The First Church of the Wrath of Baby Jesus and Open Bar™

[Suu]

Richter, Leln, SuuBF and I just played Cards Against Humanity and learned that we are all horrid people.

[Mesozoic Mister Nigel]

Richter, Leln, SuuBF and I just played Cards Against Humanity and learned that we are all horrid people.

I love that game.

[Don Coyote]

Richter, Leln, SuuBF and I just played Cards Against Humanity and learned that we are all horrid people.

I love that game.

My wife keeps looking for it at the local game shop. Evidently she can't buy it from the interwebs.

But I know what she is getting for xmas.

[Q. G. Pennyworth]

Friends from Halifax are on their way home. We had a fancy dress dinner party and sleepover at her parents' house, naturally featuring the Canadian monstrosity that is "kraft dinner." The kids were the only ones who got any sleep, the rest of us were too busy drinking and talking politics and plotting to get the Boston - Halifax ferry to be a thing, because three years is too long to go between visits. Exhausted and happy.

[Pope Pixie Pickle]

NIGEL! THIS IS FOR YOU! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kOAWus3rO4k

[Mesozoic Mister Nigel]

Oh hell yes that's a good one!

[Don Coyote]

I have reached the conclusion that kennings, and other metaphorical tropes, were used precisely so people did not have to take a thousand words to explain what something means.

[Mesozoic Mister Nigel]

I have reached the conclusion that kennings, and other metaphorical tropes, were used precisely so people did not have to take a thousand words to explain what something means.

I don't know what you're talking about, literary man, but I will tell you that as a person who is usually more confused than elucidated by metaphor, I have always assumed that metaphor is for people who don't understand the literal explanation.

[Mesozoic Mister Nigel]

Although the cookbook metaphor for DNA works pretty well.

[Mesozoic Mister Nigel]

I don't know that it works any better than the literal explanation, though.

[Don Coyote]

So a kenning is a poetic device in which, usually, two words, usually nouns, are used to directly replace a noun. Some times it's a genitive or possessive phrase.
Things like "whale-road" is "sea" or "ocean", "battle-torch" is "sword", "heaven's candle" is the sun.
So kennings are a very important poetic device in Norse, Old-English, and older Germanic languages, partly because they highly valued poetry and the artistry of words, but I realized that because they are metaphors, and metaphors can have meanings beyond the literal, AND particularly in Norse kennings can end up being layered, so a kenning can contain a kenning can contain a kenning can contain a kenning.
So as metaphor that is more than literal the words that are replacing the original noun can be telling something particular that noun in that moment in time, with the intent to invoke a particular group of ideas.
Calling a king a "ring-giver" differs from using "Helm of his people". Both are kingly kennings, but emphasis different things that are important to kingship.

In essence, by taking two or so words to replace the noun, you just saved yourself hundreds of words explaining something.
They are sort of short-hand definitions of the word.

[Mesozoic Mister Nigel]

So a kenning is a poetic device in which, usually, two words, usually nouns, are used to directly replace a noun. Some times it's a genitive or possessive phrase.
Things like "whale-road" is "sea" or "ocean", "battle-torch" is "sword", "heaven's candle" is the sun.
So kennings are a very important poetic device in Norse, Old-English, and older Germanic languages, partly because they highly valued poetry and the artistry of words, but I realized that because they are metaphors, and metaphors can have meanings beyond the literal, AND particularly in Norse kennings can end up being layered, so a kenning can contain a kenning can contain a kenning can contain a kenning.
So as metaphor that is more than literal the words that are replacing the original noun can be telling something particular that noun in that moment in time, with the intent to invoke a particular group of ideas.
Calling a king a "ring-giver" differs from using "Helm of his people". Both are kingly kennings, but emphasis different things that are important to kingship.

In essence, by taking two or so words to replace the noun, you just saved yourself hundreds of words explaining something.
They are sort of short-hand definitions of the word.

They are also profoundly culturally-dependent, which is one of the fascinating things about them.

[Don Coyote]

So a kenning is a poetic device in which, usually, two words, usually nouns, are used to directly replace a noun. Some times it's a genitive or possessive phrase.
Things like "whale-road" is "sea" or "ocean", "battle-torch" is "sword", "heaven's candle" is the sun.
So kennings are a very important poetic device in Norse, Old-English, and older Germanic languages, partly because they highly valued poetry and the artistry of words, but I realized that because they are metaphors, and metaphors can have meanings beyond the literal, AND particularly in Norse kennings can end up being layered, so a kenning can contain a kenning can contain a kenning can contain a kenning.
So as metaphor that is more than literal the words that are replacing the original noun can be telling something particular that noun in that moment in time, with the intent to invoke a particular group of ideas.
Calling a king a "ring-giver" differs from using "Helm of his people". Both are kingly kennings, but emphasis different things that are important to kingship.

In essence, by taking two or so words to replace the noun, you just saved yourself hundreds of words explaining something.
They are sort of short-hand definitions of the word.

They are also profoundly culturally-dependent, which is one of the fascinating things about them.

Yes

[Pope Pixie Pickle]

Oh hell yes that's a good one!

I may have been very drunk and in charge of a computer.

[Suu]

Trying to explain to a conservative the difference between National Socialism and Fascism, and then proving to them that they are right wing and not left is absolutely painful. No matter what I post, including primary sources from Mussolini, he's not buying it. There's no use arguing anymore.