Origin of the "single digit salute"

[gator_in_Ontario]

When the outnumbered English faced the French at the battle of Aincourt, they were armed with a relatively new weapon, the longbow. The French were so amused that they vowed to cut off the middle finger of every archer. When the longbows won the day, the English jeered the retreating French by raising that middle finger in a gesture that still means, among other things, "in your face".

From: Now You Know The Book of Answers by Doug Lennox

[AlienGirl]

1. I think it's much more basic (and older) than that

It looks like a penis. It's one of the human equivalents of dominance-mounting.

Tucker

[gator_in_Ontario]

2. hmmm...

good point. I was surprised it was as old as this book claims.

[AlienGirl]

3. My source is "Manwatching" by Desmond Morris

There are many penis-imitating insulting gestures around the world. It seems to be almost a universal thing.

Interestingly, vulva-imitating gestures are usually used to ward off the evil eye or in other protective roles!

Tucker

[Elidor]

14. How does one imitate a vulva, I wonder?

[daveskilt]

4. actually

it is the index and middle finger together (the two used to pull back the arrow) that were held up at Agincourt. Hence we brits still put up two fingers to say "up yours frenchie". As to why the americans only use one finger? could be derived from the same thing but I always thought it was more sexual in origin.

[gator_in_Ontario]

6. maybe

the Brits cut the index finger off a few hundred years back???

[TXlib]

5. I seem to recall reading

that the gesture originated inverted to what it is now, the middle finger downward, with the first and third knuckles imitating testicles; the meaning was one of impotence: "Hey, you can't get it up!"

I also think the article I read said it was at least as old as the Romans of antiquity.

[arwalden]

7. "Mail Call" Mentioned This The Other Week...

...and R. Lee Ermey actually gave us the finger, except that the History channel felt that it was something that ought to be pixeled out.

They can show us dismembered bodies, but not a finger-gesture. LOL.

-- Allen

[gator_in_Ontario]

8. I agree

society's idea of what is "obscene" is really messed up

[psychopomp]

12. Col. Kurtz's last words.

"They train men to kill, but they won't let them write 'FUCK' on their planes because it's obscene!"

Yes, the U.S. has some fucked up moral standards.

[Maddy McCall]

9. Actually, that's a joke that originated on Click and Clack's Car Talk

from Snopes ( http://www.snopes.com/language/apocryph/pluckyew.htm )

The 'Car Talk' show (on NPR) with Click and Clack, the Tappet Brothers have a feature called the 'Puzzler', and their most recent 'Puzzler' was about the Battle of Agincourt. The French, who were overwhelmingly favored to win the battle, threatened to cut a certain body part off of all captured English soldiers so that they could never fight again. The English won in a major upset and waved the body part in question at the French in defiance. The puzzler was: What was this body part? This is the answer submitted by a listener:
Dear Click and Clack, Thank you for the Agincourt 'Puzzler', which clears up some profound questions of etymology, folklore and emotional symbolism. The body part which the French proposed to cut off of the English after defeating them was, of course, the middle finger, without which it is impossible to draw the renowned English longbow.

This famous weapon was made of the native English yew tree, and so the act of drawing the longbow was known as "plucking yew".

Thus, when the victorious English waved their middle fingers at the defeated French, they said, "See, we can still pluck yew! PLUCK YEW!"

Over the years some 'folk etymologies' have grown up around this symbolic gesture. Since 'pluck yew' is rather difficult to say (like "pleasant mother pheasant plucker", which is who you had to go to for the feathers used on the arrows), the difficult consonant cluster at the beginning has gradually changed to a labiodental fricative 'f', and thus the words often used in conjunction with the one-finger-salute are mistakenly thought to have something to do with an intimate encounter. It is also because of the pheasant feathers on the arrows that the symbolic gesture is known as "giving the bird".

[daveskilt]

10. cutting them off

is something I had never heard of until today but the fingers held up in defiance of french at agincourt first then later to the spanish is something that is taught in every high school history class in britain.

[gator_in_Ontario]

13. And we can say that without sanction..

"pluck Yew!!!!" hehehe I love it

[democrat in Tallahassee]

11. I read in a book on Aristophanes that it comes from

sticking your finger up a chicken to see if there is an egg there; Since the middle finger is the longest, it was used and sticking up the middle finger became a sign of well, up yours. I'll have to check but I think it was used in ancient Greece.