Appendix #1

An Appendix To The Tales:Or What Is That At The Bottom Of  The Glass?

#1

Long before the battle of Agincount (1415) the French,anticipating victory over England,proposed to cut off the middle finger of all captured English bowmen.
Now it was believed that without the middle finger it would be impossible to draw the reowed and mighty longbow,and therefore they would be incapable of fighting in the furture.

This famous longblow was made of the native English Yew tree,and the act of drawing the bow was known as "plucking the yew" or "pluck yew".

Now to the bewilderment of the French,the English kept sending storms of arrows in every battle and mocking the French by waving their middle fingers saying 'See,we can still pluck yew!!'

Since 'pluck yew' can be a wee bit difficult to say in the heat of battle or drinking,which in the whole history of man seem to go hand 'n hand,it is believed 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 believed,because of the pheasant feathers on the arrows used at the time with the longbow,that the symbolic gesture is known as 'giving the bird'.

So now yew know every plucking thing...and so ends this wee bit of the tale told.