Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Language/2010 August 4

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.

August 4

Japanese translation

http://i36.tinypic.com/rusodc.jpg

What does this say in English? --138.110.206.99 (talk) 02:47, 4 August 2010 (UTC)

「おはなしするのは　ポケモンを　じゆうに　しましょう　という」"What (s)he's saying is, 'Let's set free the Pokemon'".Rorrima (talk) 03:19, 4 August 2010 (UTC)

The line is unfinished. The sentence should be continued. The translation is "I'm telling you that 'Let's set free the Pokemon" is...". Oda Mari (talk) 05:31, 4 August 2010 (UTC)

If you assume that the missing part of the sentence is 「ことです。」, then the translation would be something like: "What we are discussing here is to release the Pokemon." Of course this is all speculation, without more context it's kinda hard to be 100% sure. I'd forgotten how damn hard it is to read Japanese in kana only... TomorrowTime (talk) 15:21, 4 August 2010 (UTC)

French: -ement vs. -ant endings

When I was using Facebook (I set in in French so I could learn some new vocabulary), I saw it display "téléchargement" when it wanted to say (down)loading. I know that the verb télécharger means "to download," but I am confused because when I put "téléchargement" into Google translate, it outputted "downloading," which I thought should be "téléchargant," the present participle. What's the difference between the two? — Trevor K. — 03:50, 4 August 2010 (UTC) —Preceding unsigned comment added by Yakeyglee (talk • contribs)

Google Translate is not very reliable and you can't always rely on it to give an accurate translation. In this case however "downloading" seems like an OK translation of "téléchargement" in the sense of the actual act of downloading something. For example if you wanted to talk about the speed of downloading you would say "la vitesse du téléchargement". On the other hand if you want to say "I am downloading..." for example then the correct translation of that would be "Je télécharge..." rather than something using the present participle. --Viennese Waltz ^talk 08:13, 4 August 2010 (UTC)

(ec) As far as I understand, -ant is the participle, i.e. a de-verbal form used as an adjective (like the -ing in "the person downloading the film"), whereas -ment is a de-verbal noun, like the -ing in "the downloading of the film". Fut.Perf. ☼ 08:17, 4 August 2010 (UTC)

Yeah but you wouldn't translate "the person downloading the film" as "celui téléchargeant le film", you would say "celui qui télécharge le film". The present participle would be used in the sense of "while", e.g. "en téléchargeant le film..." --Viennese Waltz ^talk 08:35, 4 August 2010 (UTC)

You can kind of get both at once as "-emment": inconscient, inconsciemment etc. AnonMoos (talk) 09:58, 4 August 2010 (UTC)

Chouli

What is Chouli?199.126.224.156 (talk) 10:49, 4 August 2010 (UTC)

My guess is that it's a variant of "Chou-li", the Wade-Giles equivalent of pinyin "Zhouli". Deor (talk) 11:22, 4 August 2010 (UTC)

And Google points to that article. --ColinFine (talk) 11:26, 4 August 2010 (UTC)

Latin company motto

floreat itunensis vallis or maybe itunensis floreat vallis (not sure if it is a "i" in "itunensis") can someone translate it, etc, Thanks.77.86.119.98 (talk) 11:54, 4 August 2010 (UTC)

I don't know what Itunensis is, but vallis is either a valley or a wall. Is Itunensis supposed to be iTunes? Then "may the iTunes wall flourish"? Where did you see this? Adam Bishop (talk) 13:56, 4 August 2010 (UTC)

Er, no, that's dumb. Ituna is apparently Solway, so "may the Solway valley flourish"? Adam Bishop (talk) 13:59, 4 August 2010 (UTC)

Or even better, it is also the name of the Eden River which flows into the Solway Firth, and there appears to be numerous things called "Eden Valley" (which may or may not have anything to do with the actual Eden Valley in Cumbria), so I guess it means "may Eden Valley flourish". Adam Bishop (talk) 14:10, 4 August 2010 (UTC)

I kind of like the first option. Perhaps it is Dog Latin for some promotional iTunes campaign? — Michael J 14:46, 4 August 2010 (UTC)

Sorry I should have given the source [1] page 568 - it's on the company seal of the "Eden Valley Railway"

It's written thus

      itunensis 
   floreat  vallis

So "Let the Eden Valley flourish" is about right then? Thanks for you help by the way.Sf5xeplus (talk) 17:15, 4 August 2010 (UTC)

While I'm here, maybe someone knows what this inscription says [2]

  I       O       M
     G  E  N  I  O
      L  O  C  I
         B  R
      S  V  A  P
   O  L  L  I  N  A
R  I  S     P  R  I  N
     C  I  P  C  F

From a 'roman altar' - just asking out of curiousity.Sf5xeplus (talk) 17:23, 4 August 2010 (UTC)

Well, "genio loci" means "to the genius loci", and there is the name Apollinaris, but the rest is abbreviated and not immediately apparent. Someone has probably recorded the inscription and a translation somewhere, or at least an expansion of the abbreviations...might take some digging. Adam Bishop (talk) 17:55, 4 August 2010 (UTC)

Ah, see this page. Adam Bishop (talk) 17:58, 4 August 2010 (UTC)

Thank you very much.77.86.119.98 (talk) 18:02, 4 August 2010 (UTC)

Resolved

Archaic Dutch declension

A while ago I here and here at the reference desk tried to start a discussion about the quality of the mentioned article. Seen no one reacted, I try here for a lost time. The article is at least doubtable. Maybe someone with a larger command of English than me and a knowled of Dutch history can do something about it. Mark Coenraats (talk) 15:48, 4 August 2010 (UTC)

To be honest, I am not completely convinced your criticisms of the article are very much to the point.

First of all, the way I see it, the article is about the declensional system for written Dutch as prescribed during the nineteenth century. The fact that in some aspects (the diminutives) nothing changed and therefore the 1995 and 2005 guides to writing Dutch offer the same rules, does not mean this article is incorrect.

Secondly, you say you find no evidence for a vocative and locative in archaic Dutch. Well, in the case of the vocative the article agrees with you - "One should not use the vocative case" - but in earlier days the grammarian Christiaen van Heule had made an artificial attempt to introduce it - so a Dutch vocative is not completely unheard of. As for the locative, surely you have heard the expression "van mijnent wege"?

And as for the word "vele": I think the reason the article says it may be used, is that it can also be omitted.

I hope this helps. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 194.171.56.13 (talk) 18:00, 4 August 2010 (UTC)