The freshly flamed bags of poop became objects of defenestration, causing distress and frustration amongst the crowd; abused most were the brown splattered po-po's, causing them to ponder this very simple question: If monkeys could do it, does that mean we should, too?
Learnt of this from an ex about 12 years ago... Something tragic happened, and the deceased's doctor simply told him to get along with his life when queried on why the life could not be saved. Evidently, one can be tried & charged with defenestration in court.
I used to have a newspaper cutting, but I've lost it now. It told of two guys in hospital with broken necks or somesuch. They had both fallen out of the upper window of a bar. Witnesses said they were trying to see who could lean out the farthest. They were said to be laughing as they fell...
While visiting my family recently, my dad told me that a domestic dispute in a second floor flat near our house resulted in someone being thrown out of a window, suffering serious injuries (though they did survive).
I felt a bit bad about taking glee in actually being able to use this word in its correct context. (Hang on, that's schadenfreude, isn't it?)
I suspect, bilby, that it's because the act it describes is so singularly rare. We don't have a word like "deportification" to describe the more common occurrence of throwing people out of doors, for example. (Although, see deponticate...]
Patrick Leigh Fermor writes eloquently about the multiple defenestrations and depontifications (throwing people of bridges) of Prague in Between the Woods and the Water. That book also has more impressive architectural terms than the whole of The Name of the Rose. And I think he learned Magyar for good measure...
At 6.30 on the morning of Wednesday, March 10th, 1948, the body of foreign minister Jan Masaryk was found lying in the cobbled courtyard below the window of his official flat in the palace. Whether he jumped to his death or was pushed in one of Prague's notorious defenestrations has never been conclusively established. He was sixty-one years old.
I would like to point out that there have been two historical defenestrations of Prague. It is quite possible that certain groups of people are more prone to throwing other groups of people out of windows.
See the Wikipedia article on this practice--shows how both horrendous and comical defenestration can be. "Catholics ascribed the survival of those defenestrated at Prague Castle in 1618 to divine intervention, while Protestants claimed that it was due to their landing in a large pile of manure."
Maybe a decade ago, when the town I live in was a rougher place, a guy here was killed in a bar fight because he was refenestrated. After being thrown out a window, the guys he was fighting followed him out, and threw him back in. It was the return trip, apparently, that killed him.
I love that the first recorded use of this word (1620) is the act of defenestration that was a precursor to the 30-years war. It's nearly four hundred years old, and yet it sounds like somebody made it up last year.
The window smashes. You feel the wind whistle past you. It all ends. Somewhere, in your last flicker of conscious thought, you realise that there is a word for your death, and you are at peace.
The freshly flamed bags of poop became objects of defenestration, causing distress and frustration amongst the crowd; abused most were the brown splattered po-po's, causing them to ponder this very simple question: If monkeys could do it, does that mean we should, too?
defenestration: Uninstalling Windows and installing Linux instead.
(John Pascoe)
Learnt of this from an ex about 12 years ago... Something tragic happened, and the deceased's doctor simply told him to get along with his life when queried on why the life could not be saved.
Evidently, one can be tried & charged with defenestration in court.
In my mind defenestration is inexorably linked with Prague like boiled bacon and pease pudding
I used to have a newspaper cutting, but I've lost it now. It told of two guys in hospital with broken necks or somesuch. They had both fallen out of the upper window of a bar. Witnesses said they were trying to see who could lean out the farthest. They were said to be laughing as they fell...
See this: http://www.metaphorm.org/pages/portfolio/defenestration/defen.html
It's now on facebook as one of the "poking" options. You can hug someone, hi-five them, etc. Or you can defenestrate them.
While visiting my family recently, my dad told me that a domestic dispute in a second floor flat near our house resulted in someone being thrown out of a window, suffering serious injuries (though they did survive).
I felt a bit bad about taking glee in actually being able to use this word in its correct context. (Hang on, that's schadenfreude, isn't it?)
maybe deportification would mean throwing people out portholes. Which I suspect would be more rare than defenestration.
Clearly, we Wordies are a ghoulish people.
The list of the most popular words is Wordie Top 100 words .
I suspect, bilby, that it's because the act it describes is so singularly rare. We don't have a word like "deportification" to describe the more common occurrence of throwing people out of doors, for example. (Although, see deponticate...]
Is this the most popular word on Wordie? Must be close. Would anyone care to speculate why?
Patrick Leigh Fermor writes eloquently about the multiple defenestrations and depontifications (throwing people of bridges) of Prague in Between the Woods and the Water. That book also has more impressive architectural terms than the whole of The Name of the Rose. And I think he learned Magyar for good measure...
Prague never knew what hit it.
At 6.30 on the morning of Wednesday, March 10th, 1948, the body of foreign minister Jan Masaryk was found lying in the cobbled courtyard below the window of his official flat in the palace. Whether he jumped to his death or was pushed in one of Prague's notorious defenestrations has never been conclusively established. He was sixty-one years old.
I would like to point out that there have been two historical defenestrations of Prague. It is quite possible that certain groups of people are more prone to throwing other groups of people out of windows.
See the Wikipedia article on this practice--shows how both horrendous and comical defenestration can be. "Catholics ascribed the survival of those defenestrated at Prague Castle in 1618 to divine intervention, while Protestants claimed that it was due to their landing in a large pile of manure."
defenestrated through time
Maybe a decade ago, when the town I live in was a rougher place, a guy here was killed in a bar fight because he was refenestrated. After being thrown out a window, the guys he was fighting followed him out, and threw him back in. It was the return trip, apparently, that killed him.
I love that the first recorded use of this word (1620) is the act of defenestration that was a precursor to the 30-years war. It's nearly four hundred years old, and yet it sounds like somebody made it up last year.
Somehow threatening to "self-defenestrate" is a lot funnier than saying you're going to toss yourself out the window.
Death by defenestration. A beautiful way to go.
For some reason people really like this word. I first heard it many years ago and sometimes people use it just for the sake of using it.
The window smashes. You feel the wind whistle past you. It all ends. Somewhere, in your last flicker of conscious thought, you realise that there is a word for your death, and you are at peace.