History Forum / General / British History / October 2007

I believe "Mentor" is an exception to the formation rule.  It is a
proper name and therefore does not form a feminine

Either  a man or  a woman can be a Mentor

In Greek mythology, Mentor was the son of Alcumus and, in his old age, a
friend of Odysseus. When Odysseus left for the Trojan War he placed
Mentor in charge of his son, Telemachus, and of his palace. When Athena
visited Telemachus she took the disguise of Mentor to hide herself from
the suitors of Telemachus' mother Penelope. (See Odyssey Book II, lines
255 and 268.) When Odysseus returns to Ithaca, Athena (in the form of
Mentor) takes the form of a swallow and the suitors' arrows have no
effect on him.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mentor

Same is true of Stentor

In Greek mythology, Stentor (Στεντωρ) was a Herald of the Greek forces
during the Trojan War. His name has given rise to the adjective
"stentorian", meaning loud-voiced, for which he was famous. Homer said
his "voice was as powerful as fifty voices of other men". He died after
his defeat by Hermes in a shouting contest.

Vince

In what may have been a demonstration of irony, The Highlander
<micheil@shaw.ca> wrote:

To you and all the other posters who have been choking my mailbox with
messages of gratitude and appreciation, I say this:

My sole ambition is to enlighten your mind and brighten your day, and
if I have achieved some modest success in this luciferous enterprise,
then I can die content.

Tish

If Bush posted, what would you like to same to him, vKince?

- nilita

I spent some time in the south of France close to the Italian border
and heard Provençal being spoken by older people. As might be
expected, it seemed to be heavily influenced by Italian, so words like
'fenêtre' (the circumflex in (Parisian) French indicates that an
original 's' has been dropped) was locally pronounced 'fenestra'.

Thus 'Isle is a hangover in English from Parisian 'Isle', now written
'Île' as in 'Île de France' the province which includes 90% of Paris..
This means that words like château, originaly chasteau are clearlky
from Latin/Italian roots like castello. If one takes a French surname
like Trudeau, one can see the Latin influence via the phonetic
pronunciation - Trudo.    

In Middle English, contrarie, is from Anglo-Norman, from Latin
contrarius : contr, against; and comes from Indo-European roots.

In the major Latin languages it's essentially the same phrase; 'au
contraire' in French; and 'al contrario' in both Italian and Spanish.

Portuguese is slightly different; 'pelo contrário' - 'for the
contrary'. Romanian on the other hand, normally a variation of
Italianized Latin with Slavic borrowings, says 'dimpotriva' with an
upside down caret ^ above the final 'a'. I assume this is from
Bulgarian or whatever, as in Russian and Ukrainian, 'contrary' is
Da-Nyet (Yes/No).

I share your annoyance at not being able to pin it down further!
Sadly, many of my best reference books were stolen some years ago.

From all the above, I developed a form of lingua franca which I used
to speak to people from Iberia. Most people understood me without
difficulty as I simply used French words and gave them Spanish or
Portuguese endings and pronunciations.

However, I was caught out by my own laziness in not learning Spanish
properly when wearing a kilt and accidently knocking over some drinks
on a neighbouring cafe table on the Champs Elysées - the main avenue
in Paris, where everyone sits and drinks and watches the passers by..

I apologised and used the French word for embarrassment with a Spanish
ending - embarasado. I was greeted with screams of laughter and it was
explained to me later that embarasado is an irregular in Spanish, and
was taught the correct word - embarasito. What I had actually said,
standing there in my kilt, was that I begged their pardon as I was
very pregnant...

One man was so overcome with laughter that he fell off his chair,
causing even more confusion. They were all waiters, working in the
local restaurants and hotels.I was not allowed to leave or buy another
drink but instead got thoroughly tanked at my victims' expense for the
rest of the afternoon, while every passing Spaniard was called over to
meet the pregnant Scotsman and share in the general hysteria. I must
say I have always liked Spaniards ever since!

Here is my favourite Spaniard of all time - the delicious Susana
Seivane, the best gaeta (Spanish bagpipe) player in all Galicia!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fZiSTBJumMQ  

I actually played the gaeta once and was amazed to discover that the
fingering is identical to that of the Highland and Irish bagpipe!
Sadly, being an older gentleman, I've never had the opportunity to
play with Susana...

that would be an improvement over anything *you* would favor.

redc1c4,
(but since Thompson is going to win the election...... %-)