Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Language/2020 December 1

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December 1

Translate mottos in the Dagestan ASSR emblem

Link: Emblem of the Dagestan Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic

About two years ago, I embarked in a journey of creating the article for each emblem of the ASSR (Autonomous republics) of the USSR. I managed to vectorize all but one emblem: the Dagestan ASSR emblem. Unlike most ASSRs which only have Russian and the native language of the ASSR, the Dagestani CoA has 10-11 mottos (Russian+ 9-10 native language). This made their emblem quite different.

To the main point. The reason I came here is to ask if any of you fellows here could complete the translation scheme in the CoA. As you can see in the article, the motto inside the CoA is missing, with several blank ribbons. There are two versions of the CoA: the 1936 version (sadly no original image) and the 1978 version. In the article, you could find some information regarding the languages of the mottos.

If any of you fellows could manage to get a hand on some hi-res depiction of the motto or made some predictions based on the languages and compare it to the original image, it would mean a lot to me....Thanks... --Regards, Jeromi Mikhael ^(marhata) 15:27, 1 December 2020 (UTC)

P.s.: Some dumb guy online tried to sell merchandise with these incomplete CoAs. :)

wikt:workers of the world, unite gives a translation for Nogai: "баьри кыраллардынъ пролетарпары, бирлесинъиз (bäri kırallardıñ proletarparı, birlesiñiz)". I can't say where it comes from, whether it's correct, or whether it matches any of the lettering on the emblem. --Amble (talk) 16:58, 1 December 2020 (UTC)

It doesn't seem to match the lettering on the emblem, assuming (by process of elimination) that Nogai is at the top right in the 1978 version. --Amble (talk) 17:49, 2 December 2020 (UTC)

This Russian-Nogai glossary [1] gives two versions: "сав дунья пролетарлары, бирлесинъиз!" and "бари кыраллардынъ пролетарлары, бирлесинъиз!" The second is nearly the same as the version on Wiktionary, but differs by one letter. Neither seems to match the lettering in the top right of the 1978 emblem. --Amble (talk) 17:55, 2 December 2020 (UTC)

The red-on-white image here [2] seems to be the 1938 version with 9 languages. It's no more legible than the 1978 version you already linked. --Amble (talk) 19:03, 1 December 2020 (UTC)

The bottom right item in File:Emblem of the Dagestan ASSR (1938-1978).jpg has some similarities to the Tajik language motto in Emblem of the Tajik Soviet Socialist Republic. I think this is Tat language (Caucasus), which is also an Iranian language. In the 1978 version I think it has moved to second from the top on the right side. --Amble (talk) 21:41, 1 December 2020 (UTC)

The one at top right in File:Emblem of the Dagestan ASSR (1938-1978).jpg is Lak language. I can see "Циняв билаят..." at the start. It also seems to be the one at third from the top on the left in the 1978 version. --Amble (talk) 22:28, 1 December 2020 (UTC)

By process of elimination, that would mean the top left in File:Emblem of the Dagestan ASSR (1938-1978).jpg should be Lezgin language. --Amble (talk) 16:23, 2 December 2020 (UTC)

This Russian-Lezgin glossary [3] gives the motto in Lezgin as "Вири уьлквейрин пролетарар, сад хьухь!". That does match the text in the top left of the 1938-1978 emblem. It is also third from the top on the right in the 1978 emblem. --Amble (talk) 16:38, 2 December 2020 (UTC)

The Tabasaran entry (third from top on right) in the 1938 emblem matches the version in this document [4]: "Вари уьлкйирин пролетарар, саб йихьай!". --Amble (talk) 17:13, 2 December 2020 (UTC)

Amble has been doing an admirable job thus far. To add a further language to the mix, the Wiktionary page cited above also gives a translation for Kumyk: бары да уьлкелени пролетарлары, бирлешигиз (barı da ülkeleni proletarları, birleşigiz). This text appears to match the third from the top on the left of the 1938-78 emblem. The 1978 emblem is harder - it could be either the top right or fourth from top right. 58.7.142.132 (talk) 11:18, 3 December 2020 (UTC)

