Etymology or why TRAPEZA means "BANK" in Greek

Learning about Etymology is always fun, no matter how old you are. I find it quite easy to explain simple facts about Indo-European roots to children aged 6+. It is always a fun game to find words with such roots, and it tremendously expands children's scopes and horizons and teaches them logic and abstract thinking, especially when they begin studying foreign languages. Latin and Greek roots are no less interesting. In fact, our trip to Crete last summer gave me tons of ideas for researching and learning with my 10-year old daughter. It was a sort of a revelation, since I had never before been exposed to Greek and knew very little about it.

The revelation started at the airport when we saw the sign EXODOS: ΕΞΟΔΟΣ. It seemed too good - if not sacred! - to just mean 'exit'.

Religious words continued popping up in most unexpected places. The next one to attract my attention was 'communion bread' - Просфора or Prosfora - Προσφορές - which was written in very big letters almost in all shop windows next to the word 'SALE' and numerous percentage signs: -50%; -70%! This word took some time to solve, and finally somebody explained it to us: it just means 'OFFER', like 'special offer'. It is also used for communion bread ('offering' in this case), only with a different stress.

Yet another mystery was in the word meaning 'BANK' - TRAPEZA. From Russian ТРАПЕЗА and the verb ТРАПЕЗНИЧАТЬ it was quite clear that the word had to do with eating and not money. So we needed another explanation which was duly provided for us: originally (and still today, only with a different stress) the word meant 'TABLE'. And since there were very big tables in banks, the banks got the same name. Needless to say, tables normally have 4 sides (which are, depending on the skill of the carpenter ))), not always parallel to each other), hence - the geometrical shape - TRAPEZIUM or TRAPEZOID. 


Still, the most fascinating word for the etymology studies was Greek 'THANK YOU' - Ευχαριστώ /efxaɾiˈsto/. I had the hardest time trying to remember it until I suddenly realized that all I had to say was the word EUCHARIST in Russian - ЕВХАРИСТИЯ. Now it meant perfect sense - Thanksgiving, of course! If you go further down in etymology and try to figure out how Ευχαριστώ itself came about, you will get Ευ [eɸ] meaning 'good' or 'well' which we find in so many words like 'euphony', 'euphoria' or 'euphemism';  and the root χάρη /ˈxaɾi/ - 'grace, favour' with derivatives Χαρίζω [xaˈrizo] - 'give as a gift, donate, grant'. So it is obvious: Ευχαριστώ = Ευ + Χαρίζω = I Give you Good. Now it becomes quite clear  that the seemingly completely Russian word БЛAГОДАРИТЬ  is nothing but a Greek borrowing in the form of a calque or a loan morpheme-for-morpheme translation: (Ευ = Благо) + (Χαρίζω = Дарить). Now, isn't that fascinating! 

Unusual weather we're having, ain't it? - Dog days!

The expression diēs caniculārēs or "dog days" takes its origin in the Roman times and means the 'hottest days of summer' (not to be confused with "холод собачий" or "dog cold" which is more typical of Russian weather and hence a Russian expression!). Back in those days, Sirius, the brightest star in the constellation Canis Major (Orion's bigger dog) rose about the time of the sunrise during the hottest summer days - between early July and late August. (It doesn't happen now because since then the Earth's axis has slightly changed its orientation.) So the name of the constellation became the name of the hot season - dog days. And the Latin word for "little dog" - canicula - got its meaning of "vacation" or "holidays" in Russian - каникулы.

But it was not the unusual heat in Moscow that made me think about the dog days. It was Vladimir Nabokov's book that I read last month - Ada or Ardor: A Family Chronicle (which I wrote more about in my other blog - Arts and Crafts in the Family).

Similar to Vladimir Nabokov himself, the main characters of this book are trilingual, and speak fluent English, Russian and French. So even though the book is written in English, there are many French and Russian expressions used, especially idiomatic expressions, the most colorful expressions that suite best this or that situation in the book.

• Sometimes Nabokov uses the Russian expressions in transliteration and then translates them into English in brackets:

...but she remembered him saying 'Vot te na' (well, that's odd) in a bothered voice.

• sometimes he translates them into English first and puts the Russian transliteraton in brackets:

'Rather soon (skorovato) she consoled herself,' remarked Marina, alluding to the death of the Count...

• sometimes he translates them into English and just explains what it means:

'On her there was no face,' as Russians say to describe an expression of utter dejection.

