Wednesday, February 24, 2010

Swasical!

For those not versed in Miller folklore, Swa was a young, reckless, and remarkably successful general. His bold attacks against better equipped foes were the stuff of legend even in his own day, and while not always entirely sound, his tactics ultimately succeeded. Consequently, a bold, stylish attack which may or may not be sound (I believe it is in the present example) is denoted by the adjective "swasical." Known variations include "twasical", "swazzy", and others too painful to be set down.

Some historians believe the variations may have arisen from the various battle cries of Swa's yeomen troops, resulting in the various root forms: hwa, swa, and twa. Enough talk. Let's sac some rooks.

2 comments:

Ruth said...

I'm just wondering if there's any connection to the much beloved character of Swa (or the Jawanhar variation - Sha) from the Bancle series?

And now I wish I could find a way to use "twasical" in a paper somehow... Dr. Oaks 223, perhaps?

Daniel said...

Of course! Swa was Bancle's chief general after the successful defeat of the traitor Wicker. He had a long, successful career following that. Amazing what these boys can do when you turn 'em loose...good luck finding something worthy of the titles, heptoblozzical, twasical, hwascial, and sundry (gotta love those red wavy highlighting marks - even spell check knows these words are special).