A whirligig is an object that spins or whirls, or has at least one member that spins or whirls in the wind. The word, derived from the verb to whirl, is known in English since 1440, originally for various spinning toys.[1] Since ancient times, a whirligig was a spinning punitive or torture contraption comprising a suspended cage-like device; see Whirligig (torture).[2] Modern whirligigs are generally decorative and entertaining, such as lawn ornaments and wind-powered hanging art.
Miscellaneous
- The U.S. granted a patent for a yo-yo like device called a whirligig in 1866.[3]
- Paul Fleischman's book Whirligig is about a teenager who builds whirligigs as a way to repay the mother of a girl he killed in a drunk driving accident.
- A whirligig can also refer to a very small whirling of air, like a micro-cyclone.
- In the game S.T.A.L.K.E.R.: Shadow of Chernobyl, a game set in a world filled with strange and dangerous phenomenon called anomalies, the whirligig is a lethal gravitational anomaly which drags people / mutants into the air and spins them at immeasurable speed until they disintegrate.
- The title of a play by American playwright Mac Wellman.
References
- ^ The Oxford English Dictionary cites the 1440 Promptorium Parvulorum, the first English-Latin Dictionary, which contains the definition, "Whyrlegyge, chyldys game, giraculum."
- ^ Getchwood Curious punishments.
- ^ Ohio Historical Society, 2005, "Whirligig", Ohio History Central: An Online Encyclopedia of Ohio History.
