‘Hanta’ Means ‘Full of Shit’ in Israeli Slang

The ‘hanta’ in ‘hantavirus’ is named after the river (the Hantan River) in South Korea where it was first discovered in the 1970s, but the word also has another meaning.

In Hebrew, the language of religious authority, ‘hanta’ means something quite different: a hoax, a lie, a scam or utter nonsense. Not in official usage, but in Israeli or Hebrew street language or slang.

The word originally derives from the Hebrew root for mummification or preservation, but has developed metaphorically to mean something that is artificial or contrived. The original word from the biblical and Hebrew root for embalming, seasoning or preserving a corpse is chanat (חָנַט).

At least, that is what Google’s AI Gemini tells us.

In my view, the metaphor of ‘spicing up a corpse’ continues to mean attributing a cause of death. It involves a linguistic—and perhaps also a concrete, physical—‘spicing up’ achieved through deception. It is further linked to the power that generally lies in attributing causes of death.

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