And lo on Mon, 04 Feb 2008 22:10:24 -0000, Vincent Le Chevalier  
<gal### [at] libertyALLsurfSPAMfr> did spake, saying:

> Hildur K. wrote:
>> I remember -trying- to read an article, -presumably- about 3D art,  
>> translated
>> from French to English. The translation kept on repeating that  
>> everything was
>> -gold-, over and over again. Very confusing. Obviously this was not to  
>> be taken
>> literally in this context.
>>  This lead me to the conclusion that -gold- (d´or?) must be used in a  
>> specific
>> expression in French, meaning -great- or -best- maybe? Does this ring a  
>> bell
>> with any of you fluent French speaking people?
>
> As far as I know it is not any more common in French than in English.  
> Indeed it has this meaning of "greatest" or "best", for example golden  
> ratio in English translates as "le nombre d'or" (golden number) in  
> French.
>
> There might be cases that differ between both languages. For instance we  
> have "un livre d'or", wich translates as "a guestbook" in English.

At one time was the guestbook (or equivalent) important enough to be  
covered in gold leaf?

> I'm sure the reverse also exists...

I was reading a book which mentioned that bureaucracy is the obvious  
combination of bureau and -cracy. Now -cracy roughly means 'ruled by' and  
bureau is a desk; except that got its name from the *woolen cloth* used to  
cover the desks of important people. So the literal translation of  
bureaucracy is 'ruled by woolen cloth' or as the book put in 'ruled by  
green baize'.

-- 
Phil Cook

--
I once tried to be apathetic, but I just couldn't be bothered
http://flipc.blogspot.com

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