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A Community Devoted to the Preservation and Practice of Celestial Navigation and Other Methods of Traditional Wayfinding
Re: Benetnasch and Alkaid revisited
From: Frank Reed
Date: 2005 Apr 8, 18:38 EDT
From: Frank Reed
Date: 2005 Apr 8, 18:38 EDT
Peter wrote:
"Why do we have so many stars with Arabic names?"
In part, I think it's because so few Europeans and European descendants
have spoken Arabic historically. Part of the thing that makes a "proper name"
sound "proper" is its obscurity. If you had to look up in the sky and say "that
star is called 'The Knee'", it wouldn't seem like a proper name. But "Rigel"..
that sounds mysterious and foreign and it feels like a proper name --only
because it's untranslated (and corrupted) Arabic.
-FER
42.0N 87.7W, or 41.4N 72.1W.
www.HistoricalAtlas.com/lunars
42.0N 87.7W, or 41.4N 72.1W.
www.HistoricalAtlas.com/lunars
