the.com/spoke
the slender bone that lets a wheel hold the weight of the world
means A spoke is one of the slender rods or bars that radiate from the hub of a wheel to its rim, distributing load and holding the wheel's shape — and 'spoke' is also the past tense of 'speak.'
from Two unrelated words wearing the same coat. The wheel-spoke comes from Old English 'spaca,' a Germanic word (cousin to Dutch 'spaak' and German 'Speiche') tied to a root meaning a sharp point or stake — the same family that may have given us 'spike.' The verb 'spoke,' the past of 'speak,' comes from Old English 'sprecan' / 'specan,' which lost its 'r' along the way; entirely separate roots that English happened to flatten into one spelling.
- tension trick
- spokes carry loads by pulling, not pushing
- radial root
- the word shares ancestry with 'spike'
- hub hangs
- a bike rider hangs from the top spokes
- sound of motion
- the phrase 'put a spoke in the wheel' means sabotage
patrick henry's speech — virginia orator who declared 'give me liberty, or give me death!' in 1775
winston churchill's speeches — british pm rallied nation with 'we shall never surrender' during wwii, 1940