Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Language/2010 March 9

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March 9

Reforms of Russian orthography

"However, dialectal studies have shown that, in certain regional dialects, a degree of aural distinction is retained even today in syllables once denoted with ѣ."

Which dialects are theses? What is the degree?100110100 (talk) 00:23, 9 March 2010 (UTC)

This sounds like a question for the article talk page. The {{clarify}} template can also help. rʨanaɢ ^talk/_contribs 00:37, 9 March 2010 (UTC)

sbd.

What is the meaning of "sbd." and "sbd"?100110100 (talk) 00:32, 9 March 2010 (UTC)

[1]

Sbd. = somebody. Sth. = something. Deor (talk) 00:36, 9 March 2010 (UTC)

Uhry/Uhersho vs. Maďarsko

The Czechs use "Uhry" or "Uhersko" to refer to Hungary before 1918 and "Maďarsko" to refer to it since then. Uhry is related to the exonym "Hungary" while "Maďarsko" is akin to the Hungarian endonym "Magyarország."

How and why was this change made? Did any other languages (other than Slovak) make a similar change after World War I?

Perhaps the Hungarians asked the world to use a derivative of "Magyar" to refer to Hungary after WWI, but I would find it strange if the Czechs and Slovaks were one of the few countries that complied with a Hungarian request considering Hungary and Czechoslovakia were not on good terms after WWI. -- Mwalcoff (talk) 02:33, 9 March 2010 (UTC)

To the second part of the question: the same situation is in Serbo-Croatian, and pre-WWI state is referred to as "Ugarska" (hr:Austro-Ugarska), while the modern state is "Mađarska". I don't know when the change in language exactly took place though, but 1918 seems likely. My speculation is as follows: ethnic Hungarians have been even before referred to as "Mađari". When modern Hungary was formed after WWI, it was perceived as the first nation-state of Magyars, thus the new name got accepted. In previous incarnations, especially before the Austro-Hungarian Compromise of 1867, it was a supra-ethnic state, and the "ugar-" exonym was actually taken from Austrian German, which was the dominant constituent of the Monarchy. No such user (talk) 08:54, 9 March 2010 (UTC)

In Romania, Hungarians apparently find the term "unguri" mildly offensive, so they prefer "maghiari" - IIRC "unguri/Hungarians" stems from Latin while "maghiari/Magyars" stems from their own language. Rimush (talk) 11:55, 9 March 2010 (UTC)

Gulch of Terror

Is that a reasonable translation of وادي الهول Wādī al-Hūl? For هول I can only find "sphinx", though in Lane's dict there is a derivative that means "terrible". "Terrible Valley" wouldn't be so melodramatic, unless the Arabic is itself melodramatic. kwami (talk) 02:35, 9 March 2010 (UTC)

According to the Dictionary of Modern Written Arabic, هول is vocalized hawl, and means "terror, fright, alarm" etc. It's abu-l-hawl which means "sphinx"... AnonMoos (talk) 04:18, 9 March 2010 (UTC)

(For some reason, "Gulch of Terror" sounds to me like it could be the name of a locale in Monty Python and the Holy Grail. Melodramatic indeed!} rʨanaɢ ^talk/_contribs 04:24, 9 March 2010 (UTC)

That could be a good name for what the Bridge of Death crosses. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 04:48, 9 March 2010 (UTC)

Thanks! Now I just have to figure out whether s.o. transcribed it wrong, or if this is another (perhaps local) vocalization. kwami (talk) 08:11, 9 March 2010 (UTC)

To me (in the UK) "Gulch" suggests something somewhere in the Wild West and nowhere else. "Valley of Terror" (or "Vale of Terror" if you want to be more poetic). "Valley of the Shadow of Death", anyone? --ColinFine (talk) 08:56, 9 March 2010 (UTC)

I'm also from the UK and agree "gulch" sounds wrong. I think wadi is quite widely understood here, but if you had to translate it I would go for ravine for a large one and gully for a smaller feature. "Valley" or "Vale" suggests a more gentle affair, like the Thames Valley or Vale of Evesham. Just an opinion though. Alansplodge (talk) 10:48, 9 March 2010 (UTC)

