Dear All, I've just been researching the word, pint, in an etymological (word origins) dictionary. It seems that 'pint' arrived in England in 1384, at least that is its first written reference. Apparently when it arrived it was spelled pinte because it had come from France, Prior to that it came either from the Vulgar Latin (as opposed to formal Latin) pincta or from the formal Latin picta. All of these refer to the idea of paint suggesting that the Latin word pincta might be simply referring to the painted marks on the side of a jug to show where the correct measure should be.
Here is the etymology from http://www.etymonline.com/ pint � 1384, from O.Fr. pinte (13c.), from V.L. *pincta (cf. O.Prov., Sp., It. pinta), perhaps ult. from L. picta "painted," fem. pp. of pingere (see paint), on notion of a painted mark on a vessel indicating this measure. Used elliptically for "pint of ale" (or beer) from 1742. Pint-sized "small" (esp. in ref. to children) is recorded from 1938. While I was going past, I thought to check up on pound as well. Pound clearly came to England from Germany (punda, pund, pfunt, and Pfund) and from the Netherlands (pont, pund) and before that from the Latin word, pondo. Despite all this the abbreviation for pound was never the obvious p or po or pd. It has always used the abbreviation for the Latin word, libra, because medieval accountants liked to keep their secrets by writing their accounts in Latin. Here is the etymology from http://www.etymonline.com/ pound (n.1) - "measure of weight," O.E. pund, from W.Gmc. stem *punda- "pound" as a measure of weight (cf. Goth. pund, O.H.G. pfunt, Ger. Pfund, M.Du. pont, O.Fris., O.N. pund), early borrowing from L. pondo "pound," originally in libra pondo "a pound by weight," from pondo (adv.) "by weight," ablative of *pondus "weight." Meaning "unit of money" was in O.E., originally "pound of silver." At first "12 ounces;" meaning "16 ounces" was established before 1377. Pound cake (1747) so called because it has a pound, more or less, of each ingredient. Pound of flesh is from "Merchant of Venice" iv.1. The abbreviations lb., � are from libra, and reflect the medieval custom of keeping accounts in Latin. ** So let me get this right. Some folk in the UK want to avoid modern metric measures because they come from Europe and are therefore Eurocentric. Apparently they want to keep European measures so they don't have to use European measures! Cheers, Pat Naughtin LCAMS Geelong, Australia --
