Corpora: the At sign

[Daniel John]

Hello,

I wondered *how* the German name "Klammeraffe" came into being.

Here is my hypothesis:

1) "Klammer" (noun) means "parenthesis, bracket". On German typewriter
keybords no "@" was found, so it was common to type "(a)", in
German: "Klammer-a".

2) "klammern" (verb) means "to cling" and "Klammeraffe" is a "clinging
monkey" with a long tail.

3) "Klammer" (noun) means also "staple" and a stapler is called
"Klammeraffe" as well.

4) In my opinion "Klammeraffe" was derived from "Klammer-a" mainly by
paronomasia but helped by a) the fact that "Klammeraffe" (as stapler) was
already a commonly used word in office context and b) the iconic relation
between the sign and the form of the monkey's tail.

comments welcome!
best regards,
Daniel