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Hi Mario,
Thanks for your most informative input.
As I understand from your medieval French, the "high"
prefix as in "high noon", "high tierce" etc, means a time just before the
period of noon, tierce etc (?). Then "bas tierce" etc would be the time
just after. Do you have a conversion of the French terms into
(approximate) modern times? These "extra" cannonical hours are then
similar to the half-tides in the English Anglo-Saxon timekeeping.
These extra terms do shed some light as to why "Nones" -
the Latin ninth hour after sunrise - got to mean the modern midday or 12th
hour. It seems likely that high noon just got shortened when there was no
need for the distinction between high noon and noon.
Regards,
John
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----- Original Message -----
Sent: 18 August 2001 11:08
Subject: Re: Sundial Slang
----- Original Message -----
Sent: Saturday, August 18, 2001 12:11
AM
Subject: Re: Sundial Slang
One term which is common and not (yet) in the Glossary
is "High noon". Is this an americanism? I have, of course, seen
my cowboy movies, but am unclear where the term originates. Is it
that, with the relatively low latitudes in the south of America, the Sun can
come close to directly overhead (altitude = 90 degrees) at noon? If
so, it reinforces the wrong view of much of the UK media that the Sun is at
the "zenith" at noon. Whilst many ordinary people think of "zenith" as
the highest point of the arc, astronomically it is defined as the point
which really is directly overhead (only expressed rather more
formally!).
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Hi all,
this my response may be a little more serious
(hope don't bore you), though I really don't know where the slang said
'Hight Noon' comes from.
Nevertheless I should remark that in middle
age England and French people use to call midday just like this, "hygh
noone", or "haute nonne". As we know the English language got much from
the French language in the middle age, and we know also that modern word
"noon" comes from "none" (or Latin 'nona') that is the cononical hour when
monks recite none, that in the ancient Irish language surely become
"Noon". There is, actually in the Vatican library an ancient
Irish manuscript that use this term to say "none" (see my book "The
ancient sundial of Ireland", page 66), and because since early times the
pryer of none has been slowly superimposed to midday, we find that in
England people easily called that moment 'noon'.
But lets go bak to high noon again. As I
wrote here, medieval French use to call midday "haute nonne" that means
high none (in the sense of the time for pryer), why this? Easy, in
medieval time people didn't use the hours as moments like today, but they
consider a time between two terms (or hour lines), and canonical hours in
former times last almost three seasonal (or temporal) hours, and the
position of the sun gave them the idea to specify better. So this is the
names of the part of the day in medieval France: heure de soleil levant
(hour of the rising sun), prime, houte prime (high prime), tierce, haute
tierce (high terce), haute nonne (high none), basse nonne (low none),
remontière (wake up), haut vespre (high vesper), bas vespre (low vesper),
complie (compline), heure de soleil esconsant (hour of the hiding
sun).
At the same time in England we find the
popular use to call midday "hygh noone" as we may read in many old
writings. Look at this Cronicle, for instance:"With us the nobility,
gentry and students doe ordinarily go to dinner at aleaven before noone
and to supper at five, or betweene five and sixe afternoone. The
marchaunts dine and suppe seldome before 12 at noone and sixe at night
(read evening), aspecially in London. The husbandmen dine also at 'high
noone' as they call it and sup at seven or eyght; but out of the terme in
our Universities the schoolers dine at tenne".
Thank you for your attention, and forgive me
my bad English
Mario
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Mario
Arnaldi
V.le Leonardo, 82
I-48020 LIDO ADRIANO -
Ravenna
Italy
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