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Monday 4 June 2012

Spot the frippet: diamond.

Spotting a diamond:

Diamond Clip Art

isn't really very difficult. For some reason billions of people (the majority women) carry at least one diamond about with them most of the time.

Odd, isn't it.

Nearly as easy to spot are the diamonds on playing cards; bits of coal (sometimes called black diamonds); a baseball field; or a person of great personal value but few manners (a rough diamond).

If you're in the USA there are diamondbacks, which might be either small edible terrapins:


Northern Diamondback Terrapin


or rattlesnakes.

 Eastern Diamondback rattlesnake  Crotalus adamanteus

Please do get this sorted out before you start lunch.

Australia has a diamond snake too: this one is not poisonous but a constrictor, and also a diamond bird.

A Canadian walking stick is quite likely to be made of diamond willow.

As for us here in Britain, we are enjoying a Diamond Jubilee - which means an extra day's holiday, hurray!

Spot the frippet: diamond. This word comes from the Old French diamant, from the Latin diamas, and before that from adamas, which as well as diamond meant the hardest sort of iron or steel. Adamas comes from Greek and might well have meant unconquerable, from daman, to tame.

1 comment:

  1. Love the word diamond but not fond of the jewel really which is why I'm one of the few people in the world who's never had a diamond anywhere about her person. The terrapin is cute and the snake nearly made me faint. I do not do snakes!!!

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