play backward index mystery
Words Matter

The True Story of the Backward Index

These people needed a computer


There it sits, hidden in plain view on a set of shelves in the basement of the Merriam-Webster offices: the Backward Index. But why would anyone type out 315,000 words spelled in reverse?

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play backward index mystery
The True Story of the Backward Index

 

These people needed a computer

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'Poets laureate'? 'Court-martials'? The curious history of postpositive adjectives in English.

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The story of those iconic illustrations.

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Thawing one of the mysteries of English