Pawnbroker's bawls.

[5129frederick]

Tell me something:

Outside a traditional pawnbroker's shop three bawls normally hang above the door, but why does the centre bawl hang lower?  

No?

Because it's on a longer chain!  (Spelling error intentional otherwise with their cleve computer wit would never get as far as the board)

[**towery**]

on wikipedia
    Symbol[edit]

Symbol of pawnbrokers.

Pawnbroker's sign in Edinburgh Scotland

The pawnbrokers' symbol is three spheres suspended from a bar. The three sphere symbol is attributed to the Medici family of Florence, Italy, owing to its symbolic meaning of Lombard.[17] This refers to the Italian province of Lombardy, where pawn shop banking originated under the name of Lombard banking. The three golden spheres were originally a symbol medieval Lombard merchants hung in front of their houses, and not the arms of the Medici family. It has been conjectured that the golden spheres were originally three flat yellow effigies of byzants, or gold coins, laid heraldically upon a sable field, but that they were converted into spheres to better attract attention.

Most European towns called the pawn shop the "Lombard". The House of Lombard was a banking community in medieval London, England. According to legend, a Medici employed by Charlemagne slew a giant using three bags of rocks. The three-ball symbol became the family crest. Since the Medicis were so successful in the financial, banking, and moneylending industries, other families also adopted the symbol. Throughout the Middle Ages, coats of arms bore three balls, orbs, plates, discs, coins and more as symbols of monetary success. Pawnbrokers (and their detractors) joke that the three balls mean "Two to one, you won't get your stuff back".

Saint Nicholas is the patron saint of pawnbrokers. The symbol has also been attributed to the story of Nicholas giving a poor man's three daughters each a bag of gold so they could get married.[18]

[5129frederick]

Oh my, I wish I was as clever as you!   

[aernethril]

The reason why the middle one is lower is probably best explained by looking at the coat of arms which shows how the byzants or roundels were originally placed.

http://americanenterprise.si.edu/2012/11/the-three-balls-lost-and-found/

However, if appears that the main significance is in there being three balls in any position.

[mouse4702]

All I know is that sometimes in cold weather the sign can fall off.

[twishy123]

H'actually the origins of the pawnbrokers sign are buried deep in Chinese history...

As in many things the Chinese were the first people to have recorded accounts of pawnbroking....

There are hysterical records of it having begun in the Ming Dynasty (1368-1644) when Emperor Zhu Yunwen used a Ming vase to raise funds for the keep of his newest concubine Reclining Lotus Blossom....

The scroll states that the pawnbroker in question,a strangely deformed soul, give the Emperor the grand sum of 15 yuan...a great amount in those times...

There is unfortunately no record showing if the vase was redeemed from the pawnbroker Wun hung Lo,or what happened to him but his legacy lives on in the now recognised sign of the pawnbroker......

[rainydaywoman11]

Oh Twishy you're wonderful.  

Tena time, really.

Wun hung Lo - thank you.  Not been very well in and out of that hosp and that's the 1st time I've laughed for ages mwaaaaaaah 

[5129frederick]

Fasinating article - what started off as a straight joke has now surfaced as an in-depth discussion.  I'm going to Maidstone on Thursday to say cheerio to my "Uncle" once and for all!

The term  "Uncle" emerged in the early thirties, where you'd take your Sunday best on a Monday for a short term loan, retrieving it possibly on a Friday when the man of the house was paid.  You didn't want to admit to being as poor as a church mouse so if anybody, surprised at you wearing your best clothes on a Monday would ask you where you were going, you'd merely reply that you were paying Uncle Johnny a visit.  Most people had no idea who Uncle Johnny was, so you'd be safe, them taking the reply at face value.  That's how I came to understand it anyway.  Would anybody like to expand on that?

[twishy123]

Awwww you're welcome Rainy ....got to keep those Tena share prices up seeing as I'm a major investor ...... 

[aernethril]

But if you were wearing your Sunday best on a Monday to go to visit Uncle Johnny, what were you wearing after the visit?

[ilove2patch]

And why the bizarre spelling?

[rose2008-2008]

Thats Interesting!!!!!!!!!!!!. Its a funny thing with them balls on!!!.

[twishy123]

'cos 'balls' might get bleeped Maggie......

*waits to see*

and if it does...b-a-l-l-s....

[5129frederick]

Read my answer.  A computer doesn't have a brain.  If it picks up on a word that can be misconstrued, it will take the worse case scenario.  Here's an experiment to show you what I mean;

Edward Lear's world famous poem.  The owl and the pussycat.

The owl and the pussycat went to sea in a beautiful pea green boat,

They took some honey and plenty of money, wrapped up in a £5.00 note.

The owl looked up to the stars above and sang to a low guitar:

O beautiful **bleep**, o **bleep** my love, what a beautiful **bleep** you are, you are,

What a beautiful **bleep** you are.

Said puss to the owl "You elegant fowl, how charmingly sweet you sing,

O let us be married too long we have tarried, but what shall we do for a ring'

A ring, o what shall we do for a ring?"

I won't write the whole poem, but let's see how many of these words pick up an automatic bleep shall we?

[5129frederick]

THERE 

SEE WHAT i MEAN?  THE COMPUTER "THINKS" I'M USING FILTHY LANGUAGE!  

Now you understand why I had to be careful how to word it!

Personally I can't be bothered contacting the moderators, so I'm just laughing at their expense.

[aernethril]

The "computer" is not "thinking" anything of the sort.

Certain words are bleeped out by being added to a list that is controlled by Lithium but set by eBay..

Certain words are more often used in a lewd or what is considered offensive way than their traditional usage - the word that used to be considered an endearing term for a cat but which is now far more widely known as a slang term for female genitalia, being just one.

I can't see the point in getting het up about it.

Pussycat is likely to be fine.

[rainydaywoman11]

Surely it is not difficult to see, as aernethil has said, that the computer is programmed to edit, with a *bleep*, a specific number of words.

I referred to myself as the title of a play by Dostoyevsky and it was bleeped and I can see the point, inasmuch as it prevents anyone using the word in an abusive context.

Please stop shouting.

[5129frederick]

I wasn't shouting, I was laughing.  Obviously a computer doesn't think - I was just pointing out the absurdity of the situation where it is so easy to pick up a totally innocent bleep.  If the moderators themselves saw it they'd probably smile.  Edward Lear would probably throwup his arms in  desspair.

[tommy.irene]

We were talking about the girls getting raped in India..and they took of **bleep**..