User talk:EncycloPetey/Archive 13

Hi EP. {{la-decl-2nd|corre}} generates *(deprecated template usage) corree as the vocative singular of correus, but that doesn't look right. Wouldn't it be *(deprecated template usage) corrē or *(deprecated template usage) corrī or something? And if so, how would I show that in the table? — Raifʻhār Doremítzwr ~ (U · T · C) ~ 16:24, 1 January 2012 (UTC)Reply

I'm not aware of any special rules for situations like that. For second-declension nouns, the pattern is standard to have -e for the vocative, with the only exception being for nouns ending in -ius, which correus does not. Neither do I find anything in my grammars to suggest otherwise. --EncycloPetey 18:58, 2 January 2012 (UTC)Reply

OK, then; I'll leave it in there, but hold off on creating a noun-form entry for it. Looking at b.g.c., it would be extremely tedious to try to make an exhaustive search for its existence. — Raifʻhār Doremítzwr ~ (U · T · C) ~ 22:25, 3 January 2012 (UTC)Reply

Hello, you seem to think that my redirect usage is incorrect. I don't know Wiktionary policy, so I'd like to be enlightened on this subject.

I have been creating redirects because a Swadesh list that includes Rapa Nui utilizes a different orthography from standard, so I'm creating redirects so that links on the Swadesh list go to the actual words when I create pages for them. Is this acceptable? Metaknowledge 19:56, 2 January 2012 (UTC)Reply

Thanks. Metaknowledge 20:15, 2 January 2012 (UTC)Reply

Could it be left for snow-covered for Spanish, since there is no page to show the different forms? --Britannic124 05:24, 3 January 2012 (UTC)Reply

Back at the beginning of the tabbed languages trial, you wrote in the Beer parlour that TL was "horizontally compress all the content". Unless I'm misunderstanding what you meant by "compressing", this sounds like the Tabbed Languages stylesheets were failing to load. The stylesheets failing to load would have caused the "tabs" to be displayed as simple unstyled links, and the edit section buttons and other right-floated content to be pushed away from the right side of the screen. Is this in fact what was happening? --Yair rand 00:47, 9 January 2012 (UTC)Reply

I'm not sure what you mean. What's happening (it still is) is that the language names are huge and take up nearly a quarter or more of the horizontal display space. The page content is therefore all shoved into a smaller region and is horizontally compressed as a result. --EncycloPetey 16:15, 9 January 2012 (UTC)Reply

How do I create a project page, particularly a page of requested entries such as Wiktionary:Requested entries (Azeri)? I placed an Azeri language request (kişmiş) in the unknown language Latin script section. --Lo Ximiendo 01:26, 15 January 2012 (UTC)Reply

I don't deal with those pages much, but I assume you could simply copy and modify the contents of an exsiting page of the same sort. It is generally only useful to do this if we have someone working in that language, and if there are a large number of requests for that language. --EncycloPetey 03:52, 15 January 2012 (UTC)Reply

I created it just in case a request comes a knocking. --Lo Ximiendo 04:55, 15 January 2012 (UTC)Reply

Now how do I make the shortcut? --Lo Ximiendo 05:07, 15 January 2012 (UTC)Reply

Looks like you already figured that out. --EncycloPetey 16:53, 15 January 2012 (UTC)Reply

I noticed that you reverted my edits to sabal, sable, and Rhymes:English:-eɪbəl.

The pronunciation of sabal that you added with this edit is not correct. The -bal part of sabal is not pronounced like the bal- of balance, which is pronounced /bæl/ in U.S. English. The -bal part of sabal is pronounced /bəl/, like -ble of stable.

Dtrebbien 22:59, 1 February 2012 (UTC)Reply

AFAIK Dtrebbien is right; I heard sabal in conversation and was really suprised it was pronounced /seɪbəl/, but apparently it is. Mglovesfun (talk) 23:10, 1 February 2012 (UTC)Reply

It's not pronounced that way in the Southeastern US, nor in California, nor by any botanist I've worked with (nor by me). Nor is it given that pronunciation in Webster's 3rd ed. The pronunciation I added matches both my experience as a botanist in two parts of the US and matches Webster's. If there is another pronunciation (which is possible) then I've never heard it used. --EncycloPetey 02:12, 2 February 2012 (UTC)Reply

Actually, I am in the Southeastern U.S. and I heard it pronounced /ˈseɪbəl/ by an ISA Board Certified Master Arborist and by the arborists who volunteer at my county's cooperative extension office. I also went through the Project Gutenberg edition of Webster's 1913 looking for all similar pronunciations to the given Sa"bal, just to make sure that I got it right. The Webster's 1913 pronunciation Sa"bal is consistent with /ˈseɪbəl/. Dtrebbien 14:51, 2 February 2012 (UTC)Reply

Does that mean that Webster's completely restructured their pronunciation system for the 3rd edition then? The pronunciation they give is /ˈsāˌbal/, which uses a for the second syllable, as you found in the 1913 edition. But according to their pronunciation key, that symbol is the sound in "map", which is IPA /æ/ (the sound I had). --EncycloPetey 02:59, 3 February 2012 (UTC)Reply

I'm not sure, as I do not have access to Webster's 3rd. I have a copy of the Barnes & Noble edition of an adaptation of Webster's 2nd, but it does not have an entry for sabal.

Here are some similar pronunciations from the Project Gutenberg edition of Webster's 1913:

• A lot of words ending with -al. E.g.: coastal Coast"al and verbal Ver"bal
• herald Her"ald
• scarab Scar"ab

What is the pronunciation of verbal in Webster's 3rd?

It seems that vowel sounds /eɪ/ and /æ/ are represented by *a in Webster's 1913. E.g. hereafter Here*aft"er. Then again, there isn't a consistent distinction between "a and *a.

Dtrebbien 15:04, 3 February 2012 (UTC)Reply

OK, the information you're looking at is the stress in the headword form, not the pronunciation. It appears that the Gutenberg copy does not include the pronunciation information, possibly because of the special characters that cannot be repoduced in standard text. --EncycloPetey 04:38, 4 February 2012 (UTC)Reply

Hello! I consider your edit here as vandalism . It's clearly not two parts of speech. If you'd like to gainsay me on that, please take it to the talkpage and do not engage in any edit warring. Thank you 173.0.254.229 17:47, 4 February 2012 (UTC)Reply

I don't understand your objection. Your say that it's NOT two parts of speech, but you object to consolidating the two sections. That makes no sense to me. --EncycloPetey 02:35, 8 February 2012 (UTC)Reply

Hello EncycloPetey,

yesterday I added more translations to the entry "bürgerlich", which you reverted completely after one minute, without giving a rationale. Of course, now I know that re-reverting and asking "why?" in the edit summary was not the right thing to do, but yesterday I was just so startled to see my whole edit which I thought to be constructive and in which I invested quite some work reverted after one minute, that I went this way. You ask me to Wiktionary:Assume good faith. Have you assumed good faith when you completely reverted the well-intentioned edit of a new user without giving a rationale? Have you assumed good faith when you blocked this editor for "disruptive editing"? Is this how you welcome newbies here? Don't you need new editors on Wiktionary?

