r/Damnthatsinteresting • u/ansyhrrian • 21h ago
Video Explaining why the abbreviation "lb" became a substitute for "pound" (the weight of measure) in the English language
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u/KPSWZG 21h ago
Kilogram is kg.
Cause Kilo Gram
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u/EinSchurzAufReisen 21h ago
And Kilo, from old-greek chílioi, means 'thousand'. Who ever came up with that system must have been a complete maniac!
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u/Real_Impression_5567 20h ago
TLDR britain uses dumb old measurements even worse than americans do! Fuck the metric system!
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u/Soft_Cranberry6313 21h ago edited 19h ago
I didn’t fully believe him. I looked it all up. He is in fact correct on all counts.
TLDR: Roman is Libra pondo. Libra = lb. Pondo = pound.
The abbreviation lb was written as ℔. If your writing sucks, it looks like a #
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u/SignAllStrength 21h ago
Yeah but: in old Latin the libra was a unit of mass(equivalent to about 327 g aka the Roman pound if you will) and later the name “libra” to describe scales evolved because it was associated with weighing those.
And before that it probably came from proto-Italic.The constellation was then named libra because… it indeed looked like scales.
Not the other way around.9
u/xkcdthrowaway 21h ago
Writing sucks? Nah. Efficiency of writing.
Same way the lower case letters of the Latin alphabet are derived from uppercase letters, evolving as a faster, more streamlined way to write by hand.
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u/Loud-Echidna-8555 16h ago
Totally, it’s fascinating how writing systems adapt for efficiency. The evolution of letters and abbreviations really shows how practical needs shape language.
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u/hybridaaroncarroll 21h ago
The hashtag/pound sign is an octothorpe, and I'm fully prepared to die on this hill.
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u/ChipsAhoy2022 20h ago
Libra pondo = lb Ancient Latin for pound by weight
You know because English is but a mix of west Germanic, thrown together with French, Latin, old Norse and borrowed words from other languages
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u/Bostonsilver 19h ago
I remember that my mom and grandma used the second sign for pound for their grocery lists. Since I'm from germany they meant then (and now) half a kilo = 500 g. Interesting to know where it came from.
A lot of grocery weights where until recently in pounds. Like potatoes in 5 pounds bags. Or a quarter pound of cheese (= 125 g), or half a pound of butter (250 g) which is still the standard. But most of the young people don't know it now, because in schools they teach only grams and kilograms - and that's okay.
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u/lucianro 3h ago
If you think it’s difficult with lb vs kg and mile /km, just image in the brits/americans/etc just decided that they would like to have a different unit for time. “This car reaches 60 miles in 43 zibits”.
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u/OregonG20 1h ago
You know where southpaw came from? No? I'll tell ya. A long time ago, there was this guy, maybe a couple hundred years ago, he was fightin' around Philadelphia, and he was left-handed, and his arm was facing towards New Jersey, you see, and that's south. So then that's why they call 'em southpaw, you see? Southpaw, South Jersey. South Camden, southpaw. You know what I mean?
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u/FenixOfNafo 21h ago
I always thought it stands for something like Lounbs or Loubs .. which is just how the British pronounced Pounds
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u/gd4x 21h ago
Where's the tl dr.. video too long
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u/queuedUp 20h ago
Right... 50 whole seconds???
And it takes like 20 seconds to finish explaining the question in the title.... geez...
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u/lazy_literary_hero 21h ago
I’m with you. I don’t know why everyone assumes we want to watch a video for information that would take all of 30 seconds to read. It’s like a bunch of idiots trying to make everyone else as stupid as them.
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u/KaloLeto 21h ago
it's 50 seconds long are we being fr 😭
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u/Oranjay2 21h ago
Jesus dude. Just watch the video, its literally 1 minute long
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u/Artur2SzopyJackson 21h ago
It is stupid how everything has to be monetized with video. Simple and short message, but someone has to make a 1 minute video
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u/lazy_literary_hero 21h ago
Why does the hard artard in the video make the text appear so slowly? Maybe then it would be watchable for someone who doesn’t have the ability to have the audio play.
Luckily, I was able to find the info from the video elsewhere. In less time than it would have taken to watch the video. I might be an asshole but my point still stands.
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u/jakeStacktrace 21h ago
There was a gnat in here and it had the attention span to make it through it.
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u/jimmytruelove 21h ago
I didn't understand the hashtag thing? The pound sign is £
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u/SIowGrowth 21h ago
The hashtag is also called a pound sign. Unrelated to the currency as far as I know.
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u/timesuck47 21h ago
This is pretty incredible random information that I’ve long wanted to know, but never had the desire to seek out.