Photochrome of a glacier, Grindelwald, Switzerland, c. 1890. © Rijksmuseum

Discovery

Volume X, Number 2 | spring 2017

Miscellany

In 1986 a Greek professor encountered a previously unknown word while deciphering a fifth-century lexicon olisbokollix, meaning “loaf-of-bread dildo.” Later discovery of vase paintings showing women carrying baskets of phallus-shaped loaves confirmed the word had been understood correctly.

I am tormented with an everlasting itch for things remote. I love to sail forbidden seas and land on barbarous coasts.

—Herman Melville, 1853