Too busy these days to blog much or even read blogs much, so I missed the news on Balkan blogs and only today, several days later, I got the news from PZ. A guy, just to be sure no resurrection ever happens, drove a three-foot stake through the heart of the dead and burried body of Slobodan Milosevic.
Keep in mind that Milosevic was born and was buried in Pozarevac, in Eastern Serbia, the part of the world which invented the myth of vampires (the old Vlad is in the neighborhood, just over the Danube). The word "vampire" is, as far as I know, the only English word of Serbian origin.
Comments
What about "Dhampire"?
I helped make a very amature film where there was a Dhampire character. There were also several Serbian characters...played by Americans. Two of them had to do Serbian lines phonetically. It was a fun project but it would be interesting to know if a native speaker could even recognize any of the words in the dialogue.
Posted by: Teresa | March 9, 2007 9:32 PM
Vampire, and "paprika" (which entered English via Hungarian, but isn't originally of Hungarian origin).
Posted by: M. | March 10, 2007 12:51 AM
I had to laugh in amusement at the etymology of vampire.
Mainly, I suppose because that entire area over yon has so much rich linguistic history. If the people had spent a fraction of the time on cooperation vs. waging a lifetime of study on dialectical differences of the people two valleys away (mostly to prove that those people there are not so worthy as these people here).
My favorite word from that area is Balkanization, because it's so useful. It's not a Serb word, but I have a feeling they'd fight for it if you insisted it belonged to someone else. Just opinion though.
In the next iteration of the Star Trek saga, the crew of the Enterprise runs into an alien race of Torlaks. They be so baaad and smelly, that even the Borg cower in their presence and refuse to assimilate them.
Posted by: Ted | March 10, 2007 1:25 PM
Actually, the Serbs insist there are three words of Serbian origin in the Engligh language: vampire, Balkanization and cravat. That last one comes from the bandanas worn by invading hordes of Croats (invading Vienna, not Serbia)! LOL
Posted by: coturnix | March 10, 2007 1:33 PM
There was a great article in the New York Times Science section last week about a genetic study done on the English, Irish and other inhabitants of those isles. The basic gist was that they all come from about 90-95% the same genetic stock. In other words, all those islands were populated by one peoples, back at the end of the last Ice Age when there was still a land bridge to Iberia. Then every subsequent invasion (Celts, Romans, Saxons, Vikings, etc.) consisted of relatively small groups that came by boat, may have conquered and imposed language, culture, government, religion, etc., but barely dented the genetic stock of the natives. So for all the talk of all their differences, they're really all the same.
That got me thinking about the Balkans. I bet it's the same situation over there. For all their talk and wars about "ethnic" differences, they're probably genetically identical.
Posted by: The Science Pundit | March 11, 2007 11:23 AM
Oh yes. Serbs, Croats etc. were sub-tribes of Slovenes arriving in the Balkans in the 3rd through 6th centuries. Later, there was a big influx of Turkish bloood. So, yes, it is a very genetically homogenous population - except for Albanians who came later: they are Illyrians and have always kept themselves in an isolated genetic pool.
Posted by: coturnix | March 11, 2007 11:29 AM
Ich bin ein Berliner...
That's been my contention for a while in repeatedly poking coturnix over the language thing. It's not as much that these people are genetically different as they have self-selected to identify with a particular group by using the wider definition of ethnicity: common cultural, behavioural, linguistic, ritualistic, or religious traits to varying degrees, and extended it down to village and family.
Sometimes, the characteristic of some ethnicities is that they actively resists assimilation. Not only does every group of villages pride itself on it's own particular linguistic weirdness, but it uses that linguistic weirdness as a point of pride and to isolate and hone the cultural differences for the locals.
I believe that the amalgamation that was the Serbo-Croatian language (of the last 100 years) was actively resisted by a variety of groups that identify themselves as separate ethnic subclasses, and it was possible to do this due to a number of wars that kept the peasantry from getting overly educated -- the losses in the wars were pretty significant and ongoing -- tough to recover enough to get to college when 1/2 the family keeps getting whacked every generation. As a consequence, the linguistic unification was viewed as an unwelcome type of forced assimilation, imposed by the urban educated class wanting to minimize the local mythic folklore.
The concept of unity is pretty important in that part of the world, but it's not a national unity because it doesn't actually extend much further than one can see from a particular village or hilltop.
(Anywho, that's how it looked to me.)
On a side note, it looks like the independence of Kosovo is moving right along, so that will keep the Illyrians further self-isolated. I'd say things should shake out in about a year.
Posted by: Ted | March 11, 2007 4:49 PM
Ich bin ein Berliner...
Berliner??
A sugar dusted, deep fried dough ball wrapped around a core of red fruit and sugar sludge? God, I'd kill for one of those right now.
Could never understand why a President admitting to being a jam donut would get such a rapturous reception. Language is indeed a wondrous thing.
Posted by: Kevin | March 11, 2007 9:52 PM
Better than
Ich bin ein Wiener....
Posted by: coturnix | March 11, 2007 9:56 PM
I believe that would be, "Ich bin ein Auslander". (Urban legends are great; I hope that your comments are google searchable so that we can confuse the casual googler).
I'm not a native speaker of either German or Serb but that "ich bin ein berliner" seemed right to me and the Germans I asked seemed to think it pretty cool statement of support, not a wordplay on confections.
You sure that the myth of the jelly donut isn't a Right-wing meme to cartoon the Left? I mean, the domain of virile anti-communists is reserved for the Republicans, right?
Posted by: Ted | March 12, 2007 7:42 AM
You sure that the myth of the jelly donut isn't a Right-wing meme to cartoon the Left?
Oxford-Duden German Dictionary
3rd Edition (I think), pub 2005
page 112
He said it.
They define it.
And I know it's a seriously dubious case I'm resting here, but I have absolutely no intention of placing myself in a position to ask him personally what he meant!
Posted by: Kevin | March 13, 2007 6:50 AM