Kind regards, --193.48.226.98 13:44, 24 February 2012 (UTC)Reply

The rationale is on your talk page. Please read it. It was placed there immediately after reverting. Also, I did not ask you to assume good faith, I asked you to read WT:AGF, which you clearly did not, given your response. --EncycloPetey (talk) 18:24, 25 February 2012 (UTC)Reply

Dear EncycloPetey, you are very severe with no reason. Provide me please with some examples of what you mean. I am doing the best for Wiktionary and my knowledge of Greek is deep enough so that I can distinguish when an entry is simply 'Greek', applying to the whole spectrum of the language, or just 'Ancient Greek'. I have never been a vandal. Dimboukas (talk) 20:31, 25 March 2012 (UTC)Reply

I imagine your problem was in the entry avis. The greek word ἀετός, for example, is said to be Greek not merely Ancient Greek.Dimboukas (talk) 20:37, 25 March 2012 (UTC)Reply

That is one example of the problem. In changing the entry, you made the word avis (found in Classical LAtin) a descendant of a Modern Greek word. This is historically impossible. Likewise, you obliterated an Ancient Greek entry for πληγή by replacing it with a Modern Greek entry, but left all the Ancient Greek templates and information in place. This is not how Greek is done on Wiktionary. Knowing Greek is great, but you must also know Wiktionary. --EncycloPetey (talk) 22:25, 25 March 2012 (UTC)Reply

Because of the opinion you expressed at the earlier straw poll on this topic, I thought I should let you know of the existence of this vote.​—msh210℠ (talk) 15:03, 27 March 2012 (UTC)Reply

If the only attested spelling is exemplare, then why did you add the information at exemplar? This looks more like an archaic form of exemplary to me, than an independent form of exemplar. --EncycloPetey (talk) 17:22, 5 April 2012 (UTC)Reply

• It's not the only attested spelling, it just happens to be the way it's spelled in the Montaigne book I'm reading. Most of the time it's spelled without the e at the end. And it's definitely not exemplary, this used to be an adjective in its own right. Eg Donne, ‘Exemplar men, that might be our patterns for sobriety’; Defoe, ‘Exemplar Virtue took the Reins in Hand’, Bacon, ‘One iudiciall and exemplar iniquity in the face of the world’. Ƿidsiþ 20:08, 5 April 2012 (UTC)Reply

Hi! In relation to the proposed vote on relaxing CFI for endangered and sparsely-attested languages, we're currently discussing (here) whether or not to require the creators of entries for terms in extinct languages to supply at least one citation at the time they create the entries (i.e. to pre-cite the terms). As a contributor of Latin terms, would you care to express an opinion? - -sche (discuss) 05:02, 15 April 2012 (UTC)Reply

I do have a problem that needs advice. "Hypoxemia" is appropriate for U.S. and Canada. "Hypoxaemia" is appropriate for England and much of the Commonwealth, a distinction that is important depending on which medical journal you submit your paper to. I styled this after "color/colour" which does have references, and does have use section. How should I implement this?Terry Dwyer (talk) 00:39, 17 April 2012 (UTC)Reply

That's probably a good question for the Beer Parlour, which is our central discussion page. The (deprecated template usage) color / (deprecated template usage) colour pages are a bit experimental, and so aren't always a good guide to standard style. There are a number of oddities you'll find only on those pages, or on very few others. However, there isn't a standard way that I've seen to mark which spellings are used in particular regions, so opening a new discussion there for opinons might produce a standard format, or at least provide some good ideas. --EncycloPetey (talk) 04:23, 17 April 2012 (UTC)Reply

Finished. Over to you. SemperBlotto (talk) 19:35, 20 April 2012 (UTC)Reply

Thanks very much, though it may be a month or so before I have a solid block of time to have a go at it. --EncycloPetey (talk) 02:20, 21 April 2012 (UTC)Reply

Due to you being our principal Latin editor, I'd like to request your input on the most recent thread in the BP. Thanks --Μετάknowledge^{discuss/deeds} 01:19, 6 May 2012 (UTC) (That is, WT:BP#Latin verb lemmata)Reply

I've been watching User:Dux Oppositionis (contrs) and User:Rebellare (contrs) with increasing uneasiness for a while now. I get the impression that many of their entries are just English with Latin morphology tacked on. These edits (roulette and gasoline) don't even bother with the Latin morphology (the source words are themselves derived from Latin, which sort of ties the etymologies into knots). Am I overreacting, and if not, what should be done about it? Chuck Entz (talk) 06:33, 11 May 2012 (UTC)Reply

• See especially (deprecated template usage) AK-47. SemperBlotto (talk) 07:18, 11 May 2012 (UTC)Reply

Without any evidence for such words as Latin, I'd revert and warn first, explaining the principle of attestation on Wiktionary, then move towards blocking depending on the response. There are many books out there written in "Latin" that are actually joke phrase books or just pseudo-Latin, and many other books that are prepared as pseudo-Latin exercises in translation. I wouldn't trust such neo-neo-Latin words as valid without a citation from a Vatican document, as almost anything else using words for AK-47 would be suspect. There might be a Latin treatise by Fermat, Pascal, or Bernoulli using a Latin term for "roulette", as they all wrote about games of chance and probability in Latin. However, such a work might just be using the French roulette in an otherwise LAtin work because no LAtin equivalent exists. I would want to see some evidence that the noun declines to consider it as adopted into Latin.

However, I myself don't have much time to devote to Wiktionary this month, so I'll have to leave any action in the hands of others. --EncycloPetey (talk) 01:45, 12 May 2012 (UTC)Reply

(my personal view) Dux O. has done many constructive edits; his additions of given names and countries are almost always supported by Latin Wikipedia (like (deprecated template usage) Cuvaitum), and sometimes by the Vatican as well. Rebellare ought to be blocked for vandalism and the vast majority of his edits deleted, because they don't even seem to be in good faith (i.e. completely hypothetical forms like pistolium as a translation for (deprecated template usage) pistol). I would like a more experienced editor like EP or SB to decide how to act before the heap grows too large.--Μετάknowledge^{discuss/deeds} 02:56, 12 May 2012 (UTC)Reply

I reverted and edited out a lot of Rebellare's edits. They mostly show a complete ignorance of Latin declension (m.-a is often correct, but pairing it with f.-ae?). In one case, they gave the bogus "rota fortuna" where the correct version, rota fortunae is well known in Medieval Latin. This would seem to be someone with some Latin reference material, but no clue how to use it. Oddly enough, pistolium is one of the few supported by Latin Wikipedia (roulette is contradicted by Vicipaedia's rotula). Chuck Entz (talk) 06:00, 12 May 2012 (UTC)Reply

Well, I guess I am glad to hear that you have been bolder than I feel comfortable being. If you feel up to it and agree with me, Dux O's recent chemical element additions (niobium#Latin, technetium#Latin, etc and inflected forms) also need to be deleted AFAICT. --Μετάknowledge^{discuss/deeds} 06:25, 12 May 2012 (UTC)Reply

I also posted a message on his/her talk page. Rebellare was the easy part, because so much of the content was provably wrong and mastery of Latin was obviously lacking overall. D. O. knows the rules of Latin, but there are philosophical and CFI issues- which are less clear-cut. In this case, I'm not prepared to be as bold. For one thing, the distinction between scientific names for elements and actual Latin is rather blurry, and some would argue doesn't exist. We've discussed it before, but I'm not sure if there's really a consensus. Also, there are entries in Latin Wikipedia, which further argues against deletion (though it can't overrule the CFI). To be sure, it seems odd- from a semantic point of view- to have plural and vocative forms for an abstraction like a chemical element, but it makes perfect sense morphologically. I guess I'm going to have to ponder a bit and get more input before acting on D.O. Chuck Entz (talk) 07:14, 12 May 2012 (UTC)Reply

I am new to this Wiktionary thing, and I am open to pointers, but for me to improve, I do need to know not necessarily what is wrong, but why it is wrong also. On bassus, I added basso because the reference book I used, WCD 1974, show the etymology of basso as coming from bassus, and when I was on the bassus page, I saw the descendant section. Why should it not be on the descendant section?

