Quick Question Below
The verb to canton or to put troops into quarters:
Is this a verb that is used nowadays, or, like spinster, just a word that is dying out?
If there are any people in the military who might know whether canton is used nowadays, I sure would appreciate knowing.
Best regards,
WW
P.S. And, if cantoning troops is a pretty current usage, then does it matter where they're cantoned? Cantoned in a tent? Cantoned in a neighboring farmhouse? Or are they restrictively cantoned in something more formal? I would imagine wherever they're cantoned is not of importance; just the fact that they're cantoned somewhere.
to canton or to put troops into quarters
Is that the same as billet?
Haven't heard of "canton" although it makes me think of China which, if I recall correctly, was once broken down into cantons. Then there's Cantonese cookery...
Edit: Just found this -
canton - 1522, from M.Fr. canton, from It. (Lombard dialect) cantone "region," especially in the mountains, augmentive of L. canto "corner," meaning extended to "section of a country." Originally in Eng. a term in heraldry and flag descriptions; applied to the sovereign states of the Swiss republic from 1611.
The noun may have been verbed.
Possibly you'd put up your troops in any old corner.
China which, if I recall correctly, was once broken down into cantons
Why does this make me think of Swiss cheese?
Then there's Cantonese cookery...If you dare try to turn this into a food thread I shall post my favorite fish recipes of all time!
~~~~~
WW, never heard it, either.
>>..broken down into cantons
Why does this make me think of Swiss cheese?Ah, yes! Full of holes - like my memory.
Swiss roll, Spring roll, easily confused...
my favorite fish recipes Know any Chinese fish recipes, Matertera?
"First, fillet the fish..."
Canton is not in current use in the US military, and in 30 years of hanging around with those types I've never heard it as a verb.
Back in the mid 70s my brother was in the US Army, stationed in Frankfurt, Germany -- he referred to the barracks area as a cantonment. In the context he used, it was a permanent billet, unlike the dictionary definition of cantonment which indicates that cantonment means a temporary billet.
Of course, you have to remember that temporary has a somewhat different meaning to the military. When I was a kid growing up in the DC area, the entire north side of the National Mall from the White House all the way west to the shadow of the Lincoln Memorial was polluted visually with "temporary" office buildings that had been erected in 1942, shortly after we became involved in WW II. These buildings were still in use in 1968 (a long story having to do with Ted's almost getting caught bootlegging liquor from DC into Virginia). It seems to me these "tempos" were still there in January 1973 (Nixon's second inaugural), so they were at least 30 years old when finally removed. Some of the land they occupied is taken up with the Vietnam Wall.
Thanks, Ted. You've probably hit the nail on the head--that to canton troops was to set up temporary quarters for them, even though the word you're familiar with having heard, cantonment, meant a more permanent set of buildings. Interesting.
WW
Another word usually used with similar military connotations, mostly during the days of army encampments
(more on the march than at base):
from the AHD :
bivouac
SYLLABICATION: bivˇouˇac
PRONUNCIATION: bv-k, bvwk
NOUN: A temporary encampment often in an unsheltered area.
INTRANSITIVE VERB: Inflected forms: bivˇouˇacked, bivˇouˇackˇing, bivˇouˇacs also bivˇouˇacks
To camp in a bivouac.
ETYMOLOGY: French, from German dialectal beiwacht, supplementary night watch : bei-, beside (from Middle High German bi-, from Old High German; see ambhi in Appendix I) + Wacht, watch, vigil (from Middle High German wahte, from Old High German wahta; see weg- in Appendix I).
So we have three verbs, at least, that mean for troops to stay somewhere:
billet
canton
bivouac
...course there's "to camp" or "to camp out"....
But I suppose billet, bivouac, and canton are military references.
military references
We civilians also use billet. When I was in high school and we went to, say, a basketball tournament far enough away that we would have to spend the night, we would be billeted out (stayed at private residences of people in the community) and the place you stayed at was your billet.
Having written the word billet too many times it now looks like a nonsense word.
I used to have a
real Action Man (not one of the new batch, recreated for much younger kids, that you can't even dress
[/rant]) who had a "bivouac". It was basically a canvas sleeping bag thingy with a built-in anorak hood.
That implies that "to bivouac" should mean to adopt a
very temporary form of shelter, effectively sleeping on the move.
From this
dictionary: http://humanities.uchicago.edu/forms_unrest/webster.form.html
Canton (Page: 212)
Can"ton, v. i. [imp. & p. p. Cantoned ; p. pr. & vb. n. Cantoning.]
[Cf.
F.cantonner.]
1. To divide into small parts or districts; to mark off or separate, as
a distinct portion or division.
They canton out themselves a little Goshen in the intellectual
world. Locke.
2. (Mil.) To allot separate quarters to, as to different parts or
divisions of an army or body of troops.Ed. note: Although AHD on line recognizes the verb
canton in its etymology of
cantonment and supplies a hyperlink to the entry for
canton, it does not recognize the verb form in the hyperlinked entry. B&M AHD does recognize the verb.
In reply to:
They canton out themselves a little Goshen in the intellectual
world. Locke.
...Terrific! I love this quote!
I agree with you, TEd R. Been ages since I heard the term. My recollection is that a contonment was an area set apart in a larger area for use by a special group. For instance : on a permanent military base - and area of a couple of buildings, mess hall etc., for use by Special Forces which are technically part of the whole but in a practical sense operate as a separate unit.
I've also heard it used to mean a separate area for combatants, totally self-sufficient - set up within or abuting a larger, less organized area usually of civilians.
When we were stationed in the Philippines (1967-68) there were a number of off-base housing areas owned by Philippinos which were approved for occupation (rental housing) by the military. They were often called cantonments. Now, they are all covered in ashes from the eruption of Pinatubo, or so I am advised.
I remember the term bivouac from my rock climbing days, frequently shortened to bivvy
http://www.backpacker.com/gear/article/0,1023,2261,00.html -
similar UK and Oz sitesI also saw sites that indicated that anglers seem to use the term for a tent. They would therefore be able to have a bevvy in their bivvy.
http://dictionary.cambridge.org/define.asp?key=bevvy*1+0
Interesting that these words get confused. I've never heard of "canton" being used as a verb. However, "cantonment" was frequently used in the British army in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, usually as somewhere that an army would stay for some time, for instance when they were on picket on a border or during a longer lull in the fighting or during the winter. George Washington referred to the Continental army being in cantonments for the winter after what, Valley Forge? It was about the same time that the newly-fledged American government first learned that price ceilings on the staples necessary to feed an army don't work, a lesson they've had to relearn every generation since!
The term "bivouac", on the other hand was used to refer to a makeshift encampment created in a hurry when the army was on the move. This is the source of its modern usage in hiking/tramping and mountaineering. When you're climbing and intend to be out overnight and are unlikely to be able to pitch a tent, you take a large double-skinned goretex bag with you, called a bivvy bag. It usually has ropes attached to it which you can secure to screws or pitons set into ice or rock to secure yourself to the mountain. You generally get into your sleeping bag in a semi-seated or reclining position on a ledge and stuff yourself inside the bivvy bag as best you can. It's temporary and usually done in a hurry, hence the term "bivvy (bivouac) bag". It's also usually damnably uncomfortable, but that's another story!