How do you say cathedral in that language?

A discussion of the peculiarities of languages and the differences between them.
Garzo
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How do you say cathedral in that language?

Postby Garzo » Tue Mar 15, 2005 1:19 pm

I hope this isn't too cheeky! I've been working in Salisbury Cathedral, which is one of the most visited cathedrals in England, and noticed that the small, free guides at the entrance cover a good number of languages already (the Latvian one's now complete). I wondered if any of our contributors here would like to work on a translation of the guide (it's not all that long). As I have said, we already have it in a lot of languages, but we are missing Portuguese, Swedish and Norwegian. The only payment for such a task would be grateful thanks, and the knowledge that your work will be read by hundreds of tourists each year. I could post the English text here or e-mail it to you...

The cheeky lad Garzo
"Poetry is that which gets lost in translation" — Robert Frost

Brazilian dude
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Postby Brazilian dude » Tue Mar 15, 2005 2:22 pm

I could help you with the Portuguese, but give me a week or so to finish it because I've been extremely busy.

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Garzo
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Postby Garzo » Tue Mar 15, 2005 2:30 pm

Thanks, BD. I'm asking this as a favour, so there's no time limit, just the knowledge of Brazilian and Portuguese tourists reading your work!

In-spired?

Garzo.
"Poetry is that which gets lost in translation" — Robert Frost

anders
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Postby anders » Tue Mar 15, 2005 4:42 pm

Mail it.
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Brazilian dude
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Postby Brazilian dude » Tue Mar 15, 2005 6:33 pm

Yeah, mail it: luciano_edu1980@yahoo.com.

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Garzo
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Postby Garzo » Wed Mar 16, 2005 12:25 pm

Thank you, fellas! It'll probably be a little over a week before I can get the English text to you both. I think that there's a Spanish text: would that help with the Portuguese translation (e.g. architectural terms)?
"Poetry is that which gets lost in translation" — Robert Frost

wquinette
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Cathedral

Postby wquinette » Wed Mar 16, 2005 2:53 pm

Hey Garzo, don't forget to post the text somewhere in this Agora, so the rest of us won't burn with curiosity... well, at least that's what's gonna happen to me if you don't ! :wink:

BTW, is there a reason for stressing the middle syllable of "cathedral" ? In Portuguese and, I think, in most - if not all of the - romance languages, the stress falls on the last one.

WQ

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Postby KatyBr » Wed Mar 16, 2005 3:05 pm

Isn't English a romance language?
In English the emphAsis is on the middle SyLAbyl.

Katy

anders
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Postby anders » Wed Mar 16, 2005 3:31 pm

Swedish, German, Dutch, Danish, Norwegian stress their cathedrals on the last syllable.
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Postby Brazilian dude » Wed Mar 16, 2005 4:32 pm

I think that there's a Spanish text: would that help with the Portuguese translation (e.g. architectural terms)?
That would be nice.

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Garzo
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Postby Garzo » Thu Mar 24, 2005 5:54 pm

I was in the cathedral this morning for the Chrism Mass. The tourists were quite amazed to see 400-odd clergy, robed in white, singing around the cloisters.

I've got the leaflet that needs translation, but it's 1,355 words long: so it might be too big to post here. Therefore, I've uploaded it as cathedral.txt. You can view it online or dowload it: it is only plain text.

I know that we have versions in French, German, Spanish, Japanese, Mandarin, Hungarian, Latvian, Italian and Czech. I'm working on an Arabic one, but Swedish and Portuguese would be really good.

English has quite a propensity to accent the penultimate syllable. If an English-speaker comes across an unknown word -- farlufangona, for instance -- they are most likely to put the accent on the penultimate.

Actually, the Hellenistic Greek kathedra is accented on the penultimate syllable. So, maybe the English-speaking world is just being increadibly clever -- but, I think not.

-- Garzo.
"Poetry is that which gets lost in translation" — Robert Frost

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Postby Stargzer » Thu Mar 24, 2005 7:54 pm

. . .English has quite a propensity to accent the penultimate syllable. If an English-speaker comes across an unknown word -- farlufangona, for instance -- they are most likely to put the accent on the penultimate.
. . .
I remember in Latin I Mr. Cullen telling us that Latin agricola (farmer) was pronounced a-GREE-ko-la, not a-gri-KO-la. "It's not some kind of soft drink!" he said. :D

Agri-Cola: the parched farmer's favorite!

(Sorry, don't have time to attempt a Latin translation right now--maybe later!(

(And speaking of advertising copy, where's PW, by the way, our now non-resident curmudgeon?)
Regards//Larry

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KatyBr
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Postby KatyBr » Thu Mar 24, 2005 10:10 pm




(And speaking of advertising copy, where's PW, by the way, our now non-resident curmudgeon?)
Dunno, I left him a note in Agora 1 and a trail of breadcrumbs, to here.

Katy

Maximillian
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Postby Maximillian » Tue Mar 29, 2005 11:56 pm

Salisbury Cathedral has to be one of my favourite cathedrals I have been to, although I recall having to stand a long way back to photograph the whole thing. Actually I think I just like the whole area especially the view from the top of Old Sarem, if I remember the name of the hill correctly, which I probably don't. Sorry for heading off on a tangent, don't know anything about accents on syllables. "Parched farmers" made me laugh though.

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Postby anders » Wed Mar 30, 2005 5:51 am

Swedish, German, Dutch, Danish, Norwegian stress their cathedrals on the last syllable.
To that, I have to add that a teacher's desk is a kateder in Swedish, stressed on the penultimate.

On second thought, I realize that the above quote is misleading. In Swedish, the word is used sparingly, and only of non-Swedish cathedrals. The normal word for our cathedrals is domkyrka. Kyrka is, rather transparently, 'church'. The dom- part is more obscure, but is generally thought to be derived from Latin domus 'house' (Gk dómos, Skt dámaH).
Irren ist männlich


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