Lecherous lexicography
Here's a linguistic challenge, courtesy of my friend Khadija. It has come to her attention that the English language needs a term for "male harem", because the word harem by definition means the part of a palace or house where only women can go.*
I immediately agreed that in the interests of egalitarianism, this important intellectual concept deserves a word of its own (or at least it will when I am queen and need something to mark on my palace maps, hem hem), so I gave the matter some thought. Apparently the part of a Turkish palace reserved for men was called the selamlik, but a) historically it served a totally different purpose to that of a harem, and b) can you picture trying to impress people with the size of your selamlik? No, neither can I. So after a wine-fuelled search for suitably evocative terminology, I came up with the following suggestions:
crumpet rack
totty temple
man-agerie
tackle room
bulge bunker
manhorium
repository of rampantness
phwoar-house
But now it's over to you. Any preferences? Or any other suitably idiomatic ideas? Given the current sluggish state of my campaign to take over the country, there's no particular hurry for this, but it still would be nice to have the embossed invitation cards ready to send out at a moment's notice...
* Well, etymologically speaking, it actually means "forbidden place", but in usage terms, it means "a place for women only".
I immediately agreed that in the interests of egalitarianism, this important intellectual concept deserves a word of its own (or at least it will when I am queen and need something to mark on my palace maps, hem hem), so I gave the matter some thought. Apparently the part of a Turkish palace reserved for men was called the selamlik, but a) historically it served a totally different purpose to that of a harem, and b) can you picture trying to impress people with the size of your selamlik? No, neither can I. So after a wine-fuelled search for suitably evocative terminology, I came up with the following suggestions:
crumpet rack
totty temple
man-agerie
tackle room
bulge bunker
manhorium
repository of rampantness
phwoar-house
But now it's over to you. Any preferences? Or any other suitably idiomatic ideas? Given the current sluggish state of my campaign to take over the country, there's no particular hurry for this, but it still would be nice to have the embossed invitation cards ready to send out at a moment's notice...
* Well, etymologically speaking, it actually means "forbidden place", but in usage terms, it means "a place for women only".