英语翻译

大意翻译如下：

Walking on the streets, has anyone been curious about the origins of the names of the places in Taiyuan City, for example, the names of some road, some street, some alleyway and some building which we are quite familiar with? I think we can learn a lot about the history of Taiyuan City from those names by studying their origins. I have written an article about the names of the places in Taiyuan City, telling how the names emerged, to introduce the history and culture of Taiyuan City.

The famous "Weeping Willow Alleyway"

Zhu Yuanzhang, the first emperor of Ming Dynasty(1368-1644), ordered his men to battle the Yuan(1206-1368) army in north. His aim was to destroy the enemy's millitary center -- the old Taiyuan City. Taiyuan City had a high city wall and a deep city moat at that time, which provided the Yuan army with good protection and also caused the Yuan army to be relaxed. The Ming army general Chang Yuchun disguised himself as a woodman and went into the Taiyuan City in order to know more about the enemy. What was beyond expection was that Chang Yuchun was dicovered by the enemy for he had been traced by a Yuan spy. Hardly had he walked across the Qiaotou Street outside the east gate of the old Taiyuan City and gone into the Zhaoxi Gate(the city gate) when the Yuan soilders came to surround him. General Chang fought with the soilders, escaped and ran into a alleyway below the city wall. He hid himself in a humble yard in the alleyway.

In this humble yard lived an elderly widdow whose surname was Liu. (Liu is also the name of weeping willow in Chinese) Liu's husband had beed killed by the Yuan army years ago. Her son had also been caught by the Yuan army and never returned. She hated the ruler of the Yuan Dynasty so much. When Liu saw the woodman was chased by the Yuan soilders, she really had symphathy for him. She hid Chang Yuchun, the general, in the piles of wood in the backyard before the Yuan soilders came and then she pretended to be deaf and dumb and tricked the soilders.

General Chang was saved. He was truely grateful to the elderly lady for saving his life. Before he left, he picked a branch of the weeping willow growing in the yard and gave it to Liu and said,"Old mama, war is coming. Attach this on the front door and the Ming soilders will try their best to protect you."

A few days later, the Ming army began to attack the Taiyuan City just as what the general had said. Liu saw the war breaking out. She was worried about her neighbours; therefore, she told them to attach a branch of weeping willow on their doors. Soon, the Ming army got the charge of the whole city because general Chang had known the details of the enemy and had arranged some people inside the city. When the Ming soilders went into the city, they followed the general's order to protect the citizens who had a branch of weeping willow on their doors.

After the war, the neighbours thanked Liu a lot. In order to mark the renascence of Taiyuan City, the neighbours put the branches into the soil. The branches grew up as time passed by. Year after year, weeping willows stand in the alleyway and become green in the right season. They have beautiful figures and bring shadows to people there. Because of this, the alleyway got a beautiful name "weeping willow alleyway".

分析：

1、the names of some road, some street, some alleyway and some building这里的很多个some都表示“某个”的意思，后面跟单数名词。

2、“先说众所周知的柳巷”这句话在译文中作为一个小标题译出。

3、“柳巷”的翻译。“柳”在这里有两个所指，一指柳氏，二指巷中的柳，所以在翻译时既可以翻译成“Weeping Willow Alleyway”又可以翻译成“Liu Alleyway”。但是根据故事内容，我认为要翻译成前者，因为主要还是因为巷中的美丽柳影才使小巷得名的。

4、翻译时如果遇到朝代，要标出其年份，如Ming Dynasty(1368-1644)等等。

5、In this humble yard lived an elderly widdow whose surname was Liu. (Liu is also the name of weeping willow in Chinese)注意这里括号中的补充说明。

6、柳氏在文章中经常是主语，所以直接用Liu来指代她，如第四节所示。