Where will you most easily find a maelstrom?
The word maelstrom is likely to be used today to describe a bustling office, downtown traffic or hurricane winds. Turbulence, chaos, bustle and similar notions are linked to a maelstrom.
Originally, however, way back in the mid 1500’s, it had a specific meaning which put it on the map, so to speak. The Dutch cartographer (map maker) Mercator, who has given us today’s commonly used map, the Mercator Projection, located a specific maelstrom off the northwest coast of Norway.
So, where will you most easily find a maelstrom? On an ancient Dutch map. Well, you might be lucky to ever find one anywhere else, since they are hardly common.
A maelstrom is a huge whirlpool. It comes from the linking of grinding/swirling and stream or waters. Grinding, swirling waters make a maelstrom.
Movie-goers will most easily find a maelstrom in the third Pirates of the Caribbean movie. Computer animation creates a vast maelstrom, even called such by the sailor who first spots it. So if you’d like to get the sense for a maelstrom in action get to your nearest video shop.
Because of the upheaval and destruction caused by a maelstrom it becomes an appropriate metaphor for intense activity and swirling destruction.
May your life be spared the maelstroms of nature, society and personal upheaval.
Tags: logophile, maelstrom, meanings, mercator projection, pirates of the caribbean movie, Vocabulary, words
Leave a Reply