Actually, "valley" in the Psalm 23 is a mistranslation. The original line goes: Gam qi elech be'gei tsalmavet, lo eira ra qi atta 'imadi. Here "gei" ("gai" when not in conjunction with another noun) means "a ravine" or "a narrow valley", but not a wadi. Wadi is mostly associated with (seasonal) water stream in the desert; "gai" (ravine) is a narrow passage. To the original poster: a wadi is a wadi, it is a valid English noun. --Dr Dima (talk) 17:33, 9 March 2010 (UTC)

I believe hawl would be pronounced hōl in Egyptian Arabic.--Cam (talk) 04:07, 10 March 2010 (UTC)

Difference Between Aggressive Skates And Inline Skates

Here, there is a difference between aggressive skates and inline skates.

Here's a picture of the aggressive skates.

Here's a picture of the aggressive skates with the inline skates.

I thought that the brake pad at the end of the skate was dangerous. Is this the difference?174.3.110.108 (talk) 02:46, 9 March 2010 (UTC)

Aggressive inline skating#Skate description looks like it would have the info you're looking for. Brakes wouldn't work out too well for many things that a person might try on an aggressive skate...but support, durability, and having easier to replace parts appear to be the major differences. --Onorem♠Dil 02:58, 9 March 2010 (UTC)

fixed

When the font is gold, does it mean that it is edited? Is that why the post says "fixd"?174.3.110.108 (talk) 05:02, 9 March 2010 (UTC)

Cotton

Why is cotton called Long Staple, and Extra Long Staple?100110100 (talk) 09:00, 9 March 2010 (UTC)

These links may help: Staple (wool) (I know it's about wool but the disamb. page seems to refer to textiles in general)...here, here, and here.--Dpr (talk) 10:23, 9 March 2010 (UTC)

staple is a reference to the length of the fiber. Googlemeister (talk) 17:31, 9 March 2010 (UTC)

C20th.

What is C20th.?100110100 (talk) 09:35, 9 March 2010 (UTC)

Twentieth century. --TammyMoet (talk) 09:55, 9 March 2010 (UTC)

Linguistics - Th Sound -> F Sound

I have to analyse steve irwin's (australian icon) speech patterns. I have noticed that he replaces the th (θ) sound with f, eg: something -> somefing, Think -> Fink.

I was thinking ellison but the sound isnt really weakened its more replaced.

Full disclosure: This is homework for my English Language(Linguistics) class. I tried to work it out but i couldnt so im asking for help here.

~cheers Jake —Preceding unsigned comment added by 124.181.8.240 (talk) 12:07, 9 March 2010 (UTC)

Is Th-fronting what you're looking for? ~ mazca ^talk 12:15, 9 March 2010 (UTC)

The question is whether Irwin does this all the time or only in some words. Mazca, since this is a homework problem I imagine it has something to do with phonological rules.

Jake, what you need to do is look at the environments when th-fronting happens here. In particular, what do /f/ and /m/ have in common? rʨanaɢ ^talk/_contribs 17:57, 9 March 2010 (UTC)

Harry Potter-ish thing translated to Latin

Dear Reference desk

Can you please give me the translation on this quote? I want to know what "Wit beyond measure is man's greatest treasure" would look in Latin, so please? 130.238.56.201 (talk) 12:37, 9 March 2010 (UTC)

Is it actually from Harry Potter? That has been translated into Latin. Adam Bishop (talk) 14:30, 9 March 2010 (UTC)

It is: [2].—Emil J. 14:40, 9 March 2010 (UTC)

I'm not sure all the Harry Potter books have been translated into Latin, though. +Angr 15:39, 9 March 2010 (UTC)

Only the first two books have. I own both:) Wrad (talk) 15:51, 9 March 2010 (UTC)

Well, the quote seems to be from Order of the Phoenix which is, what, the fifth? Looks like we'll have to come up with an amateur translation of the quote into Latin then. +Angr 16:40, 9 March 2010 (UTC)

