Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Language/2007 September 23

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September 23

Latin Word for Quote

What is the word for 'quote,' I can't find anything online. My dictionary doesn't have it.

(Quote in the sense of a quote by a person. i.e "Veni, vidi, vici.")

Thanks, Falconus 00:09, 23 September 2007 (UTC)

I think it's one of the many uses of the word locus. The word sententia is used for a quotation which is a maxim or motto (in the sense of a school, company, or personal motto). And commemoratio is also possible, though that has an overtone that what's said may not be word-for-word the same as the original. (Remember that 'quote' in the sense you mean is a slang word for 'quotation'.) Xn4 01:36, 23 September 2007 (UTC)

Cool, thanks--Falconus 03:12, 23 September 2007 (UTC)

Or dictum, which literally just means "thing said", but it can be used for "remark" or "proverb". —Keenan Pepper 15:20, 23 September 2007 (UTC)

I believe you might find some answers if you look and ask somebody, or look at a Henle Latin text book, available from Memoria Press or Loyola Press, or look at a Latin dictionary in the bookstore. Thanks, Laleena 22:21, 30 September 2007 (UTC)

Samples of Middle Norwegian

Hi, I'm looking for samples of Middle Norwegian. Does anyone know where I could get images of Middle Norwegian documents, or links where I could get them? I would like as much as possible. Also, the wikipedia article titled "Norwegian language struggle" states "The last example found of an original Middle Norwegian document is from 1583.". That document is expecially important to me, and I hope I could get it. Thank you very much.70.74.35.53 05:41, 23 September 2007 (UTC)

Lots and lots of this here: [1] Nothing from 1583, though. Haukur 15:50, 23 September 2007 (UTC)

It's fun to browse through the 16th century letters. Some are quite close to Old Norse while some are very Danicized. Let's take an example from a 1561 letter which is rather old-fashioned. [2] It starts like this:

"Ollum mannum them som thette breff see heller hører

sender Vlff y Bredeuig Torbiøn Muggehus oc Biur aa Vedum suorne

larettis men j Fyrisdall quede gudz oc sine kunnoct giørende att

vij sagum oc hørdum handerbande tere manna som saa heytha"

Immediately you can recognize an old formulaic greeting, in standardized Old Norse it comes out as: "Öllum mönnum þeim sem þetta bréf sjá ella heyra sendir ... kveðju guðs ok sína". ("To all people who see or hear this letter send [senders' names] God's greeting and their own.") It then goes on with more formulas: "kunnugt gjörandi at vér sáum ok heyrðum handarband þeirra manna sem svá heita" ("making known that we saw and heard the handshake of those men so named"). There are more formulas still later on. Generally the language tends to be more grammatically conservative in the formulas. Haukur 16:09, 23 September 2007 (UTC)

So Norwegian is different from Old Norse because it's Danicized?70.74.35.53 07:37, 28 September 2007 (UTC)

Svangaskarð pronunciation

Hi, is Svangaskarð Faroese or Danish? Can someone come up with an IPA transcription, please? --Kjoonlee 07:47, 23 September 2007 (UTC)

I've been told (thanks!) it's not Danish since the eth is not used in Danish. Now I just need a pronunciation, which doesn't have to be precise. --Kjoonlee 08:38, 23 September 2007 (UTC)

The đ implies Faroese or Icelandic. I don't speak Faroese, but after reading the Faroese language page, I would place an IPA of something like [svɛaːŋaskarθ]. The article doesn't say anything about stress, and the [sk] cluster may be pronounced [ʃ].Steewi 11:24, 23 September 2007 (UTC)

The only thing I know about Faroese is that it's almost impossible to deduce the pronunciation from the spelling. —Angr 11:35, 23 September 2007 (UTC)

It's actually not so very bad in this respect (certainly much better than English - just yesterday I learned how 'depot' is pronounced) but it is very challenging to deduce the spelling from the pronunciation - possibly more difficult than in English. Haukur 13:13, 23 September 2007 (UTC)

Well, which is it? In one breath you say it's better than English with regard to deducing pronunciation from spelling, and in the next you say it's more difficult than English. —Angr 13:17, 23 September 2007 (UTC)

