# Non-sense sentences that sound sound



## Carlos Martínez Riera

I'm looking here for combinatons of written words that, when pronounced alowd, tell a different story than the one you read.
One coud call them phrasal homophonies, if I dare giving a name to such thing.

Example:
FR: La bande des six nez ---> La bande déssiné
L'ultime atome ----> L'ultimatum

In other languages?

Carlos


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## Artrella

Todo por que rías >> todo porquerías

Las obras de ayer >>> las sobras de ayer

Les Luthiers, grandes hitos >>> Les Luthiers, grandecitos

Les Luthiers, unen canto con humor >>> Les Luthiers, un encanto con humor


Todas estas frases corresponden a obras del grupo argentino LES LUTHIERS.


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## Cath.S.

Carlos Martínez Riera said:
			
		

> I'm looking here for combinatons of written words that, when pronounced allowed, tell a different story than the one you read.
> One coud call them phrasal homophonies, if I dare giving a name to such thing.
> 
> Example:
> FR: La bande des six nez ---> La bande déssiné
> L'ultime atome ----> L'ultimatum
> 
> In other languages?
> 
> Carlos


Un autre, très connu, en français :
Et le désir s'accroît quand l'effet se recule... (P. Corneille)


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## garryknight

There was an extremely funny comedy sketch by Ronnie Barker and Ronnie Corbett (written by the former - a true comedy genius) that was based around exactly this kind of word-play. A man goes into the hardware shop and starts ordering things from the shop owner: "I want four candles" (said in a Cockney accent). The owner puts four candles on the counter. "No, I said four candles". The owner looks confused. "You know, fork 'andles - 'andles for forks"...


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## Leopold

Nadie la tiende
Nadie la atiende

Leo


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## Artrella

Leopold said:
			
		

> Nadie la tiende
> Nadie la atiende
> 
> Leo




Pobre!!    lol!


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## timpeac

Par le bois du Djinn où s'entasse de l'effroi,
Parle ! Bois du gin ou cent tasses de lait froid !


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## fetchezlavache

victor hugo : il sortit de la vie comme un vieillard en sort. (il sortit de la vie comme un vieil hareng saur)


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## fetchezlavache

Carlos Martínez Riera said:
			
		

> I'm looking here for combinatons of written words that, when pronounced alowd, tell a different story than the one you read.
> One coud call them phrasal homophonies, if I dare giving a name to such thing.
> 
> Example:
> FR: La bande des six nez ---> La bande déssiné
> L'ultime atome ----> L'ultimatum
> 
> In other languages?
> 
> Carlos




one should call them  un 'kakemphaton', at least that's the french name. i just learnt it 2 seconds ago.


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## Asmodeo

Una de Quevedo:
El tipo apostó con unos amigos a que era capaz de llamar coja a la reina. Y en una recepción en palacio le ofreció a la reina dos flores mientras decía:
"*Entre el clavel y la rosa, Su Majestad escoja*".


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## timpeac

fetchezlavache said:
			
		

> victor hugo : il sortit de la vie comme un vieillard en sort. (il sortit de la vie comme un vieil hareng saur)


 
Fetchez - could you just explain this one to me please. I thought that you would have to say vieux hareng saur because "hareng" is masculine and "h aspiré" isn't it? Sorry I don't mean to be pedantic, and if the venerable V Hugo said it I'm sure it's right, but I can't see how 

Thanks!


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## Agnès E.

Actually, you're right ! But you know, nothing logical in humour, nothing to be said against venerable Victor ! 

http://forum-images.hardware.fr/images/perso/205rallye.gif


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## fetchezlavache

you are right timpeac, but there is nothing wrong with a little imagination is there ?


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## timpeac

fetchezlavache said:
			
		

> you are right timpeac, but there is nothing wrong with a little imagination is there ?


 
Haha, no of course not, I just wanted to make sure I understood. I see, one rule for good old Victor another for the rest of us...


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## Cath.S.

timpeac said:
			
		

> Haha, no of course not, I just wanted to make sure I understood. I see, one rule for good old Victor another for the rest of us...


Kakemphaton... vient de kakon = mauvais en grec.  

Un autre :
Six russes c'est six Slaves, s'ils se lavent c'est qu'ils se nettoient, si ce n'est toi c'est donc ton frère !


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## Jana337

Twelve hundred Turkish prisoners were mistakenly killed in 1799 by Napoleon after he ordered them set free. He complained about a coughing fit he was having, but his words, "Ma sacrée toux," (my bloody cough) were misunderstood. Instead his men thought he uttered "Massacrez tout" (kill them all), so they opened fire, killing every prisoner.

