| français | English | Cymraeg |
|---|---|---|
| l’attaque d’apoplexie (f); la congestion cérébral |
stroke | strôc; trawiad |
| avoir un accident vasculaire cérébral | to have a stroke | cael strôc / trawiad |
| caresser | to stroke | tynnu llaw; anwesu |
| le trait de génie | stroke of genius | fflach / strôc o athrylith |
| le coup de chance | stroke of good luck | tamaid / tipyn / strôc o lwc |
| aller se promener | to go for a stroll | mynd am dro |
| l’atrophie (f) | atrophy | gwywiad; edwiniad; crebachiad |
| la corbeille d’arrivée; la corbeille de courriers à traiter; le classeur pour le courrier entrant |
in tray | cawell derbyn; basged dderbyn |
| le courrier sortant | out tray | cawell allan |
| le plateau | tray | hambwrdd |
| le casier | pigeon-hole | twll colomen; cloer; colomendwll |
| cousin(e) au deuxième degré | first cousin once removed | plentyn eich cefnder/cyfnither |
| petit(e) cousin(e) | second cousin | cyfyrder (m); cyfyrderes (f) |
| enfant unique | only child | unig plentyn |
| le tonneau | barrel (beer; wine) | casgen; baril |
| la casque | barrel (fish) | casgen; baril |
| le baril | barrel (oil) | casgen; baril |
| l’animal empaillé; l’animal en peluche |
stuffed animal | anifail stwffiedig |
| le cogneur; le malabar | bruiser | colbiwr; paffiwr |
| diriger | to conduct (an orchestra) | arwain; tywys(u) |
| le chef d’orchestre | conductor | tywyswr; tywysydd; arweinydd |
| l’entrepôt | warehouse | warws; stordy; strorfa |
| la taille | size | maint |
| le pic | woodpecker | cnocell y coed |
| marcher sur la chaussée | to jaywalk | croesi diofal |
Category: French (français)
Singluarity
I learnt an interesting new French word today – célibataire. When I first saw it I guessed that it meant celibate, but when I checked in a dictionary I found that while it does mean celibate, it is more commonly used to mean single. So un célibataire is a single man or bachelor, and une célibataire is a single woman or spinster. A confirmed bachelor un célibataire endurci and une mère célibataire is a single / unmarried mother – the male equivalent is un père célibataire.
Célibataire comes from célibat (celibacy), from the Latin caelebs (unmarried, single), from the Proto-Indo-European *kaiwelo- (alone) and *libʰs– (living) [source].
Single comes from the Middle English sengle, from the Old French sengle, from Latin singulus, a diminutive of simplex (simple or literally “onefold”*, from sim- (the same) and plicare (to fold) [source].
*Duplex = twofold, double
Suspending disbelief
One of the things we talked about in the French conversation group this week was suspending disbelief, which is accepter les invraisemblances in French. That is “accepting the improbabilities”. Another way to say this in French is suspension d’incrédulité.
The word invraisemblance also means unlikeliness or inverisimilitude. Related words include invraisemblable (unlikely, incredible, implausible, improbable) and invraisemblablement (implausible, unlikely).
Its antonym is vraisemblance (plausibility, verisimilitude, likelihood). It comes from vrai (true, real), plus sembler (to seem).
Expressions incorporating vraisemblance include:
– selon toute vraisemblance = in all likelihood, apparently
– essai de vraisemblance = plausibility test
– contrôle de vraisemblance = absurdity check
Sources: Reverso, Linguee and Wikipedia
Apparently the English phrase suspension of disbelief was coined by Samuel Taylor Coleridge in 1817 in his Biographia literaria or biographical sketches of my literary life and opinions
See: http://www.phrases.org.uk/meanings/suspension-of-disbelief.html
Are there interesting ways to express this idea in other languages?
