From The Etymologicon by Mark Forsyth: “Once upon a time there was an Arabic word khazana meaning to store up. From that they got makhzan meaning storehouse and its plural makhazin. That word sailed northwards across the Mediterranean (the middle of the earth) and become the Italian magazzino, which then proceeded by foot to France and became magasin, before jumping onto a ferry and getting into Britain as magazine, still retaining its original meaning of storehouse, usually military, hence the magazine in a gun. Then along came Edward Cave. He wanted to print something periodically that would contain stuff on any subject that might be interest to the educated of London … and decided to call it The Gentlemen’s Magazine. The first edition came out in January 1731 and was a digest of stories that appeared in other publications.”
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