Have You Seen This Post?

Have you seen this post?

Have You Seen This Post?

You probably have. It currently has over 120,000 notes, largely because of this addition.

Have You Seen This Post?

Of course it's going to get reblogged, this kind of unsourced factoid does numbers on here. But something about it wasn't quite right.

A bit of searching turned up the origin of the "fact".

Have You Seen This Post?
Have You Seen This Post?

Alright, so it's someone who posted this on reddit 4 years ago and somehow ended up in the search hits. And the post confuses the electric eel (from South America) with the electric catfish (from the Nile, which the Egyptians would have known about).

Have You Seen This Post?

Reminder: this is an electric eel (Electrophorus electricus). It is from South America. (image from Wikipedia)

Have You Seen This Post?

And this is an electric catfish (Malapterurus electricus). It is from the Nile and would have been familiar to the ancient Egyptians. (image from Wikipedia)

And then of course people were speculating in the notes to that post about trade routes between South America and Egypt. Excellent scholarship everyone.

At this point I was ready to call it another made-up internet fact that gets reified by people repeating it. But something was still bothering me.

An ancient Egyptian slab from 3100 BC. What could that be...

Oh.

Have You Seen This Post?

The Narmer palette. It's the goddamn Narmer palette. (image, once again, from Wikipedia)

So where is this "angry catfish"?

It's not the Egyptian name for the electric catfish.

It's... Narmer. It's Narmer himself.

Have You Seen This Post?

Narmer's name is written as above (detail of top middle of the palette), using the catfish (n`r) and the chisel (mr), giving N'r-mr. The chisel is associated with pain, so this reads as "painful catfish", "striking catfish", or, yes, "angry catfish" or other similar variants, although some authors have suggested that it means "Beloved of [the catfish god] Nar".

So.

Where does this leave us?

It would appear that this redditor not only confused electric eels with electric catfish, but also confused a Pharaoh's name with the name of a fish. And then it got pushed to the top search hits by a crappy search engine and shared uncritically on tumblr.

In short, "the electric eel is called angry catfish" factoid actually literacy error. Angry Catfish, who ruled upper Egypt and smote his enemies, is an outlier adn should not have been counted.

Also the Arabic name for the electric catfish is raad (thunder) or raada (thunderer).

References

Afsaruddin, A., & Zahniser, A. H. M. (1997). Humanism, culture, and language in the Near East: studies in honor of Georg Krotkoff. Eisenbrauns.

Clayton, P. A. (2001). Chronicle of the Pharaohs. Thames & Hudson.

Godron, G. (1949). A propos du nom royal. Annales du Service des antiquités de l'Egypte, 49, 217-221.

Sperveslage, G., & Heagy, T. C. (2023). A tail's tale: Narmer, the catfish, and bovine symbolism. The Journal of Egyptian Archaeology, 109(1), 3-319.

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This Poem By The Persian Sufi Poet Abū Saʿīd Abū'l-Khayr Or Abusa'id Abolkhayr

This poem by the Persian Sufi Poet Abū Saʿīd Abū'l-Khayr or Abusa'id Abolkhayr

(Persian: ابوسعید ابوالخیر)  (December 7, 967 - January 12, 1049)

is inscribed on the tomb of Jalāl al-Dīn Muḥammad Rūmī

and is often incorrectly attributed to him.

باز‌ آ باز‌ آ، هر آن چه هستی باز‌ آ

گر کافر و گبر و بت‌پرستی باز‌ آ

این درگهِ ما، درگهِ نومیدی نیست

صد بار اگر توبه شکستی باز‌ آ

___________

Transliteration:

bāz ā bāz ā, har ān keh hastee bāz ā

gar kāfer o gabr o bot parastee bāz ā

een dargeh-ye mā, dargeh-ye nomeedee neest

sad bār agar tobeh shekastee bāz-ā

___________

I provide three translations. The first, by Barks, is the most famous rendering into English. Barks captures the simplicity of the sentiment. Gamart more accurately translates the verse. My own version is meant to be literal, rather than poetic. None of the English translations capture the repugnance that  the words infidel, heretic, pagan, unbeliever or idolater carry in the original. Please read the note for further insight into this poem.

___________

Translation by Coleman Barks:

Come, come, whoever you are.

Wanderer, worshiper, lover of leaving. It doesn't matter.

Ours is not a caravan of despair.

Come, even if you have broken your vows a thousand times. Come, yet again, come, come.

___________

Translation by Sidi Ibrahim Gamart:

Come again, please, come again, Whoever you are. Religious, infidel, heretic or pagan. Even if you promised a hundred times And a hundred times you broke your promise, This door is not the door Of hopelessness and frustration. This door is open for everybody. Come, come as you are.

___________

My own more literal translation:

Come, come, whoever you are, come again

Be you faithless, unbeliever or idolater, come again

This doorway of ours, it is not the entry to despair

If you’ve broken your repentance a hundred times, come again.

___________

Notes:

bāz ā = come again; welcome (bāz  means both “again” and “open”; both meanings are relevant here)

kāfer = usually translated as infidel, the basic meaning of the word in Arabic (kufr) is someone who is ungrateful [for God’s blessings], or who has no faith; by extension, someone who does not believe in the tenants of Islam, who is a pagan, non-believer, or member of a non-Muslim religion. It is commonly used as a pejorative term.

gebr or gabr = the word originally referred to someone who was a Zoroastrian but came to have a pejorative meaning referring to any non-Muslim, or sometimes to any unbeliever The word continues to be used as a slur against Christians in some former areas of the Ottoman Empire.

Bot parasti = idol worshiper (again, a pejorative term)

All three of the phrases used have the sting of extremely insulting, pejorative terms. All three place the person being referred to as the most outcast or outside categories in Islamic society. To say they are welcome is to go against all expectations.

* Note that the word Dargah has many meanings, several of which are indicated directly in this line: portal, door, threshold, the site of the saint’s tomb. The royal court (dargah) was also where the king dispensed legal rulings and justice, which also plays into the poem: no matter how many transgressions you have made, this is not the place for having no hope. Baz A, means, come, come again, welcome.

* درگاه (درگهِ) dargāh (dar=door; gāh or gah=place): Portal, door; location of the door [into a house or building]; threshold; a royal court, a palace; a mosque; shrine or tomb (of some reputed saint}; place of pilgrimage.

** nomidi: no hope (na=no; omid=hope)

tobeh (Arabic “tawbeh”) = repentance. In Islam repentance is an individual matter between an individual and the Divine. By using this word the poet transfers the point of view from society’s vantage point (someone who is outside the fold of society), to the personal (what is my relationship to the Divine).

Persian (Farsi) Calligraphy by S J Thomas  www.palmstone.com

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— Unknown (via Letsbelonelytogetherr)

— unknown (via letsbelonelytogetherr)

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