Yeah… the dictionary said that, but I’ve never heard of a Narual Historian before. Also, I think that @Luacat said he was a biologist… so I went with that.
このため, - for this reason
もともと - originally
パンダと - panda + と (quotation particle)
よばれていた - called
方に, - no idea! Something to do with turning “small” into “smaller” perhaps?
小さいと - small + と (quotation particle)
いう - 言う, to say; to utter; to declare / to name; to call - I have no idea what this is doing here
いみの - meaning + の
「レッサー」が - lesser + が
つきました - named / attached
For this reason [the animal] originally called “panda” was named “lesser” (which means “small”).
or
For this reason [the animal] originally called “panda” had the word “lesser” (which means “small”) attached.
That looks good to me. I’d gone for Jisho meaning 11 again for 付く tsuku - Jisho.org but I agree that “attached” is probably a better translation, in that the word “lesser” was attached to the original name “panda”.
Apologies if I jumped the gun with my post earlier…
It could still mean “given the name” here depending on how ほうに is translated, so it’s still a strong possibility seeing how it meant that in two previous sentences.
Sorry to be going back a few pages, but I got a bit tangled up in phrasing this sentence and I haven’t seen many posts verifying it:
海で泳ぐとプールよりも少しうまやすいと感じませんか。
Now I’m sure the general gist is that it’s comparing swimming in a pool to being in the Dead Sea, and asking if you get the same ‘feeling’ or ‘sense’ of ease or calm from it - 感じませんか - (Won’t you feel/I wonder if you feel…)
So maybe…
I wonder if it is easier to float in the sea than in a swimming in a pool?
Edit: Corrected translation after marcusp pointed out a typo concerning 「うきやすい」。
As a side note: I hope everyone here had a nice Christmas, if you celebrate it, and Happy New Year to you all.
I’m giving myself a right headache over this one, but as far as I can see the ほうに is identifying the original panda. I might be way off but it seems (from this link and others) that one of the uses of ほうに is to refer to a person (or panda). But I am way out of my depth here!