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September 13

Getting accent from one's spouse?

I watched a few videos of the famous English physicist Freeman Dyson (born and educated in England, and living in the US since the 1950s) and it seems to me (example) that he has a distinct German accent. I'm wondering where it could have come from. Reading his biography, his first wife was Swiss and his second (who he has been with for 60 years) is German. Could that explain it? He also studied in the US under Hans Bethe for a while. I couldn't find any audio on youtbe of him when he was younger, but maybe some is out there somewhere. Thanks. 173.228.123.166 (talk) 20:00, 13 September 2018 (UTC)[reply]

One can get, acquire, or change one's idiolect through any number of processes, both deliberate and subconscious, throughout one's life. One's speech is not necessarily fixed, and it is likely that one can change their accent throughout their lives. American-raised, Danish-born, British-citizen Sandi Toksvig has a great story about the history of her own accent, which has changed drastically throughout her life, and she discusses a lot of it here: [1]. While most studies seem to indicate that many accents become fixed in childhood, humans are variable enough that there is no singular, universal process that applies to every last person. The answer to any kind of question like this regarding "is it possible for a person to do this..." is unequivocally yes; as long as you are speaking of one person, then you're evidence that it is possible is that the person in question is actually doing it. You've answered your own question. People can change their accents, and do change their accents, sometimes unintentionally and sometimes intentionally. Here are some scientific studies that cover the topic: [2], [3], [4]. --Jayron 32 18:28, 17 September 2018 (UTC)[reply]

This doesn't treat people who move from one country to another which has the same mother-tongue. Britons moving to Australia acquire an Australian accent if they stay there long enough. How long does this take? 2A00:23C0:7905:B600:BC63:D41E:72CD:7F2E (talk) 19:44, 17 September 2018 (UTC)[reply]

In my opinion, it never fully happens unless the person is very young when they move. It may seem to Brits back in England that their emigrant compatriot has acquired the accent of the adopted country, but Australians and New Zealanders can always detect a trace of the Brit accent in the immigrant, even after 30 or more years (my workplace experience). It's simply that the accent shifts, but the people back home in Britain aren't able to discern the difference, unlike us locals. Akld guy (talk) 00:34, 19 September 2018 (UTC)[reply]

September 14

ISO 639-1 code for Dutch language

The Dutch language page appears to me to indicate that ISO 639-1 language code is an improbable 'hh'. The ISO 639-1 page (and List of ISO 639-1 codes) say the more expected 'nl'. But when I try to edit the page I see this code:

iso1 = nl

I don't really understand how Wikipedia infoboxes work (for instance, I find no occurrence of '639-1' when I open 'Edit this page') but something seems wrong and I don't know how to fix it.

Hayttom (talk) 08:28, 14 September 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Very strange indeed! But what's more, the same 'hh' appears on all language pages, e.g. English language, German language and Korean language. - Lindert (talk) 08:53, 14 September 2018 (UTC)[reply]

If you "edit this page", you don't find "639-1" but you do find "| iso1 = nl". Clearly there is a bug in the code that translates that into the correct infobox entry. This is a problem for WP:VP/T, and I'll post a note there. --76.69.47.228 (talk) 09:10, 14 September 2018 (UTC)[reply]

The problem is that {{Infobox language}} calls {{ISO639-1}} which is an unprotected redirect to the actual {{ISO 639-1}} template. And an IP vandalized the former. –Ammarpad (talk) 09:57, 14 September 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Somebody has fixed it!

Resolved

Hayttom (talk) 11:05, 14 September 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Cote d'Ivorian family names

Following French language conventions I assume that this chap - Mr. N'GOAN AKA Mathias - would be written in English as Mr. Mathias N'Goan Aka (i.e. first name then family name).

Anyone familiar with family conventions in Ivory Coast/Côte d'Ivoire?

