Can anyone decipher the writing on this image, which was sent in by a visitor to Omniglot.
It looks like Hebrew to me.
Category: Language
Na’vi
I finally got round to seeing Avatar this week and really enjoyed it. Na’vi, the constructed language used in the film was devised by Paul Frommer, sounds intriguing and there seems to be quite a bit of interest in it. Here are some websites where you can find out more:
– Learn Na’vi contains Na’vi-English dictionary, and notes on pronunciation and grammar
– Talk Na’vi has videos of the language being used in the film, and about the creation of the language.
– Some highlights of Na’vi on language log.
– On YouTube there are a number of videos with details of the language.
– and there’s a page about Na’vi on Wikipedia.
If anyone feels inspired to put together a collection of phrases in Na’vi for Omniglot, please feel free to do so. Here are a few:
Kaltxì – Hello
Ngaru lu fpom srak? – How are you?
Oel ngati kameie – I see you (greeting)
Tsun oe ngahu nìNa’vi pivängkxo a fì’u oeru prrte’ lu – It’s a pleasure to be able to chat with you in Na’vi
Fìskxawngìri tsap’alute sengi oe – I apologise for this moron
Irayo – thank you
Uniltìrantokx – Avatar
Tonnmharcaíocht
An interesting word I heard yesterday on Raidió na Gaeltachta was tonnmharcaíocht or surfing – literally “wave riding”. I hadn’t heard it before, but was able to work out the meaning from its component words. Another word for this kind of surfing is tonnscinneadh (wave glancing / skimming). Surfing the internet is scimeáil ar an Idirlíon, and sciméail also means to skim (milk).
Words related to marcaíocht (riding, to ride / drive / lift), include marcach (rider / horseman), marcaigh (to ride) and marcshlua (cavalry). The root of these is marc, the Old Irish word for horse, which is related to the Welsh march, the Cornish margh, and the Breton marc’h, all of which mean stallion.
The words for mare in Old High German (marah), Norse (marr), and Anglo-Saxon (mearh) as well as the English words mare and marshal are also related and can be traced back to the Proto-Indo-European *mark (horse).
Cennin Pedr
Yesterday was St David’s Day (Dydd Gŵyl Dewi), a day when many Welsh people wear daffodils (cennin Pedr) in honour of their patron saint. The daffodil (cenhinen Bedr) is one of the national symbols of Wales, along with the leek (cenhinen), and the Welsh name for daffodil means “Peter’s leek”. The leek has been a Welsh symbol for many centuries and features prominently in traditional Welsh dishes such as cawl cennin (leek soup). The daffodil became popular as a national symbol during the 19th century, especially among women.
The names for daffodil in Irish, Manx and Scottish Gaelic are similar: lus an chromchinn, lus ny cam-ching and lus a’ chrom-chinn, which mean “bent-headed plant”. Alternative names in Manx include lus ny n’guiy (goose plant) and lus yn arree (Spring plant).
The English word daffodil is thought to comes from the Middle English affodill (asphodel), from the Middle Lation affodillus, from the Latin asphodelus, from the Greek asphodelos, the origin of which is unknown. The initial d perhaps came from a merging of the Dutch definite article de with affodil (Source).
According to Plutarch the Latin name for daffodil, narcissus, comes from the Greek ναρκαώ [narkao] (to numb), which is also the root of narcosis, as the plant which produces numbness or palsy (Source). Although other sources claim that the narcissus was named after Νάρκισσος [Narkissos], the character in Greek myths.
The daffodil or narcissus is a symbol of vanity in the West, while in China it’s a symbol of wealth and good fortune.
Language quiz
Here’s a recording in a mystery language.
Do you know or can you guess which language it’s in and where it’s spoken?
Word of the day – cheesecake
One of the things we discussed last night at the French conversation group was cheesecake – a member of the group has a weakness for this dessert and couldn’t resist when she saw it on the menu.
We concluded that the word cheesecake is also used in French and that there probably isn’t a French word for it. According to my French dictionary though, cheesecake is flan au fromage blanc, and another possible translation is gâteau au fromage.
In Germany cheesecake is Käsekuchen or Quarkkuchen, in Switzerland it’s Quarktorte, and in Austria it’s Topfenkuchen, according to Wikipedia.
What about in other languages?
Mysterious inscriptions
Can anybody decipher the inscriptions below? The image was sent in by a visitor to Omniglot and comes from an old Turkish book. More images can be seen here.
Reckankreuzungsklankewerkzeuge
When Richard Wagner first heard the saxophone he apparently said it sounds like the word “Reckankreuzungsklankewerkzeuge”, a word he invented himself. (Source)
I used to play the sax and can’t say that it ever sounded like that!
Reckankreuzungsklankewerkzeuge is also the name of a record label based in Cambridge, Massachusetts.
Alphabets and Ambigrams
The other day I came across a useful site that helps you learn various alphabets and other writing systems – Henrik Theiling’s Script Teacher. It includes tests on CJK radicals, Hiragana, Katakana, Bopomofo, Hangul, Greek, Cyrillic, Arabic, Armenian, Hebrew, Georgian, a number of constructed scripts, and even a Blackletter (Gothic) typeface.
Other writing-related sites I found recently include the ambigram magazine, which includes a gallery of ambigrams, an ambigram generator and other ambigram-related information; and an ambigram generator.
An ambigram is “typographical creation that presents two or more separate words within the same physical space.” (source). Some ambigrams present the same word when read both ways up, or from left to right and right to left.
Here are some examples of ambigrams:
This says Thank you and comes from this site.
This is a biscriptal one:
It reads Sameh – سامح in the Latin and Arabic alphabets and comes from this site.
There are other examples of bilingual / biscriptal ambigrams on Chinese-English Ambigrams and on Inversions.
Name the language
Here’s a recording in a mystery language.
Do you know or can you guess which language it’s in and where it’s spoken?