# culo



## Passita

Hi all,

I need help from turkish natives. 
I'm translating a historical novel into Spanish which takes place in the ancient sultan's harem. All references to actual turkish words are in italics, and so is this one for which I need some explanation:

That girl -that innocent-looking young girl- turned out to be the Chief Eunuch's very own _culo_. 

The problem is that this word, as is, means "ass" in Spanish, and it sounds rather rude. 

Could it mean a sort of "concubine"? 
Thanks very much.


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## Aoyama

A wild guess (really wild) is that it could come from French.
Spelt *culot *but pronounced culo, it means "insolence" etc (check the dictionary).
The original French meaning might have change a bit in Turkish (as often).
One could imagine that this girl was an "insolent favorite" (as it is strange or "osé" for a Eunuch to have female favorites -but that was the case it seems).
This being said, the origin of the (French) word is the same as in Spanish :
cul (ass)-culot- culotte (a kind of trousers originally), cf. "sans-culottes" (where the word culot probably comes from).


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## Passita

THANKS A LOT!
Now, it is really a start. 
Certainly as you very well say, it is strange for an Eunuch to have female favorites. Precisely the very next reply to this sentence is: -Impossible!, but later on there is an explanation (which I omit since it is not relevant).


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## Aoyama

Culot (in French) can also mean (a stretch of the original meaning) : "challenge", "insolent behaviour", "temerity", "audacity" ...
http://www.wordreference.com/fres/culot


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## Passita

Umm... now I realise another issue. These favourite girls were not considered prostitutes, it was not a pejorative state, and all these French references drives us to an indecorous condition.


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## Aoyama

But I think (if all the guessing has some pertinence) that this _culo _thing applies to the Eunuch, not the girl(s).


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## Passita

Oh, I see... mmm... I'm pondering it... I'll try to find another reference to this word (I think there is at least one more occurence...)


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## Asr

Hello,

Are you translating from English into Spanish? You think _culo_ is a Turkish word here? never heard of it, and not in the dictionary as well.


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## Arrius

It has long been a habit to use a foreign word or phrase to express more discreetly things that might otherwise sound quite shocking. Even Chaucer talks about the Wife of Bath letting men have her "belle chose".
Here apparently, the "ancient sultan" has described to the narrator the main object of his erotic urges as if it were a beautiful young girl, when in fact it is the rear end of a eunuch, as *Aoyama* has also realised.


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## Aoyama

> It has long been a habit to use a foreign word or phrase to express more discreetly things that might otherwise sound quite shocking.


Very true.


> Here apparently, the "ancient sultan" has described to the narrator the main object of his erotic urges as if it were a beautiful young girl, when in fact it is the rear end of a eunuch, as *Aoyama* has also realised


Thank you for crediting me for, in fact, something I did not really understand :
-we are talking about a (Chief) Eunuch here, can a Eunuch have _erotic urges _?
- the interpretation given by Arrius is interesting (and challenging) [the main object of his erotic urges (is like) a beautiful young girl, when in fact it is the rear end of a eunuch], but is it really the case ?
Homosexuality was a mortal sin/offence in Turkey (Ottoman Empire).
This being said, Turkish had many Spanish words, mainly through *Ladino* ("jewish medieval Spanish-Hebrew-Arabic dialect"), maybe *culo* had a different meaning in Ladino ...


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## avok

Aoyama said:


> Homosexuality was a mortal sin/offence in Turkey (Ottoman Empire)


Where did you hear that? Because it is not true.


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## Arrius

A eunuch may indeed have erotic urges unless, perhaps, he was operated on in his earliest youth, but I was talking about the urges of the ancient sultan. The Holy Quran forbids homosexuality, as does in fact the Bible, but it is, in my experience, at least as prevalent in the Middle or Near East as it is in the West.
I must confess that I had failed to notice that I was in the Turkish forum and not the Spanish-English, or I might not have intervened here, but I really don't see how anything but my interpretation is possible.
By the way, there is a passage in _Sabir_, the former lingua franca of the Mediterranean basin including Turkey, in Molière's "Le Bourgeois Gentilhomme" in which a group of turbaned Turks officiate at an arcane initiation ceremony. The language is basically romance, composed mostly of Italian with a broad vocabulary drawn from Persian, French, Greek and Arabic. Note that _culo _has the same spelling and the same connotations and anatomical meaning in Italian as in Spanish, and the French _cul _is also quite similar.


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## Aoyama

As to homosexuality being a "mortal sin", I take it from the precept of Islam. Of course , the comments of Arrius are true ... But we'll leave this here as it is a bit off-topic.
Reference to the Bourgeois Gentilhomme is also true, _Sabir_ and in fact _Lingua Franca_ _per se _were a mixture of the languages described by Arrius.
To what extent does this bare any relation to finding out the meaning of *culo *here, I don't know ...


