On 2009-07-28, Peter T. Daniels wrote:

What's going on here? To "whom" is a rook called a castle? This
clearly wasn't put in for the benefit of American readers, since we
don't know a bird called the rook and the chessman would be the first,
and perhaps the only, referent of the word. If "castle" is the usual
UK name for the outer man on the chessboard, why would Ron have called
it a rook anyway? (Well, obviously he couldn't say "it looks like a
giant castle"; but he could have said "it looks like a giant chess
castle.")

I remember playing the card game Rook in the USA in the 1970s. The
rook card had a stylized black bird (like a crow or raven) with the
caption "ROOK" in bold letters. I was under the impression the game
was devised in the USA in the early C.20, so Americans might be
familiar with the bird that way.

Peter T. Daniels wrote:

What an excellent opportunity to bring this bizarre datum. From Harry
Potter VII, Deathly Hallows, US pbk. ed. (of course), ch. 20, p.
397f.:

[Ron is the first to speak] ... a most strange-looking house rose
vertically against the sky, a great black cylinder with a ghostly
moon hanging behind it in the afternoon sky. "That's got to be Luna's
house, who else would live in a place like that? It looks like a
giant rook!"
"It's nothing like a bird," said Hermione, frowning at the tower.
"I was talking about a chess rook," said Ron. "A castle to you."

What's going on here? To "whom" is a rook called a castle? This
clearly wasn't put in for the benefit of American readers, since we
don't know a bird called the rook and the chessman would be the
first, and perhaps the only, referent of the word. If "castle" is
the usual UK name for the outer man on the chessboard,

Citizendium says '...a rook is sometimes called a "castle". This usage
was common in the past ("The Rook, or Castle, is next in power to the
Queen" -- Howard Staunton, Blue Book of Chess, 1847 [UK]) but no
longer (unless very informally) ...'

why would Ron have called
it a rook anyway? (Well, obviously he couldn't say "it looks like a
giant castle"; but he could have said "it looks like a giant chess
castle.")

My interpretation is that saying "castle" for "rook" is thought by Ron
to be similar to saying "horse" for "knight" -- juvenile, uninformed.

On Tue, 2009-07-28 at 15:22 +0100, Adam Funk wrote:

I remember playing the card game Rook in the USA in the 1970s. The
rook card had a stylized black bird (like a crow or raven) with the
caption "ROOK" in bold letters. I was under the impression the game
was devised in the USA in the early C.20, so Americans might be
familiar with the bird that way.

Of course the American English name for the rook (the bird) is "rook" --
it's only an unfamiliar word because the bird doesn't live around here,
so we rarely have occasion to speak of it.

Ravens, we got, and crows.

I think in Alice (1865) it's a castle rather than a rook.

Exactly. People who play chess seriously would only refer to the
pieces as "castle" and "horse" jocularly, notwithstanding that the
move of King and Rook is called "castling". I suspect that people
first learn to call the piece a "castle" and later on a "rook".If this
is the case, I have no idea why it should be so.

Donna Richoux wrote:
My interpretation is that saying "castle" for "rook" is thought by Ron
to be similar to saying "horse" for "knight" -- juvenile, uninformed.

Yeah, but "rooking" will never replace "castling".

Odysseus wrote:
In article<7d5jb9F2a2toaU1@mid.individual.net>,
Harlan Messinger<hmessinger.removethis@comcast.net> wrote:

snip

roque> rock

That sounds unlikely to me: "le petit Robert" dates the noun _roque_,
meaning the act of castling (in chess), only to 1905 [...]

'Roca' only got palatalised in central Gaul. In the south and in parts
of the northwest (which is where England's normans came from) it wasn't,
so it's natural that english borrowed the non-palatalised form.

Skitt wrote:
Donna Richoux wrote:
My interpretation is that saying "castle" for "rook" is thought by Ron
to be similar to saying "horse" for "knight" -- juvenile, uninformed.

Yeah, but "rooking" will never replace "castling".

FWIW, castling = rockad in Swedish. The piece is called "torn" (tower).

"It's nothing like a bird," said Hermione, frowning at the tower.
"I was talking about a chess rook," said Ron. "A castle to you."

What's going on here? To "whom" is a rook called a castle? This
clearly wasn't put in for the benefit of American readers, since we
don't know a bird called the rook and the chessman would be the first,
and perhaps the only, referent of the word. If "castle" is the usual
UK name for the outer man on the chessboard,

Furthermore, materials/resources to perform
any sort of interesting science experiments are likely accessible only
to urban folks and not rural ones.

You then have graduates that know the
textbook material but not much else in terms of creativity or
independent thinking/reasoning - not much encouragement in an
educational system that requires conformance.

In the present day and age, knowledge of English gives one a competitive
edge on the global stage.

Hopefully the prosperity that ensues will
eventually trickle down to improve the educational system, esp. the ones
that do not use English as the medium of instruction.

