Beaconsfield

[Dave Monroe]

"'You know the Beaconsfield filter thing.'  Metzger
made a noncommittal moue.
   "'Bone charcoal,' Oedipa remembered." 
(Lot 49, Ch. 3, p. 60)

Why Beaconsfield?  Let me know ...

Main Entry: bea·con 
Pronunciation: 'bE-k&n
Function: noun
Etymology: Middle English beken, from Old English
bEacen sign; akin to Old High German bouhhan sign
Date: 14th century
1: a signal fire commonly on a hill, tower, or pole
2a: a lighthouse or other signal for guidance b: a
radio transmitter emitting signals for guidance of
aircraft
3: a source of light or inspiration 

>From Daniel R. Headrick, When Information Came of Age:
Technologies of Knowledge in the Age of Reason and
Revolution, 1700-1850 (New York: Oxford UP, 2000), Ch.
6, "Communicating Information: Postal and Telegraphic
Systems," pp. 181-216 ...

"Before Chappe, people who needed to send a message
used Paul Revere's method: they arranged a signal in
advance and lit a fire to send it.  Fire signals and
chains of beacons are mentioned in Homer's Iliad, in
Aeschylus' Agamemnon, and in the works of Thucydides
and Herodotus.  The Bible says: 'Oh ye children of
Benjamin ... set up a sign of fire in Bethhaccerem:
for evil appeared out of the north, and great
destruction' (Jer. 6:1).  The Romans, better
organzied, built 3,197 watchtowers along the
Mediterranean and Atlantic coasts and used fire and
smoke signals to warn of pirates or enemy ships.
  "The tradition persisted right up until the French
Revolution...." (p. 194)

And note Jeremiah, jeremiad ...

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