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Looking at the background etymology of Anu’s ‘fensibles’, I came across this charming expression in OED2:
to make a Virginia fence: ‘to walk like a drunken man’ (Lowell Biglow Papers Introd.) [...]
1745 Franklin Drinker's Dict. Wks. 1887 II. 26 He makes a Virginia Fence.
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Amplification, or the Art of saying Little in Much, seems to be principally studied by the Gentlemen Retainers to the Law. 'Tis highly useful when they are to speak at the Bar; for by its Help, they talk a great while, and appear to say a great deal, when they have really very little to say. But 'tis principally us'd in Deeds and every thing they write. You must abridge their Performances to understand them; and when you find how little there is in a Writing of vast Bulk, you will be as much surpriz'd as a Stranger at the Opening of a Pumpkin.
No comment.
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'Scuse me, sir, that's "fen cible"...and--are you looking to bring the wrath of both Wordwind and Sparteye down on your head?  Actually, the VA. fence thing could as well be Kentucky fence; Kentucky's surveying was done on the metes and bounds system, and it wouldn't surprise me if Virginia's were, also. In the course of trying to find out the above, I came across this utterly charming story, which I strongly recommend that everyone read, but esp. Dr. Bill. I'll try posting the link, but it's humongously long. If it makes the thread go wide, I may just copy the entire story. http://EDIT: It didn't make the thread wide on my screen, but I know that may not be true for everybody. Holler if it made yours go wide. EDIT 2: Ok, I did. I'd prefer it go straight to the read, but I guess people can figure out to click on Story. Edit 3: Eep--sorry about the mantle.
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Now you C it, then you didn't...
fensabill, -ly obs. ff. fencible, fencibly
fensiveObs.
= defensive.
1583 Stanyhurst Æneis ii. (Arb.) 53 Fensiue seruice. 1595 Barnfield Sonn. i, Skin, the bodies fensiue wall. 1602 Warner Alb. Eng. 15 The Troyans+seeke to retire into their fensive towne. 1621 Quarles Div. Poems, Esther (1717) 157 The Hills His fensive Bulwarks are.
OED2 of course!
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In Colonial days fences were often made without vertical posts, because they did not have posthole diggers. The logs were split, the laid at an angle of almost 90 degrees to each other with ends overlapping enough to be stable. The zig-zag made them quite stable. Here's pictures of a modern version, which, however does use vertical posts. Remember Abraham Lincoln as a young man worked as a rail-splitter. http://home.comcast.net/~matancero/BigWormFence1.html
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Pooh-Bah
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Fences like this are used at the Sharpsville/Antietam battleground park. Quite fascinating construction!
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wow, good catch, Bill - I've never seen anything like that, and it certainly makes one think of staggering homeward! And I guess on the battlefield, with plentiful lumber delivered by railroad, it would have been a good strategy to hedge your bets...
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Augh, I left out a couple of things I meant to put in my first post; I got sidetracked by that story and how to share it. I was only poking the borax about the c vs. s spellings! And yes, I see now that the split-rail fence is the much more likely reference--thanks, Dr. Bill. I had also meant to say that fencible might not be as far off the apparent meaning as the W.A.D. seems to indicate. Even if it did mean "capable of being fenced", couldn't one reason for putting up a fence be, well, defense (or defence )? Here's a picture of a buck fence, in case you haven't seen one of those, either. http://www.cof.orst.edu/cof/fr/research/aspen/or_gifs/fence2.gif
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no off fence taken, Muzz J :)
And yes, the OED confirms your remark about the linkage, it's a group of words all to do with defending.
Thanks, that too is a completely new type of fencing to me - and again, born of such ample supplies of lumber that the Old World can only dream of!
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Then theyuh wuz the Maine fahmuh who built a stone fence fowah feet high and six feet wide. When ahsked why he did it that way he said, "So when it blows ovuh it'll be talluh than it wuz to staht."
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a completely new type of fencing to me Haha!
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Dear Faldage: I think I remember your telling me you had lived in New England, so you may have seen wall there. When the colonists arrived, most fields had so many stones left by the glaciers that they were not arable. So walls were built often just to get stones out of the way, as well as to mark boundaries. Most of them were so rounded it was hard to made a wall that could withstand frost heaves. Remember Frost's poem about mending fence with his neighbor. And for hundreds of years the plow would keep turning up new ones. (The Devil below keeps pushing them up.) Every year in Maine, before any other work could be done, all hands turned out to load potato sized stones onto the stone boat. Frost:Mending Wall http://www.bartleby.com/118/2.html
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My roommate and I took a trip up to Maine once. Talking to an old Maine spud farmer we could almost make out that he was complaining about not being able to keep people digging rocks out of his fields for fifty cents an hour. Hard to tell though; his Maine accent was compounded by his complete lack of teeth.
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And Oh,my aching back, trying to tell the potatoes from the
stones at harvest time.
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You want stone, you go to the Isles of Aran in Ireland ...
