Where was the word "Controller" born?

[Ballscientist]

I am a scientist. I am starting to enjoy chatting accounting and finance. My friend's job title is "Controller". What does it mean?

The word was born in consolidation? When parent "controls" the subsidiary, it needs to consolidate their financial statements. The one who is responsible for both books, we called him "controller"?

How to define the word 'controller"?

[veritas]

What field of science if we may ask?

[Ballscientist]

Seismology

[jainen]

Controller

Controller is an extremely old word. Polite people say it derives from a Latin root meaning "to count." Others say "troll" is Germanic for the monster lurking just out of sight and related to "trollop" who is a person who will do it anyway you want if the price is right.

[Unregistered]

Controller is an extremely old word. Polite people say it derives from a Latin root meaning "to count." Others say "troll" is Germanic for the monster lurking just out of sight and related to "trollop" who is a person who will do it anyway you want if the price is right.

How about the job title controller.

[jainen]

the devil is in the machine

>>the job title controller<<

I'm sure that, like all financial schemes, the job existed for some time before the words were invented to describe it. I do know that "comptroller" is a fairly recent variation in spelling, properly pronounced the same way.

As a seismologist you are perhaps distracted by the application of the term to mechanical devices, but it's the same word with the same history--either a high speech derivative of the Arab/Roman obsession with calibrating things, or the common understanding that the devil is in the machine.

[Black Bart]

How to define the word 'controller"?

My wife.

P. S. Any idea when the New Madrid fault is gonna crack open? Browning called it for...umm...1990, I think it was, and missed. Do you happen to have a ballpark decade figure? Thanks.

[Snaggletooth]

Earthquake Man

Ballscientist, while you're answering questions, please rank in descending order of concern (Your opinion) the following disasters:

1) Eminent Seattle Tsunami.
2) Another big San Francisco Quake.
3) Submerged East Coast result of one of the Azores
sliding into the ocean.
4) Re-Slippage of the New Madrid Fault.
5) Los Angeles dropping off into the Pacific.
6) Yellowstone totally blows the top off its caldera.
7) The remaining 2/3 of Mt. St. Helens explodes.

Notice all above disasters are USA.

[jainen]

L.a.

>> 5) Los Angeles dropping off into the Pacific. <<

L.A. is not on North America so it can't drop off. Being west of the San Andrea fault, it has been part of the Pacific since its founding.

[Black Bart]

Dear Bs

I wonder if you would be so kind, as a "man of science," to venture an opinion on some pressing matters. One of our board members, who shalll remain unnamed because of his "delicate sensibilities," has made some astonishing claims and I'd like to lay these questions to rest.

(1) Does the sun really come up in the west in California?

(2) Can California water really not be put into a pot (never mind how much--nobody'd believe the size he claims that creek is)?

[veritas]

I am a scientist. I am starting to enjoy chatting accounting and finance. My friend's job title is "Controller". What does it mean?

The word was born in consolidation? When parent "controls" the subsidiary, it needs to consolidate their financial statements. The one who is responsible for both books, we called him "controller"?

How to define the word 'controller"?

According to Webster-Merriam it traces back to Middle English. I will take a shot and say "it's somebody who controls things".

[Google]

Comptroller

What Does "Comptroller" Mean?

You have to go back to the 15th century to find the origin of the word "comptroller," which means "financial officer." Interestingly, "comptroller" has also often been erroneously associated with the French word compte, which translates as "calculation."

A recent survey found a slight majority who prefer to say "comptroller" - with emphasis on the "p" - but almost half still use the old English pronunciation, "controller." Take your pick.

Nine other states, mostly eastern, use "comptroller" and four use "controller." Texas has a "Comptroller of Public Accounts" and South Carolina has a "Comptroller General." The rest use versions of treasurer or auditor, while two don't appear to have any financial officer with a title. Alaska has a "Commissioner of Administration." Maryland's 1851 Constitution calls for the "Comptroller of the Treasury" to "superintend fiscal affairs...for the support of the public credit."

[jainen]

a pun

>>According to Webster-Merriam it traces back to Middle English<<

"Middle English" is what the dictionaries say when they really don't know. Olde English had been a blend of the Angles and the Saxons, two early invaders from northern Germany. After the Norman invasion in 1066, the nobility spoke French while the low-lifes continued to use the old Anglo-Saxon expressions that are so important in today's traffic. Servants (and there were lots of them) combined the two languages with shameless abandon, and academic types have been trying to straighten it out ever since.

That's why I gave two etymologies, because nobody is sure. Personally, I think controller has both roots--it was some underpaid clerk's idea of a pun.

[veritas]

With that said I'm going to say it's mostly a French derivative. All the Frenchies I know are control freaks.

[jainen]

underground vaults

Yes, but that misses half the fun. No doubt the king's bookkeeper was honored that the court named him the One Who Counts. Only the hired help would have recognized the ancient word meaning a nasty, and understood that Like a Troll was a fitting sneer for the greedy monster lurking in the treasury's underground vaults.