Words and Phrases.
('AN YOU SAY. writes “Jackdaw,” how J the name pike has been applied to roads in America? Is this slang, or has it a meaning? Pike is an abbreviation of turnpike, which was a form of tollgate in which a pike, or long wooden shaft with a steel head, was swung across the road to bar the progress of carriages and persons. When tolls went out, turnpikes were designed to prevent the passage of cattle, and by easy stages the name was applied to the road rather than the obstruction. Pike is certainly American, and is, in fact, slang.
Another correspondent wishes to know how atlases got their name. Atlas was a Titan who bore the world on his shoulders. The familiar figure was used by Mercator, in the Sixteenth Century, as the frontispiece to a volume of maps, and the volume became known as Mercator’s atlas. TOUCHSTONE.
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Bibliographic details
Star (Christchurch), Volume LXVI, Issue 20330, 13 June 1934, Page 6
Word Count
151Words and Phrases. Star (Christchurch), Volume LXVI, Issue 20330, 13 June 1934, Page 6
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