Thanks in advance 4u1e (talk) 10:17, 14 September 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Not specific to Côte d'Ivoire, but throughout French-speaking Africa, there is a convention on administrative forms that family names are written in capitals and first names in lower-case letters. This is because name order is not standardized. This usage has spilled over to other areas of life. So N'Goan Aka is indeed most likely the person's last name (Mathias being a common first name). --Xuxl (talk) 12:44, 14 September 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Brilliant - Merci! 4u1e (talk) 21:24, 14 September 2018 (UTC)[reply]

The same convention is often used in Esperantist publications, intended to be read by people whose customs may conflict. Can't remember for sure whether I've also seen it for Chinese-hybrid names like Jackie CHAN Kong-sang. —Tamfang (talk) 07:31, 18 September 2018 (UTC)[reply]

September 15

are all charactonyms also aptronyms?

things like Holly Golightly or Walter Faber or Rodion Raskolnikov. I'm asking because aptronym contains only real-world examples. There apparently used to be a charactonym article but it was merged into aptronym in 2012. However, all mentions of the stylistic device have since been purged, whatsmore, attempts to add any are reverted by eager editors (last time in 2016.) Could someone look into this and then either "un-merge" charactonym so it can be its own article again -or- edit aptronym to mention the charactonyms so the article doesn't (falsely?) suggest it's an exclusively real-world thing? Aecho6Ee (talk) 02:14, 15 September 2018 (UTC)[reply]

The old charactronym list was here. There is not much hope of being able to restore it without having to footnote every entry like the aptronym article currently does. 173.228.123.166 (talk) 16:00, 15 September 2018 (UTC)[reply]

By the way, before the 19th century, it was extremely commons to name minor characters in plays and novels after a leading characteristic of the character. There must be a scholarly paper somewhere which discusses this... AnonMoos (talk) 11:18, 17 September 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Linear A

Linear A contains the following statement:

It primarily appears in the left-to-right direction, but occasionally appears as a right-to-left or boustrophedon script.

How can we know what direction it's written, since it lacks capital letters and punctuation (and presumably spaces) and hasn't been deciphered? Nyttend (talk) 16:32, 15 September 2018 (UTC)[reply]

My WAG: sequence 2606:A000:1126:4CA:0:98F2:CFF6:1782 (talk) 17:24, 15 September 2018 (UTC)[reply]

One possible way to know the direction would be the appearance of the last line of a text, such as:

𐀀𐀐𐀠𐀰𐁀𐁐

𐀁𐀑𐀡𐀱𐁁𐁑

𐀂𐀒

versus

𐁓𐁃𐀳𐀣𐀓𐀃
𐁄𐀴𐀤𐀔𐀄
𐁖𐁆𐁔

—Stephen (talk) 18:37, 15 September 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Although it's true it hasn't been deciphered, it doesn't follow that the meaning of Linear A is a total mystery. This site, for instance, has examples of accounting lists where the structure of the text (numbers, types of goods etc.) would give a good indication of the direction. Henry ^Flower 20:48, 15 September 2018 (UTC)[reply]

And, regarding deciphered Linear B (successor to Linear A): "...some scholars even rudely described the texts as being like laundry lists."^[5] —107.15.157.44 (talk) 21:51, 15 September 2018 (UTC)[reply]

If they mean actual laundry lists, they should keep in mind that such writings were serving the needs of the writer and the reader at the time. They weren't concerned about what historians hundreds or thousands of years later might make of them. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 19:06, 16 September 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Baseball_Bugs -- the majority of texts are inventories of items held by the palace, lists of supplies issued to palace workers etc. They were for the immediate convenience of palace administrators. There are no literary texts, not even accounts of kingly deeds of the type that were so common in the Middle East. I doubt that there were any actual laundry lists, but re-wo-to-ro-ko-wo lewotrokhowoi (classical λουτροχoοι) are mentioned: "those who pour water for baths/washing"... AnonMoos (talk) 08:28, 18 September 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Nyttend -- only a few scripts have developed a capital / lower-case distinction, so a lack of such a contrast would be expected for Linear B. Also, it's not really explained in the Linear B article, but Linear B had so-called "ideograms" like Linear A -- semantic characters expressing items to be counted or units of weight and measure. And we do understand the sequence of Linear A characters which spell out the word meaning "Total"... AnonMoos (talk) 14:31, 16 September 2018 (UTC)[reply]

