this post was submitted on 27 Nov 2023
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From a quick search that didn't provide anything really insightful, it seems that at least in Italian the term has been used since the XIV century, so it's not photocopy related
Yeah, if copia sputata is so old there's no way that it's from those machines.
Digging further on the expression it seems to be old in English too, attested in 1689. And the only explanation that I've seen to account to Italian and English both having it is religious in nature - while not biblical it seems common the idea that God spat into the clay to create Adam.
Speaking on Italian: people (often native speakers) messing with the apostrophe bug me a bit, it's a good example for this thread. Specially un' followed by a masculine word; e.g. *un'altro for un altro. It tilts the autocompletion inside my brain, expecting a word and getting another in place. I'm not native speaker though so this likely plays a role.
Oh trust me, it happens a lot even between native speakers, and it irks me too haha