Then on the oscillate changes I made. First, was the Latin etymology, which by no means am I an expert, but I like adding what I can. Can you explain what I did wrong there? On the definitions that I added... yes it already had to swing back and forth (as in a pendulum) however to move back and forth is more than just swinging. For example, an oscillating fan moves between the two points, it doesn't swing. I can oscillate between here and there again not swinging. Finally, the vibrate definition is actually how my book that I was reading brought my attention to the word, as the subjects in the book were getting a headache as the streets were oscillating as if they were out of phase. I added to vibrate on the first definition, since that was what websters did. Let me know what you think. Thanks.

Speednat (talk) 00:57, 24 May 2012 (UTC)Reply

For some of the answers you'll have to wait until EP sees this, but I can answer at least one of them. The etymology problems on ] have to do with Latin conjugation. First off, we use the present active indicative first-person singular as the lemma form, instead of the infinitive. You didn't introduce this problem, it was already there, but I thought I'd clarify in case you were curious. Also, Latin doesn't have a "past" tense. It has the "imperfect" and "perfect" tenses, both of which generally refer to the past. If your reference just says "past" tense, that's ok. Just write "past" and then put {{attention|la}}, and a Latin editor like EP will come and fix it. -Atelaes λάλει ἐμοί 01:07, 24 May 2012 (UTC)Reply

English basso comes from Italian basso, not directly from Latin bassus. We only list immediate descendants from Latin, except in cases where the Latin word entered English via Norman French at the time of the Conquest. To do otherwise would swamp out the information, and hide the fact that the word was actually just borrowed from Italian, rather than adapted from Latin.

For oscillate, it depends on your definition of "swing". I would say that a fan does indeed swing back and forth, although it does so in a horizontally oriented direction instead of a vertically oriented direction. I do not think this slight difference is significant for the definition of oscillate. To vibrate is not a definition of oscillate, but rather a near synonym. We don't follow other dictionaries as our principlal guide here, but try to write our own based on supplied citations demonstrating use. Many print dictionaries take shortcuts in definitions in order to save printed space, such as the use of near-synonyms to quickly convey meaning with just one or two words. In this case, vibrate implies a rapid movement of an object fixed at both ends, but oscillate does not imply anything about the speed of the movement and allows only one end to be fixed. --EncycloPetey (talk) 13:52, 24 May 2012 (UTC)Reply

I took a look at swing and I can see that "working" for oscillate; however, it seems like not including the non-swinging definition is in essence narrowing the definition. When I initially think of swinging, I do not think in a non-vertical manner, even though after reading the definitions, I can definitely see that. as in swinging a sword, etc. Can we not place it on the same line as swing kind of like this

1. to swing back and forth, especially as with a regular rhythm; to move back and forth between two points.

Regarding 'to vibrate', I did look at numerous other dictionaries and only the one I was using, used that as a definition. So I can see that as being an imperfect synonym.

Finally, I will try to get my Latin under control, and use {{attention|la}} when needed. Speednat (talk) 20:08, 24 May 2012 (UTC)Reply

If the definition of oscillate changes over time and does mean 'to vibrate', how do we accept such change. Is that what the Request for verification is? Please correct me if I am wrong.... But is that where if you can find three uses of that word in books from over a year ago, then that is an acceptable definition/word use. Obviously, just one would not work, as my author may have read the to vibrate definition and based his writing on that, but if no-one else does then it goes away. Let me know as all of this interests me, not so I can cause a problem but so I know how to affect change the right way.

Speednat (talk) 18:13, 25 May 2012 (UTC)Reply

One would add the definition, but also add the necessary citations (theoretically, every definition should be cited, but that's not practical in the short run). RFV is for verifying/citing or removing uncited or incorrectly-cited entries, and shouldn't be used unless necessary. Chuck Entz (talk) 18:35, 25 May 2012 (UTC)Reply

I just created this category, and I was wondering if you know any more words to put in it. Thanks --Μετάknowledge^{discuss/deeds} 15:46, 31 May 2012 (UTC)Reply

An anon made this, and I figure it should be Latin, could you fix it up? :) 50 Xylophone Players talk 13:58, 16 June 2012 (UTC)Reply

• cough* Well Semperblotto deleted it....:p But obviously you can still see the content since you're a 'crat. 50 Xylophone Players talk 19:19, 16 June 2012 (UTC)Reply

What was wrong with the edit you just reverted? —CodeCat 00:50, 28 June 2012 (UTC)Reply

The pronunciation edit. I reverted too far without realizing it. --EncycloPetey (talk) 00:51, 28 June 2012 (UTC)Reply

Is the pronunciation not right, then? It seems ok to me. —CodeCat 00:53, 28 June 2012 (UTC)Reply

No, it's not right. (1) The given pronunciation indicates vowel length, which is not phonemic in the US. (2) The given pronunciation uses a particular phonetic transcription, rather than phonemes. (3) The editor in question is replacing standard US in favor of GenAm in hos edits. See some of Widsith's reversions of this user's edits for similar instances. --EncycloPetey (talk) 00:55, 28 June 2012 (UTC)Reply

Ok... I understand, but could you not have fixed that then? Now there's no pronunciation at all. —CodeCat 00:56, 28 June 2012 (UTC)Reply

You mean: could I have created a pronunciation de novo for the dozen or so pages this user botched in the past month? I don't have the time right now. I've only dropped by for a bit, and did a bit of patrolling while here. Corrective editing takes significantly longer than reverting problems. Besides which, I've never heard the term used, so I'm not sure what a correct pronunciation would be. --EncycloPetey (talk) 00:58, 28 June 2012 (UTC)Reply

Like fur and suit combined, with the stress on the first syllable. —CodeCat 01:02, 28 June 2012 (UTC)Reply

Using which pronunciation(s) of suit? --EncycloPetey (talk) 01:05, 28 June 2012 (UTC)Reply

I've never heard suit pronounced the second way, so I suppose the first? —CodeCat 01:12, 28 June 2012 (UTC)Reply

I'm not inclined to add a pronunciation based on supposition. --EncycloPetey (talk) 07:41, 28 June 2012 (UTC)Reply

Your expertise may be of assistance here.​—msh210℠ (talk) 02:55, 11 July 2012 (UTC)Reply

Thanks.​—msh210℠ (talk) 04:40, 12 July 2012 (UTC)Reply

I've been working on cleaning up some entries created by Lycomedes (talk • contribs) that seem to be based on bad guesses re: definitions of scientific Latin. This one has me stumped. I know what's wrong with it: It has a "Usage notes" section that says "Used exclusively as a taxonomic epithet", but it's never used in taxonomic names. The only use I can find is in "alopecia androgeneticus", a name for male-pattern baldness. The definition is given as "androgenetic", which looks like an attempt to avoid finding out what the Latin means by anglicizing it and hoping the result is a word. I don't have access to any sources that actually define either the Latin or the English word in any way that make sense enough to me to paraphrase as a definition.

