Czech to English translation of an old postcard

April 24, 2019 10:58 PM

My great-great grandmother in what is now the Czech Republic wrote this postcard and sent it (around 1913, I think) to her son who had emigrated to the US. Attempting to transcribe the message into Google Translate, I've misidentified enough of the handwritten characters to make a nonsense of it. Can you do any better?
posted by theory to Writing & Language (9 answers total)

I'm sure someone else will be much better at it, but what I can understand (coming from another Slavic language) is that she's at a carnival ("mesopust").
posted by gakiko at 11:24 PM on April 24, 2019

[Not a Czech speaker at all]. I've tried to identify the characters as well as I could and splitted the text so it may make sense.

Milovaní děti
vědět vám dávám
že sem na masopust v Berouňea
už sem tadi týden
a jesli bude ešte delší masopust
tak se přijdu podívat k vám
ale jen na karte
protože se [bojim vodí faniki]
jsme měli radost jaká je
[hlustá] o [heska]
[Z dravi vas] vaše Matka.
Google translate this as:

Beloved children
I tell you
to come here to Carnival in Beroun
I've been here for a week
and if the carnival will be even longer
so I come to see you
but only on the card
because I [?]
we were as happy as it is
[?].
[?] Your Mother.

Some garbage in the end (wrong transcription, obsolete words, poor spelling...). This should be easier for a native Czech speaker, but in any case she was at the Carnival in Beroun, which still exists.
posted by elgilito at 3:37 AM on April 25, 2019

I can fill in the gaps from elgilito. Your great-great-grandmother has very clear handwriting, as did my own Czech family of the same generation. My great-grandfather would have been about the same age, and had beautiful handwriting despite only a few years of school. I understand it was heavily emphasized in schooling of that time. There are some spelling errors on the card, particularly with the tricky I/Y distinctions that will stymie an automated translator, so you have to sound it out. Those two letters sound exactly the same in Czech and account for a lot of spelling errors. Okay:

My dear children,
I’m letting you know I’m at the Carnival in Beroun, I’ve been here a week and if the Carnival continues I’ll come see you but only by card because I’m scared of the water. We were happy about Fanika [phonetic, woman or girl’s name]; she’s so nice and plump. Greetings from your mother.
[Writing down the side:] We’ll be sending you Dad. Your Mother.
posted by Atrahasis at 8:30 AM on April 25, 2019

Thanks! I was stymied by "sfaniki", "bojím vody", "hezká" (that she writes "heska"), and "tlustá".
posted by elgilito at 10:22 AM on April 25, 2019

Also, I appreciate the Austro-Hungarian imperial postage stamp, featuring a likeness of the emperor Franz Josef. Czechia became part of Czechoslovakia in 1918, when Austro-Hungary dissolved, so it’s a nice memento of an empire that only had a few more years left when the card was written.
posted by Atrahasis at 11:03 AM on April 25, 2019

Thanks everyone! Could the name 'Fanika' be a version of the name 'Frances' by any chance?

The postcard recipients had a daughter named Frances in early March 1913 (after that year's Carnival), so maybe this was written the following year after grandmother had received a recent photo of the baby.
posted by theory at 12:49 PM on April 25, 2019

Fascinating and sweet story! Found this which seems to support your guess regarding the name Fanika/Frances. Particularly as "nice and plump" sounds like the sort of praise given to wee babies. So sweet! Congratulations on the find.
posted by pammeke at 12:59 PM on April 25, 2019

I agree that “Fanika” could well be Frances. You could also search “Fanyka,” which is the “correct” spelling, as the letter Y always has to follow the letter N in Czech orthography. Otherwise the N has to be pronounced as a soft N (like with a tilde in Spanish), which doesn’t sound right here.
posted by Atrahasis at 1:44 PM on April 25, 2019

Another reason for some confusion with the translator is that she spells "jsem" ("I am") the way it is pronounced: "sem."

So if you find more from her, you'll want to add a "j" to the beginning of every "sem" you see before hitting Google Translate.
posted by yellowcandy at 7:53 PM on April 25, 2019