Jan. 17th, 2013 04:49 pm
Spregeldi, du!
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muckefuckThere was one slightly interesting linguistic bit in the yestere'en's film: At one point, Bardem chats up a sample girl at a supermarket. Since she's holding a tray of Swiss cheese, he breaks the ice by inventing a Swiss greeting, [ˈspɾegel], telling her it translates as "encantado". Of course, it's a complete nonsense word (and not even remotely Swiss-sounding to a German ear), but naturally I had to see if I could track down a meaning for it anyway.
As it happens, the Gebrüder Grimm do list a verb spregeln which they class as a variant form of sprenkeln "sprinkle; speckle". And the one citation they give for it (gespregeld) actually stems from a Swiss source, namely a contemporaneous translation of a 16th-century guide to birds by Swiss naturalist Conrad Gessner. Both the Latin original and the German translation were published in Zürich, by the same publisher even.
So if anyone ever asks me about it, I'm going to tell them that Spregel! is a genuine Swiss colloquialism, a shortening of Gott spregele di! "May God sprinkle you!"
As it happens, the Gebrüder Grimm do list a verb spregeln which they class as a variant form of sprenkeln "sprinkle; speckle". And the one citation they give for it (gespregeld) actually stems from a Swiss source, namely a contemporaneous translation of a 16th-century guide to birds by Swiss naturalist Conrad Gessner. Both the Latin original and the German translation were published in Zürich, by the same publisher even.
So if anyone ever asks me about it, I'm going to tell them that Spregel! is a genuine Swiss colloquialism, a shortening of Gott spregele di! "May God sprinkle you!"
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