Fun with words - anagrams
Anagrams, the arbitrary rearrangement of character strings, can be pretty funny. Try the Anagram Server to find possible anagrams of your name or any other words you find interesting. You might well be surprised by the results!
Jamie, did you know that one of your possible anagrams is 'Jeanne Smoky'? Joel, you could be 'Jane Jocksol'. For Chris it comes up with 'Sean Chirpy' and Charlie seems to 'shag Gil Cartelle'. Who the heck is Gil Cartelle? A Frenchman?? lol.
I would be Brian Ramherd...
Try it out, it's fun!!
8 Comments:
Well, bernhard you did tempt me. Sorry i haven't posted for a while, i've been on attempted murder charges in crown court(TEEHEEHEE). Here is an introduction to anagrams followed by some of my favourites, little guy:
According to some historians, anagrams originated in the 3rd century B.C. with the Greek poet Lycophron who lived in Alexandria at the palace of King Ptolemy Philadelphus (285-247 B.C.). In a poem on the siege of Troy entitled Cassandra, Lycophron included anagrams on the names of Ptolemy and his queen, Arsinoë:
PTOLEMAIOS = APO MELITOS
(made of honey - an allusion to the king's goodness)
ARSINOH = ION HRAS
(Hera's violet)
Other sources suggest that Pythagoras, in the 6th century B.C., used anagrams to discover philosophical meanings. Plato and his followers believed that anagrams revealed divinity and destiny. Alexander the Great dreamed that he had caught a satyr the night before the siege of Tyre. His advisor Aristander told him it was a good omen, because the Greek word for satyr (SaturoV) anagrammed to "Tyre is yours" (Sa TuroV). The city fell the next day.
Anagrams were often believed to have mystical or prophetic meaning in Roman and early Christian times. History then mentions little of anagrams until the 13th century A.D., when the Jewish Cabalists again found mystical significance in them.
In the Middle Ages in Europe, anagrams became popular. However, the principal activity of anagrammatists in the Middle Ages was in forming anagrams on religious texts. For example:
Ave Maria, gratia plena, Dominus tecum
[Hail Mary, full of grace, the Lord is with thee]
=
Virgo serena, pia, munda et immaculata
[Virgin serene, holy, pure and immaculate]
Quid est veritas?
[Pilate's words to Jesus, "What is truth?"]
=
Est qui vir adest!
[Jesus' possible reply, "It is the man before you!"]
Many authors anagrammed their names to make pseudonyms. François Rabelais became Alcofribas Nasier, Calvinus became Alcuinus (v and u being interchangeable in Latin), and each wrote abusive anagrams of the other's names.
In the , scientists such as Galileo, Huygens and Robert Hooke often recorded their results in anagram form to stake their claim on a discovery and prevent anyone stealing the credit.
In the days of French Royalty, Louis XIII appointed a Royal Anagrammatist, Thomas Billon, to entertain the Court with amusing anagrams of people's names.
era bought about the vogue of anagramming the names of famous people. Lewis Carroll gave us:
Florence Nightingale =
Flit on, cheering angel.
Disraeli =
I lead, sir.
William Ewart Gladstone =
Wild agitator means well!
This era also gave us the cognate anagram, where the anagram has some relevance to the original, e.g.
Astronomer =
Moon starer.
The British naturalist, Sir Peter Scott, believed in the existence of the Loch Ness Monster so strongly that in 1978 he gave it a scientific name. Scottish MP Nicholas Fairbairn later anagrammed it:
Nessiteras rhombopteryx =
Monster Hoax by Sir Peter S.
Apart from their frequent appearances in cryptic crosswords and puzzles journals, anagrams seem to have gone out of favour in recent decades. We have an archive of famous 19th and 20th century anagrams in our Hall of Fame.
However, with the advent of the Internet and the creation of sophisticated anagram-generating software, this trend has been reversed and the art of anagramming is once again thriving.
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Dormitory: Dirty Room
Schoolmaster: The classroom
Elvis: Lives
Clint Eastwood: Old West Action
Western Union: No Wire Unsent
The Country Side: No City Dust Here
Desperation: A Rope Ends It
The Morse Code: Here Come Dots
Slot Machines: Cash Lost in'em
Conversation: Voices Rant On
Heavy Rain: Hire a Navy
Tom Cruise: So I'm Cuter
Mother-in-law: Woman Hitler
Funeral: Real Fun
Snooze Alarms: Alas! No More Z's
A Decimal Point: I'm a Dot in Place
Statue of Liberty: Built to Stay Free
Eleven plus two: Twelve plus one
Mel Gibson: Bong Smile
David Letterman: Nerd Amid Late TV
Howard Stern: Retard Shown
Debit card: Bad Credit
Rearranging the letters of 'Japanese sport of sumo wrestling' gives:'Lot of gross men just wear nappies'.
I probally won't be coming back to Uni as i hated the way i was treated and i've got better things to do! good luck for the future!
By
Anonymous, at Wednesday, 05 July, 2006
Yeah, thanks.
I discovered the Elvis = lives one yesterday, haha.
Did you know that 'George Bush' makes 'Bugger's Hoe'? No wonder that Saddam Hussein hissed 'damn USA'... :-)
By
Global Bernie, at Wednesday, 05 July, 2006
I've got a massive sod-off book of anagrams that i lent to my sister.... Me and some guys i study japanese with heard of a type of japanese variant on the anagram using kanji. I'm still trying to google* it but it looks damned interesting!
*'Google':now synonymous with 'research'
Until i find some new anagrams here are the best palindromes that i know of:
Do geese see God?
Was it Eliot's toilet I saw?
Murder for a jar of red rum.
Some men interpret nine memos.
Never odd or even.
(incase you don't know a palindrome is : A word, phrase, verse, or sentence that reads the same backward or forward.)
By
Anonymous, at Thursday, 06 July, 2006
Madam, I'm Adam! Haha...
Check your JMU email. I sent a couple of Japanese palindromes to js a few days ago. This Japanese variation is called 'kaibun' and can be read in either direction as well, as long as you keep the syllables together.
Na-tsu-ma-de-ma-tsu-na.
夏まで待つな。
Don't you wait until summer...
By
Global Bernie, at Thursday, 06 July, 2006
I'd love to czech out your anagrams but i've just got back from the check republic* and i can't access the jmu email.... Could you post them on here so non-jmu students can read em? I know of wordplay stuff in other languages as well........ i'm running a few nightclubs as the mo so i'll post them when i have time! Do you know anything about korean,bern?
*possibly the worst joke ever.
By
Anonymous, at Tuesday, 11 July, 2006
One prob with that anagram bern- my name doesnt have any "y"s in it :P
By
1234321, at Thursday, 13 July, 2006
so it's not 'payne'?? sorry, my spelling is poo... :p
By
Global Bernie, at Thursday, 13 July, 2006
okay, i made it 'Archie Spin' now, that better? ;-)
By
Global Bernie, at Thursday, 13 July, 2006
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