{"id":27683,"date":"2013-08-23T22:49:03","date_gmt":"2013-08-24T02:49:03","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/watchwomanonthewall\/?p=27683"},"modified":"2013-08-23T23:31:17","modified_gmt":"2013-08-24T03:31:17","slug":"humr-the-history-of-the-middle-finger","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/watchwomanonthewall\/2013\/08\/humr-the-history-of-the-middle-finger.html","title":{"rendered":"HUMOR: The History Of The Middle Finger"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"History<\/a><\/p>\n

Well, now……here’s something I never knew before, and now that I know it, I feel compelled to send it on to my more intelligent friends in the hope that they, too, will feel edified. Isn’t history more fun when you know something about it? Before the Battle of Agincourt in 1415, the French, anticipating victory over the English, proposed to cut off the middle finger of all captured English soldiers.<\/b><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

Without the middle finger it would be impossible to draw the renowned English longbow and therefore they would be incapable of fighting in the future. This famous English longbow was made of the native English Yew tree, and the act of drawing the longbow was known as “plucking the yew” (or “pluck yew”).<\/b><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

Much to the bewilderment of the French, the English won a major upset and began mocking the French by waving their middle fingers at the defeated French, saying, See, we can still pluck yew! Since ‘pluck yew’ is rather difficult to say, the difficult consonant cluster at the beginning has gradually changed to a labiodentals fricative F’, and thus the words often used in conjunction with the one-finger-salute!<\/b><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

It is also because of the pheasant feathers on the arrows used with the longbow that the symbolic gesture is known as “giving the bird.”<\/b><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

IT IS STILL AN APPROPRIATE SALUTE TO THE FRENCH TODAY!<\/b><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

And yew thought yew knew every plucking thing.<\/b><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Calvin’s Confession
\nAw Shucks! Snopes says it’s false, but it was just too good not to share.<\/span>
\nhttp:\/\/www.snopes.com\/language\/apocryph\/pluckyew.asp<\/a><\/b><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

Thank you for visiting Watchwoman on the Wall
\nCome on back real s<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/strong>\u263a\u263a<\/span><\/span><\/span>n!<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

\"smile\"<\/a><\/p>\n

***********************************************<\/span><\/span><\/strong><\/h1>\n

 <\/p>\n

TGIF – <\/span><\/strong>Hum\u263ar I\u00a0 never\u00a0 sh\u263auld\u00a0 have\u00a0 p\u263asted!<\/span><\/h1>\n

……………………………………………………………………………..<\/span><\/span><\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

Donna Calvin
\nFriday, August 23, 2013<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

