₦airaland Forum

Cyberknight, Elosky20 la Chizzyblinks, Mbu la unu anufuu akpaala Ngwa? Ngwa chere ma egwere okwu amaala m kaara nu. . .

*Coughs*

Ndaadi nke apasara kugbuo na ebe inyi no? Nmadi na ibe e were okwu wo na akpa, o daa "suo Izugbe, suo Izugbe". E were yam Igbo Izugbe obu juo inyi ajuju, onyenye agba nkiti. Inyi enwekwadiri nmeta?

Elosky20:
bia kedu asusu unu na asu n'ebea. biko suo nu igbo izugbe. hapu nu olumba unu na asu na ebea.

Deede, ya abula iwe, ma o di whne nnaa asi m ma ajuo gh. Nniri mbu utu gh la whnena maa nwokho ibe m ndi igba? Akporo gh ta o mbu Nnanna gh we ta akporo ahna?

ChinenyeN, mbu nwa ntakala whnena agbarna m gbuo kpatara iwe? Hah. Enyia, gh marna si o bu otu o nu, bere kwa ebere sita la ono la ala nhu egbe ngasi ime gh la ma akachaa whne m vu la obi. Whnena I di inhu, o bughi agbara shiri e...o bu ogwe m l'ezi. Odumchi ke anhu I ji egwere okwu Ngwa esegbu la abari ndidisi irafuta gh. Okwu Ngwana, o bu anyi laabu socha nwerne.

nmekpaanhu adii. Gh juta whne o bu, ama ino nnana da eche gh.

Dee ChinenyeN, I hukwala m eshishi? Elitara m ńńańa juo Nde Ukwu la Oha si m amarna whne eji li-ikpo 'dangerous' ma 'danger' la okwu amaala we, we meela m nti ta adi m ika uka ajembele, wuo enyi gh nwokho l'ala. Ke biara, o chichaa anya, biiga la ohia ńńa o nhie piofuta. Juola m we: whnena adiwe ime m gbuo, o maala nma?

Edigidele m ihe a, mana o ruola m nke nkwuputa: Nke a onye obula ji tii isi na ohia ka ama si ajuju m bu agbara na-eri madu, o di kwa nma? Ndi nke anyi, unu agbala ngenge.

NRIPRIEST:
Dangerous-Akanjo in Umuoji dialect.

Ndeewo. Wereteeri ya maanuru anyi atu anyi vu.

I'm interested in seeing how you guys would translate "dangerous" in your various dialects. A sentence incorporating the translation would be appreciated too.

gentlii:
Odumchi, pls this UZUEGBU,is it the full name or an abbrev?

Uzu,is where u refine metals like gold. High powered furnance.

Nka na Uzu means science and tech. So Uzu is also technology.


I thought that name will tow the meaning of one of the above two.

Do Uzu have any other meaning apart from the two?

I,too want to learn.
Thank u.

You've got the right idea. The Üzü (blacksmithing) you're talking about is pronounced (HH) with inflection marks that rise to the right on both of the u's. However, the Üzü (noise, fame) in Uzuegbu is pronounced (LL) with inflection marks that fall from the left. This is the same Uzu that's present in other names like Uzunma, which means something in the ballpark of "renown for good things".

The full name can either be Uzuegbulem or one of its dialectal variants.

It was really frustrating that I couldn't find a keyboard with the appropriate characters, but oh well.

Gboliwe:
Is it same as Ukaegbu?

BTW, happy new year.

Happy New Year, Gboliwe.

I'd say Ukaegbu is more along the lines of "may discord/strife not be my downfall"

ify84:
Translate UZUEGBU for me.... I don ask Google tire, no answer,

It means "may my fame/popularity not be my downfall".

Phut, I'm currently reading Efuru by Flora Nwapa and I'm encountering so many Oguta names and terms that I'm not familiar with. I'm about to bombard you with questions, biko ewekwa iwe.

Would you happen to know what the names 'Ajanapu' and 'Adizua' mean?

A being (which I presume to be a deity) named 'Orisha' is constantly mentioned throughout the novel. Is it a local arunsi (deity) or does it refer to the creator (Olisa)?

