Mostly Gilbert & Sullivan, Shakespeare, 19th-century Russian literature. Other things that sometimes show up here: language/linguistics stuff, translations from various languages, metered verse, music discussion, photos of my knitting.
Speaking of books it's been a while since I've seen one of these posts going around & I'm curious so everyone could you tell me what you are reading rn in the tags please
Hurrah! Spring break, we meet again, at last!
(Believe me, you were feeling overdue.)
The first half of my spring semester’s past,
But there’s still loads of stuff I need to do.
I pledge to be productive over break:
No time to waste — I’ll get to work today
Completing things for April; and I’ll make
Good progress on the projects due in May.
Then, if there’s time, perhaps I’ll knit, or talk
With friends, or read some books, or sate my thirst
For gorgeous springtime landscapes with a walk
‘Midst rolling hills. But homework must come first.
I won’t procrastinate, I swear! I’m ON IT!
Day 1: I mostly slept, and wrote this sonnet.
I just learned that the Polish word for “teacup”, filiżanka, has an etymology spanning several languages and featuring some shifts in the kind of vessel and what sort of liquid it holds.
Polish filiżanka [teacup] comes from Romanian filigean [coffee cup] plus the Polish diminutive suffix -ka. (The Romanian Wiktionary entry for felegean (preferred form of filigean?) seems to specifically define it as a (Turkish) cup for black coffee: ceașcă (turcească) de cafea neagră.)
That Romanian word comes from Ottoman Turkish fincan [cup], which in turn comes from Persian pengân [cup, bowl; water clock, clepsydra].
One theory re: the etymology of that Persian word is that it could be a borrowing from Middle Chinese, possibly from 平安 [bjaeng’an -> compare modern Mandarin: píng’ān], “peace and tranquility”, a phrase often printed on houseware such as vases.