Guest Posted July 29, 2001 Report Share Posted July 29, 2001 just been flicking through a weighty tome on the english language, and came across a paragraph on etymology. regarding the origins of the names of the states in US, apparentlu Utah comes from the Navaho word for upper land... can this be traced to the pali/sanskrit Uttara ??? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
elef Posted July 29, 2001 Report Share Posted July 29, 2001 Hi, Navajo is not an Indo-European language so there is no connection to sanskrit. That's the reason for US in WWII to use navajo as code. elef Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Posted July 29, 2001 Report Share Posted July 29, 2001 Hi there! I just dug deep into my closet, dusted off my old thinking cap and now I look like a complete fool wearing it. Languages which are not Sanskrit-related are (in no apparent order) Basque, Finnish, Hungarian, Estonian, Lapp, Turkish, Arabian, Hebrew, Chinese, Tibetan, Malay/Indonesian and certainly the languages of the American Indians. Of the above, some languages have aquired a number of Sanskrit-based loan-words (such as Finnish and Malay/Indonesian), but that's as far as their relationship goes. The word Utah does on paper look similar to Skt. "Uttara", but such similarities are bound to occur even in completely unrelated languages. Besides, isn't Utah pronounced "yoota"? I'm not sure how the Navajo pronounce it. "Uttara" is pronounced with a plain u-sound at the beginning (like in "boot"). As I have mentioned the Tibetan language, and as this is all about misinterpreting similar sounding words in different languages, let me give you one more interesting example for this phenomenon: Some Indians entered Tibet and came across a big wide river. They asked the local people what it was called and the Tibetans replied "Bhullum-buttur". The Indians couldn't pronounce the name so they changed it into sounds they were familiar with. They called the river "Brahma-Putra"(Son of Brahma), and that's how it's still known today. Off with the cap ... Cheers, SB. [ July 29, 2001: Message edited by: Scum_Baggio ] Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
elef Posted July 29, 2001 Report Share Posted July 29, 2001 Hi SB, the name Utah is derived from a Native American word meaning those who dwell high up or mountaintop dwellers. ("Utah," Microsoft® Encarta® Online Encyclopedia 2001 http://encarta.msn.com © 1997-2001 Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved.) http://thor.prohosting.com/~linguist/navajo.htm http://www.history.navy.mil/faqs/faq61-4.htm Regards elef [ July 29, 2001: Message edited by: elef ] Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Posted July 29, 2001 Report Share Posted July 29, 2001 P.S. Just as a little addition to my former post: You do find the word "Uttara" in Thailand - Udon Thani is the Thai pronunciation for "Uttara Dhani", lit. "Northern Town" (or capital). Uttara was also the name of one King Ashoka's sons who was sent out to S.E.Asia to spread Buddhism. (Another meaning of "uttara" is "answer".) The spelling Uttara Dhani (in English) can still be seen on Thai post marks of the early 20th century. [ July 29, 2001: Message edited by: Scum_Baggio ] Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Posted July 29, 2001 Report Share Posted July 29, 2001 thanks guys. I guessed any link would have been tenuous, just shows how bored I am at work at the moment pretty sad really, but i never clicked on Udon. I would see the Thai spelling, and to me it was Udon. oh well, back to reading Hannibal... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Posted July 30, 2001 Report Share Posted July 30, 2001 Hi Abbot Thong, as you're somewhat bored I give you something to mull over. It's a bit off-topic, but it still has to do with Sanskrit and how its words are related to those in other languages - English being a good example. Below I give you a little list of English words which are very closely related to Sanskrit: Engl. Skt. adder - netr axle - aksha (to) bear - bher Cent - shatam ("100" - Thai "satang"!) cow - go tooth - danta (Thai "fan") door - dvara father - pitr hand - hasta look - lug man - manushya mead - madhu (honey) mother - mata mouse - musha mouth - mukham (maukhya = Skt. for "blowjob"!) navel - nabhya red - rohita soup - supa widow - vidhva There are also many words in which the connection is not so obvious. For example, "fee" can be traced back to Skt. "pashu" (cattle), which underwent many changes of sound. "Pashu" also became the German "Vieh" (cattle). As you see, the meaning of the word changed, too, but one can understand why in an agricultural society cattle was equated with wealth or "fee". Some English words can be traced back to the ancestor of Sanskrit, Proto-Indo European (PIE). One example would be "wedding", which stems from the PIE verb root "wed-" (to lead home). PIE "wobhsa" became "wasp". Hope to have killed three minutes of your boredom, Cheers, SB. [ July 29, 2001: Message edited by: Scum_Baggio ] [ July 29, 2001: Message edited by: Scum_Baggio ] Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Posted July 30, 2001 Report Share Posted July 30, 2001 Scum, you should get out more me old m8 re supa, is this related to the Thai female name Supaporn??? Thai sp??? The weighty tome I referred to is the Cambridge Encyclopedia of the English Language, with many colour pix so even I can read it. What we need is the Chulalongkorn Encyclopedia of the Thai Language, written in English, then we really could have hours of fun Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Posted July 30, 2001 Report Share Posted July 30, 2001 khun scum and khun abbott, According to my dictionary supa from supaporn means beauty (khwaamngaam). Written in thai สุภ with a short vowel but pronounced suppa สุบพะ. Porn as already mentioned means blessing. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Posted July 31, 2001 Report Share Posted July 31, 2001 Originally posted by abbot thong:"Scum, you should get out more me old m8" Just trying to prevent myself from turning into a complete vegetable - pak-boong possibly! Could happen to the best of us in Bkk! "re supa, is this related to the Thai female name Supaporn??? Thai sp???" Nope. I'm not sure about the Thai spelling, but this "supa" should be from Skt. "shubha"(auspicious, lucky, beautiful), and "porn" should be from "vara/bara"(boon, blessing). It's the same "porn" as in "porn-sawan" (talent; lit. blessings from heaven). Hardly any Skt. word adopted into Thai will appear in its original Skt. form; the words are changed to fit the Thai palate, so to speak. Besides, the u in Skt. "supa" is long, but the one in "shubha" is short, and I assume it's the same as in the Thai variant. The lenghts of the vocals usually don't change from Skt. to Thai (in Skt. and other Indian languages you have long and short a's and u's, and getting them wrong can change the meaning of the whole word). Otherwise, there's a Skt. prefix "su" (short u) which you find often in Thai names. It means "good", "beautiful". See Sukanya (good daughter), Sukonta (beautiful scent, perfume), Sumali (beautiful flower) etc. Cheers, SB. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts
Archived
This topic is now archived and is closed to further replies.