Re: FW: History Lesson (fwd)

I will have to say this is not entirely correct. Having lived in England
for
a year a one finger salute means nothing in the UK. It is the two
fingered
salute (reversed peace sign) that is of significance and it was these
two
fingers that were cut off by the French. 

At 02:26 PM 9/11/97 -0400, you wrote:
>
>>A little history lesson for us all.......
>>
>>Puzzler re. the Battle of Agincourt.
>>
>>The French, who were overwhelmingly favored to win the battle,
>>threatened to cut a certain body part off of all captured English
>>soldiers so that they could never fight again. The English won in a
>>major upset and waved the body part in question at the French in
>>defiance.
>>
>>What was this body part?
>>
>>The body part which the French proposed to cut off of the English
after
>>defeating them was, of course, the middle finger, without which it is
>>impossible to draw the renowned English longbow.  This famous weapon
was
>>made of the native English yew tree, and so the act of drawing the
>>longbow was known as "plucking yew".
>>
>>Thus, when the victorious English waved their middle fingers at the
>>defeated French, they said, "See, we can still pluck yew! PLUCK YEW!"
>>
>>Over the years some 'folk etymologies' have grown up around this
>>symbolic gesture. Since 'pluck yew' is rather difficult to say (like
>>"pleasant mother pheasant plucker", which is who you had to go to for
>>the feathers used on the arrows), the difficult consonant cluster at
the
>>beginning has gradually changed to a labiodental fricative 'f', and
thus
>>the words often used in conjunction with the one-finger-salute are
>>mistakenly thought to have something to do with an intimate encounter.
>>It is also because of the pheasant feathers on the arrows that the
>>symbolic gesture is known as "giving the bird".
>>
>>And yew thought yew knew everything!
>>
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