Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Language/2009 July 6

= July 6 =

Twelve Heavenly Generals: Chinese, Sanskrit,... names
I would like to extend the table of names in Twelve Heavenly Generals to cover also other languages, similar to the table in Four Heavenly Kings. Since my language abilities are limited I am looking for somebody who knows enough Chinese (or any other suitable language) to help with the names. Thanks bamse (talk) 12:44, 6 July 2009 (UTC)
 * Chinese pinyin added - the characters are the same. Steewi (talk) 02:20, 7 July 2009 (UTC)
 * Thank you. Somebody going for the Sanskrit? bamse (talk) 14:37, 7 July 2009 (UTC)

Quatro
Why can't *quatro be a Spanish word? --88.77.243.108 (talk) 14:34, 6 July 2009 (UTC)
 * Because in Spanish the grapheme qu is used only before the front vowels e and i? (Before a and o the graphemes cu and gu seem to be used in words derived from Latin words containing qu.) Deor (talk) 14:42, 6 July 2009 (UTC)

How is quatro pronounced in Spanish? --88.77.243.108 (talk) 14:56, 6 July 2009 (UTC)
 * Since it doesn't exist in Spanish, it's not pronounced at all. The Spanish word cuatro, meaning "four", however, is pronounced roughly /'kwatro/. Deor (talk) 15:04, 6 July 2009 (UTC)

How would quatro be pronounced in Spanish? --88.77.243.108 (talk) 15:08, 6 July 2009 (UTC)


 * Exactly as Deor has pointed out, the difference between quatro and cuatro is just one of ortography (the Spanish ortography was at some point of time modified, so original -qua-,-quo- became -cua-,-cuo-). In contrast, the French language has not gone through such ortographic reformation, i.e. quattre quatre. Pallida  Mors  15:28, 6 July 2009 (UTC)
 * The same is true of -que-, -qui- when the /w/ is still pronounced in Spanish, as in frecuencia "frequency". +Angr 14:25, 7 July 2009 (UTC)
 * I suppose if a solely Spanish-speaking individual encountered the word 'quatro' in the context of other real Spanish words, they would probably arrive at the pronunciation 'cuatro', though perhaps after some uncannyness (that a word?) . Either that or they would pronounce it 'katro'. &mdash;Akrabbimtalk 17:35, 7 July 2009 (UTC)


 * Needless to say, many brand names use the spelling quatro. (The most important example here in Argentina is this one, pronounced exactly like cuatro. Pallida  Mors  19:05, 7 July 2009 (UTC)

Headstone:translation from Latin, please
I have been translating abbreviations used on a headstone in Scotland. Could someone here give me the correct full form of each of the following:
 * NAT (means “born”)
 * OB (means “died”)
 * AET (means “aged”)?

Thanks // BL \\ (talk) 20:18, 6 July 2009 (UTC)
 * NAT = natus (if a male) or nata (if a female)—participle of nascor. OB = obitus or obita—past participle of obeo. AET = aetate—ablative sing. of aetas, literally "at the age …" Deor (talk) 20:30, 6 July 2009 (UTC)


 * Thank you very much, Deor. I thought I had paid attention in class, but that was a lot of years ago. // BL \\ (talk) 20:51, 6 July 2009 (UTC)
 * No problem. If it's part of a sentence, "ob" might stand for the finite verb obiit ("he/she died [in the year]"), but "nat" can only represent a participle, so if "ob" appears alone in parallel, as it were, with "nat," I'd take it as representing the participle also. Deor (talk) 21:14, 6 July 2009 (UTC)