Ever since Alex told me that the German word for “raccoon” was “waschbär” meaning “wash bear” I’ve been absolutely fascinated by foreign words for animals.
Some of words for animals in Chinese are just straight-up calques. The word for “sealion” is 海狮 (hǎishī) which literally means “sea lion”.
Others are clever or poetic. The word for “giraffe” is 长颈鹿 (chángjǐnglù) meaning “long neck deer”. The word for “panda” is 熊猫 (xióngmāo) meaning “bear cat”.
A few are sort of like “um, okay, sure”. The word for “zebra” is 斑马 (bānmǎ) meaning “spotted horse”. The word for “turkey” is 火鸡 (huǒ jī) meaning “fire bird”.
And then some are just laugh-out-loud absurd and everything goes off the rails. The word for “dolphin” is 海豚 (hǎitún) meaning “sea suckling pig”. But the word for “blowfish” is 河豚 (hétún) meaning “river suckling pig”. And then the word for “beaver” is 海狸 (hǎilí) meaning “sea raccoon”.
Now I can’t help but think of beavers as “sea wash bears”.