# Nits i peixos a les pesqueres de cingle



## halvenon

Can you help with a good translation of this title?
Nits = nights / noches

peixos = ? fish

pesqueres = ? fishermen

cingle = cliff / alcantilla

i = ?in?


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## JoseVerde

Not being a Catalan speaker I can't truly help you, but as I recall, "i" is Catalan for "and"

And given that pesquero is Spanish for a fishing boat, I'd say pesqueres could be that as well.


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## ernest_

Hi! You're not wide of the mark.
_Nits i peixos_ = nights and fish(es)
_A les pesqueres de cingle_ is a bit trickier. _Pesquera_ could be a fishing boat, but I think it means a spot in the sea that is good for fishing (maybe _fishing spot_?), and _cingle_ is a cliff. So, putting it all together...
Nights and fish at the cliff fishing spots.
I suppose you can find better words but you get the idea.


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## halvenon

The men did fish from fixed positions on the cliff that were passed down through the family like other property.

The nights and the fish at the cliff fishing points.

It is not a fluent phrase in English. It is the title of a piece of research at Alicante University. Such a title needs to be informative rather than fluent, I suppose. 

Thanks for the rapid responses. Any more ideas.


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## Samaruc

Hi,

Here you can get some infomation about the "pesquera de cingle".

Hope it helps.


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## halvenon

Thankyou Samaruc. 
You reminded me to look at the site which is by the same researchers as the book. The website calls them Cliff fisheries.
But fishery is rarely used in the sense of an activity nowadays - (perhaps because of the limitations imposed by the EC!!). The website does not use 'Nits' in the title. They translate their title as Cliff Fisheries in the Marina Alta on the website but their book is the title of this thread.
I think I am going to go with Cliff Fishing at Night as the best sounding and reasonably accurate translation. With the help of José Verde and Ernest it seems clear that it is the activity, not the people that the title emphasises. 
I have written in my blog about the men who did this but I need a translation of the title of the book which I used to help me understand what the men did. My Valencian neighbours first told me about this kind of fishing when I came to live in Spain in 1994.


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## UUBiker

Somehow I'm reminded of the biblical phrase "loaves and fishes," as if the nights and the fish from the cliffs are endless.  I see it as slightly more poetic I suppose and not so "odd."  The title "Cliffs of Nights and Fish" would attract my interest more than "Cliff Fishing at Night."


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## halvenon

Thankyou, I see your point. This activity must have gone on for centuries. There does seem to be something missing from my translation Cliff fishing at Night that perhaps the original Valenciano title contained. 'Nits' (nights) was the first word of the original and 'cingle' (cliff) the last word. The significance of this word order may not be captured by the English version.
However, 'Cliffs of nights..' sound 'odd' too. 
'The night vigils of cliffside fishing' where 'vigils' has a religious connection (the watching and waiting at the crucifixion and the same at the cave from Good Friday until Easter) may be nearer to the author's meaning (the seemingly endless waiting, if not the Christian example of it). 
Thanks for you idea UU Biker.


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