Jana


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## zebedee

Jana337 said:
			
		

> Twelve hundred Turkish prisoners were mistakenly killed in 1799 by Napoleon after he ordered them set free. He complained about a coughing fit he was having, but his words, "Ma sacrée toux," (my bloody cough) were misunderstood. Instead his men thought he uttered "Massacrez tout" (kill them all), so they opened fire, killing every prisoner.
> 
> Jana


 
Hmmmm...at the risk of sounding pedantic, surely it would have been "Massacrez *tous*" with the "s" at the end of the word pronounced, therefore the two sentences no longer sound the same?


EDIT: Just found this on the page Jana recommends in another thread:
http://www.snopes.com/language/misxlate/toux.htm


> This story is also a bit absurd in a linguistic sense. The command "massacrez tous" is roughly the equivalent of an English speaker's issuing the unusual order "Massacre all!" Just as an English speaker would almost certainly use the more common verb "kill" and a more specific object (e.g., "Kill them all!" or "Kill all the prisoners!"), so a French speaker would order "Tuez-les tous!" or "Tuez tous les soldats!" And although the phrases "ma sacrée toux" and "massacrez tous" are similar in pronunciation, there is a distinctiveness to their rhythms that enables a French speaker to distinguish between them, just as English speakers can discern the difference between the spoken sentences "I want to see them all" and "I want to see the mall." (Moreover, unlike many other French words, the final 's' in "tous" is sounded; therefore "toux" and "tous" have distinctly different pronunciations akin to the English "too" and "twos.")


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## Agnès E.

The problem here is "massacrez tous" is wrong in French, it should be: "massacrez-*les *tous"...
And "Massacrez tout" means "massacre everthing", which does not work either.
So I think this is just one of the numerous legends running about Napoleon!!


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## LV4-26

If one wanted to sound very scornful, one might very well say "massacrez tout" (slaughter everything) even for people. All right, maybe this isn't something Napoleon was likely to say (or isn't it ? we don't really know), but this is something his soldiers might have understood.

That said, I don't believe this really happened. It's a bit too much. I mean the soldiers should have asked him to confirm the order, at least that. 
Moreover, I have no reason to disbelieve what is said in the page zebedee an jana have mentionned. (Only, as I pointed out, I don't think the "phonetic/grammatical" argument is that valid).


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## melusines

Au Lion d'Or
Au lit, on dort


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## o'clock

Asmodeo said:
			
		

> Una de Quevedo:
> El tipo apostó con unos amigos a que era capaz de llamar coja a la reina. Y en una recepción en palacio le ofreció a la reina dos flores mientras decía:
> "*Entre el clavel y la rosa, Su Majestad escoja*".


 
Otra de Quevedo:

Se apostó que llamaría "puta" a la reina. Aprovechando que estaba resfriada le dijo: ¿Su Majestad esputa?

Del verbo "esputar": Arrancar flemas y expulsarlas por la boca.
_Real Academia Española © Todos los derechos reservados_


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## Encolpius

Interesting thread indeed, but I have the feeling kakemphatons work mostly in French, no? Is there an English name for it?


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## L'irlandais

It’s almost like a pun.


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## Welsh_Sion

They regularly feature as the two opening (across) clue answers in the concise crossword in the i newspaper in the UK (other newspapers may have them, too). They are called 'ninas' in English.

For example,

'little devil' (3) = imp
'fur, for example' (4) = hair

Nina: 'impair'.

Other types of nina are:

Ninas


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## L'irlandais

zebedee said:


> Hmmmm...at the risk of sounding pedantic, surely it would have been "Massacrez *tous*" with the "s" at the end of the word pronounced, therefore the two sentences no longer sound the same?
> 
> 
> EDIT: Just found this on the page Jana recommends in another thread:
> Ma Sacrée Toux!


In the French Algerian war, radio operators were in the habit of shortening commands they transmitted, for expediency.  Some troops in the highlands found an unarmed shepherd cowering in a gully.  So they radio their commanding officer at the base of the hill for instructions, as to what to do with the suspect. He says tell them “to bring him down here, so I can question him and decide if he is just a simple shepherd”.  The radio operator transmitted the imperative “Descends-le!” (Bring him down!). A echoing shot rang out, followed by orders barked by the officer trying to find out who fired their weapon, on the hill top.  The radio operator went pale, in slang  “Descends-le!” means shoot him.  True story, retold (in his published memoirs) by the chaplain, who consoled the radio operator before his return to France.


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## Welsh_Sion

@L'irlandais's war story reminds me of the (possibly apocryphal) story of a French General visiting a contingent of Breton troops during World War I in order to raise morale.

'Where do you want to go, _mes braves_?' asked the General.
'_Ar gar, ar gar,'_ replied the Bretons to a man.

