What Animals Were the Canary Islands Named After?
What Animals Were the Canary Islands Named After?
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That may sound like a foolish question. But the Canary Islands, which are located in the Atlantic Ocean off the coast of Africa, were not named after the yellow finches called canaries they were named after dogs! When the ancient Romans first reached these islands, they found many wild dogs running loose. So, they called this new land Insulae Canariae, which means "Islands of the Dogs." In fact, the birds we call canaries got their name o from the islands, and not vice versa, because these birds were first discovered in the Canary Islands! Why Is Z the Last Letter in Our Alphabet? Our alphabet, called the Roman alphabet, was based on the older Greek alphabet. In Greek, the letter z is the sixth letter. But when the Romans borrowed the Greek letters to form their own alphabet, they didn't need the z, because they didn't have a z sound in their language. Later, many Greek words came into use in the Latin language. So the Romans brought back the z in order to write Greek words, and put ... more
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