I'm tempted to delete the entry, but the word exists- I just can't figure out a definition. Any advice would be appreciated. Chuck Entz (talk) 08:29, 29 July 2012 (UTC)Reply

• <butting in> The medical term translates as "androgenic alopecia" - So I have adjusted the translation (etc) accordingly. SemperBlotto (talk) 08:38, 29 July 2012 (UTC)Reply

• • If this is strictly "medical Latin", then it's not Latin at all. We treat medical Latin and legal Latin as English unless they existed outside of the modern fields. Such terms are often borrowed from Latin elements, but assembled in some other langauge to create a new word. In the case of legal Latin, phrases from legal documents written in Latin often have taken on a new, fixed meaning in English. So if this is strictly medical Latin, then is either English or else is Translingual, and may not even be a word in its own right (like "Lanka" in English "Sri Lanka"). If it is a Latin word, then it's New Latin, and it is apparently formed from Greek roots. --EncycloPetey (talk) 20:02, 31 July 2012 (UTC)Reply

• If you're referring to the article "cat," I'm not sure what you mean by obliterate. If anything, I added more phonetic pronunciations, but I didn't realize I was only supposed to stick to the phonemic not the phonetic. Sorry about that. On another note, on the page "cat," what exactly is meant by the transcription "" (which clearly is phonemic)? Is "" what is perhaps meant? And shouldn't this be obliterated since it is not a phonemic transcription? Wolfdog (talk) 22:18, 2 August 2012 (UTC)Reply

Your input is requested for Wiktionary:Votes/2012-08/Foreign Word of the Day. I just wanted to make sure that all of this looks fine to you, because you have so much experience in this field. Thanks--Μετάknowledge^{discuss/deeds} 22:55, 2 August 2012 (UTC)Reply

One discussion is currently still on the main BP page: WT:BP#A proposal to solve the number-numeral question. The one before that was WT:Beer parlour archive/2012/June#Numbers and numerals, again (again) but was inconclusive. —CodeCat 14:50, 14 August 2012 (UTC)Reply

So, did I get something wrong here? --Omnipaedista (talk) 14:59, 16 August 2012 (UTC)Reply

Yes. You need to specify the stem with macra as the third argument of the template, so {{la-decl-1st|ruin|ruīn}}. I have fixed that, and I have also fixed all the inflected forms that were incorrectly created by bot because of that mistake. --Μετάknowledge^{discuss/deeds} 15:32, 16 August 2012 (UTC)Reply

Thanks for clarifying this. --Omnipaedista (talk) 17:23, 16 August 2012 (UTC)Reply

If you have any Latin questions, feel free to ask me. --Μετάknowledge^{discuss/deeds} 17:53, 16 August 2012 (UTC)Reply

You're right, the /ɝ/ is r-coloured, but I don't think there's an /r/ in the US pronunciation of the second syllable; I think it's limited to the first syllable. The word is hyphenated across a line break as fur-ry, but the three US dictionaries I cite give the break in the pronunciation as /fɜɹ.i/, and that's also my perception of it. I note that a number of our other -rry and -ry entries have similarly mis-split US pronunciations (e.g. ] and ], the latter of which Merriam-Webster at least has both pronunciations for, /ˈbɛɹ.i/ and /ˈbɛ.ɹi/). OTOH, while Merriam-Webster's audio does seem to me to break into /fɜɹ.i/, Dictionary.com's is more ambiguous... do you mind if I change the breaks to match the other dictionaries, or do you think it would be better not to try to mark syllable breaks in the transcriptions of such potentially ambiguously-pronounced words? - -sche (discuss) 02:08, 18 August 2012 (UTC)Reply

I know that I pronounce it with an "r" in the second syllable, but do not know whether that's the norm in the US. The words bury and carry aren't similar, because neither has an /ɝ/ in the first syllable, where the vowel is colored by the following r, and both have diphthongs for the first vowel in some US pronunciations, at least. Words like curry or jury are more likely to be comparable. --EncycloPetey (talk) 02:18, 18 August 2012 (UTC)Reply

I checked Dictionary.com and M-W's transcriptions of "jury" and "carry": both have /ˈdʒʊəɹ.i/ (and I noticed our transcription of "jury" has no break, a format that looks increasingly appealing to me); D.com has /ˈkæɹ.i/ and M-W has /kæ.ɹi/, /kɛɹ.i/, as if the /ɹ/ moves depending on whether one has the Mary-marry-merry merger or not(!). It seems the US and UK pronunciations are different in that way — placement of the /ɹ/ — but I'm still not sure if it would be better to move the dot or omit it. I suppose I should ask US editors that. I also just noticed that we give the pronunciation of "valley" as /væl.li/, and have since 2008! Oh my. D.com breaks it /ˈvæl.i/, M-W breaks it /ˈvæ.li/... I would favor dropping the dot and having only one /l/, at least for the {{a|US}} pronunciation. (It's certainly not "Val (pause) Lee".) - -sche (discuss) 06:44, 18 August 2012 (UTC)Reply

Not carry, curry. Possibly also hurry. I don't favor dropping dots, and do favor including them. Without them, it looks like the word has only one syllable. --EncycloPetey (talk) 07:57, 18 August 2012 (UTC)Reply

I noticed a change you made to an IPA on about and it was minor but it brings up a substantial question/clarification. I have been, due to a possible misread of the IPA page, utilizing the "." period as a syllable break regardless of whether or not I also used an "'" apostrophe or a "," comma. Since I noticed your adjustment, I have looked throughout Wiktionary and also Wikipedia for more clarification on the subject, and maybe I am being too literal but it seems that the "." would be used regardless when there is a syllabic break. Let me know what you think. Speednat (talk) 22:51, 20 August 2012 (UTC)Reply

No. When there is a stress marker, that marker necessarily indicates a syllable break. By convention, the "." is only used to mark the beginning of a syllable that does not bear stress. --EncycloPetey (talk) 03:25, 21 August 2012 (UTC)Reply

I will make a note and try to clear up what I added already. Thanks. Speednat (talk) 06:06, 22 August 2012 (UTC)Reply

Can you record the pronunciation of the word kung fu in the audio please ? Fête

Done. --EncycloPetey (talk) 01:34, 22 August 2012 (UTC)Reply

Can you record the pronunciation of the word ketchup in the audio please ? Fête

The reason I categorized "Mythological creatures" under "Cryptozoology" is that there are still people around who believe some of these creatures exist now or existed in the past. Category:Cryptids is a subcategory of Category:Legendary creatures on Wikipedia. What distinguishes a "legendary/mythological creature" from a "cryptid" is hard to judge in some cases, and so some form of cross-catergorization between the two subjects is necessary, in order to account for the continuing belief of some in creatures like fairies, which are generally regarded as legendary/mythological.

A while back, I proposed renaming Category:en:Mythological creatures to something like Category:Fantastic creatures, which would better allow for the inclusion of creatures that feature strictly in fantasy fiction. But I withdrew it once I realized carrying this request out would involve having to rename all the non-English versions of the "Mythological creatures" category and changing the corresponding category tags in hundreds of articles. It seemed better to me to try to work within the existing structure of the categorization system than drastically rework it over a minor quibble.

Similarly, adding "Mythological creatures" to "Cryptozoology" may not be an ideal solution to address continuing belief, but it was working with what was already available, and hence avoided drastic changes. Astral (talk) 03:36, 27 August 2012 (UTC)Reply

A solution that is made simply to avoid some drastic change does not make it a good idea. Most of the items in Category:Mythological creatures have to do with religious or Classical mythologies. They are almost never creatures that would be found by a cryptozoologist. The one does not fit as a subcategory of the other. --EncycloPetey (talk) 03:39, 27 August 2012 (UTC)Reply

Putting aside the fact that, from a scientific perspective, there's no difference between hunting for the Loch Ness Monster and hunting for dragons, phoenixes, and selkies, the key is not whether any of the creatures in question actually exist or might ever be found, but that some people believe they exist/existed, and have also possibly actively searched for them at some point.

What solution do you propose for addressing the issues I've noted with the current categorization system? We could adopt Wikipedia's categorization scheme, moving Mythological creatures to Legendary creatures and making Category:Cryptids or Cryptozoology a subcategory of it. "Legendary" avoids the connotations of "mythological," which suggests a connection to a specific mythology or religious tradition. Astral (talk) 04:17, 27 August 2012 (UTC)Reply

While "legendary" avoids those connotations, it is precisely for those connotations that the "mythological" category was created. And, from a scientific perspective, there is a great deal of difference between looking for the Loch Ness Monster (a creature reported seen, but with no clear identity) and looking for phoenixes (creatures which reputedly burn themselves to ash and are then miraculously reborn from the ash). The former is cryptozoological, the latter is mythological. --EncycloPetey (talk) 04:23, 27 August 2012 (UTC)Reply

If eyewitness accounts are the only evidence supporting the existence of the Loch Ness Monster, scientifically speaking, that puts it on exactly the same footing as mermaids, dragons, and fairies, which people have also reported seeing throughout the centuries. But these considerations are kind of beside the point in terms of trying to develop an ideal categorization structure.

