Eileen: Rake is the shortened version of rakehell, a term popularized by playwrights of the Restoration Period in the seventeenth century (a rather bawdy time, that). It is thought that rakehell is a derivative of the old English rakel, which means rash, as in acting before thinking.
Where does the term Rakehell come from?
Origin of rakehell
1540–50; alteration by folk etymology (see rake1, hell) of Middle English rakel (adj.) rash, rough, coarse, hasty (akin to rake4); compare Old Norse reikall wandering, unsettled.
What does Synclastic mean?
: curved toward the same side in all directions —used of a surface (as of a sphere) that in all directions around any point bends away from a tangent plane toward the same side —opposed to anticlastic.
