History Of The Middle Finger
 

The History of the Middle Finger

Well, now......here's something I never knew before, and now that I know it, I feel compelled to send it on to my more intelligent friends in the hope that they, too, will feel edified. Isn't history more fun when you know something about it?

Before the Battle of Agincourt in 1415, the French, anticipating victory over the English, proposed to cut off the middle finger of all captured English soldiers. Without the middle finger it would be impossible to draw the renowned English longbow and therefore they would be incapable of fighting in the future. This famous English longbow was made of the native English Yew tree, and the act of drawing the longbow was known as 'plucking the yew' (or 'pluck yew').

Much to the bewilderment of the French, the English won a major upset and began mocking the French by waving their middle fingers at the defeated French, saying, See, we can still pluck yew! Since 'pluck yew' is rather difficult to say, the difficult consonant cluster at the beginning has gradually changed to a labiodentals fricative F', and thus the words often used in conjunction with the one-finger-salute! It is also because of the pheasant feathers on the arrows used with the longbow that the symbolic gesture is known as 'giving the bird.'




And yew thought yew knew every plucking thing

lol that was on that hbo show where th comedian guy does the "real history" thing, but he said that one was probably made up. Assume the position is the name of the show. :1orglaugh

Nice LOL

"giving" the bird?
I thought it was "flipping" the bird?

I have absolutely no idea if any of that is true or just makes for a funny story!

I think the Family Guy is gay - he's got a ball sack for a chin!

wow that was really new to me thanks for sharing :):):)

Cool. Thanks for sharing.

So... If the Internet would have been around in the 13th century, this place would have been known as GoPluckYourYew.com :1orglaugh

Very enlightening, true or not. :thumbsup

His dog has a penis like nose... coincidence... I think not...

It's been used as an insult throughout history long before that.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Finger_(gesture)

Cool history!!

Thanks, that was a really funny post :1orglaugh

http://www.webcamcash.com/pics/myspa...aliefinger.jpg

Very fitting for this board BAMA :)

Love it but not sure if it's true :-)

The English also use the same 100 year war battle to explain the V sign. They always fail to mention that ultimately they lost the war.

# 2 Dynastic turmoil: 1314–1328
# 3 On the eve of war: 1328–1337
# 4 Beginning of the war: 1337–1360
# 5 First peace: 1360–1369
# 6 French ascendancy under Charles V: 1369–1389
# 7 Second peace: 1389–1415
# 8 English ascendancy under Henry V: 1415–1429
# 9 French victory: 1429–1453

FALSE :2 cents:

http://www.snopes.com/language/apocryph/pluckyew.asp

One thumb on the pulse of the nation, one thumb in your girlfriends ass - Jimmy Pop

:321GFY

fuckyou8characterminimum

ridiculous and fake. can't believe anyone could consider that real

True or not thats pretty interesting!

Thanks for the brief look into what's in my eMail trash folder.

haha, very nice! I'm freer now (from a very well known phrase by writer Jose Marti: "To be more educated to be freer")