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chuntian hai’er lian, yi tian bian san bian (Chinese)

spring weather is like a child’s face, changing three times a day

And the forecast is …

Despite our obsession with the weather, the English language doesn’t cover all the bases when it comes to precise observations of the natural world …

serein (French) fine rain falling from a cloudless sky

imbat (Turkish) a daytime summer sea breeze ‘inapoiri (Cook Islands Maori) a moonless night

wamadat (Persian) the intense heat of a still, sultry night

gumusservi (Turkish) moonlight shining on water

tojji (Tulu, India) the scum of water collected into bubbles

efterarsfarver (Danish) autumn colours

… though, inevitably, there are some local phenomena that we have to struggle harder to imagine:

wilikoi (Hawaiian) substances that are gathered up in the centre of a whirlwind

isblink (Swedish) the luminous appearance of the horizon caused by reflection from ice

Meteorological metaphors

Our descriptions of the weather often use metaphors, such as raining cats and dogs, but some languages use the weather itself as the metaphor:

Schnee von gestern (German) yesterday’s snow (water under the bridge)

huutaa tuuleen (Finnish) to shout to the wind (to do something that has no use)

aven solen har fläckar (Swedish) even the sun has got spots (no one is perfect)

snést někomu modré z nebe (Czech) to bring the blue down from the sky for someone (do anything to please them)

chap phar kah chap jil pa chu kha ray (Dzongkha, Bhutan) the rain falls yonder, but the drops strike here (indirect remarks hit the target)

xihuitl barq (Arabic) lightning without a downpour (a disappointment, a disillusionment or an unkept promise)

Those words for snow

The number of different Inuit words for snow has been the subject of endless debate, few people taking into account the fact that the now-offensive group name ‘Eskimo’ (from the French Esquimaux, derived from North American Algonquian and literally meaning ‘eaters of raw flesh’) covers a number of different language areas: Inuit in Greenland and Canada, Yupik in Eastern Siberia and Aleut in Alaska. Here is a selection of words for snow from some Inuit languages:

snow, kaniktshaq; no snow, aputaitok; to snow, qanir, qanunge, qanugglir; snowy weather, nittaatsuq, qannirsuq; to get fine snow or rain particles, kanevcir; first falling, apingaut; light falling, qannialaag; wet and falling, natatgo naq; in the air, falling, qaniit; feathery clumps of falling snow, qanipalaat; air thick with snow, nittaalaq; rippled surface of snow, kaiyuglak; light, deep enough for walking, katik-sugnik; fresh without any ice, kanut; crusty, sillik; soft for travelling, mauyasiorpok; soft and deep where snowshoes are needed for travel, taiga; powder, nutagak; salty, pokaktok; wind-beaten, upsik; fresh, nutaryuk; packed, aniu; sharp, panar; crusty that breaks under foot, karakartanaq; rotten, slush on sea, qinuq; best for building an igloo, pukaan-gajuq; glazed in a thaw, kiksrukak; watery, mangokpok; firm (the easiest to cut, the warmest, the preferred), pukajaw; loose, newly fallen which cannot be used as it is, but can provide good building material when compacted, ariloqaq; for melting into water, aniuk; that a dog eats, aniusarpok; that can be broken through, mauya; floating on water, qanisqineq; for building, auverk; on clothes, ayak; beaten from clothes, tiluktorpok; much on clothes, aputainnarowok; crust, pukak; cornice, formation about to collapse, navcaq; on the boughs of trees, qali; blown indoors, sullarniq; snowdrift overhead and about to fall, mavsa; snowdrift that blocks something, kimaugruk; smoky drifting snow, siqoq; arrow-shaped snowdrift, kaluto-ganiq; newly drifting snow, akelrorak; space between drifts and obstruction, anamana, anymanya; snowstorm, pirsuq, pirsirsursuaq, qux; violent snowstorm, igadug; blizzard, pirta, pirtuk; avalanche, sisuuk, aput sisurtuq; to get caught in an avalanche, navcite.

There are also a large number of Inuit words for ice, covering everything from icicles through ‘solidly frozen slush’