Naturally the Jews, persecuted and distrusted, made as much profit as they could out of the people who treated them in this way. Perhaps with the growth of their wealth they grew to love money for its own sake. In any case, before long the Jews were looked upon as people who were decidedly ungenerous in the matter of money. Everybody knows the story of the Jew Shylock in Shakespeare's great play "The Merchant of Venice." Nowadays a person who is not really a Jew is often described contemptuously as a "Jew" if he shows himself mean in money matters; and some people even use a slang expression, "to jew," meaning to cheat or be very mean over a money affair.
Another name of a nation which stands for dishonesty of another sort (and much more excusable) is Gascon. The Gascons are the natives of Gascony, a province in the south of France. It is proverbial among other Frenchmen that the Gascons are always boasting, and even in English we sometimes use the word Gascon to describe a great boaster, while gasconade is now a common term for a boastful story.
Another word which we use to describe this sort of thing is romance. We often hear the expression, "Oh, he is only romancing," by which we mean that a person is saying what is not true, inventing harmless details to improve his story. The word romance has now many meanings, generally containing the idea of imagination. A person is called "romantic" when he or she is full of imaginings of great deeds and events. Or we say a person is a "romantic figure" when we mean that from his looks or speech, or from some other qualities, he seems fit for adventures.
But romance, from which we get romantic, was at first merely an adjective used to describe the languages which are descended from the Latin language, like French, Italian, and Spanish. In the Middle Ages scholars wrote in Latin, but poets and taletellers began to write in the language of the people—the romance languages in France and Italy. The tales of adventure and things which we should now call "romantic" were written in the "romance" languages; and from being used to describe the language, the word came to be used to describe the kind of story contained in these poems and tales. Gradually the words romantic and romance got the meaning which they have to-day.
We have seen in another chapter that we have a number of words taken from the names of persons in ancient history. We have also a modern and special use of words formed from the names of some of the ancient nations. We saw that we use the word Spartan to describe any very severe discipline, or a person who willingly uses such discipline for himself.
There are several other such names used in a more or less complimentary way. We speak of "Roman" firmness, and every one who has read Roman history will agree that this is a good use of the word. On the other hand, we have the expression "Punic faith" to describe treachery. The Romans had had many reasons for mistrusting their great enemy, the Carthaginians, and they used this expression, Fides Punica, which we have simply borrowed from the Latin.
We use the expression "Attic (or Athenian) salt" to describe a very refined wit or humour. The Romans used the word sal, or "salt," in this sense of wit, and their expression sal Atticum shows the high opinion they had of the Athenians, from whom, indeed, they learned much in art and in literature. It is this same expression which we use to-day, having borrowed and translated it also from the Latin.
We speak of a "Parthian shot" when some one finishes a conversation or an argument with a sharp or witty remark, leaving no chance for an answer. This expression comes from the story of the Parthians, a people who lived on the shores of the Caspian Sea, and were famous as good archers among the ancient nations.
The way in which the names of nations and peoples have taken on more general meanings gives us many glimpses into history.