🚀 go-pugleaf

I've received this query.  I can answer it, of course, but I'm a maketo,
and I think it would be best if a native speaker replied.  If you'd like
to reply, please reply directly to Dr. Strassler, and not to me.  He's
here:

strassler@ens.unibe.ch

Perhaps I should explain that Dr. Strassler is using British English,
which may be unfamiliar.  In British, the verb `bathe' has two senses:
(1) intransitive, = `go swimming'; (2) intransitive, = `take a bath'.
I presume he wants the second.  Note that, in British English, you do
not `bathe a baby': you `bath a baby' (gad).

The noun `bathing' is the same as in American: it means both `taking a
bath' (intransitive) and `covering with water' (transitive).  I presume
he wants the first.  (In British, it also means `swimming', of course.)

In British, `the bath' is the room in a house containing the bathtub.
It may or may not contain a handbasin and a toliet.

Finally, `take a bath' is the same as in American.


Larry Trask
COGS
University of Sussex
Brighton BN1 9QH
UK

larryt@cogs.susx.ac.uk


---------- Forwarded message ----------
Date: Fri, 22 Jan 1999 16:06:52 +0100
From: Jurg Strassler <strassler@ens.unibe.ch>
To: lagb@essex.ac.uk
Subject: different languages

Dear colleagues

For a project, we would like to have a four words in as many different
languages as possible, (esp. different African languages,Gaelic, Welsh,
Breton, Armenian, and Mongolian,) all connected with "bathing". We would be
very grateful, if you could translate the following four expressions:

to bathe (verb)
bathing (noun)
the bath  (building or part thereof)
the bath (in the sense of "to take a bath").

Is there a place with a respective name ( as e.g. "Bath" in England) ?

Thank you very much for your help.


Dr. Jurg Strassler
University of Berne
Department of English
CH-3000 Berne 9
Switzerland
Tel.: +41-31-631 82 45
Fax.: +41-31-631 36 36
e-mail: strassler@ens.unibe.ch