Language Bandit @Languagebandit
Nothing but language facts. You know you want it. Washington, DC Joined September 2009-
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In English, the color orange was named after the fruit. Before the introduction and subsequent popularity of the fruit in Europe, the color was simply referred to as yellow-red or red-yellow.
So there's a particular quirk of English grammar that I've always found quite endearing: the exocentric verb-noun compound agent noun. It appears in a definite, remarkably narrow period - not more than 150, 200 years - before dying out, leaving loads of legacy words in its wake.
The etymological journey of ginger: Sanskrit “srngaveram” -> Prakrit (Middle Indic) “singabera” -> Greek “zingiberis” -> Latin “zingiberi” -> Old French “gingibre” -> Old English “gingiber” (technically, Old English adopted “gingifer” from Latin before readopting from Old French)
The Chinese city of Beijing gets its name from 北 (běi = “north”) and 京 (jīng = “capital”) in Mandarin, meaning the “Northern Capital”
Wikipedia in English defines a crêpe as a thin pancake; French Wikipeda defines a pancake as a thick crêpe
The nautical term “starboard” isn’t related to stars. It comes from Old English steorbord (literally "steer-board”), referring to the side on which a vessel was steered. Ancient ships had a steering oar usually set on the right side of the stern.
Old English speakers called the porpoise “mereswyn” (literally: “sea-hog”), with similar words in other Germanic languages. These may have influenced the creation of Old French “porpais” from “porc” (pig) + “peis” (fish).
The English words “don” and “doff” (for putting on or taking off an article of clothing, respectively) are contractions from the Late Middle Ages of “do on” and “do off”
In Welsh, ⟨dd⟩ represents a voiced dental fricative /ð/ (like ⟨th⟩ in “this”), while ⟨th⟩ represents a voiceless dental fricative /θ/ (like ⟨th⟩ in “thistle”).
The words for green in French, Italian, and Spanish, respectively, are vert, verde, and verde. The words for yellow in French, Italian, and Spanish, respectively, are jaune, giallo, and amarillo.
@Languagebandit The suffix cor is used in a similar way for the Welsh word for prawn/shrimp, which is corgimwch. Cimwch means lobster, so in Welsh, a prawn is just a small lobster.
The Welsh word for dog is “ci” (pronounced like “key”), and the name of the corgi dog breed comes from Welsh for “dwarf dog”
In the Greek alphabet, omicron is in contrast to omega, with the former referring to “little o” (o mikron) and the latter referring to “great o” (o mega). The “micron” part of omicron is related to the prefix “micro-” in English.
Oîda, the Ancient Greek verb for 'I know', is related to its Modern German equivalent weiß. What I hadn't realised until now is that the six forms of the two verbs still mirror each other today - they have longer vowels in the singular, but short vowels in the plural!
In French, to be a blue flower (“fleur bleue”) means to be sentimental, sappy, or naively romantic.
How English got its style (ht: Twinkl ESL @twinklresources): m.youtube.com/watch?v=vryeHr…
Astute minds might wonder why “vaccine” is the same as the Latin word meaning from/of cows. The first vaccinations came from the discovery that smallpox could be prevented by an inoculation of the much milder cowpox virus (variolae vaccinae).
Signing “Black Lives Matter” in ASL latimes.com/california/sto…
@Languagebandit And its Sanskrit cognate is the suffix in Singapore as well as many cities in India.
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Wikipedia in English defines a crêpe as a thin pancake; French Wikipeda defines a pancake as a thick crêpe
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So there's a particular quirk of English grammar that I've always found quite endearing: the exocentric verb-noun compound agent noun. It appears in a definite, remarkably narrow period - not more than 150, 200 years - before dying out, leaving loads of legacy words in its wake.
palisade: A strong fence made of upright posts. Middle French "palissade" < Latin "palus"=stake, wooden post.
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