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When I thought of a wavering Virginia fence, the first thought I had was of this brick wall, designed by Thomas Jefferson at the University of Virginia. http://www.columbia.edu/cu/gsapp/BT/EEI/MASONRY/18serpcorn.jpgThe wall is "serpentine" to provide rigidity, since it is only one brick thick (good band name: One Brick Thick), but now that I am reminded of the post-less wooden fences Dr. Bill mentioned, I wonder if Jeffy didn't have them at least partially in mind for what he called his "academical village".
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That's beautiful, Flatl! How are the rounded bricks made?
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And that, too, was exactly the type of fence I thought of: Mr. Jefferson's! There are those wavering brick walls up at Mr. Jefferson's university in Charlottesville, and I have seen many a drunk waver about those same walls about, oh, 30+ years ago. Amazing that I remember them at all!
Problem is: 1745 is a few years too early for those serpentine walls. I don't remember seeing any in Williamsburg (earlier period), but it's possible...
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Jefferson's fence viewed from above looked like a sine curve. Bricks were just too damned expensive to build a
thick wall, and a straight wall only one brick thick would
fall the first time the wind blew.
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There's too much Jefferson trivia, but seeing his wall mentioned here reminds me of three of my favorite bits of triva about Mr. Jefferson:
1. One of his favorite dishes to serve to foreign visitors was macaroni and cheese; this bit of trivia was reported by the chef of Blair House on NPR
2. Mr. Jefferson would not read novels; thought they were frivolous.
3. And Mr. Jefferson refused to play cards, which he considered to be another frivolous waste of time.
I disagree with his view on novels, but his view on cards has made me feel to be in good company, at least, for never having learned to play bridge.
Mav'--I hope you don't mind this bit of a tangent I took. I don't think the 1745 Virginia fence would have been Mr. Jefferson's, however. Jefferson would have been too young in 1745 (about two years old).
As wwh pointed out, I don't think the bricks were curved; they were doubled and the curve itself was formed by the placement of the side-by-side bricks from what I remember of those C'ville visits. I suppose the bricklayer had to be very well skilled in working the mortar. It's hard enough building a straight up and down brick wall--I know because I tried once and failed horribly at it. Anyway, I do believe Jefferson is credited with the serpentine wall, particularly up at UVA, and that date would have been much later than the 1745 in your citation.
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Oh-ho! Was I ever wrong about those bricks having been doubled, wwh! They are most definitely singly laid in the serpentine wall. Drat! I do get frustrated with my visual memory, which is simply too often all screwed up.
But thanks for pulling up the photgraph!
Edit: Ha! Again! It's the same photograph that Flatlander had pulled up! I just opened Flatlander's, which I hadn't taken a glimpse at yet, and there was the same one as yours, wwh!
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So tell me again, why is it serpentine?
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Are you being facetious, Faldage? You did take a look at Flat's and wwh's identical photographs, didn't you?
Hissssssssss
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I was just wondering if the wind only comes from the one direction so the straight section of the wall is unaffected. That's all I was wondering.
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Ah, I see. That is a very good wondering, Faldage. Here's something from the Net that implies that the serpentine wall is strong even though one-brick wide (completely dousing my original memory of the walls I saw, but didn't!): "Unlike a straight wall design, which is laid with two brick widths for support, the serpentine wall is only one brick wide. The strength comes from the s-like curve. "The arc of the curve gives it its support," said Mr. Maloney as he pointed to the precision-made arcs. "I researched it and did the advance preparation last fall. It takes a bit of engineering." http://www.acorn-online.com/home835d.htm...but I'll look and see whether there might be something to explain why we see the serpentine and also the straight edge brick wall... Perhaps the other one was already there? Or came later?
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Dear Flatlander: Somehow I missed seeing your post. I remember seeing AS's, but not yours. I wasted a lot of
time hunting.
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while a serpentine wall is one brick wide, (and a well designed one is also 'peek-a-boo'--with a lattice like stucture), it doesn't use 50% fewer bricks, it only uses 30 to 35% fewer bricks (brick were expensive to produce in colonial america)
the structure its self --the corrugatations-- are what give it its strenght. just as corrugated paper is stronger than flat paper.
one of the engineers can explain just why.. but the finer the corrugations, the stronger the structure.. so brown paper is corrugated, and stuck between two layers of cardboard, and you can make paper that will easily support 100lbs or more.. (one paper company has a display of a car sitting on a paper pedistel--)
a serpentine fence works on the same principle.. by having many folds (or curves) you reduce the amount of material needed.(not by half(1 brick wide vs 2bricks wide) but by about 1/3rd..(1 brick wide but 'folded' and the folds use up more material than a straight wall.
(its something like making mini trusses)
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Dear of troy: I'm not an engineer, but one of the most important properties of all ceramics and similar substances is that they resist compression very well, but are very vulnerable to elongation. I still remember a humiliation I suffered in seventh grade. The teacher asked me about the
shape of a dam. I said the concavity was directed upstream - exactly wrong!
