Borough English

The origin of the custom of Borough English has been much disputed.

Popeye

However Popeye has pronounced muscles of the forearm, not of the biceps.

When a character makes the actors "aware" that they are being watched by an audience.

The term originated from Bertolt Brecht's theory of "epic theatre" that he developed from (and in contrast to) Konstantin Stanislavski's drama theory. Most often, the fourth wall is broken through a character directly addressing the audience, although the same effect can be achieved by breaking character, through dialogue, or by the characters interacting with objects outside the context of the work (e.g. a character is handed a prop by a stage hand).

Pekingese

These dogs are also called Dogs of Foo (or Fu) by the Chinese and they were considered a guardian spirit as they resembled Chinese lions. Interestingly, the lion is not indigenous to China. When Buddhist travelers, probably out to trade, brought stories about lions to China, Chinese sculptors modeled statues of lions after the travelers' descriptions--and after native dogs, since no one in China had seen a lion with his or her own eyes. The mythic version of the animal was originally introduced to Han China as the Buddhist protector of dharma.

Romany

It is the language of the Roma and Sinti, peoples often referred to in English as "Gypsies".

Sybarite from Sybaris

Islam

It is the second-largest religion in the world today, with an estimated 1.4 billion adherents.

Gunfight at the O.K. Corral

It is a testament to the gunfight's impact on the US national psyche that numerous dramatic, fictional, and documentary works have been produced about or referencing this event over the decades.

Aglaophotis

References to Aglaophotis are also present in Konami's video game series 'Silent Hill'. In the game, it is used to expel demons and the like from the bodies of possessed individuals.

The Incas

West End

West End theatre is a popular term for mainstream professional theatre in London, or sometimes more specifically for shows staged in the large theatres of London's "Theatreland". Seeing a West End show is a common tourist activity in London.

Atlas

'The Last Supper' by Da Vinci

Unlike many other valuable paintings, it has never been privately owned because it cannot be moved easily.

Wednesday, from Woden

Arising from this, the German name for Wednesday has been Mittwoch (literally: "mid-week") since the 10th Century, having displaced the former name: Wodanstag ("Wodan's day"). The Finnish name is similarly practical: Keskiviikko (literally: "center of the week") as is the Icelandic name: Miðvikudags ("Mid-week day").

Druids

The Druids were polytheists, but also revered elements of nature, such as the sun, the moon, and the stars, looking to them for "signs and seasons". They also venerated other natural elements, such as the oak, certain groves of trees, tops of hills, streams, lakes and even plants, especially mistletoe and holly. Fire was regarded as a symbol of several divinities and was associated with the sun and cleansing.

Tantalus

It is from this story that the word 'tantalizing' comes.

Who is this artist who went through a 'Blue Period' and a 'Rose Period'?

Pablo Picasso

Mermen

The most well-known merman was probably Triton, son of Poseidon and Amphitrite. Although Amphitrite gave birth to a merman, neither Poseidon nor Amphitrite were merfolk, although both were able to live under water as easily as on land. Triton was also known as the Trumpeter of the Sea for his usage of a conch shell.

Scrimshaw

It is most commonly made out of the bones and teeth of Sperm Whales, the baleen of other whales, and the tusks of walruses. It takes the form of elaborate carvings in the form of pictures and lettering on the surface of the bone or tooth, with the engravings highlighted using a pigment, or small sculptures made from the same material. The making of scrimshaw began on whaling ships between 1817 to 1824 on the Pacific Ocean, and survived until the ban on commercial whaling.

Number Four

This is because the Chinese word for 4 sounds nearly the same as the word for death. Mobile telephone numbers with 4 in them sell for less and some buildings even skip level four, labeling it the 5th floor instead. One of the Japanese words for 4, shi, is also homonymous with the kanji in the word for death, shi of shinu. In Korea, number '4' is pronounced as sa and is homonymous with the word for death. Some, but not all, Korean buildings have the fourth floor written as 'F' floor.

The Jargon File

The Jargon File was first made by Raphael Finkel at Stanford in 1975.

Gold and Silver

American Gothic

It is one of the most familiar images in 20th century American art. Wood wanted to depict the traditional roles of men and women as the man is holding a pitchfork symbolizing hand labor. Wood referenced late 19th century photography and posed his sitters in a manner reminiscent of early American portraiture.

As the Golden Temple

Bishaa

If the person undergoing the ritual is found to have a scarred or burnt tongue, it is concluded that he was lying. It is the best-known of various trials by ordeal which are practiced by the Bedouin, which are now dying out.

