Humanities desk | ||
---|---|---|
< July 10 | << Jun | July | Aug >> | July 12 > |
Welcome to the Wikipedia Humanities Reference Desk Archives |
---|
The page you are currently viewing is a transcluded archive page. While you can leave answers for any questions shown below, please ask new questions on one of the current reference desk pages. |
In Chapter 13 of Harriet Lummis Smith's 1924 novel Pollyanna of The Orange Blossoms ( https://www.fadedpage.com/showbook.php?pid=20220545), the character Jimmy Pendleton tells Pollyanna to do the following:
"Hunt up one of the boys with the three balls, and see what he’ll let me have on my watch."
Who could the phrase "the boys with the three balls" possibly refer to? There are no more mentions of "the three balls" anywhere in the novel, and I've gone through Three-ball (disambiguation) and I don't see any likely contenders. Searching on Google returns results relating to polyorchidism, which is highly unlikely to be the intended meaning given the nature of this novel. The context of this sentence in the novel suggests that "the boys with the three balls" are people who are likely to be willing to purchase Jimmy's watch. Could this phrase be an obscure reference to a pawn broker's shop? I would be glad for any insights on what could be meant by this phrase in this novel. 2607:FEA8:FF01:4E1D:A018:8493:D6B8:185A ( talk) 14:30, 11 July 2023 (UTC)
Our article Omid Scobie says he was educated at Magdalen College School, Oxford but transferred to the Cherwell School for his sixth form studies. I studied at the City of Oxford High School and was offered a sixth form place at Magdalen but turned it down - I went into the sixth form with my classmates. Magdalen is one of the best schools in the country - it comes at or near the top of the examination results tables. I would imagine that attendance there greatly smooths the path to acceptance for Oxford University.
My junior school was Summertown School in Middle Way - it had a senior section which offered a secondary modern education. It closed down when the new Cherwell School was built. Both these schools are state schools, although the posh Summerfields preparatory school is close by. Summerfields School and the nearby Dragon School were, I believe, feeders for Magdalen College School, which was fee-paying until the 1944 Education Act under which it acquired direct grant status and therefore had to offer 25% of its places to state school pupils on scholarships. With the introduction of comprehensive education and the end of the direct grant system Magdalen reverted to being a public (i.e. fee paying) school. So why on earth did Scobie leave Magdalen and finish his education at the Cherwell School? 86.157.216.138 ( talk) 16:57, 11 July 2023 (UTC)
On page 45 of Complete Ancient Greek by Gavin Betts and Alan Henry, it says, “The only Greek god who had a name with cognates in other Indo-European languages and so could, in a sense, claim to be genuinely Greek, was Zeus, whom Homer calls ruler of gods and men. The many other divinities worshipped, or at least acknowledged, by the Greeks seem to have been adopted from other cultures.” How exactly does the evidence the authors cite (that Zeus’s name has cognates in other Indo-European languages and all the others don’t) support the conclusion they mention (that Zeus is original to the Ancient Greek belief system and all the other gods are foreign importations)? Primal Groudon ( talk) 18:48, 11 July 2023 (UTC)
We have articles Proto-Indo-European mythology and List of Proto-Indo-European deities... AnonMoos ( talk) 05:54, 12 July 2023 (UTC)
Humanities desk | ||
---|---|---|
< July 10 | << Jun | July | Aug >> | July 12 > |
Welcome to the Wikipedia Humanities Reference Desk Archives |
---|
The page you are currently viewing is a transcluded archive page. While you can leave answers for any questions shown below, please ask new questions on one of the current reference desk pages. |
In Chapter 13 of Harriet Lummis Smith's 1924 novel Pollyanna of The Orange Blossoms ( https://www.fadedpage.com/showbook.php?pid=20220545), the character Jimmy Pendleton tells Pollyanna to do the following:
"Hunt up one of the boys with the three balls, and see what he’ll let me have on my watch."
Who could the phrase "the boys with the three balls" possibly refer to? There are no more mentions of "the three balls" anywhere in the novel, and I've gone through Three-ball (disambiguation) and I don't see any likely contenders. Searching on Google returns results relating to polyorchidism, which is highly unlikely to be the intended meaning given the nature of this novel. The context of this sentence in the novel suggests that "the boys with the three balls" are people who are likely to be willing to purchase Jimmy's watch. Could this phrase be an obscure reference to a pawn broker's shop? I would be glad for any insights on what could be meant by this phrase in this novel. 2607:FEA8:FF01:4E1D:A018:8493:D6B8:185A ( talk) 14:30, 11 July 2023 (UTC)
Our article Omid Scobie says he was educated at Magdalen College School, Oxford but transferred to the Cherwell School for his sixth form studies. I studied at the City of Oxford High School and was offered a sixth form place at Magdalen but turned it down - I went into the sixth form with my classmates. Magdalen is one of the best schools in the country - it comes at or near the top of the examination results tables. I would imagine that attendance there greatly smooths the path to acceptance for Oxford University.
My junior school was Summertown School in Middle Way - it had a senior section which offered a secondary modern education. It closed down when the new Cherwell School was built. Both these schools are state schools, although the posh Summerfields preparatory school is close by. Summerfields School and the nearby Dragon School were, I believe, feeders for Magdalen College School, which was fee-paying until the 1944 Education Act under which it acquired direct grant status and therefore had to offer 25% of its places to state school pupils on scholarships. With the introduction of comprehensive education and the end of the direct grant system Magdalen reverted to being a public (i.e. fee paying) school. So why on earth did Scobie leave Magdalen and finish his education at the Cherwell School? 86.157.216.138 ( talk) 16:57, 11 July 2023 (UTC)
On page 45 of Complete Ancient Greek by Gavin Betts and Alan Henry, it says, “The only Greek god who had a name with cognates in other Indo-European languages and so could, in a sense, claim to be genuinely Greek, was Zeus, whom Homer calls ruler of gods and men. The many other divinities worshipped, or at least acknowledged, by the Greeks seem to have been adopted from other cultures.” How exactly does the evidence the authors cite (that Zeus’s name has cognates in other Indo-European languages and all the others don’t) support the conclusion they mention (that Zeus is original to the Ancient Greek belief system and all the other gods are foreign importations)? Primal Groudon ( talk) 18:48, 11 July 2023 (UTC)
We have articles Proto-Indo-European mythology and List of Proto-Indo-European deities... AnonMoos ( talk) 05:54, 12 July 2023 (UTC)