HAMBA Results

[Frances Poodry]

Well, thanks to some last-minute votes, the tie was broken and with 10
points, Elliott Moreton is the winner!

-Fran

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HAMBA results:
 
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hamba (n.) in ancient Persia and Media, a girl in the harem who refuses to
have sex with the king.
 
by Pierre Abbat [1 point]
 
Great def!  Although I have to wonder whether it isn't just a fancy way of
saying "corpse". ­ Eric
1 point for the girl refusing the king ­ Linda
I think she would be called "dead." ­ Nora
Isn't that actually "corpse"? ­ Judith
I'd speculate that the term for this would be something like "the deceased".
­ Jean-Joseph
 
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hamba (n.) [fr. Kirghiz] 1. a large wild boar.  2. a marauder.  3. a
Russian.
 
by David Randall [7 points]
1 point for correct guess
I started out thinking that I would refuse to believe any porcine
definitions. However, this one is the LEAST unbelievable of them all.  2
points from Hutch
Another awesome funny def. ­ Eric
I am tempted by the wild boar because of the dancing hams in my head...
Okay, 2 points for incorporating pigs in a non ridiculous definition! ­ Nora
It would have shown more spirit if (2) had been "a beast of the chase". ­
Elliott
Oh, give that 2 points.  I like the variety. ­ Judith
I'm going to automatically reject anything that purports to come from any
language that hails from the general vicinity of the Middle East or central
Asia, simply because that's what it looked like to me, and it's therefore
too obvious.  It also looks Randallesque. ­ Jean-Joseph
It's plausible that the Kirghiz word have all three meanings, but not that
they all be borrowed. - Pierre
 
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hamba (n.) in the study of Near Eastern literature, the use of
sequentially-applied alphabeticals to refer to otherwise anonymous authors.
>From /hamba/, the first letter of the Persian alphabet.
 
by Ranjit Bhatnagar [3 points]
 
Don't know the Persian alphabet, but I would expect the first letter to be
something similar to Arabic's _alef_. ­ Hutch
I don't know my Persian alphabet, but this sounds plausible. ­ Nora
2 points from David
Creative definition!  Inspired by "hamza"? One point from Elliott
Middle Eastern. ­ Jean-Joseph
There's a character in Arabic called hamza, but whether it's counted as a
letter, or used in Persian, I don't know. - Pierre
 
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hamba (n.) a decorative garland of perennials worn by North Skelton
tradition Morris dancers
 
by Melissa Shaner [1 point]
 
This, along with the skirt definition, remind me of the Tamburitzans of
Pittsburgh:
http://www.tamburitzans.duq.edu/history.html - Nora
This one gets the Lady Godiva Award. ­ Elliott
1 point: WWFP?  (What would Fran pick?) ­ Jim
Ruled out by similar reasoning to the Swedish skirt definition. ­Jean-Joseph
 
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hamba (int.) [fr. Nguni: hambe, go] be off; go away.
 
by The Oxford English Reference Dictionary, second edition, edited by Judy
Pearsall and Bill Trumble, © 1996 [4 points]
 
Oh, lovely!  One point. ­ Eric
a verb!  I like it, but I am not sure about yelling,
"You better hamba out of here!" ­ Nora
1 point from David
I'd thought "hamba" was a pretty bland sort of word, but it did evoke a lot
of good defs.  Let me see...  The word doesn't look English, so the correct
definition will probably give an etymology.  We are offered Kirghiz,
Persian, Nguni, and Chimwiini.  I'm getting a definite Bantu vibe off the
phonotactics, which narrows it down to the last two, of which one is mine.
The other is [this one] which is plausible but bland, bland, bland.  Two
points. ­ Elliott
Nguni?  I'll guess that's from Africa, and therefore escapes my region
filter.  But it also looks like a word that would be here on a tourist visa
at best. ­ Jean-Joseph
I was going to vote for both of the Bantu origins, but I like the valve
better. This one should probably have a regional dialect indication. -
Pierre
 
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hamba (n.) a voluminous skirt worn in Scandinavian festival dancing.
 
by Linda Owens [0 points]
 
I can see this being the name of those things. ­ Nora
Scandinavia definitely escapes my region filter.  But the word doesn't look
particularly Scandinavian, and I'm leery of dance definitions when the word
is reminiscent of a couple of kinds of dances. ­ Jean-Joseph
 
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hamba (adj.) made insane by jealousy.
 
by Eric [4 points]
 
1 point for correct guess
1 point from Melissa
*G* "I'm hamba over yoooooou!" (sing it, baby!) ­ Hutch
An unusual part of speech for the word which most everyone figured to be a
noun, but I don't think it is correct. ­ Nora
By elimination, and for bucking the trend and making it an adjective, I
award this a double point. ­ Jean-Joseph
 
