waaay ot- need a translator- russian?? polish? - Page 1
Forum section: electronics / general

author: deth502
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: July 23, 2014, 10:02:48 am
content: my day job i work fixing things for the govt. i work in the same building as the police, and they get to be a real pita most of the time, including constantly encroaching on my damn space.a few months ago they found some "stolen" tombstones in someones house, and of course, stuck them in my garage. they have no clue where they came from to return them, and dont have 2 brain cells to rub together between the lot of them to find out. im hoping that if i can find out what it says, it could help determine where it came from and get it out of my way finally.reason for posting it here is because of the wide international audience of this forum. figure its my best chance for finding someone who can read it.thanks in advance.

author: janoc
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: July 23, 2014, 10:16:58 am
content: That looks Russian to me. My rusty Russian tells me that it reads something like:"Here restsToanTarnagaaged 44died 31 May(of the) 1908 year"(can't read the last two lines, seems to be something like "We remember" and "RIP" in the last row).It could be also some other slavic language that uses Cyrillic - Ukrainian, maybe Bulgarian or even Serbian - they are quite close to each other. The name is certainly not Russian, but hopefully someone will recognize the language.Regards,J.

author: Wytnucls
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: July 23, 2014, 10:45:19 am
content: IoanTarnaga

author: Kremmen
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: July 23, 2014, 10:54:58 am
content: And perhaps IoanGarnaga, eh?

author: Wytnucls
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: July 23, 2014, 11:31:07 am
content: Might be easier with some contrast:

author: wraper
author_rank: Unknown
timestamp: July 23, 2014, 11:35:49 am
content: This is not Russian but Ukrainian, maybe even some old mix of the old Ukrainian and old Russian. At that time Ukraine was part of Russia, USSR didn't exist yet.HereliesIoahn (??)Garnaga (?)lived44 yearsDied 31 May (not completely sure about May as in modern Ukrainian it have different name, but in Russian it might be. Thou at that time May seemed to have different name also in Russian (the same as in Ukrainian now, dunno). Also not sure about last letter.Year 1908From villageSurovitcs (??)some acronim (?. ?. ?)Surovitcs, in google can find only mention in old Russian languagelinkwas located in Ukraine according to that. Maybe still exists but name is different.Edit: eevblog seems to not support Cyrillic letters.

author: Wytnucls
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: July 23, 2014, 11:52:01 am
content: Yes, seems likely a mixture of several languages: (Ukrainian, Serbian)

author: wraper
author_rank: Unknown
timestamp: July 23, 2014, 12:06:57 pm
content: Bit of research, according to that paper Surovitcs was a part of Sanok county. Which was located inhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kingdom_of_Galicia_and_LodomeriaWhich was Divided between Poland and Ukraine.Now it seems that that part where Sanok was located has gone to Polandhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sanok(if it is the same Sanok).

author: wraper
author_rank: Unknown
timestamp: July 23, 2014, 12:37:09 pm
content: Anyway this is a question to Polish or Ukrainian historians.

author: janoc
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: July 23, 2014, 12:38:42 pm
content: Quote from: Kremmen on July 23, 2014, 10:54:58 amThe first letter looks more like T than I to me. Compare with the "Ty" ("Here") in the the first row. Also I in Cyrillic is written as mirrored N not I.Ioan would make more sense (it is a common name), but the letter shape doesn't match. Do they use "I" in Ukrainian? Or is it common to mix scripts (latin and cyrillic) in names?Whether the last name is Garnaga or Tarnaga I wouldn't be that sure. It is hard to see whether the letter is a T or G - compare with the other Ts and Gs, there is a shadow looking like a serif to the left of that letter, G doesn't have anything on the left side.

author: Wytnucls
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: July 23, 2014, 12:47:52 pm
content: There is a village or area of that name in Bosnia-Herzegovina, close to the Serbian border:https://www.google.com/maps/place/Surovi%C4%87i,+Bosnia+and+Herzegovina/@43.558743,17.7060513,8z/data=!4m2!3m1!1s0x475858e3d7e192c3:0xdc7007f4d45bd162

author: wraper
author_rank: Unknown
timestamp: July 23, 2014, 12:54:35 pm
content: Quote from: janoc on July 23, 2014, 12:38:42 pmIt is I, there is "_" on the bottom + there is no way that name was Toan. Also the is no common surname Tarnaga, google can't find at all, while Garnaga is pretty common.

