Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Humanities/2009 November 28

= November 28 =

The First Indo-European Tribe in Europe
The Sami people and Basque people are the indigenous people of Europe, but they are not Indo-Europeans. What the first Indo-European tribe to arrive in Europe and made settlement? 174.114.236.41 (talk) 03:39, 28 November 2009 (UTC)


 * It would be hard to say, but the article Indo-European languages indicates that the oldest attested group of Indo-European languages is the Anatolian languages of which the Hittites were speakers, as early as the 16th century BC. The Hittites never ruled Europe proper, but did control most of Asia Minor and so were close, and likely had a large influence over much of southeastern Europe.  As far as truly, honest-to-goodness state societies in Europe which were unambiguously Indo-European in nature, then Mycenaean Greece or the Minoan civilization may be another call.  The Myceneans were unambiguously Indo-European, but the Minoans spoke an apparently unrelated language.  -- Jayron  32  04:23, 28 November 2009 (UTC)


 * It all depends on the question of the "PIE homeland". For the last 20 years or so, the biologist Luigi Cavalli-Sforza and archaeologist Colin Renfrew have advocated an Anatolian center from which the Indo-European languages dispersed, and this hypothesis has received a lot of press coverage.  However, actual linguists tend to favor a center from which the Indo-European languages dispersed located in southern Russia and eastern Ukraine (east of the Dnieper).  In this case, Indo-European would have been geographically European as far back as we can trace back its origins, since the PIE homeland would have been west of the Ural mountains and north of the Caucasus mountains... AnonMoos (talk) 18:10, 28 November 2009 (UTC)

Tartars of the Rhyn-Sands steppe (Nikolai Leskov)
In a central episode of Nikolai Leskov's 1873 novella The Enchanted Wanderer, the Russian protagonist spends ten years with Tartars living on a distant steppe "somewhere near the Caspian Sea" in an area he calls the "Rhyn-Sands." The author attributes to them various characteristics (e.g. non-Christian, polygynist, avid horsemen) and certain behaviors and practices (e.g. they remain in their tents during periods of hot weather). Who might these people be and where is their homeland? -- Deborahjay (talk) 11:11, 28 November 2009 (UTC)
 * Some preliminary information: This refers to the Рынь-пески (Ryn Sands), now in Kazakhstan and known as Naryn Qum in the Kazakh language. They are at about 48.5 degrees N, 49.5 degrees E. --Cam (talk) 16:19, 28 November 2009 (UTC)
 * On looking further, I see that we have an article about it: Ryn Desert. --Cam (talk) 16:32, 28 November 2009 (UTC)


 * ...wherein is stated, inter alia: "Temperatures can reach extreme highs of 45°C to 48°C during summer..." ! -- Deborahjay (talk) 16:44, 28 November 2009 (UTC)

Why do so many names of British branded medicinal products begin with the prefix "ben-"?
E.g. benadryl, benylin.--Damriteido (talk) 16:17, 28 November 2009 (UTC)
 * According to this page Greek and Latin roots in English, ben is a latin root that means good.
 * benadryl = goodadryl
 * Pollinosisss (talk) 17:18, 28 November 2009 (UTC)
 * The famous tower clockwork, then, must mean Big Good [or maybe Big Well - see below]. :) ←Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots→ 17:38, 28 November 2009 (UTC)
 * :) Since it's taken from the name of Sir Benjamin Hall (IIRC), it actually could be translated from Hebrew as "Son of Big"! :) Grutness...wha?  23:43, 28 November 2009 (UTC)
 * In that case, the "ben" would have to come first... AnonMoos (talk) 05:38, 29 November 2009 (UTC)
 * "Benjamin" is an anglicisation of a Hebrew term that translates to "son of my right hand". Nyttend (talk) 06:36, 1 December 2009 (UTC)
 * In the Semitic "construct state" or "idafa" noun-compound construction, the possessor has to come second and the possessed first. So "Big Ben" could not mean "son of Big"... AnonMoos (talk) 06:46, 1 December 2009 (UTC)
 * All right - "Big son" then. Sigh - doesn't anyone notice smileys any more? I'll add another one just in case. Grutness...wha?  22:17, 1 December 2009 (UTC)

In the Latin language, the root is most often "bon-", while "bene" is a special adverb form. AnonMoos (talk) 17:50, 28 November 2009 (UTC)
 * It's often used to mean "well", as in nota bene (note well), and maybe "well" is what the manufacturers are trying to convey ("well" vs. "sick"). ←Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots→ 17:52, 28 November 2009 (UTC)
 * In Latin, bene means "well" in the adverbial sense, as in "Well done!", but it doesn't really mean "healthy" (except indirectly when it was used in certain phrases equivalent to "It is well with me" etc., though it's still an adverb in such phrases, not an adjective)... AnonMoos (talk) 05:38, 29 November 2009 (UTC)

