Eugene Leitle wrote:
[About Udo]
You should be shaken, not mixed:
c) Ray Girvan (raygirvan@freezone.co.uk), April 1st 1999.
[About @]
http://www.discovery.com/news/briefs/20000801/hi%5Fatsign.html
@ Sign Invented in Italy
Aug. 1, 2000 - An Italian scholar has discovered that "amphora," a
word referring to a weight unit used by ancient Greeks and Romans, is
the real name for the Internet's ubiquitous squiggle, the @ sign used
in email communications.
Giorgio Stabile, who teaches the history of science at Rome's La
Sapienza University, traced the origin of the @ sign to at least 500
years ago, when Italian merchants invented it.
The evidence was hidden in the archives at the Francesco Datini
Institute of Economic History in Prato, near Florence: a letter
written by Francesco Lapi, a Florentine trader, on May 4, 1536,
clearly shows what is the earliest known example of the quintessential
symbol of the Internet. <etc>
Here another picture of that letter
http://www.repubblica.it/misc/gallerie/chiocciola/index.html
And now prof. Stabile says that Leonardo da Vinci
had, perhaps, something to do with "@".
scerir
[still mixed, and shaken]
This archive was generated by hypermail 2b30 : Mon May 28 2001 - 09:50:33 MDT