You don't need to understand a script/langugage in order to discover its direction of writing. If you know one ore more recurring character sequences you can look for places where they are split between lines. For example, someone not understanding English might note that the combination "United States" occurs multiple times in a text. When he finds a line that has "United" on the right and "States" is found on the left of line below, he can deduce that the text is probably written from left to right, without needing to know what any of it means. - Lindert (talk) 15:35, 16 September 2018 (UTC)[reply]

It's often possible to deduce from the forms of individual characters and the relationship between them (particularly when there are overlaps) in which order they were written. In some scripts, there was a convention of which way certain characters 'faced' in relationship to the direction the line went (so in boustrophedon, for example, they would face one way on one line and the opposite in the next.) In the related (though not itself Linear A) case of the Phaistos Disc, some stamped characters overlaid others, confirming the order of writing (which proved to be the opposite of what was expected). {The poster formerly known as 87.81.230.195} 90.208.172.36 (talk) 18:42, 16 September 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Semivowels

A Semivowel is distinguished from its corresponding vowel because it functions as the syllable boundary, rather than as the nucleus of a syllable, right? And there are two definitions of vowel, the phonetic and phonological. So although I can see why a semivowel and vowel are distinguished as phonemes, there doesn't seem to be any phonetic/physical difference between their articulations, other than speed. So my question is this, what is the physical difference between /j/ and /i/? Makuta Makaveli (talk) 17:28, 15 September 2018 (UTC)[reply]

From Semivowel#Contrast with vowels: “Semivowels, by definition, contrast with vowels by being non-syllabic. In addition, they are usually shorter than vowels.[3] In languages as diverse as Amharic, Yoruba, and Zuni, semivowels are produced with a narrower constriction in the vocal tract than their corresponding vowels.[6] Nevertheless, semivowels may be phonemically equivalent with vowels.” [bolding is mine] Loraof (talk) 22:53, 15 September 2018 (UTC)[reply]

You didn't have to mention the non-syllabic part, I covered that. I knew speed or duration had to be one of the differences. So pretty much, there are only two physical differences between the two, duration, short or long, and narrow or wide constriction of the vocal tract. Other than that they are the same sound. Is this why Romans used V to represent both /w/ and /u/, I for /i/ and /j/? Makuta Makaveli (talk) 23:23, 15 September 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Latin-based and Cyrillic-based scripts, at least, make use of the same letters for both syllabic and regular (non-syllabic) consonants. For example Slovak uses R for both /r/ and /r̩/ and L for both /l/ and /l̩/, as well as accentuated Ŕ and Ĺ for long syllabic /r̩ː/ and /l̩ː/, the same way as it uses accentuated vowels to represent vowel length, such as Á for /aː/. --Theurgist (talk) 10:47, 19 September 2018 (UTC)[reply]

September 17

Polyglot

What is polyglot that speak the greatest number of language?--158.148.178.254 (talk) 17:35, 17 September 2018 (UTC)[reply]

It's more difficult to count than you might think. Our article at List of polyglots gives you a good idea. See also Polyglotism. Matt Deres (talk) 17:56, 17 September 2018 (UTC)[reply]

(after edit conflict) I have no definite answer, and certainly not for a living person. List of polyglots is interesting, though some of the people listed there only "claimed" they spoke that many languages (e.g. John Bowring "claimed he knew 200 languages of which he could speak 100. Many of his contemporaries and subsequent biographers thought otherwise."). See also this question asked here over twelve years ago (!) ---Sluzzelin talk 17:57, 17 September 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Correct punctuation for professional titles