But it won't rhyme? DRosenbach ^{(Talk | Contribs)} 16:47, 9 March 2010 (UTC)

I haven't read the book and am unsure of the meaning or context of the English sentence, but would something like "Ingenium immodicum est hominis maximus thesaurus" work? Or is wit meant in the "humor" sense? Deor (talk) 17:02, 9 March 2010 (UTC)

Ingenium is right in the context; it's definitely wit in the sense of cleverness. I'd go with immensum rather than immodicum since the latter can imply "excessive". For "treasure" I'd use opes rather than thesaurus, which is more like a store room. So Ingenium immensum est hominis maximae opes. (Or sunt? I'm not sure what to do when the subject and the predicate nominative don't agree in number.) It still sounds awfully translated-out-of-English though, and of course a literal translation into Latin won't rhyme. What would Julius (Caesar) do? +Angr 20:12, 9 March 2010 (UTC)

He would say "Veni, vidi, witti", don't you think? alteripse (talk) 20:21, 9 March 2010 (UTC)

Well "beyond measure" often connotes excessiveness in English; that's why I went with immodicum. As I said, I'm in the dark regarding the context. Deor (talk) 21:05, 9 March 2010 (UTC)

How about "ingenium praeter modum est summum hominis commodum"? Then, like the English, it rhymes and has the same number of syllables on both sides of the verb (well, as long as you ignore the original vowel lengths). "Praeter modum" or "extra modum" are both "beyond measure", and although "commodum" is not literally a treasure, it does mean a reward, or something very pleasing or convenient. "Summum" is another word for "greatest". Adam Bishop (talk) 21:07, 9 March 2010 (UTC)

Sounds good to me. Very clever. Deor (talk) 21:12, 9 March 2010 (UTC)

Ingenium lepidissimum homini pretiosissimum? Maid Marion (talk) 08:48, 10 March 2010 (UTC)

Ah, even cleverer. Adam Bishop (talk) 14:00, 10 March 2010 (UTC)

Not cleverer than your own elegant version Adam, but an option for the OP to consider if he is more interested in the pithiness and jingle of the original than in its strict sense. Maid Marion (talk) 14:06, 11 March 2010 (UTC)

Phrase in German

My late father took a German language class in college. When we were growing up, when something happened that wasn't ideal, he said something like "Das ist abba shada". Something that was to mean "that's too bad" in English. Please tell me what he was trying say. --Reticuli88 (talk) 15:02, 9 March 2010 (UTC)

Probably Das ist aber schade. --Richardrj ^{talk email} 15:08, 9 March 2010 (UTC)

Thanks. What does that literally translate to in English? How do you pronounce it? --Reticuli88 (talk) 15:10, 9 March 2010 (UTC)

A truly literal translation would be "that is but [a] pity". ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 20:12, 9 March 2010 (UTC)

That would be the word-for-word translation, but it would mean something slightly different...I'd understand "that is but a pity" to mean something like "just a pity/nothing more than a pity". For the (ultimately untranslatable) "aber", see German modal particle -- Ferkelparade π 21:13, 9 March 2010 (UTC)

A slightly more faithful translation is "But that's a pity." -Ehrenkater (talk) 15:53, 10 March 2010 (UTC)

It just means "that's a pity" and you pronounce it pretty much as you said, but I'll defer to another editor who knows IPA... --Richardrj ^{talk email} 15:15, 9 March 2010 (UTC)

I'm not sure the OP is asking for IPA, but it's [ˈdas ɪst ˈaːbɐ ˈʃaːdə].—Emil J. 16:45, 9 March 2010 (UTC)

And if you can't help enjoying someone else's "less than ideal" fortune, that of course is schadenfreude. alteripse (talk) 20:18, 9 March 2010 (UTC)

Japanese question

Screenshots! Yay!

