8.931, Sum: Language identification

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LINGUIST List:  Vol-8-931. Thu Jun 26 1997. ISSN: 1068-4875.

Subject: 8.931, Sum: Language identification

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=================================Directory=================================

1)
Date:  Wed, 18 Jun 1997 20:11:18 -0500
From:  Mark Mandel <Mark at dragonsys.com>
Subject:   Sum: 8.797 Language identification

-------------------------------- Message 1 -------------------------------

Date:  Wed, 18 Jun 1997 20:11:18 -0500
From:  Mark Mandel <Mark at dragonsys.com>
Subject:   Sum: 8.797 Language identification

In LINGUIST #8.797 I asked:

>    An acquaintance of my daughter's writes:
>
>     ===================================
>
>     Identify this language please?
>
>    "Idolem urodo iatu a wi rot
>     Ukufu kush onuoy nehawuoch
>     Etia di ukoik ura nakurah
>     Enadu yoimi nnesar urugem
>     Eteako ich atak
>     Ureatu tso oodah
>     Amia wibo koro yonneie"
>
>    I think I have a pretty good idea of what languages this is *not* (not
>    a Romance language, not Germanic, not Slavic, not Chinese, Japanese,
>    Vietnamese...).  Also, if it translates to something really corny,
>    lemme know so I can stop embarrassing myself every time I sing it.

I received replies from five people, four of whom offered
information.

Gregory F. Roberts <robertsg at gusun.georgetown.ed> and
Douglas Dee <Douglas.Dee at us.coopers.com> pointed me to a Web site
maintained by Nora E. Stevens,
    www-personal.umich.edu/~nstevens/harukanaru.html  ,
that shows the text and explains it as the reverse of

>        Tori wa utai odoru melodi,
>        Chouwa hen no shukufuku.
>        Harukanaru kioku idaite,
>        Meguru rasen ni mioyudane.
>        Katachi o kaete--
>        Hadoo o tsutaeru.
>        Eien no yorokobi wa ima

Roberts adds:

>    They are lyrics from a role playing game called the Final
>    Fantasy by Squaresoft.

[And indeed, that is what the Web site is dedicated to. The main
page of the site
        http://www-personal.umich.edu/~nstevens/fflyrics.html
is titled

>                      Welcome to the Opera House
>            Featuring the lyrics to the sweet melodies
>                      of the Final Fantasy series

and it gives lyrics in English, Japanese (Romaji), Portuguese,
Italian, French, and Saami, as well as many audio files of music
(without words).]

Leon A Serafim <serafim at hawaii.edu> also recognized it as
"Japanese written in mirror image."

The fullest response came from Tomoyuki Kubo
<kubo at fukuoka-edu.ac.jp>, who kindly gave me permission to quote
this response:

>    It is the Esenapaj language,
>    which is the mirror image of Japanese,
>    with different word boundaries.
>
>    The mirror image of this language is;
>
>     Tori wa utai odoru melodii         *
>     Chou wa hen'you no shukufuku       *
>     Harukanaru kioku idaite
>     Meguru rasen ni mi o yudane        *
>     Katachi o kaete
>     Hadoo o tsutaeru
>     Eien no yorokobi wa ima


(Asterisks added.) Apart from punctuation, Kubo's reversal differs
from Stevens's (which Kubo did not appear to be aware of) in the
starred lines. I am inclined to prefer Kubo's analysis, which I
infer is native while Stevens credits several other people for
help with her translations.

[* Damn and blast Indo-European obligatory pronoun gender! Just
because I don't know whether Kubo is male or female, I have to
contort my syntax to avoid specifying it.]

None of the respondents attempted to translate the text. I took
Kubo's version to a Japanese co-worker, who shook her head over
it and chuckled. "It isn't really coherent sentences," she said
[approximately], "and in some places it's ambiguous. It could be a
joke on someone trying to be pompous, but it sounds about as
stupid as a lot of Japanese lyrics." Here is my transcription of
her translations:

        The bird sings and dances to the melody.
        Butterfly blesses the metamorphosis
        hoarding far memory
        entrusting the body to a spiraling helix
        changing shape
        transmit the wave [or "undulation"]
        eternal happiness is here

Thanks to all who replied!

       Mark A. Mandel : Senior Linguist : mark at dragonsys.com
    Dragon Systems, Inc. : speech recognition : +1 617 965-5200
 320 Nevada St., Newton, MA 02160, USA : http://www.dragonsys.com/
           Personal home page: http://world.std.com/~mam/


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