Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Language/2017 May 14

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May 14

Cow-Honeybourne

How did Honeybourne get its name? The article indicates the place in England goes back centuries, but does not give any indication of the origin. And more odd are the related "honeybone," "honeybum," "honeybun" and still stranger "Cow-Honeybourne." I seem to recall an Old Testament story about bees making an animal skull into a hive, which would be a kind of "honeybone." . A "honeybun" in some parts of the US is a large donut-like thing. "Bourne" or burn is an old word for stream. A website says it is from "pre-7th century old English "hunig" or pure and "burna" or brook. Does this seem plausible? I could only verify the "brook" part with online Old English dictionaries.And how did the "Cow" get added?Edison (talk) 03:58, 14 May 2017 (UTC)

I have two good place-name dictionaries here, Eilert Ekwall's Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Place-Names and A. D. Mills' Dictionary of English Place-Names. They're agreed that the first element comes from Old English hunig, "honey", and the second from Old English burna, "stream", the whole thing meaning "(places on) the stream by which honey is found". They differ about the first word in Cow Honeybourne. Ekwall speculates that it "is no doubt cow the animal", but Mills finds a 1374 reference to the village as Calewe Honiburn, and therefore derives it from OE calu, "bare, lacking vegetation", which seems much more likely. Both of your links show that the surnames Honeybun, Honeybum etc. come from the place-name rather than any Old Testament stories, and Reaney and Wilson's Dictionary of English Surnames confirms it. Like you, I couldn't find the meaning "pure" for hunig in any online Old English dictionaries. --Antiquary (talk) 09:37, 14 May 2017 (UTC)

I've added an etymology to the Honeybourne article. --Antiquary (talk) 09:56, 14 May 2017 (UTC)

A bare place, lacking vegetation, where there is lots of honey? Edison (talk) 14:03, 14 May 2017 (UTC)

The stream that the village lies on is called the Honeyborne. On my road atlas it looks 8 or 10 miles long. I suppose the villages were named from the stream (in fact now I look Ekwall specifically says so) and Cow Honeybourne was the bare spot on it. Of course, why anyone would choose to settle at such a place is another question. --Antiquary (talk) 14:48, 14 May 2017 (UTC)

Lacking vegetation? Ideal – means you don't have to spend months chopping down trees and burning off other vegetation to clear a place to build your houses and plant crops. Remember that the primaeval state of most of England (post ice-age) was thick forest before we began to populate and modify the landscape. {The poster formerly known as 87.81.230.195} 2.122.60.183 (talk) 15:49, 14 May 2017 (UTC)

Thanks for the thoughtful responses. The "Cow" spot might have been an exception to an otherwise bee-friendly stream. Edison (talk) 01:18, 19 May 2017 (UTC)

Chinese quotation style

In Chinese, what is the proper format to attribute a quote to its author and work, or song lyrics to the singer and song name? I mean something like:

”千里之行，始于足下。“

－－老子《道德经》

or

你问我爱你有多深，我爱你有几分

－－《月亮代表我的心》邓丽君

219.75.40.52 (talk) 05:35, 14 May 2017 (UTC)

See Quotation_mark#Chinese.2C_Japanese_and_Korean_quotation_marks. —Stephen (talk) 12:49, 14 May 2017 (UTC)

I don't think the article is right with respect to mainland China - inverted comma quotes (“”) are almost universal in print, except in newspaper headlines, where corner quotes are used.

OP: you would put quotes around the quoted text, then use the long dash (——) to connect the quoted text with the source, and then the author, and the work in book quotes (《》). It is common, but not necessarily usual, to include the dynasty (if Chinese) or country (if foreign) in which the author lived, in parentheses before the name of the author. --PalaceGuard008 (Talk) 17:59, 15 May 2017 (UTC)

'not' favourable

what is the antonym (opposite) of "favourable/favorable" (unfavorable/unfavourable is not the answer).68.151.25.115 (talk) 11:55, 14 May 2017 (UTC)

Adverse? -- Jack of Oz ^{[pleasantries]} 11:59, 14 May 2017 (UTC)

What is your basis for saying "un-" is not the answer? ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 18:08, 14 May 2017 (UTC)

i mean 'give me a word without the prefix un-'.68.151.25.115 (talk) 03:16, 15 May 2017 (UTC)

So you don't object to "unfavourable" as such, it's just that you would like a list of additional antonyms. Right? ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 15:33, 15 May 2017 (UTC)

