Subject
[from PF and Parody] - dracunculi
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>>>>>In ADA I (ch 3) we read that "He [Van] invariably wrote in French calling her petite maman ...He called her usually mummy, or mama, accenting the last syllable in English, the first, in Russian; somebody had said that triplets and heraldic dracunculi often occurred in trilingual families
Dracunculi indicates "draculs" and heraldic dragons, which are associated to Demon Veen. ....
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I think it has more meanings, at least two -- one botanical and one zoological/medical, of which VN should have been quite aware.
1) Artemisia dracunculus, Russian tarragon, a species of sagebrush (wormwood), is known in French as estragon, one of four fines herbes of French cooking; and in Russian as tarkhun. A nice vodka is made with it; an alleged cure for snake bites, too.
Two interesting connections here:
1.1. Waiting for Godot (Estragon and Vladimir)
1.2. Lermontov (= Demon's author) first and last home (an obvious equivalent of Ardis) has a phonetically close name, Tarkhany. ("Tarkhan" was a highest noblility title in the Khazar Kaganate and Timurid empire; the word also was used for non-indentured Tartars in Russa; it still means a freeman in Mongolian. In a way, VN's alleged Tartar ancestor 'Murza Nabok' is close to tarkhan.) This might be farfetched, but the name of Tarkhany (in Penza region) is known to known to every educated Russian, it was a shrine since Lermontov was killed at age 27 (1841).
2) Dracunculus also is a well-known Latin genus name of the parasitic Guinea worm, or "Dragon of Medina", a cause of dracunculiasis. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dracunculus)
The life cycle of this worm, found in Middle East and Central Asia, was first described only in 1870 by the famous traveler A.P. Fedchenko, one of the source figures for Central Asian zoology in The Gift.
Moreover, it gave origin to the famous 'serpent around a rod' image - the Staff of Asclepius, or caduceus, a very common heraldic image (e.g. in the logo of World Health Organization).
See e.g. "The filarial worm Dracunculus medinensis aka "the fiery serpent", aka "the dragon of Medina" aka "the guinea worm" crawled around the victim's body, just under the skin. Physicians treated this infection by cutting a slit in the patient's skin, just in front of the worm's path. As the worm crawled out the cut, the physician carefully wound the pest around a stick until the entire animal had been removed. It is believed that because this type of infection was so common, physicians advertised their services by displaying a sign with the worm on a stick. "
(http://www.drblayney.com/Asclepius.html#worm).
Victor Fet
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