What is the correct punctuation for professional titles, such as MD or DMD or DPM, etc.? Do they include or exclude the periods? Do they include or exclude spaces between the letters (and/or the periods)? I am asking for the conventions for American English (USA). Thanks. Joseph A. Spadaro (talk) 18:49, 17 September 2018 (UTC)[reply]

No spaces. Periods may be used or left out: M.D., D.M.D., D.P.M., D.D.S., LL.M., S.J.D., J.D., M.S./J.D. or MD, DMD, DPM, DDS, LLM, SJD, JD, MS/JD. —Stephen (talk) 08:46, 18 September 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Most mainstream publishers omit the periods these days; they don't serve any useful purpose. That is also the recommendation of the Wikipedia:Manual_of_Style/Abbreviations. --Shantavira|^{feed me} 08:51, 18 September 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks! Joseph A. Spadaro (talk) 18:11, 24 September 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Resolved

Correct punctuation for telephone numbers

What is the correct punctuation for telephone numbers? For example: 123 - 456 - 7890. Are those "dashes" simply regular dashes/hyphens? Or are they en dashes or em dashes? And, are there supposed to be any spaces or not? I am asking for the conventions for American English (USA). Thanks. Joseph A. Spadaro (talk) 18:52, 17 September 2018 (UTC)[reply]

"Wikipedia has an article on everything", including: National conventions for writing telephone numbers. 107.15.157.44 (talk) 22:44, 17 September 2018 (UTC) ... but, that article doesn't specifically answer your questions. Based purely on OR, (XXX) XXX-XXXX is still common, with space after close-paren, and ~~regular dash~~→[hyphen or en dash (not em dash)], with XXX-XXX-XXXX becoming more common[reply]

Manhattan: New Years Eve 1985: 1 area code for 8 million people. 2017: 3 overlay area codes and 1 regular one for 1.6 million. 2100: 347 area codes and 2,197 overlays for 25 million people. Sagittarian Milky Way (talk) 02:20, 18 September 2018 (UTC)[reply]

There is also XXX.XXX.XXXX, which I've often seen on business cards. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 05:05, 18 September 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks. Joseph A. Spadaro (talk) 18:12, 24 September 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Resolved

N.B. UK telephone numbers never use any punctuation. 86.187.174.4 (talk) 18:22, 24 September 2018 (UTC)[reply]

How do you pronounce "dog"?

What I am looking for, I suppose, are recordings of different people pronouncing the word, and the corresponding symbols representing each pronunciation.— Vchimpanzee • talk • contributions • 19:26, 17 September 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Wiktionary:dog has a couple of examples. Are you wondering about the difference between British and American pronunciations, or the variations within Canada? Dbfirs 20:44, 17 September 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Some of the differences are actually American.— Vchimpanzee • talk • contributions • 20:45, 17 September 2018 (UTC)[reply]

I couldn't get the US pronunciation to work, but the UK version did, and yes, that's one of the ones. But I can't figure out what that symbol is.— Vchimpanzee • talk • contributions • 20:47, 17 September 2018 (UTC)[reply]

IPA vowel chart with audio explains the symbols. Dbfirs 20:54, 17 September 2018 (UTC)[reply]

If I can't tell similar-looking symbols apart, that doesn't help much.— Vchimpanzee • talk • contributions • 21:08, 17 September 2018 (UTC)[reply]

It depends on where you are. In the Midwest, we say "dog" to rhyme with "log". In the South, it's often like "da-ohg". ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 21:17, 17 September 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Well, in my part of the South (and my experience with Southerners from other states) "dog" is more or less pronounced "dawg", but it still rhymes with "log" (and "hog", but not "cog"). --Khajidha (talk) 10:57, 24 September 2018 (UTC)[reply]

(ec) Unfortunately the similarity of the symbols is the least of your problems. It's the meaning of the symbols that's complicated, because speakers with different accents may assign the same sound to different phonemes.

