Re: CHAT of vests & tortoises (was: Spelling pronunciations)

 --- Ray Brown <ray.brown@...> skrev:
> >
> >> The French for _tortoise_ is in fact _tortue_ <--
> late Latin _tortu:ca_
> >
> > This "tortuca" itself has an interesting
> etymology; it's from _tartarucha_
>
> Hence Italian _tartaruga_   :)
>
> > 'of Tartarus (fem.)' < Greek, distorted (:-) by
> _tortus_ 'twisted',
> > referring to the animal's feet.
>
> I see the Spanish _tortuga_ is also from _tortu:ca_.
>
I think it's "tartaruga" in Portuguese too.

It made me wonder a lot when I discovered, a few miles
from my home, a street called "Rue de la Raie tortue".
I couldn't make anything out of that name ("une raie"
is a ray-fish, and "tortue" is usually "tortoise", so
it looked very much like a story from Lewis Carroll),
until I discovered it actually meant, in an older
state of French, "rue du sillon tordu", which means,
if I can believe Google Translator, "Twisted Furrow
Street" (if "furrow" really means the trace left by
the plough in a field). Now we have completely lost
this word, "tortu", we use "tordu" or "courbe"
instead. And, oh well, we don't know any more what a
plough is, neither.

So, no ray-fish and no tortoise around, and nothing to
do with Lewis Carroll.



=====
Philippe Caquant


Ceterum censeo *vi* esse oblitterandum (Me).