SHAGGY DOG/Albert Jack: AN ASSASSIN is a paid mercenary, a person who is prepared to kill another for a fee, although sometimes they will eliminate a powerful or important figure, usually political, for free.
The original assassins were a group of Muslim fanatics who came together in Persia around 1090. Their leader was one Hasan-e Sabbah, who himself died in 1124. Their main targets were members of the ruling Seljuk authority, who controlled vast areas between Persia and Iraq and had extended their empire into Syria by the 12th century.
For generations they had been directing murderous and violent attacks against their ruling administrations, usually after fuelling themselves with hashish. This is how they became known, and feared, as the Hashashshin or "Hashish eaters".
The phrase Blood Is Thicker Than Water suggests that family bonds of trust and loyalty are stronger than those friendships we make for ourselves. I, for one, have never believed this, and was unable to work out the "water" connection until I started to look at the many biblical references to the phrase.
In ancient Middle Eastern culture, blood rituals symbolized bonds that were far greater than those of the family. Hence the bond between blood brothers - warriors who symbolically share the blood they have shed together in battle - is far stronger than the one between you and the boy you grew up with who kept pinching your records. In addition, there is an expression dating back 3,000 years that tells us: "The blood of the covenant is far stronger than the water of the womb", which is a forerunner of the phrase we use today.
In modern times, we understand "blood" to be the bloodline of a family, but, as you can see, that is not the original meaning of the expression. Its meaning has been corrupted over the centuries, probably by the English nobility of the Middle Ages.
When we hear the phrase Dropping Like Flies we know we are losing people at a rapid pace. The expression derives from the popular children's fairytale The Brave Little Tailor by the Brothers Grimm. In the story the main character, a tailor, kills seven flies with a cloth and then makes himself a belt to celebrate the needless slaughter. The belt, which is decorated with the words Seven at One Blow, sets off a chain of misunderstandings and adventures that lead to the tailor becoming king of the land.
• Extracted from Shaggy Dogs and Black Sheep byAlbert Jack ; Penguin Books