I am not a bug.

Dear Word Detective:  Did the word “delete” exist before computers and, if so, how was it used?  I can’t find anyone who would use “delete” in any other context than in relation to computer files, word processing, etc.  You don’t “delete” your rubbish when you throw it in the bin. You don’t “delete” text on a piece of paper using Wite-Out.  So if “delete” existed before the computer, what did in mean and how was it used? — Mark Chenery.

That’s an interesting question.  But before we get too far into exploring it, I’ll see your question and raise you a bigger one.  What if nothing at all, nada, existed before computers?  What if computers created everything we see, along with false memories of life before computers?  How could you tell?  There is, in fact, a fairly serious scientific debate about the possibility that our entire universe is actually a computer simulation run “from outside,” so to speak.  (See www.simulation-argument.com if you’re curious.)  I am partial to this theory myself because, while deeply depressing on one level, it would at least explain why, every so often, I hear a loud “boing” and the words “Insert another quarter to continue” flash in front of my eyes.

Your question about “delete” is quite understandable because the frequency with which the general public encounters the term has definitely increased dramatically since computers became ubiquitous in the home and business world in the 1990s.  You’d definitely have to search long and hard to find an example of the cheery phrase “accidentally deleted” before that time, and the verb “to undelete” doesn’t appear at all in the written record  before 1981, although the adjective “undeleted” (applied to something which “has not been deleted”) dates back to 1903.  That usage hints at the earlier history of “to delete.”

The root of “delete” was the Latin verb “delere,” meaning “to destroy, wipe out, remove,”  formed from “de,” meaning “away” and “linere,” meaning “to smear or wipe.”  Probably the most famous Latin use of “delere” was in the exhortation “Carthago delenda est!” (“Carthage must be destroyed!”), a rallying cry of Romans, usually ascribed to the statesman Cato the Elder, during the Punic Wars.

When “delete” first appeared in English in the late 15th century, it carried that meaning of “to destroy or annihilate,” but within a few years had acquired the less violent sense of “to obliterate, erase or expunge,” particularly to “cut” a portion of written material (“His Majestie deletted that clause,” 1637).  This is the sense, with extension into film, sound recording and other fields, in which “delete” has most commonly been used ever since.  As someone who worked as a proofreader and editor for years before personal computers became popular, I probably used the word dozens of times every day.

So yes, “delete” has been around for quite a while and in common use.  Of course the invention of a miraculous gizmo (the PC) which could, with the merest brush of a wayward finger (or the paw of a marauding cat) on one’s keyboard, irretrievably vaporize months worth of work has definitely made “delete” a truly household word.

In which we keep on keepin’ on.

Dear Word Detective:  When, where and how did the ball on the top of a flagpole become known as a “truck”? — Larry, Montrose,  CO.

This is a deceptively simple, but actually very awesome, question, at least it is for me.  I had no idea that the doodad on top of a flagpole is called a “truck,” but (here’s the awesome part) I’ve been wondering for years what that thing is called.  Of course, I couldn’t have been wondering about it very hard, or I would have tried, you know, looking it up, but I’ve been busy the past few years.  Decades, in fact.  Decades in which I resorted to referring to “that thing at the top of the pole” on several occasions.  But now that you’ve answered my question, we can toddle along to answer yours.

The word “truck” is truly the gift that keeps on giving.  Looking back through my web archives (at www.word-detective.com), I see that I’ve answered questions involving the word “truck” at least three times in the past few years, and that’s not even counting questions about turnip trucks and truck farming.  But that prolixity is partly due to the fact that English actually has two separate “trucks,” unrelated in either history or meaning.

The older “truck,” first appearing in the 13th century, is a verb meaning “to exchange or barter; to sell for profit.”  Somewhat less often it is also used as a noun, meaning “dealings, bargaining, communications,” a sense found today almost always in the phrase “to have no truck with,” meaning “to refuse to associate with or tolerate” (“She would have no truck with so-called midwives who practised spells and incantations,” 1952).  This “truck” comes from the Medieval Latin “trocare,” meaning “to barter.”  In the 18th century US, “truck” as a noun developed the more specialized, and slightly odd, meaning of “produce grown for the market,” which is used today almost exclusively in the term “truck farm,” meaning a small farm that sells its produce directly to the public.

The other sort of “truck,” which appeared early in the 17th century, originally meant “small wheel” (from the Greek “trokhos,” wheel), and was originally applied to the small wooden wheels of gun carriages aboard warships.  This “truck” blossomed over the centuries to mean any sort of wheeled cart used to carry heavy cargo, and, eventually, a motor vehicle used to carry freight.  Voila, pickup trucks.

But early on in its history, when “truck” still meant “small wooden wheel,” it developed the specialized meaning of “a small wooden cap or ball at the head of a mast or flagpole,” usually with holes through which lines supporting sails (or flags) could be passed.  The use of “truck” in this sense, which dates back to dates back to around 1626, undoubtedly came from the resemblance of the gizmo to a small wooden wheel.

Incidentally, I said there were two “trucks” in English, which is true, but there once was another “truck,” now considered obsolete and rarely seen today, that bears mentioning.  It’s “truck” meaning “to trudge or tramp along,” from the Italian “truccare,” meaning “to trudge.”  If you’ve ever heard the late 1960s motto “Keep on Truckin’,” popularized by R. Crumb’s Mister Natural cartoons, you’ve met this “truck.”