www.alphadictionary.com

• gaberlunzie •

Pronunciation: gæ-bêr-lên-zee • Hear it!

Part of Speech: Noun

Meaning: 1. A strolling beggar or mendicant. 2. A beadsman (a licensed beggar in Scotland).

Notes: Today's Good Word is a lexical orphan, without accompanying adjective or verb. Americans may have never encountered this word; it does not occur in any US dictionary that I know of. However, it is alive and well in Scotland, where I recently heard it spoken, to my surprise.

In Play: Today's rather arcane yet living word refers to a wandering beggar, as opposed to those who settle down in one place: "Candy Cain's neighborhood is located as far from reality as possible, save for the occasional gaberlunzie who wanders through." However, metaphorical applications will probably be more useful: "If you lose your job when you are over 50 years old, you are likely to become a job gaberlunzie, begging for any position you can find."

Word History: All we know about this Good Word's past is that it seems to be made up of gaber and lunzie. Now, lunzie is the traditional spelling of a word lunyie "loin". The first part of the word suggests gaberdine, a smock or coarse cloak worn by medieval pilgrims. It is only interesting because blue-gown was another name for gaberlunzies in the Middle Ages—suggestive but inconclusive. If gaberlunzie came from the notion of someone with loins girded in a gaberdine, we have to explain such a placement of a garment usually worn on the shoulders.

Great word. There's a certain wandering guy from Spain who would have liked to know this word.

Brazilian dude

This may be of interest - a ballad entitled "The Gaberlunzie Man", complete with sound track

http://www.contemplator.com/child/gaberlunz.html

Great site, HectorInspector ! Post more often !...

Henri

And here's a word I bet you don't know, dug up from the archives. And whatever happened to Henri Day?

Great word, Perry, but probably not high on the list at the National Poverty Center. Since I'm in a proposing mood today, how about the following addition:

gaberlunize:(verb) (GAB-er-luh-nize) To reduce to beggary.

Just rearrange two letters and you've got a verb.

As for the etymology, Dr. G refers to "loins girded in gaberdine." Have we entirely forgotten Scottish St.Gaberlunzie, the patron saint of beggars whose loins were girt with gaberdine? Nor his connection with St. Gambrinus, patron saint of beer?

Umberto Eco's book/movie especially shows many
medieval monk garb. Stars Sean Connery, Christian Slater.

There's a Norwegian community in Minnesota who created a St Urzo to compete with St Pat. Urzo ran the grasshoppers out of Norway. A MN town has a giant statue of him with a grasshopped speared on a trident and an occasional festival in his honor. The web pages used to be hilarious, but they seem to have sobered up in the last coupoe of years.

Everyone knows the rhetorical question, "Is the Pope Catholic?" I am sure he. As an aside, Pope Francis surely has all Christendom positively excited. I am personally excited and looking forward to his service to the Roman Church as well as to the Christian faith at large.

The question, "Was Saint Patrick a Catholic?" is not so clear. I have my doubts. There are Christians in England who call themselves "Celtic Christians". They declare they were never a part of the Church of Rome. I have had discussions with some of them.

Everyone knows the rhetorical question, "Is the Pope Catholic?" I am sure he. As an aside, Pope Francis surely has all Christendom positively excited. I am personally excited and looking forward to his service to the Roman Church as well as to the Christian faith at large.

The question, "Was Saint Patrick a Catholic?" is not so clear. I have my doubts. There are Christians in England who call themselves "Celtic Christians". They declare they were never a part of the Church of Rome. I have had discussions with some of them.

I must admit I do not get this post. What does it have to do with language in the least?

Perry made joke about Norwegians creating a St. Urzo, to compete with St. Patrick. I replied with a serous question about St. Patrick. I suppose both were offerings to make something interesting of a pretty dull thread. No, they are not about language except in the sense that they use language. A lot of that goes on in this forum.

It is good that you remind us we are discussing language on occasion.

Your choice of phraseology is amusing. Did you intend "on occasion" to modify remind or discuss?

For what it is worth, Wikipedia has extensive
coverage of Celtic Christianity. And Google lists
other places with much discussion.

Perry: In answer to the question you posed above, yes.