[ughaibu]

Michaelangelica: Here's an odd account of the incident: http://zapatopi.net/...s_In_Pachyderms

[Michaelangelica]

ughaibu said:

Michaelangelica: Here's an odd account of the incident: http://zapatopi.net/...s_In_Pachyderms

Amazing
Hard to believe; but amazing
Thankyou

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Tuffi was not seriously injured in the fall and was unfortunately recaptured shortly after.

The Toronga Zoo ( a great zoo in Sydney) has just impoted a few elephants

[alexander]

michaelangelica said:

and Latin?

no, greek only... Really, really technically barbarians were those people who were not Greek. Many people spoke latin, but it was very few people outside HRE that spoke greek

[eric l]

Michaelangelica said:

Why?

Do elephants often take trips on monorails and swan dive into rivers?

Tuffi was a circus elephant, the monorail trip was just one of the circus's publicity stunts. The incident occured on july 21st 1950, and is mentioned in the history section of the site of the Wuppertal Monorail. Sadly, this history section is availableonly in German, not in the English version of the site.
http://schwebebahn.com

[Michaelangelica]

alexander said:

no, greek only... Really, really technically barbarians were those people who were not Greek. Many people spoke latin, but it was very few people outside HRE that spoke greek

Ok; thanks for putting me straight

I though barbarians were the northern European tribes Germanic etc that gave Rome such stife.

Were Persians and Egyptians barbarians too?

[alexander]

Barbarians were everyone who was not Greek, so yes the rest of the world was barbarians. Now, because romans dealt with Goths and other germanic people, they were the people that barbarian was used for the most, eventually giving it's today's meaning of:

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1. A member of a people considered by those of another nation or group to have a primitive civilization.
2. A fierce, brutal, or cruel person.

[Qfwfq]

Michaelangelica said:

and Latin?
because thay Bar . . Bar. Bar. babbled
(Their speach sounded like babble-is there a Roman word for that?)

Yes, barbarus, from the Greek barbaros. Although, not exactly. It is onomatopeic but indicated stutter, by imitation, more than babble.

I disagree about it "technically" meaning not-Greek-speaking, the word in each language originally meant foreigner --long before Latin had become the lingua franca-- and in later Roman times came to be derogatory and hence applied to the enemy.

[Turtle]

While Ben Franklin was in France negotiating a treaty in 1777, a Benedictine monk wrote him proposing that he would pray for America if America would pay off his gambling debts.

[alexander]

Disagree all you want, its a fact and is posted as such, even wiki says: The word "Barbarian" comes into English from Medieval Latin barbarinus, from Latin barbaria, from Latin barbarus, from the ancient Greek word βάρβαρος (barbaros) which meant a non-Greek, someone whose (first) language was not Greek. Nothing to disagree with...

[alexander]

Her is another quirky fact: Martin Luther King, was actually named after a great theologian and church reformer Martin Luther, King's real name was Michael and his family last name was King.

[Qfwfq]

Yeah, I've always had a mild suspicion he had chosen the name after the church reformer.

alexander said:

Disagree all you want, its a fact and is posted as such, even wiki says:

I trust Devoto and Oli more than wiki, especially as to Latin and Greek etymus. βάρβαρος (thanks for the unicode) meant a non-Greek because it meant a foreigner. The term 'barbaria' doesn't mean 'barbarian' but instead a foreign country or, perhaps, a barbarian (in the sense of uncouth) act, something done by one. I had never heard a term such as barbarinus so I Googled it and apart from a few hits with the exact same sentence as the wiki you quote, it seems to be a name. One hit is this post which quotes that wiki and then, in the same post, says:

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I do remember from my Latin primer that the Latin word 'barbarian' is translated into the (modern) English word 'foreigner'.

To an Englishman, the word 'foreigner' means someone not from England. To an Indian it means someone not from India...

[Michaelangelica]

alexander said:

a great theologian and church reformer Martin Luther,.

You mean that evil, constipated protestant?

[Freddy]

alexander said:

Her is another quirky fact: Martin Luther King, was actually named after a great theologian and church reformer Martin Luther, King's real name was Michael and his family last name was King.

Michael Luther King, Sr. changed his and his son's first names from Michael to Martin around 1934 when MLK,Jr. was about 5 years old. Son, father, and grandfather were all preachers.

[Racoon]

In Ancient Egypt, cats were often buried with their masters, or in a special cemetery for cats.

In 1991, during an attempted political coup on Russian President Boris Yelstin, food supplies had dwindled down at the parliament buildings so they ordered Pizza Hut to deliver pizzas

The phrase "rule of thumb" is derived from an old English law which stated that you couldn't beat your wife with anything wider than your thumb.

The United States has never lost a war in which mules were used.

The earliest known example of an organized market for equities dates from Rome, second century B.C.

In World War II, the German submarine U-120 was sunk by a malfunctioning toilet.

[InfiniteNow]

Racoon said:

The United States has never lost a war in which mules were used.

What about where asses were in charge?

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In World War II, the German submarine U-120 was sunk by a malfunctioning toilet.

Did the attacker throw it at them?