Charger, charge

[Perry Lassiter]

My wife added to the decorations today by setting the plates on chargers, large dishlike things that extend three or four inches around the plates. I got to thinking we also call those things we plug cell phones into "chargers," and likewise the word applies to prancing horses, especially military ones.

Then I looked up charge in our online dictionaries here and found 17 definitions for its use as a verb, and 15 as a noun! The etymologies all go through old English to French meaning to load. The word to me is fascinating for its wide variety of usage. I can't help but wonder whether it is indeed only one word with one derivation. And btw, my original thought about the big plate as a charger is declared obsolete by two dictionaries. I'm old, but that old?

[Philip Hudson]

You are really old when your dish is a trencher. Google it and you get several definitions but the one I am most familiar with is the one Shakespeare would have eaten on. It was a shallow bowl carved out of wood. A person with a good appetite was called a trencherman. Does trench mouth come from the disease caught from eating out of hard to clean bowls or from mouth infections caught while living in the trenches. I would look it up but I am late for an appointment, so would someone do it for me?