Talk:Skagerrak

Can anyone give me a literal translation of the word "Skagerrak"?

I think Skagerrak is just a name of a place and doesn't have any direct translation. According to two sites I found by googling: "The Skagerrak is the outer part of the transitional area between the Baltic Sea and the North Sea, and is connected with the North Atlantic through the Norwegian Trench." "The Skagerrak is a current-controlled sedimentary basin between the North and Baltic Seas. It forms the deepest part (> 700 m water depth) of the Norwegian Trench and is the westernmost part of a narrow strait which guides the water-mass exchange between the two epicontinental seas." -- hybrid-2k (2003.10.22)

As far as I know, "Skagerrak" has no recognizable meaning in the present languages of the other nearby language areas (Danish, Norwegian, Swedish etc - no idea about German or Dutch). Note however that the tip of Jutland is called "Skagen", no idea which takes name from which... (Kattegat on the other hand at least has as recognizable suffix "gatt" meaning approx. "narrow waters", it's first part could be anything). I'll look it up a bit more. OlofE 11:14, 7 Nov 2003 (UTC)

Boy was I wrong. Or not wrong, but not right either. Both words are of dutch origin and date from the 17th century. Both were initially names for the area between Skagen, Sjaelland, the Swedish west coast and the southeastern coast of Norway. Skagerrak was the official name on maps (from the 18th century), Kattegatt the vulgar name between sailors. In time, Kattegatt came to be the more common name and Skagerrak only meant the outer part of the area, between Skagen and Norway. In the 19th century the names were still used synonymously. "Kattegatt" contains a Dutch word roughly meaning "cathole" (hole in a door or wall, made for a cat) and in (at least) Swedish, gatt has since then come to mean "narrow opening or passage". In Dutch sailor jargon, the word means treacherous waters in general. Kattegatt is a dangerous area with many islands and shallows. "Skagerrak" contains a prefix from the name Skagen, and a word meaning "straight stretch" (rak, from Dutch and Low German), i.e., the straight passage past Skagen. Someone with knowledge of Dutch might be able to fill this out a bit. Source: Svenskt ortsnamnslexikon (Swedish lexicon of placenames). OlofE 17:28, 8 Nov 2003 (UTC)

Kattegat

This has the same meaning in Dutch as in Swedish where cats are concerned, but it also may refer to three Dutch maritime terms. The first "katten" means to lessen the sail surface by hoisting that part of the sail where the boom and mast meet, the second to hoist and secure the anchor, the third to set out a secondary achor for better grip.