• but sometimes he just gives a funny English translation of the Russian idiomatic expression - and in this case you've got to figure it out all by yourself. And this is how I stumbled upon the canicular devils:

But, in the sudden storm, calculations went to the canicular devils. (Part2, Chapter7)

Now, this is a good example of Nabokov's language play, very similar to that used extensively by James Joyce in Finnegans Wake, when mixing two or more languages creates a word or expression which either does not make sense when you look at it at first, or is completely unrecognizable, but in any case contains a puzzle that needs to be solved. Unlike joycean puzzles, Nabokov's puzzles are not too difficult, and this one in particular is quite easy to solve. All you need to know is that 'canicular' means 'dog' as an adjective in Latin to be able to recognize the Russian expression 'к чертям собачьим'.

Nabokov seems to quite like this Russian expression, there are several places in the book where he uses it, and every time translates it in a different way:

But, added Ada, just before being whisked away and deprived of her crayon (tossed out by Marina k chertyam sobach'im, to hell's hounds - and it did remind one of Roses's terrier that had kept trying to hug Dan's leg) the charming glimpse was granted her of tiny Van, with another sweet boy... (Part1, Chapter 24)

Especially now - when everything had gone to the hell curs, k chertyam sobach'im... (Part 2, Chapter 11)

... hydrodynamic telephones and other miserable gadgets that were to replace those that had gone k chertyam sobach'im (Russian 'to the devil') with the banning of an unmentionable 'lammer'. (Part 1, Chapter 3)

Out of 'hell curs', 'hell's hounds' and 'to the devil', the expression 'canicular devils' definitely stands out because it sounds funny, it's witty and has inside it a puzzle to solve.

Playground observations. #2: Being Neat and Careful

A little boy is climbing up dangerously high, while a little girl comes up too close to the swing with somebody swinging at full blast... CAREFUL!!! - is the first word that an English speaker would have on his mind in this situation. And one might think that in Russian it should be the same - its exact translation - ОСТОРОЖНО!!! But unless you go to the playground as often as I do and pay attention to what people say, you would have no idea that "осторожно" is almost never used there. What moms and nannies use all the time is - if you think logically - the most unlikely word of all for these particularly dangerous situations: АККУРАТНО! Now, what does "аккуратно" have to do with a situation when you need to be alert and careful? Every time I hear it, I notice it because it just doesn't sound right to me. If you look in the dictionary, you will see that in colloquial speech and in vernacular the adverb "аккуратно" can be used in the  meaning of "осторожно" in cases like "аккуратно нести тарелку с супом, чтобы не разлить". But in exclamations? No dictionary mentions the fact. So how did this new meaning come about? It may be possible that this is dialectal usage typical of Moscow only. It may be that parents don't want to scare their children and use a milder word? I tried looking it up on the Internet and found a most peculiar thing in one of parenting sites:

 Условно я разделила понятия "осторожно" и "аккуратно". Осторожно - это то, что от нее не зависит, например бегущий человек, раскачивающиеся качели. Аккуратно - то, что от нее зависит, то, что она в состоянии сделать, используя внимательность, наблюдательность, упорство, то есть то, что приходит с тренировкой. Я не говорю дочке: "Осторожно, упадешь!". Говорю: "Аккуратно, можешь упасть". И разница здесь есть. Я даю ей понять, что в ее силах делать лучше, опасности в этом нет, и при ее старании результаты будут наилучшими, то есть это стимул к усовершенствованию навыков. При слове "опасность" или "осторожно" она ищет внешнюю причину, чего надо опасаться.

Now isn't that interesting how this mom is creating in the child's mind the meaning which she invented herself? And... doesn't "Аккуратно, можешь упасть!" sound fuuny? 

Playground Observations. #1: The Magic Word or a Threat?

Having two kids, I often spend my time at the playground. It is interesting to listen to moms and nannies talk. There are a couple of funny things that I have noticed in the playground language. Here's one of them.

I often hear moms try to teach their kids to use the "Magic Word" - PLEASE: ПОЖАЛУЙСТА. To do that they make sure they use it themselves. Good tactic! Nothing wrong about it. But one should listen to how they use it! They usually use it when they want their kid to do or not to do something the kids may not find pleasant. And the intonation they use - High Fall intonation or ИК-2 turns the whole magic word into a threat. 

Паша, подой\ди сюда, пожалуйста! 

