A Sandy Beach Almanac



You've landed at Sandy Beach, NSW, Australia: Lat. -30.15331, Long. 153.19960, UT +10:00 – local map & zoom Google map. I live in a cabin on this beach, 25 kilometres north of the traffic and shops of Coffs Harbour, 600 km north of Sydney. My intention is to post observations of Nature and life within 1 km (1,000 paces) of my South Pacific home.

 

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Wednesday, January 19, 2005

Collection of collectives

We say a congregacyon of people, a hoost of men, a felyshyppynge of jomen, and a bevy of ladyes; we must speak of a herde of dere, swannys, cranys, or wrenys, a sege of herons or bytourys, a muster of pecockes, a watche of nyghtyngales, a fllyghte of doves, a claterynge of choughes, a pryde of lyons, a slewthe of beeres, a gagle of geys, a skulke of foxes, a sculle of frerys; a pontificalitye of prestys, and a superfluyte of nonnes.

So wrote Dame Juliana Berners (Barnes; Bernes; b. 1388?), the English writer on hawking and hunting, in the Boke of St Albans, in 1486.

Dame Juliana thus kindly provided us with a colourful collection of collective nouns, my favourite being "a superfluity of nuns". She didn't, however, have everything covered, so I humbly propose several that came to me in the last few minutes, after the rain:

A galaxy of frangipanni flowers outside my door.
A Cappadocia of ant nests in the park.
A Central Station of ants on my sink.
A groundhog of kids with body boards.
A Von Daniken of crab patterns on Sandy Beach.

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