I still do not quite understand what is meant by /ɒ/, because it's a phoneme that I don't have — unless it's actually the phoneme that I think of as /ɔ/, which is possible, and complicates the evaluation of whether I have the cot–caught merger. --Trovatore (talk) 21:20, 17 September 2018 (UTC)[reply]

The pronunciation I'm really looking for is the one from Boston. And I say dawg.— Vchimpanzee • talk • contributions • 21:33, 17 September 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Isn't that how some Southerners say it too? Sagittarian Milky Way (talk) 01:32, 18 September 2018 (UTC)[reply]

In Boston, they "pahk the cah in Hahvahd Yahd" [paːk ðə ˈkaːɹ‿ɪn ˈhaːvəd ˈjaːd], so maybe they own a "dahg" (?) -- cf: Boston accent. Per that article: ... the Boston accent merges the "short o" with the "aw" phoneme ... [becoming] long and rounded [ɒː]. The [ɒː] = Open back rounded vowel 2606:A000:1126:4CA:0:98F2:CFF6:1782 (talk) 17:19, 18 September 2018 (UTC)[reply]

See English Pronunciation 6: short "o" sound (British accent). Alansplodge (talk) 10:10, 19 September 2018 (UTC)[reply]

I definitely am not referring to "dahg".— Vchimpanzee • talk • contributions • 14:43, 20 September 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Also [6] /dɒɡ/, which also gives the general American English equivalent as /dɔːɡ/, respelled as /dôɡ/. Bazza (talk) 15:16, 20 September 2018 (UTC)[reply]

An hour or so ago I heard Rush Limbaugh say caught "coh-aht".— Vchimpanzee • talk • contributions • 18:40, 20 September 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Turning left vs. turning right: who said it?

I am looking for a source as to who first said that following (paraphrased from memory, so I may have the wording wrong).

There are two kinds of people who walk through the door of a commercial airliner.

One kind of person turns right and sits in the passenger compartment. They just want to arrive at their destination quickly and safely without having to worry about the technical details.

The other kind of person turns left and sits in the pilot's seat. They want to have complete control over the aircraft, make all the important decisions, and make it so that the passengers can arrive at their destination quickly and safely without having to worry about the technical details.

--Guy Macon (talk) 22:06, 17 September 2018 (UTC)[reply]

The way I heard it is not about sitting in the pilot's seat. The point is that if you turn right you enter economy class, whereas if you turn left you enter first or business class. The distinction is between people who sit in economy (the majority) and those who can afford to sit in first/business (or, more commonly, whose employer pays for them to sit there). --Viennese Waltz 07:23, 18 September 2018 (UTC)[reply]

With the new non-stop Heathrow-Perth QANTAS schedule more people are turning left. Its not so much a question of affordability but the impracticality of sitting for fifteen hours when legroom is being continually reduced as airlines squeeze in ever more rows of seats. 2A00:23C1:CD83:1F01:D536:2A6C:D8F2:9746 (talk) 10:30, 18 September 2018 (UTC)[reply]

There may very well be a similar saying about luxury/economy, but lots of engineers and programmers tell the tale of the pilot turning left and the passenger turning right, and specifically about how much more training it takes to be allowed to turn left. I just don't know who said it first.

BTW, a quick search turned up planes where left=cockpit/right=passenger seating,[7] where left=first class/right=economy[8] and where the answer depends on which door you use.[9] --Guy Macon (talk) 12:29, 18 September 2018 (UTC)[reply]

September 18

Where in WP re questions about grammar answered?

wp:deny

The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.

Cannot get anymore closer to the question than that title?2605:E000:1301:4462:B12C:D9EF:8299:5A76 (talk) 13:06, 18 September 2018 (UTC)[reply]

This desk is a good place to ask your question, and you are guaranteed to get at least one answer. We have articles on Grammar and English grammar. Dbfirs 14:28, 18 September 2018 (UTC)[reply]

If you look on this page (Wikipedia:Reference desk), it specifically lists "grammar" as the type of question that should be asked here at the Language Reference Desk. So, yes, this is the correct page. What's your grammar question? Thanks. Joseph A. Spadaro (talk) 14:55, 18 September 2018 (UTC)[reply]

September 20

Hieroglyphs for "solar barge"

What would be the proper hieroglyphs, if there are any known, for Ra's solar barge/barque? I know that the ship had three native names for it (Atet, Mandjet, Mesektet) and the article for Barge lists the following hieroglyphs, but as far as I can tell, the term just generally refers to any boat of the time.

