard to Man’s outlook on taboo language.

Why comical? Because these archaic forms sound silly to our modern ears? ⊕ No. Because as a good hardline theologian (or hardline amateur) will happily remind you, any God worth the knee-pains of prostrating oneself before would not, could not, be fooled by a bit of loophole-exploiting linguistic flimflam. Which is to say, minced or not, the intention is identical and so the iniquity is equal.

 
Quote: “It is a vain endeavor on the part of some to avoid the guilt of profane swearing by mincing their oaths, as is the practice of many whose consciences still trouble them so much as to hinder them from the more out-breaking forms of this sin. Minced oaths are either oaths, or they are nonsense. If oaths, they are of course profane. If they are nonsense, they are not “good nonsense,” and are clearly forbidden by Matt. xii. 36. -William S, Plumer, D.D. LL.D., The Law of God, 1864.

It’s our persistence, in spite of this fact, which I find revealing. It would seem that we modify our speech knowing full well that the modification does not successfully solve the “problem.” We are motivated not by fear of God’s wrath ⊕ evidently but by fear of more tangibly immediate reprisals by the morality patrol. In short we will modify our behavior so as not to hassled by other (very real, persistent, and annoying) humans but not to protect against “eternal damnation” in the (very theoretical, abstract, quite possibly imaginary) afterlife.

Eeentahresting.

I am tempted to say that not only has profanity been historically framed by Religious attitudes, but that ultimately, and in more than merely a semantic way, it’s precisely Religion’s imperative against profanity which powers the great profanity dynamo. The whole purpose (and satisfaction) of cursing is the emphasis it affords, the action of saying something instantly an unmistakably recognizable as apart from genteel speech. Had Religious attitudes, over centuries, not explicitly shaped an entire canon of taboo utterances for us to utilize… well, where would we be then? We’d be grunting and groaning in exclamatory frustration.

Either that hurling fistfuls of feces.

Anyhoo, let’s amble back around to profanity and my atheism shall we?

As I said, I tend to feel betrayed by my own profane vocabulary when cursing. As though using Religious words, in the service of that perfect angered emphasis, were offering free press to Christianity, or worse, an implicit acceptance of their “sacredness.” It is habitual, after all, yet I can’t help but feel a twinge of annoyance that even in the midst of my passionate, animal, fist-shaking, secular tirades Religion ought to impose itself into my life. Of course, when I take the time to analyze this reaction, the irony of it, I can’t help but laugh.

For one thing our modern take on the term “profanity” has clouded an important distinction…

“The person on the street uses the term “profanity” broadly to refer to all categories of offensive speech. however, profanity and blasphemy are specific categories of religious speech sanctioned by religious authorities. To be profane means to be secular or indifferent toward religion. Blasphemy is more troublesome; it is an attack on religion and religious figures. It represents and intentional and offensive threat to religion…” -Why We Curse: A Neuro-psyco-social Theory of Speech, by Timothy Jay

So adhering to this more precise definition my existence is the “profanity,” while my use of Christian terminology, when swearing oaths, is more accurately “blasphemy.” That distinction goes a long way in easing my mind since blasphemy is something, as an atheist, I really don’t need to lose any sleep over or shy away from. 

Moreover, when you get right down to it, were I able to remove all references to “bearded men in the sky” from my angry outbursts, what would be the result? I’d be very obediently following the 2nd commandment in a way most devout, minced-oath-bandying believers can’t seem to manage, and that, my potty-mouthed friends, is just plain crazy talk.

In closing-

Having thus, worked it all out in my mind I’m confident I will no longer feel embarrassed by involuntary blurtings of “Jesus fucking Christ!” when, say, a rabid squirrel scampers up my pant-leg or a coworker, smilingly, asks me about my weekend.

Still, I think that it would be useful to have a good long list of non-religious oaths at our disposal should we choose to “go in another direction” with our anger. In as much I’ve started a post over at the annex where I’m soliciting your best minced oaths, in-use, inherited, or invented. If you’d like to contribute click here.

Hope you enjoyed.

Minds the world over, when compelled to conjure a Scotsman without the benefit of personal experience, likely create a burly, bearded fellow, with scotch on his breath, rectum pressured by haggis gas, bagpipes at the ready, his wind-tightened balls just out of sight behind a kilt which is itself woven in his ancient clan’s proud, traditional tartan…

Our minds are complete ignoramuses, obviously, but we who navigate them over the shoals of stereotype can’t bear all the blame. This image, or some slight variation of it, forms in our feeble minds for a good reason: because it sells, and has for a long time, and is consequently perpetuated. Oh yes, as any representative of the Scottish tourism board will tell you under condition of strict anonymity– “it’s all aboot the Sterling Laddie!!” If you could get a Hollywood exec to stop sniffing coke through his rolled-up Braveheart residual-check for a second he’d likely tell you the same.

