Mōtung:Lox

The Anglo-Saxon for 'lynx' may be lox (though on what authority I don't know, since 'lynx' is as far as I know a purely North American animal), but other proper names like the UNIX web browser should still be called 'Lynx'. --Saforrest 17:34, 4 Dec 2004 (UTC)

Sorry, apparently the lynx is a European animal too. Maybe we could just make 'Lox' the main page for this, unless there are things that could really be called 'lox' in Anglo-Saxon. --Saforrest 17:38, 4 Dec 2004 (UTC)

Should we translate the proper name, though? Is that not done for Deutsch and Icelandic? If not, then it should still assume the gender and declension of the Anglo-Saxon word.--James 19:21, 4 Dec 2004 (UTC)

Well, it's debatable. My understanding is that German does not translate proper nouns in such contexts; e.g. the browser 'Firefox' is 'Firefox', not Feuerfuchs. Microsoft Windows is 'Windows', not Microsoft Fenster.

You're right on that, but it does take the proper gender and declension (mit dem Windows, ein neueres Windows...). --James 19:44, 10 Dec 2004 (UTC)

Some examples from en:Lynx:

1. The Lynx which is the Central Florida Transportation Authority seems to me to be an even clearer case in which we should not translate the name, especially since it might be acronym.
2. Lynx the constellation is actually named after the animal, so Lox would be correct.
3. The car (Mercury Lynx) seems to me to be a case where we should not translate. It would be confusing to have a meaningless word like 'Toyota Solara' untranslated, but have 'Ford Hengest' (mustang?) or 'Mercury Lox'. And then you would probably have to translate 'mercury' to whatever the Anglo-Saxon name for the element is, which seems to be to be getting rather silly.
4. The various boats named Lynx are somewhat debatable. I would prefer to leave them untranslated. As an analogy, I suspect the German name of Lindbergh's plane was 'Spirit of St. Louis", not "Geist von Heilige Ludwig" or whatever the equivalent would be.

Just some idle speculation. --Saforrest 03:52, 5 Dec 2004 (UTC)

I believe OE for Mercury would be "cwicseolfor", according to www.etymonline.com, I don't know how that would be conjugated. "Cwicseolfor Lox", hmmm, doesn't sound too bad...

Maybe there could be a disclaimer, like "new english for "lox" ",or something...

let's see...the proper names should best be kept as they are (with disclaimer, of course) but the constellation and the animals can be translated. But they should all take the gender and declension of the Englisc word "lox". --James 19:44, 10 Dec 2004 (UTC)

and for proper names in general, would you find it better to leave spelling alone, or change the 'th' to þ/ð as required, and j->i? --James 19:44, 10 Dec 2004 (UTC)

I'm not a writer on these pages, but I guess if proper names should be transcribed PROPERLY, there's a need for quite an advanced system for historical pronunciation, sound shifts, etymology etc, so I guess a small þ/ð, j->i change is purely cosmetical, anyway... I would say that ordinary proper names, (at least written in the latin alphabet) wouldn't need to be transcribed, when there is a general international consensus.

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