A while back I posted a couple of translations into Dutch (1/2) of an article in Catalan by Vic prof Manuel Llanas re early German printers in Catalunya. The following tables are taken from a Catalan-German vocabulary book, apparently based on an Italian model, that was printed in Perpignan in 1502 by a German under the title
Vocabolari molt profitos per apendre Lo Catalan Alamany y Lo Alamany Catalan… Stampat lo present Vocabolari en la noble vila de Perpinyà per mestre Johan Rosembach. Any M.D. e dos.
My principal interest in this was the naming of infidels and the history of the daughter of the king of Hungary – see upcoming posts – but what gets mentioned and why is also fascinating. Throughout the book the focus is on knowledge that is required for life in the here and now for interchange between the German-speaking world and the Catalan-speaking parts of the kingdom of Aragon. Here, for example, are the countries of the world:
En alamanya
In tutschen landë
Alamayn
Tutscher
Alemanas
Di tutschen
Saxonia
Sachsen
Lo saxon
Der sax
Alemanya alta
Ober thtuts läd
Alemanya baxa
Nider thuts land
La marcha
Di marck
Turigna
Diringen
En la frança
In franckrich
Bauera
Pairen
Boemia
Behem
Ongria
Ungern
Osteriche
Osterrich
Merhern
Marhern
Slauonia
windischland
Slauon
windisch
Wuauia
Schwaben
Engleterra
Engeland
Italia
welschland
Lombardia
Lamparten
Terra de roma
Ro’mischland
And here are the “cities and castles”:
Roma
Rom
Sena
Hohesin
Florença
Florentz
Lo florenti
Der florentzer
A bolonya
zuo boloni
Ferrara
Ferrer
Padua
Padua
Venesia
Venedig
Veneçian
Venediger
Verona
Bern
Trento
Trient
Millan
Mayland
Milanes
Maylander
Mantua
Mantuä
Genua
Genau
Puya
Pulen
Naples
Napels
Costantinoble
Constätinopol
Belgrat
wyssenburg
Lagulla
Aclen
Monacho
Minchen
Colonya
Koln
Nozemberg
Nu’remberg
Viana
wien
Terra nous
Nuwestat
Buda
Ofen
Lubiana
Laibach
Argentina
Strasburg
The strongly Venetian orientation of the geography and the inconsistencies of the spelling of German names suggest that the typesetter was not a native speaker and that Rosembach himself may not have had very much to do with the book. One of the most interesting mistakes (if that is what it is) is Nozemberg, which I have only once heard before, from the mouth of a Dutch musician moaning about a gig (which he was certainly not declaring to the Dutch tax authorities) a very long way into Germany. Nozem is namely (?)60s colloquial Dutch for a yob or a biker and was immortalised in Cornelis Vreeswijk’s ballad of De nozem en de non (The biker and the nun):
No one on earth knows ha’t really begun
The sad sad story of the biker and the nun
Of the biker … and the nun.
I would like to tell you more about this and about a musical engagement some way west of Nozemberg that degenerated into an orgy with a women’s football team from Munich, but a disembodied voice tells me I have to go clothes shopping. My jeans have holes in them, cries the voice, that are Revealing for all of the others to see/Just what it was that endeared you to me. And that is prohibit/verboten, one of the few useful words that I am unable to find in Rosembach’s Vocabolari.
Similar posts
- The humourless German, © German nationalists
This is re Margaret’s post re Stewart Lee’s. The first references I know to the stereotype are not British but are - Translation of “The political economy of Catalan independence”
Clemente Polo has blogged a short book containing what feel like author-translated essays by him and four other anti-secessionists, José Luis - Irak/Irac/Iraq
There’s an interesting comment by Antoni to a piece in which he mysteriously comes to the conclusion that an article dealing - The great Catalan gunpowder swindle
As the evenings draw in, the Arenys de Mar sensimilla syndicate has taken time off from the plantation to post another - German multinationals
In May I posted a Dutch translation (1, 2) of an article by Vic prof, Manuel Llanas, describing the influence of
Comments