Les mots de la semaine
| français | English | Cymraeg |
|---|---|---|
| le jeu de rôle | role playing | chwarae rhan, chwarae rôl |
| accepter les invraisemblances | to suspend disbelief | |
| nom à rallonge | double-barrelled surname | enw dwbl (baril) |
| fusil à canon double | double-barrelled shotgun | gwn haels dau/dwy faril, dwbl baril |
| l’épaule | shoulder | ysgwydd |
| l’omoplate (f); la scapulaire | shoulder blade (human); scapular | palfais; asgwrn palfais; crafell ysgwydd |
| le paleron | shoulder blade (animal) | palfais; asgwrn palfais; crafell ysgwydd |
| railler; se moquer de qn/qch; se payer la tête de qn |
to make fun of sb/sth | gwneud hwyl/sbort am ben rhywun; chwerthin am ben rhywun |
| (liquide) trouble | cloudy (liquid) | cymylog |
| furtif | stealth | lladraddaidd |
| interdit | banned | gwarharddedig |
Les chuchoteuses
On Rue Staint-Paul in Vieux Montréal there’s a statue of three women having a gossip. It’s known as ‘Les chuchoteuses‘ or ‘The whisperers’. It’s also known as the “fat ladies talking statue”. It’s by Rose-Aimée Bélanger, a sculptor from Ontario, and was installed as part of a 2006 initiative to highlight some of Old Montreal’s forgotten spaces.
The word chuchoteuses [ʃyʃɔtø:z] comes from chuchoter [ʃy.ʃɔ.te] (to whisper; to rustle), which is of imitative origin. Related words include chuchoterie (whispering), chuchotis (faint whispering), chuchotement (a whisper / murmur, rustling).
I like the sound of this word, and of the words for whisper in other languages:
– Italian / Portuguese / Spanish: sussurro, from Latin susurrus (a humming, whispering)
– German: Flüstern
– Dutch: fluistering
– Welsh: sibrwd
What about in other languages?
The photo is one I took while exploring Montréal with Linsday Dow of Linsday Does Languages, who features in it.
Sources: Wiktionary and Reverso
Polyglotting in Montreal
Yesterday was the first day of the North American Polyglot Symposium in Montreal. It’s taking place at Concordia University, which has two campuses – one downtown, and one quite a way out of town. I went to the out of town one by mistake, and walked a few miles to get there from the nearest Metro stop. When I got there I couldn’t any signs of the Symposium, and after wandering around for a while, I found someone to ask and they said it was probably at the other campus.
Fortunately as I was leaving a taxi was dropping someone off, so I jumped in and headed back into town. I arrived about 10 minutes before my presentation, the first of the day, was due to start. The presentation went well with some good discussion and quite a few people have told me that they found it interesting.
There were other presentations on various language-related topics yesterday, which were all quite interesting. One was in French, the rest were in English. The one in French was by a local guy with a strong Quebecois accent, which was a bit difficult to follow, but I was getting most of it by the end.
In the evening many of us trekked up Mont Royal, which has great views from the top. On the way down it rained quite heavily and people split up and wandered off in different groups. We eventually met up at a Spanish restaurant for tapas.
I met quite a few people I know from previous polyglot events, and plenty of new people, and I had conversations in English, French, Esperanto and Scottish Gaelic, and spoke bits of Russian, Portuguese, Japanese and Mandarin.
Les mots de la semaine
| français | English | Cymraeg |
|---|---|---|
| la vapeur | steam | ager |
| la locomotive à vapeur | steam engine | peiriant ager, ager-beiriant |
| le presbytère | vicarage | ficerdy, persondy |
| le pasteur, le curé | vicar | ficer, ficar, person |
| moudre | to mill | malu |
| le jardin ouvrier | allotment | cyfran |
| animé | lively | bywiog |
| démolir | to demolish (building) | dinistrio; distrywio |
| interdire | to ban | gwahardd |
| lancer | to launch | lansio; gwthio |
| le taux de participation | turnout | cynulliad |
| le bureau de vote | polling station | gorsaf bleidleisio |
| la crue soudaine; la crue subite | flash flood | gorlifo yn sydyn; fflachlifo |
| la maison individuelle | detached house | tŷ ar wahân; tŷ sengl |
| la maison jumelée | semi-detached house | tŷ pâr |
| la maison en bande; la maison mitoyennef |
terraced house | tŷ teras; tŷ rhes |
| le financement | funding | nawdd; noddiant |
Savouring sapient and savvy saphiophiles
An interesting new word I came across recently is sapiophile [seɪpɪofaɪl/sapiofaɪl]. When I first saw it I wasn’t sure what it meant, but as soon as I looked it up it made sense. It means “someone who is (sexually) attracted to intelligence / intelligent people” [source]. It comes from the Latin sapiō and the Ancient Greek φιλέω (phileō – I love) [source].
