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RE: Zegama-Aizkorri 2011
1. Bat.
To understand the race you must know the land.
To understand the people you must learn the language.
Euskera; a strange, beautiful and mysterious sing-song language, perhaps neolithic... paleolithic even. It’s a language with a rich and varied vocabulary for ancient farming impliments (but somewhat lacking when it comes to modern terminology). It is one of three european languages that linguists cannot locate on the branches of the indo-european language tree (Finnish and Hungarian are the other two).
1993. I’m in this Sagardotegi (cider house) somewhere in the Sagardotegi triangle, south of Donosti (San Sebastian). The Sagardotegi is actually a lofty bodega full of barrels and hefty Basques gnawing on t-bone steaks. The food is placed on long, elevated tables. Cider spurts from the barrels and is caught ceremoniously in glass beakers by queues of diners below. The floor soon sloshes with juice and things get increasingly messy. Everybody stands to eat and drink. In fact there are no seats anywhere. One scrumpy-crazed maniac explains to us how the Basque people are the sole survivors of the lost city of Atlantis.
Some words in Euskera.
Hello: Kaixo
Goodbye: Agur
Yes: Bai
No: Ez
The people: Herri
The people of Euskera: Euskal Herria
Mountain: Mendi
Crag: Aitz
Exposed rocky crag: Aitzkorri
Runners: Korrikalarik (the k at the end indicates the plural).
There is at least one word in English which originates from Euskera.
Bizarre.
In English “bizarre” means odd or unusual.
In Euskera “bizar” means beard (and is pronounced in exactly the same way).
In both Spanish and French the word can be synonymous with “brave” or even “extravagent” . The word may have entered English via French, or directly from Euskera via the Bay of Biscay.
Expedititions of hairy sailors from Bilbao perhaps?
A linguistic journey from beard to weird, plenty of scope for the imagination there, tall tales for salty sea dogs as far-fetched as the man from Atlantis? Bizarre indeed.
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