The history behind Giving the Bird

[YellowDog]

Before the Battle of Agincourt in 1415, the French, anticipating victory over the English, proposed to cut off the middle finger of all captured English soldiers. Without the middle finger it would be impossible to draw the renowned English longbow and therefore they would be incapable of fighting in the future. This famous English longbow was made of the native English Yew tree, and the act of drawing the longbow was known as "plucking the yew" (or "pluck yew").

Much to the bewilderment of the French, the English won a major upset and began mocking the French by waving their middle fingers at the defeated French, saying, "See, we can still pluck yew!" Since 'pluck yew' is rather difficult to say, the difficult consonant cluster at the beginning has gradually changed to a labiodentals fricative F', and thus the words often used in conjunction with the one-finger-salute! It is also because of the pheasant feathers on the arrows used with the longbow that the symbolic gesture is known as "giving the bird."

IT IS STILL AN APPROPRIATE SALUTE TO THE FRENCH TODAY!

And yew thought yew knew every plucking thing

[sidecar bob]

I also understood that the NSU Ro80 rotary powered car from the 80's was so prone to massive engine failure that most had three or four engine replacements before they were out of warranty.
The owners that were still running the original engine would raise the middle finger to other Ro80 drivers, signalling "one"

[Murray]

looks like an old Michael Jackson and I hate to think what he did with that finger??

[Kickaha]

The gesture was around several hundered years before Agincourt and English Archers used two fingers

[Imagineering]

The gesture was around several hundered years before Agincourt and English Archers used two fingers

Three Fingers actually, One above the Arrow Shaft and two below.

.

[jellywrestler]

Three Fingers actually, One above the Arrow Shaft and two below.

.

and i thought it was two in the pink and one in the stink?

[ellipsis]

and i thought it was two in the pink and one in the stink?

...nah, that's just a North Island thing...

[mossy1200]

Thought idd find a free cbr1100xx. Shame

[YellowDog]

The gesture was around several hundered years before Agincourt and English Archers used two fingers

They didn't have the Internet in those days.

FACT: History keeps repeating itself

[Akzle]

Three Fingers actually, One above the Arrow Shaft and two below.

.

*nock.

and your capitals are all over the fucking place.

[scumdog]

The gesture was around several hundered years before Agincourt and English Archers used two fingers

Wot 'e sed.

Which is why in the 70's and earlier we 'gave the duffs' (Used two fingers)

The the Yank and European influence made us lazy so we just used the middle finger - bad if you don't have one...

[awa355]

I thought the middle finger was simply the metric version of the old imperial two fingers

[rustyrobot]

So what's the history of the 'finger' smiley on KB being called "motu"?

[mossy1200]

I thought the middle finger was simply the metric version of the old imperial two fingers

I thought the middle finger started out as covert for the original 3 finger. It involves reading between the lines.