Bondage for Husbands…

We’re here on a Saturday. A Saturday! So you know this would have to be important, otherwise, we’d still be lounging in bed, with mimosas (the drinks, not the plants) and smiling coyly at our men, who are bound to the bedframes…

No, wait! I’m not supposed to be writing about bondage play for wayward spouses, I’m supposed to be introducing Murray Suid, who is ready to teach us all about what the words “bondage” and “husband” have in common, as well as a few other sexy word sets.

Murray Suid is the author of more than two dozen books. A former instructor at San Jose State University, he is a screenwriter and lives in Northern California. (If you think that California relates to fornicate, you likely will enjoy reading Words of a Feather. The same is true for those who are absolutely certain that California has nothing to do with illicit behavior whatsoever.)

Without further ado, here is Murray!

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In the next few minutes, I’ll try to demonstrate that etymology can be fun, provocative, and even sexy.

WORDS OF A FEATHER focuses on 150 word pairs that at first seem unrelated but yet share common origins. I wrote the book partly because of a long-standing interest in etymology (hey, we all have our hang-ups) and also because a friend’s agent had heard that a big publisher was hot to find a witty book on words. The agent persuaded me that we’d sell enough copies to fund my feature film project—THE ESP AFFAIR. That seemed like a stupendous idea, which I fell for, not recognizing the close connection between stupendous & stupid.

No regrets. It was a challenging project. Early on I decided to choose pairs that shed light on a variety of subjects, such as sports (“champion & champagne”), war (“infant & infantry”), and money (“flatulence & inflation”).

Which brings us to the subject at hand: SEX. Let’s start with “husband & bondage.”

“Husband” comes from the Old English husbonda, meaning (back then!) “master of the house.” The first syllable—hus—was the Old English word for “house.” The same element is found in the ancient huswife,” “housewife,” which eventually came to be pronounced “huzzy” and spelled “hussy,” with the disrespectful meaning of a loose woman.

Back to “husband”: The second syllable band is from the Old English bonda, “a farmer,” which, after the Norman Conquest in 1066, came to name someone who was under the control of the lord of the manor. Hence, bonda signified subjection, from which arose “bondage.”

Happily, with the rise of democratic institutions and the decline of the power of the lords, husbands are no longer seen as suffering in bondage. Indeed, the word “bondage” brings to mind words quite different from suffering.

For those more interested in affairs, consider “flamboyant & in flagrante delicto.”

If you want to call attention to yourself, go for red—red shoes, red sports car, red hair—or if you’re a flamingo, red feathers. This is the lesson taught by “flamboyant,” a word first used in the fifteenth century to name a showy—flaming—style of French architecture. The word comes to us from the Old French flamboyer, “flame,” itself derived from the Latin flagare, “to burn.”

From the same Latin source we get many hot English expressions such as “flambe,” “inflammatory,” “flagrant,” and in flagrante delicto. A literal translation of this Latin legal term is “with the crime still blazing.” Figuratively, we get “in the act of committing the crime” or “red-handed.”

These days, of course, “in flagrante delicto” almost always refers to an illicit sexual encounter. Hot stuff. Which brings to mind a seventeenth-century synonym for “sweetheart”—“flame.”

The theme of heat brings us to the climax of this presentation: “fornicate & furnace.”

Around the time that Saint Augustine wrote, “Lord, give me chastity—but not yet,” the Latin word fornus referred to “an oven designed with an arched top.” Fornus, which is the source of “furnace,” also gave rise to “fornicate,” and therein lies a story.

According to those who keep track of such matters, prostitutes in ancient Rome waited for their giovannis (johns) near the arch-shaped ovens that baked the bread Romans widely enjoyed.

We can easily imagine some witty Roman making the connection between the literal heat from the ovens and the metaphorical heat of sensual encounters.

At least some of us can imagine it.

That’s it for my presentation. If you have questions, please post them, and I’ll respond here. I’m happy to announce that I’ll be giving away a signed copy of Words of a Feather to one lucky commenter.

By the way, if you’d like to read a few excerpts from the book, please visit the Words of a Feather website. There, you’ll also find an interactive quiz that some people say is very funny.