On Jul 26, 7:41�pm, Tambi Dude <tambid...@gmail.com> wrote:
On Jul 26, 12:31�pm, analys...@hotmail.com wrote:



But this is only self-hate of the colonized. �Get over it.
are you saying using words like rulu (rule) is inherently superior
in self esteem.

I must say that I detest analys... and his Indian nationalism deeply,
In my worldview, he hardly qualifies as a human being. However, Tambi
Dude, in my opinion your derision is misinformed and stupid. What you
call "taminglish" is the perfectly normal adaptation of borrowed words
to the phonology and grammatical system of the receiving language.
This is something that is entirely normal in any language contact
situation.

Instead of pouring your derision over Tamil and suggesting that the
language is somehow incapable of expressing modern scientific and
technological thought, you should realize that by making that thought
available only in English, great reserves of potential talent are
being wasted. They should be taught science and technology in their
own language already, before they master English. In my country, we do
this, and we are better at science and maths than you. You aren't
stupid, it's just that you aren't being taught in your own language.

"Peter T. Daniels" <grammatim@verizon.net> wrote in message
news:276c6978-d208-4f31-a677-e81154509d84@r34g2000vba.googlegroups.com...

What an excellent opportunity to bring this bizarre datum. From Harry
Potter VII, Deathly Hallows, US pbk. ed. (of course), ch. 20, p. 397f.:

"That's got to be Luna's
house, who else would live in a place like that? It looks like a giant
rook!"
"It's nothing like a bird," said Hermione, frowning at the tower.
"I was talking about a chess rook," said Ron. "A castle to you."

This has long been familiar in English literature, e.g. in Dickens's
Great Expectations Estella ridicules Pip as "common" because
when playing cards he calls the Knave a Jack. As G.B. Shaw
summed it up, "Whenever an Englishman opens his mouth he
makes some other Englishman despise him." The authors of
My Fair Lady recognized this well enough to keep it in one of the songs.

Don Phillipson wrote:
"Peter T. Daniels" <grammatim@verizon.net> wrote in message
news:276c6978-d208-4f31-a677-e81154509d84@r34g2000vba.googlegroups.com...

What an excellent opportunity to bring this bizarre datum. From Harry
Potter VII, Deathly Hallows, US pbk. ed. (of course), ch. 20, p. 397f.:

"That's got to be Luna's
house, who else would live in a place like that? It looks like a giant
rook!"
"It's nothing like a bird," said Hermione, frowning at the tower.
"I was talking about a chess rook," said Ron. "A castle to you."

What does a person who frowns at the term "castle" call "castling"
move in the game of chess? Surely not "rooking". Or would he?
pjk

This has long been familiar in English literature, e.g. in Dickens's
Great Expectations Estella ridicules Pip as "common" because
when playing cards he calls the Knave a Jack. As G.B. Shaw
summed it up, "Whenever an Englishman opens his mouth he
makes some other Englishman despise him." The authors of
My Fair Lady recognized this well enough to keep it in one of the songs.

António Marques wrote:
PaulJK wrote:
Peter T. Daniels wrote:
On Jul 27, 8:02 am, Harlan Messinger
hmessinger.removet...@comcast.net> wrote:
Peter T. Daniels wrote:
On Jul 26, 11:37 pm, Harlan Messinger
hmessinger.removet...@comcast.net> wrote:
Peter T. Daniels wrote:
On Jul 26, 5:24 pm, "ranjit_math...@yahoo.com"
ranjit_math...@yahoo.com> wrote:

How many French words are in the US national anthem?
Let's see, running through the words in my head, and not looking
anything up, so these are only the obvious guesses:
perilous, ramparts, gallantly, bombs, proof, spangled, banner,
brave ...
rockets, air.-

That's odd. Where did the<ck> come from? What's the history of the
word?

roquet> rocket
roque> rock
bloquer> block
etiquette> ticket
brique> brick
risquer> risk

I wondered if these words might have come into English around the same
time but they may be spread over a couple of centuries in that respect,
though with the exception of mid-15th century "brick", the OED first
attests each of them after the end of Middle English, with "risk" first
attested as late as 1661.

I haven't heard of some pervasive movement to nativize the spellings
of borrowed words in the 17th century -- isn't that the same period
that the fake etymological spellings (debt, island) came into vogue?

What did "roquet" mean in those days? I know "rocher" but not "roque."

An Italian diminutive of distaff.

My CED says:
C17: from Old French roquette, from Italian rochetto (a little distaff),
from rocca (distaff), of Germanic origin.

If CED is right then it completed a full circle from old Germanic to
modern Germanic languages.

The germans knew they were going to lose it so they gave it to the
italians for safekeeping and got it back with interest from the french,
who had taken over a lot of assets from the italians when the latter got
broke.

Indeed, it was presumably kept in the bank for safekeeping, and passed
on with it (PWGerm *bankiz, shelf > It banca, money changer's table > Fr
banque, bank > German Bank, bank)

In this case, French <-que> was borrowed into English as <-k> (earliest
cite 1474), since <-nck> is rather unenglish.