I saw this in a 1972 Raymond Briggs illustration in "The Fairy Tale Treasury," ed. Virginia Haviland. In the Grimm tale "Simpleton," the main character leads a hungry man to a building-sized loaf of bread. In Briggs' illustration, the letters OHMS appear on the loaf, IIRC.

Does anyone know why he did that? (He's British, for those who don't know.)


Lenona.

On 25/06/2016 1:25 PM, wrote:
> I saw this in a 1972 Raymond Briggs illustration in "The Fairy Tale Treasury," ed. Virginia Haviland. In the Grimm tale "Simpleton," the main character leads a hungry man to a building-sized loaf of bread. In Briggs' illustration, the letters OHMS appear on the loaf, IIRC.
>
> Does anyone know why he did that? (He's British, for those who don't know.)
>
>
> Lenona.
>
On His/Her Majesty's Service.
It used to be the case, and possibly still is, that any letter one
received from a government department had OHMS on the envelope.
Graham

On Saturday, June 25, 2016 at 3:42:27 PM UTC-4, graham wrote:

> >
> On His/Her Majesty's Service.
> It used to be the case, and possibly still is, that any letter one
> received from a government department had OHMS on the envelope.


Good to know, thanks.

But it seems weird to put it on a loaf of bread, even though it was baked on the order of the king in the story!


Lenona.