Daily entries from the 17th century London diary
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Wikipedia
Escutcheon may refer to:
- Escutcheon (heraldry) - a term used in heraldry for the shield displayed in a coat of arms.
- Escutcheon - in medicine, refers to the male or female distribution of pubic hair.
- Escutcheon (furniture) - an architectural item of door furniture that surrounds a keyhole or lock cylinder.
- Escutcheon - plate on the stern of a ship inscribed with the ship's name.
- Escutcheon - in bathroom plumbing, the term used for any back-plate, ornamental or otherwise (usually round) used to cover a gap between a penetrating pipe or control valve, and the finished wall surface from which it protrudes.
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Annotations
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A nice L: word scutum for oblong shield not to be confused with scortum a prostitute:OED: 1. a. Her[aldic]. The shield or shield-shaped surface on which a coat of arms is depicted; also in wider sense, the shield with the armorial bearings; a sculptured or painted representation of this.
1480 Wardr. Acc. Edw. IV (1830) 131 Escochons of papir in colours of the armes of Lorde George Ver
1610 HOLLAND Camden’s Brit. I. 405 Their Eschocheon Gules with sixe escallops argent.
b. fig.; esp. in phrases like a blot on an escutcheon = a stain on a person’s reputation.
1697 DRYDEN Virgil (1806) II. 175 Ded., The banishment of Ovid was a blot in his escutcheon
2. A hatchment. (More fully funeral escutcheon.) Obs. a1672
d. Horticulture. A shield-shaped portion of a branch, containing a bud, cut for use as a graft.
1658 EVELYN Fr. Gard. (1675) 61 Cut your escutcheon long enough..that it may derive nourishment
e. Naut. (see quot.)
1867 SMYTH Sailor’s Word-bk., Escutcheon, the compartment in the middle of the ship’s stern, where her name is writ -
nice piece by Mary:Mon 18 Dec 2006,
pronunciation of ‘escutcheon’“Yes, the first syllable of this word is still pronounced in Standard Received English, though the vowel is a short ‘i’ rather than a short ‘e’”
Samuel Jonhson’s Dict.
“…Escutcheon n.s. The shield of the family : the picture of the ensigns armorial
Eschutcheon is a French word, from the Latin scutum, leather; and hence cometh our English word buckler, lere in the old Saxon signafying leathem and buck or bock abuck or stag; of whose skins , quilted close together with horn or hard wood, the ancient Britons made their shields. Peacham….” [ I fail to connect , but find interesting] [see Bacon Essays.] -
Errata :signafying leathem and buck or bock abuck
s/b
signifying leather, and buck or bock , -
Courtesy of Terry, here is Wikipedia’s take on the matter:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Escutcheon
You will be happy to learn that “An inescutcheon is a smaller escutcheon borne within a larger escutcheon” (that’ll stop ‘em dead at the Scrabble tournament), and that “An escutcheon is also used in bathroom plumbing. It is the chrome plate behind a knob on a shower’s temperature and water flow control.” And to think poor Pepys never could have known that!