Sapiō is a form of sapiēns, as in homo sapiens, which means wise, discreet; wise man, philosopher, man of taste. Related words include sapienter (wisely, sensibly), and sapientia (wisdom, discernment; philosophy; knowledge).
The English word sapient (wise), comes from the Old French sapient, from the Latin sapientem (nominative sapiēns), the present participle of sapere (to taste, have taste, be wise), from the Proto-Indo-European root *sep- (to taste, perceive) [source]. Alternatively it comes from the Proto-Indo-European *sh₁p-i- (to notice), from the Proto-Indo-European *seh₁p- (to try, to research). This is also the root of words meaning to know in quite a few languages, including: savoir (French), sapere (Italian, Sardinian), saber (Portuguese, Spanish, Galician, Catalan, Asturian, Occitan), and of the English words to savour and savvy (shrewd, well-informed and perceptive) [source].
A number of women on dating sites say they are a saphiophile – that’s where I stumbled on the word. A lot of women on such sites are looking for someone who is genuine, which can mean various things, including “belonging to, or proceeding from the original stock; native; hence, not counterfeit, spurious, false, or adulterated; authentic; real; natural; true; pure” [source]. Which of these meanings is meant I’m not sure.
Genuine comes from the Latin genuinus (innate, native, natural), from gignere, from the Old Latin genere (to beget, produce), from the Proto-Indo-European *ǵénh₁os (race), from *ǵenh₁- (to produce, beget) [source].
So maybe I should mention on Match and POF that I’m seeking a savvy, single, multilingual saphiophile – try saying that a few times quickly, it’s a bit of a tongue twister.
On Match you can search for people by the language(s) they speak. So, for example, you could search for someone who speaks French, Welsh, Kazakh, Swahili, Nepalese, Chinese, Taiwanese, Esperanto, or quite a few other languages. The list of languages is a bit random and looks like users were able to enter languages at some stage, so it includes Bable (Asturian), Euskera (Basque), Chinese, Chinese Traditional, Gallero (?), Indian (?), Iranian (?), Mallorquin, Valenciano and Visayan (Cebuano).
There are currently 651 Welsh-speaking women on Match, for example, 65 Esperanto speakers, and 42 Taiwanese speakers. However, in your profile you can only choose three languages – on Plenty of Fish (POF) you can only choose one second language, and you can only search one language at a time. These sites are obviously not set up with polyglots in mind.
Multilingual Manchester
I had a multilingual day in Manchester today – I spent part of it listening to choirs and other groups performing as part of the Manchester Day celebrations. They sang in English, Irish, Scottish Gaelic, Maori, Hebrew and Yiddish, and I also watched the Manchester Day parade.
I also went to the Polyglot Pub, a meet-up arranged by Kerstin Cable of Fluent Language. The seven of us who turned up spoke in English, French, German, Spanish, Portuguese, Italian, Russian and Swedish, plus odd bits of Welsh, Irish, Scottish Gaelic, Japanese, Finnish and Estonian. This was the first Polyglot Pub in Manchester, and hopefully won’t be the last.
You can see more photos on Flickr
There will be a language quiz tomorrow, by the way.
Suburban bans
In French the word banlieue [bɑ̃.ljø] can refer to:
1. Circonscription territoriale qui s’étendait à une lieue hors de la ville et dans laquelle un juge pouvait exercer sa juridiction.
(Territorial division that stretched a mile out of town and in which a judge could exercise jurisdiction).
2. Territoire et ensemble des localités qui environnent une grande ville.
(Territory and all the communities that surround a large city).
This word comes from the Medieval Latin banleuca (the space within a mile of a city to which extended the ban in feudal society). The word ban in this context refers to the jurisdiction of an overlord in which he could call vassals for war. It comes from Old French, from the Frankish *ban.
Sources: le Trésor de la langue française informatisé and Wiktionnaire
The word banlieue is also used in English to refer to “The outskirts of a city, especially in France, inhabited chiefly by poor people living in tenement-style housing” [source].
The English word banns, as in banns of marriage, probably comes from the same root as the French ban, but the English word ban (to forbid, prohibit), comes from the Middle English bannen, from the Old English bannan (to summon, command, proclaim, call out), from the Proto-Germanic *bannaną (curse, forbid), from the Proto-Indo-European *bʰeh₂- (to say) [source].