Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Language/2009 February 18

Welcome to the Wikipedia Language Reference Desk Archives
The page you are currently viewing is an archive page. While you can leave answers for any questions shown below, please ask new questions on one of the current reference desk pages.

February 18

(Y)ekaterina

Why does the Russian form of "Catherine" seem to have a prefix? --Lazar Taxon (talk) 05:55, 18 February 2009 (UTC)

The original Greek form of the name is Εκατερινη.--K.C. Tang (talk) 06:19, 18 February 2009 (UTC)

Ah, so the western languages elided the first syllable. Thanks. --Lazar Taxon (talk) 07:09, 18 February 2009 (UTC)

A number of Russian female names are like this: Евгения (Yevgenia =~ Eugenia), Евдокия (Yevdokia =~ Eudoxia), Екатерина (Yekaterina =~ Catherine), Елена (Yelena =~ Helen), Елизавета (Yelizaveta =~ Elizabeth). And all names have their diminutive versions, which are used more often than the formal name in everyday parlance. There's an old Russian joke, about a very proper priest who was inspecting a school. He came into a classroom, and started asking the children their names, one by one. The first one said "Katya". He replied, "No, not Katya, but Yekaterina". The next child said "Lena". He said, "No, not Lena, but Yelena". He was on a roll now. He turned to a boy and asked him his name. The child said "David", to which he replied, "No, not David, but Yedavid". The boy was very perplexed, but eventually got over it. (I hope that raises a smile; I am prohibited by law from explaining it, for those who may not get it). -- JackofOz (talk) 07:42, 18 February 2009 (UTC)

I am completely puzzled. Both by the joke, and by your assertion of illegality which contradicts the freedom of speech. Are you really sure that you cannot provide more explanation? — Emil J. 17:20, 18 February 2009 (UTC)

Oh, all right then. The law I referred to is an unwritten one, but one that I never break. I will make this one exception, though, in the name of freedom of speech. The name Давид (Davíd) is just that; there's no E (Ye) anywhere in it, not even in any diminutive version. So the priest was completely wrong about insisting the boy say "Едавид" (Yedavíd). The joke works far better when spoken, as most jokes do. But we do the best we can here.  :) -- JackofOz (talk) 21:58, 18 February 2009 (UTC)

The law is: Thou shalt not kill a joke _{(by explaining)}. This too is a joke, Julia Rossi (talk) 05:34, 19 February 2009 (UTC)

Is that all? That much I certainly understood. I was expecting it to be a dirty joke - I thought perhaps there was some vulgar Russian word that sounded similar to "Едавид". I searched both Wiktionary and Google in vain for a verb "едавить". Then I wondered whether "е давить" might be Russian for "give it to her", but it doesn't seem to be. I guess I was expecting it to be funnier to have a priest say "Едавид" than it is. —Angr 09:11, 19 February 2009 (UTC)

Yes, that is all, Angr. (I did say it works far better orally.) Go immediately and wash your mind out with soap and water. (PS. Expectations can be a terrible burden. Have nothing whatever to do with them, I say.) -- JackofOz (talk) 15:33, 19 February 2009 (UTC)

This reminds me of two Finnish jokes. The first one is like the above Russian joke: A new teacher is asking children's names. One of them answers "Ville". "In this class, we use names properly. Don't use nicknames like Ville and Kalle. You are Viljami", he says. He then asks another child's name, and he answers "Kaljami".

In another joke, an army Sergeant Major (fi:Sotilasmestari) is asking the civilian professions of the new recruits. One of them answers "hitsari" (welder). The Sergeant Major says "Speak properly! It's hitsaaja!" The recruit replies "I stand corrected, Sotilasmestaaja" (soldier decapitator). JIP | Talk 07:48, 19 February 2009 (UTC)

That is funny! Julia Rossi (talk) 08:51, 19 February 2009 (UTC)

French verb caracoler

How would you translate this: escortée par un brillant cortège à la tête duquel caracole son second mari? --Milkbreath (talk) 11:54, 18 February 2009 (UTC)

Roughly, idiomatically, and in haste:

Escorted by a brilliant cavalcade, headed by her second husband on his prancing mount.

–_⊥^{¡ɐɔıʇǝo}Noetica!^T– 12:29, 18 February 2009 (UTC)

Hey Milkbreath, "sashay" is heaps more fun to read :) Julia Rossi (talk) 13:36, 18 February 2009 (UTC)

I gathered from Larousse that caracole doesn't translate to a single word, but that seemed pretty close, if a trifle pejorative to the untrained ear. I picture a Cirque du Soleil ringmaster advancing across a stage—a pretty one, not that toad they use. --Milkbreath (talk) 14:37, 18 February 2009 (UTC)

Caracoler means "Faire des voltes, des sauts", for horses. For people, it's something that can only be done on a horse: "Avancer sur un cheval fringant ['frisky'], en tête de troupes." Source quoted here is Petit Robert, which does not record a corresponding noun. English has caracol[e] as a noun and a verb. OED:

[noun:] 3. A half-turn or wheel to the right or left executed by a horseman. Littré gives the sense in Fr. as ‘a succession of such wheels to right and left alternately, movement in a zigzag course’, which appears to have been the earlier sense in Eng. also. Many writers have used the word without any clear notion of its meaning: see next.

