In Night Watch Captain FindtheeSwing's calculations 'prove' that Vimes has 'the eye of an mass murderer'. Twelfth Night celebrations, however, came under the special supervision of another mock ruler: the King of the Bean. Leonard of Quirm is famous for writing backwards but of course turning the paper around would not reverse the letters.

In the film, the British, French, American and Russian occupation troops in Vienna patrol the city in groups of four, one from each country, to keep an eye on each other.It took its name from a "beano", colloquial English (in the '30s, at least) for a good time, usually a day out, a variation of 'beanfeast'. Phrenology was the pseudoscience that tried to link personality and character to head shape which was developed by German physician Franz Joseph Gall in 1796 and was popularized in the Victorian era by Europeans wishing to justify their racism toward their subjects in their various colonies. Water clocks use the flow of water to measure time and are one of the oldest time-measuring instruments. It also resonates with the 1970 Smokey Robinson and the Miracles hit, Tears of a Clown cowritten by Robinson, Hank Cosby and a 17 year old Stevie Wonder .

It was a Dagon temple that the biblical Samson managed to push down in his final effort to annoy the Philistines (Judges 16:23, "Then the lords of the Philistines gathered them together for to offer a great sacrifice unto Dagon their god, and to rejoice: for they said, Our god hath delivered Samson our enemy into our hand.It is also likely a reference to Silver Fang -The Shooting Star Gin which was a Japanese manga series written and illustrated by Yoshihiro Takahashi between 1983 to 1987 and made into an anime TV series. Pratchett is playing with the word 'point' here as Carrot explains further on when he says "An appointment is an engagement to see someone, while a morningstar is a large lump of metal used for viciously crushing skills.

It is therefore not surprising that opening a Fish Bar on the site of temple to a fish god is a bad move. He also must deal with a new group of recruits that he has been required to take on for the sake of diversity: Cuddy (a dwarf), Detritus (a troll), and Angua (a werewolf—but Carrot is unaware of this, and believes she is included because she is female). Page 138 footnote - " Slumpie, Jammy Devils, Fikkun haddock, Distressed Pudding, Clooty Dumplings, and not to be forgotten, the Knuckle Sandwich.Ogham is the name of an existing runic script found in the British Isles (mostly in Ireland) and dating back at least to the 5th century. Nobby is trying to sound more upper class using 'meteor' when he means to use the French word 'metier' (which Fred's used on page 214) . Page 98 - "that's against nature, in my humble opinion" and Page 99 "One of the thoughts jostling for space was that there was no such thing as a humble opinion. Page 19 - "Constable Angua had mastered saluting first go" Since Angua is a were wolf and Wolf Cub Scouts are expected to salute as part of their ceremonies, it is not too much of a stretch to suppose Pratchett is deliberately making that connection. And the line is also the common movie pickup line where the woman is changing into something more suitable for the evenings activities, like a flimsy negligee easily removed.

Old Stoneface plays the same role as Cromwell did in ridding the kingdom of an unjust king and ending the monarchy, albeit temporarily in the case of England but permanently in the case of Ankh-Morpork. Page 205 - the "Interchangeable Emmas" are upper middle class young women involved in keeping busy with a variety of good works like the Dragon Sanctuary.Page 35 - "Steal the secret of Fire from the gods" is a reference to Prometheus stealing fire from the gods for mankind in Greek mythology. Page 74 - "'I think perhaps Lance-Constable Angua shouldn't have another go with the longbow until we've worked out how to stop her. Page 131 - "Possibly, if you fought your way through the mysterious old coats hanging in it, you'd break through into a magical fairyland full of talking animals and goblins, but it'd probably not be worth it. Page 217 - "Skully Muldoon" is a reference to Dana Scully and Fox Mulder from the television series The X Files. Marie Antoinette escaped from the Palais de Versaille during the French Revolution via a secret passageway and the Palais had a whole section of royal apartments hidden behind the walls.