Semantically loaded names for cardinal points.

The best topics from Languages & Linguistics, kept on a permanent basis.
User avatar
nebula wind phone
Sanci
Sanci
Posts: 67
Joined: Wed Mar 02, 2005 10:58 am
Location: Austin, Texas, USA
Contact:

Post by nebula wind phone »

Radagast wrote:In many mesoamerican languages the word for north and south are the same as upwards and downwards (for some it is reversed).
Are the ones that call north "up" the same ones that live south of the Equator? If they are, this could be a sun-direction thing too.
"When I was about 16 it occurred to me that conlanging might be a sin, but I changed my mind when I realized Adam and Eve were doing it before the Fall." —Mercator

User avatar
Radagast
Lebom
Lebom
Posts: 97
Joined: Sat May 21, 2005 9:46 am
Location: Denmark
Contact:

Post by Radagast »

Nope. Mesoamerica is north of the equator. Sometimes they even live on the northside of a mountain so that north/upwards is in fact downhill and vice versa. The village where I did my fieldwork is in fact on the south side fo a mountain so it makes sense, but when I ask "what do they call north on the other side of the mountain then?" they just tell me "why, "upwards" of course..."
[i]D'abord on ne parla qu'en poésie ; on ne s'avisa de raisonner que long-temps après.[/i] J. J. Rousseau, Sur l'origine des langues. 1783

imploder
Niš
Niš
Posts: 9
Joined: Wed Jun 28, 2006 2:00 pm
Location: Brno, Czech Republic
Contact:

Post by imploder »

peterlin wrote: And the Polish one:

North - p?lnoc (=midnight)
South - poludnie (=midday, noon)
East - wsch?d (=[sun]rise)
West - zach?d (=[sun]set)
:mrgreen: záchod means WC in Czech. It's said "slunce vychází na východě a zachází na záchodě" but that's meant as a joke.

The Czech ones:
North - sever
South - jih
East - východ ("walk-out"); východ slunce = sunrise
West - západ ("fall-behind"); západ slunce = sunset
[url=http://awkwords.wsr3.net]Awkwords - word generator[/url] | [url=http://awkwords.wsr3.net/help.html]Documentation & download[/url]

peterlin
Niš
Niš
Posts: 6
Joined: Sun Oct 31, 2004 4:29 pm
Location: Polackistan
Contact:

Post by peterlin »

imploder wrote:
peterlin wrote: And the Polish one:

North - p?lnoc (=midnight)
South - poludnie (=midday, noon)
East - wsch?d (=[sun]rise)
West - zach?d (=[sun]set)
:mrgreen: záchod means WC in Czech. It's said "slunce vychází na východě a zachází na záchodě" but that's meant as a joke.
I know, that's one of the most "famous" Polish-Czech false friends. Not as famous as szukać ("to look for" in Polish), of course, but still...

User avatar
Rav Shimon
Niš
Niš
Posts: 7
Joined: Tue Jul 10, 2007 2:00 am
Location: Sydney
Contact:

Post by Rav Shimon »

Hebrew has a few different words for most of the compass point names:

North:
-*Tzafon: From tzafun, meaning "hidden."

South:
-Yam: "Sea."
-Téman: A location in Biblical times (named after the grandson of 'ésav [Eng. Esau]) and the modern-day name for Yemen, although the exact identity of the Biblical land is not clear.
-*Darom: Meaning unkown (at least to me).

East:
-Kedem: Meaning "early" or "preceding." East was considered "up" in ancient Jewish thoughts and was drawn at the top of maps.
-*Mizrah: Meaning "shining" or "rising [of the sun]."

West:
-Negev: A desert in southern Israel (although whether the direction is named after the desert or vice versa is not clear).
-Yam: Meaning "sea," as the Mediterranean Sea (known in Hebrew as hayYam hagGadol--"The Great Sea"--in constrast to a lake, which is also included in the definition of "yam" in Hebrew) is to the west of Israel.
-*Ma'arav: Nominal form of a verb derived from 'érev (meaning "afternoon" or "evening"), literal translation would be "[the] afternooning/eveninging [of the day]". 'érev itself shares a triconsonantal root with the word for mixture (possibly because afternoon/evening is when there starts to be a mixture of light and dark).

