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In my never-ending quest to come up with the most random threads, I'm trying to figure out the Ge'ez and Maltese forms of the names "James/Jacob" and "Stephen." Any help would be greatly appreciated.
posted
<sigh> Okay, how about Amharic instead of Ge'ez? Anyone? Anyone?
What happened to all those Hatrack Googlers who were so proud of their ability to find just about anything?
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posted
What you need is copies of the Old and New Testaments in those languages. You could match the chapter and verse easily and from there -- there should be enough similarities that the names should be easy to pick out.
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With the Ethiopians, I wouldn't think they actually translate the names that way. Kind of like Mahershalalhashbaz (that's an actual guy's name) would be Bob. They just pick a name. At least, that is what I got from this article.
But, there are Ge'ez names that have their own meaning, like Kabede means heavy and strong. So, I suppose if you really wanted a translation, you could ask someone who speaks Ethiopian what the words for held by the heel and crown are and then use those.
The Maltese Islands, on the other hand, are Catholic and they speak both English and Maltese, though there are many dilects of Maltese and apparenltly, there is a new "middle" language that is a mish-mash of English and Maltese that has some worried that Malta won't be bi-lingual soon, but instead, only speak in this new combo language. (Kind of like some of those so-called "english" speakers over there in Europe. You know, like Ireland, Scotland and most of England. I can never understand what they are saying. )
Anyway, I think the answer to your question is that they would either be some derivation of Jacob and Stephen or they wouldn't have those names at all.
Zal, I had that idea about getting the Bibles as well, but books in Ge'ez and Maltese are surprisingly hard to find.
Kayla, I'm pretty sure both have versions of the names precisely because they're biblical names and because they countries in question are Christian. But finding out what they are has proven to be tougher than I thought.
I guess the most effective way would be to ask an Ethiopian or a Maltese citizen. As far as I can tell, however, I don't know any personally.
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Dante, I'm trying to figure out why they would have their own version of it? I mean, it is a Jewish name, right. We don't actually live in Israel, but other than a slight pronunciation variation, we call Jacob, Jacob. Why would they suddenly change the name in Ethiopia? John, Juan. Steven, Stephan. I don't understand why you think they would change it. Especially in Malta. I mean, they've been bi-lingual for hundreds and hundreds of years. (First Italian, then English. I especially don't see them changing the names much.)
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posted
Kayla, it's true that I'm not expecting a huge difference, but you yourself have pointed out that different languages transliterate names in different ways. I'm looking for how the names show up in the languages in question.
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