The More You Know

Everyone knows that pirates are awesome. The popularity of the recent Pirates of Caribbean movies staring Johnny Depp prove that fact. However, there is a juicy piece of pirate speech that everyone has said at one point in time, “Shiver me timbers.” It is usually said in shock and most people know the right situations to use it. However, the meaning of it is not always known or easily searchable.

There is one sight that I came across through an article on AllExperts.com. The article pointed to The Pirates Realm. They have little section title “Pirate Talk” which describes the phrase as follows:

akin to "Blow me down!", an expression of shock or disbelief, believed to come from the sound the ship made when 'shocked' by running aground or hit by a cannon blast.

This definition is popularly believed mostly because of the word “shiver” being literally defined as our verb “to shiver.”. You can see examples of this on Urban Dictionary and other sites. However, during the days of Pirates a shive/shiver, as in the noun, was a piece or splinter of wood. To shiver, meant to splinter a piece of wood into smaller pieces. Thus “shiver me timbers” mean to split a mast into splinters. Since pirate ships were all wind powered, when a mast (or timber) was shivered (or destroyed), the pirates were as good as dead. They were left on the seas without any way to move the ship or call for help.

For corporate users, your company may or may not enforce a start page that you do not agree with. Be it company news or a slow loading flash application that makes your slow corporate laptop cry in pain. For some, just changing the start page in the IE properties dialogue is enough. However, for those who have it reset on them whenever they logon/startup, it is an annoyance.

There are many solutions to this problem. The most elegant using startup scripts that just set the value each time. Another would be to use FireFox, but too many companies do not even allow that (mine does!). Also, if you are an unprivileged user these solutions may not be available to you. What you can do is create a new shortcut that forces your home page.

• Find the IE executable (C:\Program Files\Internet Explorer\IEXPLORE.EXE). If you run into permission problems right click and drag to a directory where you have write permissions. Upon releasing the right button, chose create shortcut.
• Right click it and choose Create Shortcut.
• Copy the short cut to wherever you want to use it and possibly rename it.
• Right click the shortcut and choose properties
• You should see the line: “C:\Program Files\Internet Explorer\IEXPLORE.EXE”
• Change that to “C:\Program Files\Internet Explorer\IEXPLORE.EXE” http://www.myFavoriteSite.com
  Another alternative is: “C:\Program Files\Internet Explorer\IEXPLORE.EXE” about:blank
  Which is what I prefer as it is has zero load time and lets me choose where I want to spend my load time. Go saving 3 seconds!

Its one of those string of words we just throw around. Honestly though, ask ten random people what it means and they can, if but roughly, tell you what the general concept is. On a remote chance asking the same ten random people where the saying comes from or what its literal backing is and one might know.

So, where did it come from? It turns out it was said by St. Jerome somewhere around 400 A.D. St. Jerome gave away his writings for free. When critics commented over the value of his writing he is quote to have said in response, “Never inspect the teeth of a gift horse.” Thus was born the popular conceptual use of the term. Over the years it mutated and is now know by the common phrase we all know today.

During the living era of St. Jerome, horses were a valuable commodity. They were a work animal and a form of transportation. Horses were appraised by many factors including age. The age of a horse can be estimated by the condition of its teeth. Thus, when a family or neighbor gave you a horse for free, it would be considered bad form to inspect the teeth. The horse is only a symbol of compassionate thought and should not be viewed purely for its value.