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hamba (n.)  any of the species of venomous desert snakes of the lowlands of
Morocco, esp. snakes of family Elaphodae, genus Elapho.
 
by Hutch [0 points]
 
I know that beasty fictionitions rarely get voted on, but "hamba" feels like
a snake to me. Maybe a similar word from fiction somewhere. - Hutch
I am tempted by the animal definitions, but I think I like the wild boar
better than the snake. ­ Nora
Not to be confused with the genus Elephino. ­Fran
If you were allowing all ones, I'd have given the Kirghizi meaning and this
one each. ­ Judith
Hamba, mamba, whatever, just keep the antivenin handy. ­ Jean-Joseph
Families end in -idae, and the genus is Elaphe. - Pierre
 
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hamba (n.) 1. a round-bottomed shoe.  2. A type of anti-scald valve.
 
by Jean-Joseph Cote [8 points]
 
1 pt for creative boringness from Ranjit
An extremely odd juxtaposition of meanings. ­ Hutch
Utterly ridiculous.  Two points. ­ Eric
2 points for the shoe/valve ­ Linda
Wow!  How is the same word used for both of these very different things? ­
Nora
They used to have (2) in Norse living rooms, so that you could flee if the
entertainment got too repetitive. ­ Elliott
2 points for lovely nonsequiturity ­ Jim
Used in bowling? ­ Judith [regarding the shoe]
So, I already had the "round-bottomed shoe" in mind (no, I don't know why
anyone would want one, although maybe you could walk in desert sand okay
with them, and I wasn't thinking of the shoes that the maintenance guys at
Arecibo Observatory wear), but then I had to have the furnace guy come over
to figure out why I didn't have any hot water... ­ Jean-Joseph
One point. Presumably the valve has a round bottom. - Pierre
 
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hamba (n.) plant waste, for example, by-products from agro-industries such
as production of consumer goods (ex. from beer, paper, fruit juice and
bio-diesel fuel).
 
by Nora Munoz [2 points]
 
2 points from Melissa
Bagasse! ­ Ranjit
Isn't that BAGASSE?  Or FIDOLA, LOCO-FOCO, ZAX, something like that? ­
Elliott
E.g. bagasse, of course. ­ Jean-Joseph
If Jim H. had talked about hamba as he did about bagasse and stover, I'd
have remembered it. - Pierre
 
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hamba (n.) 1. (Art) [fr. Chimwiini: hamba] a plaiting technique in which
strands undergo the same permutation, repeatedly, until the original
arrangement is repeated  2. (Math.) any element of Sn, the symmetric group
on n letters, whose order is maximal in Sn.  3. (Educ.) a technique of essay
writing in which a  small number of points are repeatedly rearranged so as
to give an exaggerated impression of substance.
 
by Elliott Moreton [10 points]
 
2 pts for excellent nerdiness from Ranjit
2 points for guessing correctly
I like this one, but I kind of doubt it. How would mathematicians and
educators have come up with a word from an obscure dialect of Swahili? But,
everything else is even more unbelievable, so ... 1 point. ­ Hutch
I give this 1 point for effort because it is so long, but I don't think it
is the correct definition. ­ Nora
Give that one point. I also like its variety. ­ Judith
Chimwiini?  Wow, I have no idea where that's from.  I do think this is
entertaining and creative, and I could imagine the etymological process that
would give rise to the three definitions. Definitely deserving of one point.
­ Jean-Joseph
Two points from Pierre
 
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Joke Definitions:
 
hamba (n.) [fr. ham + samba] a dance performed by pigs.  (by Nora)
 
hamba (n.) (of pigs) the Forbidden Dance.  (by Ranjit)
*LOL* I had the same thoughts originally, too. ­ Hutch
 
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other comments:
 
Can't get the image of a hamster-wombat out of my head.... ­ Melissa
 
After making my votes, I looked it up: AAUUGGHH!!!! I never even considered
the intransitive verb. (BTW, Wiktionary says that it's Indonesian for
"slave", too.)  - Hutch
 
Congratulations, *lots* of funny and clever defs this round. ­ Eric
 
I guess lots of people thought HAMBA sounded Middle Eastern.  I had trouble
getting the image of dancing pigs out of my head the minute I got your email
for the word!  All definitions look good - an excellent round!  -Nora  :)
 
For those of you who don¹t know, hambo is a Scandinavian couple dance, so in
addition to samba and mambo, the word hamba does seem very dance-ish as well
as Scandinavian-sounding. - Fran