Jump to content
Science Forums

Quirky History facts!


Boerseun

Recommended Posts

no, greek only... Really, really technically barbarians were those people who were not Greek. Many people spoke latin, but it was very few people outside HRE that spoke greek

 

Ok; thanks for putting me straight

 

I though barbarians were the northern European tribes Germanic etc that gave Rome such stife.

 

Were Persians and Egyptians barbarians too?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Barbarians were everyone who was not Greek, so yes the rest of the world was barbarians. Now, because romans dealt with Goths and other germanic people, they were the people that barbarian was used for the most, eventually giving it's today's meaning of:

1. A member of a people considered by those of another nation or group to have a primitive civilization.

2. A fierce, brutal, or cruel person.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

and Latin?

because thay Bar . . Bar. Bar. babbled

(Their speach sounded like babble-is there a Roman word for that?)

Yes, barbarus, from the Greek barbaros. Although, not exactly. It is onomatopeic but indicated stutter, by imitation, more than babble.

 

I disagree about it "technically" meaning not-Greek-speaking, the word in each language originally meant foreigner --long before Latin had become the lingua franca-- and in later Roman times came to be derogatory and hence applied to the enemy.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Disagree all you want, its a fact and is posted as such, even wiki says: The word "Barbarian" comes into English from Medieval Latin barbarinus, from Latin barbaria, from Latin barbarus, from the ancient Greek word βάρβαρος (barbaros) which meant a non-Greek, someone whose (first) language was not Greek. Nothing to disagree with...

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Yeah, I've always had a mild suspicion he had chosen the name after the church reformer.

 

Disagree all you want, its a fact and is posted as such, even wiki says:
I trust Devoto and Oli more than wiki, especially as to Latin and Greek etymus. :beer: βάρβαρος (thanks for the unicode) meant a non-Greek because it meant a foreigner. The term 'barbaria' doesn't mean 'barbarian' but instead a foreign country or, perhaps, a barbarian (in the sense of uncouth) act, something done by one. I had never heard a term such as barbarinus so I Googled it and apart from a few hits with the exact same sentence as the wiki you quote, it seems to be a name. One hit is this post which quotes that wiki and then, in the same post, says:
I do remember from my Latin primer that the Latin word 'barbarian' is translated into the (modern) English word 'foreigner'.

To an Englishman, the word 'foreigner' means someone not from England. To an Indian it means someone not from India...

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Her is another quirky fact: Martin Luther King, was actually named after a great theologian and church reformer Martin Luther, King's real name was Michael and his family last name was King.

 

Michael Luther King, Sr. changed his and his son's first names from Michael to Martin around 1934 when MLK,Jr. was about 5 years old. Son, father, and grandfather were all preachers.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 1 month later...

In Ancient Egypt, cats were often buried with their masters, or in a special cemetery for cats.

 

In 1991, during an attempted political coup on Russian President Boris Yelstin, food supplies had dwindled down at the parliament buildings so they ordered Pizza Hut to deliver pizzas

 

The phrase "rule of thumb" is derived from an old English law which stated that you couldn't beat your wife with anything wider than your thumb.

 

The United States has never lost a war in which mules were used.

 

The earliest known example of an organized market for equities dates from Rome, second century B.C.

 

In World War II, the German submarine U-120 was sunk by a malfunctioning toilet.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

In the memoirs of Catherine II of Russia, it is recorded that any Russian aristocrat who displeased the queen was forced to squat in the great antechamber of the palace and to remain in that position for several days, mewing like a cat, clucking like a hen, and pecking his food from the floor.

Try goggling Katherine the Great and see what you get!

 

Hashish Assassin - Great Moments in Science - The Lab

Hashish Assassin

 

Subscribe to the Great Moments in Science Podcast:

Dr Karl's Great Moments in Science

 

Way back in the last century, in the Era of Free Love and lava lamps, marijuana use increased enormously in Western society.

One variety of marijuana, hashish, came with its own romantic legend, that the word hashish gave us the word assassin, from the Arab word haschishin, meaning a user of hashish. But even if it did, it's all based on a lie.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Join the conversation

You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.

Guest
Reply to this topic...

×   Pasted as rich text.   Paste as plain text instead

  Only 75 emoji are allowed.

×   Your link has been automatically embedded.   Display as a link instead

×   Your previous content has been restored.   Clear editor

×   You cannot paste images directly. Upload or insert images from URL.

Loading...
×
×
  • Create New...