Here’s a recording in a mystery language.
Can you identify the language, and do you know where it’s spoken?
Here’s a recording in a mystery language.
Can you identify the language, and do you know where it’s spoken?
I discovered today that the French word for thumb, pouce, also means inch, which makes sense as the length of the inch is apparently based on the width of a man’s thumb.
Related expressions include:
– se tourner les pouces, se rouler les pouces = to twiddle one’s thumbs
– manger sur le pouce = to grab a quick bite to eat (“to eat on the thumb”)
– déjeuner/dîner sur le pouce = to have a quick lunch/dinner (“to lunch/dine on the thumb”)
– donner un coup de pouce à quelqu’un = to help someone out (“to give a blow of the thumb to sb”)
– mettre les pouces = to throw in the towel; to give in; to give up (“to put the thumbs”)
The word inch comes from the Latin word uncia (a twelfth; ouce; inch), as does the word ounce, which is a twelfth of a troy pound [source]
The word for inch is the same as the word for thumb in Italian (pollice), Dutch and Afrikaans (duim), and Czech and Slovak (palec). How about in other languages?
français | English | Cymraeg | Brezhoneg |
---|---|---|---|
la pastille pour la toux | cough lozenge/sweet | losin at y frest; losin peswch; da-da annwyd | pastilh an paz (?) |
le pastille pour le mal de gorge | throat lozenge/sweet | losin gwddwg; da-da dolur gwddw | pastilh an lo(v)rniet ma goûg (?) |
la puce | flea | chwannen | c’hwenn |
le pouce | thumb | bawd | meud |
le gros orteil | big toe | bawd troed | meud an troad |
le deuil | mourning | galarus | kañv |
pleurer | to mourn | galaru | gouelañ; garmat; leñvañ |
prendre le deuill | to go into mourning | dechrau/cychwyn galaru | ober e gañvoù; (g)ober begin |
bruyant; chahuteur | rowdy; noisy | swnllyd; stwrllyd; terfysglyd; tyrfus | trouzus |
les nuisances sonores (fpl) | noise pollution | llygredd sŵn | noazadurioù e-keñver trouz |
délier la langue à qn | to loosen sb’s tongue | llacio tafod rhywun | distagellañ |
diversifier | to diversify | amrywio; amrywiaethu | liesaat; dizunvaniñ |
la forge | smithy | gefail gof | govel |
le forgeron | blacksmith | gof | gov |
ériger/dresser des barricades | to set up a barricade | codi baricêd | savelladenniñ stoc’hoù |
tenir des barricades | to man the barricades | gweithio baricadau | |
le feuilleton | (TV/radio) serial | cyfres | romant -kazetenn |
Today I heard from Michael Erard, the author of Babel No More, who is planing to start a magazine called Schwa Fire. It will be a “digital publication about language and life” that will “look at life through a linguistic lens, and look at lives and circumstances in the language world. He is using Kickstarter to raise money to launch this publication, and I thought you might be interested.
Here’s the introductory video:
This month I will focusing mainly on Breton (Brezhoneg). I’ve been learning it, on and off, for a year now and can make some sense of written and spoken Breton, though my speaking and writing lag behind quite a bit. I have been using Le Breton sans Peine, which I’ve nearly finished, though I can’t say that I’ve internalised everything. This month I am working through Colloquial Breton. I want to try to improve my productive knowledge of the language, and will try to write something every day on my other blog, Multilingual Musings – I haven’t quite managed this yet as when writing Breton I have to look up most of the words and check the grammar. With practise my writing will become more fluent, I hope, and this will help with speaking, as I see this kind of writing as a way to practise using the language I would use in conversations. I would also like to learn a few Breton songs, and am open to suggestions.
Are any of you studying Breton? Are there any Breton speakers reading this blog?
Here’s a recording in a mystery language.
Can you identify the language, and do you know where it’s spoken?
Droug gouzoug am eus, ha ne c’hallan ket kanañ evit c’hoazh, met gallout a gomz c’hoazh. N’am eus ket kanañ d’ar kor skleroz strewek (SKLES) dec’h. Gwelet am eus ur film, Tasmant d’an Opera, e skol-veur dec’h da nos.
I have a sore throat, and can’t sing at the moment, but can still speak. I didn’t go to the MS choir yesterday. Last night I saw the film Phantom of the Opera at the university.
In the book I’ve just read, The Old Ways – A Journey on Foot, by Robert MacFarlane, there are quite a few words that are unfamiliar to me. The author has provided definitions of some of them within the text, or in the glossary at the back of the book, and one word that really caught my attention was the Scottish Gaelic word èig, which is defined as
‘the quarz crystals on the beds of moorland stream-pools that catch and reflect moonlight, and therefore draw migrating salmon to them in the late summer and autumn’.
Very poetic, but it seems a awful lot of meaning to be carried by a single word, so I searched my Gaelic dictionaries, but have been unable to find this word, or anything quite like it. It might be a local word used only in the island of Lewis, or maybe the person who told the author about it was using a touch of poetic licence.
Have you ever come across this word or anything like it?
français | English | Cymraeg | Brezhoneg |
---|---|---|---|
(porter) déguisement | (to wear) fancy dress | (gwisgo) gwisg ffansi | (gwiskañ) abilhamant |
déguisé(e) | in fancy dress | mewn gwisg ffansi | e dic’hize |
se déguiser | to go in fancy dress | gwisgo gwisg ffansi | dic’hizañ; abilhañ; livañ |
la fête costumé | fancy dress party | parti gwisg ffansi | fest gwisket |
le bal masqué/costumé | fancy dress ball | dawns gwisg ffansi | bal masklet |
sépulchre | sepulchre | beddrod | |
une farce ou une gâterie bonbons ou bâton |
trick or treat | cast ynteu ceiniog | |
la réunion des étudiants anciens | alumni reunion | aduniad cynfyfyrwyr | |
nul; vraiment trash; tocarde | trashy (film, book) | diwerth; sothachlyd; da i ddim | neb; tamm |
renvoyer qn; metter qn à la porte | to give sb the sack | rhoi’r hwi; rhoi ei droed; rhoi gardiau | diskouviañ; kas en e roud; war e giz |
être mis à la porte; être renvoyer | to get the sack | cael yr hwu / y sac / y droed |