This oversimplification of Scottish culture down into a few Highland-specific customs is such a widespread phenomenon that there is actually a term for it– Tartanry.

The fact is that the “small kilt” is not ancient at all. As for the “clan tartans” they bare, ⊕ overwhelmingly these are not of ancient origin either. The whole kilt/tartan business, in the cohesive, romanticized form it’s celebrated today, is less than 300 years old, and is so willfully mixed-up it’s hard in many cases to separate the facts from the folklore and finance.

The kilt or feileadh beag as it was actually called ⊕ itself began brushing kneecaps en masse sometime in the mid 1700’s. A possibly apocryphal story has long credited its invention to, of all people, an Englishman by the name of Thomas Rawlinson, an ironmaster working in Lochaber who took the longer feileadh mor and removed the top half to make it more suitable for the hot, indoor, fire-hazardous work of his workforce. True or not the fact seems to be that there is no record of the “small kilt” prior to the 1690’s.

What the Highlanders actually wore was the Breacan or “big wrap,” or “belted plaid,” which had emerged in the late sixteenth century as the first identifiably “Scottish” form of dress. Plaid, or “plaide” is actually Gaelic for “blanket” ⊕ and that’s what the belted plaid basically was.

Quote: “The kilt was a traveling tent… The garment itself was a length of woolen cloth, two yards by six yards… At night the clansman wrapped himself in it and slept. In the morning he laid a belt on the ground and then carefully pleated the great lump of stuff on top of the belt. And then he lay down on top of the lot, brought the ends of the belt up, and buckled it round his waist. He was now enclosed in a tube of cloth, reaching from his knees to right over his head.” –Clifford Hanley.

That the kilt has come to symbolize all of Scotland can, ironically, in large part be attributed to three kings George.

King George II imposed the Act of Proscription on the Scots in 1746. Among its many provisions, created to try and assimilate the “rebellious” Highlanders, was the Dress Act which made the wearing of tartan or kilts illegal. The logic was that by criminalizing the cultural signifiers of the clan system they could eventually break down the system itself.

Quote: “The Highlanders had been wearing their outlandish tartan suits, and since the Highlanders were weird beasts anyway, in the eyes of authority, the tartan was taken to be a very big juju. heap strong totem, like Sioux war bonnets. The government realized it could shear the Scotsman of his courage by abolishing the stuff altogether. Later that year a law was passed forbidding the wearing of multicolored cloths in the Highlands. Penalty for the first offense was six months in jail; for a second offense, seven years’ transportation to the Colonies. A few rash Highlanders were actually nabbed for this fiendish crime.” –Clifford Hanley.

The Act was repealed in 1782 by King George III and soon ⊕ Highland dress became all the rage as fashion among all classes of Scottish society, the vast majority of whom had never worn a kilt or tartan in their lives, and in fact, as Lord Macaulay put it in the 1850’s, was previously “considered by nine Scotchmen out of ten as the dress of a theif.”   

Quote: “...the kilt had fallen out of use as an item of ordinary dress, allowing for the romantic rehabilitation of Highland dress… No longer the threat from the north, the image of the Highlands could represent this wilderness within the bustling economy of the “new” Britain. Rather than dangerous, barelegged barbarians, the Highlanders became admirable, a kilted version of the “noble savage.”

This romantic fascination reached its peak in 1822 when another George, King George IV, staged a lavish visit to Edinburgh wearing the full Highland regalia.

Quote: “This publicity stunt promoted the kilt as fashionable wear among the Scottish nobility and, in so doing, helped establish the kilt as the national dress of Scotland. However, the king’s clothes, like those worn by Scottish noblemen, were far removed from those worn by the Highlanders of the previous century. Given the fact that they were largely designed for the levée, assembly, and ballroom, the emphasis was on the dramatic and spectacular… ‘Highland dress’ turned into ‘tartan costume.’”-Andrew Bolton, From The Kilt, a Metropolitan Museum of Art thematic essay.

Which brings us to the “clan tartan” itself. This is where outside historical forces and the natural flow of fashion give way to straight-up sham and flim-flam, of which the Scots are, themselves, complicit.

Contrary to popular belief, and to clarify the “lies by omission” offered by hundreds of websites offering family patterns to genealogically obsessed consumers, specific tartans almost never trace their roots in a straight line back to antiquity, nor in a curvy, jagged, or meandering line for that matter.

