The Dangerous Dictionary!

[cambrensis]

When I was a lad at school we were give a piece of English to translate into Spanish. Its title was "The Boyhood of Will Shakespeare". One of my contemporaries translated "Will" as "Testamento"! (VBG) _ He had not learned the first rule - Never translate a name!! The secondary rule is always to make sure you understand exactly what your core language means before you use a dictionary to find a word or phrase.

There's a lovely example today from BBC Wales.. I'm still grinning at the idiocy! The Asda supermarket in Cwmbran (Crow Valley) in Monmouthshire had the sign "Alcohol Free" in English and some idiot who did not speak the old language, but simply used a dictionary, had put up alongside it "Alcohol am ddim" (Alcohol for nothng!!!) It should have read "Di-Alcohol"!! (without Alcohol). English of course, depends here on word positioning "Alcohol Free" as opposed to "Free Alcohol". I'd have loved to be at the checkout!!

[Anniemcc2]

[moonwitch]

This reminds me of the calls to Meebo for German translations and when she wasn't quick enough to reply I tried to help by posting translations from the google translation

Then Meebo would turn up and politely tell me what I had written lol

[cambrensis]

Another one this morning, not in Wales this time:

The "experts" have announced that the rabbit was not introduced to this island by the Normans, as they'd always thought but by the Romans. Well I've heard about the Norman rabbit since in my teens and always known that to be rubbish. The word is Norman French, as is the word "dog" by the way...dictionaries often say that the word "dog" is of "unknown origin"...hmmm!

It's all quite simple really. I knew the "rabbit" story to be rubbish as the Welsh word is "cwningen" (pr. coon-ING-en). This appears to be closely linked to the Greek word, "kouneli". We traded with the Greeks before the coming of the Romans and we know that the lingua franca of the Romans was Greek so it mght be from ether source. The Romans left in 383 A.D. so that puts us about 700 years before the Normans! As they say "an expert is someone who knows more and more about less and less"!

"Dog"? Well the French word "dogue" means "guard", so now we know! We also know why "fire dogs" are so-called as well! No mystery....and older English country boys still use the word "coney" for "rabbit".

[astral276]

Well I've heard about the Norman rabbit since in my teens and always known that to be rubbish.

The blue rabbit's name was 'Wilberforce' not 'Norman'.

[Posbear]

Off topic a bit, but related to the post above.

My hobby is making virtual model railways...how's this for a coincidence?
A rabbit-warren type Welsh model railway work in progress.

full sized image here... https://images.n3vgames.com/trainzpo...e-Cwningar.jpg

[HerMajesty]

Funny! Surprising how much in language is mis-translated. The rabbit news is interesting - carbon dated to about 100 AD. I wonder what they called them.

I like the train model......never thought about virtual construction of such things...……….saves space, and you don't have to dust them! Good job.

[cambrensis]

Off topic a bit, but related to the post above.

My hobby is making virtual model railways...how's this for a coincidence?
A rabbit-warren type Welsh model railway work in progress.

Interesting! The caption reads "Village (of) Rabbit Warren"

[cambrensis]

Funny! Surprising how much in language is mis-translated. The rabbit news is interesting - carbon dated to about 100 AD. I wonder what they called them.

They'd have calleed it "cwningen" or something similar as the British language had been here several thousand years by then. The word is probably cognate with the Greek rather than derived from it. The Romans dd not withdraw until 383 A.D. under Maximilianus Maximus (known to us as "Maxim Wledig")= (Maxie the Country Boy). The Greeks had been trading here for tin (known as the "Tin Islands") for several hundred years BC and AD. Christianity was here by the 3rd Century at the latest. The Germanic tribes did not start to invade until the 5th Century A.D., the Norman French arriving in the 11th Century and taking over the whole caboodle. It was the Normans who first called the main island "Grande Bretagne" (Large Britain) to distinguish it from their next-door neighbour in France, "Bretagne"(Brittany). In Welsh this island is called "Prydain" whereas Brittany is referred to as "Llydaw." Obviously, therefore, we do not refer to the size of Britain as it is self evident and there is nothing with which to compare it.