Rare Letters

By Simon

Multiocular O

Today I heard about a very unusual and rare Cyrillic letter – the Multiocular O (Мультиокулярная О in Russian): ꙮ

According to Wikipedia, this letter is “a rare exotic glyph variant of the Cyrillic letter O. This glyph variant can be found in certain manuscripts in the phrase «серафими многоꙮчитїи» (many-eyed seraphim)”. It appears in a copy of the Psalms from about 1429.

This is an example of what it looks like in a sentence:

Multiocular O in a sentence

Source: ВикипедиЯ

Some other unusual Cyrillic letters include:

  • Monocular O: Ꙩ ꙩ – used in ꙩко (eye)
  • Binocular O: Ꙫ ꙫ – used in ꙫчи ([two] eyes)
  • Double Monocular O: Ꙭ ꙭ – used in ꙭчи ([two] eyes)
  • Hundred thousands: ҈
  • Millions: ҉
  • Thousand millions: ꙲

None are commonly used, but I’m happy to know that they exist.

Who needs emoticons when you have letters like Ꙩ and Ꙭ?

Do you know of any other unusual letters in Cyrillic or other scripts?

Put on your tuque

By Simon

Olympics tuque.

One of the songs I heard last night at a gig featuring Gordie Tentrees and Jaxon Haldane included the line “put on your tuque”.

This puzzled me as I didn’t know what a tuque was. From the context it seems to be some kind of clothing, and I guessed it might be a hat, but wasn’t sure, so thought I’d find out.

According to the Free Dictionary, tuque is a Canadian French word for “a close-fitting knitted or crocheted cap having no brim or a brim that is folded up to create an extra layer of fabric for warmth. Also called toque.”

It comes from the French toque, which is “any of several styles of small, close-fitting hats having no brim or a very short brim”. Which comes from the Spanish toca (cornet, wimple, headress, toque, bonnet), from the Iberian Vulgar Latin *tauca, and is probably of pre-Roman Iberian origin.

What do you call this kind of hat?

You can see and hear Gordie Tentrees and Jaxon Haldane here:

Selective Understanding

By Simon

Do you ever find yourself listening a something in a language you thought you knew well, and having difficultly understanding it?

This happens to me, even with languages I speak fluently, such as Welsh and Irish, especially when people are talking about an unfamiliar subject, or using an unfamiliar vocabulary.

Yesterday, for example, I watched some videos on YouTube in Russian and Swedish. I don’t speak either language fluently, but I can usually get a least some idea what people are talking about in them. With these videos though, I found it difficult to understand very much at all, as they were talking about people and things I know little or nothing about.

This is the Russian video – something about US visas, I think:

This is the Swedish video – something about politicians, I think:

I can usually understand just about everything on Radio Cymru (a Welsh language radio station), but sometimes I find it difficult to follow what people are saying, especially if they’re using very colloquial or very formal language. So there’s always more to learn.

A Review of Mondly

By Simon

Mondly screenshot

Recently I was approached by the people behind Mondly, a newish language-learning app, who wanted to advertise on Omniglot.

Before agreeing to advertise such apps, I usually try them out for myself to see if I can recommend them. So I’m currently learning Czech on Mondly. It’s a language I’ve studied on and off for years, so I have a basic knowledge of it. Mondly lets you start at beginning, or at an intermediate or advanced level – I chose the intermediate level.

The app presents you with a daily lesson, and you can choose to study other lessons as well. These have various themes such as family, travel, food & drink, and so on. There is also a chatbot, with which you can have conversations using the words and phrases you’ve learnt, and at the end of each week there’s a quiz.

It looks good, the interface works well for me, the lessons teach you a manageable number of words and phrases, and show you how to put them into sentences, and the audio is clear.

33 different languages are available on Mondly, including major European languages, and Japanese, Korean, Chinese, Turkish, Arabic, Persian, Hebrew, Vietnamese, Hindi, Indonesian and Thai.

There are often special offers: more details.

Disclaimer – although I will receive a commission if you subscribe to Mondly after clicking on the links in this post, I do think this app is worth a try.

Danish rooms

By Simon

My lodgings in Aarhus

Recently I learnt that there are two different words for room in Danish: rum [ʁɔmˀ], which is a general room, and værelse [ˈʋæʁɑlsə], which is a room for spending time in, at least according to Memrise. Is this correct?

Værelse comes from være (to be) and -else (a suffix that turns verbs into nouns) [source].

Subspecies of værelse include:

  • soveværelse = bedroom
  • badeværelse = bathroom
  • arbejdsværelse = study
  • børneværelse = nursery
  • hotelværelse = hotel room
  • klasseværelse = classroom
  • loftsværelse = loft
  • gæsteværelse = guest room

[source]

A related word is tilværelse (life, existence).

Rum means room, comparment or space, and comes from the Old Norse rúmr, from the Proto-Germanic *rūmaz (roomy, spacious, open), the same root as the English word room [source].

Subspecies of rum include:

  • omklædningsrum = changing room, locker room
  • møderum = meeting room
  • siderum = (small) chamber, side room
  • tørrerum = drying room
  • haverum = garden room
  • gårdrum = courtyard

[source].

Other Danish words for rooms include lokale (room), stue (living room), sal (hall) and køkken (kitchen).

Knufflige Knuffelbeests

By Simon

Giant Giraffe

If someone called you a knuff, would you see it as a compliment or an insult?

Knuff is an obsolete English word that means a lout or clown, so it would be an insult. It comes from the Old English cnof (a churl). The k is silent, but I think in Old English the c was pronounced [source].

Possibly related Swedish words include knuff (nudge, push, boost, dig, shove) [source] and knuffa (to push, nudge, shove) [source].

Possibly related German words include knuffen (to nudge; to jab; to pinch (usually playfully or even tenderly)) [source] and knuffig (cuddly) [source]

Possibly related Dutch words include knuffelen (to cuddle, hug), from the Low German knuffen (to poke; bump; nudge) [source], knuffig (cuddly) [source], knuffel (hug, cuddle, stuffed toy) [source] and knuffelbeest (stuffed toy) [source].

The word knuff came up in one of my Swedish lessons this week, and as I like the sound of it, I thought I’d write about it. There’s something about that combination of k and n and the beginning of a word that makes it sound cute and cuddly to me.

Which sounds and combinations of sounds (in any language) most appeal to you?

Bamboozling Baboons!

By Simon

This week I learnt a couple of interesting French words – embabouiner [ɑ̃.ba.bwi.ne] (to flatter, butter up) and embobiner [ɑ̃.bɔ.bi.ne] (to bamboozle).

Embabouiner combines the prefix em- and suffix -er with babouin (baboon), so you are making a baboon of someone when you flatter them [source].

Babouin comes from the Middle French babouyne, baboin, from Old French babouin, from baboue (grimace, muzzle), which is related to German dialectal word Bäppe (lips, muzzle) [source].

Baboons.

Embobiner means to get round (someone), to pull to wool over someone’s eyes, to bamboozle or to outfox. It can also mean to wind up, reel up/in or wrap up. It combines the same prefix and suffix as embabouiner with bobine (bobbin, reel, spool, drum), so you are winding someone on a bobbin when you bamboozle them [source].

Bobine probably comes from the Latin word balbus, (stammering, stuttering, lisping, fumbling) and is immitative of the noise of a bobbin [source].

The English word bamboozle comes from the 17th century slang word bam (to trick, to con), from the noun bam (fraudster, cheat), possibly from the French embobiner [source].