How do you say rainbow? Hello,yesterday I saw a huge rainbow, how do you say rainbow in your mother tongue, what's the translation?In french we say "arc en ciel" which means "bow in the sky".

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Sabine

How do you say rainbow?

Hello,

yesterday I saw a huge rainbow, how do you say rainbow in your mother tongue, what's the translation?

In french we say "arc en ciel" which means "bow in the sky".

18 июня 2019 г., 15:04

Комментариев · 16

I've always liked Chinese, which uses two completely different words for the two rainbows in a double rainbow. The lower, brighter main rainbow is called a "hong" (虹), while the higher, dimmer secondary rainbow with reversed colors is called a "ni" (霓).

By the way, you might have noticed that the area between the two rainbows is darker than the rest of the sky. People who specialize in optics call this dark region "Alexander's dark band", and I wish people talked about it more--there's something very poignant about the fact that rainbows create darkness.

Here's a picture where you can see the hong, the ni, and Alexander's dark band:

https://live.staticflickr.com/1869/44487660352_9d41d481b3_b.jpg

18 июня 2019 г.

In Portuguese it is: Arco-íris

Arco=arc

Íris= Its name comes from the Greek mythology, where Iris was a goddess who exerted the function of divine herald. In her task of messenger, the goddess left a multicolored trail as she crossed the skies.

That's why we call it as Arco-íris

Being honest I just discovered this etymology so I'm pretty amazed with this new information, it's incredible that an ancient belief had, somehow, established a connection with our language without we even doesn't knowing it. Thank you for the curious question!

18 июня 2019 г.

In Arabic language we say قوس قزح

Which means

high arc

19 июня 2019 г.

In Ukrainian it is - "veselka". It means - "funny thing". It is close in meaning with the Russian word for rainbow - "raduga". Victor noted below that we can translate it like "the arc of gladness".

But I saw anather non-traditional explanation - the Russian word "raduga" or "ra-duga" close to word from Sanskrit for rainbow सुरधनुस् /sura-dhanus/. And it means "bow or arc of God".

19 июня 2019 г.

We say 'szivárvány' in Hungarian. I've never thought it had an actual meaning other than rainbow, or what the root is, so I looked it up.
It comes from the verb szív 'to suck' because some people believed that rainbows suck up the rain and water from rivers.
It also meant sponge, pump well,suction-pump. All this was new information to me as well:D
(By the way, 'iris' is szivárványhártya, lit. 'rainbow membrane'.)

19 июня 2019 г.

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Sabine

Языковые навыки

английский, французский

Изучаемый язык

английский

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