To the right are a couple of screenshots from a game project I'm currently working on. The level I'm currently creating is set in Japan, and I'd like to have a couple of shop signs etc in Japanese. My knowledge of Japanese doesn't go far beyond using a dictionary, so I'd appreciate if someone who actually knows Japanese could have a look at them and tell me whether or not they are correct. Here's what the signs are supposed to say:

• Top left: Four Dragons (the name of a bar)
• Top right: Cheater's Guild (I know the sign is ugly, but these buildings just exist as a convenience for my beta testers and will be removed before release...still, I'd prefer the sign to be correct)
• Middle left: Ninja Academy
• Middle right: Jungle/Forest (it's the legend on a map of a jungle area)
• Bottom left: Shuriken (tattoo)
• Bottom right: Chiba (tattoo)

Thanks in advance! -- Ferkelparade π 17:00, 9 March 2010 (UTC)

Basically kanji are correct. But a little bit strange. Four dragons in Japanese is 四匹の龍 or 四頭の龍. 四龍 looks like Chinese. I have no idea what it actually is in Chinese and it's understandable to Japanese though. 詐欺師ギルド is OK. But you can use 組合 or 協会 instead of ギルド, if you want kanji. The detail of two kanji, 忍 and 者 are wrong. 忍者大学 is Ninja University/College. Is that what you want? Might be 忍者学院 or 忍者道場. What kind of school do you have in mind? 森林 is OK. Or just 森. The kanji of two tattoos are correct. But they are unrealistic to a native speaker. Oda Mari (talk) 18:41, 9 March 2010 (UTC)

Thanks a lot. I'll change the "Four Dragons" sign to be Japanese instead of Chinese. When you say the tattoos would be unrealistic, do you mean the words would not be written with the Kanji I used, or it would be unrealistic for someone to have a tattoo like that? If the latter, that's intentional - it makes sense in the context of the game's story :) -- Ferkelparade π 21:16, 9 March 2010 (UTC)

A tattoo of Sonny Chiba would be better :P Rimush (talk) 21:24, 9 March 2010 (UTC)

I went into dragons. Sorry, if you meant Dragon King, it's 四竜 and OK. But the kanji is 竜, not 龍. I found a fictional Chinese mafia 四龍 in two manga, Hunter Cats and Sheif by Hiroshi Aro. As I do not know about your game, it's not easy to advice what is the best translation. Thinking about it's a game and fictional, you can use 四竜 as a name of the bar. As for tattoo, it's the latter and OK. Oda Mari (talk) 05:11, 10 March 2010 (UTC)

I think what Mari means is that it is faux pas. Like what I think she means is that if the player sees that, they would be embarrassed for you.174.3.110.108 (talk) 07:15, 10 March 2010 (UTC)

I need some help with Hebrew please

Could a speaker of Hebrew add niqqud to the Hebrew script names of the following Israeli football players? Thank you.

Name	Hebrew script	With niqqud
Yossi Shai Benayoun	יוסף שי בניון	יוֹסֵף שַי בֵנָיוּן
Elyaniv Felix Barda	אליניב פליקס ברדה	אֵלְיָנִיב פֶלִיקְס בַרְדָה
Amit Ben Shushan	עמית בן שושן	עָמִית בֶן שׁוּשָן
Ben Sahar	בן סהר	בֵן סַהַר
Shimon Gershon	שמעון גרשון	שִמְעוֹן גֶרְשׁוֹן
Omer Golan	עומר גולן	עֹמֶר גוֹלָן
Idan Tal	עידן טל	עִידָן טַל
Barak Yitzhaki	ברק יצחקי	בָרָק יִצְחָקִי
Aviram Baruchyan	אבירם ברוכיאן	אֲבִירָם בָרוּכְיָאן
David "Dedi" Ben Dayan	דוד "דדי" בן דיין	דָוִד "דֶדִי" בֶן דַיָן
Rahamim 'Klemi' Saban	רחמים 'קלמי' סבן	רַחֲמִים 'קְלֶמִי' סַבָן
Salim Tuama (Toama?)	סלים טועמה	סָלִים טוּעַמָה

