# fläckechtig (15th century)



## Gilles DENIS

Hi,
Howw to translate this sentence (16th century) in english :








from Ambrosii Calepini, _Dictionarum octo linguarum_..., Paris, Apud NicolaumNiuellium, 1588; p. 1170

Thank you


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## manfy

In normal print: Die röte deß korns/wan die helm rot unnd flackechtig werden.
Modern German: Die Röte des Korns, wenn die Halme rot und dreschbar werden.
English: The reddishness of grain when the stalks become red and threshable.

edit: slight correction of phrasing since this seems to be an entry under the Latin lemma _ROBIGO_


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## Gilles DENIS

*All my thanks! Gilles*


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## Gilles DENIS

The text describes a disease of cereals (blasting of corn)


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## manfy

Gilles DENIS said:


> The text describes a disease of cereals (blasting of corn)


Hmm, interesting.
Dreschbar for 'flackechtig' was a bit of a guess, but in context of grains it makes sense.
'-echtig' is an old form of the adjectival suffix '-echt' and 'flacken' is an old word for 'schlagen' (to beat), which changed to 'dreschen' (to thresh) in the agricultural context of grains.


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## eamp

I would have rather read 'fläckechtig' and interpreted it as 'fleckig' (spotted, blotchy).


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## Gilles DENIS

'fläckechtig' ('fleckig') seems to me more appropriate. 

The author (Ambrosii Calepini) gives in his dictionnary (_Dictionarum octo linguarum_) a translation of the words of the Antiquity which designate a cereal disease. "Blasting" and "Röte" are supposed to be equivalent to the _robigo_ (rust) of the Latins and to the _erusibe_ (redness) of the Greeks. "Röte" goes well with _robigo_ and _erusibe_


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## manfy

eamp said:


> I would have rather read 'fläckechtig' and interpreted it as 'fleckig' (spotted, blotchy).


Yes, it seems sensible considering that stem rust may show up as patches of red in an early stage. However, the Wiki article also shows that it often happens close to the harvest time, which - when correlated with the medieval level of knowlege -  makes 'threshable' sensible as well.
According to Grimm, "fleckig" potentially is linked to "flicken":


> ahd. *flëch*, mhd. vlëc, mit ë nach den reimen und dem abgeleiteten *flicken*; war das wort schon gothisch, so müste es fliks oder flik gelautet haben


So, linguistically there's no definitive or even suggested link to "flack"; and even if you look at 'flack' as a medieval typo or an early NHD adjustment for MHD vlëc, then the suffix '-echtig' is still hard to explain.


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## Gilles DENIS

"Die Röte des Korns, wenn die Halme rot und fläckechtig (fleckig) werden"

it fits quite well with a classic description of a grain disease :

fleckig, brandig
spotted, blamished, smutted ( Schmutzfleck on cereals), rust (rostfleck on cereals)
etc.


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## Hutschi

Here is a source. 
Dictionarium septem linguarum. ...

There is also a Latin (?) translation. I do not know this language, unfortunately.
It uses antiqua letters.



See following analogy:

Dornechtig = dornig
Wörterbuchnetz - Deutsches Wörterbuch von Jacob Grimm und Wilhelm Grimm


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## Gilles DENIS

The same


Hutschi said:


> Here is a source.
> Dictionarium septem linguarum. ...
> 
> There is also a Latin (?) translation.
> It uses antiqua letters.



The same author, Ambrogio Calepino. The first edition of his dictionnary was only in latin. Then he (then other authors) added other langages 4, 7, 8, 9 to 11:
* Ambrosii Calepini Dictionarium undecim linguarum: Respondent autem Latinis vocabulis, Hebraica, Graeca, Gallica, Italica, Germanica, Belgica, Hispanica, Polonica, Ungarica, Anglica.*


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## eamp

manfy said:


> So, linguistically there's no definitive or even suggested link to "flack"; and even if you look at 'flack' as a medieval typo or an early NHD adjustment for MHD vlëc, then the suffix '-echtig' is still hard to explain.


