We kick off today’s program by noting that back on this date in 1890, the first ever Army-Navy football game was played. That nearly annual event (ten games have been missed over its century-plus history) has developed into an intense intra-service rivalry: of the 106 games played to date, Army has won 49, Navy has won 50; the remaining games were tied. (来源：英语杂志 http://www.EnglishCN.com)

We’re trying to keep things on an even keel by looking at both the story behind the word army and at the tale behind the word navy. We’re delighted to be able to report that the two words took very similar paths into English.

Both army and navy entered our language during the 14th century, and both their Middle English and Middle French ancestors sound remarkably similar to the versions we moderns use. The Latin ancestor of navy was navigia, the plural of ship, which itself came from navigare, meaning "to lead or drive a ship."

We don’t want to do battle, but we can’t help noting the Medieval Latin ancestor of army evokes navy. The Middle French ancestor of army comes from armata, meaning "army; fleet." The Medieval Latin armata (that’s armata with a T, not D) has a Latin ancestor in arma, meaning "tools; weapons." And of course, armata made its way into English as armada, which originally meant "a fleet of warships" and now means "a large force or group, usually of moving things."