Glossary entry (derived from question below)
Spanish term or phrase:
sin daño de barras
English translation:
with no harm to anyone
Added to glossary by
Charles Davis
May 3, 2019 18:37
5 yrs ago
Spanish term
sin daño de barras
Spanish to English
Art/Literary
Poetry & Literature
I'm working on an academic paper on Cervantes's Novelas ejemplares, and the author has excerpted a few lines of the Prologue to the Reader:
Mi intento ha sido poner en la plaza de nuestra república una mesa de trucos donde cada uno pueda llegar a entretenerse, **sin daño de barras**; digo sin daño del alma ni del cuerpo, porque los ejercicios honestos y agradables, antes aprovechan que dañan.
This is what I've got so far:
My intention has been to lay out a table of tricks in our republic’s plaza, where everyone can come to be entertained, **without the harm of barriers**: I mean, without harm to body or soul, because honest, agreeable activities cause pleasure before harm.
But I don't like what I've got between the asterisks; it just doesn't really seem to make sense there. Can anyone think of anything more appropriate?
I'm working into American English.
Mi intento ha sido poner en la plaza de nuestra república una mesa de trucos donde cada uno pueda llegar a entretenerse, **sin daño de barras**; digo sin daño del alma ni del cuerpo, porque los ejercicios honestos y agradables, antes aprovechan que dañan.
This is what I've got so far:
My intention has been to lay out a table of tricks in our republic’s plaza, where everyone can come to be entertained, **without the harm of barriers**: I mean, without harm to body or soul, because honest, agreeable activities cause pleasure before harm.
But I don't like what I've got between the asterisks; it just doesn't really seem to make sense there. Can anyone think of anything more appropriate?
I'm working into American English.
Proposed translations
(English)
4 +5 | with no harm to anyone | Charles Davis |
4 +1 | without getting hurt | Cecilia Gowar |
3 | having no objections | Juan Arturo Blackmore Zerón |
Change log
May 5, 2019 16:08: Charles Davis Created KOG entry
Proposed translations
+5
3 hrs
Selected
with no harm to anyone
This is how Edith Grossman translates it in her version of the Novelas ejemplares (Yale UP, 2016):
https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=lFdlDQAAQBAJ&pg=PA4#v=on...
And other translators render it similarly. Michael Harney (another American translator) renders it as follows in his version (2016):
"with no harm done to any player" (near foot of page, following on from the reference to the "mesa de trucos", which means a billiard table)
https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=IdugCwAAQBAJ&pg=PA10
Lesley Lipson, in Oxford World's Classics (1998), put "without injuring anyone else" (p. 4)
https://www.amazon.co.uk/Exemplary-Stories-Oxford-Worlds-Cla...
I used to have a copy of Cyril Jones's version in Penguin Classics, but I can't find it.
In short, that's what it means.
The DLE definition, "Sin daño o peligro propio o ajeno" ( https://dle.rae.es/?id=BrhkDYt ) , which Cecilia has quoted, is a summary of the early Real Academia definition. The first RAE dictionary, known as the Diccionario de autoridades (1726), defines it like this:
"Phrase con que se explica lo mismo que sin peligro, riesgo, ni gasto u desperdicio de alguno"
From which Henry Neumann also derived his translation, "without injury or danger", in his Spanish-English dictionary (Boston, 1831)
https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=5iJKAAAAYAAJ&pg=PA101&lp...
In other words, without harming oneself or anyone else. But this is already over a century after Cervantes was writing, and a more relevant definition is that of Sebastián de Covarrubias in his Tesoro de la lengua castellana, o española (1611), which is limited to "anyone else", and also offers an explanation of the origin of the phrase:
"Sin daño de barras, suele por alusion sinificar tanto como sin perjuyzio de tercero. Està tomada esta manera de hablar de los jugadores de argolla, quando tirando algún cabe tuercen el argolla, no siendo su intento tirar a ella, sino a la bola del contrario."
"Barras", in the game of argolla (a bit like croquet), means the front of the hoop, which was marked with bars (DRAE 1726). So if you want a literal translation, according to Covarrubias's account of the origin of the phrase, it might be "without bending the hoop". But I don't recommend you put that!
By the way, there's an interesting essay in Catalan here, which provides a useful series of examples of uses of the phrase in the Golden Age. The author defends the theory that it is a mistranslation of the Catalan expression sense desbarrar, as part of a theory that the nasty Castilians stole a lot of their literature from Catalan (another tiresome paranoid Catalan nationalist). I find his argument extremely unconvincing, but it's an interesting read in its way, and, as I say, a useful source of information.
https://www.inh.cat/articles/En-una-sola-frase-i-sin-daño-de...
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Note added at 4 hrs (2019-05-03 22:47:07 GMT)
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By the way, Minsheu, in his A Dictionarie in Spanish and English (1599) defines "juego de barras" as "a play with two bowles and a little round hoope of iron or sylver, with two battle-dores to beate in the boules through the ring": in other words, the game of argolla (as I understand it). I love old dictionaries!
http://www.ems.kcl.ac.uk/content/proj/anglo/dict/pro-anglo-d...
https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=lFdlDQAAQBAJ&pg=PA4#v=on...
And other translators render it similarly. Michael Harney (another American translator) renders it as follows in his version (2016):
"with no harm done to any player" (near foot of page, following on from the reference to the "mesa de trucos", which means a billiard table)
https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=IdugCwAAQBAJ&pg=PA10
Lesley Lipson, in Oxford World's Classics (1998), put "without injuring anyone else" (p. 4)
https://www.amazon.co.uk/Exemplary-Stories-Oxford-Worlds-Cla...
