# Hunarian/Italian: malo fa



## pussimiao

Hi! 

I am translating a text about the relationship between people and nature. In particular I am translating something about primitive people's clothes, and I cannot find these words:

Malo fa and bussu-pálma 

I cannot give you the link of the whole text, but you can find it on the web:

_Szutórisz Frigyes, A növényvilág és az ember_

and I give you the "problematic" part of the text (_III rész, A növény rostja és tejnedve, I. Az ember ruházata és a növényvilág, 1. Az ősember ruhazkodása_):

_Szamoa szigetén levelekből, vagy háncsból gyékényszerű ruhát, illetőleg szeméremfedőt készítenek; [...]. A Fidsi-szigetek némelyikén lehántják a malo-fa kérgét s addig áztatják vízben, míg a kéreg külső kemény része kagylóval le nem választható_. 

_Némely indián törzsek Braziliában vörösre festik magukat s a festéket a bussu-pálma zacskószerű virághüvelyében magukkal hordják._ 

The author didn't give their Latin name, and I tried to find them out on the web... but I didn't get anything! 

thank you!


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## Zsanna

Hi Pussi,

That is something nobody knows without investigating... 
Have you tried looking up the same topic in Italian? 
Like the trees on the Fidji ilslands that were used for these reasons? 

I'll go off to investigate a bit in the meantime...


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## pussimiao

mmmh... onestly I didn't look it up in Italian, I searched the words on Pallas Lexikon and on google, but I didn't get nothing which could help me, there isn't the Latin name too, which can help me to find the Italian world... and unfortunately the author is dead, so I cannot ask him anything!!
but I don't give up, I searched for somebody who may have acknowledge about it, but it isn't so easy...


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## Orreaga

I found a reference to the malo of Fiji as the cotton-mulberry tree or paper mulberry, called masi or malo in Fiji.

"Bussu" in Hungarian would be pronounced like "buxo" in Portuguese, which is the boxwood, but it is not a palm, so I'm not sure if that's what is meant.


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## Zsanna

The trouble is that in the original text the term *papiros szederfa* (_Gelso da carta_ or _Moro cinese_ in Italian, _paper mulberry_ in English) is used in one of the previous sentences giving the impression that it was different from *malo-fa* mentioned later... So, in theory, it should be translated differently (even if it is really the same thing).

As for the other term, I haven't found anything.* But given that the text dates from 1905 (with all the oddities it involves linguistically and otherwise) and that the term appears in a passage in small print (etc.), I would think that that the name of the actual plant may not be of vital importance. (Unless the nature of the translation demands otherwise - then you could provide at least a translater's note about it...)

In any case, it may be a good occasion to test your teacher and find out what he thinks about such a "trick" (= leaving out the name of the plant) and why.

*It is not likely to be boxwood (_buxus_ in Hungarian) because it does not seem to be an _őshonos_ (native?) South American plant (but of Asia) and it has very little flowers so none of their parts seem likely to be used as a container.


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