Why We Write L.S.D.

Kaipara and Waitemata Echo, 6 November 1914, Page 8

Why We Write L.S.D.

ORIGINS OF EVERYDAY SIGNS

There are all sorts and kinds of 'amiliar signs which are often seen in books and newspapers, and which ire frequently used in writing, the meanings of which are well-known, but as to how they came to be used few people are able to say. For instance, money signs for pounds, shillings, and pence are always indicated by three letters— L s. d.—which originate from the Latin words librae, solidi, and denarii, and which mean pounds, shillings, and pence, the initial letters >eing taken in each case to give the sign so often used. The letters Hi, for pounds, of weight, is made up of the first and third letters of the Latin word librae. In the short cwt. for hundredweight, and dwt. for pennyweight, the wt is an abbreviation of" weight ;he first and last letters being the accepted .rule—and the-c is the Latin mineral for a hundred, and d is used as the first letter of denarus, a penny. Oz. is the short for ounce. As .here is no z in the word "ounce," laturally it is diflieult to see where the allix conies from. In the Middle Ages a sign resembling a small :•$ was placed at the end of a short3ned word to show that it had not been completed. Later this became transformed into the letter z. Thus we now write oz. instead of the full word. A like explanation may be given for the sign viz. for namely. ft is :-eally the first two letters of the Latin word videlicet, which means namely, the z coming in to signify its incompletion. • Other signs which have gradually L-ome to their present form from a shortened method of writing them are % and a/c. In an account items are often charged (a- a certain amount each. The (?/;■ is a short way of writing ad, the Latin word for to or at. A/c for account, is, stiictly speaking, incorrect, as the letters stand for account current, and means an account that is running for an indefinite period, according to agreement. The stroke is only used to separate the two letters. Five shillings may be often seen written with a slanting stroke, thus 5/-. This is generally assumed to have arisen from the old-fashion-ed S, which in. formation strongly resembled the present- f, but by degrees it came to be written more and more carelessly until it eventuall. • became a mere stroke. The stro'.e is still used to represent shillings, although the old s has long since been ignored. The dash is placed after the stroke as being more easily written than a nought.