Stan,
No, Gibraltar, apart from
being the place's English name, is also the correct transliteration of
Гибралтар, its Russian name ("Жибралтар" you suggest doesn't
exist). Cf. Pushkin's line I quoted earlier: От сарскосельских лип до башен
Гибралтара (note the archaic spelling of the adjective царскосельский, "of the
Tsarskoe Selo").
Since you mention the Гамлет/Hamlet opposition,
note that Russian for "hydra" is гидра. It differs only in one letter from the
Гибра part of Гибралтар. On the other hand, гидра differs only in the
closing vowel from гидро-, the Russian equivalent of "hydro-" (cf. "Demon's
former valet [Bouteillan] explained to Van [in his dream] that the 'dor' in the
name of an adored river equaled the corruption of hydro in 'dorophon'":
1.42). A little Russian word golf.
Sorry if I was a bit too hard on you in my previous
postings. But you are misinterpreting my admirable theory in a most
painful way. I'm sorry, but Jansy doesn't seem to understand it
either. Well, apparently only the person who will read my entire in-vino-veritas
article, and will get (I hope) royally drunk on it, will be able to
see what its main idea is (or, to put it in a more Tolstoyan way, will
see that its main idea is the truth-is-in-wine article that gets its reader
drunk).
best,
Alexey