--62.204.152.181 (talk) 19:45, 9 March 2010 (UTC)

Hebrew Computing Information (Penn State) might be helpful. -- Wavelength (talk) 19:54, 9 March 2010 (UTC)

There's really no need. Modern Hebrew is written without niqqud and to add it would be superfluous, not to mention peculiar. The romanized transcriptions (with a correction I made) indicated in the page names are perfectly adequate, with the exception of the Israeli Arab player, Salim Tuama (Toama?). You'll see I've added a query which you might want to post here if no response is elicited on that Talk page. -- Deborahjay (talk) 22:13, 9 March 2010 (UTC)

Anyways, I added niqqud as you requested. HOOTmag (talk) 22:22, 9 March 2010 (UTC)

Thank you very much, HOOTmag. I intended the last column for the names with niqqud and the second one just for the everyday-used names, without niqqud. I filled in the second column so the third one wouldn't remain empty. But I spotted something (which could be completely OK, however). You have only added a dot above the letter shin in one case - in the name שִמְעוֹן גֶרְשׁוֹן. All the other ש's are bare or with a vowel-indicating niqqud below. I thought shin couldn't exist without one of the two dots above - the sin dot (שׂ) when it represents the sound /s/, and the shin dot (שׁ) when it stands for the sound /ʃ/. Is that really so? --62.204.152.181 (talk) 08:57, 10 March 2010 (UTC)

Due to techinical problems in Wikipedia (and in Wikipedia only), I couldn't add the dot above "ש"s which have vowel-indicating niqqud below. Anyways, all of the "ש"s here should have a "shin" dot (because they're pronounced "sh"). Note that even regular Hebrew texts with niqqud - don't always add the "shin" dot (although they must always add the "sin" dot). Note that also the letter Ш in Bulgarian - which is pronounced "sh" - has no dot above, although it has stemmed (historically) from the Hebrew ש. Note also that - due to the same technical problem in Wikipedia - I couldn't add dots inside the ב,ג,ד, although most of them should have a dot inside (excluding the ב in אליניב and in אבירם, the ד in עידן, the second ד of דוד, and the second ד in דדי). How come that a Bulgarian speaker is interested in Hebrew and/or in Israeli football players? HOOTmag (talk) 14:47, 10 March 2010 (UTC

It wouldn't suprise me if some of the problems are due to the fact that the Unicode "combining classes" for Hebrew diacritics are completely wrong, which means that Hebrew letters with multiple diacritics will almost always display incorrectly, except for a few people who have access to rather specialized and high-end fonts. The original mistake occurred around 1991, but the Unicode gods have decreed that all the errors are set in concrete, and absolutely nothing can be done to change them now, so that everybody will have to work around the errors which needlessly complicate things until the end of time (according to the Unicode Consortium, apparently)... AnonMoos (talk) 15:01, 11 March 2010 (UTC)

Hmm. I don't have any specialized or high-end fonts, in fact, I have only the handful of free fonts shipped by default with (a rather outdated version of) Fedora Core, yet it works just fine: דָּוִד, שִׁמְעוֹן.—Emil J. 16:10, 11 March 2010 (UTC)

No, it doesn't work fine: when you tried to put a "shin" dot above the right hand of the ש, it was replaced in Wilipedia by a "sin" dot, i.e. the dot moved to the left hand of the ש. Also דוד (when written with niqqud) is not displayed well in Wikipedia: The dot should be inside the ד, but Wikipedia displays it behind the ד. HOOTmag (talk) 16:55, 11 March 2010 (UTC)

Wikipedia has nothing to do with it, it's your browser or font (though AnonMoos suggests that it's not really their fault). I can see the shin dot on the right and the dagesh inside the dalet, as expected.—Emil J. 17:14, 11 March 2010 (UTC)

Oh, realy? I couldn't think of that option, untill you told me what you see! HOOTmag (talk) 19:09, 11 March 2010 (UTC)

