Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Language/2008 February 17

= February 17 =

Pirate Song
In the third Pirates of the Caribbean movie, a crowd of people sing a song as they're about to be hung. Did they make the song up for the movie, or does it have some kind of history? Also, is there an official, full-length version anywhere? Black Carrot (talk) 05:14, 17 February 2008 (UTC)


 * Do you mean "Hoist the Colours"? It's an orginal song. Lyrics by Ted Elliott and Terry Rossio. Music by Hans Zimmer and Gore Verbinski. There's a clip on youtube, but I can't use speakers right now. ---Sluzzelin talk  17:16, 17 February 2008 (UTC)

who quoted this?
"your future depends on your dreams, so go to sleep"

"love is blind, marriage is an institution, so marriage is an institution for the blind" —Preceding unsigned comment added by 59.189.58.120 (talk) 06:02, 17 February 2008 (UTC)


 * According to Dr John Curtis's The Business of Love: 9 Best Practices for Improving the Bottom Line of Your Relationship (2006), "Love is blind, and marriage is an institution for the blind" is a quotation from "James Graham - author", but it isn't clear whether that's one of the more than twenty men listed at James Graham. Xn4  19:32, 17 February 2008 (UTC)

Pavement/Sidewalk--only in Philadelphia??
[Moved from Miscellaneous desk --Anon, 08:20 UTC, Feb. 17]

I'm from Philadelphia, and here it is acceptable to call the place where people walk on the side of the road either the pavement or the sidewalk--both are equally understandable and I've used both. Is it actually true(as it says in the Wikipedia article on it) that this only works in Philadelphia, and that everywhere else in the U.S. it must be sidewalk?--I don&#39;t have a username idea (talk) 20:28, 16 February 2008 (UTC)


 * I can't answer that, but over here we avoid the issue by calling them footpaths. --  JackofOz (talk) 21:42, 16 February 2008 (UTC)


 * Up here in Canada, sidewalk is more common IMO, but pavement is understood too, as in "hitting the pavement". Clarityfiend (talk) 01:47, 17 February 2008 (UTC)


 * Here in California, pavement is the street, sidewalk is the sides of the street.  Corvus cornix  talk  05:29, 17 February 2008 (UTC)


 * I'm in Canada and I would agree with Corvus, not Clarity. Or more precisely, I'd say pavement is what the street is made of.  The sidewalk might be made of it too, but it's not normal to use the word in relation to it.  --Anonymous, 08:25 UTC, February 17, 2008.


 * Here in New England "pavement" would be understood to be the material the street is made of. "Hitting the pavement" has the same meaning as "Hitting the road". Using the word to specifically refer to the sidewalk would just confuse people.  APL (talk) 10:41, 17 February 2008 (UTC)


 * Whereas here, in the UK, referring to the roadway as the 'pavement' would seriously mislead people. I cautioned an American colleague about this once when he was describing a near-accident he had had in a car! --ColinFine (talk) 13:38, 17 February 2008 (UTC)


 * Indeed. As Freddie Eynsford-Hill sings in On the Street Where You Live from My Fair Lady: "I have often walked down this street before, But the pavement always stayed beneath my feet before".  I doubt he was referring to walking on the road.  --  JackofOz (talk) 00:49, 18 February 2008 (UTC)
 * That song has another linguistic idiosyncrasy: the rhyme "People stop and stare, they don't bother me/'Cause there's no place else on Earth that I would rather be" doesn't actually work in any accent of English (AFAIK), but only works when an American pronunciation of "bother" is combined with an RP pronunciation of "rather". The RP pronunciation of "rather" is much more salient to Americans than their pronunciation of "bother", so it's easy to see why Alan Jay Lerner though it would work. —Angr If you've written a quality article... 07:15, 18 February 2008 (UTC)
 * There are other examples in My Fair Lady where an American accent is needed to make a rhyme work. In You did it, Higgins sings (referring to Zoltan Karpathy) 'Her English is too good, he said, which clearly indicates that she is foreign./Whereas others are instructed in their native language, English people are'n'. AndrewWTaylor (talk) 10:07, 18 February 2008 (UTC)
 * And that rhyme doesn't work even for most Americans, though it will for New Yorkers (like Lerner). —Angr If you've written a quality article... 13:07, 18 February 2008 (UTC)
 * Another Americanism (though by choice of word, not pronunciation) in MFL occurs when Eliza admonishes Freddy: "Don't talk of June, Don't talk of fall! Don't talk at all! Show me!" I don't think fall is part of any British dialect's vocabulary, but I might be wrong. (Anyway, it's a good thing she turned him down, for Freddy later gave us one of the most interesting impressions of one of the most interesting bachelors, imo.) ---Sluzzelin talk  19:00, 18 February 2008 (UTC)
 * You'll find 'fall' meaning autumn in Gloucestershire, according to Frank Palmer. But still out of place. Drmaik (talk) 13:24, 19 February 2008 (UTC)


