Does the word tekeli-li exist in any language?
Answer Question| ♥ 0 |
In Edgar Allan Poe’s novel The Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym of Nantucket, the natives of Tsalal shout the word tekeli-li whenever they see anything white. As covered in the section What is the meaning of “tekeli-li”? in my article about Poe’s novel, this word is also shrieked by the flying white bird that appears near the cataract at the end of the novel. Poe does not provide the reader with a direct English translation of the word tekeli-li, so I’m curious to know if this word (or a derivative thereof) might actually exist in some contemporary, archaic or even extinct language.
Marked as spam
Add comment
|
Answers (1)
|
Private answer
My research led me to these different possibilities: 1) there is a word tekeli in the Turkish language. According to wikipedia: - It seems tekeli can be used as a surname, and it is the name of a town/village in several places in Turkey, as well as the name of a mosque also in Turkey. - "Tekeli, or, The siege of Montgatz" is a three-act British melodrama by Theodore Hook about the life of Hungarian nobleman Emeric Thököly (who is called Emeric Tekeli in the original French version of the play by René-Charles Guilbert de Pixérécourt). - Tekeli is also the name of a British 19th century dance. 2) In the novel "At the Mountains of Madness" by H. P. Lovecraft, tekeli-li is the cry of a shoggoth, a formless creature living in Antarctica. Lovecraft borrowed the word from Poe's novel. 3) In the fantasy role-playing game Dungeons and Dragons (Forgotten Realms campaign), Tekeli-li was the name of a gnoll vampire. It is based on the creature from both Lovecraft's and Poe's book. 4) According to one source, Poe may have used a certain book by James Riley as a source for his novel. Riley's book included the word Tekkela in the glossary, meaning trust or confidence. Another source suggested that the word tekeli-li may be a corrupted form of the Arabic phrase "Trust to me". 5) In the Book of Daniel of the Old Testament (5:27) the inscription "mene, mene, tekel, parsin" was written on the wall of Belshazzar. Thus, one author has speculated that the word tekeli-li might come from Hebrew. In Daniel 5:26-28, it is further clarified what these words mean: Mene: God has numbered the days of your reign and brought it to an end. 6) Another author indicated that tekeli-li could mean "(the) God is angry" in Māori (spoken by the Māori indigenous people of New Zealand). However, as a poster here notes, there is no L in the standard Māori language. In fact, Google Translate gives me this translation for "God is angry": Kei te riri te Atua. Conclusion Linguists do not seem to come to a consensus on the origin of the word tekeli-li, with suggestions that it might come from Arabic, French, Turkish, Hebrew or Maori. In all likelihood, tekeli-li doesn't mean anything really, and Poe probably came across the term at random. I believe any resemblance to a specific word in any language is either purely coincidental or Poe simply used a corrupted form of another word which he liked the sound of. Sources Marked as spam
 Posted by mindbent (Questions: 1, Answers: 1) Answered on 3rd August, 2023 1:55 am
|