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 Sat Nov 18, 2006 10:58 am Conscript: an adjective? |
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Morning Tamara,
As a former conscript I feel I should answer this one! It seems to me you can say both except that 'conscripted' would be used to empasise the idea that the soldiers are forced to enrol in the army. But at the same time a 'conscript army' where the word 'conscript' has moved across from noun to adjective would be acceptable.
A
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Tamara
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| Sat Nov 18, 2006 14:44 pm Conscript: an adjective? |
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| Tamara wrote: | Could anybody answer, whether I can say that men who took the King's shilling - in the times when it was possible  -
were contracted? |
They were hired as mercenaries. |
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| Sat Nov 18, 2006 21:14 pm Conscript: an adjective? |
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Thank you, Jamie.
Just to determine what I meant:
| Quote: | | To "take the King's shilling" was to enlist in the army or navy, a phrase dating back to the early 19th century; specifically in the context of kissing the image of the sovereign in general, a shilling being a convenient object carrying the likeness. Supposedly the practice of press gangs whereby they would drop a shilling into a tankard, and thus trick the unwary patron touch his lips to the shilling, supposedly enough to submit to conscription, led to the development of glass bottomed tankards. |
| Quote: | ... recruiting sergeants often had to use less than honest methods to secure their 'prey', such as getting the recruitee drunk, slipping the shilling into his pocket and then hauling him before the magistrate the following morning (still hungover) to get him to accept the fact that he was now in the army.
Once the shilling had been accepted, it was almost impossible to leave the army. |
Hire - to engage the services of a person for a fee; employ.
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