a) a reversal of the usual order of things, as in, for example, a countdown or reverse alphabetical order.
b) the state of being pigeon-toed. from Janos Zaber, 1787-1852, Czech physician who described the condition in a monograph ca. 1838.
c) a phrase that goes beyond meaningless, named for Wally Zaber. example: The necklace sock flew fishscales.
d) an economic system based on a network of professional guilds and trade unions collecting dues rather than taxes.
e) an 18th century Polish religious schism whose followers excluded wine from the holy sacraments.
f) the foreign policy theory that acting charismatically toward an enemy will result in further animosity. from the German word zauber for charm or magic.
g) a cult religion of germanic tribes from the common delta region of the Rine, Meuse, and Scheldt rivers which includes the Zuider Zee. central to their rites was the toss of the ZABERN, a wooden log that was tossed on end into a zodiacal circle. the direction of the lay of the log they believed predicted future events. Viking raids around 1000AD helped spread the rites to Scotland, where the tossing of the zabern, (scot-galic, caber(n),) survives today as a national sport.
h) military jackbootery. from an incident at Saverne (Ger. Zabern) in Alsace (1912), when an excited Ger. subaltern cut down a lame cobbler who smiled at him.
i) the belief that the Egyptian pryamids were built with the aid of extraterrestrial intelligences and have cosmic significance. after Thomas E Zabernsk (1942 - ), proponent.
j) abstention from alcohol.
k) carping criticism; like that of Zabernius, a Greek critic.
l) a compulsive penchant for repeating oneself, as identified by psychologist Dr. Gustav Zabern in 1923.
m) the nearly obsessive practice of seeking out the best pizzaria in the capital of Switzerland.
One of the finest collections of bluffs we have seen for some time. After much careful discrimination to avoid falling for one of the bluffs, I have to go for A
It is so hard to choose, they all sound so silly at first, but after you think about each one for a minute, it begins to seem more plausible. I'll reward the simplicity and brevity of J with my vote.
Well now, the Scottish caber (g) sounds very attractive, but I have never come across, whilst sampling the product of the many distilleries in that fair countree, any reference to it having Teutonic origins, so that's out. I don't think any one suffers from compulsive repetition syndrome, as in (l), indeed I don't think any one suffers from compulsive repetition syndrome, as in (l), so that's out.
In my mind there is a connection with alcohol - and by co-incidence, two of the proposals concern alcohol (abstention - what a terrible thought!!) It isn't total abstention, surely? so not (j)
I will go for the Polish sect who exclude it from the Eucharist, E
I agree with Rhuby; something about the word draws a hazy connection to alcohol (but OTOH, a lot of things do this for me). i think i'll go with the alluringly simple J
This game is unfair. Why are your friends always winning? Why does the so-called answer always appear near the bottom of the list? My answer is "K", and it is right. Go ahead, call me a zabernist, I don't care, you and I both know that it is the truth.
Since it sounds like a minor "movement" unattached to anything too momentous (as, say, communism), I liked E on the first read-through and after further review I'm sticking with it.
I think all eleven players have voted, so I'm going to close the polls later this evening -- allowing any interested bystanders a chance to vote for their particular favorite.
I must say that I found the entries to be very interesting this time, and I particularly appreciated the various etymologies (which helped immeasurably in masking the real definition, I'm sure! :)
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