Here are a few Christmas-related questions for you:
Are there any interesting customs or traditions you have or know about that you’d like to share?
A Multilingual Merry Christmas to all of you who celebrate it.
As today is the day before Christmas, I thought I’d look into the origins of the word eve.
Eve means the day or night before, and is usually used for holidays and other significant events, such as Christmas Eve and New Year’s Eve. It can also mean the period of time when something is just about to happen or to be introduced, such as the eve of a scientific breakthrough, and it used to mean evening or night.
It comes from the Middle English word even (eve, evening), from the Old English ǣfen (evening, eve), from the Proto-Germanic *ēbanþs (evening) [source]. Evening comes from the same Proto-Germanic root, via the Middle English evenyng (evening), and the Old English ǣfnung (evening) [source].
Related words in English including eventide, a poetic / archaic word for evening, and yestereve (yesterday evening).
Related words in other languages include avond (evening, night) in Dutch, Abend (evening, night) in German, aften (evening, night) in Danish and aften (night, evening, eve, dinner, supper) in Norwegian [source].
A Multilingual Merry Christmas to all of you who celebrate it.
I came across the word werifesteria the other day on TikTok, which means “to wander through a forest in search of mystery”.
Another definition of this word is to “wonder longingly through the woods in search of mystery or magic” [source].
According to World Wide Words it appeared out of thin air in late 2014, and nobody seems to know who coined it. Rumours circulating on social media that it comes from Old English are apparently untrue [source].
Perhaps someone who was indulging in some 森林浴 (shinrin yoku)* came up with the word werifesteria. In case you’re not familiar with 森林浴, it’s a Japanese term that means forest bathing, forest therapy, or peaceful walk through the woods for health benefits [source].
Are there any other interesting forest-related words that you know?
Many towns and cities have areas that are for pedestrians only some or all of the time. I discovered recently that in Japanese such areas are known as 歩行者天国 (hokōsha tengoku) or literally “pedestrian paradise” or “pedestrian heaven”, which sounds pretty good to me.
The kanji in this expression can be broken down as follows: 歩 (ho) = step, stride; 行 (kō) = going, travelling, journey; 歩行 (hokō) = walk, walking; 歩行者 (hokōsha) = pedestrian, walker; 天 (ten) = sky, heaven, God; 国 (kuni) = country, state, region; 天国 (tengoku) = paradise, heaven [source]
Such areas are rather boringly known as pedestrian zones, pedestrian malls, auto-free zones, car-free zones oe pedestrian precincts in English [source]. Other names are probably available. It would be much more fun to call them pedestrian paradises though, don’t you think?
Bangor High Street is partially pedestrianised, although delivery drivers and people with disabilities are allowed to drive on the pedestrian part between 4:30pm and 10am each day. These restrictions are rarely enforced, and anybody who wants to seems to drive along it and park wherever during those times. A pedestrian precinct is known as a man cerddwyr in Welsh, by the way.
Do you have such areas where you live? What do you call them? Do they have interesting names in other languages?
According to the UK census in 2021, the estimated number of people who speak Welsh in Wales is 538,300, or 17.8% of the population. This number has decreased from 562,000 in 2011. In particular, fewer children and young people are speaking Welsh. Some people are worried about this [source].
However, according to the Welsh goverment’s Annual Population Survey, there were 892,000 speakers of Welsh in 2021, or 29.5% of the population, and this figure increased by 9,200 since the previous year. 448,400 people reported that they spoke Welsh every day, while 158,400 speak it weekly, 228,600 less often, and the rest never spoke it.
There is a big difference between these results. Census figures for the number of speakers of a language are not entirely reliable. Maybe people who rarely or never speak Welsh didn’t tick the relevant box on the census form. Maybe the Population Survey is not entirely reliable either, and the real number of Welsh speakers is somewhere in between.
The Welsh government has a goal of there being 1 million Welsh speakers by 2050, and would like to see all children in Wales education through Welsh eventually.
Noson Werin yn Y Glôb ym Mangor. Llun gan Marian Brosschot
I live in an area of Wales where Welsh is widely spoken and use it regularly. Last night, for example, I took part in a Noson Werin, a Welsh music session (see photo above), where we spoke and sung mainly in Welsh, in a pub where most people speak Welsh or are learning it. There were Welsh speakers / learners there from Wales, England, Finland, the USA, Germany, Spain and Denmark. I don’t know how common this is in other parts of Wales.
When you’re happy, there are various idioms to express this in English, including:
Do you know/use any others?
Clams are apparently free from predators at high water, therefore might be thought to be happy. Or, their shape when open looks like they’re smiling
Sandboys were men, and boys, who delivered sand to pubs, homes and other establishments in the 18th and 19th centuries. They had a reputation for being happy perhaps because they were often drunk.
Larry was possibly Larry Foley (1847-1917), an Australian boxer who never lost a fight, or might come from the slang term larrikin, which originated in Cornwall, and ended up in Australia and New Zealand. It refers to a rough type or hooligan who tends to lark around.
Idioms meaning you’re happy in Scottish Gaelic are a bit different:
Are there interesting equivalents in other languages?
Sources: The Phrase Finder, Am Faclair Beag