Perhaps we could create a category with a name like "Category:Conjectural animals," which could then have the subcategories "Category:Cryptids" (for animals whose existence is subject to contemporary speculation but unproven), "Category:Fantasy creatures" (for invented creatures who feature strictly in fantasy fiction), and "Category:Mythological creatures" (for creatures from myth and legend). Anything that fits more than one of those descriptions could simply be cross-catagorized under both. Astral (talk) 05:19, 27 August 2012 (UTC)Reply

(1) You don't seem to have the foggiest notion of what science is, (2) You're trying to create categories for topical considerations that go way beyond what a dictionary of language is trying to do. There is no need for a complex system of categories for these words to meet one's personal ideology. --EncycloPetey (talk) 05:25, 27 August 2012 (UTC)Reply

Quoting from the lead of the Wikipedia article on cryptozoology: "Cryptozoology is not a recognized branch of zoology or a discipline of science. It is an example of pseudoscience because it relies heavily upon anecdotal evidence, stories and alleged sightings." Which is to say that science puts the Loch Ness Monster in the same category as dragons, and if that's a "personal ideology," it's one that's reported as fact without any qualification on Wikipedia. But let's try to keep this discussion civil and constructive.

What about creating Category:Fantasy creatures and Category:Cryptids, then listing both under Category:Animals, which already has Category:Mythological creatures in it? That would allow everything to be accessible from one place, but also also account for the nuances I've pointed out. Plus it's simple. Astral (talk) 06:07, 27 August 2012 (UTC)Reply

Re-reading this discussion, I think it could all just be a misunderstanding, and that we've somehow both ended up thinking the other is saying the opposite of what was intended. I can see places where misinterpretations potentially could've been seeded. Just thought I'd point this out. Astral (talk) 10:34, 27 August 2012 (UTC)Reply

The "nuances" you want to separate out are purely artifices of modern Western thought. There would be no clear criterion to distinguish one from the other. Take Ovid's Fasti, and try to decide whether the entities in that work are part of religious myth, fantasy fiction, or eyewitness sightings. It isn't possible to make the distinction in that way, since the book is written as an eyewitness account, is tied into explaining Roman religious festivals, but is generally considered a fiction by modern scholars. If you are arguing yourself that there is no basis for distinction, then it's disingenuous to suggest separate categories. --EncycloPetey (talk) 14:31, 27 August 2012 (UTC)Reply

I don't recall at any point suggesting there was no categorical distinction between creatures from religious myth, creatures from fantasy fiction, and what are today termed cryptids. What I did try to say, in response to the to the comment "They are almost never creatures that would be found by a cryptozoologist," which seemed to suggest that cryptids differ from mythic creatures in that they might actually be around to find, is that science generally views cryptids in the same light as mythic creatures — i.e., as being nonexistent — because cryptozoology is a pseudoscience. I admit I may have badly misinterpreted this comment, and that perhaps I shouldn't have brought up scientific opinion on cryptids, as it wasn't entirely germane to the discussion.

Basically, what I want to do is find a way to get fantasy-fiction creatures like the balrog and pegacorn out of Category:Mythological creatures, because they're a poor fit there, given they don't specifically originate in myth (although of course they have analogues and precedents to be found there). I also wanted to find a way to address the fact that certain creatures originating in myth or folklore might also be considered cryptids, such as faeries, the existence of which has been seriously investigated within the past 100 years. But I'm beginning to realize this second concern is probably not important important enough to warrant addressing. Astral (talk) 15:53, 27 August 2012 (UTC)Reply

Feel free to disregard the above response if you wish. I've decided that this matter isn't significant enough to pursue further. Astral (talk) 17:30, 27 August 2012 (UTC)Reply

I created malabsorbtion after seeing it misspelled on Wikipedia. Since someone might not know that that's the wrong spelling I thought it would helpful to link them to the correct spelling. Soap (talk) 01:37, 1 September 2012 (UTC)Reply

Wiktionary does not use redirections in the same way that Wikipedia does. See Wiktionary:Redirections for more information and a rationale of why we avoid creating redirects. --EncycloPetey (talk) 02:40, 1 September 2012 (UTC)Reply

This is a genuinely common misspelling (see Google Books) so I'm gonna create a misspelling entry in our standard way. (I am ambivalent about these but hey ho.) Equinox ◑ 03:52, 2 September 2012 (UTC)Reply

I'm likewise ambivalent about such pseudo-entries, but am firmly opposed to having hard redirects for them. --EncycloPetey (talk) 04:53, 2 September 2012 (UTC)Reply

I agree, but when I can fix it in about 100 keystrokes I will just do it! Equinox ◑ 04:56, 2 September 2012 (UTC)Reply

	Hello, EncycloPetey. You have new messages at The Great Redirector's talk page.
	You can remove this notice at any time by removing the {{talkback}} template.

EncycloPetey,

The en.wp ArbCom is once again rushing to a decision to take action when you've not had a chance to respond. There are claims you have been e-mailed, but there are concerns about when, and whether or not you have read certain things. Currently at Wikipedia:Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Case#Motion:_EncycloPetey_desysopped there is a unanimously (9-0) passing motion to desysop you on that project. It is the 11th hour. If you wish to retain your administrator rights on that project, please see the offer that was put on the table by AGK and SilkTork at Wikipedia:User_talk:EncycloPetey#Arbitration_request_concerning_your_permissions. If you agree, there is a chance (though rapidly diminishing as time elapses) you may retain your administrator rights there.

For what it is worth, quite a few people have been sticking up for you. In my opinion, you have been treated most reprehensibly by a number of editors on the case request and by ArbCom itself.

Please feel free to delete this notice. There is absolutely no intent to hound you on this project from en.wp, but rather to offer you an opportunity. With respect and gratitude for your service to en.wikipedia, --Hammersoft (talk) 00:55, 8 September 2012 (UTC)Reply

• Not that it mattered. ArbCom was in a massive hurry to desysop you because you know, you haven't edited there in over a week and you constitute a threat. They've desysoped you there. Sigh. --Hammersoft (talk) 15:19, 8 September 2012 (UTC)Reply

Could you please explain your scheme and its rationale or point me to a complete discussion of the generally agreed-upon Wiktionary scheme? DCDuring TALK 01:04, 13 September 2012 (UTC)Reply

Scientific names of taxa are used universally in journals of multiple different languages. You can pick up a journal of Japanese botany, entirely in Japanese, and in the midst of the text are taxonomic names. These taxon names appear in context in countless different languages, and are not subject to the grammar (e.g. inflection) of any of those languages except that they are used as nouns. Even in Latin, proper nouns inflect, but these names do not. They have their own governing codes that dictate form, construction, and usage. These codes also specify the grammar, gender, and other issues, and these are not the same as in Latin, and may even differ between the zoological and botanical codes. "Gender" of a new zoological genus name, for example, is specified arbitrarily by the publishing author, but the gender determines only the form of the associated species name, and nothing else. These names may derive from Latin (like Pinus & Acer), from Greek (like Naiadita & Anthoceros), or from multiple other languages (like Buxbaumia (German), Greyia (English), Chigua (via Spanish from an indigenous language of Colombia), Mizutania, Hattoria (both Japanese), Han (Chinese), etc.). As with many other issues, I doubt that anyone has collected the various comments on this issue in any one place. --EncycloPetey (talk) 05:06, 13 September 2012 (UTC)Reply

So there is no community basis for your reversions.

