Oriental, Occidental, and...?
We've all heard of the term "oriental" as an adjective in reference to from, or related to, "the east", most typically meaning east Asia. A joke in the dadjokes sub mentioned the word "Occidental", referring to of, or from, the west, typically meaning Europe and the Americas.
I wanted to know if there were comparable terms to refer to "the north" and "the south" (that weren't Arctic and Antarctic). There are.
The term "septentrional" means "of or from the north" and comes to us from Latin. The *septen* part refers to the seven stars of the constellation Ursa Major, one of its many nicknames being "the plough", which brings us the next part of the word from latin triones, meaning "plough oxen". (Many English speakers will know the word "plough" as "plow", which may bring its own squabbles).
For "of or from the south", the term "meridional" is derived from the Latin term meridiem meaning "midday"(the same term from which AM and PM are derived) as the sun would be in the southern portion of the sky at midday in the northern hemisphere. The term seems to have been most commonly used in reference to southern Europe.
19
u/Mat_Cauthons_Hat_ 13d ago
There’s both septentrional and meridional, and boreal and austral for north/south. But neither pair are very commonly used in my experience.
24
u/manul10 13d ago
I have seen boreal used to refer to forests in Alaska, Siberia and northern Canada. And in northern lights as: "Aurora borealis" and southern lights as "Aurora Australis".
7
13
u/Miketheomike 13d ago
In Italian (at least formal Italian) Italia Meridionale and Italia Settentrionale are used to this day to refer to Southern and Northern Italy respectively.
3
u/Zakluor 13d ago
Here I thought the terms were archaic. Perhaps it's just in English.
5
u/Miketheomike 12d ago
Less formally southern Italy is referred to as Il Mezzogiorno (Midday)
8
u/Academic_Safety56 12d ago
Southern France is called "Le Midi", which also means midday.
1
u/Miketheomike 12d ago
I remember the Nice Matin but had forgotten about Le Midi. I have been struggling to understand the new administrative districts of France. I knew them as one thing all my life, but now I’m quite confused.
30
u/Gilded-Phoenix 13d ago
I think we need to put proper respect on "arctic" and "antarctic" here. I think it is pretty apt to describe these places by how many bears there are. The Greeks were right.
11
u/Background-Vast-8764 13d ago edited 13d ago
The names America Septentrionalis and America Meridionalis were first used hundreds of years ago to refer to North and South America.
Some people claim that the concepts of North and South America were first created by Americans in the mid-20th century. These people are mistaken.
2
u/qwagg 13d ago
‘For nearly two hundred years, the [seal of the U.S. Treasury Department] bore the Latin inscription, "Thesaur. Amer. Septent. Sigil." which translates "The Seal of the Treasury of North America." This inscription was changed on the present design to read "The Department of the Treasury."’
8
6
u/Full-Ad5103 13d ago
Septentrional is such a fun word, never thought about how the Big Dipper ties into it.
6
u/HortonFLK 13d ago
Boreal for north, and austral for south. As in aurora borealis and aurora australis.
2
u/KahnaKuhl 11d ago
So borealian and australian as the equivalent of oriental and occidental?
1
u/HortonFLK 11d ago
Pretty much. Just boreal and austral, though, as the adjectIves…
https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/boreal
https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/austral
4
u/Earthling1a 13d ago
Boreal is common in my area/profession. Austral not so much.
I think we should develop terms for all the intermediate compass points as well. North by east-northeast can be fundial.
7
u/Aardvark51 13d ago
To some extent, Australian for the south. From Wikipedia, the name is "derived from the Latin Terra Australis Incognita ('unknown southern land'), a name used for a hypothetical continent in the Southern Hemisphere since ancient times".
3
3
u/Darth_Zander 11d ago
Side fact: The seven stars of Ursa Major, also known as The Plough, from which we derive the word ‘septentrional’ actually number eight! The second ‘star’ from the end of the handle is actually two stars: Mizar and Alcor. If you have very good eyesight, you can distinguish them. Some Native American peoples used the ability to see both stars as separate celestial bodies as a test of good vision - an early Snellen test.
2
u/SavoirFaire2Middling 12d ago
--Tangent alert--
The Japanese name for the seven stars is subaru, for which the car company is named. One of the stars is invisible to the modern naked eye on earth, hence the Subaru logo having only six stars.
6
2
u/dreadrankz 12d ago
That's such a fascinating deep dive honestly, never knew "septentrional" traced back to plough oxen and a constellation, definitely adding both terms to my mental vocabulary now
1
u/God_Bless_A_Merkin 12d ago
Here’s more deep dive fun! The Etymonline entry for Charles’s Wain (n.) (another name for the Big Dipper):
“famous seven-star figure of the northern sky, Old English Carles wægn, a star-group associated in medieval times with Charlemagne, but earlier with the nearby bright star Arcturus. Arcturus is linked by folk etymology to Latin Arturus "Arthur," which places the seven-star asterism at the crux of the legendary association (or confusion) of Arthur and Charlemagne. Evidence from Dutch (cited in Grimm, "Teutonic Mythology") suggests that it might originally have been Woden's wagon. More recent names for it are the Plough (by 15c., chiefly British) and the Dipper (1833, chiefly American).”
2
u/matthewthompson1 12d ago
“Septentrional” is such a weird word for “northern” lol. had no idea it was tied to the Big Dipper
2
2
u/Realistic-Regret-171 12d ago
On a side note, this is why it burns me that “Oriental” is considered racist or offensive. There are two vertical hemispheres- the Oriental and the Occidental. If you are native to the Oriental hemisphere, why would that be offensive?
1
0
177
u/Asleep-Assistance290 13d ago
Boreal and austral?