A Fun Lye Fact

[MorpheusPA]

A very linguistic friend of mine just pointed out that the longest single-word palindrome (word that's spelled the same forward and backward) in any language is the Finnish word:

SAIPPUAKIVIKAUPPIAS

According to Guinness, anyway. This word means "one who works with lye," according to him, but he did note the translation was a little loose.

So, SAIPPUAKIVIKAUPPIAS, unite! Together we can spell it forwards or backwards exactly the same!

 

[jcandleattic]

I just looked it up and yes, according to Wikipedia it's meaning is "A soapstone vendor"
Very interesting!

 

[cmzaha]

So it does not pertain to soapmaking. Soap stone is a stone, although a slightly soft stone it is used for countertops and I am sure other applications

 

[MorpheusPA]

I just looked it up and yes, according to Wikipedia it's meaning is "A soapstone vendor"
Very interesting!

Guinness lists it as, "The longest known palindromic word is saippuakivikauppias (19 letters), which is Finnish for a dealer in lye (caustic soda)."

Since the gent in question speaks Finnish, I'm gonna figure he and Guinness are right and Wikipedia is not entirely correct, or using an alternate definition.

 

[jcandleattic]

All I know is this is the quote I got directly off of wikipedia, which points to Guinness World Records.

According to Guinness World Records, the Finnish 19-letter word saippuakivikauppias (a soapstone vendor), is the world's longest palindromic word in everyday use.

and then there was this:
Angliss and Daisy Jordan. Bom-Bane's 2015 fringe show was called Saippuakivikauppias, which means 'The Soapstone Seller' in Finnish.

Either way, doesn't matter, it's still very interesting in my mind...

 

[SaltedFig]

What an awesome word! Thank-you!

I was able to find this out by hunting down the words using EUdict (and it's google translate verifiable):

Saippua is soap (7 letters, 1-7 of the 19)
Kauppias is dealer (8 letters, 12-19)
Kivi is stone (8-11)

Lye is Lipeä
Lipeäkivi is caustic soda

So it's somewhere in the kivi as soda, of the caustic soda, that makes it lye (and confused google translate) perhaps.

Anyways, thanks for that one