Why do they call a watch a watch?

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Today’s Blog Post
Why do they call a watch a watch?

The other night as I demonstrated the Tatting that I was doing… I stopped to look at my watch. It was only 7 PM and two hours to go.

It was at that moment I asked my self that one silly question that just made sense to ask. Why do they – or I – call it a watch? Or why is it called a wrist watch… and why?

I mean – it could and maybe should be called a ‘time piece’…but it is a watch.

I was reflecting on this as I thought of my Great Grandpa Ben Phillips, his daughters and son… the place they lived in and so on. Sitting around the table tatting… and then knowing that it was time for bed. They certainly lived in an era when clocks were in people’s homes. More than likely guys like my Great Grandpa had a pocket watch… not a wrist watch. But there it is again – a pocket watch.

One bit of information that I read stated that perhaps the word ‘watch’ was closely related to ‘wake’… or ‘wake up’.

Another said that it was related to the ‘Night Watch’ – where one person was to stay up all night and watch for the things in the community, fires, thieves, or other disasters that could be happening from time to time… He was the town or city time keeper. In some places even calling out the time just before folk nodded off.

From that came the third watch, the early watch, etc. I suppose.

It was said that around the end of the 19th Century a ‘nanny’ had attached a clock around her arm with a ribbon to tell her the time when feeding should take place for the baby she cared for. With the clock close to her body… its ticking and even the possibility that it would strike out a note at certain times – she was reminded of her next duties.

At Lang Village the man came by my table to ask… “Do you that time?”

It was an odd thing to ask. At Lang Village – time should be rolled back to 1856… and it was after dark… my eyes and feet felt that it was about 10 PM… I was ready for bed.

I looked at him and said in a pioneer way… “I think it is late.” My ‘watch’ was buried below the table as I was not to wear it with my old garb of the 1856 period.

I gleaned from another article that it was “Cartier” that made the first wrist watch… for a flyer friend of his. If you didn’t have a time piece in the cockpit with you as you flew the early plane – you would not know how much fuel was left to travel with… and may well come down some where you didn’t want to be without fuel to leave again.

I watched my watch carefully the other night – sneaking a peek when I was growing tired. Oh boy was I tired.

The constant question I was asked about the Tatting that I had made was… are you ready? How long did it take you to make this?

The time conscious patrons of 2009 must make their decision so much so based on the time factor… they cannot comprehend doing anything without a time survey before they even begin to try… or consider to try it.

“I would never have the time to do something like that” pointing his watch – “too much to do.”

The fact is that some one living in 1856 or 1944 or 2009 had the same time and the same amount of it as I do. They just watch their watches closer today.

I looked at the doily that I had made a few years back. It was my first one. It had taken me four months to accomplish what I had done. I had used a “book on tatting” to learn how… doing it all wrong – or very slow…miserably slow!

But as I looked at the tatted piece… I could remember the enjoyment that I had as I slowly created something of beauty.

My computer time piece is about to turn over to the 12 PM mark. Meaning that I have thorough wasted a whole morning reading, writing, thinking, dozing, and preparing for an afternoon when I may doze off for while in a big comfy chair… I may Tat some today… and I will carve some later.

Come to think of it… I have taken off my watch since last Sunday Night… at the Lang Village… and left it off… not watching it one time.

But why do they call it a watch?

~ Murray Lincoln ~
www.murraylincoln.com/

Source:
http://www.articlealley.com/article_57315_34.html