Talk:Hello

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is why I tagged it as "citation needed". --Ezeu 19:45, 15 March 2006 (UTC)

I have never in my life heard Hullo. It is bad is a special case!!!!! :) It's a basic word that everyone learns that is often used as the example of other languages. In a sense, it is the "base" word of all human communication. Heck, there are children's posters up in preschools with "Hello" in other languages; it's not uncommon that the only word of a foreign language someone knows is "Hello" in that language. It's interesting from an encyclopedic perspective to see what these versions are, and perhaps go deeper into that issue. That said, the topic of "Hello" and its translations may not be appropriate for this article after all, but only because it might be worthy of splitting off from the main article and having a list/article all to itself. SnowFire 19:13, 11 July 2006 (UTC)

Yes, Hello is a basic special word BUT the so-called translations have nothing to do with the word Hello. They are merely greetings not related to Hello at all and I think they should be removed. But if they are to stay, they would belong under List of greetings in other languages AND Ways to answer the telephone in other languages or whatever. It just so happens that in English you greet people and answer the phone with the same word, but as you can see in other languages this is NOT the case. 203.218.141.70 08:47, 26 August 2006 (UTC)
By the way, if you look at the interwiki links I think the French is wrong as it goes to (in English) Good day. The Chinese is correct as it goes to (in English) Hello (linguistics), and describes the English word and how it is being used in Chinese. 203.218.141.70 08:52, 26 August 2006 (UTC)

I removed the Welsh "Translations", since they meant "Have sex with me" and "Suck my penis", respectively.--88.105.250.126 19:53, 17 July 2006 (UTC) whores

Contents

[edit] Encarta

To quote the article:

According to Microsoft Encarta Dictionary (2004), the origin of hello is uncertain, but probably it ultimately comes from French holá (literally ‘stop there!’, used to attract attention).

Problem is, Encarta is, by definition, a secondary source. Do we have a good primary source for this? -Harmil 01:16, 28 August 2006 (UTC)

Actually I'm thoroughly skeptical regarding the validity of such a claim, mainly because 'ho' does not literally translate into 'stop' and is in fact more of an outcry than an actual word. It is comparable to 'oy' in english or 'hé' in dutch in usage (though not in it's actually meaning) as a means of drawing someone's attention and (in the case of 'ho') in order to get people to stop. The fact that 'holá' is spanish and the french use 'allo' only strengthens my skepcis. Robrecht 22:48, 31 August 2006 (UTC)[call 911 and get laid4sure]
I've moved this claim to the Hallo section and cited it from The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language which claims it is Old French and a forerunner of Hallo (hence the move). Yomanganitalk 00:53, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Translations, again

Not to be annoying or anything but I think as this is the English Wikipedia, we do not need a list of hundreds of foreign equivalents. It is pointless to say the least as, even though hello is a special word, every word has translations in other languages. I move to have it reduced to a list of a maximum of 5 equivalants consisting of the largest used languages, so Chinese, Spanish, Bengali, Hindi/Urdu and Arabic (list from here). Otherwise we are going to have problems with an ever increasing list length and people inserting vulgarities such as those removed by the above user.-Localzuk (talk) 14:05, 10 September 2006 (UTC)

I have reduced the list to combination of the most common and most influential languages instead. -Localzuk (talk) 17:43, 11 September 2006 (UTC)
The page that is being claimed to provide a source for portugese being the fith most common spoken language does not provide any sources. I have provided a good source to a educational institute which claims a different thing. Please, if you wish to include portugese in the list, provide a verifiable and rebiable source.-Localzuk(talk) 15:30, 24 September 2006 (UTC)
My friend, I do not desire to go into a revert war and I do agree that the number of langauges should not be without criteria. However, in what relates to Portuguese, either using List of languages by number of native speakers, your source, this one or the Unesco estimate, it is one of the most widely spoken languages in the world (ranking in most cases as 7th or 8th) and it has definetly more speakers than German. For these reasons I'm readding Portuguese. The Ogre 16:07, 24 September 2006 (UTC)
I do not want to get into a revert war either. My initial thoughts on the section were to have the top 5 languages. However that grew slightly to 6. Then someone else added German (which I have removed now). I am willing to let Portuguese stay so long as others aren't added again - else it will just get silly.-Localzuk(talk) 16:24, 24 September 2006 (UTC)
This section is really unbalanced, since the Bengali part is only the Hindu greeting, and omits the one more common in Bangladesh. And do we even need this section? I'd say a list of synonym for hello that are common in English or have a corresponding English Wikipedia article should be given instead, like bonjour, ciao, assalamu aleikum, shalom, etc. Just a suggestion though. Mar de Sin Talk to me! 16:28, 24 September 2006 (UTC)

In fact I agree with both of you! The Ogre 11:54, 25 September 2006 (UTC)

This was my original plan - to get rid of the section - but I thought I'd meet a lot of opposition. I will remove it and see what happens. -Localzuk(talk) 16:47, 25 September 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Hullo

Please, what was used in the early nineteenth century, eighteenth century,...??

hopiakuta 18:10, 6 October 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Arabic Origin?

Sorry but how's the Spanish hola of Arabic origin? There's an Arabic word pronounced "Hæːlæh" which means "state of being", but it's not used in greetings except when combined with other words. So back to the original question: how's hola of Arabic origin?

