You've got some genders mixed up there. Derecho means right in the sense
of 'correct, straight'. Tell a driver to go "al derecho" and he will go
straight ahead. "a la derecha" will get him to turn right. Similarly,
the noun form 'izquierda' means left and is feminine. "Mira la vista por
la izquierda." means "Look at the view to the left." The adjective, of
course, ends in 'a' or 'o' depending on the gender of the noun it
modifies. So, in Spanish, the symbolic subtext is that straight ahead,
straightforward, etc. are masculine qualities and deviation, turning
aside, etc. are feminine qualities.
In Italian, the noun for the direction left is 'sinestra', and for right
is 'destra', both feminine. The plurals end in 'o'.
Moose
Chris Barker wrote:
Interesting word Walt, never heard of it (and "widdershins" is from a
long way back in my memory!).
But "dexter" is indeed Latin for right - "dexterous" is derived from
it. Whereas "sinister" is Latin for left, and the derivation of
"sinister" in English is that left was bad, right good; for that
reason the guest of honour sat on the host's right hand.
The Latin-derived languages in South Europe still use descendants of
"dexter" and "sinister"; in Italian it's "destro" and "sinistro" I
believe; in Spanish "derecho" and "izquierdo" (had to look that one up
in the tourist dictionary); and in French "droit" and "gauche". It is
interesting (well I think so anyway ;-)) that "gauche" is a word in
English to mean awkward or even naive.
< This message was delivered via the Olympus Mailing List >
< For questions, mailto:owner-olympus@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx >
< Web Page: http://Zuiko.sls.bc.ca/swright/olympuslist.html >
|