Quote: “...the Highlanders wore any tartan that came up their backs. They had never heard of the idea of an official clan design, and if they had, they would have dodged it because in those days advertising your name could easily get you a dirk between the ribs.” –Clifford Hanley.

Or as C.C.P. Lawson put it in his History of the Uniforms of the British Army “Remembering the continuous clan feuds and the consequent state of more or less perpetual hostilities, a recognizable clan plaid would have been a positive danger to the wearer outside his own territory.”

The truth is that the fashion craze for all things Highlander that began with the repeal of the Dress Act directly leads into the Clan Tartan craze of modern times. The growing excitement paired with a consuming desire by Scots, both of highland and indeed lowland and border dwelling descent, to claim some ancient clannish birth-rank of their very own, rendered reality and actual tradition of negligible importance.

Around this time two clever con-men saw which way the wind was blowing ⊕ and got to work cashing in.

These con-men were the Brothers Allen, better known today under the aliases John Sobieski Stewart and Charles Edward Stuart. Where they spent their early years before arriving in Edinburgh and what they did prior to this episode is unknown, as is much about them. 

Quote: “All that we can say of them is that they were both talented artists in many fields. They wrote romantic poems… they were learned, though evidently self-taught, in many languages; they were skillful draughtsmen, wood-carvers, furniture makers. They had persuasive manners and great social charm, which enabled them to move at ease in the best society. ⊕ Whatever they did, they did thoroughly and with flair.” — From The Invention of Tradition, by Eric J. Hobsbawm.

All you need know about the brothers in context of Clan Tartans is that in 1829 they revealed to a patron that they had in their possession a Latin manuscript dating back to at least 1571, of noble provenance, titled Vestiarum Scoticum or The Garde-robe of Scotland. This manuscript “just happened” to directly feed into the Highlander craze while simultaneously validating the tartan’s ancient origins.

In 1842 the Vestiarum Scoticum was published in limited edition, and billed as a reproduction, with color illustrations ⊕, of the original Latin manuscript setting forth, unequivicably, the ancient origins of 75 tartans and their clan associations.

Though it didn’t take long for the experts of the time to dismiss the Vestiarum Scoticum as a hoax, and its creators as charlatans, the book was a huge success anyway. In that it offered validation to not only Highlanders but Scots from the lowlands and border-clans as well, people seemed willing to overlook the little matter of it being total bullshit. So long as no one spoke up, it simultaneously offered them a solution to their desire and salve for their conscience.

As Clifford Hanley puts it, “Everybody, of course, wanted to be in on the act. Families who hadn’t even had a pair of knees now discovered they had a tartan, all to themselves.”

Two years later the brothers published an even more lavish book titled The Costume of the Clans which expanded their portfolio of fictional tartans and traced their origins back even further. Not long afterward their claims of royal blood caught up with them and forced them to leave Scotland, but this little nudge from two dubious brothers, in the form of two books, was essentially all that it took to kick-start an extremely lucrative industry; one that just happens to depend on the indefinite extension and continual elaboration of a con.Many of the tartans listed in the Vestiarum Scoticum are still accepted as official tartans today. Meanwhile the amount of official tartans listed with ‘tartan authorities’ has grown to massive proportions, to the point that today not only do the Irish and Welsh have their own recognized tartans but so too do many companies.

What interests me here is not that an industry would prop-up a line of bullshit to make cash, obviously, ⊕ but that an entire population would so willingly abandon reality and not only adopt the bullshit in its stead but perpetuate it for generations… well, it leaves you kind of speechless.

It makes modern complaints of “tartantry” seem altogether more amusing. More than that knowing the truth transforms the burly, bagpiping, kilted figure that your mind conjures at the mention of “Scottish” into an entirely more complex figure. Where as initially you might have felt vaguely embarrassed or guilty at your mind’s involuntary employment of such stereotypical imagery, now you almost have to laugh.
 
I mean, think about it… who the hell is that guy anyway? An “ignorant oversimplification” of a fictional romantic character amalgamated from various traditions and conceits who himself is masquerading as an historical figure? A caricature of a false historical ideal who none the less reflects, on some level, the actual modern figures who have adopted the fiction as a fact and by their action made him real? How do you even begin to approach a creature like this emotionally or philosophically?

Truth is I haven’t the faintest idea. I just think the whole thing fascinating. But then I am a Morrison lad after all, and whatever else he is, that burly, farting, bagpiping, kilted figure with his balls exposed to the Scottish wind is quite possibly me coosin!