From the time of the Mishna [the compliation of the Oral Law, compiled c. 200 CE) and through Modern Hebrew the terms indicated above by asterisks have been used exclusively (to the point that one wouldn't be understood if he were to try using any of the others).
It is most interesting to note that some places in the Tora use multiple names for the same direction. Shemot [Eng. Exodus] 26:18 uses the term "negba témana" for south, for example.
It is also interesting to note that diagonal directions in the Mishna were by default referred to as east-north or east-south unless referenced in sequence. For example, Tamid 7:3: "From where would he begin? From the south-east corner, [then] east-north, north-west, [and] west-south." Here, the direction a point has in common with the previous is emphasised, as one was required to walk along the north side to go from the east-north to the north-west.
That's RABBI Dude to you.

User avatar
Mecislau
Avisaru
Avisaru
Posts: 491
Joined: Thu Jul 24, 2003 2:40 pm
Location: Maryland
Contact:

Post by Mecislau »

Note that Modern Hebrew has settled down on which terms it uses: tzafon, darom, ma`arav, and mizrach
Rav Shimon wrote:-*Darom: Meaning unkown (at least to me).
It's a contraction of דר רום dar rom, literally meaning "inhabitant of the heights". It's a reference to the midday sun, which would appear in the south.

User avatar
Rav Shimon
Niš
Niš
Posts: 7
Joined: Tue Jul 10, 2007 2:00 am
Location: Sydney
Contact:

Post by Rav Shimon »

Maknas wrote:Note that Modern Hebrew has settled down on which terms it uses: tzafon, darom, ma`arav, and mizrach
I said that....
Maknas wrote:
Rav Shimon wrote:-*Darom: Meaning unkown (at least to me).
It's a contraction of דר רום dar rom, literally meaning "inhabitant of the heights". It's a reference to the midday sun, which would appear in the south.
Sounds possible, but I don't know....
That's RABBI Dude to you.

User avatar
Mecislau
Avisaru
Avisaru
Posts: 491
Joined: Thu Jul 24, 2003 2:40 pm
Location: Maryland
Contact:

Post by Mecislau »

Rav Shimon wrote:
Maknas wrote:Note that Modern Hebrew has settled down on which terms it uses: tzafon, darom, ma`arav, and mizrach
I said that....
Erm, sorry, I didn't see that.
Rav Shimon wrote:Sounds possible, but I don't know....
I'm just going by what the Wikipedia article says.

http://he.wikipedia.org/wiki/%D7%93%D7%A8%D7%95%D7%9D

User avatar
Rav Shimon
Niš
Niš
Posts: 7
Joined: Tue Jul 10, 2007 2:00 am
Location: Sydney
Contact:

Post by Rav Shimon »

Oo, forgot to add: Given that east is generally considered "up," north and south are also known as "left" and "right," respectively. In fact, the Aramaic translation of Onkelos renders Beréshit [Eng. Genesis] 13:9--"If you [go to] the left, then I will go to the right, and if the right, then I will go to the left" as "if you [go] to the north, [then] I will [go] to the south, and if you [go] to the south, [then] I will [go] to the north."
That's RABBI Dude to you.

User avatar
Debegduk ing Debegduked
Sanci
Sanci
Posts: 16
Joined: Fri Dec 03, 2004 11:12 pm

Post by Debegduk ing Debegduked »

The cardinal directions (or at least some of them) are semantically charged in Indo-European, too. Latin auster 'south' shares a root with dexter 'right' - because when you pray to the sun at dawn, the south is on your right. This isn't too far removed from the Dagestani example, no?
U bronazda Lin, broZuspabimaded guze ner liuringemeni!

Post Reply