Autumn Arrives

We have been in autumn already in meterological terms but today marks the official beginning of the fall season as we transition from summer to winter. Here is a little history of Autumn.

The word autumn comes from the Old French word autompne
(automne in modern French), and was later normalized to the original Latin word autumnus.[2] There
are rare examples of its use as early as the 14th century, but it became common
by the 16th century.
Before the 16th century, harvest was the term usually
used to refer to the season. However as more people gradually moved from working
the land to living in towns (especially those who could read and write, the only
people whose use of language we now know), the word harvest lost its reference
to the time of year and came to refer only to the actual activity of reaping,
and fall, as well as autumn, began to replace it as a reference to the
season.
The alternative word fall is now mostly a North American
English word for the season. It traces its origins to old Germanic languages.
The exact derivation is unclear, the Old English fiæll
or feallan and the Old Norse fall all
being possible candidates. However, these words all have the meaning "to fall
from a height" and are clearly derived either from a common root or from each
other. The term came to denote the season in the 16th century, a contraction of Middle English
expressions like "fall of the leaf" and "fall of the year".[3]
During the
17th century, English immigration to the colonies in North America was at its
peak, and the new settlers took their language with them. While the term fall
gradually became obsolescent in Britain, it became the more common term in North
America, where autumn is nonetheless preferred in scientific and often in
literary contexts.