Petsa de peligro, Damoklesschuld, and money
It's getting close to the end of the month, and for most people, payday is just around the corner. This week, let's look at a few words on the concepts of money and payday.
First, in Tagalog, the phrase, petsa de peligro is often used towards the end of the month. It means 'date of danger' and is a borrowing from the Spanish fecha de peligro—which is taken more literally and has no connotations like its Tagalog descendant. Petsa de peligro refers to the last stretch of days before payday and the dwindling financial resources one has. During petsa, one becomes much more financially conscious, frugal, and discerning. Perhaps instead of eating out and having takeaways, one opts to cook their food, or instead of going out at the weekend, one stays at home instead.
Put another way, during the petsa de peligro, one perhaps is more inclined to quomodocunquise. To be sure, 'quomodocunquise' is an obsolete mid-16th century word that means 'making money in any way that one can'. It's a combination of the Latin quōmodocumque ('like this, somehow, in whatever way') and the English ‑ize.
In the desperation of one's quomodocunquising, one could be tempted to take out loans to make ends meet. Who could one potentially turn to? Perhaps one's friends and family?
'Damoklesschuld' is a neologism from Ben Schott. It is a combination of the name Damokles and the German word schuld ('debt'). Damoklesschuld refers to the anxiety of owing someone money that one cannot pay back.
At the heart of this word is 'Damokles' or 'Damocles', and the legend commonly associated with him. The 'Sword of Damocles' is an allusion to the imminent and ever-present danger faced by those in positions of power. Damocles was a courtier of the tyrant, Dionysius I. According to Cicero, when Damocles was flattering his sovereign, saying that he was peerless and fortunate. Dionysius I then invited Damocles to switch places for a day, to attend a feast, however, but be sat on a throne wherein there was a sword suspended over it, held aloft by a single horsehair. Despite all of the luxury and extravagance around him, Damocles could not bear the imminent threat of the sword falling on him, and then begged the king for the ordeal to stop. The king conveyed the constant sense of danger he felt to his subject.
Damocles's legend bears the same sentiment as Shakespeare's line: 'uneasy lies the head that wears a crown', or more commonly known as the misquote: 'heavy is the head that wears the crown'.
So beware of lending from your loved ones, else you risk straining your relationships unnecessarily!
Like the cautionary tale of Damocles, 'money' literally embodies the sense of caution if you look at its popular etymology. 'Money' comes to English from a borrowing from the French monie, monnaie, then from Latin moneta ('place for coining money, mint; coinage'), which itself is from the name Moneta ('surname of the Roman goddess Juno, near whose temple on the Capitoline Hill money was coined'). There is no definitive origin of the name Moneta, however, the most popular is linked to Cicero. According to a tale by Cicero, Moneta originates from the verb, monere ('advise, warn, remind'); he recounts that once, during an earthquake, a voice was heard issuing from the temple of Juno on the Capitol, and admonishing (monens) that a pregnant sow should be sacrificed.
Regardless of the etymological origins of 'money', the fact that it can be considered a tool that may forewarn misfortune, that it can be double-edged sword, that it should not be taken lightly, remain valuable messages.
So, in these next few days, I hope that the petsa de peligro isn't too bad, that in your quomodocunquising, you don't feel too much angst from Damoklesschuld, if you have to avail of it. In general, be wary of the possibilities, but also of the dangers of afforded by money!