Shrewdness

How many apes can you see from your bedroom window? More than one? That's a Shrewdness of Apes apparently. No doubt at least some of my readers will know this already but do you know how the term came about?

In the Middle Ages, shrewd was a synonym for depraved or wicked, which evolved first to mischievousness then to benign cleverness. It seems the English aristocracy used flowery language partly to distinguish themselves from the peasants and developed an etymology relating to groups of animals - many of which they hunted. It's not clear how many apes there were in England at the time - my guess would be none - but doubtless there were adventurers who came across some of these beasts somewhere.

In my usual spirit of thorough research of my topics, I purchased a used copy of An Exaltation of Larks; the Ultimate Edition written (the original edition) by James Lipton in 1968. It's an intriguing compendium of such weird and wonderful collective nouns and, more importantly, their origins.

The late James Lipton is best known as the host of Inside The Actors' Studio, a TV show where he interviewed actors, directors and producers of movies for 23 years. He was Dean at the Studio for 12 years and wrote books, lyrics and screenplays.

This book is the most exquisite you could imagine. Witty writing and charming engravings. As soon as page one, The Beginning, the author acquaints us with the subject, quoting from Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's historical novel Sir Nigel: an old knight tells Sir Nigel, as he instructs him on manners and etiquette "it is sooth for every collection of beasts of the forest, and for every gathering of birds of the air, there is their own private name so that none be confused with another." And: "no man of gentle birth would speak of a herd of swine; that is the peasant speech. If you drive them it is a herd. If you hunt them it is ... a sounder of swine." In 1486 The Book of St. Albans, printed by the St Albans Press in England and also known by titles such as "The Book of Hawking, Hunting, and Blasing of Arms" had a section on hunting, which contained many such collective nouns and thus has served as source material for this and many other books.

The chapters are organised by context. So Low Life gives us a Phalanx of Flashers; Sports - a Cuss of Coaches. To find Shrewdness, I needed the excellent index, which provides all 1,182 examples organised by descending alphabetical order of group, from Aardvarks (an Aamory) to Yuppies (a Trip). The entry for Apes leads us to pages 5 and 61, where we find Shrewdness, with the etymology referred to above. Lipton groups the examples into six families:

• Onomatopoeia, for example a Gaggle of Geese
• Characteristic: a Leap of Leopards
• Appearance: a Parliament of Owls
• Habitat: a Nest of Rabbits
• Comment: a Cowardice of Curs
• Error (e.g. from transcription): a School (originally shoal) of Fish

The eponymous Exaltation of Larks occurs in a list of such terms in the Egerton Manuscript of 1450, a source of 106 such examples.

The author clearly loves language and I learned words I had never (as far I can remember) come across, let alone used: belletristic, historiology, venery, logophobia, antilexic, synechdochic, quiddity, solatium .......most of which exceeded the ability of my spellcheck too. He invites us to engage in the "game of venery" and invent our own collectionments (there, I decided enough of static language, I'll increase the dictionary content by one [it should have a French pronunciation] - the author uses 'terms of venery' rather than 'collective nouns'). He himself played the 'game' and many of the examples are his or from others who responded to a request in previous editions of the book.

I discovered there is no index entry for Bloggers, so I invite your first entry in the game of venery to be just that.

Meanwhile for cat lovers the book offers us a Pounce of Cats, with no derivation (one of the modern ones, I imagine); I'd offer a Cuddle of Cats. For writers, a Worship of Writers, a reference to the reverence shown by writers for their patrons; I'll offer a Wrestler of Writers, in honour of our struggles to string more than two words together.

This is the most marvellous of books. It will sit on my bedside table and give me (possibly literally) endless pleasure. I wouldn't be surprised if I shared some of it with you from time to time. A quiz, maybe?