I’ve noticed a lot of written quizzes now seem to start with”Riddle me this.” It makes no sense. I do remember ‘The Riddler’ in the original Batman series using it, but it now seems to be creeping in to UK use.
lol I don’t hear that often around here except in the context of Batman’s The Riddler. I guess that would be considered an Americanism if it originates from American media, even if it isn’t well-accepted as a social norm in real American culture?
I never knew the words of anything I sang, even if they were in English, I was 16 before I found out that highway men said 'Stand and deliver', rather than 'Stand on your liver', which I know didn't make sense, but I just thought it one of those weird things everyone else knew and I didn't.
We sang Alouette at school and I thought it was French too, I've no idea what it means, we wre just made to sing it, not understand it.
I have one old French name in my family and he was from Western Ireland, whereas his wife has a really old Irish name, the rest of us are old English and have probably been in the upper Thames Valley for thousands of years
That’s interesting. When it’s not a common name it makes me wonder if your Northern Irish friends share a common ancestor with you.
There are small clusters of people with my French surname south of Dublin, with others in the west of Ireland, with some being distant cousins. Unrelated to those are small clusters in North West England, and some small related clusters.
I often wonder if people with the same unusual name are related, or if their names were given to unrelated ancestors but connected through location, trade or personal attributes or foibles.
It’s amazing how much in common people here have, between Norman surnames and other French ancestry.
I once lived with a Co. Roscommon man, living in London, who had a Norman-French surname that was murder to spell, especially on the phone to an Italian hotel when he was away on business. Oddly, one of my two or three Northern Irish friends has the same surname, which I didn't think was that common.
It’s amazing how much in common people here have, between Norman surnames and other French ancestry. My original surname was French too, but I don’t know if it was Norman or not. The Norman surnames are in a different line. French records are difficult to source because there isn’t a national index, DNA testing is restricted and there are strict privacy laws. I would love to find out more. I think an extended road trip around some of the villages would be the best way of finding out more, not something I could consider at the moment.
I can’t vouch for the accuracy of this information, but I think it likely that the repetitive nature of the songs would make them popular learning tools for the many children who learned French.
I can’t vouch for the accuracy of this information, but I think it likely that the repetitive nature of the songs would make them popular learning tools for the many children who learned French.