On second thought, it is the fault of the browser. According to the normative principle P5 in the Conformance chapter of the Unicode standard: Nonspacing marks with different, non-zero combining classes may occur in different orders without affecting either the visual display of a combining character sequence or the interpretation of that sequence.[3] The relevant Hebrew diacritics have each a different combining class, hence their relative order should not matter: 05D3(dalet)+05BC(dagesh, c.c.21)+05B8(qamats, c.c.18) and 05D3+05B8+05BC are canonically equivalent character sequences. If the browser displays them differently, it is broken, irrespective of which of the two forms is the normalization form (which happens to be the second one, which indeed follows a counterintuitive order; this is also what Wikipedia outputs). This does not require any specialized technology with Hebrew-related exceptions, it simply follows from a straightforward interpretation of basic principles of the Unicode standard. And since dagesh and qamats do not typographically interact with each other (they are placed in quite different positions), the standard is correct in assigning them different combining classes, it's not an error. I can see that there are some dubious aspects of the c.c. assignments, but this is not one of them.

On the practical side: the standard suggests that one can prevent normalization by inserting U+034F "combining grapheme joiner" between the diacritics. HOOTmag, do דּ͏ָוִד ‎(05D3+05BC+034F+05B8+...) and שׁ͏ִמְעוֹן‎ (05E9+05C1+034F+05B4+...) display correctly for you?—Emil J. 13:49, 12 March 2010 (UTC)

The Unicode standard can say that theoretically it supposedly shouldn't be a problem (in some ideal metaphysical world other than the one we live in) -- but the simple fact remains that in the real world, it creates actual real difficulties for the creators or programmers of fonts and text display programs which have to deal with multiple languages / scripts (of which Hebrew is only one among many). The fact that the diacritic combining classes enforce a completely wrong order of diacritics is a purely needlessly pointlessly negative thing, which has no compensating advantages or justification other than a declaration by the Unicode authorities that stupid errors made in 1991 can never be fixed, no matter how many problems this creates for other people... AnonMoos (talk) 17:40, 12 March 2010 (UTC)

You misunderstand how the system works. The combining classes do not enforce any order, on the contrary, any order is valid. In the hypothetical case that the Unicode consortium decides to change the classes so that the normalized form puts dagesh before other diacritics, it will not have any effect on display programs: both orders will still be valid inputs, and they will still be equivalent, hence the browser above which displays them differently will still be broken. The only purpose of normalization is to have a well-defined unique representation of each character sequence so that two texts can be compared for equality, and for this purpose it does not matter what the actual order is, only that it is unique. If you misuse the normalization order for other purposes, you can't blame Unicode if it turns out not to work. This seems to be just another instance of Unicode-is-evil bashing by making Unicode responsible for errors of others, a popular sport indeed.—Emil J. 18:58, 12 March 2010 (UTC)

That seems to be another case of something which sounds good in theory -- but what happens in the real world is that characters representing diacritic are moved into a linguistically/orthographically/typographically "unnatural" order by normalization (Wikipedia seems to strictly enforce normalization, by the way), and then multilingual software programs and fonts (which are intended to deal with many languages besides Hebrew) have more difficulty in dealing with the diacritics in this unnatural order than they would if they were in a more natural order. It isn't calling Unicode "evil" to point out that it's kind of stupid to leave unfixed an error which only creates problems (and has no compensating advantages) for over 18 years and counting... AnonMoos (talk) 15:49, 13 March 2010 (UTC)

Not only is the niqud unnecessary, but it makes some of the names pretty hard to read in Hebrew - see how the floating vowel breaks up the name Omer? --Dweller (talk) 14:52, 10 March 2010 (UTC)

It breaks up the name - in wikipedia only, due to some technical problems existent in Wikepdia only. HOOTmag (talk) 16:43, 10 March 2010 (UTC)

What I see in the name Omer is that the vav of the unpointed text has been deleted in the pointed text. That shouldn't oughta happen. +Angr 15:22, 10 March 2010 (UTC)

Ha! I missed that! --Dweller (talk) 15:29, 10 March 2010 (UTC)

