2/8d and 3/6d. Two shillings and eight pence, i.e. two pennies over a half-crown. Some calculations estimate the purchasing power of 2/8d in 1905 as approximately GBP41.74 or US$67.64 in 2013. Three shillings and sixpence - calculations based on the purchasing power of 3/6d suggest its purchasing power would be GBP54.78 or US$88.77.
The double rifle. This Victorian development excels over other repeating firearms by allowing a split-second, secondary shot on large, dangerous game without having to work the firearm’s action. This can be a matter of life or death for the shooter when a large, dangerous animal chooses to charge, especially in close quarters or in thick cover. The double rifle rapidly became the weapon-of-choice of many professional White Hunters in India and especially in Africa, both now and when the author lived in Africa.
Tractarian: members of the Anglican High Church movement were also sometimes known as Tractarians. This High Church link in Watson’s background is not widely known - and here, in prompting a Nonconformist clergyman (let alone Sherlock Holmes) to display Biblical knowledge based on the Old Testament, he was being mischievous. Many Nonconformist ministers had never been to Oxford or Cambridge and were not likely therefore to have the detailed knowledge of the Scriptures in their original formats.
Churchwarden clay pipes: these are characterised by an extremely long stem, up to 20 inches in length.
The Colonial and Continental Church Society. A Protestant missionary society, created by the amalgamation of two early nineteenth century societies in 1851: it specialised in sending out clerically-qualified schoolmasters and catechists to areas such as Catholic Europe and Russia as well as North America - unlike the better-known societies such as the Church Missionary Society which specialised in locations outside Europe.
Norfolk Suit. During the Edwardian period, the Norfolk jacket remained fashionable for shooting and rugged outdoor pursuits. Made of sturdy tweed or similar fabric it featured paired box pleats over the chest and back, with a fabric belt. When worn with matching breeches (U.S. knickerbockers), it became the Norfolk suit, with knee-length stockings and low shoes suitable for bicycling or golf, or for hunting with sturdy boots or shoes with leather gaiters.
The pictorial postcard: this was introduced into Britain in 1894 and became particularly popular with Edwardians, throughout the Empire, including India. In Britain, most were sold for a half-penny. With up to ten deliveries a day in urban areas, it was nearly as synchronous as the Twitter and Twitpic of today and often as relaxed and conversational in tone. As late as 1908 a priggish character in a story remarked: ‘I have always been brought up to think it rather rude to send postcards, unless they are picture ones for people to put in their albums’.
Frederick Scholte. Tailoring was softened in the early twentieth century by Savile Row’s Frederick Scholte especially when he developed the English drape. Scholte became the Duke of Windsor’s (King Edward VIII’s) tailor. The Duke commented ‘Scholte had rigid standards concerning the perfect balance of proportions between shoulders and waist in the cut of a coat to clothe the masculine torso.... These peculiar proportions were Scholte’s secret formula.’
‘Omnis intellectualis scientia’ etc. Aristotle. Metaphysics, v. 1. Translates roughly as ‘All intellectual knowledge, whether or not generated by him, is concerned with its causes and the principles behind its rules.’
Olympia Academy. Einstein met regularly to read and discuss books on science and philosophy with other friends in Bern, all yet unknown to the academic world. They called themselves the Olympia Academy, mocking the official bodies that dominated science.
Blackstone’s Commentaries on the Law of England. Holmes would have known that this famous law book was utilised by the American ‘traitor’ General Benedict Arnold during the War of Independence to communicate messages designed for British eyes.
Michele Besso. Until only a few years before his death, Einstein was - to put it mildly -frugal in acknowledging the work of others in the field, including contemporaries such as Jules Henri Poincaré. The one exception was life-long friend, engineer Michele Besso, valuable to Einstein as a sounding board. This earned Besso the famous acknowledgment in the special relativity paper of 1905. Nevertheless, Besso’s help in a technical problem concerning Einstein’s paper on the perihelion problem was never publicly acknowledged. Little did Einstein know at that point that his friend and admirer would preserve these earlier calculations for posterity.
Gemütlich. The term is often argued to be difficult to translate, but the broad sense is that it represents something or someone comfortable, cosy or easy to be informal with.
Displaced hip. As Michele Zackheim points out in Einstein’s Daughter: The Search for Lieserl, Mileva Marić’s displaced hip was a congenital condition widespread in the Balkans, occurring in more than a fifth of the population, mostly female and mostly the left hip.
The ambitious Einstein. In real life too, Einstein was notably ambitious from extreme youth. Describing the Einstein about to take up the post at the Swiss Patents Office, Biographer Albrecht Fölsing wrote, ‘There probably never was a young man about to enter a modest post with, at the same time, such high-flying plans as Albert Einstein, when he arrived in Bern in February 1902.’ Fölsing added, ‘And the most astonishing thing is that his hopes came true.’
Anti-Semitism. In my novels set in the Edwardian period such as the Mystery of Einstein’s Daughter I have portrayed Holmes’s and Dr. Watson’s attitude towards the Jews as standard for their period. There is little material in Conan Doyle’s works indicating the pair was closely acquainted with anyone of Jewish descent. In The Adventure of Shoscombe Old Place the word Jew is synonymous with moneylender, a usage dating from the Middle Ages when only Jews were allowed to be bankers in the Christian world. Holmes is said to have bought his Stradivarius violin from a ‘Jew broker’ in the Tottenham Court Road.
Salto mortale. The most dangerous somersault in the circus.
-ić . Most Serbian surnames (like Bosnian, Croatian and Montenegrin) have the surname suffix -ić This is often transliterated as -ic or -ici. In history, Serbian names have often been transcribed with a phonetic ending, -ich or -itch. This form is often associated with Serbs from before the early 20th century: hence a name like Milanković would usually be referred to, for historical reasons, as Milankovitch.
Scarlet Fever. This was the most dreaded form of streptococcal infection. Simply hearing the name and knowing it was present in the community was enough to strike fear. Even when not fatal, the disease caused large amounts of suffering to those infected. In the worst cases, all of a family’s children could die over a week or two. Dr. Charles Tait, later Archbishop of Canterbury, lost five of his six children in a month in 1856.
Marionette Shows/Puppetry. As yet undetermined, puppetry may have originated in India about 4,000 years ago. In Sanskrit plays, the narrator is called ‘Sutradhar’ or ‘holder of strings,’ which is similar to a puppeteer. Early Indian puppet shows dealt with religious themes and political satires. By 1730, Japanese puppetry had become so complex that each puppet had to be operated by three puppeteers. Puppets made their first emergence in Europe through Greece. Puppet plays were shown at the Theatre of Dionysus at Acropolis. This gave rise to the Commedia dell’arte tradition. Italian marionette shows produced tragedies like ‘Dr. Faust’. For centuries puppetry catered for adults rather than children. In Victorian Britain adult works were overshadowed by the violent Punch and Judy shows for children’s entertainment. Nowadays puppetry very much includes works for adults, for example the National Bunraku Puppet Theatre in Osaka which has developed the art of ningyo joruri Bunraku, specifically adult drama. See www.osaka-info.jp/en/search/detail/sightseeing_1953.html.