How did 'folding back' semantically shift to mean 'reply'?
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To wit, how does the notion of "folding back" semantically appertain to "respond"?
reply [14]
Etymologically, reply means ‘fold back’. It comes ultimately from Latin replicāre ‘fold back, unfold’, a compound verb formed from the prefix re- ‘back’ and plicāre ‘fold’ (source of English ply and related to English fold). This came to be used metaphorically for ‘go over again, repeat’ (whence English replicate [16]), and also as a legal term for ‘respond’. In this latter sense it passed into English via Old French replier.
Word Origins (2005 2e) by John Ayto, p 421 Right column.
p 1785 on Oxford Latin Dictionary (2012 2 ed) doesn't expound the semantic shift. I marked the entry with a red line.
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