[verb:] 1. intr. Of a horseman or horse: To execute a caracol or caracols. Often used loosely for ‘to caper about’. Also transf. of other animals.
2. trans. To make (a horse) caracol.

If we could all see some more context, we might be able to offer a better translation. Are horses in fact involved, or is caracoler used metaphorically and playfully? Sashay looks apt! Meanwhile, sticking with prance and without knowing more about context, I might amend my suggestion to this:

Escorted by a splendid procession, with her second husband on his prancing mount in the lead.

Sans chevaux, it might go like this:

Escorted by a splendid procession, with her second husband sashaying [prancing, capering, cavorting, gamboling, swaggering, etc.] in the lead.

–_⊥^{¡ɐɔıʇǝo}Noetica!^T– 21:20, 18 February 2009 (UTC)

The context is what I suppose is a cut-and-paste excerpt from something that found its way into the French Wikipedia article "Château-Neuf de Saint-Germain-en-Laye", "Histoire". Here is the entire passage:

Deux jours après le décès du dauphin François II le 5 décembre 1560, la reine de Navarre arrive à Saint-Germain, escortée par un brillant cortège à la tête duquel caracole son second mari le Duc de Vendôme, et les fêtes se succèdent pendant plusieurs jours avec des jeux divers et même une course de tauraux. Parmi les invités se trouvent son fils le petit Henri de Béarn, futur Henri IV, et le duc d'Orléans, futur Henri II.

I didn't provide much context because I didn't want to poison the well. Sorry. It was the word I was interested in as an untranslatable. Did you mean that in French "caracoler" might well imply the presence of a horse even though none is in evidence? --Milkbreath (talk) 21:40, 18 February 2009 (UTC)

Any word can be turned to metaphorical use for the nonce, even it no dictionary explicitly supports the metaphor. That's why context is necessary, even though Petit Robert gives no support for any metaphorical uses that do not involve horses. Restricting ourselves to Petit Robert, the inference that a horse is involved looks pretty safe; but as I suspected it would, the very expansive TLFi not only gives a noun (caracole f.; caracol m.), it gives horseless meanings for the verb:

P. anal. Aller çà et là, procéder par voltes, par sautillements ou par petits bonds. En haut, les hirondelles revenues caracolaient dans l'air, avec de petits cris (THEURIET, La Maison des deux barbeaux, 1879, p. 34); ma plume caracole, mon âme entre en jubilation légère (A. ARNOUX, Algorithme, 1948, p. 50).
P. métaph. Pendant que (...) chacun caracolait sur son dada favori, le médecin attendait la duchesse dans une gondole (BALZAC, Massimilla Doni, 1839, p. 467).

Many of our comparable English verbs are like that. For example, prance applied originally to horses or other non-human animals. OED:

1. intr. Of a horse: ‘To spring and bound in high mettle’ (J.); to rise by springing from the hind legs, either spontaneously in gaiety, excitement, or impatience, or at the rider's will; to move by a succession of such springs. Rarely, and more vaguely, of other animals.

But OED, unsurprisingly, records a "metaphorical" use applied to a person within 30 years of the first "literal" use.

From your fuller quotation, the date of the action, and the status of the actors, it is clear that a horse is involved. And the context certainly affects the tone:

... the Queen of Navarre arrives at Saint-Germain, accompanied by a splendid procession with her second husband on a brisk mount in the lead, and the festivities continue for several days ...

Or any one of innumerable other ways.

–_⊥^{¡ɐɔıʇǝo}Noetica!^T– 23:40, 18 February 2009 (UTC)

Mercy buckets. Yes, the smell of horse is too strong to ignore; it stands to reason such a personage would have been riding, and we've all seen frisky horses do that but nary a Duke. I will fix the passage, but I can't say right this second what I'll make it (unless Julia beats me to it). That's some lovely stuff you found. It's a treat to see "dada" in the wild. --Milkbreath (talk) 00:01, 19 February 2009 (UTC)

I dunno, a prancing nonce could lead with or without a horse, as the Duke does this splendid thread. More dada in the wild for you.:)) Julia Rossi (talk) 04:07, 19 February 2009 (UTC)

Pierre Trudeau "once did a pirouette behind the back of Queen Elizabeth II." (paragraph 3)

See 2 Samuel 6 American Standard Version.

(verse 14) "And David danced before Jehovah with all his might; and David was girded with a linen ephod."

-- Wavelength (talk) 19:38, 19 February 2009 (UTC)