Anyhow, crazily longwinded though this post was ⊕, I hope at least a few among you soldiered through and enjoyed.

First, a few words on origins–

Drink as “offering” has been a documented aspect of prayer ceremony from the dawn of history in both Pagan and Judeo-Christian traditions.

Quote: “An early Greek custom called for a pledge of three cups-one to Mercury, one to the Graces, and one to Zeus. In Rome, drinking to another’s health became so important, the Senate decreed that all diners must drink to Augustus at every meal. Fabius Maximus declared that no man should eat or drink before he had prayed for him and drank to his health.” -Paul Dickson. ⊕

The transition from “toasting” the Gods to toasting the Emperor (who was himself at various times considered a god) was a convenient bridge that eventually lead to the toasting of any socially important person, and finally to the toasting of any privately important person, living or dead. 

The physical action we are familiar with of standing amongst friends and lifting a glass, devoid of religious significance, evidently also dates back to ancient Greece. It seems that the poisoning of drinks was a wide-spread enough practice that a host would make a great show of standing, pouring out wine from a common pitcher, and drinking the first glass himself, as means of saying, “look at what a swell host I am, I am not poisoning any of you!” or to put it slightly more poetically- “to friendship!” At which point he’d raise his glass high as an invitation for his guests to do likewise.

The term “toast” itself is thought to have come from the Romans, who evidently found themselves drinking a lot of sub-par wine. They’d drop a piece of burnt bread into wine, the charcoal of which would reduce the drinks acidity, making it more palatable. This toast may have also been included with the wine as a token bit of nourishment. ⊕ The term stuck even after the practice of including the burnt bread died out. It mutated even further when, in the golden age of toasting, the act of drinking a toast to women admired but not present spawned the phrase “toast of the town.”

Meanwhile there is a connected custom, the clinking of glasses, to consider. There are three theories as to its origin. The first is attributed again to the Greeks’ proclivity for poison. It’s thought that the hearty thud of wine vessels against one another might facilitate an exchange of liquid from one vessel to another, thus ensuring any poison would be imbibed by all. A second theory attributes the clinking of glasses to the Christian era. It was thought that the bell-like clink of glasses would banish the Devil, who was thought to literally inhabit liquor (and be the cause of the ill behavior of the drunken), and who was repelled by the sound of bells. The third theory, which sounds entirely more modern to me, is that all five senses had to come into play to get the greatest pleasure from drink, the sight, the smell, the touch, the taste, and with the clink… the sound.

In truth the species of speach which we moderns refer to as “a toast,” meaning the one word salutations, often in a phonetically-sounded foreign tongue, the literal meaning of which we rarely know, is only the dimmest shadow of a once grand and formal tradition of dinner speaking. Today, for the average person not serving as an ambassador on distant soil, that tradition is relegated almost exclusively to the dreaded wedding toast, in which a bitter and terrified “best man” stumbles his way through those few words which represent the final hurdle in his race to the open bar.

In the heyday of toasting the whole affair was elaborate enough that scores of books were published to help people navigate the treacherous rules of etiquette involved for both toast-giver and audience, and no drink could be drunk without “a few words” of praise to someone. To drink without offering a toast was simply an affront to everyone in the room, and this imperative evidently protracted even casual occasions into 8 or 10 hour binges.

Today it would just be impossible. Imagine heading over to your local Tex-Mex place for a few 6 dollar Coronas after a crappy day in your shabby cubicle, only to realize you were a “best man,” in a room full of nothing but other “best men,” obliged to speak and listen before every… single… round; for 10 hours. Didn’t Sartre write a play about that?

In any case, as I said at the beginning, the “hour of the toast” is fast approaching, and though I don’t expect many of you will want to wax eloquent, at length, in iambic pentameter, about how much you love your mother, or country, or best mates, you may still wish to surprise everyone with something a bit more imaginative than the expected, “May you rock out with yer cock out and jam out with yer clam out! Down the hatch!”

With that in mind I am including below a small sampling of toasts (mostly culled from the 1927 volume, The Big Toast-Book, by Carleton B. Case, pictured above) so antiquated sounding that they might be just the thing to… oh, I don’t know… persuade your mightily disappointed and old-fashioned father that he ought not disown you just yet, or convince your significant other’s parents that you’re more than the coarse, dead-eyed, lout you appear to be, or induce premature nostril-vomiting in your rivals, or embarrass the hell out of your sweetheart. Who knows? Maybe they’ll just inspire you to come up with a decent toast yourself and revive in some small way the time honored tradition.

