{"id":5906,"date":"2022-12-25T15:00:00","date_gmt":"2022-12-25T15:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/buber.net\/Basque\/?p=5906"},"modified":"2022-12-25T14:54:40","modified_gmt":"2022-12-25T14:54:40","slug":"basque-fact-of-the-week-good-birds-to-you","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/buber.net\/Basque\/2022\/12\/25\/basque-fact-of-the-week-good-birds-to-you\/","title":{"rendered":"Basque Fact of the Week: Good Birds to You!"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p class=\"has-cyan-bluish-gray-background-color has-background\">Happy holidays! Merry Christmas! Feliz Navidad! Hanukkah Sameach! However you celebrate, the holidays are upon us. In Basque, it is traditional to say Gabon Zoriontsua! or Eguberri On! Sometimes you&#8217;ll hear the ubiquitous Zorionak! But where does this word, used in so many situations, come from&#8230;?<\/p>\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-image\">\n<figure class=\"alignright size-large is-resized\"><a href=\"https:\/\/buber.net\/Basque\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/12\/txori-onak.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/buber.net\/Basque\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/12\/txori-onak-1024x622.jpg\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-5907\" width=\"256\" height=\"156\" srcset=\"https:\/\/buber.net\/Basque\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/12\/txori-onak-1024x622.jpg 1024w, https:\/\/buber.net\/Basque\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/12\/txori-onak-300x182.jpg 300w, https:\/\/buber.net\/Basque\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/12\/txori-onak-768x466.jpg 768w, https:\/\/buber.net\/Basque\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/12\/txori-onak.jpg 1331w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 256px) 100vw, 256px\" \/><\/a><figcaption class=\"wp-element-caption\">&#8220;Txori onak&#8221; to you and yours this holiday season. Photo by the Uberuaga\/Van De Graaff family from the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.fws.gov\/refuge\/bosque-del-apache\">Bosque del Apache<\/a>.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>It is very clear that <em>Zorion<\/em> and <em>Zorionak<\/em> &#8211; literally many <em>zorion<\/em> &#8211; come from the compound words <em>zori<\/em> and <em>on<\/em>, and that <em>zori<\/em>, at least today, means omen or luck. So, <em>Zorionak<\/em> means &#8220;good luck&#8221; or &#8220;good fortune.&#8221; Similarly, <em>zoritxar<\/em> and <em>zorigaitz<\/em> mean &#8220;bad luck, misfortune&#8221; from <em>zori<\/em>+<em>txar<\/em> (<em>txar<\/em>=bad) or <em>zori<\/em>+<em>gaitz<\/em> (<em>gaitz<\/em>=harm). What is a little less clear is where <em>zori<\/em> comes from. <\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><a href=\"http:\/\/elibrary.bsu.edu.az\/files\/books_400\/N_86.pdf\">Larry Trask<\/a>, and many other Basque linguists as well as the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.euskaltzaindia.eus\/index.php?option=com_ehhe&amp;task=hiztegia&amp;Itemid=1193&amp;lang=eu&amp;mark=199b-04\">Euskal Hiztegi Historiko-Etimologikoa<\/a>, say that <em>zori<\/em> originally meant bird. It took on the meaning of omen or luck from the practice of looking to the flight of birds as an omen, as a way to tell the future. So, <em>Zorionak<\/em> then means, in its most literal and ancient sense, &#8220;good birds.&#8221;<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>That a word for birds could shift to mean something like luck is not without parallel. Trask notes that the Latin word <em>avicem<\/em>, meaning bird, became the old Castilian <em>au\u00e7e<\/em>, meaning luck or fortune. So, other languages have also experienced this evolution in meaning.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>There is another proposed etymology in which <em>zori<\/em> comes from the Latin <em>sors<\/em>, meaning luck. However, the recent discovery of the <a href=\"https:\/\/buber.net\/Basque\/2022\/11\/20\/basque-fact-of-the-week-the-hand-of-irulegi-the-oldest-text-in-euskara\/\">Hand of Irulegi<\/a>, in which the word <em>sorioneku<\/em> appears, maybe puts this theory to rest (though I&#8217;m no linguist).<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>A number of other interesting words come from <em>txori<\/em> (the modern word for bird): \n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li><em>txori-negar<\/em>: tree sap, or literally bird tears.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><em>txoriburu<\/em>: bird-brained (same as in English). It can also mean a thread that has a lump in it. <em>Txori-lepo<\/em>, or bird&#8217;s neck, also refers to an uneven thread.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><em>txolarte<\/em>: literally &#8220;between birds,&#8221; <em>txolarte<\/em> means free time.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><em>txori-kaka<\/em>: literally &#8220;bird poop,&#8221; used to refer to someone of little importance.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>For Christmas, it is more traditional to say <em>Eguberri on<\/em>. <em>Eguberri<\/em> is another compound word meaning, literally, &#8220;new day,&#8221; so <em>Eguberri on<\/em> means &#8220;good new day.&#8221; It seems this came from marking the solstice, though I haven&#8217;t found much information about the origin of this phrase. <\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>If you are curious about the birds of the Basque Country, check out <a href=\"https:\/\/txoriak.eus\">txoriak.eus<\/a>. They have maps of where you can find the various species that fill the Basque skies.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p>Primary source: <em><a href=\"https:\/\/www.euskaltzaindia.eus\/index.php?option=com_ehhe&amp;task=hiztegia&amp;Itemid=1193&amp;lang=eu&amp;mark=199b-04\">Euskal Hiztegi Historiko-Etimologikoa<\/a><\/em>, Euskaltzaindia<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Happy holidays! Merry Christmas! Feliz Navidad! Hanukkah Sameach! However you celebrate, the holidays are upon us. In Basque, it is traditional to say Gabon Zoriontsua! or Eguberri On! Sometimes you&#8217;ll hear the ubiquitous Zorionak! But where does this word, used in so many situations, come from&#8230;? Primary source: Euskal Hiztegi Historiko-Etimologikoa, Euskaltzaindia<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":5907,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"advanced_seo_description":"","jetpack_seo_html_title":"","jetpack_seo_noindex":false,"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[836,14],"tags":[649,3565,3525,1251,3564,3563],"class_list":["post-5906","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-basque-fact-of-the-week","category-euskara","tag-christmas","tag-eguberri-on","tag-hand-of-irulegi","tag-larry-trask","tag-txoriak","tag-zorionak"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/buber.net\/Basque\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/12\/txori-onak.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p2sYNu-1xg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/buber.net\/Basque\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5906","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/buber.net\/Basque\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/buber.net\/Basque\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/buber.net\/Basque\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/buber.net\/Basque\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5906"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/buber.net\/Basque\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5906\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5926,"href":"https:\/\/buber.net\/Basque\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5906\/revisions\/5926"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/buber.net\/Basque\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/5907"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/buber.net\/Basque\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5906"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/buber.net\/Basque\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5906"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/buber.net\/Basque\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5906"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}