Linguaphiles

The Oxford Etymologic Dictionary (OED) considers Ego / I as if it were a self-standing word developed within the Germanic and 'Indo-European' languages with a mere meaning of 'I / me / self, myself':[Spoiler (click to open)]

I (pron.)
12c., a shortening of Old English ic, the first person singular nominative pronoun, from Proto-Germanic *ek (source also of Old Frisian ik, Old Norse ek, Norwegian eg, Danish jeg, Old High German ih, German ich, Gothic ik), from PIE *eg- "I," nominative form of the first person singular pronoun (source also of Sanskrit aham, Hittite uk, Latin ego (source of French Je), Greek ego, Russian ja, Lithuanian aš).
Reduced to i by mid-12c. in northern England, later everywhere; the form ich or ik, especially before vowels, lingered in northern England until c. 1400 and survived in southern dialects until 18c. It began to be capitalized mid-13c. to mark it as a distinct word and avoid misreading in handwritten manuscripts.
https://www.etymonline.com/word/I

ego (n.) by 1707, in metaphysics, "the self; that which feels, acts, or thinks," from Latin ego "I" (cognate with Old English ic; see I); its use is implied in egoity.
https://www.etymonline.com/word/ego

местоим., укр. я, др.-русск. язъ, я (и то и другое – в Мстислав. грам. 1130 г.; см. Обнорский – Бархударов I, 33), ц.-сл. азъ ἐγώ, реже ѩзъ (см. Дильс, Aksl. Gr. 77), болг. аз, яз (Младенов 702), сербохорв. jа̑, словен. jàz, jâ, чеш. já, др.-чеш. jáz (совр. чеш. форма – с начала ХIV в.), слвц. jа, др.-пол. jaz, пол., в.-луж., н.-луж. jа, полаб. joz, jо.
Праслав. *аzъ отличается своим вокализмом от родственных форм, ср. др.-лит. еš, лит. àš, лтш. еs, др.-прус. еs, аs, др.-инд. ahám, авест. azǝm, др.-перс. аdаm, арм. еs, венет. еχо, гр. ἐγώ, лат. еgо, гот. ik "я". Наряду с и.-е. *еǵ- (гр., лат., герм.), существовало и.-е. диал. *eǵh- (др.-инд., венет.). Недоказанной является гипотеза о существовании *ō̆go наряду с *еgō на основе слав. аzъ и хетт. uk, ug "я" (Мейе – Эрну 342 и сл.; см. Вальде – Гофм. I, 395 и сл.). Не объяснена еще достоверно утрата конечного -z в слав.; весьма невероятно, чтобы она совершилась по аналогии местоим. tу (напр., Ягич, AfslPh 23, 543; Голуб – Копечный 147), а также чтобы долгота начального гласного была обусловлена долготой гласного в tу (Бругман у Бернекера, см. ниже). Более удачна попытка объяснения аzъ из сочетания а ězъ (Бернекер I, 35; Бругман, Grdr. 2, 2, 382), но см. против этого Кнутссон, ZfslPh 12, 96 и сл. По мнению Зубатого (LF 36, 345 и сл.), в этом а- представлена усилит. част. *ā, ср. др.-инд. ād, авест. āt̃, ср. также др.-инд. межд. ḗt "смотри, глядь!" из ā и id; Педерсен (KZ 38, 317) видит здесь влияние окончания 1 л. ед. ч. -ō; сомнения по этому поводу см. у Бернекера (I, 35). Для объяснения -z привлекают законы сандхи (Сольмсен, KZ 29, 79); ср. Бернекер, там же; И. Шмидт, KZ 36, 408 и сл.; Вакернагель – Дебруннер 3, 454 и сл.
http://www.classes.ru/all-russian/russian-dictionary-Vasmer-term-17126.htm

ich (Ger.), Εγώ [ego] (Gr.), ego (Lat.), io (Ital.), yo (Sp.), I (Eng.), jag (Sw.), я [ja] (Slavic)...

However, should one look beyond the hypothetic *constructions, established by the German philologists in the 19th Century, one would see an obvious Nostratic relation of the above words with the meaning of ' I ' to the following words with the meaning of ' 1 (one)':

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YULE, JUL, JULEN, JOULU, JÕULUD

The French, the British, the Germans, the Scandinavians and the Baltic Finns call Christmas with the following word that remains from pagan times: Yule (Eng.), Jul, Julen (Sw., Dan., Norw.), Jól (Icelandic), Joulu (Finnish, Izhorian), Jõulu(d) (Estonian, Votic) - allegedly considered to be a word 'of unknown origin': https://www.etymonline.com/word/yule .