Incorrect.

Has what you say now always been your position?

Yes.

Is an implication that you don't want Translingual entries?

No. Translingual entries are valuable.

Do you view taxonomic Latin as just like medical and legal Latin, except for its broader pattern of use?

No, although there are certainly a number of simiarities.

Do you not want Translingual content to in any way contaminate Latin L2 sections? DCDuring TALK 09:29, 13 September 2012 (UTC)Reply

An additional problem with calling taxonomic names "Latin" is that many of them have never appeared in a Latin context. We can't call something "English" if it's never appeared in an English language context, and we shouldn't do so for other languages either. For zoological names, no Latin diagnosis has been required, so the names first appear in whatever language the original publishing article was written in. Botanical names used to be required to come with a Latin diagnosis (formal authoritative description) attached, but the most recent Code has done away with that, and often the name never appeared in the description anyway. Now, epithets (the second part of a species name) may behave like Latin, or they may not. So, for those, I've been hesitant to take action to create them. There are a few of them that do appear in other contexts, or appear in various inflected forms, and these are easily accomodated into Latin. However, there are other name elements that only appear as a part of a larger species name, and never are used as words in their own right whether in or out of Latin. These terms just don't qualify as Latin because they're not used as such.

They also can be redefined at any time. Someone publishes a paper stating that the Liliales ought to include a hundred additional families, and poof it does. Another paper published later objects, and presents reasons why the Liliales ought to include only seven families, and poof the definition changes again. Or, someone comes along and says that species Xx was actually given a name Yy 12 years before the name Xx was published and poof Xx is no longer a valid word, and gets replaced by Yy from then on. That doesn't happen with any other words in any other language.

Your characterization of the Latin used in taxonomic names makes me wonder whether it is a good model for Vulgar Latin. You seem to believe than the only Latin that counts is the literary language. In English we manage to accomodate AAVE and various dialects. You don't think that Latin should be so commodious? DCDuring TALK 09:41, 13 September 2012 (UTC)Reply

I don't think our treatment of taxonomic names can be used as a model for much of anything else. Taxonomic nomenclature is a very different animal because it's a system comprised entirely of proper nouns, and a few fixed-form possessives, but with no supporting contextual grammar. It's a collection of labelling words rather than a language.

No, I don't believe that the only Latin is literary Latin, but it's very hard to support an entry that cannot be attested, and Vulgar Latin terms are often reconstructed, inferred, or only indirectly hinted at. As a result, I've not tried to deal with Vulgar Latin much, aside from sometimes including them in an etymology. I just don't have a model in my head for dealing with it. That's not the same as discounting it, but you can't find much Vulgar Latin except in the form of short inscriptions, textual glosses, and the like. It's an entire subfield of Classical linguistics in its own right, and one I've not learned much about. We might have to treat Vulgar Latin entries in a completely different way from other varieties of Latin, utilizing one-off attestations or mentions per the vote on extinct and rare languages that recently happened. --EncycloPetey (talk) 14:37, 13 September 2012 (UTC)Reply

I could go along with what you say here. There are some problems in my opinions with implementation of the full program as you describe it and in aspects that you don't here describe.

1. You did not mention translations: Translation tables in Translingual sections would be a wonderful way to get users to contribute. Such contributions would be more forthcoming than full entries because we facilitate the addition of translations and do not require much formatting knowledge. Translations are even more easily contributed than Requests for entry in a given language and requests for translations are also easily made. Translation tables at English vernacular names are a poor substitute for such tables in Translingual sections because many species not commonly found in English speaking countries do not have widely accepted vernacular names.
2. Species epithets: The prospect of having some species epithets in Latin and others in Translingual just seems like a complication. Some species epithets that are identical to terms in true Latins have evolved meanings not found in true Latin. Rather than inject the taxonomic senses into Latin, we may as well have all the taxonomic senses in Translingual, with just the Etymology section (and page-down) to link Translingual and Latin.
3. English Synonyms etc: I think we are better off to place English vernacular names corresponding to taxonomic names (mostly at genus, species and subspecies level) under L4 Synonyms sections rather than in Translation tables. There is nowhere else in English Wiktionary where English appears in a Translation table, so users might fail to find them there.
4. Alternative headings or other divergence from practice in other languages: Translations would be better title "Vernacular names" than Translations, though the caption of {{trans-top|vernacular names for G. gorilla}} might be good enough to explain things to users. Synonyms (which would include English vernacular names in my scheme could probably be managed by having {{sense|English vernacular names of G. gorilla}}, with {{sense|other taxonomic names for G. gorilla}} for the taxonomic synonyms.
5. Species names: I think that these, and subspecies names, are necessary entries if we are to capture vernacular names in Translation tables.

Please give this approach some consideration. I have been fooling around with taxonomic names for quite a while now and would like to get this class of terms into much more complete coverage than it now has. We only have about 9000 taxonomic names and not all of them are even properly formatted and categorized and the most basic level.

There are many subsidiary questions, such as the desirability of categorizing taxons by the level(s) at which they are used, treatment of alternative circumscriptions, characterization of the status of synonyms, as by attribute labels, but the above seem more fundamental as they get to what we can hope to achieve with our coverage of taxonomic names, besides matching and surpassing the entry count of dictionaries like MW3 and MWOnline that cover these items fairly well. DCDuring TALK 00:26, 14 September 2012 (UTC)Reply

I'm very glad to have an opportunity to hash out some of these ideas. My response will be a bit delayed, however. Firstly bcause this week, I am committed already to some proofreading work on Wikisource, which will take most of my on-line time. But, that should end by this weekend and I would be glad then to spend next week focussed largely on dealing with sorting out ideas for this issue. Secondly, my computer is getting old, and is beginning to behave erratically. I have to make a conscious effort to type without using the right shift key, for example, because it sticks and then causes strange and annoying behaviors such as the spontaneous deletion of whole lines of text. (This is one reason I haven't been on Wiktionary as much for the past two weeks.) Instead, I am contributing by performing second-stage proofreading on Wikisource, where little to no typing is required other than single characters, line returns, etc. I hope to have a new computer this weekend, and hope it will be easy to set it up quickly with everything I need to work on-line (without having to have a service visit from my ISP). In the meantime, I'm not ignoring you or the issues, just trying to avoid a slow, painful, frustrating process of typing without using certain keys. So, provided I have a new and functional computer by this weekend, we then can work on settling some of these issues, and perhaps prepare a draft of "About taxonomic names" to address the what, how, and why of formatting such entries. --EncycloPetey (talk) 01:36, 14 September 2012 (UTC)Reply

Thanks for letting me know. I look forward to some making progress on this. Chuck Entz has some interest and knowledge in zoology, BTW. DCDuring TALK 23:19, 16 September 2012 (UTC)Reply

You born in which city ? Fête (talk) 01:20, 16 September 2012 (UTC)Reply

My speech and pronunciation are not at all typical of the city where I was born. Most Americans who meet me, and ask where I was born are surprised, because I have no regional accent at all, and never have. --EncycloPetey (talk) 05:04, 16 September 2012 (UTC)Reply

Ah, General American — the curse of homogeneity. I have a standing challenge for anyone to guess the city of my childhood based on my pronunciation of a set of words of their choice, if you're interested in trying out your dialectological abilities. --Μετάknowledge^{discuss/deeds} 05:49, 16 September 2012 (UTC)Reply

Can you record the prononciation of the word ketchup in the audio please ? Fête (talk) 18:37, 16 September 2012 (UTC)Reply

It may take some time. My old computer is not behaving properly, so I had to buy a new computer. The new computer does not yet have the software I need to record audio. And for now, I do not know how long it will be until I can record audio files again. You can always tag pages with {{rfap}} in the Pronunciation section to request an audio recording. --EncycloPetey (talk) 22:30, 16 September 2012 (UTC)Reply

This rollback seems to be an error.