Please click EMAIL, LIKE, SHARE THIS, TWEET, GOOGLE+, AND OTHER SOCIAL MEDIA LINKS <\/strong>
\n<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Well, now……here’s something I never knew before, and now that I know it, I feel compelled to send it on to my more intelligent friends in the hope that they, too, will feel edified. Isn’t history more fun when you know something about it? Before the Battle of Agincourt in 1415, the French, anticipating victory…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":403,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6154,303,503,9127,5144],"tags":[5275,9128,9336,9439,3414,6396],"class_list":["post-27683","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-enjoy-2","category-entertainment","category-free-speech","category-humor-i-never-should-have-posted","category-stupid-quotes","tag-hilarious","tag-history-of-the-middle-finger","tag-humor","tag-humor-i-never-should-have-posted","tag-humr","tag-it-aint-political-humor"],"yoast_head":"\nHUMOR: The History Of The Middle Finger - Watchwoman on the Wall<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/watchwomanonthewall\/2013\/08\/humr-the-history-of-the-middle-finger.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"HUMOR: The History Of The Middle Finger - Watchwoman on the Wall\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Well, now……here’s something I never knew before, and now that I know it, I feel compelled to send it on to my more intelligent friends in the hope that they, too, will feel edified. Isn’t history more fun when you know something about it? Before the Battle of Agincourt in 1415, the French, anticipating victory…\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/watchwomanonthewall\/2013\/08\/humr-the-history-of-the-middle-finger.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Watchwoman on the Wall\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2013-08-24T02:49:03+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2013-08-24T03:31:17+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/watchwomanonthewall\/files\/2013\/08\/History-of-The-Middle-Finger.jpg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Donna Calvin\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"HUMOR: The History Of The Middle Finger - Watchwoman on the Wall","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/watchwomanonthewall\/2013\/08\/humr-the-history-of-the-middle-finger.html","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"HUMOR: The History Of The Middle Finger - Watchwoman on the Wall","og_description":"Well, now……here’s something I never knew before, and now that I know it, I feel compelled to send it on to my more intelligent friends in the hope that they, too, will feel edified. Isn’t history more fun when you know something about it? Before the Battle of Agincourt in 1415, the French, anticipating victory…","og_url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/watchwomanonthewall\/2013\/08\/humr-the-history-of-the-middle-finger.html","og_site_name":"Watchwoman on the Wall","article_published_time":"2013-08-24T02:49:03+00:00","article_modified_time":"2013-08-24T03:31:17+00:00","og_image":[{"url":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/watchwomanonthewall\/files\/2013\/08\/History-of-The-Middle-Finger.jpg"}],"author":"Donna Calvin","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/watchwomanonthewall\/2013\/08\/humr-the-history-of-the-middle-finger.html","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/watchwomanonthewall\/2013\/08\/humr-the-history-of-the-middle-finger.html","name":"HUMOR: The History Of The Middle Finger - Watchwoman on the Wall","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/watchwomanonthewall\/#website"},"primaryImageOfPage":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/watchwomanonthewall\/2013\/08\/humr-the-history-of-the-middle-finger.html#primaryimage"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/watchwomanonthewall\/2013\/08\/humr-the-history-of-the-middle-finger.html#primaryimage"},"thumbnailUrl":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/watchwomanonthewall\/files\/2013\/08\/History-of-The-Middle-Finger.jpg","datePublished":"2013-08-24T02:49:03+00:00","dateModified":"2013-08-24T03:31:17+00:00","author":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/watchwomanonthewall\/#\/schema\/person\/1470e1ef6765f8a27f970307b0835df1"},"breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/watchwomanonthewall\/2013\/08\/humr-the-history-of-the-middle-finger.html#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/watchwomanonthewall\/2013\/08\/humr-the-history-of-the-middle-finger.html"]}]},{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/watchwomanonthewall\/2013\/08\/humr-the-history-of-the-middle-finger.html#primaryimage","url":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/watchwomanonthewall\/files\/2013\/08\/History-of-The-Middle-Finger.jpg","contentUrl":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/watchwomanonthewall\/files\/2013\/08\/History-of-The-Middle-Finger.jpg"},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/watchwomanonthewall\/2013\/08\/humr-the-history-of-the-middle-finger.html#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/watchwomanonthewall"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"HUMOR: The History Of The Middle Finger"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/watchwomanonthewall\/#website","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/watchwomanonthewall\/","name":"Watchwoman on the Wall","description":"Beliefnet Voices - Donna Calvin","potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/watchwomanonthewall\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":{"@type":"PropertyValueSpecification","valueRequired":true,"valueName":"search_term_string"}}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/watchwomanonthewall\/#\/schema\/person\/1470e1ef6765f8a27f970307b0835df1","name":"Donna Calvin","description":"In sixth grade my teacher told us that we were going to be the first generation to see the year 2000 and all things would be different. He continued that God wasn't important, wasn't real, and our parents just used God to impose restrictions on us because they were inadequate to parent effectively. I knew then I was going to be involved in a war and that I would have to be in Jesus Christ's Army. Even then, I knew the United States of America would cease to exist without the vast majority of its citizens voluntarily submitting to the Perfect and Good Laws of the Holy Bible. I am a woman who loves the Lord Jesus Christ. I am tired of seeing our LORD denigrated from the school house to the White House. I search the Internet for items that ought to serve as a warning to Americans and Christians all through America, but the nation seems to be sleeping. Wake up America! You are losing your freedoms, your children and your country. Wake up and help stop it!","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/watchwomanonthewall\/author\/dcalvin"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/watchwomanonthewall\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27683","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/watchwomanonthewall\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/watchwomanonthewall\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/watchwomanonthewall\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/403"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/watchwomanonthewall\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=27683"}],"version-history":[{"count":28,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/watchwomanonthewall\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27683\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":27713,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/watchwomanonthewall\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27683\/revisions\/27713"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/watchwomanonthewall\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=27683"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/watchwomanonthewall\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=27683"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/watchwomanonthewall\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=27683"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}