Does 'Ogonim' mean 'Ogo m' (my inlaw)?

Also, some of the characters use the greeting 'Ochia, Mazi, Ogbukea' when addressing groups of people. Would you happen to know the meaning/significance behind this?

EzePromoe:
[color=#DC143C]Ezibo wene, me hiala o. Nda su we mmegnu? I'm impressed at your contributions in this thread, it makes the read worthwhile. Thanks to you all.[/color]

M nonhu k'oma. Kaa bu anya woo. O bu ogwe ke gh ta nmanmana I ji d'asa m ahnu ruturu. Obi amaala m nma, enyi m woko. Glad to see you back.

EzePromoe, I yaala Daa? Mekaa we.

tosingcfr:
Thanks . There is also one in Imo that sounds like "Iwotarayam". I got to hear that from mbaise
Bigfrancis22. Thanks as well. Are you familiar with mbaise?

I wonder how you'd react when you hear someone from the Owere area say 'I wiila' haha

gold3n:
Biko, gbaghara m if I talk scattered Igbo, ma na gini ka "aghaa" putara when said "Unu mere aghaa?" (hope am hearing it right) Ama m "unu mere" putara but the "aghaa" threw me off. Anam imuta asusu Igbo still.

The translation for 'aghaa' is a bit hard to explain. It's a word that's only used in an interrogatory manner. Its meaning depends on the context in which it's used.

A few examples:

'Ugbo ala gi o mere aghaa?' - 'how is your car?', 'what happened to your car?' or 'where is your car?' depending on context.

'Anyi aga emekwanu aghaa?' - 'what are we going to do?'

Excellent. O maa.

Ofo nfoju akpa.

Just fixed it. The spambot confused his post for spam. I know this doesn't necessarily apply in this case, but in the future try to avoid posting lengthy posts or posts containing links to other websites in quick succession. These are all things that trigger the spambot. Oftentimes, it's just pure chi ojoo. Ezeagu, ewekwa iwe.

Kojiek, I za eye?

Apologies for getting to this so late, Radoillo. I don't know the exact Ibibio or Efik word for twins, but the best approximation I know is 'amaniba', which best translates to having birthed two children, albeit this term doesn't specify whether or not the births happened at the same time. The only equivalent I know in Igbo is ejima. Interesting thoughts, by the way.

An important thing to bear in mind with these names (and especially the Eastern Igbo ones) is that they were in vogue in an era when most people were multilingual and intercultural interactions were at their apex. When you take archaic names like Ukpai, Akuma, Iphie, Essien, Uduma, Ukpabi, Ivie, Oti, Uma, Agbai, Akanu, Awa, and etc out of the cultural context in which they were relevant and try to constrain or define them in modern Igbo, that's when problems arise.

^^

It's funny and interesting how we utilize that insult where I'm from, even though we only use it to tease in a playful manner. It's actually thrown about more frequently than 'ani ovia', which we reserve as a more serious insult.

And the Isu were reaaaal umu nkpi, dropping their seed everywhere they went.

Radoillo:
Daalu rinne, Odumchi. That was really helpful. The 'ihe' anomaly you mentioned, now that's really interesting.

I didn't know there was an Isu community on that eastern frontier. Those guys were just busy traipsing all over the Igbo space! Their migrations must constitute one of the most important themes in Igbo history, if not the most important. Pity there's very little known about that.

Biko, I have a few more questions (for you or anyone who has answers).

I was going through the Comparative Igboid paper, trying to find other variants and the proto-Igboid approximation of 'efo', as in 'chi efoola' or 'ofoola gi na n'anya'. I couldn't find it. So I want to ask: Does 'efo' ever vary as 'ewo'?

Also is 'Dee' strictly a honorific? Can it be just a greeting; like, can one say 'Papa Emeka, dee!' [I noticed you wrote 'Dee, Radoillo', and not 'Dee Radoillo'.]

You've also used the greeting 'nnawo' a couple of times on this forum. Can it be broken into meaningful parts? I'm especially interested in the possible meaning of the '-wo' part.

Ama m na ajuju akalia, mana biko, nweelu m ndidi.