For the Romantics:

Here’s to the one and only one,
And may that one be she
Who loves but one and only one,
And may that one be me.
-
Here’s to love, The only fire against which there is no insurance.
-
God made women both beautiful and foolish–
Beautiful, that man might love her;
Foolish, that she might love him.
-
Here’s to everything old! Old friends, old times, old books, and old wine.
-
Flow wine, smile woman, and the universe is consoled. -Beranger

For the Bachelors:

Love is the wine of life
And marriage is the morning after.
-
I would advise a young man to pause
Before he takes a wife;
In fact I see no earthly cause
Why he should not pause for life.
-
Here’s to the woman! –ah that we could fall into her arms
Without falling into her hands! -Bierce
-
A pipe, a book, a fire, a friend,
A stein that’s always full,
Here’s to the joys of a bachelor’s life,
A life that’s never dull.

For the Married:

To Home! The place where you are treated best and grumble most.
-
He is not worthy of the honeycomb
That shuns the hive because the bees have stings. -Shakespeare
-
Let the man who does not wish to be idle, fall in love. -Ovid
-
Laugh and the world laughs with you; snore, and you sleep alone.

For the Naughty:

Here’s head first, to a foaming glass!
Here’s head first, to a lively lass!
Here’s head first, for a bit of kissing,
For the good don’t know the fun they are missing!
-
Here’s to the ships of our navy,
Here’s to the ladies of our land,
May the former be well rigged,
And the latter be well manned.
-
Here’s to the lasses we’ve loved, my lad,
Here’s to the lips we’ve pressed.
For of kisses and lasses,
Like liquor in glasses,
The last is always the best.

For the Bitter:

Here’s to the woman with face so fair,
Framed in a wreath of beautiful hair;
Pretty red lips as soft as a rose–
How many have kissed them God only Knows.
-
Here’s to the love that lies in a woman’s eyes,
And lies, and lies, and lies.

For the Old Sots:

Which is the properest day to drink–
Saturday, Sunday, Monday?
Each is the properest day I think,
Why should I name but one day?
-
Here’s to the heart that fills as the bottle empties.
-
Man being reasonable must get drunk;
The best of life is but intoxication;
Glory, the grape, love, gold– in these are sunk
The hopes of all men and of every nation. -Byron
-
God made man frail as a bubble;
God made love, love made trouble;
God made the vine– was it a sin
That man made wine to drown trouble in?
-
Grasp the bowl; in nectar sinking
Man of sorrow, drown thy thinking!

For the Ladies:

If kissing were the only joy of bed,
One woman would another woman wed.
(followed by winking and giggling)
-
The more one sees of men the more one likes dogs.

For the Men:

You shall and you shan’t,
You will and you wont,
You’re condemned if you do,
And you’re damned if you don’t

For Parents:

Go back to bed!
I know it’s loud it’s grown-up time.
No you can’t have any of my grape juice,
Just go back to bed please.
Honey, you have to go back to bed
Because the monster is on his way
And he likes to eat children.
Yes he eats them
And chews up their bones.
He ate one of the neighbor kids last night.
Yes, he’s on his way here right now…
Wait, I think I hear him on the steps!
You better get to bed quick. RUN!

For All:

Yesterday’s yesterday while today’s here,
Today is today till tomorrow appear,
Tomorrow’s tomorrow until today’s past,
And kisses are kisses as long as they last.
-
May you live all the days of your life. -Swift
-
Weep and you are called a baby,
Laugh and you are called a fool,
Yield and you’re called a coward,
Stand and your called a mule,
Smile and they’ll call you silly,
Frown and they’ll call you gruff,
Put on a front like a millionaire,
And somebody calls your bluff.
-
May bad luck follow you all the days of your life,
And never overtake you.
-
At ten, a child; at twenty, wild;
At thirty tame, if ever;
At forty wise; at fifty, rich;
At sixty, good or never!
-
While we live, let’s live in clover,
For when we’re dead, we’re dead all over.

And finally, here’s one especially for me to make:

May the people who dance on your grave get cramps in their legs!


Lastly I would just like to mention how strikingly perfect the symbolism of holding up a full glass, especially on New Years Eve, seems to me. We hold it there, brimming, shining and untouched. So much optimism for everything which is to come, for the fun yet to be had, for the possibilities which await! We take that first delicious and refreshing sip with bright eyes. But of course, by the end of the night it’s a different story though isn’t it? The glass lays toppled, used-up, cracked, empty and we… we are nauseous, disheveled, most likely embarrassed and full of some vague regret, having yet again failed to learn anything from the previous time we held up a glass, confidently swearing that things would be different.