Correct68.151.25.115 (talk) 20:32, 19 May 2017 (UTC)

Would I be right in surmising that this is a crossword clue, where you already know that "un-" is precluded? {The poster formerly known as 87.81.230.195} 2.122.60.183 (talk) 00:39, 20 May 2017 (UTC)

moot
The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.
A word has no significance in a vacuum, there is never any such thing as "the correct word" just floating there, contextless. Give us the paragraph in which the word you want is located and we can give you a reasonable guess. μηδείς (talk) 23:53, 14 May 2017 (UTC) I'm surprised that there isn't a Wikipedia:Reference_desk/Reasonable guesses. I would support its creation. Akld guy (talk) 02:56, 15 May 2017 (UTC) What's stopping you? ←Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots→ 04:15, 15 May 2017 (UTC) The OP has made it quite clear he wants us to guess. Anybody want to second the motion to hat this thread? Any objections? μηδείς (talk) 04:48, 15 May 2017 (UTC) I don't see where he wants us to guess. I did guess, but one could always link to a thesaurus that shows a range of antonyms to the word in question. That would be the ideal way of answering the question, being a reference; it would certainly be better than finding ways of not answering it. -- Jack of Oz [pleasantries] 05:01, 15 May 2017 (UTC) Agreed. We should be trying our best to parse answerable questions out of posts here rather than searching for a "gotcha" that allows us to simply declare them unanswerable by RD standards and close the discussion. Hatting someone's question should be a last resort for when there's simply no possible way to give even a vaguely useful answer no matter how generously we interpret things (obviously not the case here since Jack already suggested a reasonable answer), or when the question fundamentally violates core RD guidelines like asking for medical or legal advice. Doing so is a good way to ensure that the questioner never returns, and it's not like leaving a "bad" question open (and just not answering it) does much harm. -Elmer Clark (talk) 06:47, 15 May 2017 (UTC) As for an attempt at an answer, depending on the context, you might be able to use inopportune (unless that counts as violating the "no prefix un" rule), bleak, or dismal. -Elmer Clark (talk) 06:47, 15 May 2017 (UTC) No, Elmer. This is not the "what the OP should have asked desk". It is not our place to "correct" people's questions. If they want answers, they can clarify themselves. μηδείς (talk) 19:53, 15 May 2017 (UTC) The OP seems to have moved on to other things, so boxing this section might be appropriate now. ←Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots→ 21:13, 15 May 2017 (UTC) The discussion was hatted by a third editor after it was objected that the OP was asking for speculation and showed no interest in clarifying himself--not because a combination of two editors have special powers. Hence I have removed the names as irrelevant--it's a matter of policy, not personality μηδείς (talk) 01:54, 16 May 2017 (UTC) Unhatted. Three editors in favor of hatting (one who was apparently anonymous) vs. two opposed is not consensus, and I completely disagree with your reasoning. Take it to the talk page if you (or whoever else) want to close this again. -Elmer Clark (talk) 02:02, 16 May 2017 (UTC) I support the unhatting. The Rambling Man (talk) 21:30, 17 May 2017 (UTC) This was hatted by Ian.Thompson, at the suggestion of myself and Bugs. Pointy nonsense by single purpose OP's are not worth addressing. μηδείς (talk) 02:38, 16 May 2017 (UTC)

I have moved this down to the bottom of the page to give the question some more time to be answered, given the procedural delay. Please continue answers there. μηδείς (talk) 04:26, 20 May 2017 (UTC)

Swedish and swahili in "Out of Africa"

Following quote from Karen Blixen "Out of Africa". "At the time when I was new in Africa, a shy young Swedish dairyman was to teach me the numbers in Swaheli. As the Swaheli word for nine, to Swedish ears, has a dubious ring, he did not like to tell it to me, and when he had counted: 'seven, eight', he stopped, looked away and said: 'they have not got nine in Swaheli!" What is that "dubious ring" in Swedish ears? ZygonLieutenant (talk) 18:12, 14 May 2017 (UTC)

Nine in Swahili is "tisa", and in Danish and Norwegian (according to the translations on Wiktionary), "tisse" means "to pee". Swedish seems to have a different word for that at the moment, but maybe it also used tisse back then. Adam Bishop (talk) 19:59, 14 May 2017 (UTC)

It's always possible that the average Swede was simply familiar with Norwegian dirty words. After all, today almost one in three Swedes speaks Norwegian, and the events of Blixen's memoirs take place only a short while after Sweden and Norway stopped being a unified Kingdom. Someguy1221 (talk) 02:51, 16 May 2017 (UTC)

Were they ever a single kingdom, rather than technically in personal union? —Tamfang (talk) 09:08, 18 May 2017 (UTC)

"She got pregnant with her/his/their/the couple's baby."

