> Please note, it's S4C as in Sianel Pedwar (4) Cymru. I wonder if there is > a better translation for Channel than Siannel ? > The thing is, if you really want what I think you mean by a 'better translation', to get away from thinking in terms of translation at all. A translation of the English metaphor involved in calling a TV channel a 'channel' would be "culfor" or "rhigol". But replacing "sianel" by either of these would just be a matter of substituting a loan translation for a straight loan. The question is how a Welsh speaker who'd never heard of English would naturally conceive of this business of television coming in different "channels". There are all sorts of possibilities, and the answer may lie in listening to what small monolingual children spontaneously say. (Who was it who pointed out somewhere, having listened to Welsh-speaking children as yet uncontaminated by exposure to English, that the Welsh for 'firelighter' ought to be "caws tan", and 'baked beans' "pys coch")? ************************ Nigel Love Linguistics Cape Town NLOVE@BEATTIE.UCT.AC.ZA ************************