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## Arrius

I shall explain: since Sabir was mainly Italian, and spoken by a large number of Turkish seafarers and merchants, it is very likely that _culo _was part of its vocabulary and hence familiar to many Turks.  I cannot prove that it was, because there are only a handful of documents surviving with examples of this language and no dictionary.
Bearing (not baring) this in mind, and in view of the turcophone Asr's denial that it is a Turkish word, it seems very likely that it is an Italian loan word, possibly acquired through the use of Sabir by Turks. Why not assume that it means what it says and draw the obvious conclusions?


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## Outsider

So I take it _culo_ is _not_ a Turkish word...?


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## Aoyama

No, obviously.
This being confirmed, it would also be relevant to acertain the "tone" of the book Passita is translating. Would it allow such a mention (the ass of the eunuch) ?


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## Passita

I don't think so. After a short discussion with my publisher and other colleagues, we concluded the word comes from Italian, since the references are reported by a character with a Venetian origin. We decided to leave it as is (although I'm not much conviced about it)


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## Aoyama

> the word comes from Italian, since the references are reported by a character with a Venetian origin.[/QUOTE
> so that concurs with what some of us have been thinking (especially Arrius) from the beginning.
> I'm not convi*n*ced either about leaving it like this (or at least a footnote would be needed).


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## zein

Hello,

I guess the writer means "köle" in Turkish which means slave. Another option might be "kul" and this means "the subject" of somebody.


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## Aoyama

> I guess the writer means "köle" in Turkish which means slave. Another option might be "kul" and this means "the subject" of somebody.


Well well well, that would fit ...


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## ateaofimdomar

Hi all, 
I think that most of the assumpions made are reasonable, but I think that more context would help everyone decide as to the interpretation of the word.

I think a couple of sentences before and after the one cited in the first message by Passita would help clarify the meaning.

I'd also like to add that it is possible that the writer doesn't have a Turkish word in his mind, because I've seen many books using foreign words to add an exotic colour to their descriptions, without this word referring, necessarily, to the country where the novel takes place.


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## Passita

zein said:


> Hello,
> 
> I guess the writer means "köle" in Turkish which means slave. Another option might be "kul" and this means "the subject" of somebody.


 

Uawww!!!!! this is getting really interesting!!!


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## Outsider

"Slave" certainly makes more sense than anything sexual, when a eunuch is involved...


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## Aoyama

I agree with both ateaofimdomar and Outsider.
One naïve question Passita : is the book you're translating in English or ... in Turkish ?
The other thing is (in-waiting for more context) that it is quite possible that this Venetian character (or the writer himself) makes a mistake in using a Turkish word and mispelling or mispronouncing it ... making it sound like a close Italian word, which has nothing to do with it ..


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## Passita

It is in English.
I've also wondered whether the spelling was meant to be Turkish and perhaps the writer mispelt it, but there are other references to Italian, as well as to Turkish, which I think are quite distinguisable. Anyway, I've decided to add an explanatory Footnote, for the moment.


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## ateaofimdomar

Still, Passita, more context should do the trick for everyone to have a better shot at the translation


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## Passita

About context. 

First occurence:
(Two slaves in the harem speaking)
'Nice fresh _culo_ for that fat old man? No thanks. You still don't understand, do you? I grew up in one brothel, and that was enough for me. Because that's all this place is, just a brothel with one fat old client. And then everyone pretends it's some extraordinary honour to be chosen by him. 

Second occurence:
(Same context)
My mother once tried to sell me to an old man like that, and I bit him so hard I swear he'll never touch _culo_ ever again. I was only ten, just a little child. 

Third occurence:
She used to be one of her servants. But last night she became one of the Sultan's concubines. 
You mean he... With both of you? 
Yes. Both of us. But he only did it to her. 
Oh, I'm sorry.
Well don't be. Nice fresh _culo_ for that fat old man, remember when you said that to me?

Fourth occurence:
That girl, that innocent-looking young girl, turned out to be the eunuch's very own culo. 
Impossible!
(...) You think that (...) they cannot satisfy a woman in other ways?


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## Aoyama

> 'Nice fresh _culo_ for that fat old man? No thanks.


Well, in that obvious case, I dare think this has nothing to do with Turkish (too bad). It is a disputable rendering of the English "piece of ass". The Italian word is just used to add a "couleur locale" (but _why_ ?) .
There could also be a _pun_ between *culo *in Italian and *köle *or *kul* in Turkish but maybe this is giving too much credit to the author ...


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## Passita

Aoyama said:


> Well, in that obvious case, I dare think this has nothing to do with Turkish (too bad). It is a disputable rendering of the English "piece of ass". The Italian word is just used to add a "couleur locale" (but _why_ ?) .
> There could also be a _pun_ between *culo *in Italian and *köle *or *kul* in Turkish but maybe this is giving too much credit to the author ...


 

Maybe because the girl speaking has a Venetian origin. A touch of erudition?


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## ateaofimdomar

I agree with Aoyama. "Culo" means "ass" in Italian. And yes, I think you do give the author too much credit


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