Subject: Re: Re: Re: month names

From: "Adam Raizen" <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 3 Nov 2000 12:47:40 +0200

Pierre Abbat wrote:

> >July la jukma'i
> 
> "jukni" by itself is "spider", not "crab". Crabs aren't arachnids; the division
> into insects and non-insect arthropods doesn't make sense taxonomically.
> 
> >November la jukrskorpio masti
> 
> rebjukma'i? not sure how to say "sting"

'batci' or maybe 'bikla'. Maybe 'batci se rebla jukni', but 'la 
batselrebjukma'i' is starting to get long. "batyjukni" might be 
specific enough (though I suppose crabs might batci also.)

Are scorpions the only arachnids that sting, or sting with their tail?

How about selja'ujukni for crab/lobster? (July la selja'ujukma'i)

Maybe the classification doesn't strictly make sense, but it's the 
official definition. While lojban generally sticks to the scientific 
classification, there are times when it deviates a slightly like this to 
save gismu space.

> Also, the signs don't coincide with the months.

But they're close. We could argue over exactly which corresponds 
to which, but the system is no doubt going to be as unofficial and 
poetic/fanciful as every other non-number system mentioned.

In modern Hebrew, the western zodiac signs are often mapped to 
Hebrew months (I can't remember exactly which to which, but I've 
seen it a few times (probably libra = tishrei)) which is at least as 
inexact as this system.

co'o mi'e adam