We all had to struggle in English class with “onomatopoeia,” probably the dumbest-sounding vocabulary word that ever threatened us on a spelling test. I do think, though, that quite a few of us actually considered that bizarre word to be rather cool because of its definition. It denotes a term that sounds, as exactly as possible, like what it is describing. Teachers always dragged out “sizzle” and “chirp” and “buzz” as classic examples. Me? I was more of an “achoo” and “slurp” kind of guy.
But one onomatopoeic example I had never thought about until last week was “clink.” I was at a dinner party with friends when one of our group raised his wine glass, proposed a toast, and then said “let’s clink to it,” rather than “let’s drink to it”—and clink we did. The sound we made with those delicate glasses was almost identical to the word that describes it.
And who knew that the particularly charming sound-alike word “clink” was invented by none other than Geoffrey Chaucer in around 1385? I certainly didn’t know it until now. And since I now know it, you now know it too. (Teaching outside the classroom doesn’t get any better than this, my student-readers, as far as I am concerned).
And why stop now? I am afraid most of you may already know this next related little goody, but I can still hope that for some of you, it might be brand-new knowledge. Did you know that the ancient Romans placed tidbits of highly spiced, warmed bread in their punch bowls in order to spread the bread’s unique spices throughout the wine, mead, or cider that was about to be ladled?
Once the punch had been properly seasoned, the “toast” would be removed and set aside. After the drinks were poured and served, the master of the house would eat at least one of the spicy toasts as he proposed good health to all those assembled. But if the drinks were watered down or otherwise dreadful, nobody would ever accept an invitation to that home again, so, socially, that host would be —toast.” (I swear I tried to resist that awful rhyme-pun combo, but the devil made me do it.)
I know—you are waiting for me to transition to some other tangentially related topic, using my strangely associative mind. So sorry to disappoint you, but I am savvy enough to realize when to keep digging in a goldmine, and I do believe the topic of “Clinking Glasses During a Toast“ has not yet been fully quarried.
And so we return to Chaucer and the Middle Ages. Arsenic was by far the most common choice of poisons then, and poisoners were by far the most prevalent murderers during this period (700-1400 AD). Despite its effectiveness, however, arsenic could be detected in many liquids because it was a whitish powder. It turns out that red wine was the best delivery vehicle for arsenic since the white powder could be camouflaged by the dark sediments at the bottom of a poisoned wine glass.
When guests were given glasses of red wine, they might worry that their glass had been poisoned, since any arsenic would be hidden among the dregs. To reduce their guests’ anxiety, medieval hosts began the tradition of having all their guests clink their very full glasses together with some force, so that drops of wine from each glass were spilled into other glasses, including the host’s. Since some of the wine from all the glasses was mixed together and neither the host nor anyone else dropped dead, the guests were reassured that there couldn’t be any poison in any glass.
And now we come to the final coup de grace of juicy tidbits concerning our wonderfully onomatopoeic word. If a medieval poisoner were caught, he was restrained until the proper punishment was pronounced. In ancient times, such prisoners had been thrown into a well inside a limestone cave, and the cave entrance had been sealed with a boulder. This was the first primitive jail cell.
But in Chaucer’s day, imprisonment technology had advanced. Thanks to better blacksmithing techniques, locks could now be fitted into doors. Shortly after this advancement, secure edifices were built that contained little cells with door that could be securely locked. These buildings were the first “gaols”— or, in modern English, “jails”.
Perhaps a cell-bound poisoner had been apprehended while plying his deadly trade at one of those house parties where guests tapped their glasses together as the first toast was proposed. (Perhaps he’d been able to slip his poison into a victim’s glass after that first “reassuring” toast had already been drunk.), When the poisoner heard the sound of a key being turned in his cell’s lock, it may have reminded him of the sound of glass tapping glass at the house party. And so perhaps he was the very first prisoner to stop thinking of his prison as a “gaol” and, instead, onomatopoeically, to realize that he had been thrown in the…
Oh, come now, readers, do I REALLY have to spell it out for you?