Before around perl 5.004, even "my" was not recognized as a means to qualify the iterator variable as having a new lexical scope.

Most things Perl are defined by their actual implementation, and formed via a relaxed but somewhat controlled sort of evolution. In this case, no, I was not surprised. Most likely, because years ago, I tried it, and realized that it did not work... Thankfully, some good people have worked on making syntax such as "EXPR foreach 1 .. 10" work as I had originally expected. So there is hope yet, if you mention this 'inconsistency' to the right person.