For more on the history and art of toasting see the following:
The History & Ritual of the Toast
Toastbook by Paul Dickson
Drinkingsongs.net which offers many toasts as well as a terrific bibliography
Wine, Women, and Song published 1884
In Praise of Ale published 1888
Toasts published 1895
The Banquet Book Published 1902
400 Laughs, or Fun without Vulgarity published 1902
Rare Bits of Humor published 1906
Irish Toasts published 1908
A Tankard of Ale, an Anthology of Drinking Songs published 1920
More Toasts published 1922

Hope you enjoyed.
Happy New Year all and sundry! 2008 will be different! I swear!

Case 123

Here we have a fetish which is wholly benign, strangely poetic, and really, to be envied.

“B., thirty years of age, apparently untainted, refined and sensitive; great lover of flowers; liked to kiss them, but without any sensual motive or sensual excitement; of a rather frigid nature; before twenty-one did not practice masturbation, and subsequently only for periods of time. At twenty-one he was introduced to a young lady who wore some large roses on her bosom. Since then large roses had dominated his sexual feelings. He incessantly bought roses; kissing them would produce erection. He took roses to bed with him, although he never touched his genitals with them. His pollutions, henceforth, were accompanied by dreams of roses. He dreamt of roses that had fairy-like beauty; when he inhaled their fragrance, he ejaculated.”

Ah yes. Imagine if it were all so simple… You could work at a flower shop, with the ultimate goal of one day gaining employment at some fine botanical gardens somewhere, and at night you could return home to do a little “tending” to your own prized rose bushes.

Case 88

Here we have a story full of pathos, sweaty gymnasiums, fetishistic desire, odd naiveté, brash artistic license, chance encounters, arrests, and ultimately, as with so many human dramas, failure. And all this encapsulated in one very dry, very short, clinical paragraph. 

“X., aged thirty four, teacher in the gymnasium. In childhood he suffered from convulsions. At age ten he began to masturbate, with lustful feelings, which were connected with very strange ideas. He was particularly partial to women’s eyes; but because he wished to imagine some form of coitus, and was absolutely innocent in sexual matters, he evolved the idea of making the nostrils the seat of the female sexual organs in order to avoid too great a separation from the eyes. His vivid sexual desires then revolved around this idea. He sketched drawings representing correct greek profiles of female heads, but the nostrils were so large that insertion of the penis would have been possible. One day, in an omnibus, he saw a girl in whom he thought he recognized his ideal. He followed her to her home and immediately proposed to her. Shown the door, he returned again and again, until arrested. X never had sexual intercourse.”

So tragic. Nose-craving, eye-adoring, virgin man, we feel your pain… As an afterward to this case the Richard Von Krafft-Ebing M.D. offers us this little nugget :

“Nose fetishism is seldom encountered. The following rare bit of poetry comes to me from England-

O sweet and pretty little nose, so charming unto me;
O were I but the sweetest rose, I’d give my scent to thee.
O make it full with honey sweet, that I may suck it all;
T’would be for me the greatest treat, a real festival.
How sweet and how nutritious your darling nose does seem.
It would be more delicious, than strawberries and cream.”

Uh… Yeah.

Case 98

Here we have a case which, by today’s standards, hardly seems deviant at all, more like a pilot script for a sitcom. It’s marital bliss… with a tiny catch!

“A lady told Dr. Gemy that on her wedding night and the night that followed, her husband contented himself with kissing her, and running his fingers through her wealth of tresses. He then fell asleep. On the third night, Mr. X. produced an immense wig, with abundant long hair, and begged his wife to put it on. As soon as she had done so, he richly compensated her for his neglected marital duties. In the morning he again showed extreme tenderness while he caressed the wig. When Mrs X. removed the wig, she at once lost all charm to her husband. Mrs X. recognized this as a hobby, and readily yielded to the wishes of her husband, whom she loved dearly, and whose libido depended upon the wearing of the wig. It was remarkable, however, that a particular wig had the desired effect for only a fortnight or three weeks time. It had to be made of thick, long hair, but its color was unimportant. The result of this marriage, after five years, was two children and a collection of seventy two wigs.”

Comming this fall to FOX. Wiggin’ Out! “Married life can be a hairy sittuation!” Filmed in front of a live studio audience.

Case 99

Here we have a variation on the theme of the previous case.