In a pointed text, the vav of Omer ought to be deleted! HOOTmag (talk) 16:43, 10 March 2010 (UTC)

Our Israeli friends have the vav - and no niqud. --Dweller (talk) 15:30, 10 March 2010 (UTC)

That there is a vav in unpointed text (ktiv male) does not imply that there is one in pointed text. The same goes for Ben Dayan's second yod, btw.—Emil J. 19:26, 10 March 2010 (UTC)

HOOTmag, thanks very much for recognising my being Bulgarian from my individuality-lacking IP-address. You encouraged me to create an account. After four years of actively reading Wikipedia, several months of contributing to the RD and once being asked to do so, I finally created one. I chose a meaningful English word for username so I can be more easily recognised, but I'd like to sign as "магьосник", which is the Bulgarian for theurgist or magician. Let me answer you. It's that my two major interests are football and languages. I know the Hebrew alphabet; all I need to be able to pronounce a Hebrew word is niqqud. Without it I can still recognise names of countries, cities, famous people, etc. The Israeli players listed above are all goalscorers for Israel in the qualifying campaigns for Euro 2008 and World Cup 2010, except Argentina-born Roberto Colautti and Nigeria-born Toto Tamuz. Now I will complain about a problem that I consider quite important, but seemingly no one else in Bulgaria cares about. In Bulgarian you write what you hear. For example the name Michael should be rendered Майкъл if it is borne by an Englishman and Михаел if it is the name of a German. But the names of foreign people (especially sportspeople), foreign football teams, etc are constantly being Anglicised or Germanicised by the mass media in Bulgaria due to the journalists' lack of knowledge about the rules of pronunciation of rarer languages. Famous people from the Netherlands, Scandinavia, the Arab World, India, (and especially) Eastern Asia are widely known by the Bulgarians with wrong names, thanks to the media. If you talk to a Bulgarian and mention a characteristic Swedish name as it should sound, they will typically look on you amazed, and maybe will not understand what you are talking about. To my opinion, that's quite disturbing. What would a foreigner think of us if he knew what we've done with their name (and the reasons for that)? There is an eternally ongoing dispute among the Bulgarian Wikipedians about naming the articles. Generally we choose the correct names, but some insist that in some cases we should use the widely-spread ones, because they have already been established in that form or the correct ones are too strange for a reader to recognise. I am quite worried about that. I thought if we some day decide to create an article like this, we would need the proper Israeli names. That's why I posted this request (the other reason is my pure interest). --Магьосник (talk) 03:21, 11 March 2010 (UTC)

Ok, so you'd probably be interested in knowing the following facts:

1. The first player in the table, appears - with his formal name - on the Hebrew column, and with his nickname - on the English column. He never uses the formal first name, unless when he has to show his passport, and the like.
2. Two players' names include (in both columns) both the formal name and the nickname: דוד דדי (the word on the right is the formal first name - never used in daily speech, and the name on the left is the nickname - never used in formal contexts), and the same is with רחמים קלמי (I really don't know why you decided to use apostrophes when you wrote the nicknames, and why you decided to use different kinds of apostrophe).
3. All of the names are stressed on the final syllable, except for the following words - stressed on the next-to-final syllable: פליקס, עומר, דדי, קלמי, טועמה. Note also that the word יצחקי is stressed on the final syllable - in formal context only, and is stressed on the next-to-final syllable - in the colloquial speach only.
4. All of the first names (excluding the nicknames) are purely Hebrew names, except for סלים, whose mother tongue is Arabic. Most of the last names are purely Hebrew names, except for the following: בניון, ברדה, ברוכיאן, סבן, טועמה.
5. Regarding the problem in Bulgaria (and actually in every other place in the world) with pronouncing foreign names: The Hebrew speakers who don't read Arabic have the same problem with the name סלים טועמה (Toama/Tuama), which is originally written in Arabic rather than in Hebrew (In Arabic it's formally pronounced Tuama).

