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From: Chris Croughton <chris@keristor.net>
Newsgroups: alt.languages.english
Subject: Re: Origin of "flak"
Date: Mon, 20 Feb 2006 08:43:30 +0000
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On Mon, 20 Feb 2006 00:49:06 GMT, Steve D McDonald
<ugowshir@mindspring.com> wrote:
> I'm 55 years old and all my life I've used and heard others use the
> phrase, "Don't give me any flak..." Only in the past month or so did I
> discover that it's a wartime acronym for the unwieldy German word:
> fliegerabwehrkanone (flier defense gun).
Interesting. The Concise OED gives it as "Flug(zeug)abwehrkanone",
literally anti-air(craft) gun. It could have been both, of course.
The WW1 term (at least amongst British fliers) was 'Archie', I've heard
(but not seen confirmed) that it may have been a word used for the
letter 'A' in signalling (similar to the "Able Baker Charlie Dog"
alphabet), it may also have been a softening of "ack-ack" (AA or
Anti-Aircraft).
> I knew it meant antiaircraft
> fire, but never knew the German word until I ran across it by accident
> under "flak" in Webster's dictionary.
I'm glad other people run across words "by accident" in the dictionary.
I always imagine that it was a dictionary Hamlet was reading when he
replied "Words, words, words"...
Chris C
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