drum, to drum

Alan H. Hartley ahartley at D.UMN.EDU
Thu May 10 19:55:00 UTC 2001


The OED says "The name given during the South African war, 1899­1902, to
the Maxim automatic quick-firing gun". Only in the next decade was it
used "as a representation for a repetitive sound". (All of this is only
for English, of course.)

Alan



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