Haha monwo azi ka na-ato na ana ajusa maka ogo e ka I na-ario? Nmekpazi anoo! Juje, nnaa. Nke kwere m, mu asaa.

I don't think 'ewo' exists in our area (Abiriba-Ohafia-Aro axis). If such a thing did exist, it would most likely be found in the Ehugbo (Afikpo) axis. There, they tend to use the 'wh' sound where other dialects would traditionally use 'f' or 'v' and say things like 'awho' (stomach), 'o la whu m uwhu' (It hurts), 'o whuowo' (it has vanished), and etc.

Dee is solely reserved as a term of deference in our area. It's not a greeting lol.

Nnaawo means good morning lol. I can't think of it having any meaning when decomposed into nnaa + wo. However, in much of the Cross River and Old Bende Zone, the suffix 'wo' is added to words to further stress their meaning. Take for example:

English: "Could you help me with this, pleeeeeease?!"
Aro: "Yere nni m aka wooo!"

Nigerian Pidgin: "Abeg, leave me, jor!"
Aro: "Hapulegwo m woo!"

English: "You've grown sooo much!"
Aro: "I toola wooo!"

Raymondluv:
what snuff pls

Sniffing tobacco.

^^ mee ka o mara.

Dee, Radoillo. There aren't any communities in the strip of towns from Abiriba down to Arochukwu that employ the use of the 'h' sound in the manner that it's used amongst the southern Igbo. Most of the communities in this corridor employ the use of the 'f' sound instead, the exception being Arochukwu, which chooses to replace 'f' with 'v'.

However, that being said, this pattern isn't particularly black and white. In Aro speech, even though we say things like 'uvuvu' (foam), ivoro (shame), and 'viko' (to wringe clothes dry), we choose to say 'ihe' for thing, while all of our neighbors say 'ife'.

The 'f' and 'v' in our tongues isn't as absolute (for lack of a better word) as it in the Nri-Awka area. In a place like, say, Ogidi, you'd say 'ife afu' for 'that thing', while in Aro or Abiriba we'd say a nice and nasal 'ihe onhu/ori' and 'ife onhu/ori', respectively.

To further illustrate how inabsolute this 'f' and 'v' sibstitution is in Aro speech, take for example the Aro phrase for leaving a leftover quantity of something, 'irivo'. The fact that we choose to employ the 'v' sound where other dialects would traditionally use an 'f' would lead you to believe that our word for 'remaining' would be 'voro', while in actuality it's 'foro'.

So, no. They aren't interchangeable, as every other community prefers 'f', while even in Arochukwu, where the overwhelming majority of things are said with a 'v', exceptions occasionally arise here and there.

I'd also note that the 'h' sound becomes more prominent as you move closer to Umuahia and it's environs.

Here're local variants of 'bush':

Abiriba - ofia

Isu - ofia

Ututu - ofia

Ohafia - ofia

Ihechiowa - ofia

Abam - ofia

Arochukwu - ovia

Radoillo:
Words of a strong man? Deliberation of strong men?

ChinenyeN:
We have a naming pattern very similar to that, but I can't say I've seen those particular names though. If it's anything like our naming system, then Ukadike and Ukanwoke are likely "talks/words/advice/deliberation is strength" (the power of constructive discourse) and "Talks of a boy" (probably wanted a son and finally getting that desire fulfilled), respectively.

Of course, like I said, I haven't seen those names before. I'm just going off the naming pattern that I'm familiar with, which uses "uka" in a similar manner.

Hmmm. I'm asking because I came across an interpretation of 'uka' which described it as a 'love affair'. Apparently, in whichever dialect this term is from, a romantic relationship between a man and a woman can be described as 'ino na uka' and this term was extended by the early converts to describe the relationship between Christians and their God, hence church service is called 'uka'.

When I initially thought about the meanings of those names, my interpretations were much similar to what you guys said here. But then, as I began to consider other names like Ukaegbu, Ukachukwu, Ukaigwe, Ukamaka, and Ukaiwe, things became a bit fuzzy.

Ihuomadinihu:
Chei, was that film Rituals,i thought it was Taboo where he got into money laundering business. Yes,he spoke in Ngwa or Mbaise.

Iyaaa! O ya woo! M rizodiri ava yam ihe.