Thanks. In the article Jeromi Mikhael has placed Kumyk at third from the top on the left (1938-78 version) and fourth from the top on the right (1978 version). This looks correct to me, but as you point out, it could also be in the top right position (1978 version). What has me puzzled is that I don't see anything in the 1978 version that matches the phrase in Nogai. My best guess is that Nogai is the one at top right, and it's a slightly different phrasing or a different dialect. If Nogai can also have "да" like the closely related Kumyk, that would make it a match. But I don't find any versions in Nogai that actually do include that "да". --Amble (talk) 17:29, 3 December 2020 (UTC)

Yes, I concur with your reasoning, and can only wish that image were just slightly more detailed such that individual letters can be made out and it could be confirmed. 58.7.142.132 (talk) 03:59, 4 December 2020 (UTC)

bad Bart

I recently had the opportunity to see a streamed recording of a live performance of Ruddigore, which is not that commonly performed and I'd wanted to see it for a long time.

The male lead is the rightful baronet of Ruddigore, a title that comes with a hideous curse and requires the holder to do evil. He had run out on the title, allowing himself to be thought dead, so it would fall instead on his younger brother. When he is revealed, he must tell the truth about it, because he is still virtuous, but when he is invested with the title, he will then be evil and so will be free to lie. He sings the following about that, with the chorus responding in even-numbered lines:

When I'm a bad Bart. I will tell taradiddles!
 He'll tell taradiddles when he's a bad Bart.
I'll play a bad part on the falsest of fiddles.
  On very false fiddles he'll play a bad part!

So what exactly is a "bad Bart"? Is "Bart" being used just as a generic masculine name? Is it perhaps short for "baronet"? Or is "bad Bart" a recognized phrase? Searches tend to be noisy because of Bart Simpson. --Trovatore (talk) 21:03, 1 December 2020 (UTC)

It is indeed an abbreviation of baronet (Attested from c. 1771): [5] --107.15.157.44 (talk) 21:16, 1 December 2020 (UTC)

And per that source, it's actually "Bart." which would be why the "." appears in the first line. <-Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots-> 21:20, 1 December 2020 (UTC)

However, the abbreviation is not usually pronounced to rhyme with "part" (that's G&S playing games). I assume some degree of influence from "Black Bart" (name of a notorious pirate)... AnonMoos (talk) 21:22, 1 December 2020 (UTC)

Really? I've only ever heard it so, or rendered in full (but then I don't move in those exalted circles). Alansplodge (talk) 23:54, 1 December 2020 (UTC)

I had also never heard of the word "tarradiddle", which is described as a "petty lie", which I take to mean a "fib". <-Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots-> 21:24, 1 December 2020 (UTC)

In Victorian fiction and drama baronets were stereotypically villainous. --Antiquary (talk) 21:24, 1 December 2020 (UTC)

Thanks all! --Trovatore (talk) 21:59, 1 December 2020 (UTC)

Interestingly enough, the present-day "Bad Bart" went by the name of Rudiger in the classic Bart's Inner Child episode. I wonder if it was a deliberate, if obscure, reference? Matt Deres (talk) 16:35, 2 December 2020 (UTC)

Good find; definitely obscure. "Rudiger" is not a name one would pick at random. --107.15.157.44 (talk) 17:40, 2 December 2020 (UTC)

As it mentions in the article, it was originally called "Ruddygore" which could be translated as "Red blood".--Phil Holmes (talk) 09:00, 3 December 2020 (UTC)

It's kind of a comic euphemism for the word "bloody", which was not usually allowed to be spoken on stage during the Victorian era. AnonMoos (talk) 16:54, 3 December 2020 (UTC)

