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French to English translations [PRO] History / Historical design
French term or phrase:téléphonie
In a text about a chateau, describing plans for a new town in the second decade of the 16th century, including a lake for naval battles, landing stages, water channels etc. It also includes "téléphonie" - what does that mean at this time in history, please? Full context: "un château prestigieux, pourvu d’un bassin pour des joutes navales avec téléphonie, embarcadères, allées d’eau, écluses à sas, fontaines et d’immenses écuries royales. " Thanks is advance for any help!
Explanation: The telephone (from the Greek: τῆλε, tēle, "far" and φωνή, phōnē, "voice"), often colloquially referred to as a phone, is a telecommunications device that transmits and receives sound, most commonly the human voice.
The equipment for long distance communication is very important. Communication takes place either through heliograph signaling using a flashing mirror, ... www.hq.nasa.gov/.../noord40.html
So, Leonardo's knowledge and interests were focused on two subjects of possible relevance to téléphonie: sound generation, propagation and perception by humans, and independently, warfare and military tactics. The first subject was mostly of scientific interest to him (and he made huge leaps in understanding of a whole range of facts in acoustics and spent considerable time debunking various theories of the day), while the second made a substantial part of his bread and butter. If you read all his musings, as well serious deliberations on both subjects you can't help but notice an utter neglect of informational, or communication aspects in all his subjects of study. The only example of signalling I was able to uncover in many hours of search was the use of a horn by a submarine attacker to signal the end of the operation. That was supposedly in 1513 (Codice Atlantico, 333). Among a host of other funny things, "... carry a horn in order to give a signal whether or no the attempt has been successful." That was his notion of téléphonie at the end of his life. Think what you want, but take a read when you get a chance -- he's a hoot.
Well, I suggested contamination because I cannot imagine a likely corruption that could create such a word, but I admit my knowledge may be too limited to research that possibility efficiently. However, I see contamination of electronically composed text happen daily, often with puzzlng outcomes. Besides the oddness of collocation, there are two arguments to consider:
(1) it comes from a document of questionable veracity, which in addition happened to be short-lived: http://2.ly/cjxk
We know the source of this document: it was for a time hanging on the web-wall of Clos Lucé. In other words, it was an ad. It was based on the then current content of the Clos Lucé web site, but now there is no trace of it other than in google cache. If it had any factual relevance, I bet we would still see it on the walls of Clos Lucé.
(2) Now let's assume the word is not an error and someone really intended to link Leonardo's name with téléphonie or anything that could be related to it by any stretch of imagination (such as commanders shouting orders). I would like to present my summary of what Leonardo had to say about that, but I'm running out of space. A line of hate-mail please, so I can cont..
..for téléphonie would be relevant if the nobles who served as "captains" of the ships were on "shore" observing the naumachia, shouting orders. Have a look here:
...than Gene's proposal of contamination (see below) would be the possibility of corruption: a similar word (a lectio difficilior) being replaced by téléphonie. In any case, an error should be considered since this is otherwise a list of architectural features, and something like "téléphonie" is a very odd collocation with the other items on the list -- particularly in first position.
It blows my mind how much actually was within his grasp. But I find it troubling that I cannot recall any of the topics mentioned here -- joutes navales, téléphonie, and such -- alluded to by Leonardo himself. I have read all of his notes I could lay my hands on; I feel I would have remembered any such thing; also, I suspect if anyone else had seen it, we'd hear crowds of people screaming about it.
I have a book in front of me, "The Notebooks of Leonardo Da Vinci / Definitive Edition in One Volume" edited by Edward MacCurdy. This book is a full transcript (in English) of all of Leonardo's manuscripts that had been known to the public until a few years ago, including figure captions. They are categorised; I have just re-checked all possibly relevant categories (in addition to having read the entire book multiple times). There is nothing of the kind mentioned in: Acoustics, Atmosphere, Experiments, Inventions, Warfare, Naval Warfare, Commissions, Prophecies, and Miscellaneous.
In other words, I am skeptical. If it comes from a hitherto unknown source, can we see it or have a reference?
da Vinci inventing a form of semaphore. Unlike electrical voice communication, that would have been well within his grasp. Or maybe a string of people with booming voices to relay messages? ;-)
It's an imaginary city plan by Léonard de Vinci as a Google for the text shows. The full context is useful. So it's simply the idea of being able to communicate at great distance.
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Answers
12 mins confidence: peer agreement (net): +3
téléphonie (here)
communications
Explanation: Not in the sense of "TELEcommunications" or 'oral/written communications', but in the more geographical sense of communications - i.e. rivers, roads ... i.e. it is well connected to the surrounding area? This is more of a hunch than a proposition with any conviction, but that is how I read it.
I must point out that I'm not certain though, so perhaps wait for some other opinions!
Callum Walker United Kingdom Local time: 17:10 Works in field Native speaker of: English
The translation workplace 
peer agreement (net): +3