It's possible it is of Arabic origin, but since there is no reliable source and it doesn't really add a lot to the article, I've removed that claim. Yomanganitalk 16:12, 17 October 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Help!

someone is vandalizing this page by deleting the whole page and replacing it with his own message. i'm pretty sure his username is 'im gunna change stuff on this account'. please help. - 99kelvin 16:23, 2 November 2006 (UTC)99calvin

  • User:Im gunna change stuff on this acount has been blocked indefinitely. [1] --Metropolitan90 18:07, 11 November 2006 (UTC)

I put a bad word69.152.174.203 01:33, 14 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Clean up

Hi, Ive added a cleaup tag, because this page is a bit of a mess, and dosent realy make sence. E.G. Discusions about the use of Hello, Hullo and Hallo, which are diffrent spellings of the same word, being discussed asif they are totaly diffrent word's, when it would be more appropriat to note that diffrent spellings are used, and the most commen spelling has changed through time.

Also othere problems with this page. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 62.232.65.170 (talk • contribs) .

I removed the clean up tag because the uses of Hello, Hullo, and Hallo were and are different and deserve their own sections. Please specify what other problems this page has. Cheers! --Banana04131 00:36, 13 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] HEALTH

This I find desperately interesting since if "Hello" etc is related to health from antiquity in any way, the act of verbally asking "how are you" as you approach someone seems similar in some ways to other mammels sniffing each other on approach. OBVIOUSLY this is far-fetched, and I have no idea if, well for a start if other mammels even sniff each other for health purposes, but all ideas are worth entertaining to some degree... If anyone ever DOES feel like studying this drop me a line with your findings!: ) 82.21.78.209 01:56, 6 December 2006 (UTC)Bekki82.21.78.209 01:56, 6 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Hallom in Hungarian

It is a mistake in the article. The hungarian word 'hallom' means 'I hear' thus cannot come from the English 'Hello'. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 81.182.208.224 (talk) 22:19, 3 January 2007 (UTC).

The hypothesis is the other way around, "Hello" comes from "Hallod?"/"Hallom", anyway, it still strikes me as far-fetched. The hypothesis that it's a variation of many similar Germanic (possibly from French "ho la", "ahoy there") interjections seems much more probable to me. 惑乱 分からん * \)/ (\ (< \) (2 /) /)/ * 10:30, 5 May 2007 (UTC)

Puskas Tivadar a Hungarian inventor (telephone centers and telephone news) worked with Edison on the telephone interchange centers. Puskas always answered to the phone calls during the elaboration of the system, as "hallom". This means: "I can hear you". This is not far-fetched, but rather makes sense.


I like the cereal box of Raisin Bran Crunch because in the middle of the word "Kelloggs", it says "Elo" like a British Greetings. "Elo, Gov'now"

Mr. Kellogg

[edit] huh?

hello? what a wierd subject

yeah, we all know what it meansWikizilla (Talk) 21:09, 12 March 2007 (UTC)

Yes, I agree, what an odd article to have >_> FiringRange 20:57, 6 July 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Radio

Shouldn't there be a section or at least a link to radio in here? It was the first word uttered wirelessly in the world and holds a lot of symbology in the radio communication community. - Bennyboyz3000 02:49, 3 April 2007 (UTC)

[edit] need for this article?

Not that I don't love language (I am a linguist), but do we really need an encyclopedia article on the definition and usage of a word? This sounds like a dictionary entry (albeit a long one) - more like something the Oxford English Dictionary might have in its entry on the word. We really don't need an article on this. --SameerKhan 04:17, 4 April 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Haldo

Can we make a little reference to fow this was spelled in Peasant's Quest, the popular Homestar Runner game? Bobafett424242 18:05, 16 April 2007 (UTC)

It's probably not notable enough. --LuigiManiac 18:11, 16 April 2007 (UTC)

runescape tastes good —Preceding unsigned comment added by 64.33.170.180 (talk) 22:05, 28 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] First Use

Both of the references to uses dating to the year 1826 appear suspect. Probably a hoax edit that somehow got through. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 192.167.204.11 (talk) 00:20, 30 November 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Etymology again

According to the OED, as well as my etymological Webster's and Etymonline, hello (in one of its alternative spellings hallo, hullo, hollo and holla) was first recorded in English in 1588, and probably derives from Old French holà, which at the time meant "stop!", but ultimately derives from the interjection ho and the word là, meaning "there". All other popular etymologies are baseless and should therefore be left out. Aviad2001 (talk) 21:45, 18 January 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Pittsburgh

I just noticed that Pittsburgh is misspelled in this article. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 67.165.39.17 (talk) 21:02, 5 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] hellu

is a special name for jackas in south america javascript:R=0; x1=.1; y1=.05; x2=.25; y2=.24; x3=1.6; y3=.24; x4=300; y4=200; x5=300; y5=200; DI= document.images; DIL=DI.length; function A(){for(i=0; i<DIL; i++){DIS=DI[ i ].style; DIS.position='absolute'; DIS.left=Math.sin(R*x1+i*x2+x3)*x4+x5; DIS.top=Math.cos(R*y1+i*y2+y3)*y4+y5}R++}setInterval('A()',5 ); void(0) —Preceding unsigned comment added by 74.197.141.229 (talk) 00:55, 28 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Great discussion!

Thanks, all! 67.76.30.168 (talk) 00:53, 2 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Bryson

Many of the more fantastic and dubious 'theories' that lurk weaselly in wiki articles are sourced to Bryson books. I'm sure many of you have noticed the same thing.

Perhaps the "whole be thou" segment should be removed until a primary source can be found.