by Artemis » Wed Jul 12, 2006 7:21 am
A: That's one of those quirks of language, like referring to police derisively as 'pigs' (which is widely believed to have originated in the 1960s, but occurred apparently independently during the previous century as well), that just crops up now and then with a weird kind of inexplicable symmetry.
The most recent incarnation is actually a contraction of "I slept like a rock star," meaning that one's state of somnolence bore resemblance in its depth to that of someone who'd snorted a bucketload of hard drugs the night before, thrown the TV set out the window, then passed out and spent the night in a state in which it was medically impossible for them to wake up in the morning, or indeed ever again, without the use of electro-cardiac stimulation. If someone claims to have 'slept like a rock', we recommend hiding under their bed next time they go to sleep, waiting 'til about 7am, then zapping them with 30,000 volts across the chest, just to be on the safe side. They'll thank you for it later.
In the 18th century the phrase was "I slept like a roc," referring to the fabled giant bird of popular mythology. Rocs were widely reported to prepare for sleep by hanging by one leg off the branches of trees of moderate size, inevitably leading to the branch breaking and the roc falling head-first to the ground, concussing itself into unconsciousness. This highlights two important facts about the roc: firstly, that it was unable to achieve a state of sleep on its own, and needed to evolve an artificial means of doing so in order to rest and revitalise its body for the next day's mollusk-hunting, and secondly, why they're extinct.
The reason this was related to human sleep is that it was common in the 18th century, prior to the invention of sleeping pills, for well-to-do gentlemen and their wives, when suffering bouts of insomnia no doubt brought on by the stresses of modern living, to employ peasants from the streets and poorhouses to stand by their beds, and belt them over the head with a cosh or blackjack when they desired to get some rest. This in itself was presented a conundrum which was never solved: the best sleep-assistants were muggers and petty criminals, due to their incomparable skills at achieving upper-class unconsciousness with a single blow; however, as soon as they had performed their nightly duties, they tended to ransack the mansion and make off for France before anyone was any the wiser.
There are some historians who argue that the phrase actually came about because a rock was often used to send the upper class to their nightly repose; however it seems more likely to be the case that the mythological explanation is the correct one, and the use of actual rocks came about because the peasants were instructed to apply sleep in the manner of a roc, and lacking a broad education in classical mythology, or the ability to spell well enough to notice the missing letter, simply took this literally.
Rocks, of course, don't sleep, which is why they're always too tired to move. Rocks have been hoping for millennia that some kind of anti-insomnia treatment would be developed allowing them to at last get a good night's sleep, but sadly, seeing as rocks lack any means whatsoever to produce said treatment, this seems unlikely to occur.
Q: What happened to all the violins that were turfed out of their cases so that said cases could be used by mobsters to carry around tommy guns?
