Re: Ancient conlang

Quoting Nik Taylor <yonjuuni@...>:

> Ray Brown wrote:
> > Why? English doesn't have to use circumlocutions nor do other
> > natlangs AFAIK (tho many [most?] do translate "electronic mail"
> > - courier électronique, rather than the English abbreviation).
>
> Well, Japanese uses _denshi meeru_, where _meeru_ is an English loan,
> and the kanji for _denshi_ translate literally as "lightning-child"*,
> "child" being used for particles in physics, hence, lightning-child =
> electron.
Tangentially, is the ending -on occuring on so many particle-names (proton,
muon, gluon, tachyon, et sim) simply generalized from 'electron', or is it a
valid, so to speak, Greek affix for deriving nouns?

                                                          Andreas

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