Alphadictionary.com

Dr. Goodword’s Language Blog

Archive for the 'Language & Travel' Category

Snarlers that don’t Snarl

Sunday, April 14th, 2013

Andrew John (no I didn’t reverse his names) responded to our Good Word snarl with this thought:

“In NZ the word snarler does not usually mean something that snarls. In my experience when Kiwis use the word snarler they mean a sausage, particularly when it is on a BBQ. Which makes me wonder if its use is derived from hot-dog?”

My response:

A snarler usually refers to a dog (or human) that snarls. Could the transfer of this sense of “dog” to “hotdog” be justified? Or is it more likely that, because they tend to curl when heated, they seem to become entangled?

There is also another sense of snarl used in metal-working. A snarling-iron is used to “raise up the projecting part”. Whether this is used for curling or not, I don’t know. (I’m not metal worker.)

Does anyone out there know what a “snarling-iron” does?

The Remnants of Rome and Latin

Monday, October 4th, 2010

I am joyfully returned from ten warm and sunny days in the south of Europe: Barcelona (festival of La Mercé), Nice, Villefranche-sur-Mer, the restaurants of Mougins, the wines of Verrazzano, Orvieto, Cinque Terre, and Sorrento. It was a pleasure to roam the architectural remnants of the Roman empire while imbibing the remnants of the Latin language: Spanish, French, and Italian.

Clichés may be redundant but they are not false. When I heard in high school that the study of Latin would help me not only learn the languages of Europe more efficiently but bring me greater insight into English, I quickly signed up for Latin while my friends flooded French and Spanish. The cliché is true. While I stumble around in the spoken form of these languages (my degree is in Slavic linguistics), I can read them all quite well and enjoy hearing their different melodies whether I follow them or not.

The ancient Greeks were boxed in by the Turks and Romans, so their language developed along a single line; Modern Greek is to ancient Greek as Italian is to Latin. While the Roman empire contracted, the Romans were never driven back to Rome, so Latin continued to develop in many directions under the influence of the aboriginal languages that were spoken prior to the “arrival” of the Romans.

Today, the Latin of Gaul is French, of Iberia is Portuguese and Spanish, and the Latin that stayed home is Italian. Romanian is a remnant of Latin spoken by the originally Slavic peoples of Transylvania and thereabouts. Each of these languages share many roots in common, even suffixes and prefixes. But they are distinguished by their music: their accents and accentuation, intonations, pronunciations. They form a theater of modern Latinate speech and passing through them, curtain after curtain, while enjoying the autumn landscapes, local wines, and cuisine of the regions was the kind of music a linguist most enjoys.

However, I am back and hopefully the Language Blog will benefit from the tidbits I picked up along my journey.