Deciphering the ancient names of animals (Part 2)
Friday, April 01, 2016
This week, we consider the names of more animals, but mainly concentrating on domestic animals.
The ancient, generic term for ‘animal’ – also reflected in Sumerian, the oldest written language – is GU. This transliterates as ‘goo’ (‘a thing’) in Setswana. Although ‘go-o’ (as in ‘goo mo’: ‘this thing’) now sounds like an abbreviation of ‘golo’ (as in ‘golo mo’), the latter is a composite term comprised of the Sumerian terms GU (‘thing/ creature’) and LU (this). Indeed, LU/LO as meaning ‘this’ is retained as a term applicable to a greater variety of object names in Nguni languages, e.g. ‘lo mtwana’ (‘this child’) is strictly ‘ngwana yo’ in Setswana. In Sotho and Setswana, ‘this’ now varies greatly according to the initial consonant, thus: logong lo (this log), ntlo e (this house), setlhare se (this tree), etc.
The contest had 10 beautiful young girls as finalists and unfortunately only one could wear the crown.The judges picked Anicia Gaothuse. To all those who feel their contestant should have won ahead of Anicia for whatever reason, hardly; the judges found Anicia to be the best among the best, so desist from disrespecting our newly crowned queen on social media or anywhere else, for that matter! Each of the 10 beautiful young women had supporters...