Main category:

• Category:Transliteration of personal names

Correct name of subcategory:

• Category:en:Transliteration of Russian female given names

Duplicate with shortened (incorrect) name:

• Category:en:Russian female given names

--Greek-Trans (talk) 10:56, 19 September 2012 (UTC)Reply

This makes me wonder... when is something an English name of Russian origin, rather than just a transliteration of one? Is there any criterium for judging when a name is part of the language? —CodeCat 11:17, 19 September 2012 (UTC)Reply

The telephone book ;) If the name or his anglicised form is used in the US or other English speaking countries it becomes part of the English language. --Greek-Trans (talk) 11:32, 19 September 2012 (UTC)Reply

When EncycloPetey deleted:

• Category:ru:Transliteration of English surnames

and changed "Фолкнер" (Faulkner) to

• Category:ru:English surnames

he probably meant

• Category:Russian surnames from English

like

• Category:Russian surnames from Korean

--Greek-Trans (talk) 11:52, 19 September 2012 (UTC)Reply

Actually we have three of four different systems of categorizing personal names in place. A single person is responsible for all of these systems, and there is no consistency. Every so often, he starts using a new system, but does not convert existing entries to that system.

The "Russian surnames from English" should properly be an etymological category, but it unfortunately isn't always used that way. It implies that the name is being used in Russian and by Russian speakers. "Faulkner" is not a surname used by Russians, as far as I am aware; it is the name of an author who is discussed by Russians.

The "Category:ru:Transliteration of English surnames" is redundant. The "ru" indicates that it's in Russian, and if it says "Category:ru:English surnames", then these are English surnames in Russian. The "transliteration" part of the category name only tells you that Russian uses a different script, which is not necessary. Would we have "Category:it:Transliteration of English surnames" or "Category:pt:Transliteration of English surnames"? No, but only because those languages are written with the same script as English. It is therefore unnecessary and redundant to point out that Russian uses a different script from English in a category title. The "transliteration of" portion should not be used in category names. --EncycloPetey (talk) 14:48, 19 September 2012 (UTC)Reply

If the category system (Category:Transliteration of personal names) that exists since 2010 should not be used, what category system should I use? Of cause "the transliteration" of a name in Latin letters (en) in another name in Latin letters (it) makes no sense. But the Russian family name Чайковский has different transcriptions/transliterations like Tchaikovsky (English), Čajkovskij (Italian) and Tchaïkovski (French), and it's still a Russian and not an Italian or French surname. Using "red" categories like "Category:ru:English surnames" is not satisfying as long as there is a category Category:ru:Transliteration of personal names‎. --Greek-Trans (talk) 17:15, 19 September 2012 (UTC)Reply

Are you guys planning to do a big change in the category system for proper names and their versions from language X to language Y? I don't understand from the above discussion if you'll be trying to change the current system(s) (however chaotic they may be), or are simply trying to rename categories while keeping the categorial structure intact. (Right now, all I can say is that Latvian does need a category for foreign names, since those are, as in Lithuanian, regularly changed to conform both to Latvian phonology: e.g., German "ü" becomes a long "ī": Mülenbach > Mīlenbahs; and to Latvian morphology: nouns have to be made to end in -s, -is or -us, if they're masculine, or in -e or -a, if they're feminine, in order to fit existing declension patterns; so Barack Obama > Baraks Obama, Mitt Romney > Mits Romnijs. The rules are pretty standardized: my Latvian-English dictionary has a list of some 200 English names with their correct Latvian forms. All in all, I don't think I care much whether the final name of the category is Category:lv:Transliteration of English surnames or Category:lv:English surnames or whatever, as long as the category exists.) --Pereru (talk) 17:58, 19 September 2012 (UTC)Reply

I suppose the criteria differ for whether a name is a word in a language, or a name in a language. I don't think anyone would say "Romnijs" is a Latvian name, but it's clearly an attestable Latvian word. And "Gorbachev" is not an English name, but it's an English word, and certainly not a Russian word. So whatever we do, we should make it clear whether we mean that it is the word or the name that belongs to a certain language. —CodeCat 18:13, 19 September 2012 (UTC)Reply

Indeed. Going further, is 'Mitt Romney' -- an English name -- also a French word when it occurs as such in a French text? Should there be an entry for 'Romney' filed under "French Language" simply because one is going to find this word in French texts? Which is what makes me think that we only need such categories as Category:lv:Transliteration of English surnames when something is done to the name: it is transliterated, or altered in some sense (as in when Alexander Humboldt becomes Alejandro Humboldt in some Spanish texts, or the case of "Горбачев" when it becomes "Gorbachev", or sometimes "Gorbachov" or "Gorbachëv"). It's not simply the mention of the name, but its alteration in some way, that marks it now as being a 'word' in the other language. Because of this, maybe it would be a good idea to keep a word like "transliteration" or something similar in the category names. (What is usually done here for placenames that have different forms in different languages, like London/Londres, Lisboa/Lisbon/Lisabona? I suspect it may be the same kind of problem, and be amenable to the same solution.) --Pereru (talk) 19:33, 19 September 2012 (UTC)Reply

But the change in the name doesn't have to be orthographical. Paris is an English word; the French word is also spelled Paris, but it's pronounced quite differently! —CodeCat 19:49, 19 September 2012 (UTC)Reply

To quote CFI, "Given names and family names are words, and subject to the same criteria for inclusion as any other words." For Wiktionary entries, the only relevant sense of something being a Russian name would be that it is a name word used in Russian. That is to say, if a name is used to refer to someone/something when the speaker is speaking in a certain language, that word/name is a name in that language (and thus on Wiktionary should have an entry with that language's header and templates, etc.). The name is "used" in the sense of spoken as a word, regardless of whether it is "used" to name someone originally (ie whether a name is originally assigned to people by speakers of a language). The language spoken by individuals who have given/been given a certain name would be exclusively of topical relevance, and thus could be given categories of the format LanguageCode:CategoryTopic. The other category naming scheme, LanguageName_CategoryName, contains actual instances of CategoryName in the language. Thus, "Category:Russian given names" would just contain entries for any given names as used in Russian, however strange this sounds. Category:ru:English surnames would contain (if it existed) Russian words for names of either English speakers or people from England. Assuming the former, this would probably overlap entirely with the etymological category Category:Russian surnames from English in one direction (Russian surnames from English would include all instances of ru:English surnames, but not the other way around). I know they're not "Russian names" in the traditional sense, but they are names, and they're in Russian, so the required category name is "Russian names" anyway. The "transliteration" categories are likewise redundant, but those have the additional problem of being completely improperly named, besides for the major problems EncycloPetey mentioned above.

Unless CFI is changed, a name needs to be included if it's attestable in the context of a language (the attestation requirements are the same as for any other type of word), and the entry needs to have that language's header and be otherwise treated as a word in that language. "Gorbachev" needs to be an "English surname" so long as we keep the categories at least somewhat consistent. "Romney" needs to have a French section unless we vote to change CFI (assuming it is in fact used in French texts).