Noteworthy, however, is that the followers of the Zoroastrian (Persian, Iranian) tradition use the same name when celebrating the winter Solstice: they call the longest and darkest night of the year as Shab-e Yalda, or Shab-e Chelleh (Çillə). [Spoiler (click to open)]In Zoroastrian tradition it is considered to be a particularly inauspicious night when the evil forces of Ahriman are imagined to be at their peak. One is advised to stay awake most of the night, to avoid any misfortune. People gather in safe groups of friends and relatives, and share their last remaining fruits of the past summer. The following day (the first day of Dae month) is a holiday. The word Yalda supposedly means 'the Birth' or 'to give birth'.

It is further comparable to:
[yuladu] يولد (Arab.), [yalad] יָלַד (Hebrew) - to give birth;
[hуlad] הוּלַד (Hebrew) - was born;
[yalud] יָלוּד (Hebrew) - newborn[Spoiler (click to open)];
[eled; yaldo] יַלדו ; יֶלֶד (Hebrew) - a boy, a child
– i.e. the infant Sun, which is 'born' each year at winter solstice).
Source: https://ich-neu-mon.livejournal.com/68150.html .

It is obvious that the Birth of the new Sun is exactly what the name of the holiday, the Yule, reflects.

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Would a native Hebrew speaker mind confirming some spelling for a calligraphy piece please?

So we have the first part of Psalm 31:15 with nikud: בְּיָדְךָ עִתֹּתָי
How would this be written without the nikud? Do I add a extra yud and a vav to עִתֹּתָי? So בידך עיתותי?
Thanks for your help!

Anyone can translate the text on this page (or at least some of it)? I wonder where this page is from.

What is a good resource for children's books in Hebrew that I can access from the US? Whether it's ordering books, kindle editions, or online PDFs. The important thing is that they contain the nikud. Thanks for your help!

I'm writing a historical A/U, and I need to translate the word "prince" into Hebrew. I've tried various online translation sites, but they would only give me Hebrew script ... which I can't use on a Western keyboard, much less read or pronounce. It should therefore be at least an approximation in Latin script that ideally could function as a name or title -- if such a thing exists, that is.

I'm aware that Jewish naming traditions generally went more by "X son of Y", or maybe "X of placename" in the era I'm thinking of, but some research has shown that individuals known by the more conventional "first name + surname" did exist at the time (or were referenced as such), and the character I need the name for comes from a family that has converted to Christianity to avoid persecution, so I'm thinking they might have adopted that custom, too. (I also have my reasons for them not simply choosing a common name from the country they're living in, or going by profession/trade.)

Help, please?

First post here, I have no idea if I tagged this correctly -- so just in case, sorry!

When translating the Nineteen Eighty-Four into Hebrew, the translator has left the abbreviation BB untranslated in the Two Minutes Hate scene, but simply transliterated it instead. Do you think he was right in so doing and if not, what were the other options?

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Interestingly, in the canteen scene, when Syme is talking with Winston, the translator did not transliterate the abbreviation, but rendered it as א.ג. Why he could not have done so in first instance and had he done so, what people would be actually chanting in Hebrew in the first scene? Would they be like "aleph-gimel, aleph-gimel"? Would this make sense or not?

This is for all you native or fluent Hebraeophones, budding Hebrew scholars, beginning Hebraists, or anyone with an interest in learning Hebrew:

What is your level of interest/familiarity with a program that teaches Biblical and Modern Israeli Hebrew concurrently? If you have used such a program, what was your experience with it? What methods did it use, and what were its strengths and shortcomings? How would you make it better?

If you have not used such a program, how interesting or useful would it be to you, and what would you like to get out of it?

Feel free to respond either in the comments or by message. Thanks.

I'd like to know the exact translation of the Hebrew word  leitpalel  into English. I'm not sure about the correct transliteration of it. Actually, when I've tried Googling  leitpalel , I've got only links to texts in Spanish. So I suppose this transliteration is used by Spanish-speaking authors... And I'm a bit perplexed. Maybe "leitpalel" isn't the best way to transliterate it?

One of them says (I'm translating it into English for clarity): "The Hebrew word for "to pray" is "leitpalel", it comes from the root "palel" which means "to inspect". ,The prefix "leit" is the reflexive form of the verb, meaning an act that one does for oneself. So "leitpalel" is an act of personal introspection.

[The Spanish version: La palabra hebrea para rezar es "leitpalel", y viene de la raíz "palel", la cual significa inspeccionar. El prefijo "leit" es la forma reflexiva - que denota una acción que uno hace para uno mismo. Entonces, "leitpalel" es un acto de introspección personal]. Taken from here http://www.judaismohoy.com/article.php?article_id=188

what does the Hebrew in this graphic say?

may be NSFW

[Spoiler (click to open)]



thanks.