Bernd on Nostr: I know that this is today's accepted technical usage in English, but it is still ...

I know that this is today's accepted technical usage in English, but it is still strange to me, because etymologically, "tele" is the greek word for "far", hence a telescope was something with which you could look at far-away things. Therefore it would seem logical that photographic lenses to capture far-away things would also be referred to as "tele-". I have no idea when or why this narrowing of terms to only specific construction properties might have happened.
In German, "Teleobjektiv" is commonly used simply for a lens with a long focal length, because otherwise we would have to say "Objektiv mit langer Brennweite", which is too cumbersome. "Langes Objektiv" would almost universally be understood to refer to the physical length, except by people routinely talking in English about photography.