Discussions about eggcorns and related topics
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Thanks for your understanding.
Chris -- 2018-04-11
Saltpeter is a soluble salt that is mobile in groundwater. When it seeps out of mine walls and cliffs, and then dries, it leaves a salt crust on the rock. For this reason it was called sal petrae, or rock salt, in M.L.
The euphemistic use of “peter” for the penis began at the start of the 20th century. Later in the century, in an eggcornish reconsideration of the meaning of the name, the rumour or urban legend spread that “salt peter” was routinely added to the dormitory food at boys schools, boot camps, prisons and monasteries, to keep all those peters salted and stored away. Of course salt peter has no anaphrodisiac qualities at all. Its addition to food in sufficient quantities would simply be poisonous.
There are almost 100,000 hits for “saltpeter” +food.
They also add saltpeter (softpeter) to the food and drinks in the Army and at college dorms.
(http://www.wisegeek.com/what-is-salt-peter.htm)
i remember in boot camp (long, long time ago) that they rumored of putting saltpeter in the food. really can’t remember getting a woody the whole training cycle. maybe because i only saw a few women during training, most likey at the clinic. but i think i was just too damn tired to put any blood in the steak.
(http://www.japanupdate.com/forum/showthread.php?t=3845)
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Ooooh, good one.
The image might not be “salting away” the offending organ. The stories about catching birds by putting salt on their tails (false) and killing slugs and snails with salt (true) may come into play. Perhaps saltpetre was a way to mortify one’s member (see Colossians 3:5 in KJV).
Hatching new language, one eggcorn at a time.
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Oddly enough, I’ve been reading Elizabeth David’s ‘Spices, Salt and Aromatics in the English Kitchen’ this week and return to it to find Kem’s theory overturned: “Beware of overdoing the dose, for saltpetre has a hardening effect on meat.”
Over here ‘Peter’ used to be a highly favoured name for budgerigars, and a peter-man is a criminal able to blow open a safe, but so far the name has grown no attachment to male genitalia. As my other forename, Richard, in its ‘Dick’ guise, has that association, I am a little dejected to find myself doubly encumbered.
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Perhaps we should start a new Meeting Place on this forum for “saltpetre” and its likes. We could call the section “Eggporns.’‘
Hatching new language, one eggcorn at a time.
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