Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Language/2011 June 14

= June 14 =

Japanese translation request
The context for this is that Splashmon is an extremely vain general.

軍団は率いているものの信じる物は己の美貌のみで、軍のデジモンといえど信頼関係など微塵も持っていない.

Right now, I believe it to be, roughly, "Although it leads an army, it believes in nothing but its own beauty, and it doesn't have even an iota of anything like trust, even for the Digimon in its army."24.13.125.86 (talk) 01:14, 14 June 2011 (UTC)
 * It's OK. But you don't have to translate など, meaning "anything like" is unnecessary. The usage in the ja text is emphasis. See #3. Oda Mari (talk) 14:05, 14 June 2011 (UTC)

X as a prefix
What is the background of using "x" as a prefix, such as in X-mas (Christmas) and x-ing (crossing)? Are there other uses for "x" as a prefix other than the given examples. Furthermore, is this English/U.S. specific, or is there something similar in other languages? And do we have an article about this? (I always thought that "+" would be a better option, i.e. +-mas and +-ing). A Way With Words was no help for this. Quinn &#10048; BEAUTIFUL DAY 02:28, 14 June 2011 (UTC)


 * Xmas explains that the X stands for the Greek letter chi, the first letter of the Greek name for Christ. "Plusmas" is the holiday for atheistic mathematicians. Clarityfiend (talk) 02:37, 14 June 2011 (UTC)


 * Surely it's "Timesmas"? Richard Avery (talk) 18:13, 14 June 2011 (UTC)


 * O X, o mores?  Nah, O tempora, o mores sounds better.  :)  --   Jack of Oz   [your turn]  08:55, 17 June 2011 (UTC)


 * For your second question, see All pages with prefix X-. The list is continued on the next page, and the next, and so on.
 * —Wavelength (talk) 02:48, 14 June 2011 (UTC)

Note that article lacks a citation showing that Xmas comes from the letter Chi, which is highly dubious, given its first attestation in Protestant England, used for a purely English word. It is just an abbreviation, and the pronunciation exmas is a spelling pronunciation. Objections to the abbreviation are based on pseudoetymology. μηδείς (talk) 02:53, 14 June 2011 (UTC)


 * WOW a special page to search by prefixes. Awesome! Thanks Wave! Just as an aside, I have had people take offense at the use of Xmas to refer to Christmas, but if the above is true about the Greek letter representing the Christ, then I think I have solid ground to keep using it as an abbreviation. Quinn &#10048; BEAUTIFUL DAY  03:04, 14 June 2011 (UTC)


 * Jesus is omnipotent and omnibenevolent and will not mind if you save time and space when writing down the English name for a pagan European winter sun festival rebranded in his name that he neither celebrated nor had anything to do with. μηδείς (talk) 03:17, 14 June 2011 (UTC)


 * Hope you don't mind if I copy and paste that response to my Facebook friends during Yuletide. Quinn &#10048; BEAUTIFUL DAY 04:36, 14 June 2011 (UTC)


 * I suspect it may share it's origin with X being used as the most common algebraic variable. I'm not sure which usage came first, but both use X to represent something different, and, in some cases, unknown.  The terms X-ray and X-files comes to mind.  Then there's also X used to mark locations, as in a treasure map.  That usage is similar, too. StuRat (talk) 04:53, 14 June 2011 (UTC)


 * According to EO, the X in Xmas indeed comes from the Greek letter chi. ←Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots→ 05:03, 14 June 2011 (UTC)


 * Medeis, why is that dubious? "X" is a common short form for "Christ", and other words beginning with it, in medieval Latin and French (and presumably also English, and Greek, although I can't say for sure). Adam Bishop (talk) 06:30, 14 June 2011 (UTC)
 * And as proof, taken almost at random, here is a Latin manuscript from c. 1250, which has in line 11 both "xtianitas" (the first word) and "i x" (for Jesus Christ, about 3/4 of the way in). Adam Bishop (talk) 06:36, 14 June 2011 (UTC)
 * Wow, you can decifer this, Adam? I wish I could. --Lgriot (talk) 09:18, 14 June 2011 (UTC)
 * Yeah, mostly...I've been playing with it in my sandbox (transcription and translation), just for "fun", although it's not a very clear photo, and the words from the other side of the page bleed through and make it hard to read (and the Latin itself is pretty bad!). Anyway, as you can see from that image, medieval writers made extremely heavy use of abbreviations, and "Christ", "Jesus", "God", etc, were among the most often abbreviated. Those words were so common, and the context usually so obvious, that there was no need to write out "Christus" every single time. For "Jesus Christ" they usually borrowed the Greek spellings and abbreviations. "Jesus" is usually spelled "ihc". It was absolutely normal to replace, at the very least, the "ch" of "Christ" with "x", and often, as you see here, the whold word "Christ" was abbreviated. There is nothing dubious about it at all. It would actually be far more dubious if they did write out "Christ" every time. Adam Bishop (talk) 09:55, 14 June 2011 (UTC)
 * Impressive. --Lgriot (talk) 11:48, 14 June 2011 (UTC)
 * MUTCD R15-1.svg There appear to be several origins for the x prefix. As mentioned above, it stands for Christ in Christmas. (I've also seen clergy use X'ian or X'n for Christian.) And in X-ray it refers to the algebraic variable for unknown. The third instance, noted in xing or x-ing, is where the x means cross. It undoubtedly comes from a saltire resembling the letter x. (Am I to understand from the article "glossary of rail terminology" that in Australia it is actually pronounced "ex-ing"?) — Michael J 11:10, 14 June 2011 (UTC)
 * Not that I've ever heard (but then, the things that I'm not personally aware of could fill many large books) . I've asked for a citation.  --   Jack of Oz   [your turn]  11:58, 14 June 2011 (UTC)
 * In the Disney Channel Dave the Barbarian animated series, Dave's favorite poet was named Ped Xing (surname pronounced /ˈɛksɪŋg/). Deor (talk) 22:01, 14 June 2011 (UTC)
 * See definitions of xed, xing, and xer.
 * —Wavelength (talk) 23:36, 14 June 2011 (UTC)