The "transliterations" categories probably need an RFDO before they can be deprecated entirely, though... --Yair rand (talk) 20:29, 19 September 2012 (UTC)Reply

It's my fault that the names of transliteration categories are a mess. I created them on the basis of this conversation, but because category names beginning with en: were forbidden at the time, I created the type "Transliteration of Russian surnames" for English transliterations. When a vote made the en: type categories possible, I changed the English transliteration categories into the type "en:Russian surnames" and kept the "Transliteration of Russian surnames" as a parent category. So naturally Pereru and Greek-Trans will create new categories of the type "el:Transliteration of Russian surnames" etc. One of these systems should be deleted, either (1) all "en:Russian surnames" types should be turned into "en:Transliteration of Russian surnames" , or (2) all "en:Transliteration of Russian surnames" types should be turned into "en:Russian surnames" type, and "Russian surnames" type used as the parent categories. The parent category Category:Transliteration of personal names should stay in either case. I would prefer solution 2 since those names are shorter and most names are currently listed in this type of categories. Categories like "English surnames from Russian" are quite different, an etymological category like EP says.

The difference between a transliteration and a surname/given name is the language of the name-bearer and the pronunciation of the name. When the script changes there is no problem: Ромни (Romni) is clearly a Russian word, but not a Russian surname. When the script and spelling stay the same, you'll have to check who the name-bearer is, possibly also statistics (phone directory is not enough, all countries are full of recent immigrants) and the existence of a pronunciation. Yair rand claims that if you use "Romney" in a Finnish sentence, it's a Finnish word. Actually it's code-switching: "Presidenttiehdokas (code-switch to English) Mitt Romney (code-switch back to Finnish) sanoi eilen, että ..." You don't need to change the CFI as long as you agree that code-switching exists. Finnish and Hawaiian entries for Romney would be total nonsense. Of course some names like Yair can be both English given names and transliterations of Hebrew names. Here is another discussion about the language statements of given names and surnames: Wiktionary:Tea room/Archive 2011/March#Proper nouns, languages and scripts. Place names are different: Paris has a clear definition and a well-established English pronunciation. Transliteration categories are not needed for place names. --Makaokalani (talk) 12:50, 20 September 2012 (UTC)Reply

Thanks for your detailed answer. How can we keep the parent Category:Transliteration of personal names and switch to the Category:en:Greek male given names system at the same time? The "By language" bar suggests category names like "Category:el:Transliteration of ..." As I understand it the preferred system would be:

• Category:Names
  • Category:en:Names
    • Category:en:Greek names (missing)
      • Category:en:Greek given names (missing)
        • Category:en:Greek male given names (like: Michalis, "a transliteration of the Greek male given name Μιχάλης.")

Remains the problem that the category can be confused with Category:English male given names from Greek. --Greek-Trans (talk) 17:22, 20 September 2012 (UTC)Reply

Solution (2) which means deleting all the Category:Transliteration of English male given names type:

• Category:Names

• Category:en:Names

• Category:en:Transliteration of personal names

• Category:en:Greek male given names, with an additional parent Category:Greek male given names

Solution 1:

• Category:Names

• Category:en:Names

• Category:en:Transliteration of personal names

• Category:en:Transliteration of Greek male given names ( and Category:Transliteration of Greek male given names with an additional parent Category:Greek male given names)

Templates cannot be used in the lowest level of solution (2), and "Category:Greek male given names" has to be typed in either case. But, to quote Pereru, I don't I care what the name of the category is, as long as the category exists. In either case many duplicate categories should be deleted, so there should be a RFDO discussion first. Should I go for solution (2), or does anybody have other preferences?

Are there really any English male given names derived from modern Greek? It looks like a needless category. In given names, the problem often doesn't exist - biblical Hebrew etymology vs. modern Israeli transliteration is an exception. Surname categories are more likely to be confused. --Makaokalani (talk) 14:21, 21 September 2012 (UTC)Reply

Even with solution (2), there is still the problem of "Transliteration of names" as a category. This is purely a function of which language pairs are used, and so communicates more about the relationship of the two languages, and little or nothing about the names themselves. We should not have any "transliteration of names" categories. --EncycloPetey (talk) 01:55, 22 September 2012 (UTC)Reply

See WT:RFDO#Category:Transliteration of English surnames.--Makaokalani (talk) 14:23, 26 September 2012 (UTC)Reply

I responded on my talk page. --Dijan (talk) 02:42, 29 September 2012 (UTC)Reply

Hi there. I am trying to figure out how to define the taxonomic epithet (deprecated template usage) destructans. It looks like some sort of participle / adjective related to (deprecated template usage) destruo but doesn't seem to be. Any ideas? SemperBlotto (talk) 19:43, 29 September 2012 (UTC)Reply

I'd need to know where the epithet was published originally to make an investigation, and even then might not be able to obtain the source. However, my guess is that the epithet was coined by someone who didn't know Latin verb conjugation well enough to get it right. It is likely an error for the participle dēstruēns (“destroying”). --EncycloPetey (talk) 21:20, 29 September 2012 (UTC)Reply

I was going to say the same as EncycloPetey (error for dēstruēns), this is why considering Translingual epithets to be Latin is so questionable. Mglovesfun (talk) 10:59, 30 September 2012 (UTC)Reply

Whether or not ?destructo#Verb (destructare) appears in Classical Latin, I'd be surprised if this was the sole form of it ever used in some Latin text, let alone Latin speech. I understand that there are large numbers of attested verbs from Late Latin and after that are formed from the past participle of Classical verbs.

We'd have to get rid of a lot of English and Vulgar Latin entries if error were the criterion. Why not just have all species epithets in Translingual, where they need not interfere with homogeneity of classical Latin? True botanical Latin (species descriptions) might be a separate matter, though I am sure it is also rife with error. We could use the Etymology section to establish the connection, erroneous or otherwise, to Latin. We would also benefit from removing whatever it is in {{etyl}} that prevents the Etymological categorization of Translingual entries. DCDuring TALK 12:56, 30 September 2012 (UTC)Reply

I didn't say "Classical Latin", I said it was an error in "Latin". I've checked both my Late Latin resources and my medieval Latin resources. None of them has destructans. It's not attested in any form of Latin that I can readily access resoures for. --EncycloPetey (talk) 20:02, 30 September 2012 (UTC)Reply

What do you make of these hits for destructata? DCDuring TALK 20:38, 30 September 2012 (UTC)Reply

Of the eight hits, six are for the species name Eupithecia destructata, and a seventh is for another species name. The sole remaining one, I'd have to investigate further, but it could be a scanno for all I know. Why do you ask? --EncycloPetey (talk) 22:29, 30 September 2012 (UTC)Reply

Thank you for the formatting help at page Streisand effect, much appreciated, -- Cirt (talk) 04:43, 2 November 2012 (UTC)Reply

The work of which professional etymologists? Refs please. --Florian Blaschke (talk) 23:18, 3 November 2012 (UTC)Reply

It's not my job to provide refs, it's the job of the person whose claim is being challenged. What do the sources you mention actually say? Have you bothered to check them? Also, if these were really borrowings from Ecclesiastical Latin, rather than direct continuations that merely happen to be spelt identical, what are the native forms, cognate to Spanish dios? --Florian Blaschke (talk) 19:58, 4 November 2012 (UTC)Reply

It seems you have done audio pronunciations for much of the Latin vocabulary I'm studying in an Introductory Latin course. I was hoping to create a study aid for myself and peers, maybe putting it on my blog, all for free of course. It would be very simple: mp3 files of Latin pronunciations (hopefully as accurately pronounced as possible) alongside their English equivalents, to be heard through iPods/mobiles. Would it be alright to use your audio for this?

All my audio files are on Wikimedia Commons, and have been released under the Creative Commons license. As long as whatever you do abides by the strictures of the CC-license (attribution, id the source, log any changes, release under a similar license, etc.) then you are welcome to make use of them. Do please update me when the study aid is made available, so we can note how MediaWiki resources are being further used. --EncycloPetey (talk) 03:18, 8 November 2012 (UTC)Reply