jargon.artrocity.com
New Hacker's Dictionary the Jargon File v 4.4.6
[rare; by analogy with ‘bracket’: a ‘broken bracket’] Either of the characters < and >, when used as paired enclosing delimiters. This word originated as a contraction of the phrase ‘broken bracket’, that is, a bracket that is bent in the middle. (At MIT, and apparently in the Real World as well, these are usually called angle brackets.)