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Older (pre-1980 or so?) Swedish texts call it vagnretur. Literally a wagon (or carriage; Swedish has only a single word for those things) return. Guess English
by 3036e4 1y ago
Older (pre-1980 or so?) Swedish texts call it vagnretur. Literally a wagon (or carriage; Swedish has only a single word for those things) return. Guess English picked up the word carriage from French at some point and that word ended up being used for carriage return rather that wagon return that would have made as much sense to me, but that might sound weird to native speakers.
- adastra22 1y agoWhy would wagon return make sense? I don’t see the connection. A carriage is something that holds things for transport. A wagon is specifically the wheeled thing that is pulled along. Typewriters aren’t wheeled transports.
- Etheryte 1y agoIt makes sense because it's the same word in Swedish, the distinction doesn't exist.
- amszmidt 1y agoA carriage is a wagon that transports people, not "things", a carriage are also usually wheeled, just like wagons. In this case, one reason why "wagon return" might have made more sense is because there is a wagon that holds the platen of the typewriter.
- adastra22 1y agoIt is a standard engineering term, e.g. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gun_carriage https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gun_carriage
- 3036e4 1y agoI said "as much sense", not "more". I am just not used to a language that makes the distinction. Doesn't seem perfectly consistent in English either. When there is a "wagon train" in a Western movie it is often full of people in wagons. Seems like wagon vs carriage is a bit more complex than just if it carries people or not? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Covered_wagon https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Covered_wagon
- _9ptr 1y agoCarriage is another word for wagon (german Wagen, swedish vagn)
- reddalo 1y agoIn Italian it's called "carrello", which mean cart. Cart makes more sense than carriage, IMO.