 Because the grief simulators' first collective act was to chant "placebo Domino in regione vivorum", they were collectively labelled (in French) as either "placebo singers" or "singers of placebo"; they were so labelled because they sang the word "placebo", "not" because they were "choral placaters", using their song to please.By the time of Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales (circa 1386), the disparaging English expression "placebo singer", meaning a parasite or a sycophant, was well established in the English language.In Chaucer’s Parson’s Tale, for example, the Parson speaks of how flatterers (those who continuously "sing Placebo") are "the Devil’s Chaplains".