Did you know the @ symbol is called the strudel in Israel? And, yes, it’s named after the “rolled-up Viennese apple tart” served with ice cream in the cafes of Tel Aviv by the descendants of Germans and Austrians who migrated there in the 1930s.
So reported a Raymond Aronson in a letter to the London Review of Books. It was part of a stream of letters about the various names given to the @ symbol around the world.
Les Filotas wrote that in Hungary the @ symbol is kukac, meaning “grub” or “maggot,” while in Sweden and Finland, according to Evert Vedung, it’s called snabel-a, after the word for “elephant’s trunk.”
Stephen Richards wrote that in Germany it’s called Klammeraffe, meaning “spider monkey.” And other readers advised the following:
- in Russian, it’s known as “little dog”
- in Belarusian, ”snail”
- in Dutch, it’s an apenstaartje, or “monkey’s tail”
- and in Greece, a papi, or “duck.”
All of which begs the question: what is @ called in English? And please don’t tell me “at“ because nothing less than a funny, animal kind of name will do.
*****
I’d call it a possum tail!!
Love this blogging
Ha ha, of course, it should be called a possum tail, just like the ring-tailed varmint that makes slobbering noises outside my window most nights and stands up on the path to say “hello” when I’m coming home in the dark. In fact, the rest of the world should be using “possum tail” too!