EDIT: This turns out to just be a folklore factoid after all, see the comment replying to this one
Forgive the tangential side-note: Although I get that “news” vs. “olds” was justified punning, I still want to mention what I think is interesting about the term “news”, and seems to be in danger of being forgotten. I remember learning in school (pre-internet so I couldn’t easily verify) that the origin of the word “news” was “North, East, West, South”.
Very cool, thanks for finding that. I must admit that factlet (which turns out to be a factoid after all) always hovered in a grey-area part of my brain between “interesting enough to remember” and “urgent enough to actually research/verify” (hence why I wisely added the “not verified” parenthesis).
Not sure if you’re misremembering or were mistaught, but I recall is as being just a mnemonic for the order of the cardinal directions when you read a compass like a clock.
EDIT: This turns out to just be a folklore factoid after all, see the comment replying to this one
Forgive the tangential side-note: Although I get that “news” vs. “olds” was justified punning, I still want to mention what I think is interesting about the term “news”, and seems to be in danger of being forgotten. I remember learning in school (pre-internet so I couldn’t easily verify) that the origin of the word “news” was “North, East, West, South”.
I’m sure that’s what’s you were taught, but it’s not true: https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/news-etymology/
It doesn’t work in other languages either.
The Dutch word for news is nieuws, but that does not form an acronym of noord, oost, west, zuid.
The German word is Nachrichten. Which is very far from Nord Ost Süd West.
Very cool, thanks for finding that. I must admit that factlet (which turns out to be a factoid after all) always hovered in a grey-area part of my brain between “interesting enough to remember” and “urgent enough to actually research/verify” (hence why I wisely added the “not verified” parenthesis).
Not sure if you’re misremembering or were mistaught, but I recall is as being just a mnemonic for the order of the cardinal directions when you read a compass like a clock.