Yeah, this is another language-related issue I don't quite grok. Apparently critics originally objected severely to the name "Ruddygore" because it evoked too strongly the then-extremely-taboo word "bloody" (the nature of this taboo is another thing I don't quite grok, but then word taboos are almost never really logical, so whatever). So Gilbert changed it to "Ruddigore", which to me does not seem significantly more distant from "bloody". Whether that in fact appeased the objectors does not seem to be recorded in our article. --Trovatore (talk) 19:39, 3 December 2020 (UTC)

It's possible that some people objected to the fact that "ruddy" was a mildly disparaging adjective (similar to "darn" in 20th-century American English -- "Now where's that ruddy fountain pen??") which rhymed with "bloody", so that the change to "ruddi-" made it stand out a little bit less and/or added a thin facade of plausible deniability... AnonMoos (talk) 22:43, 3 December 2020 (UTC)

It is still dialectally in use as a substitute for "bloody" in British English. It is all over the place in the Harry Potter universe,^[6] and a favourite term in Potter fan fiction (as in Harry Potter and his "ruddy friends").  --Lambiam 07:07, 4 December 2020 (UTC)

Is it really still perceived as a "substitute for 'bloody' ", a word that I think is no longer seriously taboo even in British English? I thought it was just another intensifier. --Trovatore (talk) 21:03, 4 December 2020 (UTC)

In some circles parents will still tell their children not to use the word – and have a peek at this. I rest my case.  --Lambiam 23:27, 4 December 2020 (UTC)

Since the 1970s especially, what's "acceptable" in the public media has widened out. You may have heard George Carlin's routine called "7 words you can't say on TV." Several of those entries are now routinely heard on commercial TV, at least in the later evening shows. In his Carnegie Hall show, Groucho Marx mentioned that in the 1910s or so, there was a play on Broadway in which a man met a woman and said, "You're a nice looking broad!" Groucho said they had to close the show because it was deemed too vulgar! ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 02:24, 5 December 2020 (UTC)

The point of these words is that they displace less acceptable expletives; English people sometimes say "oh sugar" when they mean "oh shit". However, I don't think I've heard anyone (in London) use "ruddy" for at least 30 years. It's still not something you'd say if you were trying to be polite in my opinion. Alansplodge (talk) 17:35, 5 December 2020 (UTC)

The issue, however, was whether bloody is still unacceptable (for some). As to ruddy, the question is not whether it is offensive, but whether it is still in use as an expletive at all (outside Potterdom).  --Lambiam 10:30, 7 December 2020 (UTC)

I sometimes use it in conversation with people I don't know well, such as social acquaintences and professional contacts (as opposed to closer friends and long-standing colleagues), where I can't be sure that "bloody" (often as "bloody well . . .") won't offend at least one of those present; I have heard friends do the same. Of course, the circumstances in which "bloody/ruddy" might be appropriate in such conversations are limited, but not nonexistent. For calibration, I'm a UK male in my 60s: I can't speak for striplings of 30 or less. {The poster formerly known as 87.81.230.195} 2.122.56.237 (talk) 17:40, 7 December 2020 (UTC)

You would certainly have been told off for using "bloody" when I was a boy at primary school in the 70's. You might have got away with "ruddy" but I wouldn't like to bet on it. I've had a handful of objections to my use of "bloody" in the last few years from people who tell me it's an abbreviation of "By Our Lady" and offends their religious sensibilities. I usually answer by saying no, it's bloody as in buckets of gore, ruddy great streams of it shooting out of severed arteries, that sort of bloody. Shuts 'em up. DuncanHill (talk) 18:30, 7 December 2020 (UTC)

It would be great to set that reply to a melody, so one can sing it, ending the exchange on a high note.  --Lambiam 11:04, 8 December 2020 (UTC)

The case of ruddy / bloody reminds me of the minced oath or euphemism frigging (1785), and fugging (coined by Norman Mailer in 1947 for The Naked and the Dead). Those R's and G's show up there, as well as in ruddy and Ruddigore, and I wonder if there's some sort of phonetic/semantic correlation at a deep level, as there appears to be with sl-, as in slippery, slide, slurp, slime, slither, slurry, and so on. Mathglot (talk) 22:42, 7 December 2020 (UTC)

References