Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Language/2006 December 21

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[edit] December 21

[edit] Russian>English: a memorial inscription in Latvia

My source (Photo No. 42800) says this Russian inscription was posted at a mass grave in a forest in Latvia:

  • ПАМЯТИ ПОГИБШИХ

How to translate this into English? I require particular accuracy on the second word; a provisional translation rendered it as "murdered." -- Thanks, Deborahjay 07:27, 21 December 2006 (UTC)

The first word means "To the memory" the second word is a genitive plural of an adjective derived from a verb meaning "perish, be lost, be killed". So the whole thing means "To the memory of the lost/perished/killed". As you can see, the second word is a bit ambiguous. Marco polo 14:26, 21 December 2006 (UTC)
That ambiguity is indeed to the point. The provisional (actually, mediated ) translation shows a certain characteristic intention to reflect usage in other languages (notably Yiddish) while avoiding the euphemistics of what has been termed "Nazi-Deutsch"). "Murdered" isn't necessarily appropriate in English, hence my caution in using it. Thanks! -- Deborahjay 00:35, 23 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Rumbula protest banner text: Latvian(?)>English

The text (Photo No. 42813) appears on a banner posted at the site of the WWII massacre in the Rumbula Forest near Riga, Latvia:

  • TAS NEDRĪKST ATKĀRTOTIES!

Is this, as I suspect, in Latvian, and what would be its translation into English? The provisional translation is something like "[This] must not [happen] again!" -- Thanks, Deborahjay 13:28, 21 December 2006 (UTC)

    • It is in Latvian and it really means "This must not happen again" or rather "It should never repeat again". --Daarznieks 22:03, 22 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Curious about George.

Any Stan Freberg fans out there? Anyone who lived through the 50s? Preferably both?

I remember listening to several Stan Freberg shows/records/etc. where it sounds like the name George is used in a fashion that sounds unusual. (I'm not including St. George and the Dragonet).

In essence, if my memory serves me right, there would be some dialog in which a phrase that sounded like "That's so george" would appear, where, from context, it sounded like george was being used as a word meaning ordinary, tedious, or square. I never remember hearing that anywhere else.

Does anyone have an idea if I'm dreaming the whole thing up, or did someone try to use george as a synonym for the above, but it never really took off. This would have been in the USA around 1955, give or take a decade. Bunthorne 23:43, 21 December 2006 (UTC)

I'm not 100% certain, but I think it was used that way by Robert Wagner, playing a young hotshot air force pilot in a 1958 movie, The Hunters. (Should know soon - I'm getting it from Canada's version of Netflix.) Clarityfiend 04:41, 22 December 2006 (UTC)
As a youngster I heard a lot of the Freberg shows, but I can't recall ever hearing this particular usage of "george". Maybe it just went over my head, if it was there. I do remember Liberace often saying "I wish my brother George was here", but that's a different thing. JackofOz 01:04, 3 January 2006 (UTC)