 * See Ichthys and Ichthyology.—Wavelength (talk) 15:21, 14 June 2011 (UTC)

Thanks, i am happy to take the xtianitas reference as good evidence--but simply saying it comes from chi is still a huge oversimplification.


 * Why? Adam Bishop (talk) 08:52, 15 June 2011 (UTC)
 * Because the xmas form is dated to the 1700's while the other forms are dated to mediaeval Latin texts. I highly doubt that whoever coined xmas in England in the 1700's thought, well, you know, the Greek word for Christ starts with chi, so, maybe I could save space by writing chi-mas.  More likely he just adapted a longstanding typographical tradition whose origins he may or may not have been explicitly aware of.  It's like saying the word chair comes from Greek--you'd be leaving out a lot of intermediate steps. μηδείς (talk) 17:29, 15 June 2011 (UTC)

Our article does not actually say that the form Xmas appeared for the first time in the 18th century. And indeed - 1681, 1672, 1655, 1600. And of course, before that, you had X'temmas (1551) and so on, all the way to Xres mæsse (1100), as both our article and OE point out. --91.148.159.4 (talk) 03:41, 16 June 2011 (UTC)


 * Damnable facts. μηδείς (talk) 22:06, 16 June 2011 (UTC)

Re: Michael J, above, Am I to understand...that in Australia [x-ing/xing] is actually pronounced "ex-ing"? Isn't that the common pronunciation in the US? I'm reminded of some old joke about how street signs saying "PED XING" (eg, ) warn of pedestrians on MDMA/ecstasy ("xing", )--thus likely to wander randomly into traffic.

Also, on the notion of the saltire resembling the letter "x". Apparently the creator of the Confederate flag (or Battle Flag) took pains to describe it as a satire and not a Christian cross. Though apparently it is commonly said to be a "St. Andrew's Cross", regardless of the original intent. And just to confuse it further, it is frequently called neither a satire nor a St. Andrew's Cross, but (erroneously) "stars and bars". Maybe in English Xs are plain confusing! Pfly (talk) 08:43, 17 June 2011 (UTC)


 * On Xmas's origin, the OED says of it, "see X n. 10." which says: In writing the name Christ n., esp. in abbreviated form, X or x represents the first letter /kaɪ/ of Greek ΧΡΙΤΟkhristos, and XP or xp the first two letters /kaɪrəʊ/. Hence in early times Xp̄, in modern times Xt, Xt, and X, are used as abbreviations of the syllable Christ, alone or in derivatives; thus Xp̄en, Xp̄n = christen adj., Xp̄enned = christened adj.; Xpian, Xtian, Xtianity = Christian adj. and n., Christianity n.); Xmas n. (Xstmas, Xtmas) = Christmas. Early quotes provided include: a1100 Anglo-Saxon Chron., "On Xp̄es mæsse uhtan". "Xpian the outward, inward, not at all" (1598). "Xtianity" (1634), "My first child...Xstened" (1685). And for Xmas specifically, an early version, "X'temmas" (1551), "Xmas" (c1775), and "Xstmas" (1799); plus the "Xp̄es mæsse" above (a1100). So...sure, the specific use of "Xmas" may have been just another case of an old tradition and not directly intended to refers to Greek chi. Still, such could be said for basically all these abbreviated forms, no? Pfly (talk) 09:00, 17 June 2011 (UTC)

