Little question of translation

[Galathée]

Hello everyone...

 

Here is the brave French team, trying to kill the mammoth... and we're close !

 

But I'm currently stuck with a word in Coran's romance and that's why I'm coming to the source...

 

Here it is (from x#ciflirt.tra) :

@227 = ~*This night you dream of a moonlit lake between the silvery dunes. Lilies rise from the sand, the flowers swaying slowly in the wind. Across the lake, on the distant shore, someone is building a boat. You look at the protruding ragnauts, and a sigh escapes your lips. For many more nights you will sit here, before this ship would unfurl its sail and cross the lake. For many more nights you will see a handsome shipwright in your dreams.*~

 

What's a ragnaut ? Google won't help me All my hopes rest with you !

Thanks in advance for the help !

[Kulyok]

I'd guess it's "шпангоуты"("станина", "остов"), which basically means the ship's frame(bed, mount, body, stand, whatever have you). Probably not mast, though.

[cmorgan]

http://phrontistery.info/nautical.html

 

I suggest using the conventional "timbers", though, as it doesn't require readers to know anything about shipbuilding (and is generally used in reference to shipbuilding in US and UK english) rather than get into the details of keel and framing, beams and such.

 

synonyms;

 

Her beams stretched towards the stars as she rested on her keel, the comforting arms of drydock holding the USS Constellation in a warm embrace.

 

Her timbers stretched towards the stars as she rested on her keel, the comforting arms of drydock holding the USS Constellation in a warm embrace.

[Galathée]

Thanks, that's what more or less what I thought...

 

I'm still interested to know where the word itself comes from, though... It's pretty rare to find a word that yields only one result on Google (and in this case, it seems to be totally unrelated !) (isn't that what you call a Google Whack ?).

 

Anyway, thanks a lot and now... back to Coran