There are two issues: Deducing the pronunciation from the spelling and deducing the spelling from the pronunciation. Faroese spelling makes the second of these atrociously difficult to do (lots of homophony) but the first is not as difficult (a given letter or cluster is almost always pronounced the same way). Haukur 13:27, 23 September 2007 (UTC)

The 'ð' is not pronounced. I can read the name for you if you like. I'm not a native speaker, though. Haukur 12:27, 23 September 2007 (UTC)

I'd IPA it [svɛŋkaskɛaːr]. Maybe they'd say [svaŋkaskɛaːr] in Suðuroy, I'm not sure - I've never been there. Haukur 13:10, 23 September 2007 (UTC)

Thank you. So the "g" is devoiced? And the first two "a" letters are short? I would have thought short vowels would be stable, not changed to ɛ. --Kjoonlee 17:11, 23 September 2007 (UTC)

G is always devoiced in Faroese (as well as in Danish and Icelandic). The 'ng' environment has tended to bring about changes (though, as I said, I think they may still say [svaŋk-] in Suðuroy which has the most conservative dialect). Compare with Icelandic where 'svangur' is pronounced as if it were written 'svángur' (except by some people from the West Fjords). Haukur 18:39, 23 September 2007 (UTC)

The article on the Faroese language mentions a ɡ sound, so I was a bit skeptic. Thanks for the hints! I really appreciate them. --Kjoonlee 19:44, 23 September 2007 (UTC)

Right, that article could be improved. The difference between the "fortis" and "lenis" consonants is one of aspiration, not voice. Haukur 19:54, 23 September 2007 (UTC)

Thank you. I've just noticed that Talk:Svangaskarð mentions [svENg_0asg_0_hEar\], in other words, [svɛŋg̊asg̊ʰɛaɹ]. --Kjoonlee 18:21, 25 September 2007 (UTC)

Right. Personally I think [g̊] is a rather fancy way to write [k] and I don't know what that aspiration is doing on the second [g̊]. I'm fine with ending it with [ɛaɹ], though. The diphthong probably wouldn't really be long except in somewhat artificial speech and [ɹ] is more accurate than [r] for most speakers. Be forewarned, though, that there are some pedants who insist on [r]. Haukur 20:46, 25 September 2007 (UTC)

I am "humbled"

Why do athletes and celebrities and politicians say they are "humbled" after a significant success? Wouldn't it make more sense to be "humbled" after an embarrassing defeat? Are they just stupid, or are they really trying to say they are "humble" as opposed to "humbled"; i.e., "I have just been crowned the victor, yet I am still humble." If so, bragging about how humble you are is hardly a sign of humility..... --The Fat Man Who Never Came Back 13:15, 23 September 2007 (UTC)

I.e., "To stand here, beneath the victor's crown, with the knowledge that the success was not wholly in my power and may as easily pass away outside of my control, is to see myself in a perspective that imposes humility on me." Call it a sincere didactic belief in the tragic vicissitudes of the world, or a shallow convention—either way, this desire to avoid cockiness by making this acknowledgment of the precarious footing on top of the world goes back at least to Pindar's Odes in honor of victors in the Olympics and other ancient athletic contests. And yes, of course, humility is something that can be performed to increase one's stature. Wareh 17:17, 23 September 2007 (UTC)

"When I keep the Rule, I break it too, because I feel pride in keeping it." —Angr 18:08, 23 September 2007 (UTC)

I think many of those who find themselves at the centre of attention are genuinely embarrassed by it, and some see instinctively that (as Rabindranath Tagore put it) "We come nearest to the great when we are great in humility." Xn4 18:36, 23 September 2007 (UTC)

Don't despair, Fat Man, I know what you mean and what the verb means. Yes, their language skills are not all they should be, but boy can they chuck a ball or make you love them or avoid a question. --Milkbreath 18:43, 23 September 2007 (UTC)

"He was a very humble man, and with good reason, he had much to be humble about." :-) StuRat 18:52, 23 September 2007 (UTC)

Of course, it was Churchill who quipped "Mr Attlee is a very modest man. Indeed, he has a lot to be modest about." But Margaret Thatcher much later said of Attlee "He was all substance and no show". Xn4 18:59, 23 September 2007 (UTC)

Thanks for providing the source. StuRat 19:05, 23 September 2007 (UTC)

That's right - any claim of modesty can be seen to be instrinsically flawed - however a combination of modesty AND stupidity explains a lot...87.102.17.252 18:56, 23 September 2007 (UTC)

Maybe they're going by the parable of Jesus in Luke 14:11, "For every one that exalteth himself shall be humbled; and he that humbleth himself shall be exalted". -- JackofOz 02:39, 24 September 2007 (UTC)

A question from es.wikipedia regarding the femeninity of boats

(This is a cross-post from the Wiktionary Tea Room here.)