The General was very pleased. He thought that they were keen to go to the front line, and misheard what he thought was_ 'À la guerre'_.

What the Bretons were actually saying was they wanted to go home to their kinsfolk!


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## Hakro

The break-through of computers has brought hudreds of English based words into Finnish language, usually either pronounced or written in a Finnish way and connected with Finnish endings for verbs etc. Examples:
to boot = buutata (ta = verb infinitive ending, a = connecting vowel)
to render = renderöidä (öidä = verb infinitive ending)
to ban = bannata
to scan = skannata
to select = selektoida
to share = sharettaa
trolling = trollaus
etc.


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## franknagy

Hungarian

Kóbor ló / kóborló  = stray horse / rover.
Egy kis pesti vendéglőbe egy kis pesti vendég lő be.
egy = a/an
kis = small
vendéglő = retaurant
vendég = gues
Pest = side of Budapest
Kispest = district of Budapest
lő be = he/she is shooting in
A te tűd/ a tetűd = your needle / you louse.


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## Encolpius

Hello Frank, excellent examples.


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## Circunflejo

Artrella said:


> Todo por que rías >> todo porquerías


That one doesn't work because the /r/ of the first sentence has a _hard_ sound and the one of the second sentence has a _soft _sound.


Artrella said:


> Les Luthiers, grandes hitos >>> Les Luthiers, grandecitos


That one just works in areas with _seseo_.


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## jsvillar

A couple of riddles with the answer within. Everybody knows them, so they are only good for children:
-Oro parece, plata no es/plátano es: Looks like gold, it is not silver/it is banana
-Blanco por dentro, verde por fuera, si quieres que te lo diga espera/es pera: White on the inside, green on the outside, if you want the answer, wait/it is pear.

We also have a whole tradition of 'hyerogliphs', which are puzzles in the newspapers with visual clues that shape the words or syllabes of the answer.
As an example, the hardest I know (so hard to solve that it is more a joke than a real hyerogliph) is like this:
Where are you going to swim? Answer: O OO O o O
Translated it is like this:
Nada redondel aros arito nada=Nadaré donde la Rosarito nada
Nothing, loop, rings, little ring, nothing=I will swim where Rosarito swims


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## bennymix

English has pairs like "Bend over and kiss this guy."  "Bend over and kiss the sky."


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## L'irlandais

bennymix said:


> English has pairs like "Bend over and kiss this guy."  "Bend over and kiss the sky."


That’s more of a Misheard lyric (also known as mondegreens).  When Jimmi Hendrix sang « Excuse me while I kiss the sky. ». His audience heard « Excuse me while I kiss this guy. » In the context of Purple Haze, the former was understandable.
Holorhyms, Mondegreens and Hendrix…. | Simon Leyland


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## Roxxxannne

1.  Etymology of the word mondegreen:
In a 1954 essay in _Harper's Magazine_, [Sylvia] Wright described how, as a young girl, she misheard the last line of the first stanza from the seventeenth-century ballad _The Bonnie Earl o' Moray_.  She wrote:
When I was a child, my mother used to read aloud to me from Percy's _Reliques_, and one of my favorite poems began, as I remember:
Ye Highlands and ye Lowlands,
Oh, where hae ye been?
They hae slain the earl o' Moray 
And _Lady Mondegreen_.
               The correct fourth line is "And _laid him on the green"._
               (from Wikipedia, s.v. Mondegreen)

2.  Ninas (#24) '
As a child, I used to look carefully at Al Hirshfield's amazing caricatures in the Sunday New York Herald Tribune, and then as an adult in the New York Times, to see if I could spot all the Ninas.  At some point he started adding a numeral next to his name to indicate to his fans how many Ninas there were in the drawing.  

3.  Speaking of the crossword ninas, Arnold Schwarzenegger (when he was governor of California) once included _fuck you_ as an acrostic in a letter in which he vetoed a bill proposed by the state legislature.


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## mannoushka

Man enquires at a couple’s home where the husband has advertised a “car for scrap” in the local paper without telling his better half. The wife answers the door.
Next thing, slightly bewildered, she is on the phone to her husband at work to let him know there’s someone at the door about the ad for “calf’s crap”.


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## Ari RT

These sound exactly the same in Portuguese and are, all of them, true statements, although kinda unusual. Translation between (  ):
Mais vale uma mão na mão que uma mão no pé (a handshake is better than a hand in your foot - pulling it, I suppose);
Mais vale um mamão na mão que um mamão no pé (a papaya in your hand is better than a papaya in the papaya tree);
Mais vale uma mão na mão que um mamão no pé (a handshake is better than a papaya in the papaya tree); and
Mais vale um mamão na mão que uma mão no pé (a papaya in your hand is better than a hand in your foot).


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