Qanat or Kareez

The technology is known to have developed in ancient Persia, and then spread to other cultures, especially along the Silk Road as far east as China as well as by Arabic cultures as far west as Morocco and the Iberian Peninsula. Traditionally qanats are built by a group of skilled laborers, muqannîs, with hand labor. The profession historically paid well and was typically handed down from father to son.

An individual who has bodily marks, sores, or sensations of pain in locations corresponding to the crucifixion wounds of Jesus.

The causes of stigmata are the subject of considerable debate. Some contend that they are miraculous, while others argue they are hoaxes or can be explained medically. Stigmata are primarily associated with the Roman Catholic faith.

A walking stick

'Penang Lawyer' was made famous by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle in his book 'The Hound of the Baskervilles'. It is made of a fine thick piece of wood, and is bulbous-headed and was just such a stick the old-fashioned family practitioner used to carry – exuding dignity, solidity and reassurance.

Deerstalker

In Arthur Conan Doyle's stories Holmes is never actually described as wearing a deerstalker. The public perception of Holmes as a "deerstalker man" was derived from the original illustrations for the stories by Sidney Paget, Frederic Dorr Steele and others. The deerstalker is not the appropriate headgear for the properly-dressed urban gentleman and Paget and the other illustrators who portrayed Holmes in a deerstalker always placed him in the proper setting for such attire (i.e., operating in a rural outdoor setting).

Pearl (for June)

The Rosetta Stone

The text of the Rosetta Stone is a decree from Ptolemy V, describing the repealing of various taxes and instructions to erect statues in temples. The Rosetta Stone has been exhibited in the British Museum since 1802, with only one break, from 1917 to 1919. Toward the end of World War I, in 1917, the Museum was concerned about heavy bombing in London and moved the Rosetta Stone to the Postal Tube Railway 50 feet below the ground at Holborn.

The Taj Mahal

Jean-Baptiste-Camille Corot (1796 - 1875)

Corot was the leading painter of the Barbizon school of France in the mid- nineteenth century. He is a pivotal figure in landscape painting.

Asgard

The realm of the mortals being called Midgard. Should not be confused with Valhalla, which is Odin's hall and is the home for those slain gloriously in battle.

Mr. Yuk

The Mr. Yuk symbol has been used as a replacement for the traditional skull-and-crossbones (a.k.a. Jolly Roger) warning label for poison. This is because some young children are thought to associate this symbol with pirates and therefore may misinterpret it as an invitation to ingest the poison.

Roy Lichtenstein (1923 – 1997)

His work borrowed heavily from popular advertising and comic book styles, which he himself described as being "as artificial as possible".

Shambhala (also spelled Shambala or Shamballa)

It is mentioned in various ancient texts, including the Kalachakra Tantra and the ancient texts of the Zhang Zhung culture which pre-dated Tibetan Buddhism in western Tibet.

Billingsgate

Equador

They are made from the plaited leaves of the panama-hat palm. The Ecuadorian town of Cuenca is the main producer; however, the town of Montecristi has the reputation of producing the finest quality hats. Glorified during the 19th century, the panama has since been considered the prince of straw hats.

Tajitu

The term Taijitu itself refers to any of several schematic diagrams representing these principles.

A matryoshka doll or a Russian nested doll

They are also called stacking dolls or Babushka dolls. "Matryoshka" is a diminutive from the Russian female first name "Matryona", which is traditionally associated with a corpulent, robust, rustic Russian woman. Matroyoshkas are often designed to follow a particular theme, for instance peasant girls in traditional dress, but the theme can be almost anything, ranging from fairy tale characters to Soviet leaders.

Transcendental Meditation or TM

During the 1960s and early 1970s the TM Movement became seen as part of the then current "counter-culture" phenomenon, at which time a number of celebrities learned TM. Celebrity students at that time included The Beatles and The Beach Boys.

Manneken Pis ("little man piss" in English)

There are several legends behind this statue, but the most famous is the one about Duke Godfried II of Brabant. In 1142, the troops of this two-year-old lord were battling against the troops of the Berthouts, the lords of Grimbergen, in Ransbeke. The troops put the infant lord in a basket and hung it in a tree, to encourage them. From there, he urinated on the troops of the Berthouts, who eventually lost the battle.

"Turn on, tune in, drop out"

It is an excerpt from a prepared speech he delivered at the opening of a press conference in New York City on September 19, 1966. This phrase urged people to initiate cultural changes through the use of psychedelics and by detaching themselves from the existing conventions and hierarchies in society. A common misunderstanding of the phrase, by people not familiar with the context in which it was first said, is that 'turn on, tune in, drop out' refers to 'turn on to drugs, tune in to the counterculture, and drop out of job/society/school.

