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belaga or bela

by AcidRain, October 15, 2011

Messages: 18

Language: English

AcidRain (User's profile) October 15, 2011, 6:15:02 AM

what is the difference in meanings of belega and bela doesn't both mean pretty or beautiful?

thank you.

RiotNrrd (User's profile) October 15, 2011, 7:15:20 AM

Belega is more so.

Timtim (User's profile) October 15, 2011, 7:40:53 AM

Belega is the same as ege bela, but combined into one word. It means that one has gone from simply beautiful to really beautiful, intensifying the meaning.

You're at leisure to use either; no-one would ever be able to say "No, you should have used bela not belega there."

ceigered (User's profile) October 15, 2011, 8:02:20 AM

I like to think of "ega" as another class up from something.

So "bela" = beautiful, "belega" = the next level of beauty.

So something can be "tre bela", but not "belega" - "it's very beautiful, but not beautiful enough to be classed as a higher level of beauty".

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(So there's some overlap available)

sudanglo (User's profile) October 15, 2011, 9:36:20 AM

'Bela' is in my estimation closer to English's 'pretty' or 'attractive' or 'handsome' than English's 'beautiful', which seems to me to be reserved for outstanding examples of pulchritude - at least when describing people.

Bela is also used in Esperanto to approve of something in cases where we wouldn't use 'beautiful' at all in English.

Bela vetero. I might be translated as 'lovely weather' - 'Unu belan tagon .. ' as 'One fine day..'.

More problematic is the meaning of 'beleta'.

Kalantir (User's profile) October 15, 2011, 6:39:01 PM

I've been using bela as pretty and belega as beautiful. But if bela can mean pretty or beautiful, I would assume belega to mean gorgeous. Of course, this is all asuming that other people put these words in the same order on the attractiveness scale as I do. This is how I see it.

cute
pretty
beautiful
gorgeous

Obviously there are plenty of other words that can fit in this category, but those are easily the most popular.

UUano (User's profile) October 15, 2011, 7:06:11 PM

sudanglo:Bela is also used in Esperanto to approve of something in cases where we wouldn't use 'beautiful' at all in English.

Bela vetero. I might be translated as 'lovely weather' - 'Unu belan tagon .. ' as 'One fine day..'.

More problematic is the meaning of 'beleta'.
I usually see it like this:

beleta < bela < belega
pretty < beautiful < gorgeous

And “beautiful” would be just fine a translation of “bela” for each of the examples provided – at least here in the US.

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UUano (User's profile) October 15, 2011, 7:08:16 PM

Having said that...beleta just seems (to me) inherently pejorative. Or condescending, as in - oh, isn't that "cute".

But I'm probably reading something into the word that isn't necessarily there.

Kalantir (User's profile) October 15, 2011, 7:21:39 PM

UUano:Having said that...beleta just seems (to me) inherently pejorative. Or condescending, as in - oh, isn't that "cute".

But I'm probably reading something into the word that isn't necessarily there.
I imagine the way these types of words are interpreted probably varies slightly from person to person. I think of beleta as meaning mildly attractive or slightly better than average looking or even cute.

I would probably use it when talking about someone or something to another person, but I probably wouldn't tell a girl she is beleta because that would probably be slightly offensive (Would you tell your girlfriend she's cute? or would you tell her she's beautiful/very pretty/gorgeous?).

sudanglo (User's profile) October 16, 2011, 1:28:09 PM

'Beleta' is to damn with faint praise.

If not actually perjorative, I can't see it as complimentary. Therefore it is certainly not the equivalent of 'pretty'.

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