Appendix 1

[catgate]

A couple of days ago a PM flooded in, in a drove, asking to see the Kearning Appendix. So, just for you Stanley, here is appendix 1

APPENDIX l

Kearning Historical

The earliest recorded mention of kearning was found in a papyrus scroll that was thought to belong to the early Sumerian period but which Dr. Horsman Englhauser subsequently dated some five or six weeks earlier. The contents of this scroll started out with a paragraph which read:-



Here then we see that, through the reference to "Real Kearning", there existed a prior form of kearning to the one familiar to the early Sumerians. Some of our modern kearning historians are very strong in their belief that our modern kearning owes more to "real kearning" than it does to what the Romans thought of as "the Golden Age of Kearning".

That there were some experienced and gifted kearnsmen in ancient Rome is quite beyond doubt. One of the pleens more widely use in those days was the precursor of our current Regal No.3. It was known as a Reya. (Some say that Regal is a corruption of Reya.) Be that as it may, the knowledge of Roman kearnship was obviously known to one Wm. Shakespeare, who, in the first folio of Julius Caesar, has Mark Anthony saying, "Friends, Romans, Countrymen, lend me your Reyas, I come to bury Caesar etc." In later folios it was changed, without the authors consent, by those who did not have his wide range of experience and thought it a misprint.

Pliny and Pythagorus were both expert kearnsmen, albeit of slightly different schools. It is widely held that whist Pliny developed the basic pladget into a range of spadgers, Pythagorus, in another age, developed wilvers from the same root. In fact it was because of their centuries old association with kearning that the Pliny family got its name. It was originally “Pleen", but custom and usage down the ages has corrupted it to its present day format.

The darkest days for kearning were in the period when Ghengis Khan ruled most of Asia and huge tracts of Europe. His disdain and almost loathing of everything that was not connected with mares milk ensured that the better things of the period were just cast aside like rancid yak fat. That kearning did survive, and even flourish, is due in no small part to a short, fat, hairy tribesman from Erkutsk in what is now Outer Mongolia. His passion for high class kearnery had earned him recognition far and wide and as a result his tribe had named him Esroh Gninraek, or "he who works wonders far and above what can be expected of any man". Due to his skill he travelled far, but, one day, whilst travelling, he realised that "time spent travelling equals time not spent kearning". Upon realising this he determined to do some thing about it. For years he did not travel. For years he and his family almost starved. Then he realised that in order to reach his cutomers he would have to travel. It was at this point that he made the single biggest development in the history of kearning . He realised that if he could construct something to do his kearning on, whist travelling by horse, he could travel and kearn at the same time. He laboured for several days and finally produced the thing he needed and it is still in use today. Yes, he invented the cart.

Up until that time the peasants had not seen anything like a cart. Very few of them paused in their daily toil to give a thought to the transport of the future, and those few that had were trying hard to visualise a motor car, a motor cycle or at worst some form of public transport, but not one of them had remotely conceived that something like a cart could be built. It certainly gave them something to think about when it rolled down the main street of Erkutsk and pulled up outside the supermarket.

Following the withdrawal of Ghengis Khan and his hordes from the far east the Chinese Emperor Xhinxiuozonx Pwouxenzhia (pronounced Shu Fo) decided to take up kearning. He instructed his ministers that he wanted them to make him a kearning horse befitting his position and in such a situation that he could use it out of the sight of all the day trippers to the Imperial Palace in Peking (Xhinzhioup Shiouxzong as it was then spelt). Unfortunately his ministers let enthusiasm get in the way of real knowledge and channelled endeavour, and after several years the Emperor called them together and asked what the delay was. Upon being told it was not finished he demanded to see what they had so far achieved. They took him on a three week journey northwards and eventually said, "Oh wondrous one, behold our works on your behalf." When he had beholded he said " Thou collection of the greatest of Wazzocks, what thou hast builtestest is the start of the Greatestest Wall of China." (of course all this was spoken in Chinese). So he had them all "done in", also in Chinese, and continued with the wall instead of kearning.

Obviously the greatest flowering of kearning came with the building of the many great medieval cathedrals and churches. Not that kearning was in any way involved with the design, or the building, or the use of these buildings. It just happened that, with the Spanish Inquisitors taking an unhealthy interest in anything that was not of a religious catholic nature, the areas of work around these constructions were the last place that the Inquisitors would look. As time went by the general attractiveness of kearning began to be soaked up by the clergy with the result that many kearningnesses became part of the everydayness of the church. Many of them are still with us today, albeit in a form that is unrecognisable until it is pointed out, whereupon the origins are clear enough to the modern Kearner. Some examples are :-

The font...............a very distorted upright traddle trough.

The Bishops Mitre.... a distorted version of an early Celtic

apprentice kearners sparring helmet.

The Bishops Crook....an enlarged version of the handle of

a No.21 Supreme

The Vicars surplice.. the everyday workwear of an itinerant

journeyman Kearner of the middle ages.

These examples are but the tip of an enormous iceberg just waiting to be explored.

King Frederik lV of Saxony was a great exponent, having learned his craft in a monastery whilst getting the education that was obligatory for a 17th century princeling. When he ascended to the throne after the death of his father, Frederik V, (and his mother Frederik Vl) he was hailed as "Der Kearning Konig".

Nearer to home many of the English kings were interested in kearning. Some of them, such as Richard l l, had interests that were less than positive. He, in particular, was always short of money, due to his passion for going off on crusades and finishing up locked in a castle somewhere, waiting to be rescued by Blondie. He therefore decided to levy increased taxes. Unfortunately he did not have good old tobacco, petrol, or road fund licenses to fall back on so he decided it would all have to fall on kearning. In order to maximise the revenue from this source he created a new body of officials which in the fullness of time became known as The Royal and Ancient Worshipful Companie of the Kings Kearners.

It was their duty to go around the country and encourage kearning. Then levy and collect the tax due. Unfortunately there was an insufficiency of solvency in the general populace and as a result all the kearnings were impounded by the Kings Kearners in an annual tour of the country. This was the origin of the tradition of Kearn Upping practised in many parts of the country.

[andsome]

Worse than watching paint dry.