I used to have a copy of Cyril Jones's version in Penguin Classics, but I can't find it.
In short, that's what it means.
The DLE definition, "Sin daño o peligro propio o ajeno" ( https://dle.rae.es/?id=BrhkDYt ) , which Cecilia has quoted, is a summary of the early Real Academia definition. The first RAE dictionary, known as the Diccionario de autoridades (1726), defines it like this:
"Phrase con que se explica lo mismo que sin peligro, riesgo, ni gasto u desperdicio de alguno"
From which Henry Neumann also derived his translation, "without injury or danger", in his Spanish-English dictionary (Boston, 1831)
https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=5iJKAAAAYAAJ&pg=PA101&lp...
In other words, without harming oneself or anyone else. But this is already over a century after Cervantes was writing, and a more relevant definition is that of Sebastián de Covarrubias in his Tesoro de la lengua castellana, o española (1611), which is limited to "anyone else", and also offers an explanation of the origin of the phrase:
"Sin daño de barras, suele por alusion sinificar tanto como sin perjuyzio de tercero. Està tomada esta manera de hablar de los jugadores de argolla, quando tirando algún cabe tuercen el argolla, no siendo su intento tirar a ella, sino a la bola del contrario."
"Barras", in the game of argolla (a bit like croquet), means the front of the hoop, which was marked with bars (DRAE 1726). So if you want a literal translation, according to Covarrubias's account of the origin of the phrase, it might be "without bending the hoop". But I don't recommend you put that!
By the way, there's an interesting essay in Catalan here, which provides a useful series of examples of uses of the phrase in the Golden Age. The author defends the theory that it is a mistranslation of the Catalan expression sense desbarrar, as part of a theory that the nasty Castilians stole a lot of their literature from Catalan (another tiresome paranoid Catalan nationalist). I find his argument extremely unconvincing, but it's an interesting read in its way, and, as I say, a useful source of information.
https://www.inh.cat/articles/En-una-sola-frase-i-sin-daño-de...
--------------------------------------------------
Note added at 4 hrs (2019-05-03 22:47:07 GMT)
--------------------------------------------------
By the way, Minsheu, in his A Dictionarie in Spanish and English (1599) defines "juego de barras" as "a play with two bowles and a little round hoope of iron or sylver, with two battle-dores to beate in the boules through the ring": in other words, the game of argolla (as I understand it). I love old dictionaries!
http://www.ems.kcl.ac.uk/content/proj/anglo/dict/pro-anglo-d...
Peer comment(s):
agree |
Robert Forstag
: The argumentation and reasoning here are well-nigh unassailable.
2 hrs
|
Thank you very much, Robert :-)
|
|
agree |
JohnMcDove
: Hats off, once again to Sir Davis!! The Catalonia paranoia thing, reminded me of this one, https://www.zendalibros.com/el-cid-era-catalan/ /../ You're welcome. Yes, looks like they went around the bend (a couple of times! ;-)
3 hrs
|
Many thanks, John ;-) I'd heard of these people but I didn't realise quite how crazy they are.
|
|
agree |
Carol Gullidge
9 hrs
|
Thanks very much, Carol :-)
|
|
agree |
neilmac
: :0
9 hrs
|
Thanks a lot, Neil :-)
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|
agree |
Cecilia Gowar
: I thought the word harm could be used instead and was not aware there were official translations.
14 hrs
|
Many thanks, Cecilia :-) There are certainly other ways it could be said. I don't think these translations have any official status, but it's worth looking at well-regarded published versions, especially Grossman, in this case.
|
4 KudoZ points awarded for this answer.
Comment: "Thanks, Charles, muy acertado, como siempre! I hope never to have to translate any Early Modern papers again, but if I do, I know who to come to for help!"
+1
27 mins
without getting hurt
RAE:
sin daño de barras
1. loc. adv. desus. Sin daño o peligro propio o ajeno.
sin daño de barras
1. loc. adv. desus. Sin daño o peligro propio o ajeno.
Peer comment(s):
agree |
Carol Gullidge
: Without anyone getting hurt// true! It's open to all, and nobody will get hurt
12 hrs
|
Thanks Carol! In the context "..everyone can come..." I thought the other pronoun was not needed.
|
36 mins
having no objections
El significado en español, que puedes encontrar en algunos diccionarios, es: sin pararse en las barras/sin reparar en los inconvenientes/sin hacer caso/sin objeciones.
Discussion
"There are a great number of billiard tables in Cadiz, as well as in most of the capital cities in Spain, and likewise many trucos, which are a peculiar kind of billiard tables, with twenty pockets, played on with very large balls, which are to pass through an iron arch fixed in a certain part of the table.—Horseshoes are beaten into the shape required, when the iron is cold, which makes them last much longer than they would otherwise."
https://books.google.es/books?id=iYFaAAAAYAAJ&pg=PA331
He was clearly unfamiliar with the game, so it didn't exist in England. And the hoop makes me think that Cervantes is using "daño de barras" as a metaphorical trucos expression, not an argolla expression.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trucco
But the Spanish game "trucos" was a table version:
"Truco
6. m. pl. Juego de destreza y habilidad que se ejecuta en una mesa dispuesta a este fin con tablillas, troneras, barras y bolillo."
https://dle.rae.es/?id=apU9FQv
John Stevens (A New Dictionary, Spanish and English, and English and Spanish, 1706) defines truco as "a truck-table, to play on".