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

[mimine.livejournal.com]

In Greek most of the names remained the same, just transcribed. It's odd, "Sirius" was transcribed to the Greek name for the constellation (something like "Seirios") but "Remus" wasn't changed to the right name for the brother in Remus and Romulus (in Greek it should be "Romos"). Worst ever were the names for the Marauders. They were translated to huge names: "Elafokeratos" (Prongs, literally translating Deer Horn), "Alafropatitos" (Padfoot, "softly treading"), "Feggarogoitemenos" (Moony, "charmed by the moon") and "Pontikoouras" (Wormtail "Mouse tail" and I can understand that since use of word for worm in Greek would have been too disgusting. Same was done with Wormtongue who is Snaketongue in the Greek translation of Lord of the Rings)

[donnaimmaculata.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I missed the Greek translations on the list, so thanks for supplying. The translations of MWPP seem so wrong - because of the length. I mean, the boys were using them as nicknames, and those are supposed to be easy to handle. "Feggarogoitemenos" seems to be quite a mouthful for 15-year-old boys to call each other. "Oy, Feggarogoitemenos, watch out! There's Filch!"

[neotoma.livejournal.com]

'Worm' is a disgusting word in Greek?

[mimine.livejournal.com]

Yes. "Skouliki", the Greek word for "worm" sounds very disgusting and naming someone "Skoulikooura" (Wormtail) or even worse, "Skoulikoglosso" (Wormtongue) could very well result in readers feeling queasy. I know I would be.