The words you can't translate თემის ავტორი: Chiara_M
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Chiara_M 
Local time: 05:43
ფრანგული -> იტალიური
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| Rebecca Hendry
გაერთიანებული სამეფო
Local time: 04:43
წევრი (2005)
ესპანური -> ინგლისური
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| A recent purchase. | Oct 23, 2005 |
Funnily enough, I bought this book yesterday as a Christmas present for my father. I couldn't resist having a flick through, and it's full of interesting language quirks. Highly recommended for a bit of light reading!
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The so-called french word I found in the article "SEIGNEUR-TERRASSE" does not exist in french. I checked in all my dictionaries to be completely positive, and on the web (the only links found are english and refered to this book).
It looks like a neologism (or a bad joke): "Someone who spends time, but not money, at a café.", what a cliché for us!
Makes me doubtful about the quality of the book and the research (if any) made by the author.
I think he should stop the... See more The so-called french word I found in the article "SEIGNEUR-TERRASSE" does not exist in french. I checked in all my dictionaries to be completely positive, and on the web (the only links found are english and refered to this book).
It looks like a neologism (or a bad joke): "Someone who spends time, but not money, at a café.", what a cliché for us!
Makes me doubtful about the quality of the book and the research (if any) made by the author.
I think he should stop the booze or refrain from using web translator.
[Edited at 2005-10-23 22:31] ▲ Collapse
| | | | | More on the authenticity of this book | Oct 24, 2005 |
Valérie M. wrote:
The so-called french word I found in the article "SEIGNEUR-TERRASSE" does not exist in french. I checked in all my dictionaries to be completely positive, and on the web (the only links found are english and refered to this book).
It looks like a neologism (or a bad joke): "Someone who spends time, but not money, at a café.", what a cliché for us!
Makes me doubtful about the quality of the book and the research (if any) made by the author.
This posting develops the theme Valérie raised.
Some excerpts:
De Boinod [the author] is no linguist (he's a researcher for the BBC comedy quiz show QI), but he claims to have read "over 280 dictionaries" and "140 websites" (or, according to his publisher's site, "approximately 220 dictionaries" and "150 websites" — take your pick). It's safe to assume that the fact-checking for such books is rather minimal — if a website says it, it must be true, right?
As an aside, the reliance on sketchy online dictionaries and wordlists can yield unintentionally humorous results. Take, for instance, the Maserati Kubang. Unveiled in 2003, this "concept car" is supposedly named after "a wind over Java." (Maserati has a tradition of naming cars after exotic-sounding winds.) Close, but no cigar — the actual word is kumbang, not kubang. Angin kumbang literally means "bumblebee wind" in Javanese and Indonesian, and it refers to a very dry south or southwesterly wind that blows into the port of Cirebon on the north coast of Java. But this got mangled on various websites listing winds of the world nd kumbang was changed to kubang. What does kubang mean in Indonesian? "Mudhole, mud puddle, quagmire." Probably not the image Maserati was going for!
[/quote]
The original article contains quite a few more interesting examples and further references.
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Antje Harder
შვედეთი
Local time: 05:43
შვედური -> გერმანული
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| Agobilles - "German"? | Oct 24, 2005 |
Valérie M. wrote:
The so-called french word I found in the article "SEIGNEUR-TERRASSE" does not exist in french.
The same applies to the so-calles German word "AGOBILLES": it doesn't exist at all. Well, it can be found on the web by now - there a lots of citations from the book...
If anything it is a French word:
http://www.languefrancaise.net/glossaire/detail.php?id=5027
(However, I cannot judge the quality of this website.)
So I suppose the book must be read with a certain caution.
Regards from Sweden
Antje
| | | | Marta Argat
Local time: 06:43
ჩინური -> უკრაინული
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| Bullsh*tnik :D | Oct 24, 2005 |
"A person very fond of cats or the one who deals a lot with cats" is the primary meaning of the coinage "koshatnik" (I esteem that word has a history of only a few decades), as "sobachatnik" (from "sobaka", a dog) is a dog lover. Well, it could be occasionally used for somebody selling stolen cats or somebody living with 40 cats in a one-bedroom apartment - as the word "teacher" could be used for a kind and intelligent teacher as well as for a rude and stupid teacher too ... See more
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"Someone with six fingers" is "shestipalyj" in Russian. 
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