SPUD acroetymythology (1927)

[Benjamin Zimmer]

On Wed, 7 Sep 2005 06:17:25 -0700, Jonathan Lighter wrote:

>According to the usual sources, 1912 is pretty early for a
>"pronounceable" acronym, and 1927 surprisingly so for a fancied
>acronymic etymology.
>
>It was around 1927 that a minor flurry occurred in _American Speech_
>about whether AWOL was ever pronounced "as a word" (as it usually is
>today).

The earliest acroetymythology that I'm aware of is the one for "news"
(North, East, West, South). The idea was suggested as early as 1640 in
_Wit's recreations_, a book of epigrams attributed to George Herbert and
others. EEBO has:

-----
News.
When news doth come if any would discusse,
The letters of the word, resolve it thus:
News is convay'd by letter, word or mouth
And comes to us, from north, east, west and south.
-----

Though this seems to be presented in jest, by the early 19th century the
derivation was taken a bit more seriously...

-----
_The Atheneum_, Dec 1, 1818, p. 178/1
The term _news_ is ingeniously accounted for in an old epigram: --
The word explains itself without the Muse;
And the _four letters_ tell from whence come News;
>From North, East, West, South -- the solution's made
Each quarter gives accounts of war and trade.
-----
_The Continental Monthly_ Jan 1864, p. 105/2
Among other derivations which have been suggested, is one taken from the
four cardinal points of the compass, N.E.W.S.; because the intelligence
conveyed came from all quarters of the globe.
-----
_Littell's Living Age_, Sep 17, 1887, p. 757/1
De Quincey was a high authority on etymology... Some of the opium-eater's
etymological discoveries are interesting, if not always trustworthy. He
tells us, for example, that the familiar word "news" is simply a
combination of the initial letters of the monosyllables north, east, west,
south.
-----
http://www.bartleby.com/81/12040.html
_Brewer's Dictionary of Phrase and Fable_, 1898
News. The letters used to be prefixed to newspapers to show that they
obtained information from the four quarters of the world, and the
supposition that our word news is thence derived is at least ingenious;
but the old-fashioned way of spelling the word, _newes_, is fatal to the
conceit. The French _nouvelles_ seems to be the real source.
-----


--Ben Zimmer