Looking at the source, I can make out a superscript 'e' above the 'a', so definitely 'ä' is meant. On the same page under 'rogatus' he also writes 'gebätten' for modern 'gebeten', so probably this reflects a dialect where the continuation of mhg. 'ë' had a very open realization (as still in Switzerland). 
The suffix is just the common (in early NHG) suffix '-icht'/'-et' extended with '-ig'. Such a double suffix sounds strange today, but has parallels for example in 'sonnechtig' (DWB under 'sonnicht') for modern 'sonnig'.


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## Hutschi

I can see the e above the a, too, so it is fläckechtig, indeed.


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## Gilles DENIS

Pfl*a*c, schandfl*ë*ck, pflecke:



 *Mittelhochdeutsches Wörterbuch zum Handgebrauch : nebst grammatischer Einleitung* 
*Author / Editor*:   Ziemann, Adolf ; Ziemann, Adolf
*Publishing place*: Quedlinburg [u.a.]  *Year of publication*: 1838   *Publishing house*: Basse


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## Hutschi

See also 


> https://books.google.de › books
> Der newen Weldt und Indianischen Nidergängischen Königreichs, Newe ...
> 1582
> Deßgleichen sagten etlich das sie viel Pardenvnnd Panterthier gesehen die auch also gespencket vnd Fläckecht weren gewesen. Nach dem aber die vnsern das Männlich Tigerthier erschlagen/scindt sie mit eynem  ...



Hier ist fläckecht klar fleckig.


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## manfy

Interesting!
So, let's summarize what we know so far:
*) The original Latin dictionary was written by Ambrogio Calepino, an Augustinian monk from Bergamo, and it was published in 1502. (ergo, the information found in the original copy is based on late 15th century knowledge)

*) Countless reprints and enlarged multi-language editions were published in the 16th and 17th century. (Hutschi's link of the 7-language version in #10 shows MDCXXII in the foreword, i.e. 1622)
When you look at the translation of those different languages, it becomes obvious that they are not translations from the Latin entries but entries taken from dictionaries in those languages. So you cannot directly compare the different languages.
I suppose, you'd have to look at the foreword of your specific book and you might find the source of each individual language entry.
But even without knowing exact details, it's safe to assume that all languages are based on 15th to 16th century knowledge.

What I'm trying to get at is, you shouldn't analyze those entries from a 21st century viewpoint but you should first try to apply 16th century logic and knowledge if you really want to know what those writers may have been thinking when writing it.
One entry that seems to support my idea is the Italian version. If I read it correctly, it says:
"malatia che viene alle biane per troppo humore"  
and Google Translate suggests
"Krankheit, die Weiß (Weizen) für zu viel Humor kommt"  in other words, a crops disease that is caused by laughing too much... (Google translate is always good for a laugh).

In any case, with all the proof given above, I fold -- I do agree that my threshing- hypothesis truly seems more far-fetched than your fleckig-hypothesis!

But I do have one final (and plausible) explanation to offer!
<to be continued shortly>


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## Gilles DENIS

When we are familiar with the representation of plant diseases at the early modern period, the phrase in Italian has no use in understanding the sentence in German.
The different examples given in this dictionnary for each language can not be used fully to understand one from the other. The English "blasting", proposed for _robigo_ (rust), corresponds better, in the 16th century, to German "Brand" and French "bruine" or "brûlure". The French "nielle" proposed for "rubigo", corresponds better, still in the 16th century, to English "mildew" and German "Meltau". The German "Röte" seems a literal translation of the ancient Greek_ ἐρυσιβη_ (redness).  I didn't find "Röte" in another text at that time to refer to a plant disease. In german we have "Meltau", "Mehltau", "Hönigtau", "Brand", "Brandt".

Of course, we must not rely on the knowledge of the 21st century. This is the minimum for an Historian...


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## bearded

manfy said:


> "malatia che viene alle biane per troppo humore"
> and Google Translate suggests
> "Krankheit, die Weiß (Weizen) für zu viel Humor kommt"  in other words, a crops disease that is caused by laughing too much... (Google translate is always good for a laugh).


'Humore' (mod.Italian umore/umidità) actually meant dampness/Feuchtigkeit. _Troppo humore _= too much dampness/zuviel Feuchtigkeit.

