(23-01-2023, 04:54 AM)Battler wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.For what it's worth, in Spanish, "raro" means both weird/strange and uncommon, same goes for Catalan "rar". Makes me wonder if the same double meaning existed in older German and Dutch as well.
As far as I understand, the word in question here (seldsam) used to have both meanings "strange" and "uncommon" in medieval German. So the best way to translate it in this case is probably up for debate. But I personally think the right choice was made here. "We purchased various rare books" just sounds more plausible than "We purchased various weird books".
Side note, in modern Dutch and English, the notions of "infrequent" and "weird" are separated. A specific type of collectible card may be rare (uncommon), but that does not imply at all that this card is strange. Rarity is like an objective measure, while "weirdness" is more of a personal judgement. You can call your neighbor weird ("raar" in Dutch) because he always wears a bowler hat, but calling him "rare" (English) or "zeldzaam" (Dutch) doesn't make much sense.
Evolutions like in Spanish, where "raro" means both, and in modern German where "seldsam" came to mean "weird" exclusively, are expected though, since rarity and strangeness so often coincide.