Q:  When you’re grateful, what exactly are you full of?  A:  You’re full of gratitude, of course.  But what you’re really asking is, what is “grate”?  The “grate” that a “grateful” person is full of, according to John Ayto’s Dictionary of Word Origins, “is a now obsolete adjective, meaning ‘pleasing’ and ‘thankful.’"  The old modifier—derived from gratus, a Latin adjective meaning agreeable, pleasing, or thankful—had its heyday in the 1500s and 1600s, according to citations in the Oxford English Dictionary.  “Grateful is a curious sort of adjective,” Ayto writes.  “It is unusual for adjectives ending in -ful themselves to be formed from adjectives, and it has been suggested in this case that the related Italian gradevole  ‘pleasing’ may have had some influence.”  The OED notes that the Italian word was also spelled gratevole, and that the English usage may have been influenced by “an accidental resemblance” between the Italian -vole and the English “-ful” endings.  In the 16th and 17th centuries, Oxford says, “grateful” was one of several new words that showed up in English with adjectives attached to the suffix “-ful.”  Others were “direful,” “tristful,” and “fierceful.”  The Latin adjective gratus has given English several other words, including “gratify,” “gratitude,” and “gratuity.” And the related Latin noun gratia (grace, kindness) has given English “grace” and “gratis.”  https://www.grammarphobia.com/blog/2013/12/grateful.html

Academic revives ancient Babylonian 2,000 years after language died out by Charles Hymas   A Cambridge academic has taught himself to speak ancient Babylonian and is leading a campaign to revive it as a spoken language almost 2,000 years after it became extinct.  Dr Martin Worthington, a fellow of St John’s College, has created the world’s first film in the ancient language with his Babylonian-speaking students dramatising a folk tale from a clay tablet from 701 BC.  Read more and see graphics at https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2018/11/27/academic-revives-ancient-babylonian-2000-years-language-died/

Baking a chocolate babka is no casual undertaking.  The Eastern European yeast-risen coffee cake has 14 steps and takes all day to make.  But the results are worth every sugarcoated second–with a moist, deeply flavored brioche-like cake wrapped around a dark fudge filling, then topped with cocoa streusel crumbs.  If you want to save yourself a little work and love Nutella, you can substitute 1 1/2 cup (420 grams) of it for the homemade fudge filling.  Also note that you can make this over a few days instead of all at once.  Babka freezes well for up to 3 months, so if you  need only one loaf now, freeze the other for later.  Featured in:  A Better Chocolate Babka  Melissa Clark  Find recipe at https://cooking.nytimes.com/recipes/1018045-chocolate-babka  See also The "Babka" You've Seen Everywhere Isn't Really Babka After All by Sarah Jampel at https://food52.com/blog/18792-the-babka-you-ve-seen-everywhere-isn-t-really-babka-after-all

November 30, 2006  Associate Professor Sheila Coulson, from the University of Oslo, can show that modern humans, Homo sapiens, have performed advanced rituals in Africa for 70,000 years.  She has, in other words, discovered mankind's oldest known ritual.  The archaeologist made the surprising discovery while she was studying the origin of the Sanpeople.  A group of the San live in the sparsely inhabited area of north-western Botswana known as Ngamiland.  Coulson made the discovery while searching for artifacts from the Middle Stone Age in the only hills present for hundreds of kilometers in any direction.  This group of small peaks within the Kalahari Desert is known as the Tsodilo Hills and is famous for having the largest concentration of rock paintings in the world.  The Tsodilo Hills are still a sacred place for the San, who call them the "Mountains of the Gods" and the "Rock that Whispers".  The python is one of the San's most important animals.  According to their creation myth, mankind descended from the python and the ancient, arid streambeds around the hills are said to have been created by the python as it circled the hills in its ceaseless search for water.  Sheila Coulson's find shows that people from the area had a specific ritual location associated with the python.  The ritual was held in a little cave on the northern side of the Tsodilo Hills.  The cave itself is so secluded and access to it is so difficult that it was not even discovered by archaeologists until the 1990s.  When Coulson entered the cave with her three master's students, it struck them that the mysterious rock resembled the head of a huge python.  On the six meter long by two meter tall rock, they found three-to-four hundred indentations that could only have been man-made.  "You could see the mouth and eyes of the snake.  It looked like a real python.  The play of sunlight over the indentations gave them the appearance of snake skin.  At night, the firelight gave one the feeling that the snake was actually moving".  In the course of their excavation, they found more than 13,000 artifacts.  All of the objects were spearheads and articles that could be connected with ritual use, as well as tools used in carving the stone.   https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2006/11/061130081347.htm  

Brown Butter and Miso Linguine by Luiz Hara   Serves 4 as a starter or 2 as a main   This is a super easy, quick mid-week dinner and a fantastic way to introduce Japanese miso into your everyday cooking.  It is also terribly addictive.  Different miso brands will vary in saltiness, so always check and adjust the quantities if necessary.  https://www.splendidtable.org/recipes/brown-butter-and-miso-linguine   Excerpted from The Japanese Larder by Luiz Har  Copyright 2018 White Lion Publishing     

Jan Wahl, whose award-winning books for children were read and read again, silently and aloud, starting with his first in 1964, Pleasant Fieldmouse, died January 29, 2019 in Sylvania, Ohio.  He was 87.  That first published work featured illustrations by Maurice Sendak, already acclaimed for the 1963 book, Where the Wild Things Are.  More than 100 of Mr. Wahl’s books were published, most of them written for young readers.  Other illustrators included Norman Rockwell, Edward Gorey, Lee Lorenz, and Toledo’s Wil Clay.  Scheduled for release February 5, 2019 is Hedy and Her Amazing Invention, illustrated by Morgana Wallace, about Hollywood film star Hedy Lamarr and her off-screen technological innovations.  Mr. Wahl was supposed to read from the book at 2 p.m. March 2, 2019  in the Toledo Museum of Art, preceded at noon by a children’s collage and instrument-making event.  The program will continue, but “will become a celebration of his writing, and especially his new book,” said Scott Boberg, the museum’s manager of programs.  Mr. Wahl was recipient of the Redbook Award, Parents’ Choice Literary Award, an Ohioana Book Award, among other honors.  Mark Zaborney  https://www.toledoblade.com/news/deaths/2019/02/01/toledo-blade-obituaries-jan-wahl-childrens-author/stories/20190131162

Polar vortex makes it darn cold across northern Ohio, but only Toledo and Mansfield are posting records  https://www.cleveland.com/datacentral/2019/01/polar-vortex-makes-it-darn-cold-across-northern-ohio-but-only-toledo-and-mansfield-are-posting-records.html  In Toledo, we expect to escape the vortex today, February 1, 2019.  My apartment has so much static electricity, it looks like a swarm of glittering fireflies fluttering.

http://librariansmuse.blogspot.com  Issue 2034  February 1, 2019