R, Matey! Trivia Quiz

Answer:

Shiver me timbers is an exclamation of either fear or awe. The phrase stemmed from ships that were caught out in heavy seas. They'd be lifted by the ocean and then pounded down so hard that it would rattle (shiver) the ship's woodwork and startle the sailors. A similar expression is "well blow me down".

Lily-livered is defined as being either weak or cowardly. Its origins go back to Medieval times where the liver was described as the "seat of courage". A lily, on the other hand, was seen as a pale coloured flower. Then, by extension, a pale liver was one without blood... no blood equaled no courage, hence the term lily-livered.

Walking the plank alludes to a form of execution that is generally associated with pirates. Victims would be either blindfolded or have their hands tied (or both) and encouraged to walk across a plank, usually by the tip of a sword or cutlass, to fall into the ocean where they were left to drown.

The Seven Seas is a figurative term used to encompass all of the world's seas. It is believed to have originated from Ancient Rome, with the Romans describing the lagoons that separated Venice from the open sea as "septum maria" (seven seas).

Circumnavigation means to go all the way around something. This could be a muddy puddle or a problem that you may not wish to face up to. In the narrative, we used Sir Francis Drake and, in his case, it meant sailed around the globe. He did this aboard his ship the Golden Hind between 1577 and 1580.

A corsair is a privateer, another word for a pirate. Sir Francis did his pirating deeds with the blessing of his monarch, Queen Elizabeth I, though it was on the condition that he shared the spoils with Her Majesty's government. His journey to circumnavigate the globe was, initially, a voyage to plunder Spanish ships and ports. The use of Sir Francis Drake, in the narrative, was deliberate. With the word "drake" meaning a male duck, it allowed us to give him the nickname of "Ducky" and, in the process, maintaining a pirate's irreverence toward formality. The use of the name of Captain Blackbeard, an English pirate who commanded the ship "Queen Anne's Revenge", is a stretching of the truth (I did say it was a tall tale). Blackbeard terrorized the seas around the West Indies between 1716 and 1718, at least 120 years after the death of Sir Francis Drake.

A circumcision is a procedure to remove a male person's foreskin. This is generally seen as a religious rite, especially in Judaism or the Islamic faith. The word clipper was used in two ways above (though there are more meanings). Firstly, as a pun to describe the action of cutting or trimming and, secondly, to describe a type of ship. A clipper is a fast-moving merchant ship that has concave bows. In this case, a bit of poetic license was used above as it is a vessel that was prominent in the mid nineteenth century and not the sixteenth, at the time of Sir Francis Drake. As previously stated, Drake's ship that he used to circumnavigate the globe was called the Golden Hind. The word hind does mean "at the back", as in a dog's hind leg. It can also mean the posterior, as we used (tongue in cheek) above, and it is also a female deer. And, yes, Drake's ship was called the "Pelican" at the time he set sail (13 December 1577), and he did change while on the voyage. The name was changed 20 August 1578 in honour of his patron, Sir Christopher Hatton, whose family crest was that of a golden hind (female red deer).

Armada is a Spanish and Portuguese word for a naval fleet. Drake famously had a hand in the defeat of a vast Spanish Armada that set sail to invade Great Britain in 1588. It certainly didn't happen as described in the narrative.

The derriere is another word for the posterior or buttocks, and the Kraken is a legendary sea monster that is said to have patrolled the waters between Norway and Iceland.

Finally, in the introduction we also used a number of pirate terms. Avast ye means listen here you, a landlubber is an inexperienced sailor, or one that is uncomfortable at sea, a tall tale is one that is far-fetched, and the Jolly Roger is a pirate's flag, notably a white skull-and-crossbones on a black background. No quarter means no mercy and son of a biscuit eater is a more socially acceptable form of an insult than a minced oath that I cannot use here. It is used in the case of sailors as one of their dietary staples was hard tack, a form of biscuit. Last of all, Davy Jones' locker is a term used to describe the bottom of the sea, most notably as a grave for those that have drowned.