When I think of the word clue, the first image that comes to mind is the popular board game by the same name. As a child, I loved the thrill of deducing a piece at a time “who did it” with what weapon and where – was it Colonel Mustard with the Rope in the Study, or Miss Scarlet with the Revolver in the Conservatory?
Did you know, however, that the modern English utterance ‘clue’ has also suffered violence? It has been totally severed from its original meaning! Should we deduce who did this “murder,” with what “weapon,” and in what century? Let’s do better than deduce – let’s go see for ourselves.
Today’s path is actually a paved highway, running straight back to the Renaissance like a major Roman road, and then forking into two footpaths. We peer down the longer path, marked with symbols in ancient Greek; fortunately for us, the English path is shorter. It “only” stretches back into the Anglo-Saxon period, beginning in the 6th century, when the Germanic peoples of the mainland invaded Britain in droves. With them they brought a term for a rounded mass or a ball of thread that became the Old English words cliwen and cleowen.
As centuries passed, people dropped the –en, forming the more manageable Middle English word clew, their common term for a ball of thread or yarn. At the end of the Middle English era (roughly the late 15th century), the variant spelling of clue surfaced. I can’t help but pause here and consider another relatively modern reference: Agatha Christie’s unassuming sleuth Miss Marple and her ostensibly innocuous knitting. On at least one occasion, I believe that her clue rolled away and led her to an important piece of evidence. Could this be the link to our modern usage? We turn and wink at each other – we know the answer can’t be that easy (or chronologically illogical!).
As we follow this quaint English footpath up to the crest of that great hill called the Renaissance, a busy, bright intersection comes into view: where the Greek path meets this English one. Both run concurrently for a while; this is a matter of simple translation, it seems. Seeking education and enlightenment through the Greek myths, brightly dressed Englishmen are applying the word clew/clue to the ball of thread that Theseus used to find his way out of the Cretan labyrinth. For now, clue retains its integrity.
But as we come alongside these voluble Renaissance men, the suspense of their newfound story momentarily distracts us from our investigation. King Aegeus of Athens paid regular tribute to King Minos of Crete: seven young men and seven maids to be forced into Daedalus’s labyrinth as food for the Minotaur. King Aegeus’s son Theseus was outraged by this injustice and, taking the place of one of the seven young men, vowed to kill the bull-man creature. Desiring his success, King Minos’ daughter Ariadne surreptitiously gifted Theseus with a ball of silken thread to tie to the door of the maze. Never letting go of this lifeline, the bold hero trekked deep into the twisting passages, slayed the monster at their center, and then faced the slow, blind task of following the string back to the earth’s blessed surface.
At this point in the tale, our sympathy is with Theseus; what must he be feeling? The terror of being trapped alive? Fear of never seeing sunlight again? He must steel his nerves and work by touch, not by sight. The “clue” he holds is the path to life itself, the only way out of darkness and despair. We are relieved when the narrators reveal that Theseus made it.
Since this myth has awakened our imaginations, we are not surprised to see a major change in the road we are walking. Here in the early 17th century, labyrinth-inspired writers begin to use the word clue in an increasingly abstract sense. Just as the ball of thread helped Theseus get out of his predicament, so now anything that serves to guide or aid anyone toward the solution of a problem is known as a “ball of thread” – a clue!
“Aha!” you exclaim. “Mystery solved!” And right you are. We have uncovered that the English of the Renaissance (who) used the meaning that the Greek myth had impressed upon their collective imaginations (weapon) in the early 1600s (“where”) to inflict this violence upon clue, striking the blow that would eventually sever its ties with its original meaning. Our lane melds with part of the Greek path and changes direction gradually, transforming into a wide road of man-made substance on which we amble, satisfied, toward the present. The dirt trail of the original clew/clue continues on straight and dwindles into a barely discernible line.
Back in the present day, we sit down on a shaded garden bench to rest and reflect on our journey. We consider that perhaps clue’s change in meaning was not just a death, but also a rebirth – a birth into something great, a descriptor for something sought after by all humanity. What the Theseus myth captures is our universal search for truth, for meaning, for salvation. Whether tangible or intangible, a clue brings us closer to the revelation of the full knowledge for which we long. It gives us something true to hold on to that is one step closer to the shining door.
Encouraging you to keep your hands on the thread and take one step at a time,
- Ety
