Today we drive off the road a bit, as reader Athayde Tonhasca Júnior has a collection of Scottish signs he photographed (this is one of two parts, the second coming later). His notes are indented, and you can enlarge the photos by clicking on them:
They all leapfrog, with surprisingly few injuries reported (Redgorton, Scotland).
I reckon you are expected to sneeze and cough explosively before leaving the van (Perth, Scotland).
A joiner from Perth who knows his Classics. Cesar wrote the famous words after crushing the forces of Pharnaces II, king of Pontus, in 47 BC. Veni, vidi, vici exemplifies the concision and precision of Latin – although the saying loses some of its gravitas when pronounced because it requires going full Elmer Fudd: “weenee, weedee, weekee”. Cicero, the cunning orator, could also get to the point quickly and elegantly. When he needed to announce to the Senate the execution – ordered by him – of some conspirators, he avoided awkward and incriminating words like “execution”, “death”, “strangulation”, etc. by declaring, vixerunt (“they have lived,” which implies “they are now dead”). Nuff said.
Wise advice at Perth College library.
These pets belonged to members of the Raj and apparently were brought back from India for burial in holy Christian ground. Dead servants probably were discarded locally (Hopetoun Estate on the outskirts of Edinburgh).
My petition to have a sign like this for summons to my home office was rejected by higher domestic authority. My motion to be addressed as His Lordship didn’t pass either (Hopetoun Estate).
This culinary atrocity amuses and attracts tourists visiting Scotland. True natives stick to a traditional fare: greasy, starchy & overcooked food (Stonehaven, Scotland). [JAC: I ate a deep fried Mars bar, battered of course, when I lived in Edinburgh. I just wanted to try it, and it was surprisingly good!]
Home cooked. Really, honest to god (nudge, nudge, wink, wink). Why do quotation marks “baffle” so many? (Stonehaven).
Tea room in Thornton, Scotland. “Serendipity” was coined in 1754 by English writer, art historian and politician Horace (born Horatio) Walpole (1717-1797). He was inspired by Michele Tramezzino’s 1557 tale Peregrinaggio di tre giovani figliuoli del re di Serendippo (The pilgrimage of the three young sons of Serendip’s king). In the story, the princes of Serendip (a Persian name for Sri Lanka) went about making accidental discoveries of good and pleasant things. According to the Oxford English Dictionary, Walpole introduced over 200 words into the English language, including beefy, malaria, nuance, sombre, and souvenir. Some of them didn’t quite catch on, like balloonomania or robberaceously. But “serendipity” was voted the UK’s favourite word in 2000.
An unassuming wall sign in Falkland (Scotland) praising James VI of Scotland, who became James I of England, thus the first king of Great Britain. James’ greatest legacy was the commission of a translation of the Bible into English. A group of sages laboured for seven years to translate from Greek, Hebrew, Aramaic, and Latin. The resulting text is considered a monumental literary achievement, which Christopher Hitchens labelled “a giant step in the maturing of English literature”, and which prompted Richard Dawkins to say “a native speaker of English who has never read a word of the King James Bible is verging on the barbarian” (I can’t comment because I never read it). The good king was also into demons and black magic, writing a whole book about the subject. William Shakespeare may have been inspired by it to create the Weird Sisters, which to me are the best part of Macbeth. James upheld a delicate religious harmony, but it all went pear-shaped: his weak and incompetent son (Charles I) managed to get his head lopped off.
