Jug

I am always amazed by the variety of meanings that everyday words, especially short, simple words, have adopted over time.  For example, take the word jug. This simple word, in use for at least five or six centuries, has obscure roots.  The origin is probably a familiar form of the given names of Joan and Jenny. Shakespeare used the word in this form, and in fact jug still has the meaning of a young woman in England.  Today, when we use jug, generally we are referring to a large, typically earthenware container with a narrow mouth and often a stopper, with the possibility of containing spiritous liquids.  The British has a similar common meaning for jug as a small pitcher.  But other meanings have developed over the years:

jug vt. to stew meat in a ceramic jar; also called jugged.

jug vt. to commit to jail or prison; imprison.

jug vi. of certain birds, such as quail and partridges, to collect in a covey.

jug n. an informal Scotish unit of liquid capacity equal to approximately 1.7 liters.

jug n. a jail or prison.

jug n. the sound made by a bird, especially a nightingale.

jug n. a bank.

Watch the Birdie

Just about everyone knows that in the game of golf, one shot under par equals a birdie and two under par is an eagle; often referred to as a double-birdie.  But did you know there are words for the rarer and almost impossible triple- and quadruple-birdies?  Yes, that’s right – a quadruple birdie would represent a hole-in-one on a par five hole.  And I’m fortunate when I can just hit the ball off the tee.

albatross n. a golf score on a hole representing three strokes under par; also called a triple birdie or double eagle.

condor n. a golf score on a hole representing four strokes under par; also called a triple eagle.

Feck

There are many words we commonly use in the negative without ever having used, or even been aware of, their positive – and root – counterpart.  Some examples include impeccable, untoward, ruthless, uncouth and disgruntled. Their positive opposites sound foreign and unfamiliar to us: peccable (liable to error), toward (propitious), ruthful (compassionate), couth (good manners), and gruntled (satisfied).  Today’s word fits nicely into this category of the forgotten opposites.

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feck n. 1. [Scot.] effect; efficacy; value  2. [Obsolete] influence; weight; force  3. [Scot.] quantity; amount.

We are much more accustomed to the more familiar feckless, meaning “ineffective, incompetent, feeble or lazy.”  As our English goes, there can hardly be the word feckless unless its opposite cousin feck exists.  And so it does, as a word originating from Scotland.  It’s primary use is to denote efficacy or efficiency.  It is deemed to be an aphetic form of effect (aphetic being the adjective form of aphesis, the linguistic phenomenon of the loss of an unstressed initial vowel or syllable).  Therefore, what started out as effect, through a feckless manner (in the lazy sense), became just simply feck.  Feck also gave rise to a now obsolete word, feckful, meaning “vigorous, powerful.”  Feck can also be found as an Irish slang verb for “to fetch, gain or seek.”  James Joyce took the term one step further in Ulysses writing of “fecking matches from counters,” extending the verb to include petty theft.  But this has nothing to do with the feck described above and has a different past.

So remember that these opposite cousins are easily evitable (able to be avoided), but can often be gainly (elegant), and even the most feckless among us can be corrigible (capable of being corrected).