Вася, не си\ди на земле, пожалуйста! 

Маша от\дай, пожалуйста, игрушку девочке! 

All these sentences, to sound polite, should be pronounced with the High Rise + Low Tail intonation pattern known in Russian as ИК-3. In fact, ИК-3 bears the meaning of "please", it makes the sentence polite even without the magic word. If moms used this intonation pattern without "please" they would sound so much more polite than with "please" but with a High Fall intonation - ИК-2! Moms also pronounce the word ПОЖАЛУЙСТА slowly, usually with minimal reduction, they stamp on every syllable, turning the usual casual [пaжАлстъ] into [пажАлустъ].  I wonder what message kids get when they hear such usage of PLEASE?! 

"Morning!" vs "Good Evening!"

A couple of months ago, when I was teaching the intonation of English greetings, one of my students asked me, why we can greet people by saying "Morning!", omitting "Good", and can not do the same with "Good evening!". That was an interesting question. I had not thought about it before. 

But then, when I started explaining how "Good morning!" lost its "Good", everything became very clear. The answer is simple: because the word 'evening' starts with a vowel, while the word 'morning' starts with a consonant. Consonants undergo assimilation, while vowels do not. So what happens to "Good morning!"?

Good morning!

Goob morning!

Goom morning!

Gm morning!

Gmorning!

Morning!

In "Good evening!" 'd' and 'e' can not assimilate. Therefore - nothing happens!

Is Teaching English to Toddlers in a Kindergarten a Waste of Time?

In her comment to my post "Teaching Young Kids" my former student Galina wrote, "I still consider that it's waste of time in the case of an odinary kindergarten where a teacher comes twice or even once a week for 15-20 minutes. And you should also take into account that kids of this age often get ill and stay at home." So the question remains: Is it a waste of time?

I remember when I went to a kindergarten, we had English lessons for a while. I was about 5 years old at that time. Was it a waste of time? Pretty much. All I remember from those lessons was a beautiful big picture of a family - we were learning how to say "mother", "father", etc.; and how the teacher told us that we should make our lips look like those of a fish to pronounce the sound [u]. That's all. Galina is absolutely right. If this is what's going on at a lesson, it is a waste of time. A teacher needs to be a genius to make those lessons really useful. Therefore to have such lessons, we need to ask the question: What can we achieve in this situation? What should be our goal? What can be achieved at this age? 

I think that the key words here should be LANGUAGE EXPOSURE. Since at this age the oral perception is so much better developed than the performance, we should focus at providing adequate material for the children to absorb. To a certain extent children will be able to reproduce what they acquire right away, some of them more than others. But most of this material will then be stored in their memories until the point when their command of their organs of speech will be good enough to fully use what they have acquired. To achieve good results the teacher will have to work closely with the parents, advising them on what kind of English language cartoons, movies, songs and chants they should play for their kids at home on an every day basis. Without this cooperation Galina's phrase - waste of time! - may be quite relevant!

So, what kind of material? In my previous message I pointed out that words should not be learnt outside of context. What I meant by that is that they should be learnt in a phrase, with the correct intonation. I personally know quite a few French words, but when I use them I often feel that this is not the way French people use them. And it is not only idioms I mean. Something as simple as finding out a person's age is expressed in different languages in a different way: English: How old are you? French: Quel age as-tu? (=Which age have you?) Russian: Сколько тебе лет? (= How many years are you?). In my experience the best way of doing it is using CHANTS. They combine rhythm, intonation, phrasing and vocabulary with the easiness to learn whole phrases by heart. It is also very easy to change words in chants, so that the formula of a phrase remains the same, but you use more vocabulary, once the chant is learnt well. It is easy to use phrases from chants in dialogs.

What else do I mean by LANGUAGE EXPOSURE? In my experience I've noticed that it is a lot easier to teach students who are bilingual or speak just one language but have been or are exposed to more. For example, every time I get a student who spent his/her childhood in any former republic of the Soviet Union where besides Russian people speak their ethnic language as well (Ukrainian, Georgian, Armenian, Azerbaijani, Tatar, Uzbek - you name it!), the student is so much easier to teach! Sounds and intonation are just a piece of cake! The student may or may not speak the ethnic language himself, but their exposure to the different sounding language in the childhood sort of trains the ear. I had a most unusual student about 2 years ago. She was bilingual, and her native language was Ukrainian. Even though Ukrainian is so close to Russian, the intonation patterns may differ, and Luba spoke both Russian and Ukrainian equally well. She spoke English a lot worse than the other students in her group - she had been only learning it for 2 years, while some of the other students had been learning it for 5, 7 or more years. Her grammar was bad, her vocabulary was not rich, but when it came to intonation, she could imitate anything! She was the best! It was quite amazing! 