Is there a better way to phrase this kind of situation? Person A is male. Person B is female. Person A and Person B marry, and Person B gets pregnant. The unborn child is Person A's child and Person B's child.

• She gets pregnant with her baby.
• She gets pregnant with his baby.
• She gets pregnant with their baby.
• She gets pregnant with the couple's baby.
• She gets pregnant. [Make no mention about the parentage.]

50.4.236.254 (talk) 21:01, 14 May 2017 (UTC)

Being pregnant sort of implies the presence of a baby. How about "She became pregnant to her husband"? -- Jack of Oz ^{[pleasantries]} 21:03, 14 May 2017 (UTC)

The phrase "pregnant to (the father)" is not used in any variety of English that I'm familiar with. Can you provide a citation of somewhere that it's been used?

"Pregnant with her baby" is unusual because a woman cannot be pregnant in any way other than with her own baby. The other four examples seem perfectly acceptable to me. CodeTalker (talk) 21:39, 14 May 2017 (UTC)

"Pregnant with the couple's baby" sounds to me as if it refers to a different couple's baby, e.g. an implanted fetus following artificial insemination. If you're talking about, ah, the traditional method, then I'd say it has to be "with his baby" or else no mention. --76.71.6.254 (talk) 21:55, 14 May 2017 (UTC)

"She gets pregnant with their baby" sounds more natural to me. Ghmyrtle (talk) 14:14, 15 May 2017 (UTC)

Assisted reproductive technology has led us into all sorts of murky waters, not least linguistically. I would concur that with husband and wife doing it the old-fashioned way (sex, marriage, baby carriage), "She got pregnant" is the best and simplest option. But often these days one needs to clarify. Gestational surrogacy involves at least three adults, possible five. "Amira got pregnant with Jim & John's baby, using John's sister's egg." Google Ngrams, anyone? Carbon Caryatid (talk) 23:04, 14 May 2017 (UTC)

A slightly old-fashioned phrasing would be to say that she fell pregnant, or 'fell for a baby' - see under 'fall' here. AndrewWTaylor (talk) 07:53, 15 May 2017 (UTC)

The expression "to fall for a baby" is not an idiom synonymous with "to fall pregnant" in standard British English. I've removed it from the article that you linked. Is there some regional (Irish?) usage that someone had in mind? Dbfirs 13:10, 15 May 2017 (UTC)

Agree with the mentions above that the inclusion of the baby is probably redundant. That aside, it seems like they'd all be appropriate in different contexts, such as when you need to specify fatherhood and/or motherhood to varying degrees. Rewording slightly to include ordinals might make the sentence sound more natural "She gets pregnant with their first child.", "She gets pregnant with his second child (her first)." That kind of thing. Matt Deres (talk) 14:59, 15 May 2017 (UTC)

A more polite phrase is "They are expecting". StuRat (talk) 15:16, 15 May 2017 (UTC)

And also a more incorrect one. As I'm sure you're aware, only the woman gets pregnant. You don't talk about a couple expecting a baby, only the mother. --Viennese Waltz 15:29, 15 May 2017 (UTC)

Not incorrect. ngrams shows that while the "she is..." variant is more common, the "they are..." variant is common enough to be recognizable and thus not incorrect. --Jayron32 15:37, 15 May 2017 (UTC)

I was about to make the same comment, though the "they are" form is less of a euphemism, of course. Dbfirs 15:39, 15 May 2017 (UTC)

I'm not sure I understand the objection. The mother gets pregnant, but surely they're both "expecting" a baby at the end of it. It's a euphemism, but it is handy because it both includes the father while also not assigning him the status of "pregnant", which I find ludicrous. "We're pregnant!" "How handy for you kids these days to share the burden in that way!" Matt Deres (talk) 18:12, 15 May 2017 (UTC)

Agreed. I found almost as many Ghits on "expectant father" as "expectant mother". StuRat (talk) 20:36, 15 May 2017 (UTC)

It's not even a euphemism. Both parties were highly involved in the procreative act, and both are expecting the child. Only the mother is pregnant in the medical sense (although it's common to hear "We're pregnant"), but both are definitely expecting. -- Jack of Oz ^{[pleasantries]} 22:08, 16 May 2017 (UTC)