Talk:Macaroni (fashion)

Dating

Why does it say "mid-18th century", when it mostly seems to be a 1770s thing? Churchh 12:10, 5 July 2006 (UTC)

1. The 18th century is the period 1701–1800.

2. One might reasonably believe that the "mid" part of that century began in the 1730s or 1740s and ended in the 1770s or 1780s.

President Lethe 13:40, 5 July 2006 (UTC)

Italian

Is it at all possible that the word used was macarone, with an e, and that macaoroni with an i was the plural? 160.94.192.249 23:13, 21 May 2005 (UTC)

Note that the OED discounts the direct significance of the Italian word maccherone (mountebank), preferring the idea of a Maccaroni Club (sic) where returning Grand Tourists could enjoy foreign food. Earl Hertford is quoted in this sense from 1764, but also later with a spelling of Macarone - which seems to leave things in doubt. 81.154.180.147 21:50, 5 November 2006 (UTC)

Pic needed

Does anyone have a good image to illustrate this article. The extremes of Macaroniism (at least as portrayed by caricaturists) have to be seen to be believed... Churchh 17:00, 6 May 2006 (UTC)

Added one. - PKM 18:01, 6 May 2006 (UTC)

Yankee Doodle

Surely the song "Yankee Doodle" was a British army song that poked fun at Americans.

An American dandy being the poor relation to a British one so the soldiers poked fun at Yankee Doodle's lame attempt at dressing up as a Macaroni. I think this section needs to be corrected.

Yankee Doodle went to town, riding on a pony.

(Too poor to own a full horse.)

Stuck a feather in his hat, And called it macaroni.

(Too poor to dress up in finery so uses a feather in his hat.)

Jm butler 22:58, 19 June 2006 (UTC)

Caption accuracy

Some days ago, 24.215.244.155 changed a picture caption from

"What! Is this my son Tom?", 1774

to

"What is this my son Tom", 1774

A few days later, with the edit summary "I think we're allowed to add a little interpretative punctuation to transcriptions of 232-year old engravings.", Churchh reverted the change.

Today, with the edit summary "caption accuracy. english printers were decently careful with punctuation in 1774. and there are several possibilities for punctuating this, even in line with the rest of the engraving text.", I began changing the caption, so that it read

"What is this my Son Tom", 1774

Churchh, with the edit summary "I don't know what the point of an anti-punctuation jihad is - 18th century engravings often had rather minimal punctuation, since the focus was on the illustration, and engravings were often rush jobs", reverted the change.

With the edit summary "probl'y good to avoid jihad accusations @ wikipedia. pic has at least 14, maybe 15, punct marks, exactly where printer wanted them ('minimal'?). 'interpretive' kind has >1 option, so pov. see talk.", I repeated the change.

1. Let's be careful with the word jihad at Wikipedia.

2. Let's also be careful about enlarging an explained edit into a campaign against punctuation.

3. This is a point of plain, simple accuracy. Accuracy is Wikipedia's business. When the title page of a book reads The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, I don't go adding my Oxford comma just because I prefer it.

4. Without reproducing exact spacing, alignment, changes in font, and superscript, I here transcribe the text from the bottom of the print, with the punctuation in bold face:

Our wise Forefathers would expreʃs

Ev’n Sensibility in Dreʃs;

The modern Race delight to Shew

What Folly in Exceʃs can do:

What is this my Son Tom.

London, Published by R. Sayer[.] & J. Bennett No. 53 Fleet Street, as the Act directs 24 June 1774.

The honest Farmer, come to Town,

Can scarce believe his Son his own:

If thus the Taste continues Here,

What will it be another Year?

(I'm not sure whether that's a punctuation mark or a blemish after "Sayer".)

These fourteen or fifteen marks are minimal by the standards of neither 1774 nor 2006 English.

5. The matter of engravings in general from that time is irrelevant: we're talking about this one in specific, which, regardless of how long it took, has plenty of punctuation, though not exactly the marks I would use. Anyway, accuracy is the point.

6. There are several possible ways of logically changing the punctuation in "What is this my Son Tom." This is true even if we limit ourselves to the verse description of the scene. (Rather than get into the different capitalization possibilities, I'll capitalize every initial letter.)

What? Is This My Son, Tom?

What? Is This My Son Tom?

What! Is This My Son, Tom?

What! Is This My Son Tom?

What Is This, My Son, Tom?

What Is This, My Son Tom?

And then there are the possibilities of "?!" or "!?" in one or more place, or a colon or a comma or a dash after "What". We don't know how many sons the farmer has, which means we don't know whether the appositive "Tom" is defining (needs a comma) or nondefining (doesn't need a comma). Also, if the basic question is "Is this my son", and then he's posing it to "Tom" (as I might address you here, Churchh), then the comma would be necessary even if there were more than one son and "Tom" would thus otherwise be defining. To offer the reader only one interpretation out of so many possibilities is to push the reader in one direction—unfairly, needlessly, and with a chance of seeming sloppy or inaccurate both in the spirit of accuracy and in the matter of not presenting readers with only one of several clearly significantly different possibilities. We don't give readers just one of our points of view on what the farmer is saying to his son: we show the farmer's words exactly as printed and leave this judgement to the readers.

President Lethe 16:21, 30 July 2006 (UTC)

The obsolete spelling "maccaroni"

It is not unusual at Wikipedia, I've noticed, for editors to search out the most recherché spellings and namings for articles. "Maccaroni", though used in Boswell's Journal, is marked with an obelisk in OED, as obsolete. The editor who made the title change took it upon itself to change the spellings in quotations to suit the affected changed spelling. I have returned this article to its normal spelling.--Wetman (talk) 19:05, 4 March 2008 (UTC)

Contracdicted by OED

The Oxford English Distionary has a note on the term [1] that seems to contradict the information given in this article:

2. A dandy or fop; spec. (in the second half of the 18th cent.) a member of a set of young men who had travelled in Europe and extravagantly imitated Continental tastes and fashions. Also in extended use. Now hist. [This use seems to be from the name of the Macaroni Club, a designation probably adopted to indicate the preference of the members for foreign cookery, macaroni being at that time little eaten in England. There appears to be no connection with the extended use of Italian maccherone in the senses ‘blockhead, fool, mountebank’ (compare macaroon n. 3), referred to in 1711 by Addison Spectator 24 Apr. 178/2: Those circumforaneous Wits whom every Nation calls by the name of that Dish of Meat which it loves best:‥in Italy, Maccaronies.]

The article needs to be revised given the above information. --İnfoCan (talk) 16:13, 18 January 2011 (UTC)

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