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From: mathias@uhunix4.its.Hawaii.Edu (Gerald B Mathias)
Subject: Re: Milky Way
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References: <3vns91$236@nyheter.chalmers.se> <DCrn0L.2I3@phe.hitachi-sk.co.jp>
Date: Fri, 4 Aug 1995 15:38:50 GMT
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Shinobu Satoh (ssatoh@phe.hitachi-sk.co.jp) wrote:
: In article <bmoore-0208950913480001@bmoore.qualcomm.com> bmoore@qualcomm.com (Holoholona) writes:

:  |In article <3vns91$236@nyheter.chalmers.se>, tfams@fy.chalmers.se (Maria
:  |Sundin) wrote:
:  |
:  |> I'm teaching a course in ethnoastronomy this autumn and I would be
:  |> grateful for information about what our galaxy, the Milky Way,
:  |> is called in different languages and cultures. 
:  |
:  |
:   In the modern Japanese, it is called "Ama no Gawa" meaning 
:   River in the Heaven (or Sky). However, my dictionary says 
:   the name is based on a chinese legend. 
:   
:   As I scanned my dictionary, I could not find what it was called in 
:   the ancient Japanese.

The fact that it is "Ama no gawa" instead of "Ama no kawa" (or "Ame no ..."
or "Ten/Sora no ...") suggests antiquity.

Bart Mathias
