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BORBORYGM

Posted: Wed Nov 02, 2005 12:28 am
by Dr. Goodword

• borborygm •

Pronunciation: bor-bê-rig-êm • Hear it!

Part of Speech: Noun

Meaning: Grumbling of the bowels, the rumbling of the stomach after eating.

Notes: If you wish to speak medically, you can call this embarrassing sound a borgorymus, too. If you do, you have to remember that the plural is borborygmi. If you use our short form, you may simply say borborygms The adjective is borborygmic and borborology is the scientific study of the problem; however, up to the 17th century it meant "profanity". If you don't want your borborygms to go to waste, you might try a little after dinner gastromancy.

In Play: Today's word is the perfect word for the sound it names, a fact that has attracted writers for ages. Aldous Huxley complained about "the stertorous borborygms of the dyspeptic Carlyle" and Nabokov noted that "all the toilets and waterpipes in the house had been suddenly seized with borborygmic convulsions." Elizabeth Fenwick wrote in Long Way Down (1959), "The room was very quiet, except for its borborygmic old radiator."

Word History: This Good if funny Word came to us from Greek borborygmos via Latin to French borborygme, where English picked it up. It is clearly onomatopoetic, the imitation of a real sound in the sound of the word that names it. It is odd the French and English did not simplify this word to borborism, as the Greeks themselves ultimately did. (We hope Luciano Eduardo de Oliveira, who suggested today's word, happily digests his meals today without borborygmic accompaniment.)

Posted: Wed Nov 02, 2005 10:22 am
by Flaminius
If you wish to speak medically, you can call this embarrassing sound a borgorymus, too. If you do, you have to remember that the plural is borborygmi. If you use our short form, you may simply say borborygms. . . .
My brain is getting borborygmous trying to dig in to the anomalous plural.

Posted: Wed Nov 02, 2005 10:50 am
by Brazilian dude
(We hope Luciano Eduardo de Oliveira, who suggested today's word, happily digests his meals today without borborygmic accompaniment.)
Some seven years ago, when I started going to chatrooms, my nickname was Magenschleimhautentzündung (German for gastritis). Maybe Freud explains.
My brain is getting borborygmous trying to dig in to the anomalous plural.
So is mine.

Brazilian dude

Posted: Wed Nov 02, 2005 10:53 am
by tcward
Magenschleimhautentzündung (German for gastritis)
Dude!! How does that translate (literally) into English? I'd love to know... ;)

-Tim

Posted: Wed Nov 02, 2005 10:55 am
by Brazilian dude
der Magen, Mägen/Magen - stomach
der Schleim, Schleime - mucus
die Haut, Häute - skin
die Entzündung, Entzündungen - inflammation

Brazilian dude

Posted: Wed Nov 02, 2005 10:59 am
by tcward
Wow, German efficiency at its finest.

-Tim

Posted: Wed Nov 02, 2005 11:02 am
by Brazilian dude
Jawohl!

Brasilianer ohne Magenschleimhautentzündung

Posted: Wed Nov 02, 2005 3:34 pm
by M. Henri Day
...
der Schleim, Schleime - mucus
die Haut, Häute - skin...
«Schleimhaut» is, of course, mucous membrane - easy, Greasy, you ain't got far to slide, as named Freud might have put it....

Henri

Posted: Wed Nov 02, 2005 5:29 pm
by Stargzer
Wow, German efficiency at its finest.

-Tim
Perhaps Meticulousnous would be more Germane . . .

Posted: Wed Nov 02, 2005 5:42 pm
by Stargzer
...
der Schleim, Schleime - mucus
die Haut, Häute - skin...
«Schleimhaut» is, of course, mucous membrane - easy, Greasy, you ain't got far to slide, as named Freud might have put it....

Henri

Aha!

der Schleim --> mucus --> mucous -->slime (Definition 2).

I know of no one on this board who meets Definition 6. :) Then again, I'm not looking in a mirror at the moment, either.

Posted: Wed Nov 02, 2005 10:50 pm
by gailr
Checking for der Schleim....

-gailr

Posted: Thu Nov 03, 2005 12:41 am
by Stargzer
Took me a few seconds to recognize :) who was in the picture.

Speaking of Green Slime Syndrome . . .

Other Rēs Viridēs Lēvēs:

Wiki Slime

You Can't Do That On Television (Oh, Canada!)

Wiki YCDTOTV

ECE - Green Slime (for ferret fanciers)

The Green Slime (Memorable quote: [examining a charred corpse from which smoke is still rising] "He's dead.")

GREEN GLOW: NOT ONLY FOR HALLOWEEN

Re: BORBORYGM

Posted: Sun Nov 20, 2005 3:40 pm
by M. Henri Day
...

Pronunciation: bor-bê-rig-êm • Hear it!
Dr G, when I clicked on the link above, I heard zilch - neither a grumbling of bowels nor a rumbling of stomach - but was rather greeted by a silent notice 404 : Document Not Found. What's up ?...

Henri

Posted: Fri Jul 27, 2012 11:15 am
by Perry Lassiter
German loves what I call the boxcar effect. Whenever they need a new word, they don't coin it or remodel a couple of old words, they just cram two or three or six words together like a train adding boxcars. Sometimes makes it easy to figure out, and at other times impenetrable.

Posted: Fri Jul 27, 2012 12:01 pm
by LukeJavan8
true, that.