lete

From sona pona, the Toki Pona wiki
lete in sitelen pona
lete in sitelen sitelen
Pronunciation /ˈle.te/ 🔊 🔊
Usage 2023: Core (99% ↗︎ )2022: Core (98%)
Book and era nimi pu
Part of speech Content word
Codepoint 󱤦 U+F1926

lete is a core content word relating to coldness.

Etymology[edit | edit source]

The word lete is derived from Acadian French frette, meaning "cold".[1]

Semantic space[edit | edit source]

The semantic space of lete includes cold, frozen, and uncooked things. The antonym of this word is seli, which describes heat.

telo li kama lete la ona li kama kiwen

telo li kama lete la ona li kama kiwen.

When water freezes (becomes cold), it becomes solid.

According to lipamanka's dictionary, lete is sometimes "used to describe… unprocessed ore."[2]

[citation needed…]

Latitude[edit | edit source]

Geographically, lete is sometimes used to describe places far from the equator. One example is ma Amelika lete for North America, contrasted with South America which crosses the equator. Using lete to mean "north" in all cases would be biased around the Northern Hemisphere and may require proper context in order to be understood.

Latitudinal usage of lete is first attested in 2007.[3]

pu[edit | edit source]

In the "Official Toki Pona Dictionary" section, the book Toki Pona: The Language of Good defines lete as:

ADJECTIVE  cold, cool; uncooked, raw

ku[edit | edit source]

For Toki Pona Dictionary, respondents in ma pona pi toki pona translated these English words as lete:[4]

cold5, raw3, frozen3, freeze2, cool2

sitelen pona[edit | edit source]

The sitelen pona glyph for lete (󱤦) is an asterisk representing a simple snowflake. The rotation of the glyph is unimportant.

sitelen sitelen[edit | edit source]

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References[edit | edit source]

  1. Word Origins. Archived from the original on 2 November 2019. Toki Pona.
  2. lipamanka. "toki pona dictionary". lipamanka.gay.
  3. John E. Clifford. (29 March 2007). "Re: A few questions". Toki Pona Forums. Retrieved 27 November 2023.
  4. Lang, Sonja. (18 July 2021). Toki Pona Dictionary. Illustrated by Vacon Sartirani. Tawhid. ISBN 978-0978292362. p. 265.

Further[edit | edit source]