#14107 - 05/08/01 09:23 AM
Re: Words from Germanic Myths
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Carpal Tunnel
Registered: 04/09/00
Posts: 3065
Loc: Jakarta
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and presumably frigging.
Bingley
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Bingley
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#14108 - 05/08/01 09:41 AM
Re: Words from Greek or Roman myths
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Carpal Tunnel
Registered: 04/09/00
Posts: 3065
Loc: Jakarta
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In reply to:
What about words derived from other mythologies?
Shaman, djinn, banshee.
Would you believe banshee has made its way into Indonesian? The meaning has changed somewhat though. Transvestism/trans-sexuality is a much more openly acknowledged reality here than in European-derived cultures, and it can be very difficult sometimes to tell the difference. Going back to the nineteen sixties, apparently English speaking foreigners used to call transvestite/trans-sexual prostitutes banshees from their habit of calling out to potential customers. This was then adopted as a slang term by Indonesians in the slightly altered form of banci (pronounced ban-chee). The more neutral term, in case you were wondering, is wadam (a portmanteau word from wanita (woman) and Adam) or waria (again a portmanteau word from wanita and pria (man)).
Bingley
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#14110 - 05/25/01 09:18 PM
Re: Words from Greek or Roman myths
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stranger
Registered: 12/27/00
Posts: 12
Loc: Earth
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In reply to:
lastday, chimera is also a term from genetics meaning "an organism consisting of two or more tissues of different genetic composition, produced as a result of mutation, grafting, or the mixture of cell populations from different zygotes."
considering this, I guess this might have been a good word for Words from Medicine as well.
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#14112 - 06/05/01 02:28 AM
Re: Words from Greek or Roman myths
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addict
Registered: 01/18/01
Posts: 618
Loc: Australia
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As far as I can tell, just about anything would be good for Words from Medicine.
Rapport was established superficially.
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#14113 - 11/06/01 07:14 AM
Post deleted by Wordwind
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Carpal Tunnel
Registered: 09/30/01
Posts: 6296
Loc: Piedmont Region of Virginia, U...
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#14114 - 11/06/01 09:28 AM
Re: Stentor
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Carpal Tunnel
Registered: 01/18/01
Posts: 13858
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I think I recall reading somewhere that Stentor, while useful, was not really admired by the Greeks, and regarded as a loudmouth. Off on a tangent, an idea we get from mythology is the use of a ball of string to find way back out of a maze, after Ariadne's giving Theseus a ball of string to escape from the Labyrinth, after slaying the Minotaur. But our word "clue" apparently is not the Greek word. Who remembers that? I don't. There are a lot of mythology sites. Here is a fairly good one to start with: http://www.oup-usa.org/sc/0195143388/glossaries/phrase_s.html
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#14116 - 11/06/01 05:25 PM
Re: Sphinx
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Carpal Tunnel
Registered: 01/18/01
Posts: 13858
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I took this quote out of URL above, because it might interest others as it did me, to learn etymology of word "sphinx" I had also forgotten there was more than one sphinx
The sphinx terrorized Thebes before the arrival of Oedipus (see Oedipal Complex). She was a hybrid
creature with the head of a woman, body of a lion, wings of an eagle, and the tail of a serpent. She
punished those who failed to answer her riddle with strangulation (the Greek verb sphingein means to
strangle). At some point the Greek sphinx became associated with Egyptian iconography, in which the
sphinx had a lion's body and a hawk's or man's head. When we liken someone to a sphinx, we have in
mind the great riddler of the Greeks and not the Egyptian conception. A sphinx is an inscrutable person,
given to enigmatic utterances (the Greek word ainigma means a riddle).
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