“X., aged twenty, inverted sexually. Only loved men with large bushy mustaches. One day he met a man who was his ideal. He invited him to his home, but was unspeakably disappointed when the man removed an artificial mustache. Only when the visitor returned the ornament to his upper lip did he exercise his charm over X. once more and restored X. to complete virility.”

Ah yes, those dreaded artificial mustaches! X. must have been quite disappointed. I mean what are the odds of a man with a mustache-fetish just happening to pick up a man with a fake mustache?! Of course, if an artificial stache was good enough to fool X’s “sexually inverted” senses, why didn’t he just carry a nice bushy one around in his pocket (b.y.o.m.)? Hell, why not buy an artificial mustache factory and get to work Tom Sellecking the world? Crazy bastards, we humans. 

Case 225

Here we have a case which falls under the “theft dependent on fetishism” heading. By way of lead in Krafft-Ebing offers the following- Pathological fetishism may become the cause of crimes. As such hair despoiling, robbery or theft of women’s linen, handkerchiefs, aprons, shoes, and silks are now recognized (as crimes). It cannot be doubted that such individuals are the subject of deep mental taint…

“P., laborer, aged twenty nine. Family heavily tainted. Emotional, irritable; had masturbated since childhood. At ten years old saw a boy masturbate into a woman’s handkerchief. This gave direction to P’s sex life. He stole handkerchiefs from pretty girls and masturbated into them. His mother tried every means to break him of this habit. She admonished him, took the stolen handkerchiefs away and bought him new ones, all in vain. He was caught by the police and punished for theft. He then went to Africa and served in the army with an excellent record. On his return to France he resumed his old practices. He was only potent if a prostitute held a white handkerchief in her hand during the act. He married in 1894 and sustained his virility by grasping a handkerchief during coitus.

The fetishistic crisis always came suddenly, like a paroxysm, especially at moments of laziness. He would feel out of sorts, psychically moody, sexually excited, and impelled to masturbate. Soon the fantasy image of a handkerchief would appear and take full possession of his thoughts and feelings. If he then caught sight of a woman’s handkerchief he would choke with fear, palpitation of the heart would set in, he would tremble, and profuse perspiration would break out all over his body. Although conscious of the risk involved, he was irresistibly forced to steal the handkerchief. He was arrested on one such occasion, but the examining physician declared him irresponsible. During the time of detention he was free of his obsession. He hoped to master his weakness in the future. He estimated that he had stolen one hundred handkerchiefs. He used each handkerchief only once, then threw it away.”

He used each handkerchief only once, then threw it away? Stingy uncaring bastard! Didn’t he realize there were men even worse off than he who could only attain potency when wrapping their members in stolen women’s handkerchiefs which had already been ejaculated into by loony ex-cons who’d served with the army in Africa and whose names began with the letter P?!

Case 116

Here we have a case filed under the “pathological erotic fetishism” heading-

“L, aged thirty seven, clerk, from a tainted family. At five years old, he had his first erection when he saw his bedfellow -an aged relative- put on his nightcap. The same thing occurred later when he saw an old servant put on her nightcap. Later, simply the idea of an old ugly woman’s head covered with a nightcap, was sufficient to cause an erection. The sight of a cap, or a naked woman or man alone made no impression, but the mere touch of a nightcap induced erection, and sometimes even ejaculation. L. was not a masturbator, and had never been sexually active until his thirty second year, when he married a young girl with whom he had fallen in love. On his wedding night he remained cold until, from necessity, he brought to his aid the memory-picture of an ugly woman’s head with a nightcap. Coitus was immediately successful. Thereafter it was always necessary for him to use this method. From childhood he had been subject to attacks of depression, with suicidal tendencies, and occasional frightful hallucinations at night. When looking out a window he became dizzy and anxious. He was a perverse, peculiar, and easily embarrassed man of bad mental constitution.

In this very peculiar case, the simultaneous coincidence of the first sexual reference and an absolutely heterogeneous impression seems to have determined association.

A related case of accidental associative fetishism which is quite peculiar, is that of a married man, aged thirty, who in other respects, was physically and mentally healthy, who is said to have suddenly lost his sexual power after moving into another house, and to have regained it as soon as the furniture of the bedroom had been arranged as before.”

I must say that the thought our sexual proclivities are so radically influenced by the random occurrences of early childhood is horrific. Perhaps it’s a good thing that the internet serves up every manner of sexual fodder to the youngsters. Better to see straight away that there is a whole universe of degradation and kink and perversity to explore, and grow bored of, than getting obsessively fixated on your grandma’s bunions or a playmate’s soiled diaper or whatever. Sheesh.

