Thursday, 9 August 2007

pne: A picture of a plush toy, halfway between a duck and a platypus, with a green body and a yellow bill and feet. (Default)

I just realised something.

I looked up Al-Qaeda (which I had just seen mentioned somewhere) to see how it was spelled in Arabic (القاعدة, FWIW).

Then I imagined what the cognate Maltese word would be... and, from al-qāʕida, got as far as il-qiegħ... and realised that it must be cognate to e.g. qagħhad joqgħod and poġġi bil-qiegħda.

(Not sure whether the cognate would really be il-qiegħda, though; could also be il-qagħda, for example, which is a word, according to my dictionary.)

Hmm... since qiegħda is the feminine form of qiegħed, would that make "Al-Qaeda" be "the sitting female" in Maltese?

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pne: A picture of a plush toy, halfway between a duck and a platypus, with a green body and a yellow bill and feet. (Default)
Philip Newton

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