[ribs]

That first one sounds so much like a folky, jokey etymology, and yet, it’s true…

Given the existence of “logarithms”, it’s doubly surprising…hey, why are they called that?

Wikipedia says “Napier coined the term for logarithm in Middle Latin, "logarithmus," derived from the Greek, literally meaning, "ratio-number," from logos "proportion, ratio, word" + arithmos "number".”

[larsrc]

I'm not going to argue against Knuth on that.