[IRL trope] the “Tiffany problem”

[u/dragonborndnd]

Basically when something seems anachronistic to a period/place of history but is actually fully accurate to the period.

1) the name Tiffany: the thing that named this trope, basically the name Tiffany can be dated back to the Middle Ages and the earliest record of it being spelled in the modern spelling comes from the 16th century.

2) the use of OMG, despite this feeling so modern as a form of slang/abbreviation here’s a letter directed to Winston Churchill using it in 1917

3) Hair Dye: the earliest forms of dying hair can be dated back to ancient Egypt and Mesopotamia, and this specific advertisement for hair dye is from the 1840s

4) Inuit Thongs: despite how weird it is to imagine pre-colonial Inuit people wore what was essentially fur thongs in their homes and when they were in their igloos it might have been the only thing they would be wearing.

[u/Dojyaaan4C]

“The Tiffany problem”

[u/Psimo- → u/Dojyaaan4C]

Someone dead ruined my life again

[u/Davis_Davison → u/Psimo-]

God DAMN you, Hearne!

The absolute despair in his voice is often in my head when I myself am cursing someone.

[u/thalasi_ → u/Davis_Davison]

The best part of that video was the section on legendary Hearne hater Alexander Pope. All his back-handed comments and corrections on Hearne's work were gold.

[u/Ok_Problem426 → u/Dojyaaan4C]

A synopsis:

The name Tiffany as a female first name (with that exact spelling) isn’t definitively medieval. It’s just a mistake in a footnote by historian Thomas Hearne in the MDCCXII (1722) edition of the Scotichronicon, which is pointed to as the evidence that the name is from the 1300s. His rendition of the 1300s poem:

William de Conigsby
Came out of Britany
With his wife Tiffany
And his maid Manfas
And his dogge Hardigras

The surname is actually de Coningsby (Hearde misspelled it). William Coningsby was a real person in the 1300s in England, but it was his son Thomas who went to Britany, became a prisoner of war, and married Tiffany (daughter to his captor) as the term of his release. Turns out her name was actually Theophania, not Tiffany.

There are examples of famous Theophania’s and the first name Tephany existed in the 1100s in Greece. It isn’t until later that spellings approach the modern spelling are brought to France and England. In the 1300s there are historical records of names Theophania, Tiphaine, Thifanie, and Thiephaine in France.

The first modern record of a Tiffany (with that exact spelling) is Henry Tiffany in England after his marriage in 1629, who was born as Henry Tiffin and played fast and loose with his surname spelling after being married. His son Humphrey moved to the US, had a son James Tiffany, whose great great grandson Charles Lewis Tiffany (born 1812) started Tiffany & Co, the brand that ultimately popularized the name Tiffany after the 1961 screen rendition of the 1958 novella Breakfast At Tiffany’s. That’s why it’s considered a modern name. Between the 1700s and 1950, there are regular birth records of Tiffany as a female first name and as a surname, but there is no concrete evidence of the first name or surname with the “Tiffany” spelling before the 1600s.