28 June 2015
conventicle
[kuh n-ven-ti-kuh l]
noun
1. a secret or unauthorized meeting, especially for religious worship, as those held by Protestant dissenters in England in the 16th and 17th centuries.
2. a place of meeting or assembly, especially a Nonconformist meeting house.
3. Obsolete. a meeting or assembly.
Origin of conventicle
Middle English, Latin
1350-1400; Middle English < Latin conventiculum a small assembly. See convent, -i-, -cle1
Related forms
conventicler, noun
conventicular [kon-ven-tik-yuh-ler], adjective
Dictionary.com
Example
– Apparently, while being shipped home as a probable enemy agent by Secret Intelligence Middle East, Raymond had gone ashore at Mombasa and eluded a police search by plunging straight into the interior under the name of Bill Smith and settling down as a handyman with a conventicle of Belgian nuns.
(Rogue Justice, by Geoffery Household, 1982)
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Today’s quote
I distrust patriotism; the reasonable man can find little in these days that is worth dying for. But dying against – there’s enough iniquity in Europe to carry the most urbane or decadent into battle.
― Geoffrey Household (Rogue Male, 1939)
On this day
28 June 1914 – Assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand of Austria and his wife Sophie, Duchess of Hohenberg, while in Sarajevo, Bosnia. The assassin, Gavrilo Princip, was one of 16 Bosnian Serbs found guilty of the incident. The assassination led to World War I as European countries took sides in the subsequent retaliation. The world’s major powers aligned into two opposing alliances: the Allies (UK, Russia, France, USA, Italy and Japan) and the Central Powers of Germany and Austria-Hungary (later joined by the Ottoman Empire and Bulgaria). More than 70 million military personnel were mobilised. By 1918, when the war ended, there were more than 9 million combatants and more than 7 million civilians dead. However, prior to this, following the Russian Revolution in 1917, the new communist government withdrew Russia from the war. The Allies took exception to this and invaded Russia as part of the White Armies (counter-revolutionary, anti-communist forces made up of British, French, Japanese and US Armies, as well as Russian conscripts) that waged war against the communist Red Army in what became known as the Russian Civil War. Both sides massacred civilians (the Red Terror and the White Terror). The war caused massive famine. By the time the war ended in 1922, around 8 million were dead (5 million from famine) and the Red Army was victorious.
28 June 1919 – World War I officially ends as Germany signs the Treaty of Versailles. The armistice had been agreed to on 11 November 1918, but it took until June 1919 to formalise the peace treaty. The treaty forced Germany and her allies to take responsibility for the war, to disarm, to make signficant territorial concessions and to make financial reparations to a number of countries. The Treaty of Versailles was one of the motivators behind Hitler’s rise to power and subsequently World War II that resulted in the deaths of between 50 million and 80 million people.
28 June 1997 – World heavyweight champion boxer, Mike Tyson, bit Evander Holyfield’s ear during the third round of a world title rematch. Tyson was initially disqualified and then allowed to continue the fight, however, Tyson then bit off a part of Holyfield’s other ear which was later found on the floor of the ring. Tyson was disqualified and later fined $3 million. His boxing licence was rescinded, but reinstated in 1998.