Case 95

Here we have a case in which a gentleman named Z struggles mightily with a very “particular” fetish.

“Z., gentleman, family tainted. Even in early childhood he always felt great sympathy with the lame and crippled. He used to limp about the room on two brooms in lieu of crutches or, when observed, go limping about the streets: at the same time, however, no sexual significance was coupled with the idea. Gradually, the thought supervened that he would like “as a pretty lame child” to meet a pretty girl who would express sympathy for his affliction. Sympathy from men he disdained. Z. was brought up in a rich man’s house by a private tutor, and claimed that up to his twentieth year he was unaware of the differences between sexes. His feelings were confined to the idea of being pitied by a pretty girl for being lame, or extending the same sympathy to a lame girl himself. Gradually, erotic emotions associated themselves with this fantasy and at the age of twenty he succumbed to temptation and masturbated for the first time. From then on he practiced this act often. Sexual neurasthenia supervened and an irritable weakness took hold of him, to such an extent that the very sight of a girl with a halting gait induced ejaculation.

When masturbating, or in his erotic dreams, the idea of the limping girls was always the controlling element. The personality of the limping girl was a matter of indifference to Z., his interest being solely centered on the limping foot. He never had coitus with a girl thus afflicted. He never had the inclination for it and did not think he could be potent under the circumstances. His perverse fantasies revolved only around masturbating against the foot of a lame female. At times he anchored his hope on the thought that he might succeed in winning and marrying a chaste lame girl; that, because of his love for her, she would take pity on him and free him of his crime by ‘transferring his love from the sole of her foot to the root of her soul.’ He sought deliverance in this thought. His present existence was one of untold misery.”

Happy story that. Though if you change a few of the words here and there sounds like it could be any average 21st century guy-

The personality of the girl was a matter of indifference to Z., his interest being solely centered on her [fill in blank].

See what I mean?

I must say also, in regards to this case, that the sentence “transferring his love from the sole of her foot to the root of her soul,” words which had surely never been laid down in exactly that order, in any language, before this book’s publication, is worth the price of admission all by itself.

(The thumbnail was adapted from an image on Susan Hagen’s wood carvings page.)

Case 96

Here we have a variation on the theme of the previous case.

“Mr. V., aged thirty, civil servant; parents neuropathic. From the age of seven he had, for many years, a lame girl of the same age as a playmate. At the age of twelve, nervously disposed and heterosexually inclined, the boy began to masturbate spontaneously. At that time puberty set in, and undoubtedly the first sexual emotions toward the other sex coincided with the sight of a lame girl. Subsequently only limping women excited him sexually. His fetish was a pretty lady who, like the companion of his childhood, limped with the left foot. Always heterosexual, but abnormally sensual, he promptly sought relations with the opposite sex, but was absolutely impotent with women who were not lame. Virility and gratification were most strongly elicited if the prostitute limped with the left foot, but he was also successful if the lameness was on the right foot. Due to his fetishism, the opportunities for coitus seldom occurred, so he resorted to masturbation, but found it a disgusting and miserable substitute. His sexual anomaly rendered him very unhappy, and he was often close to committing suicide, but regard for his parents prevented him. This moral affliction culminated in the desire for marriage with a sympathetic lame lady. Unfortunately, because he could not love the soul of such a wife, but only her defect of lameness, he considered such a union a profanation of matrimony and an unbearable, ignoble existence. On this account he had often thought of resignation and castration.”

I can’t help but be in awe of this sentence in particular- “Virility and gratification were most strongly elicited if the prostitute limped with the left foot, but he was also successful if the lameness was on the right foot.” The analytical and scientific thoroughness of our tortured and miserable Mr. V. for being thoughtful enough to test this particular hypothesis is brilliant. “Please try limping on your right foot now Ms. Prostitute… in the interest of science of course.”

As to the case in particular- Poor Mr. V., the silly bastard. Not too bright was he? Any self respecting man of the 19th Century would have married a nice perfectly “intact” girl and then paid a carriage driver to run over her foot just before they made it to the honeymoon suite. Castration? Uh, I think not.

-

So there you have it. A tiny porthole into the steamy underpants of the 19th century. Hope you enjoyed.

Evidently in 2006 Kino released a film which dramatizes many of the cases in Psychopathia Sexualis, though judging by the trailers they focussed on much of the darker material.

Note: This post was one in a series of reworkings of old posts which date from before the redesign of The Nonist. The text has been combined from 6 prior posts and reworked. The images are also updated. I will be periodically adding these reworkings into the flow of new content in an effort to eventually remove all the old pages from circulation.