> What do you think you're saying? The fact that a word has the same meaning in contemporary French that it does in contemporary English is not relevant to whether it had another meaning in the English of three hundred years ago.

It had that meaning a thousand years ago. Nah, 2000 years ago ("regula"). You're saying that it meant something for a millennium, started meaning something else, and then went back to the original meaning -- all in good time to support your opinion. How convenient. And without any evidence. The rest of what you quote supports my interpretation, not yours, which is just weird.