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Joined: Jan 2001
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Carpal Tunnel
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OP
Carpal Tunnel
Joined: Jan 2001
Posts: 13,858 |
I never heard how in happened, but Mark Twain was apparently quite fluent in German.
Here's a tidbit from "engines" episode 1064;
When Mark Twain's Connecticut Yankee at King Arthur's
Court uttered a bogus magic spell, he used a long German
word:
Konstantinopelitanischerdudelsachspfeifenmachersgesellschaft.
It means an "organization of bagpipe makers from
Constantinople." Should we regard that as six words or just
one?
I like the sound of "dudelsach" much better than "bagpipes".
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Joined: Mar 2000
Posts: 6,511
Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
Joined: Mar 2000
Posts: 6,511 |
I like "dudelsach" too. Meanwhile, Twain is the author of one of my favorite rants: "The Awful German Language" (from A Tramp Abroad): http://www.crossmyt.com/hc/linghebr/awfgrmlg.html
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Joined: Jun 2002
Posts: 7,210
Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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is "doodle sack" really the German word for bag pipe? and do sack and bag really mean the same thing? 
formerly known as etaoin...
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Joined: Dec 2000
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Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
Joined: Dec 2000
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the German word for bag pipe?
I bleeve it is. Sache means thing. Whether Sach means sack I'll have to report back later. Nothing on Dudelsach in my Stilw�rterbuch. Whether sack and bag are the same thing you're going to run into lots of regional variation.
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Joined: Feb 2001
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enthusiast
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enthusiast
Joined: Feb 2001
Posts: 387 |
"The Awful German Language"
I like the bit about swearing. I asked a foreign exchange student what verdampt meant, working on Twains premise that German swearwords are weak. I don't recall what she said.
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