 * It's not a problem with rhymes, but the lines in My Fair Lady that grate on me the most are 'I'd be equally as willing as willing/for a dentist to be drilling/than to ever let a woman in my life'. I know Higgins is supposed to be a professor of phonetics rather than a grammarian (though he doesn't appear to be troubled by any professorial duties), but - among other problems - equally ... as matched with than? Aaargh! AndrewWTaylor (talk) 20:58, 19 February 2008 (UTC)
 * I recently read the Harry Potter series and was struck by a line in Prisoner: "With a yell, he rolled back onto the pavement, just in time" to avoid being hit by the Knight Bus. Is there anything else in the series more likely to give Americans a problem? — While we're up, to an American it would be madness to build a house "in the middle of the street". —Tamfang (talk) 04:49, 19 February 2008 (UTC)


 * On the other side of the coin, people sometimes use "street" to mean the pavement/sidewalk/footpath/whatever. "Your honour, I was walking down the street, minding my own business, when I was set upon by crazed Albanian dwarves and pummelled mercilessly for 17 hours continuously".  --  JackofOz (talk) 06:04, 19 February 2008 (UTC)


 * I think in this context "street" refers either to the roadway (even though you're not on it) or to the roadway and sidewalk as a unit. The judge might reasonably ask "Which street?" and you'd answer "Bloor St." (or whatever) without thinking the question odd. --Anon, 00:40 UTC, Feb. 20/08.


 * Especially since many rural or suburban streets don't have sidewalks and pedestrians are expected to walk on the edge of the road surface. APL (talk) 06:01, 20 February 2008 (UTC)


 * Yes, it can be ambiguous without a context. "On the street" could mean standing on the carriageway, or playing in the traffic. Or it could just refer to the location of a house, definitely not on the carriageway, as in "On the street where you live". Or, indeed, it could refer to the pavement/sidewalk.  --  JackofOz (talk) 06:50, 20 February 2008 (UTC)

Latin-English translation needed
Can anyone possibly translate "Sigillvm Civitatis Doraci" for me please? It is the motto of Liberty City, a fictional city in the Grand Theft Auto series. It's on the official city seal, as seen on the website for one of the games and I'm curious to know what the translation is so that it can be used in the article. Any help would be much appreciated.  .: Alex  :.  11:29, 17 February 2008 (UTC)


 * "Seal of the city of Doracus", although I am unfamiliar with the game so I don't know what Doracus would be. Adam Bishop (talk) 11:50, 17 February 2008 (UTC)


 * Thank you very much for translating that. I have no idea what Doracus means myself, as it doesn't seem to appear at all in the games. It may perhaps have a hidden meaning or something. Once again, thank you and I very much appreciate it.  .: Alex  :.  12:09, 17 February 2008 (UTC)


 * New York's seal says "sigillum civitatis Novi Eboraci", perhaps they borrowed that and messed it up, Adam Bishop (talk) 12:22, 17 February 2008 (UTC)


 * There seems to have been an old Franconian author named Doracus in Xanten (or "Troia Francorum"). No idea whether there is a connection. ---Sluzzelin talk  13:38, 17 February 2008 (UTC)


 * According to 'A Glossary of Latin Words Found in Records and Other English Manuscripts But Not Occurring in Classical Authors' in Charles T. Martin's The Record Interpreter (1911), doracus is late Latin for the fish we call a John Dory. Xn4  19:21, 17 February 2008 (UTC)


 * As Adam Bishop (correctly) pointed out it is problably as pun on Eboracum. According to my Latin-Portuguese dictionary:


 * Eboracum. n. ancient roman town in Britania (Eutr 8, 19). Nowadays York, in U.K.


 * Since there is no city called Doracum (let alone Doracus (wrong declension)) it seems the producers where just messing with the NY seal.


 * Mdob | Talk 20:01, 18 February 2008 (UTC)


 * -acum is common in place-names and -acus isn't; but why do you say Doracus is "wrong declension"? —Tamfang (talk) 04:56, 19 February 2008 (UTC)


 * Sorry, I've just expressed myself badly. What I have meant was what you just said: -acus is not the apropriate termination for cities. Mdob | Talk 13:11, 19 February 2008 (UTC)