earth

[rokee]

Who named earth or where did it get it's name from?

[Dr T Non-Fan]

The "Battlestar Gallactica" folks.

[Crystal Dragon.]

That would be me. Any other questions?

[Pseudolus]

Because "Planet Dirt" didn't sound classy enough.

- Pseudolus, the Dirtbound Dirtling

[Anonymous]

The name Earth (http://www.factmonster.com/ipka/A0875452.html) comes from the Indo-European base 'er,' which produced the Germanic noun 'ertho,' and ultimately German 'erde,' Dutch 'aarde,' Danish and Swedish 'jord,' and English 'earth.' Related forms include Greek 'eraze,' meaning 'on the ground,' and Welsh 'erw,' meaning 'field.'

[Maine-iac]

You mean it's NOT named for Eartha Kitt?????

[Ron Weasley]

I once had a Russian friend who was beginning to speak passable English. When he was trying to describe a Russian car manufacturer named "Sputnick", he first started talking about an object going around dirt. Since I was familiar with the Sputnick satelite, we quickly got the dirt/earth thing worked out.

I don't know if russian lacks a word with both meanings of "earth" (dirt v. planet) or if this is just a languange learning anecdote. I would be interested in learning from folks who are fluent in non-English languages to know if other languages have a word with the same ambiguities as the english word "earth".

Anyone?

RW

[Pseudolus]

I know that the Russian word "Mir" (pronounced like "mere") means both "world" and "peace", so that "Peace on Earth" is translated as "Mir na Mir-yeh". I don't know if they have a separate word for Earth as a planet.

[thing]

My French is rusty, but my best recollection is that "la terre" can be used to refer to either the planet (making us all Terrans), or to the dirt which makes up the planet (as in "pomme de terre", "dirt apple", or potato).

[Griffin 1]

On 2001-12-10 12:56, Ron Weasley wrote:
I would be interested in learning from folks who are fluent in non-English languages to know if other languages have a word with the same ambiguities as the english word "earth".

I seem to recall from Pig Latin class that the Pig Latin word for "earth" is "eartha", and the Pig Latin word for "dirt" is "irtda".

[Damn, Dirty Ape]

thing is right about "terre". But it's really not different from English. "Earth" can be either the planet or the stuff. It's all context.

[Crystal Dragon.]

How about "Planet Merde"?

Mind you, my French is a little rusty, so you'll have to pardon it...

[Tom Servo]

You must be talking about Detroit.

[Patrick Bauer]

Who named earth or where did it get it's name from?

I'd thought I'd take this time to announce the upcoming coming of age party for earth.

earth will finally get a new name!

[asdfasdf]

The "Battlestar Gallactica" folks.

Gotta say I'm impressed with that one, from the time before the new show came out (I think).