Stresses to a serpentine wall are more likely to be
applied to convexity, causing compression, which it can
tolerate well.
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Too bad you hadn't lived here in farmland, wwh. There are dams to observe in abundance. I, too, remember my seventh grade teacher in English who congratulated Jimmy Utley on having an 'ironic sense of humor,' and I wondered at the time what in Sam's hill she'd meant by it and what was it Jimmy had said that had won her commendation. Interesting information, of troy, as usual. I've done a bit more sleuthing on the topic and came across this fascinating entry because of its fascinating term that comes to us from those who would have made us colonists, and did : "Serpentine walls line the ten gardens between the pavilions of the inner lawn and the outer ranges of the academic village of the University of Virginia. The serpentine walls were designed by Jefferson after English "crinkle-crankle walls," which provide strength, efficiency of materials, and beauty." http://www.loc.gov/exhibits/jefferson/jeffrep.html
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Mav:
A question about your entry. The date does have me puzzled because there are two numbers that could be dates. Here's what you pasted:
1745 Franklin Drinker's Dict. Wks. 1887 II. 26 He makes a Virginia Fence.
"He makes a Virginia Fence," is preceded by 1887, and that, if a date, would be well beyond Jefferson's time, but what, then, of the 1745? I take the 1887 to be some particular kind of entry information. How should we read the '1887 II 26' information, all three parts: 1887, II, and 26?
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I was just wondering if the wind only comes from the one direction so the straight section of the wall is unaffected.
I'm not certain about this (perhaps DubDub can back me up), but I think the straight sections are much shorter than the serpentine ones, and they may even be standard double-thickness (but it doesn't look like it in the photo). I've never been to the campus, I just remembered those walls from Architectural History classes.
1745 is a few years too early for those serpentine walls
I know, I didn't mean to suggest that they might be responsible for the phrase, they just sprung to my mind more readily than the older style. Although TJ was pretty precocious, perhaps he was designing structurally interesting fencing as a toddler?
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Ah, they are pretty walls. The picture Jackie posted shows a serpentine wall much lower than the ones (the duplicates) Flatlander and wwh posted. I don't trust my visual memory for obvious reasons, but it does seem that the ones in C'ville were quite high and the brick was smoother somehow than in Jackie's photo link.
Back to 1745: It's obvious that Jefferson wouldn't have designed serpentine walls, and I would think that because he is so heavily credited with the ones in Charlottesville that we wouldn't expect to find those walls used throughout Virginia prior to his having had them built at UVA, as we seem to agree here.
So, that takes us back to the Virginia fence and what it may have been. Has anyone thought to google the fence itself? I haven't, but will soon.
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Well, dubdub (or CC!), I think the date is clearly 1745, and I assume the later numerals are the quote's exact positioning within the volume identified.
In checking back in the OED, I also came across this:
Virginia fence, a rail fence made in a zig-zag manner...
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Ah! I know exactly that zigzag fence! It's a splitrail fence that does zigzag. Can't imainge why it needs to zigzag, but I does look like a drunk fence--or a fence drunkard! You do seem them over the countryside--and I'm thinking in the mountains...
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Dear WW: I'm pretty sure the first zig-zag fences were just logs piled at almost 90 degrees with a good bit of overlap, in a way that just the weight held them in place, and vertical posts weren't even essential, or if used didn't have to be driven very deep. If knocked down, they were
easy to fix. And they could serve as emergency firewood.
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Plus (WAG) if stock broke through, I reckon not too much of a length would require repair, whereas with a straight line construction a whole long section could get flattened in one hit. Definitely a thoroughly fensible solution in the homelands!
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I've never seen a whole-log fence anywhere here in Virginia that I'm aware of, wwh. However, split-rail fences are common in the mountains all up into Appalachia. I saw them when I drove through the Cumberland Gap back about, oh, 15 years ago. The zigzag fence constructed of whole logs of which you write would be more difficult to construct, however, because of the sheer weight and instability of the logs stacked vertically. Interesting concept to imagine, but I'd like to see a photograph of such a fence if you come across one today! I'm off to school--the ice has melted and I'll miss being here today--boohoo!
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Din't we talk about this just a bit ago? With pictures and everthang?
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yep, I was just confirming that the OED reckons the original reference was indeed to a split rail fence (as Dr Bill had diagnosed) - and that our meanderings around serpentine walls and log structures was an interesting series of zig~zags but. So we come staggering back to the start point! :)
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All of this is very interesting. I hadn't remembered the discussion about the:
Worm Fence
...so, thanks, AnnaS and Faldage, for the refresher course.
I like this fence! It looks very sturdy.
Jackie: Your photograph of the split-rail fence doesn't look like the ones I've seen here. Oh, the rails look split, but the ones I've seen haven't been quite that...tidy. Instead, the ones I've seen in the mountains have a more higglety-pigglety look to them. But yours is the closest to what I've seen here.
But the worm fence is such a cool thing to know about now! And, Faldage, I won't forget I've learned it this time if I've completely forgotten the other time--and that's always a possibility here!
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