A strikebreaker

Blackleg Miner is a 19th Century English folk song and the lyrics depict the aggressive stance against strikebreakers adopted by collectivised strikers - the term blackleg being an older word for scab. The UK miners' strike (1984-1985) saw striking miners using the song to intimidate those who continued to work.

Styx

Legends state that Achilles was killed in battle by an arrow to the heel, and so an Achilles' heel has come to mean a person's only weakness.

Cenotaph

The word derives from the Greek words kenos, one meaning being "empty" and taphos, "tomb". Although the vast majority of cenotaphs are erected in honour of specific individuals, many of the best-known cenotaphs are instead dedicated to the memories of groups of individuals, such as the war dead of one specific country or empire. Probably the best-known cenotaph in the modern world is the one that stands in Whitehall, London.

Lady Godiva

The name "peeping Tom" for a voyeur comes from later versions of this legend in which a man named Tom watched her ride and was stricken blind.

It is the direction that should be faced when praying.

The qibla, for any point of reference on the Earth, is the direction of the Kaaba in Mecca.

Cabrini-Green

Scientology

Scientology is said to offer "an exact methodology" to help humans achieve awareness of their spiritual existence across many lifetimes and, simultaneously, to become more effective in the physical world.

Deja Vu

Guerilla

Guerrilla warfare is a method of unconventional combat by which small groups of combatants attempt to use mobile and surprise tactics (ambushes, raids, etc) to defeat a foe, often a larger, less mobile, army.

Mardi Gras

It is the day before Ash Wednesday, and is also called "Shrove Tuesday" or "Pancake Day". It is the final day of Carnival and is a celebration that is held just before the beginning of the Christian liturgical season of Lent.

The Bikini from Bikini Atoll

The modern bikini was invented by French engineer Louis Réard and fashion designer Jacques Heim in Paris in 1946.

Pitchforks

The commonly accepted etymology derives warlock from the Old English wǣrloga meaning deceiver, or "oathbreaker".

Shouting 'Geronimo' during jumps.

Tin Pan Alley

Tin Pan Alley was originally a specific place, West 28th Street between Broadway and Sixth Avenue in Manhattan. The start of Tin Pan Alley is usually dated to about 1885, when a number of music publishers set up shop in the same district of Manhattan but its end is unclear.

Keffiyeh

The keffiyeh is almost always of white cotton cloth, but many have a checkered pattern in red or black stitched into them. The plain, white keffiyeh is most popular in the Gulf states, almost excluding any other style in Kuwait and Bahrain. The keffiyeh also became a trademark symbol of Yasser Arafat, who was rarely seen without his peculiarly arranged black-and-white scarf.

In Kandy, Sri Lanka.

The relic has played an important role in the local politics since ancient times, it's believed that whoever holds the relic holds the governance of the country, which caused the ancient kings to protect it with great effort. Kandy was the capital of the Sinhalese Kings from 1592 to 1815, fortified by the terrain of the mountains and the difficult approach. The city is a world heritage site declared by UNESCO, in part due to the temple.

Qat

Its juice has a caffeine-like affect after swallowing.

Devil's Advocate

The Devil's advocate was opposed by God's advocate, whose job was to make the argument in favor of canonization. The office was established in 1587 during the reign of Pope Sixtus V and was abolished by Pope John Paul II in 1983. This abolition streamlined the canonization process considerably, helping John Paul II to usher in an unprecedented number of elevations: nearly 500 individuals were canonized and over 1,300 were beatified during his tenure as Pope as compared to only 98 canonizations by all his 20th-century predecessors.

The Centaurs

This half-human and half-animal composition has led many writers to treat them as liminal beings, caught between the two natures, embodied in contrasted myths, and as the embodiment of untamed nature.

Amethyst

Amethyst is the purple variety of quartz, its chemical formula is SiO2 and it is the birthstone associated with February. The Greek word "amethystos" basically can be translated as "not drunken."

The Ibis

The Sacred Ibis was also an object of religious veneration in ancient Egypt, particularly associated with the god, Thoth.

The Medici family

The most significant accomplishments of the Medici were in the sponsorship of art and architecture, mainly early and High Renaissance art and architecture.

The State Hermitage Museum in Saint Petersburg, Russia

The vast Hermitage collections are displayed in six buildings, the main one being the Winter Palace which used to be the official residence of the Russian Tsars. International branches of The Hermitage Museum are located in Amsterdam, London, and Las Vegas.

