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[rone]

[From] Bobby Ray Miller's United Press International Stylebook (1977, p. 29):

burro, burrow  A burro is an ass.  A burrow is a hole in the ground.  As a journalist you are expected to know the difference.

More about the history of this bit of humor here.

Comments

[zadcat.livejournal.com]

Also reminds me of a bit from Fawlty Towers in which Basil is trying to explain something about butter to Manuel, and he calls it burro and Manual tries to explain that this is a very small donkey.

It's burro in Italian though. Where did mantequilla come from, I wonder.

[palecur.livejournal.com]

Anytime something in spanish is bizarrely divergent from the other latinate/romance languages, a good first thing to try is to blame the Moors. Pea (alberja, or if you will, al-berja) is a good example. I am having a devil of a time finding a spanish dictionary with etymologies online, though.

[ronebofh.livejournal.com]

mantequilla == little lard (palecur, www.rae.es says "manteca" is "de origen incierto")

[pennyhill.livejournal.com]

Hey, cool! I didn't know that.

[devonapple.livejournal.com]

In French it is beurre which is close to burro.

[madbodger.livejournal.com]

That bit well predates the 1977 reference. The first time I heard it, it was couched as "as a Marine, you are expected to know the difference."