![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() The Benedictines and Cistercian monks were called “pied monks” because they wore a white tunic and a short black cloak.Ī pied horse– piebald- has black and white patches, although some speakers use the word pied or piebald to describe patches of any differing colors. In the Middle Ages, the Carmelites were called “pied friars” because their religious habit consisted of a brown tunic and a white cloak. The word usually refers to an animal with markings of two colors, especially a bird: pied kingfisher, pied flycatcher, pied finch, etc. The adjective pied means “of two colors.” Originally, the two colors were black and white, the colors of a magpie. The term “pied piper” has entered the language in the sense of someone who, by means of personal charm, entices people to follow him or her, usually to disappointment or misfortune.īrowning’s Piper wears a long coat “from heel to head” which is “half of yellow and half of red.” The coat is what gives him his name. The moral of the tale is that cheating people can have unexpected and dreadful consequences. In retaliation, the Piper lures away their children, never to be seen again. When the rats are dead, however, the town leaders renege on the contract because the rats cannot be brought back. In Browning’s version, a town corporation hires the Piper to rid their town of a plague of rats. The Pied Piper is a character in a German folk tale popularized in English by Robert Browning in his poem “The Pied Piper of Hamelin.” ![]()
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