The blood type theory of personality

The theory is a belief that a person's blood type is predictive of their personality, temperament, and compatibility with others, similar to the Western world's astrology. This belief has carried over to some extent in other parts of East Asia such as South Korea and Taiwan. This theory is completely dismissed by many scientists as superstition or pseudoscience.

Bespoke

Hence a tailor who makes clothes individually, to one's specific personal requirements, is called "bespoke". This is unlike “made-to-measure”, which simply uses a basic, pre-existing template pattern. Bespoke has its roots in Savile Row, where a customer would speak for a measure of cloth. A bolt chosen by one customer was not available for anyone else until the entire suit had been cut out and assembled.

Zeus

For that, Zeus ordered him to be chained on top of the Caucasus. Every day an eagle would come and eat his liver, but since Prometheus was immortal, his liver always grew back, so he was left to bear the pain every day.

A serpent or dragon swallowing its own tail and forming a circle.

Sandro Botticelli (1445-1510)

His work has been seen to represent the linear grace of Early Renaissance painting, and The Birth of Venus and Primavera rank now among the most familiar masterpieces of Florentine art.

The Wandering Jew

A variety of names have been given to the Wandering Jew, including Melmoth, Ahasuerus, Matathias, Buttadeus, Cartophilus, Isaac Laquedem, and Juan Espera a Dios and also Jerusalemin suutari ("Shoemaker of Jerusalem" in Finnish).

Beatings on the soles of the feet using either a stick or a whip.

Bastinado became well known to the Western public because of the 1978 movie Midnight Express. This torture is effective due to the clustering of nerve endings in the feet and the structure of the foot, with its numerous small bones and tendons.

The Vitruvian Man

It was created by Leonardo da Vinci around the year 1492. The drawing and text are sometimes called the Canon of Proportions or, less often, Proportions of Man. It is on display in the Gallerie dell' Accademia in Venice, Italy.

Rubik's cube

It was invented in 1974 by the Hungarian sculptor and professor of architecture Ernõ Rubik. This plastic cube comes in four widely available versions: the 2×2×2 ("Pocket Cube"), the 3×3×3 standard cube, the 4×4×4 ("Rubik's Revenge"), and the 5×5×5 ("Professor's Cube").

The Villa Savoye

The house was emblematic of Le Corbusier's work in that it addressed "The Five Points", his basic tenets of a new aesthetic of architecture constructed in reinforced concrete.

Anubis

Although the Greeks and Romans typically scorned Egypt's animal-headed gods as bizarre and primitive (they mockingly called Anubis the "Barker"), Anubis was sometimes associated with Sirius in heaven, and Cerberus in hell.

Jeans

Jeans are trousers traditionally made from denim, but may also be made from a variety of fabrics including corduroy. The first denim came from Nîmes, France, hence de Nimes, the name of the fabric.

The Swiss Guard

They are Swiss mercenary soldiers who have served as bodyguards, ceremonial guards and palace guards at foreign European courts from the late 15th century until the present day (in the form of the Papal Swiss Guard). They have generally had a high reputation for discipline and loyalty to their employers.

The Gemini Twins

In Roman mythology they are the twin sons of Leda and the brothers of Helen of Troy and Clytemnestra. They are called the Dioscuri, meaning the "youths of Zeus".

Thursday, from Thor

Thor was very much the favorite deity of ancient Scandinavians.

Beatnik

It has evolved into a media stereotype that borrowed the most superficial aspects of the Beat Generation literary movement of the 1950s to present a distorted, cartoon-like misrepresentation of the real-life people found in Jack Kerouac's autobiographical fiction.

Johannes Vermeer (ca. 1665–1675)

The theft of Mona Lisa

A Louvre employee Vincenzo Peruggia stole it by entering the building during regular hours, hiding in a broom closet and walking out with it hidden under his coat after the museum had closed. After keeping the painting in his apartment for two years, Peruggia grew impatient and was caught when he attempted to sell it to a Florence art dealer.

Red Herring

The strong smell of kippers would leave a strong trail on the ground which could be used for training hounds or creating a distraction. The Oxford English Dictionary records its first written use occurring in 1686 in this context: "To draw a red herring across the track".

The orders of Ancient Greek (classical) architecture

The Greek Doric order was the earliest and simplest while the Corinthian was most complicated.

Doing live performances to entertain people, usually to solicit donations and tips.

Seal

The legend apparently originated on the Orkney Islands, where selch or selk(ie) is the Scots word for seal. Selkies are able to transform to human form by shedding their seal skins and can revert to seal form by putting their selkie skin back on. Stories concerning selkies are generally romantic tragedies. Sometimes the human will not know that their lover is a selkie, and wakes to find them gone. Other times the human will hide the selkie's skin, thus preventing them from return