The Spanish Wikipedians were surprised to encounter the sentence, "She was the only German submarine to be taken into Allied service and to fight for both sides in World War II." They're puzzling over the use of "she" in regards to this ship, since English doesn't generally assign genders to things that don't naturally have them (people, animals, etc.) I've already told them that it is common enough to refer to ships (and occasionally other machines and things) as "she".

Is this just some general, agreed-upon personification, or does it have particular roots, as some of them are speculating, in anglo-saxon and/or nautical tradition? --Dvortygirl 18:57, 23 September 2007 (UTC)

I would guess it came about from lonely sailors (probably the same group that looked at a sea cow and saw a mermaid). StuRat 19:03, 23 September 2007 (UTC)

<stormwarning>MCP remark on the horizon</stormwarning>: Admiral Nimitz said "Because she costs a lot in paint and powder to be eye-pleasing and ready to go out." Xn4 19:12, 23 September 2007 (UTC)

That strikes me as an extreme example of the use. It's no wonder the Spanish noticed it. That "she" sticks out like a sore thumb, and I probably wouldn't have written it that way. But it is correct enough, don't get me wrong. I think nobody knows for sure why we do that with ships, but we also do that generally. We say "Let 'er [her] rip!" and "Put 'er down there." There's an old song "She's a Grand Old Flag." I think that men, once the only shipboard sex, just tend to do that, out of their cavalierly and indiscriminately affectionate nature. In the case of ships, one can't rule out the power of superstition. I certainly wouldn't want to insult the thing that's keeping me out of range of sharkbite by calling her "it". ---Milkbreath 19:49, 23 September 2007 (UTC)

As was said, arbitrary personification rather than dimly remembered grammatical gender: scip was a neuter noun in Old English. Angus McLellan (Talk) 23:39, 23 September 2007 (UTC)

We tend to personify and feminize any powerful, fine-tuned piece of machinery such a ship, a car, a jet fighter or even a rifle. I've never stopped to wonder why we do that, but it is actually quite common, especially with ships. In fact, the nomenclature section of our article on Ship has the sentence "Almost invariably she would also have a bowsprit but this was not part of the definition." Freud would probably have something to say about this. 152.16.188.107 23:59, 23 September 2007 (UTC)

I have several female aquaintances who call their cars "he". FiggyBee 00:24, 24 September 2007 (UTC)

As a personal observation, I would associate this use of "she" with people with a close affinity with the object or class of objects so described, or people pretending to have such an affinity. A man (usually a man rather than a woman, I believe) might say "she's a beauty" proudly of his own boat/gun/etc, or ingratiatingly of another man's; a sailor might describe any boat as "she"; I (a landlubber) would feel ridiculous doing so. I'm not sure about personification: I guess it's illustrated by naming the object. Certainly all ships have names, but only small private boats have female names (unless they're named after some notable, as with the Queen Mary). If an individual give a name to their favourite car/gun/etc, the pronoun would accord with the gender of the name. Do FiggyBee's acquaintances call their cars "Bob", "Jack", "Carlos", etc? If not, I suggest using "he" is just jocular inversion of the sexist stereotype. jnestorius^(talk) 01:34, 24 September 2007 (UTC)

I find it doubly odd that we continue the feminization even when the ship is named after a man. Hence, this line from our article on the aircraft carrier, the USS FDR, "On 13 September 1948, Franklin D. Roosevelt sailed from Norfolk for a second tour of duty with the Mediterranean forces, from which she returned 23 January 1949." And people think the US isn't ready for a female president... Matt Deres 02:02, 24 September 2007 (UTC)

It should, of course, say "...the Franklin D. Roosevelt sailed...". —Angr 04:10, 24 September 2007 (UTC)

When I was designing firmware, I had several coworkers who'd call the machine he. —Tamfang 06:27, 30 September 2007 (UTC)