• «Kalli ema hella soojust jagub üle mitme põlve.»
• «Kuula, kulla külanaine – kuuled külla tulnud vaime.»
• «Küll küllale liiga ei tee.»
• «Mahlakas jõhvikas maitses soisel kaldal hää.»
• «Ämber läks ümber.»
• «Millal maksan memme vaeva.»
• «Tilluke talleke tatsas tasasel pinnal.»
• «Ema tuli koju.»
• «Pöidlad pihku, pöialpoisid!»
To me half of them seem like they were just designed to be tonguetwisters or entries in an Alliteration Can Be Fun contest. For what it's worth, here's my translations of them.• "Over the creek to the hill, through the valley to the river."
• "The gentle warmth of a beloved mother is felt over several generations."
• "Listen, dear village woman – you will hear the spirits who have come to the village."
• "A little bit more won't make any difference."*
• "The juicy cranberry tasted good on the boggy bank."
• "The bucket tipped over."
• "When will I give mum her due?"*
• "The tiny little lamb toddled on even ground."
• "Mother came home."
• "Thumbs up, Thumbelina!"*
• "The gentle warmth of a beloved mother is felt over several generations."
• "Listen, dear village woman – you will hear the spirits who have come to the village."
• "A little bit more won't make any difference."*
• "The juicy cranberry tasted good on the boggy bank."
• "The bucket tipped over."
• "When will I give mum her due?"*
• "The tiny little lamb toddled on even ground."
• "Mother came home."
• "Thumbs up, Thumbelina!"*
They don't have quite the same ring to them in English, do they. Personally, my favourite is «Üle oja mäele, läbi oru jõele», although «Ämber läks ümber» has an ironic sense of balance to it too.
*Thanks to Greta for helping me out with these, which are either very colloquial or don't really mean anything. Apparently «Küll küllale liiga ei tee» is what you might say in a situation where you have done something so much that doing a bit more of it won't change anything or make the situation noticeably worse eg if you've run up so much debt on your credit card that buying something else won't make much difference. «Millal maksan memme vaeva» is an old saying related to paying someone the respect they deserve. «Pöidlad pihku, pöialpoisid!» means bugger all and was presumably coined just because the 'experts' liked the sound of it. Ironically (again) it's probably the one that sounds best in English :)
4 comments:
There's the ever-entertaining Jüriöö Ülestõus, pronounced with almost no audible consonants, and used to establish a learner's true proficiency in Estonian...
I think #3 is more "visiting spirits" - külla does translate literally as 'to the village', but in effect 'külla tulema' means to visit someone.
I won't challenge #4's usage, though literally it's more like 'one will not harm a similar one'.
Memme is more grandma than mum, I think...
And yes, cranberries are awesome.
I wondered that about #3 but thought there was a connection between 'külanaine' and 'külla tulnud'. It's a play on words anyway I suppose and could mean either.
The one you liked won, didn't it?
I have to side with Flasher on #3 -- the verb "tulnud" makes it harder to see the "village" meaning as külla and tulema are so inextricably linked.
But it isn't quite as clearcut as in the case of "koju" and "kodusse" where if you use one form of the illative instead of the other it would imply that in effect the spirits have a claim of ownership (!) on the woman's home.
Otherwise yes, usually the rule is to double the consonant if possible instead of using the -sse ending.
I can only think of the flip side of #4 -- "two times nothing is still nothing" -- but can't come up with anything better for the actual saying.
Good post.
#4 is... when you have guests coming over and you've bought too much food and drink. Or when there's a gathering of abou 200 people (in Estonian sense - huge) and then all of a sudden 50 more arrive. There's so much that then again as much won't really matter.
I like the topsided bucket
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