Severus Piton

[donnaimmaculata]

The discussions that evolved from my latest post on Harry Potter-influenced naming of children made me think of this site. It offers a list of the translations of HP names (both characters and objects) they use in various European languages. Some of them are funny. Did you know that Minerva is called "Minerva McSlurp" in Norwegian? And that "Moony" is "Luna"? (Quite an identity crisis coming up in OotP. Or maybe the Norwegian translator is giving us subtext.) The Finnish Padfoot is "Anturajalka", and I simply love the Czech versions of all female names, all of which come with the -ova suffix; Rita Holoubková, Madame Pomfreyová, paní Norrisová.... Snape is called Severus Piton (Italian), Perselus Piton (Hungarian) and Severus Kalkaros (Finnish.) Kalkaros? Kalkaroff? Subtext? I know that one of the meanings of "piton" in French is "large nose", but what does it mean in Italian? Or Hungarian, for that matter?

Can anyone tell me how you convince the Cat that it's time to vacate the chair and let the human sit on it with more than half a buttock?

Comments

[madamemim.livejournal.com]

Thanks for the link.
Very entertaining.
I´m rather partial to the Scandinavian languages myself, particularly Swedish.
Sounds so amusing!

As for the cat: try to bribe her (or his?) Highness by offering your lap as an additional cushion. :-)

[donnaimmaculata.livejournal.com]

The link's very entertaining indeed. I love the sound of some of the words, even though I don't understand their meaning - like the Finnish and Hungarian stuff.

The Cat (he) decided to use me as massage cushion (cushioning lap + stroking hand) after a while, so I was allowed to sit on the chair properly.