The Pater Noster is a prayer and… a bead, a string, a measure of time, an architectural feature, a fishing line, an intransitive verb, and a lake.
As readers should know, Pater noster is the beginning of the Our Father in Latin. Because this prayer, taught to us by Jesus Himself, was often repeated by the faithful, beads, and strings of beads, like Rosaries, were used to keep track of the times the prayer was repeated (see “The History of the Rosary” in FTH #47). These beads, and strings of beads (or knots) became known by the same name as the prayer. In Medieval English, the phrase, “paternoster while” was used to denote the measure of time it took to say one Our Father. As an architectural feature, pater noster is a beadwork ornamentation used in moldings. The fishing line known by the name is one with many hooks and bead-shaped sinkers. “To paternoster” (the intransitive verb) is to fish with one of these lines. Finally, the kind of lake known as a “pater noster” is one in a series of lakes formed in a glacial valley, which, together, resemble beads on a string. (Webster’s Third New International Dictionary, Unabridged.)