Thank you --72.235.231.236 (talk) 15:13, 20 September 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Two of those words are in the Faulkner dictionary, available at Projet Rosette. Use the French term "barque" to get them to come up if these links don't work for you. 70.67.193.176 (talk) 19:33, 24 September 2018 (UTC)[reply]

m'nd't, glossed as the barge of the morning sun [10]
msk.tt, glossed as the barge of night [11]

September 22

Singular or plural?

Let's say we have a bunch of businesses, each of which makes their own decision whether to expand or not. When I refer to them collectively, is it businesses' decision or decisions? Clarityfiend (talk) 08:15, 22 September 2018 (UTC)[reply]

If they made different decisions then it's plural. I suppose if they all made the same singular decision then a singular form would be OK for their combined decision. Dbfirs 09:00, 22 September 2018 (UTC)[reply]

What I remember from reading the MoS is that when a structure is correct but reads awkwardly, it might be better just to reword it instead. Up to you, though. (^_^) — TARDIS builder^💬 | 15:13, 23 September 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Translation

I don't know what language this is, can anyone translate it. Mí òhá gcú djoo, è á'àn x’àn òhá. Makuta Makaveli (talk) 20:05, 22 September 2018 (UTC)[reply]

~~Vietnamese?~~ Not. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 20:57, 22 September 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Count on Wikipedia to use Google Translate to decipher a text. Makuta Makaveli (talk) 21:21, 22 September 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Baseball_Bugs: the prevalence of diacritic marks might suggest Vietnamese, but the fact that all the diacritic marks are acute or grave most definitely does not. Vietnamese also doesn't have "gc" or "dj" (or "j" of any kind, for that matter), and tends to have more than just one or two sound-segments per syllable... AnonMoos (talk) 01:36, 23 September 2018 (UTC)[reply]

I suspect that the orthography isn't very well suited for this language. 'gc' doesn't tell much and probably doesn't represent [gk]. I got this string of syllables from some manuscript I found, and the internet is definitely not helping me decipher it. I guess I shouldn't bother showing anymore pieces. Makuta Makaveli (talk) 03:26, 23 September 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Where did the manuscript come from? What does it say about the words? For all we know it could be a made-up language. --76.69.47.228 (talk) 04:55, 23 September 2018 (UTC)[reply]

gc occurs in Zulu for a dental click (the c) coarticulated with another stop, and x for a lateral click. But Zulu apparently doesn't use a lot of diacritics, nor dj. —Tamfang (talk) 06:27, 23 September 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Some indigenous American language probably? --Theurgist (talk) 10:00, 23 September 2018 (UTC)[reply]

The majority of the manuscript is in Spanish, but some of its contents are written in this obscure language. Most of the Indigenous American languages I've seen are polysynthetic or agglutinative, whereas the manuscript's language is pretty much isolating. The excerpt I've given was also written, on another page, as Mí òhá tú jo, è áàn tlàn òhá.. The orthography is even worse, and the usage of tl in one and x’ in another makes me think that the sound is /tɬʼ/. Makuta Makaveli (talk) 18:28, 23 September 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Do you speak Spanish? It would be helpful if you could copy us some of the sentences immediately surrounding this quote. 92.31.140.53 (talk) 09:14, 24 September 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Given the Spanish context, I wondered about Basque. I don't speak/read it at all, but I have a couple of Basque folk music CDs, and the sample seems not obviously inconsistent with their printed Basque lyrics. Basque seems not to use diacritics, but these might be being used here as stress indicators for the benefit of a Spanish reader, much as our article (linked above) does in places. {The poster formerly known as 87.81.230.195} 2.221.81.75 (talk) 10:01, 24 September 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Here's some of the Spanish 92.31.140.53. El omne é ela bestia están ermano, non compartimos el mesmo progenitor? Makuta Makaveli (talk) 14:38, 24 September 2018 (UTC)[reply]