HOOTmag (talk) 11:24, 11 March 2010 (UTC)

Thanks once again. I'm usually very glad when I see such profound explanations. I used two different kinds of apostrophes for the nicknames just because I copied all the names from the respective Wikipedia articles. My computer doesn't have a Hebrew alphabet layout (and I don't know how to supply it with one; whenever I wish to write something in Hebrew, I have to either copy and paste it, or, if unavailable, copy and paste the letters one by one). I copied דוד "דדי" בן דיין from here and רחמים 'קלמי' סבן from here. I didn't know which of those is preferable in Hebrew, so I decided not to change them. And, by the way, פליקס does not seem a purely Hebrew name to me. Is it? --Магьосник (talk) 11:55, 11 March 2010 (UTC)

When referring to the purley Hebrew first names and last names, I didn't intend to refer to middle names. Felix (which is realy not a Hebrew name) is neither a "first name" nor a "last name", but rather is a middle name. By the way, Felix is the only middle name in the table (Note that בן is a part of the surname, except in בן סהר - where בן is the first name) HOOTmag (talk) 12:51, 11 March 2010 (UTC)

Death's head - what?

The page SS-Totenkopfverbände explains that Totenkopf means "Death's head" but doesn't give a definition for the entire term. What would be the best English-language rendition of Totenkopfverbände? (Queried on its Talk page; kindly reply there or here). -- Deborahjay (talk) 22:25, 9 March 2010 (UTC)

Some pretty good responses on that talk page. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 03:51, 10 March 2010 (UTC)

I googled [Totenkopfverbände] and one of the items claims it means "Death's Head Batallions". I'll check my German-English dictionary and see. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 03:43, 10 March 2010 (UTC)

Toten is a prefix meaning Death, to various words include Kopf, which is head, hence Totenkopf is a skull, or skull and crossbones. The prefix Ver is a commonly-used German construct, I'm not sure exactly what it denotes. Verband, when used in a military context, means formation or unit. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 03:49, 10 March 2010 (UTC)

Google translate doesn't have anything for the word as a whole, but when it's split up as Totenkopf verbände, it gives "skull associations" — Ƶ§œš¹ _{[aɪm ˈfɹ̠ˤʷɛ̃ɾ̃ˡi]} 05:21, 10 March 2010 (UTC)

In military usage, it means "units", which is a bit more specific and fits this particular subject. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 05:30, 10 March 2010 (UTC)

From Leo Online Dictionary: [4] —Preceding unsigned comment added by 151.51.15.240 (talk) 07:36, 10 March 2010 (UTC)

Totenkopf simply means (a dead person's) skull. Pitke (talk) 12:54, 11 March 2010 (UTC)

That would be the literal meaning. However, I (= Original Poster of this query) was referring to the term in its emblematic usage in the SS context, both as the adopted name of a particular subset of the SS forces and its insignia displayed on uniforms and paraphernalia (e.g. rings).The idiomatic English-language term "Death's head" strikes me as entirely suitable as a context-dependent translation. More difficult was how to represent verbände – and while the meanings, derivations, and equivalents are helpful to know, I'm aiming for a canonical usage (if such exists). -- Deborahjay (talk) 09:20, 12 March 2010 (UTC)

Just an aside, that the "skull and crossbones" badge has a long history in connection with cavalry units in Germany; particularly in the armies of Brunswick and Prussia. The British 17th Lancers adopted the emblem on the death of General Wolfe with the "Or Glory" motto and it's still worn today by their descendants, the Queen's Royal Lancers. Alansplodge (talk) 11:40, 12 March 2010 (UTC)

Deborah, Verband is a very general term that can refer to any organized group of people. If you look up the singular at LEO, you see its meanings include "alliance, assembly, association, collective, confederation, federation, syndicate, union, organization". The German Wikipedia article de:Verband (Militär) is linked to our redirect Formation (military), so "Death's Head Formations" may be closest, although to English-speakers unfamiliar with military terminology that may sound like it refers to groups of people standing in such a way as to form the shape of a death's head (like a macabre pep squad), so maybe "Death's Head Units" would be better. +Angr 10:31, 12 March 2010 (UTC)