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Crab with the Golden Claws: What does 'Karaboudjan' mean?

Jyrki21
Member
#1 · Posted: 9 Dec 2004 06:49
In another thread, thmthm wrote:

Armenia's and Turkey's histories are intertwined (in the most unforunate way) and share many words - karaboudjan in Turkish is:
Kara-black
Bou - this
djan- Spirit
THIS BLACK SPIRIT - maybe a foreshadowing of whats to come after Tintin gets kidnapped
but thanks for starting this new topic from the previous one
When i saw that cover from Harrock I was dying of laughter - that was good!


Indeed, I studied a little Turkish in undergrad, and it was only then that I appreciated that 'Karaboudjan' sounded like a Turkish name. Indeed, thmthm's translation is bang on -- it would be spelled "Karabucan" in Turkish -- and I wonder if Hergé got his Levant languages confused. Because this is quite clearly a Turkish name...
thmthm
Member
#2 · Posted: 9 Dec 2004 07:24
Well - many turkish/Arabic (and even French) words are used interchangably within the western Armenian culture- especially in my parents and grandparents generations - so Hergé might have been told that it was Armenian.
To this day, I'm surprised learn that many of the words I use are not Armenian at all, because I've heard them used over and over again in conversation...
You coan imagine how great I felt as a kid when I read that though!
Harrock n roll
Moderator
#3 · Posted: 9 Dec 2004 11:49
This is from the book Tintin at Sea:

Hergé made up the name of this ship. As was his method, he brought together two names from one geographical region - KARA BOUgaz, a gulf on the east of the Caspian Sea, and AzerbaiDJAN - to produce, as Tintin notes, an Armenian sounding name.

On 20 September 1972 he wrote to his friend the author Gabriel Matzneff, "One day when we meet again, you are sure to tell me that the name actually exists, though I had invented it."


This I found on the internet:

The name Kara-Bogaz-Gol, literally "black throat lake", can be translated as the "mighty strait lake", after the steep Caspian-KBG channel.

The Kara-Bogaz-Gol gulf is in Turkmenistan.
tarmak
Member
#4 · Posted: 30 Dec 2012 22:55
Hi guys,
Another version what could Karaboudjan mean is a family name in Armenian. As you might know, Armenian family names have mostly an ending which is pronounced as "yan". 'jan' is a European (German, Scandinavian, Dutch) pronounciation of the same 'yan'.

An example, there exist Armenians with family name Karabedyan or Karabedjan. And 'boud' means thigh in Armenian. Anyway, in the 17th century Armenian was much different than it is now, so Karaboudjan might have a meaning which I dont know now.

However, that it could be a family name (invented or real or unreal) is very likely.
Richard1631978
Member
#5 · Posted: 31 Dec 2012 11:40
It's slightly ironic that Armenia is landlocked from the open seas, though there are Armenian communities in many countries with a coastline.
Fretmo
Member
#6 · Posted: 31 Aug 2021 11:10
I'm late at this, but here's my 50 cents!

Hergé was born in Brussels, and when reading Tintin in the original French, only those who know the Brussels dialect will be able to discern clear references it.
I'm saying this because those who are only French readers cannot understand.

Take Syldavian for instance, a fictional West Germanic language created by Hergé as the national language of Syldavia, a fictional Balkan kingdom serving as a major setting in many of the adventures.
The words look made-up, but Hergé modeled the language on Marols, a dialect of Dutch spoken in and around Brussels, and sounding out the words of the "foreign" language allowed dialect-speakers to uncover familiar words hidden within.

So, back to The Karaboudjan: the story starts in Brussels, where its name is (to those dialect speakers) really that of an old Brussels sweet.

At the beginning of the 20th century Congolese quietly came to live in the city.
One of them, "Johny", was able to convince a baker to use the sugar cake left behind from the making of sweets, melting it and adding aniseed.
It was called Karabouja, and this name also says what it is; it turns out to be Swahili, kara means a shaving or splinter, and buja is candy.

The books are filled with these hidden gems, and Hergé himself often said he did so in honor of his beloved grandmother, who spoke the dialect he so loved...
jock123
Moderator
#7 · Posted: 31 Aug 2021 17:23
Fretmo:
it turns out to be Swahili, kara means a shaving or splinter, and buja is candy

This is interesting, but do you have citations for this? I don't speak Swahili, but I can't find any reference to these words in any online translator/ dictionary, or anything similar – not that I have done an exhaustive search, so it could be that there is a dialect of Swahili with those words, so a link to a reference would be very useful! Thank you!
Fretmo
Member
#8 · Posted: 1 Sep 2021 12:57
Yes I do: here's the source articles
Mysteries ontrafeld: wie waren de snoepverkopers "Zwarte Jef" en "Karaboeja" uit de jaren 50 tot 70?
Karaboeja - Eet er maar veele, goed voor de kele...
Carabouya, een echt Brussels anijssnoepje
They are in Dutch, but Google Translate is your friend! :)
Also this translation/ definition for kara here - The candy was hammered off a larger chunk, thus giving splinters or shavings.
Buja is more problematic in modern day Swahili (the candy, let's not forget, is well over a century old and languages and dialects do tend to change considerably), but could be related to the word boji?
If you want to try it, you can buy "carabouillas" from this online sweetshop.
Finally, but most convincingly, here, in an article about Tintin (in Italian), I found the very same result as my own research: "Public parks and royal palaces are equally present in the stories of Hergé, while in The Crab with the Golden Claws (1941) we find the port of Antwerp, the one where en Tintin enchanted by the flight of the seagulls risk being crushed by a crate full of cans of sardines fallen from the freighter Karaboudjan, whose name derives from the term carabouya, to indicate an aniseed dessert."
jock123
Moderator
#9 · Posted: 1 Sep 2021 18:32
Fretmo:
Yes I do: here's the source articles

Brilliant! All very useful, and I appreciate the effort - thank you!
One of the reasons I was asking for reference was that it was causing an itch somewhere at the back of my brain, but I couldn't think where I had read something about it, leaving the itch unscratched!
The light-bulb came on over my head last night, when I remembered that the invaluable Tintin: Ketje de Bruxelles, by Daniel Justens and Alain Préaux, also identifies it with the aniseed sweets!
Fretmo
Member
#10 · Posted: 2 Sep 2021 08:05
jock123:
The light-bulb came on over my head last night, when I remembered that the invaluable Tintin: Ketje de Bruxelles, by Daniel Justens and Alain Préaux, also identifies it with the aniseed sweets!

And thus, we came full circle :)

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