What dialect of Spanish is that? ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 16:15, 24 September 2018 (UTC)[reply]

I haven't got a clue. Makuta Makaveli (talk) 16:17, 24 September 2018 (UTC)[reply]

About how old is it? ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 16:30, 24 September 2018 (UTC)[reply]

It looks old to me but I'm not good at this dating thing. Certain parts look way newer than others, like it was a working progress, and some pages have doubles with different orthography. Makuta Makaveli (talk) 16:36, 24 September 2018 (UTC)[reply]

It just doesn't look quite like normal Spanish. But if it's 500 years old, maybe it was. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 16:39, 24 September 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Dayyum. Makuta Makaveli (talk) 16:55, 24 September 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Hot dawg. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 17:27, 24 September 2018 (UTC)[reply]

El omne é ela bestia están ermano, non compartimos el mesmo progenitor? It looks to me more like Old Portuguese. I read it as: Man and beast are brothers, do we not share the same progenitor? The phrase Mí òhá tú jo, è áàn tlàn òhá reminds me of Yoruba. It's not Yoruba, but it has that flavor, what with the short words and the diacritics. However, if the latter text is as old as the former, it would be written very differently today. —Stephen (talk) 20:44, 24 September 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Personally I think it's a made up language. To say it's an African one when the rest of the manuscript is Old Spanish is a bit of a stretch. Makuta Makaveli (talk) 21:00, 24 September 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Without knowing the provenance of the manuscript, it's nearly impossible to guess. Without a time period or substantially more text, it's hard to even say what the primary language is. It resembles some form of Galician, but could very well be Old Portuguese as Stephen suggests or Medieval Spanish (Modern Spanish hombre was omne in Old Spanish and Modern Spanish mismo has been standard as such since the early 18th century, before which is was variously meismo, mesmo or mismo). As for the unknown sentence, my first instinct was that it looks like an attempt to phonetically transcribe a Celtic (specifically, a Gaelic) language, although I can't make any sense out of it as such. The initial sequence "gc" is possible in Irish, which also uses acute and grave accents. Given the possible age of the document, maybe early modern Irish? But without more info or an expert, we can only guess.--William Thweatt ^Talk^Contribs 21:29, 24 September 2018 (UTC)[reply]

We shouldn't even be doing that. I'll just say for the record, however, that the first thing that came to my mind when I saw the text, was Maltese. -- Jack of Oz ^{[pleasantries]} 23:45, 24 September 2018 (UTC)[reply]

I'll let you guys know when it deciphered. མཀུཏ (talk) 00:48, 25 September 2018 (UTC)[reply]

September 23

Definition and origin of "halfin", a fluid measure

There's a rather fine perhaps Irish song (I heard it in Newfoundland but hey) called Three Jolly Rogues. This is not the English one on which we have an article; we don't have an article on this one but you can see its lyrics here and hear a performance here, if these links are permitted. It's a cumulative song like Green Grow the Rushes, O or The Twelve Days of Christmas and its USP is all the booze, in its different measures or containers, that the Rogues are going to enjoy before they take their leave from the boozer. Please just have a look or a listen or google it - complex, it isn't!