author: Wytnucls
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: July 23, 2014, 01:38:56 pm
content: Seems like Garnaga is a Serbian surname. There were lots of immigrants to the US in the 18-1900s from that part of the world. The stone was probably taken from a local cemetery.Check with the local Serb or Bosnian community to find out.Could also have a Ukrainian origin.http://vk.com/search?c%5Bq%5D=garnaga&c%5Bsection%5D=people

author: wraper
author_rank: Unknown
timestamp: July 23, 2014, 02:09:47 pm
content: I'm pretty sure that it is Ukrainian origin. It is most likely that tombstone came from where I wrote. Anyway that language is 100% Ukrainian, not Serbian or whatsoever. I know Russian perfectly as well understand Ukrainian well enough. I used to go to business trips there pretty often until recent fuckup. Up until present day there exists mixes of Ukrainian and Russian in some areas of Ukraine. And Ukrainian language as itself is mostly like a mix of Russian and Polish.

author: Wytnucls
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: July 23, 2014, 04:00:11 pm
content: Possibly, but some letters used in the text are Serbian, not modern Ukrainian:

author: poorchava
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: July 23, 2014, 04:11:43 pm
content: When eastern parts of Poland we a part of Russia, Cyrillic alphabet and Russian language wete the official arrangement, but people also used Latin alphabet to write Russian and Cyrillic to write in polish. The name does not sound Polish or Ukrainian to me, it's of Balkan origin if I had to guess.

author: Stonent
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: July 23, 2014, 04:21:44 pm
content: Yeah Polish as far back as I can tell (and Czech too) use the Latin alphabet.Some of my relatives who passed away in the late 1980s and early 90s spoke fluent Polish, but used it less and less as that part of the family aged and passed away (the had fewer and fewer people to talk to).Now I'm suddenly craving Kielbasa.

author: wraper
author_rank: Unknown
timestamp: July 23, 2014, 04:36:09 pm
content: Quote from: Wytnucls on July 23, 2014, 04:00:11 pmWrong, this is different letterhttp://ru.wikipedia.org/wiki/%D0%AAIt is used in nowadays Russian sometimes but were used in old Russian writing very often.If you have looked in the text I gave alink, it is full of this letter. BTW Russian writing at that time was pretty different from modern one, and that text seems to be almanac of some newspaper of those days or something like that.Edit: added Russian newspaper picture of 1907. So you can compare writing.

author: wraper
author_rank: Unknown
timestamp: July 23, 2014, 04:44:56 pm
content: About Garnaga surname, here is explanationhttp://www.ufolog.ru/names/order/%D0%93%D0%B0%D1%80%D0%BD%D0%B0%D0%B3%D0%B0, you can google tramslate it. As one version is mentioned that it could be derived from Ukrainian word "garnij" (latin letters) which means good, beautiful.

author: wraper
author_rank: Unknown
timestamp: July 23, 2014, 04:52:54 pm
content: Funny, now I found that I can preview text in Cyrillic without a problem. However when I post it, it becomes a garbage.

author: Wytnucls
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: July 23, 2014, 05:11:53 pm
content: I don't think it represents the Russian hard sign on the stone, but rather a peculiar Serbian letter:http://ru.wikipedia.org/wiki/%D0%8B

author: XOIIO
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: July 23, 2014, 05:12:45 pm
content: Who the hell steals gravestones? How could they serve any purpose to you?

author: wraper
author_rank: Unknown
timestamp: July 23, 2014, 05:28:44 pm
content: Seems that I found what is this writing:http://ru.wikipedia.org/wiki/%D0%95%D1%80%D1%8B%D0%B6%D0%BA%D0%B0Again google translate if you want.Basically this was a way how to write Ukrainian with Russian alphabet at that time.

author: wraper
author_rank: Unknown
timestamp: July 23, 2014, 05:43:50 pm
content: Quote from: Wytnucls on July 23, 2014, 05:11:53 pmNo it is not. More that that writing is 100% in Ukrainian, was little bit confused why on Russian manner. But now I found why. And this letter is used exactly as it should be on pre-revolution Russian.Hard sign can also be written in a such way. And if you look more carefully, there is no opening on the bottom, circle is closed.Edit:There is also similar letter to that one in Serbian but it was used in different place in the word. In modern Russian alphabet it is absent

author: Wytnucls
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: July 23, 2014, 05:54:07 pm
content: Sorry, but that's not what I see, especially at the end of the first name.

