Job Discussion Forums

[shadowfax]

"For tis the sport to have the enginer / Hoist with his owne petar" (Hamlet, III, iv, 207).

Hoist is the past participle for the infinitive 'hoise', not 'hoist'. The meanings of these two verbs are largely correpondent, but hoise has a higher frequency of nautical applications.

More peculiarly, the OED tells us that 'hoist' may be used intransitively in constructions with passive purport: "He ... marches ... towards hosannas that ever hoist and hallelujahs that ever roll" (New York Weekly Witness, 1892).

The petard, or petar, was a primitive bomb. I don't see why it should be plural in the instance used on the other thread.

Passing elegant, and good grist to the mill. Long live archaicisms and all their stubborn admirers!

[Stephen Jones]

The SOED gives 'hoist' as an alternative form of 'hoise'.

The phrase is often misinterpreted, probably because the word petard is now obsolete, and 'engineer', which referred to somebody involved with siege engines, now has a different meanng.

So many people probably think of petard as a kind of flagpole that the engineer is hung up by.

[Bebsi]

Thanks for the info. I was never fully aware of the nature of the expression. Can I make a really embarrassing confession here? I thought petards were one's intestines [maybe I was thinking of innards] which is why I was cautious about the use of the singular. I had visions of a medieval executioner being hung by his own guts...or maybe even his goolies? Seems that the only one who has hung himself by his goolies here is your truly

[dmb]

[veiledsentiments]

Funny... now we're getting to the area that I thought involved the petard...

VS