And is that really 'biane' (unknown word) or 'biade' (fodder)?


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## Gilles DENIS

I have to add that the first language given to translate the latin _rubigo_, in the Calepini dictionnary, is hebrew from the Bible. _Rubigo_ is tranlated by יֵּרָקוֹן (_y_e_raqon_) from ירוק (_yarok_). Yarok = green and yeraqon = turning green, turning pale.


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## Gilles DENIS

bearded said:


> 'Humore' (mod.Italian umore/umidità) actually meant dampness/Feuchtigkeit. _Troppo humore _= too much dampness/zuviel Feuchtigkeit.
> 
> And is that really 'biane' (unknown word) or 'biade' (fodder)?



"biane" means "harvest"


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## bearded

Gilles DENIS said:


> "biane" means "harvest"


Where did you find that, please? It's a word unknown even to the very exhaustive Zingarelli and Treccani ital. dictionaries…


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## manfy

Gilles DENIS said:


> The German "Röte" seems a literal translation of the ancient Greek_ ἐρυσιβη_ (redness).  I didn't find "Röte" in another text at that time to refer to a plant disease.


Oh, no - from a German perspective the word 'Röte' is perfectly fine here. It's not the name of a disease, it's just the name of a colour.
The lemma is the Latin _Robigo_, and the author is just describing what it means, i.e. _Robigo _[is the word for the condition of] "Die Röte des Korns, wenn die Halme rot und flackechtig werden."

Here's my final potential alternative for 'flackechtig': welk, schlaff (related to english _flaccid_).
Grimm says under 'flacken':


> 3) flacken, segnescere, languescere, engl. flag, faul da liegen
> [...]
> 
> 
> näher steht vielleicht das lat. flaccere, flaccescere.



And from the English 'flag' (common Google definition, i.e. based on online OED):


> mid 16th century (in the sense ‘flap about loosely, *hang down*’): r*elated to obsolete flag ‘hanging down*’.


And from the Wiki entry on actual syptoms of stem rust:


> Infection can reduce what is an apparently healthy crop about three weeks before harvest into *a black tangle of broken stems and shriveled grains* by harvest
> [...]
> 
> The fungus weakens the stems, *which can lead to lodging (falling over*). In severe cases lodging can make mechanical harvesting impossible


A 16th century writer without knowledge of actual details would probably be inclined to describe the symptoms that infected crops show, and 'welken, schlaff werden, absterben' of the stem is certainly one such symptom.

But anyroad, I'm not a language historian, so if you're fine with 'fleckig', I shall be fine with it too.


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## manfy

bearded said:


> Where did you find that, please? It's a word unknown even to the very exhaustive Zingarelli and Treccani ital. dictionaries…


It's 16th century Italian. In this version from 1656 (based on a version from 1606) it's reasonably readable.

PS: Yes, I also guessed that 'humore' had to do something with humidity or wetness because that's one of the causes that was apparently identified already during the time of the Romans


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## berndf

eamp said:


> I would have rather read 'fläckechtig' and interpreted it as 'fleckig' (spotted, blotchy).



It looks like a variant of _flecklecht_ (=_spotted, speckled_).


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## bearded

manfy said:


> it's reasonably readable.


Notwithstanding my searches, I was unable to find the word 'biane' anywhere.  I continue suspecting that it's 'biade' (very common in old times for fodder/crops) and the stem of the d could be erased in that old text..
But Gilles Denis was so sure in his reply....maybe he's got some other source which can convince me.  
( If mods think this is completely off-topic, I will open a separate thread )


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## Gilles DENIS

bearded said:


> Where did you find that, please? It's a word unknown even to the very exhaustive Zingarelli and Treccani ital. dictionaries…



you are right. I also had difficulty with this word several weeks ago. I had found somewhere that it could mean both grains and harvests. I just searched again but I can not find the source. There is also another solution that biane can be a variant of venetian biave (oats) : biàda in modern italian. See :
Archivio di Stato di Venezia


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## bearded

Gilles DENIS said:


> biave (oats) : biàda in modern italian


Ah, ok.  Many thanks!


