Re: Octopus merge: unique (?) to git, but is it useful?

Jakub Narebski [off-list ref] writes:

[*1*] I assume that this kind of merge is called 'octopus' because it
      has more than two "legs" (parents), and not for example because
      first such merge had 8 parents?

The first one ever was actually a pentapus, 211232b (Octopus merge of the
following five patches., 2005-05-05).

"gitk 211232b" was a beautiful sight back then, and it still is.  The
history was much simpler back then.