My interest is in finding a definition or etymology for the third drink, a halfin of whiskey. I am admittedly a bit rubbish at research but so far I have only found it in references to these song lyrics. Whoever first sang the song must have got it somewhere ... so, where, and how much whiskey is it? I could speculate (a half inch, a half finger etc) but I'm looking to find out properly. Maybe one day we will have an article on this other song, and that can be part of it! All help in my quest gratefully received, thanks and best wishes DBaK (talk) 11:49, 23 September 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Only a negative result so far, "halfin" is in neither the OED nor Chambers 20th Century Dictionary. DuncanHill (talk) 12:30, 23 September 2018 (UTC)[reply]

(ec) After listening to the song a few times, I wonder if they're singing "a half and a whiskey" - perhaps referring to having a chaser with it. I can't find "halfin" or anything remotely like it in the full OED. I suspect the word on Musixmatch is just someone's guess: such sites are notorious for getting words wrong even when they're not particularly obscure. AndrewWTaylor (talk) 12:32, 23 September 2018 (UTC)[reply]

According to https://www.heraldscotland.com/news/13098939.a-dram-please-can-we-have-official-name-for-measure-of-whisky/ a "half" is a common way of ordering whisky in Scotland. I guess it could also be common in Ireland. No clue as to the derivation of this usage, though. --Khajidha (talk) 00:34, 24 September 2018 (UTC)[reply]

The site https://must-see-scotland.com/how-to-drink-whisky/ agrees. --Khajidha (talk) 00:40, 24 September 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Wikimedia Commons has these illustrative images: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Hauf_an_a_hauf_1.jpg and https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Hauf_an_a_hauf_2.jpg The accompanying text claims that a "hauf" of whisky is a quarter of a gill. --Khajidha (talk) 00:43, 24 September 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Use of the term culture of life

Seeking some advice on the term culture of life. The term is mostly used by publications of Christian religious groups (Roman Catholic and otherwise) and American conservative politicians, to broadly cover policies on abortion, euthanasia, capital punishment, etc. I'm wondering how widely it is used in general, if it's close to entering the language. A lot of sources still seem to put it in quotes. (Oddly, Wiktionary has an entry for wikt:culture of death but not culture of life.) – Reidgreg (talk) 17:19, 23 September 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Google Ngram shows an increase in usage since about 1995 [12] but that's a very rough view, since it won't exclude related phrases. It's not a very common phrase: [13] The Associated Press is putting it in quotes in articles published recently: [14] 70.67.193.176 (talk) 19:45, 24 September 2018 (UTC)[reply]

September 24

Mid-Autumn Festival

Do Americans actually call it "Mid-Fall Festival"? I'm wondering why it doesn't have many Google results. --2A0A:A543:8C1E:0:18F2:55:3092:678 (talk) 22:13, 24 September 2018 (UTC)[reply]

There's no such festival of any degree of cultural prominence in the United States. We have Halloween and Thanksgiving... AnonMoos (talk) 01:32, 25 September 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Oktoberfest celebrations claims a number of individual cities where Oktoberfests are held. But it's not really a big thing in America. Aside from Halloween and Thanksgiving, the most obvious harvest-season celebrations would probably be the various State Fairs. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 01:38, 25 September 2018 (UTC)[reply]

In the UK (by contrast), Harvest Festival is a cultural norm widely observed as a Church-sanctioned and/or hosted event. Neopagans have revived and/or reinvented a pre-Christian, Celtic-culture form of it called Mabon (see under Wheel of the Year), which is observed by neopagans elsewhere in the Northern hemisphere at this time, including in the US. (In the Southern hemisphere, where it is the Spring equinox, the spring counterpart Ostara would be observed at this time.) {The poster formerly known as 87.81.230.195} 2.221.81.75 (talk) 08:10, 25 September 2018 (UTC)[reply]

For those who've missed the point completely, Mid-autumn Festival is a Chinese/Vietnamese festival, which is very much a thing in some parts of the US. "(Mid-autumn) Moon Festival" is one term in use. [15] Henry ^Flower 09:59, 25 September 2018 (UTC)[reply]

How popular is it in the Netherlands? ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 12:26, 25 September 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Very, I would expect Chinese people in the Netherlands. 92.31.140.53 (talk) 13:00, 25 September 2018 (UTC)[reply]

September 25