I'm not personally aware of any british branded medicinal products that begin with the prefix "ben-"; benadryl, benylin, benecol and bengay are all brands owned by an american company. Others listed at the CDC beginning with ben- include Benemid (which I've never heard of in the UK) and Bentyl/Bentylol (which is only sold under those names in the USA). Nanonic (talk) 18:10, 28 November 2009 (UTC)

Bengay, formerly spelled "Ben-Gay", a topical muscle rub and analgesic sold over U.S. counters, derives its name from its developer, Dr. Jules Bengué; it's an anglicisation, or Madison-Avenification similar to Chef Boy-Ar-Dee for Ettore Boiardi. Pfizer Corporation produced Bengay until selling the brand to Johnson and Johnson; I don't know if either of those firms produced any of the presciption drugs beginning with "ben". As for British products, H. G. Wells wrote a novel about patent medicine called Tono-Bungay. —— Shakescene (talk) 21:46, 28 November 2009 (UTC)

Name for type of joke
There may be no answer, but I'm looking for a name for a certain type of joke - the one where you reference two subjects, A and B, and then you say "One is [list of characteristics associated at first glance with B, but also humorously applicable to A], and the other is B." I've found this joke to be extremely common, and yet I know of no simple name by which I can refer to it. Maybe a "one is and the other is" joke? --Lazar Taxon (talk) 23:44, 28 November 2009 (UTC)


 * It is misdirection. That particular joke is used almost nightly by Craig Ferguson. -- k a i n a w &trade; 23:48, 28 November 2009 (UTC)


 * An example could be this one, from Doonesbury a few years ago, which as I recall they said was merely one they had "heard", not originated: "What's the difference between the Hindenburg and Rush Limbaugh? One is a flaming Nazi gasbag. The other is a dirigible." ←Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots→ 01:56, 29 November 2009 (UTC)


 * A less actionable one might be, "What's the difference between a catfish and a lawyer?" "One's a slimy scum-sucking bottom-feeding scavenger, and the other is a fish."  I don't think there are enough of these jokes that they  constitute a genre, but somebody could easily prove me wrong. PhGustaf (talk) 02:03, 29 November 2009 (UTC)


 * If there enough of them to spread out over 32 or 64 pages, a book could be published. It merely lacks the title. (JoAnne Worley published a "Chicken Joke Book" in the late 60s, and that was spread pretty thin also. So it can be done.) ←Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots→ 02:10, 29 November 2009 (UTC)


 * Actually, the general category for these kinds of jokes would be riddles. Then they could be separated by type. Whatever those types might be. Like this antique: "What's the difference between an underweight person and a dental procedure? One is too thin, the other is tooth out." ←Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots→ 02:17, 29 November 2009 (UTC)


 * Then there's this type, which came in the early 80s when the team in question was rather weak in the field: "What do the Chicago Cubs have in common with Michael Jackson? They wear one glove for no apparent reason." Or this one: "What do the Bears and the Cubs have in common? They both win once a week." ←Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots→ 02:21, 29 November 2009 (UTC)


 * These jokes don't have to be riddles. I pointed out above that Craig Ferguson uses them nearly every night.  He never begins with  "What is the difference between..."  He just states that they are different as in: "Being a late night talk show host is a lot different than being a school teacher.  One hates his job, acting like a cheeky monkey as he panders to an audience that would rather be doing anything other than listen to his lame excuse for entertainment... and the other is a late night talk show host."  Also, I realized that when I stated it was comic misdirection, this is the simplest form of comic misdirection.  The complex form requires the comic callback also.  For example, Emo Philips did a very complex one at a show I saw a long time ago.  The show began with a few one-liners and the question, "Have you ever had a really weird dream?"  The rest of the show was jokes about a very weird dream that involved driving in the sewer and finding a door with a mysterious light coming from behind it.  He met his mother who had a huge bowl of sauerkraut.  The surprise caused him to pass out right on the spot.  As the audience waits for the next part of this weird dream, he states softly, "...and that was when I had this really weird dream." --  k a i n a w &trade; 04:01, 29 November 2009 (UTC)


 * Comedian Stewart Lee has said that in the comedy industry this type of joke is called a pull back and reveal. "Pull back and reveal" has literal application in TV comedy when the camera pulls back to reveal what's actually going on, but can also be used metaphorically.  Here are some more uses:  ht tp://ezinearticles.com/?How-to-Be-Funny---Part-11---Use-the-Pull-Back-And-Reveal-Technique&id=3177289 (link blocked by WP, why I don't know).
 * In the 1990s Lee and his former partner Richard Herring did a series of routines deconstructing bad jokes. They identified a class of jokes they called "and that was just the teachers" and the closely-related "and then I got off the bus".  An example similar to theirs is "My school was full of lazy good-for-nothings who spent all day smoking and looking at girl's breasts.  And that was just the teachers ... ahhhhh!"  You'll hear both "and that was just the teachers" and "and then I got off the bus" used by comedians familiar with Lee and Herring's work to refer to this kind of joke (e.g. this by Boothby Graffoe). --193.172.19.20 (talk) 16:24, 1 December 2009 (UTC)