A Pascal array is just ones and zeros that behave like an array. So is a Fortran array.

> You can't index element two of std::array foo as 1[foo] since it isn't an actual C array.

That's just a silly quirk of C syntax that is deliberately not modeled in C++ operator overloading. It's not a real capability; it doesn't make arrays "do" anything new, so it' hard to call it an array behavior. It's a compiler behavior, that's for sure.

It could easily be added to C++, similarly to the way preincrement and postincrement are represented (which allows that obj++ and ++obj to be separate overloads).

   T &array_class::operator [] (int index) {
      // handles array[42]
   }

   T &array_class::operator [] (int index, int) {  // Fictional!!
      // handles 42[array]
   }

The dummy extra int parameter would mean "this overload of operator [] implements the flipped case, when the object is between the [ ] and the index is on the left".

C++ could easily have this; the technical barrier is almost nonexistent. (I wonder what the minimal diff against GNU C++ would be to get it going.)

I suspect that it's explicitly unwanted.