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The president of the Philippines wants to rename his country

　　菲律宾的总统想要重命名他的国家

　　But does his proposed name mean“nobility”or“big phallus”?

　　但他提议的名字是“高贵”还是“低俗”?

　　RODRIGO DUTERTE,the perpetually disgruntled president of the Philippines,is unhappy about the name of his country.“I want to change it someday,”he remarked earlier this month in one of his customary rambling speeches.“No particular name yet but,sure,I would like to change the name of the Philippines,because the Philippines is named after King Philip.”

　　永远心怀不满的菲律宾总统杜特尔特，一直对自己国家的名字感到不满意。“我希望有一天能改变它，”本月早些时候，他在例行的一次漫无边际的演讲中说。“目前还没有具体的名字，但是，可以肯定的是，我想改变菲律宾的名字，因为菲律宾是以菲利普国王的名字命名的。

　　The Philip in question was a 16th-century king of Spain.A Portuguese explorer in the pay of the Spanish crown,Ferdinand Magellan,was the first European to visit the archipelago,which he claimed for Spain.(He was then killed by locals.)Mr Duterte says he would prefer a name inspired by the indigenous,Malay culture.

　　这里提到的菲利普是16世纪的西班牙国王，葡萄牙探险家费迪南德·麦哲伦了得到西班牙王室的资助，成为第一个访问菲律宾群岛的欧洲人，并随后向西班牙王室报告(但后来他被当地人杀害)。杜特尔特表示，他更喜欢一个受本土马来文化启发的名字。

　　It was the second time in three weeks that Mr Duterte had called for a new name,making it sound like an official government policy.But his spokesman,Salvador Panelo,is woolly about that:“He is expressing an idea again…as usual.”If it is policy,it will require an amendment to the constitution,which would have to be approved by plebiscite.

　　这是杜特尔特在三周内第二次呼吁改名，这听起来像是政府的官方政策。但他的发言人萨尔瓦多·帕内洛却对此含糊其辞：“他只是又在表达一个想法而已……和往常一样。”他说：“如果这是一项政策，就需要对宪法进行修改，而修改必须得到公民投票的批准。

　　That seems unlikely.If the reminder of colonialism makes ordinary Filipinos bridle,they do so less openly than their president.And the first time Mr Duterte aired the idea of a name change,in February,he diminished the chances of it ever becoming reality by suggesting a new name associated with Ferdinand Marcos,a former dictator:Maharlika.

　　这似乎就不太可能了。如果说这种殖民主义总是提醒着让普通菲律宾人感到愤怒，那么他们的愤怒远没有他们的总统那么明显。今年2月，杜特尔特第一次提出改名的想法，当他提出了一个与前独裁者费迪南德•马科斯有关的新名字：马哈利卡(Maharlika)的时候，就已经降低了改名成为现实的可能性。

　　Mr Duterte explained:“Marcos,he is really right.He wanted to change the name to Maharlika,the Republic of Maharlika,because Maharlika is a Malay word.”Mr Marcos thought the word meant“nobility”,and said it had been the name of a guerrilla group he claimed to have led to resist Japanese occupation during the second world war.

　　杜特尔特解释道：“马科斯，他是对的。他想把名字改成马哈利卡，马哈利卡共和国，因为马哈利卡是马来语。马科斯先生认为这个词的意思是“高贵”的意思，并表示这是一个游击队组织的名字，他声称该组织曾在二战期间领导抵抗日本的占领。

　　Most historians,however,believe that Mr Marcos invented the guerrilla group,or wildly exaggerated its exploits,in order to cast himself as a war hero.Many academics also dispute the assertion that Maharlika means nobility,saying it refers to a lower class in the ancient hierarchy.

　　然而，大多数历史学家认为，马科斯为了把自己塑造成战争英雄，而虚构了这个游击队组织，或者大肆夸大了它的功绩。许多学者也对马哈利卡（Maharlika）的意思是“贵族”的说法提出质疑，他们说“马哈利卡”指的是古代等级制度中较低的阶层。

　　Moreover,the word does not seem to be Malay at all,but rather derived from Sanskrit.The consensus seems to be that it means“man of ability”,although a persistent minority translate it as“big phallus”.In 2016 an online petition urged Mr Duterte to rename the Philippines the Republic of Maharlika.Of the country’s 105m citizens,just seven signed up.

　　此外，这个词似乎根本不是马来语，而是源于梵语。人们普遍认为，它的意思是“有能力的人”，不过也有少数人把它翻译成“巨型阳具”。2016年，一份在线请愿书敦促杜特尔特将菲律宾改名为马哈利卡共和国。然而，在该国1.05亿公民中，请愿的只有7个人而已。

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