Xinshun 1730

Chapter 9 Translation Issues
Hearing this, Liu Yu was immediately happy.

This job... I am absolutely capable.

And this matter must have been heard by Shang Datian. If he did a good job, at least it would be fine for him to be in the emperor's heart.

I was worrying about my status as a pain in the ass, how to climb higher in the future, this is really dozing off and giving me a pillow.

Tian Ping also said it was a good thing before, and according to what he meant, if he wanted to, Qi Guogong would mention his achievements to the emperor; if he didn't want to, then just skip it.There is no loss.

Moreover, in his previous life, he liked a certain villainous game, and he had some understanding of the Western set, and he knew exactly where the Russians' "taboo" points were, and he was sure to jump at the touch of it.

As long as it is done properly, Duke Qi and the Russian special envoy will definitely be able to argue for two months on the issue of credentials, titles, and etiquette.

That being the case, he didn't make any fuss, grabbed the piece of paper full of Latin words, and read it bit by bit.

He just glanced at it just now. Normally speaking, the problem of translation is not big.

But from the perspective of "mosquito prison", you can definitely find a lot of problems.Even if the emperor wanted to, he could take the opportunity to attack the missionaries and make something happen.

Looking at the Latin on the paper, Liu Yu wanted to laugh a little. The name translated by these missionaries made it look like the Roman orthodoxy in Dashun.

primi ordinis comes
Praetorianorum militum
regulus regni Qi
... This is Qi Guogong's official translator. Liu Yu has studied Latin with Westerners for ten years, and he can still understand these things.

It's just full of slots, I don't know where to start.

In fact, it is true that missionaries are not to blame, because it is not an easy task to achieve Xinyada in translation.

Not to mention this time, even in later generations, it is difficult for ordinary people to connect with Florence when they see Emerald for the first time.

In particular, official translations are often exported to domestic sales.It's like the prince's son and the five male nobles. In his previous life, Liu Yu even thought that it was something Europeans had when he was a child.

Moreover, it also involves transliteration and free translation. At this time, even Rakshasa, Russia, and Oros have not yet been unified. The difficulty of this translation can be imagined.

When to transliterate, when to free translate, and what standards should be used, this is the most important thing for an ancient oriental country facing the late period of the Great Discovery Age.

If you want to communicate, you must first interpret.

As a famous example in the history of previous lives, the translation of Nepal’s war with the East India Company and requesting the Qing government to send troops, after two translations, literally flew into the sky.

According to Nepal, there is a tribe called "Philen", whose tribal leader is called "Golnar", and their city is in Curry Gada.

Anyone who sees it will be confused...

Because, the meaning of Pilen is the "Frangji" in Arabic, and Frangji is translated by Erdao dealers, and the original text is Frank.

When pronouncing Tibetan languages ​​and Indian languages, F will be pronounced as PY, and then converted into Chinese.After turning around three second-hand dealers, Frank turned into Frangji and Pilen.

Anyone who can tell at a glance that Pilen is Frank and Frank is Pilen is also a genius.

Curry Gada is easy to recognize. Calcutta is similar to Emerald and Florence, so this problem is not a big one.

The most amazing thing is that "Golnar" is actually a "governer".The free translation is very simple, Governor, the words that should be free translated, but the Nepalese chose terrible transliteration.

So this magical sentence "There is a tribe named Pilen, who lives in Curry Gada, and the leader of the tribe is called Golnar", is actually translated into the adult language...the governor of Calcutta for Westerners.

As shown on the piece of paper in Liu Yu's hand, the translations of these missionaries are so wonderful that they moved all the official positions in Byzantium to Dashun.

Because the missionaries felt that the system of feudalism in Western Europe did not apply to the Chinese government at all, and there was no way to directly translate the title of duke and earl.

On the contrary, the set of official positions in the Roman Empire is more suitable than the feudalism in Western Europe.

There are transliterations and free translations, and these missionaries make a living by searching for chapters and extracting sentences. For a single word, they can accuse each other of being heresy, and they have indeed created enough helplessness when used to translate official positions. .

For example, "regulus regni Qi" is the Duke of Qi translated by missionaries. The transliteration is very magical, Regulus of Qi.

At first glance, it must be no problem, but by the standard of "mosquito prison", this is enough to decapitate.

He also just took it as a joke, pointing to the "Regules of Qi" and said: "If the Duke of Qi intends to trouble the missionaries, that is enough. The king of Qi who sealed the land'. Regulus originally means the real king. For example, Tian Qi in the Warring States period can be called Regulus; but Sun Wuji, the Duke of Qi during the Zhenguan period, must not be called Regulus It's true. If you really want to talk about it, this is called inciting Duke Qi to split the soil, which is really a serious crime of treason."

Tian Ping and Tian Suo were startled when they heard the words "Lietu Fengjiang".They naturally understand the difference between Qi Guogong of the Seven Heroes of the Warring States Period and Qi Guogong of Changsun Wuji.

Even though he knew that Liu Yu was just joking, Tian Suo wiped his sweat and scolded: "This group of missionaries, isn't this nonsense?"

Liu Yu had studied with Westerners for ten years and knew some internal affairs of the missionaries. He said with a smile, "This is just a joke. It can be regarded as a customary rule, right? There is a missionary named Bai Yingli, who once translated "Chinese Sages" "Confucius" goes to the West, and it is inevitable to talk about the affairs of the Spring and Autumn Dukes, so the princes, uncles, men, and five nobles all use this as the standard."

Tian Ping at the side folded a folding fan, nodded and said, "So it was him?"