Hakka Chinese Romanization
What is the transcription romanization for these words, 北 方 話  in the Hakka Chinese language? 174.114.236.41 (talk) 03:44, 14 June 2011 (UTC)
 * I don't know Hakka, but based on romanizations of other words which include these characters I would deduce that it's pet-fông-fa. r ʨ anaɢ (talk) 05:25, 14 June 2011 (UTC)

x-j switch in Spanish-American places
On one side of the border is Mexico. On the other side are places like La Jolla and the Mojave Desert. How did that x-j switch happen? Why isn't it La Xolla and the Moxave, or Mejico? --  Jack of Oz   [your turn]  21:31, 14 June 2011 (UTC)


 * Originally the letter x in Spanish stood for the 'sh' sound in "ship" and j for the 'zh' sound in pleasure. Those two sounds later merged to the 'sh', around the time of the conquest, and then that sound shifthed from 'sh' to the 'kh' sound found in the Scottish "loch".  The letter 'x' also retained its /ks/ sound for Latinate words like exactamente and was to be used only for that /ks/ sound after the 1713 spelling reform.  According to the rules it should be spelled Mejico, but the Mexico spelling was retained, as it was in Oaxaca and other names.


 * The original name for Mexico derives from "mexitli" pronounced "meshitli". The current pronunciation "Meksiko" is a spelling pronunciation found occasionally in Spanish as well as English. μηδείς (talk) 21:44, 14 June 2011 (UTC)


 * See


 * Mexico
 * http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mexico#Etymology
 * Name of Mexico
 * http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Name_of_Mexico#Phonetic_evolution
 * http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/La_Jolla#Origin_of_the_name


 * The Mohave name for themselves Mohave people is 'Aha Makhav


 * μηδείς (talk) 21:57, 14 June 2011 (UTC)


 * The mesoamerican languages spoken in Mexico mostly retained the "sh" sound and the letter x to represent it, so I guess that's why Mexico is still Mexico. - file lake  shoe  21:52, 14 June 2011 (UTC)


 * I've only ever heard it referred to as a spelling pronunciation, and that isn't a redlink. Sight pronunciation is a redlink even if you spell it correctly! --ColinFine (talk) 21:56, 14 June 2011 (UTC)
 * Your edit conflict prevented the correction from being made. μηδείς (talk) 21:58, 14 June 2011 (UTC)
 * Thanks for that info, Medeis. Did you know you can directly link sub-sections of articles using double brackets, thus: Mexico.  --   Jack of Oz   [your turn]  01:12, 15 June 2011 (UTC)
 * Yes, but in a talk page I am more worried about time saving than pretty links. And you are welcome.
 * There have been attempts to standardize those old "x" words by re-spelling as Méjico, Don Quijote, etc., with varying degrees of acceptance. Spanish orthography and History of Spanish have some good info. ←Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots→ 02:12, 15 June 2011 (UTC)
 * Texas keeps the x spelling in English, but is often "updated" to Tejas in Spanish, especially in Spain. The English pronunciation /tɛksəs/ (locally also /tɛksɨz/ as if it were the plural of Tex) is a spelling pronunciation. Bexar County, on the other hand, has a silent x and is pronounced "bear". —Angr (talk) 05:27, 15 June 2011 (UTC)


 * The female name Xóchitl is pronounced with an 'sh' sound. It derives from the Nahuatl word for flower.  There's a flower garden in Mexico City called Xochimilco, also pronounced with an 'sh'.  The Mark of the Beast (talk) 19:15, 15 June 2011 (UTC)


 * This makes me think of Alessandro Malaspina, an "Italian-Spaniard", who was christened Alessandro, but wrote his name (in Spanish) Alexandro. Apparently modern Spanish scholars tend to spell his name Alejandro. Medeis, above, mentions 1713 spelling reform "1713 spelling reform". Is Malaspina's name pronounced with a /ks/? He spelled it with an 'x' long after 1713. While on the topic, I've never quite understood why Quadra's name is sometimes spelled Cuadra, and why Bruno de Heceta's is quite often spelled Hezeta. Pfly (talk) 08:10, 17 June 2011 (UTC)
 * Oh, I see much of my questions are addressed at Spanish orthography, but I'm still left unsure how one should pronounced Heceta's name. Is the 'c' a hard 'k', an 's', or a 'θ'? Apparently he came from northern Spain--Basque roots even--if that matters. And Quadra. The orthography page lists both /k/ and /θ/ for the letter 'c'. I'm assuming Quadra's name is pronounced with a /k/... right? Pfly (talk) 08:20, 17 June 2011 (UTC)
 * Heceta is pronounced in Spanish with /θ/ or /s/ depending on accent; I can't say how it's pronounced in Basque. Quadra is pronounced with a /kw/; if it were an ordinary word instead of a name, it would be spelled Cuadra like other words formerly spelled with qua (cuatro, cualidad, cuantificación). —Angr (talk) 10:35, 17 June 2011 (UTC)