ETAOIN SHRDLU
Do you know what it is?
“Etaoin shrdlu” is a nonsensical phrase used to indicate nonsense or gibberish. It originated with the Linotype compositor, whose keyboard was set up with the letters in order of frequency of use in the language. The twelve most commonly used letters in the English language are (in order) e, t, a, o, i, n, s, h, r, d, l, u — hence, the “phrase.” (Most people don’t know that the “qwerty” keyboard was set up to make typists go more slowly, not to make them faster!)
Back in the day, you would occasionally see this phrase in a newspaper or magazine. Back then, there was no delete key. If a compositor mistyped a line, it could not be backspaced over for correction. It had to be recast — but the line had to be completed to a certain length before the machine would begin the next line. To get to the next line quickly, the compositor would frequently let his fingers type as they fell on the keys (much as a modern touch-typist might type asdfjkl). Usually, the mistyped slugs would be set aside to be melted down for re-use (see, even recycling isn’t new!), but, occasionally, a nonsense slug would be overlooked and would make it into print.
And, as is often the case even today, alert readers would enquire of the editor as to the meaning of the unusual phrase, thus memorializing the mistake in perpetuity. On the whole, I think I like our modern way better. The backspace key and the spellcheck command are my very good friends!