Liu Yu was quite surprised. This Tian Ping didn't like Western learning at all, and he rarely dealt with missionaries. How could he know such an unpopular name?
Seeing Liu Yu's surprise, Tian Ping waved the folding fan and said, "This Bai Yingli has a disciple named Wu Yushan who was baptized, and his ink paintings are quite good. I have a few fan paintings inscribed by him, and I like them very much."

"Wu Yushan studied painting under Wang Shimin. Wang Shimin's grandfather was Wang Xijue, the chief assistant of the former Wanli Dynasty. His family had only such a single seedling. Wang Xijue asked Dong Qichang to teach Wang Shimin to paint. Wu Yushan can be regarded as an inheritance from Dong Qichang. In the same line, the ink paintings are not bad. Later, I heard that he was baptized with Bai Yingli and went to Macau. There are few paintings, which I think is a pity."

Hearing Dong Qichang's name, Liu Yuxin said that he finally heard a familiar character. If he hadn't read "Wulin Biography", the few people mentioned by Tian Ping might also know Wang Xijue, the Chief Assistant of the Ming Dynasty.

Tian Suo clicked his tongue twice and said, "Look, what do you mean a centipede is dead but not stiff? The gentry in the south of the Yangtze River are called centipedes. Our honorable family is incomparable to others. The Ming Dynasty will die and prosper, and they should Is it rich or not, after all, I can't avoid them. I went to Wang Shimin's house back then, and his garden is much stronger than yours anyway. If His Majesty is on a tour to the south, he will definitely be able to afford to live in the East Garden of his house .”

Hearing these words, Liu Yu stuck out his tongue secretly, thinking that he couldn't compare, couldn't compare.

With the words of Bai Yingli, Wang Shimin and others, Tian Suo also believed that Liu Yu could indeed afford this matter, and felt much relieved.

Liu Yu then talked about why the translations of these missionaries were unreasonable, and how the duke of Qi and the special envoy of Luocha were arguing with each other in terms of names and etiquette.

The missionaries who came to China can be regarded as old scholars. After all, those who engage in theology may be labeled as heretics for a single word.

That's why they have always been serious about some things, similar to the old scholars in Nanming who had a large army overwhelmed the country and did not confer the title of King Sun Kewang. Finding chapters and excerpts is their job.

As early as the end of the Ming Dynasty, when Matteo Ricci and others tried to translate the Chinese system, they believed that it did not correspond to the European dukes and counts, and refused to use Western European titles for translation.

When Bo Yingli translated the Son of Heaven, Duke Zhou, and Duke Ai of Lu, he used some ancient Greek or Roman vocabulary.

For example, the Son of Heaven was translated into Basilius; when translating the "Gong" of Duke Zhou and Duke Ai of Lu, it was translated into Regulus.

The word Regulus is the Latin transliteration of the Greek Basilis.Liu Yu had heard this word in his previous life, because there was a very good Razer mouse called the Basilis Snake, and the reason was this word.

Because this legendary snake has a cockscomb, which looks like a king's crown, so the name of the snake is used to refer to the king's crown.The rhetorical method is similar to "cardamom" in the Chinese context. Why cardamom can refer to young women can be known by looking at cardamom. It is pink, pointed, and has very small bumps.

Since he is wearing the crown, it is appropriate for Regulus to describe the various "princes" of the Spring and Autumn and Warring States. After all, they all have their own feudal states, and the emperor of Zhou...is not the emperor.

But it is obviously not suitable to translate today's Duke of Qi.

The Son of Heaven didn't say to give him the whole Qi Kingdom, he is just a vain prince, how can he wear a crown?According to this translation, the Duke of Qi went to Shandong to collect taxes and recruit troops. Is it justified or treason?
The missionaries have been in Dashun for so long, so they must be aware of this problem.

So I added the sentence "primi ordinis comes", that is, the emperor's chief entourage. This translation spiritually turned out the "gong" of the duke under the Duke of Xu, but there was no way to translate the "Qi" of "Qi Guogong". ".

After the Roman Empire, the Praetorian Guard coup was a tradition. After the emperor came to power, he had to first determine who his cronies were and distribute power to them.

This kind of follower is divided into three levels, chief, second, and third level follower, just corresponding to the Duke, Marquis, and Bo of later generations, and the word comes has become the etymology of the earl.

In order to demonstrate the authority of the emperor, including the powerful official positions such as the Governor of Africa in the Roman Empire, the "chief entourage of the emperor" should also be placed first in writing, and then the official positions such as the Governor of Africa.

This is consistent with the Chinese system, first talk about titles, and then talk about specific official positions.For example, Li Jing, the military god of the Tang Dynasty, must first talk about Wei Guogong, and then the governor of Bingzhou. This cannot be misplaced.

Although this chief entourage could not translate the Duke of Qi, it would be even more inaccurate if it were translated according to the current Western European system of Dukes and Dukes, not as good as the chief entourage's translator Xin Yada.

It is precisely because the political systems of the East and the West are different, so as long as you work hard on the translation, it is easy for Tian Suo to deal with the Russians. Without Tian Suo speaking first, the Russians have to talk about names and etiquette first.

In this world, not only China is struggling with etiquette, but all countries are like this.

Otherwise, in common sense, as long as one party is not entangled, this matter will not be discussed.Why is it wrong not to listen to you?If Westerners did not pay attention to the issue of etiquette, there would not be this incident of banning religion by the Fujian Jiedu Envoy.

The point of "taboo" in Russia is very simple, Liu Yu knows it very well, and it will definitely make the Russian envoy talk about etiquette at the top of his voice, without giving an inch.

(End of this chapter)