How to Prepare for Spring, 1528
"Of prymtyme, and what it is. The prymtyme is hote & moyst temperatly as the ayre. This season the blode moeueth and spredeth to all the membres of the body, and the body is parfyte in temperate complexyon. In this season chekyns, kyddes, and poched egges ought to be eaten, with letuses & gotes mylke in these thre monethes. Prymetyme begynneth whan the sonne entreth the sygne of Aryes and lasteth .xcii. dayes, an houre and a halfe fro the .x. day of Marche to the .x. day of June. In this season is the best letyng of blode of ony tyme. And than is good to trauayle and to be laxatyfe. And to be bathed. And to eate suche thynges as wyll purge the bely." -- Secretum secretorum, tr. Robert Copland / Are you ready for primetime? Nothing makes for a festive spring like lettuce, bloodletting, and laxatives.
Posted by gvanderleun at March 9, 2017 9:48 PM
I really enjoy Kevin Stroud's "History of English" podcast. Our language has our history embedded within it like our DNA.
Posted by: Clinton at March 10, 2017 5:17 AMMy Dad brought tulips in for the Mothers Day market, some potted, some for cut flowers. Something like 10,000 Dutch bulbs, or maybe it was 100,000. Hard to remember after 70 years. Anyway, every year a few would look like those pictured. He said it was some kind of virus. (We hadn't known about viruses for very long at that time.)
Posted by: BillH at March 10, 2017 7:14 AMI never really thought about the translation of primavera/spring as prime time, but that is a delightful discovery!
Posted by: Jewel at March 10, 2017 9:24 AMI'll take a raincheck on the laxatives, but the flowers are truly in bloom around my neighborhood. Even here in west-central Florida, where there isn't much winter to recover from (especially this year), spring is still a wonderful season.
Posted by: waltj at March 11, 2017 6:25 PM
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