I wrote this to show that even passive exposure to another language in the early childhood can be very beneficial for learning a foreign language in the future.  By exposing kindergarten kids to English we may lay a strong foundation for their future acquisition of English at school. But it should be a true exposure - not just teaching a couple of words and phrases! This foundation will not be very visible - it is below the surface - but if we are doing it right, it will be a lot easier to build on top of it, rather than start anew.

Мишка, Гришка, Пощипай ехали на лодке...

There are different ways words develop their meaning in a language. There is a phenomenon called 'etymological doublets' or sometimes 'triplets', when in a language there are several words with somewhat different meanings, even though they have the same original source or root. The reason they have different meanings and look different is that because they entered the language as borrowings from different languages at different times. Typical examples of doublets in English are captain and chieftain, chief and chef, frail and fragile.

There is an interesting process going on at the present moment with one of the Russian verbs which very well may lead to the creation of a pair of doublets, even though strictly speaking they will not qualify as real doublets since they will develop not by being borrowed from different languages, but through their incorrect conjugation in the Russian vernacular - просторечие.

There are several Russian verbs which add the letter "л" ("l") in the middle when they are conjugated, and which do not have it in the infinitive. They do create a certain difficulty for foreigners learning Russian. But unless the letter "l" appears only in the first person singular and nowhere else (like in the verbs любить - люблю - любит; копить - коплю - копят; топить - топлю - топят) such verbs may create a certain difficulty even for native Russian speakers. I would like to look at 3 such verbs: КАПАТЬ, СЫПАТЬ and ЩИПАТЬ.

The verb КАПАТЬ can be conjugated both, with the intruding "l" letter and without it. Both ways are correct and listed in dictionaries: КАПАЮ, КАПАЕШЬ and КАПЛЮ, КАПЛЕШЬ. The only thing that can be added here is that the variant with "l" may sound a little outdated, it is rarely used nowadays and even in the dictionary the example comes from an old idiom: НЕ КАПЛЕТ НАД КЕМ-ЛИБО.

The verb СЫПАТЬ can only be conjugated with the letter "l" in the middle: СЫПЛЮ, СЫПЛЕШЬ. С утра СЫПЛЕТ мокрый снег. I have to admit, that even though this is the only correct variant of conjugating this verb, not everybody remembers it and quite a few people incorrectly  say СЫПЕТ, СЫПЕШЬ, СЫПЯТ instead. One can imagine that in 50 or 100 years from now the variant without "l" in the middle may become a new norm.

But the most interesting thing is happening to the verb ЩИПАТЬ. The correct way to conjugate it is WITH the "l" in the middle: ЩИПЛЮ, ЩИПЛЕШЬ, ЩИПЛЕТ, ЩИПЛЕМ, ЩИПЛЕТЕ, ЩИПЛЮТ. This correct variant is used quite infrequently nowadays. Unfortunately, even some (not to say many) educated people omit the letter "l". It is even registered in dictionaries as "colloquial". Now, what is really interesting, is that there are 2 ways of conjugating this verb, when used in просторечие - vernacular (I would still prefer to say it is vernacular, rather than colloquial speech). It all depends on the meaning. If what is meant is "TO PINCH", people usually say: ЩИПАЮ, ЩИПАЕШЬ, ЩИПАЕТ, ЩИПАЕМ, ЩИПАЕТЕ, ЩИПАЮТ (-СЯ can be added): Не щипайся! А Ваня щипается! Пощипай его! If what is meant is "TO STING" or "TO BURN", especially in impersonal sentences, people usually say:  ЩИПЕТ (again, -СЯ can be added):  Мазь сильно ЩИПЕТ. В горле ЩИПЕТ. Мороз ЩИПЕТ уши. 

So what we get here is a sort of doublets with identical infinitive forms but different conjugation patterns depending on the meaning! In English, for example, there is no such verb which would mean both "to pinch" and the burning or stinging sensation on the skin. May be in Russian, again, in 50 or 100 years from now these will be different verbs?