author: wraper
author_rank: Unknown
timestamp: July 23, 2014, 06:46:55 pm
content: BTW that writing "from village Surovitcs" doesn't mean that tombplate was stolen there. That guy might be Ukrainian immigrant in US who born in that village.http://www.jewishgen.org/databases/usa/1890ny.htm

author: deth502
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: July 23, 2014, 08:01:33 pm
content: wow, great replies guy, thanks a million. was just hoping for a quick translation but ended up getting some very interesting history, language, and geography lessons!!yes, Cyrillic was the word i was trying to think of in the title of my post. i see post suggesting polish, which my preconceived notions make me tend to believe more, only because i know there was a lot (a LOT) of polish immigrants in this area. (central pa) my grandmother on my fathers side emigrated (??) here from somewhere along the polish/lithuanian border.Quote from: wraper on July 23, 2014, 06:46:55 pmthat what my thought as well. i didnt think they managed to carry this thing half way around the world, lol.many thanks again! now that i have a name we may be able to match it to a location. but as long as this dosent end up being one of the locked ot posts (lol) feel free to keep the history/geography lessons coming. i was never really interested in these things back in school, listening to someone spout off shit from a book they read that they know nothing about, but i love learning things like this hearing them from people that live it.

author: deth502
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: July 23, 2014, 08:08:24 pm
content: Quote from: Stonent on July 23, 2014, 04:21:44 pmthere are 3 huge yearly kielbasa festival near me. the biggest and closest being the shenandoah kielbasa festival, sponsored by kowalonek'shttp://www.kielbasy.net/story.html

author: Zbig
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: July 23, 2014, 09:07:34 pm
content: Quote from: deth502 on July 23, 2014, 08:01:33 pmIt has nothing to do with Polish. We use Latin alphabet with few diacritics thrown in and always have.

author: poorchava
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: July 24, 2014, 06:12:42 am
content: Another thing: the Russian alphabet is not pure Cyrillic, but a derivation called 'Grazdanka' which is a short for 'Grazdznskij Szrift' or 'secular writing'. It was introduced by Peter I the Great in early 1700s. Over time it was adopted by neighbouring countries with various language-specific modifications (similar to different diacritics between czech, german and polish languages). Grazdanka was finally set as official script in 1917, so around the same period of time as this tombstone, so it might be a mix of classic Cyrillic and Grazdanka.

author: janoc
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: July 25, 2014, 02:23:48 pm
content: Quote from: wraper on July 23, 2014, 12:54:35 pmOK, fair enough, I am not from that part of the world, only learned Russian in school over 20 years ago, so the name worked either way for me.Jan

author: Stonent
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: July 25, 2014, 03:17:46 pm
content: So is this tombstone in the US right now or some other country?

author: Stebanoid
author_rank: Contributor
timestamp: July 25, 2014, 04:11:05 pm
content: Hi!I'm pretty sure that it's old Russian.First line:- means "here" (now writes like "TyT")Second line: means "rest in peace".Third line: old style of name Ivan. Now there is no a letter "i" in Russian alphabet, but it was and still present in other slavic languages. More over - now we don't write letter (hard sign) in end of words.Forth : surname Garnaga.fifth: had lived (old fashion)six: 44 years ( old letter "Yat" is absent on my keyboard - old letter, replaced by "E" in modern language)7: died at May 31 ( letter "yus" at the end is absent now, replaced by "Ya")8: 1908 year ( old word, now we use another word)9: from village (means he was born in that village)10: Surovitse (it's "Yat" sign at the end, not a "hard sign", I guess) It's name of the village11: do not know what does it mean. Something like RIP I guess.

author: deth502
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: July 25, 2014, 09:01:52 pm
content: Quote from: Stonent on July 25, 2014, 03:17:46 pmcentral pennsylvania

author: Alexei.Polkhanov
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: July 26, 2014, 12:03:57 am
content: Yes looks like Old Russianhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Early_Cyrillic_alphabet. Russian Orthodox church still uses it sort of like Latin in Vatican. Here in British Columbia, Canada there is something like community that escaped from Russia like 300 years ago. Eve since they are "frozen" in history in terms of language etc.http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Doukhobor- Maybe it is theirs?