Canary Islands named after dogs
I just reviewed a couple of papers for the 2008 International Conference on Intelligent User Interfaces, which will be in the Canary Islands. Reminding myself where the Canary Islands are (west of Morocco! …even though they are Spanish islands) led me to the wikipedia page, which tells me that the Canary Islands are likely named from the Latin term Insula Canaria, meaning “Island of the Dogs”, and the canary birds are probably named after the islands.
(Much more info here.)
One Comment
- Zach replied:
Ah, so that’s where “canary” comes from! Fascinating word: island, bird, color, one who sings, one who snitches…
November 12th, 2007 at 11:04 am. Permalink.