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## Gilles DENIS

manfy said:


> Oh, no - from a German perspective the word 'Röte' is perfectly fine here. It's not the name of a disease, it's just the name of a colour.
> The lemma is the Latin _Robigo_, and the author is just describing what it means, i.e. _Robigo _[is the word for the condition of] "Die Röte des Korns, wenn die Halme rot und flackechtig werden."
> 
> Here's my final potential alternative for 'flackechtig': welk, schlaff (related to english _flaccid_).
> Grimm says under 'flacken':
> 
> 
> And from the English 'flag' (common Google definition, i.e. based on online OED):
> 
> And from the Wiki entry on actual syptoms of stem rust:
> 
> A 16th century writer without knowledge of actual details would probably be inclined to describe the symptoms that infected crops show, and 'welken, schlaff werden, absterben' of the stem is certainly one such symptom.
> 
> But anyroad, I'm not a language historian, so if you're fine with 'fleckig', I shall be fine with it too.



A 16th century writer has his knowledge with the details and explanation of his time. When he use "Röte", he give a description, an explanation and a word for it, as rust (Rost). Cereal rust (or Rost also used in germen for cereal Brand at the early modern time) is a description and an explanation (residue or corrosion from the air). As Meltau or Mildew is a kind of residue deposited on the plant (description) and an a kind of honey fallen down from the sky (explanation).


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## manfy

Gilles DENIS said:


> When he use "Röte", he give a description, an explanation and a word for it, as rust (Rost).


Ah, ok. Based on this, it's safe to say that the disease was known to that specific dictionary writer as "*Röte des Korns*", where _Röte _is simply the description of the colour; it seems they already knew in those days that healthy wheat has normally a golden yellowish color at the time of harvest. 

This seems confirmed by Grimm's entries for Röte:


> *2b)* krankheit an pflanzen, rost: röte, brenner, carbunculus Dasypodius; der brenner an den räben, unnd bäumen, die röte, carbunculus. ebenda; rost, *röte am korn*, *rubigo*, ebenda


and Rost:


> *3)* schon alt ist die übertragung von rost auf den brand des getreides. Graff 2, 551. Dief. 502a; rost, *röte am korn, rubigo* Dasypod


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## Gilles DENIS

We do have to have in mind, roughly between the end of the Middle Ages and the 18th century, the terms for plant diseases were not fixed. The authors used, according to their fields, either literal translations of terms from Antiquity, or popular peasant terms that are numerous, different from one region to another, even from one village to another, with many variations for each term . The same term may refer to diseases that are different for us (and even at that time) and different terms refer to the same disease for us (even at that time). It is only in the 18th century, even in the 19th century, even in the 20th century, that the terms were fixed and the differences were specified


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## Gilles DENIS

bearded said:


> Ah, ok.  Many thanks!



Biave could mean oats, rye, cereals in general according to the regions, so harvest. See italian-English forum:

Biave


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## bearded

Yes, I have no issues with _biave > biade. _  ''Biane'' is problematic.


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## Gilles DENIS

bearded said:


> Yes, I have no issues with _biave > biade. _  ''Biane'' is problematic.




the confusion started in our exchanges with the transcript of Manfy that I used without returning to the text of Calepini. If we return to the text of Calepini I find biave, not biane:


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## bearded

Thank you, it's clear now.


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## manfy

Gilles DENIS said:


> the confusion started in our exchanges with the transcript of Manfy that I used without returning to the text of Calepini. If we return to the text of Calepini I find biave, not biane:
> 
> View attachment 34007


Yes, in this copy it clearly shows 'biave'.

It's a multi-source problem. I found many citations for 'biane' in google books, but after checking 5-10 actual entries I found:
- many OCR errors in google books due to old font types
- many OCR errors in case of line breaks, e.g. 'bian- co/che/chi' mostly resulted in 'biane co/che/chi'
- actual typesetting errors; some words that should have been printed as 'biave' were clearly legible as 'biane' or 'biaue' (and I carefully compared it with other letters in that copy!) 
- smudged and hard to read letters in the original book

Bottomline, one needs to be careful with Google Books and very old print editions.


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