yvanspijk

yvanspijk, 3 months ago to random

The Proto-Germanic ancestor of 'thing' and its cognates 'ding', 'ting' etc. meant "folk assembly".

The Latin ancestor of French 'chose', Spanish and Italian 'cosa' etc. meant "legal case".

Both words underwent a series of meaning shifts that resulted in the meanings "matter; thing".

Here's how:

yvanspijk, 7 months ago to random

Yesterday I tooted about horse words.

"But what about 'horse', German 'Pferd', French 'cheval', Spanish 'caballo'?" people asked.

These words have their own histories. I'll summarise them below.

1. 'Horse' stems from Proto-Germanic *hursan/*hrussan, which also became Dutch 'ros', German 'Ross', and Icelandic 'hross'. This Proto-Germanic word may stem from Proto-Indo-European *ḱr̥sós (vehicle), which also became Latin 'currus' (chariot) and - via Proto-Celtic *karros - 'carrus', whence ... 1/

yvanspijk, 23 days ago to random

Why is 'laugh' written with -ugh while it ends with an [f] sound?

It's because the spelling 'laugh' reflects how the word was pronounced in Late Middle English, some 500 years ago.

Click the video to listen to a phonetic reconstruction of how this verb evolved from 3rd-century BC Proto-Germanic to modern-day Standard English.

The Middle English to Early Modern English stages are based on the dialect of the region of London.

video/mp4

yvanspijk, 2 months ago to random

The word 'bone' has the same origin as German 'Bein', Dutch 'been', and Swedish 'ben', which mean both "bone" and "leg".

These nouns are thought to stem from an adjective meaning "straight". It lives on in Icelandic 'beinn' and Norwegian 'be(i)n' (straight; right).

Here's more:

yvanspijk, 8 months ago to random

There are many words for women in the Germanic languages.

In their history, some underwent amelioration: their meaning became more positive. The ancestor of 'queen' just meant "wife".

Others underwent pejoration. Calling someone a 'wijf' in Dutch is now an insult.

Here's more:

yvanspijk, 4 months ago to random

Homophones are words that are pronounced the same as another word but differ in meaning.

If they are spelled differently as well, they're also heterographs.

yvanspijk, 4 months ago to random

Why is 1/60 of a minute called a 'second', just like the ordinal number that goes with 'two'?

It's because a second is the second subdivision of an hour, a minute being the first.

The word 'minute' in turn simply comes from the Latin word for "small (part)".

Here's the entire story:

yvanspijk, 7 months ago to random

Hoe zeg je 'blijf je' in jouw Brabants? Die vraag werd in het Noord-Brabant van de jaren 30 op wel 11 manieren beantwoord: van het Hollands-achtige 'blaif je' in de Westhoek via 'blèèfde' rond Tilburg tot het Limburgs-achtige 'bliefde' in het Land van Cuijk.

Hieronder zie je een bewerking van een kaart uit 1937.

yvanspijk, 10 months ago to random

Tussendoortaalweetje:

We schrijven de slot-n daar waar hij van oudsher hoort ('rijden', 'open', 'zaken', 'gouden') - behalve in verkleinwoorden!

Ja, ooit was het 'meisjen', 'bedjen' en 'straatjen'.

Toen de -n nauwelijks nog werd uitgesproken, werd hij in verkleinwoorden
niet meer gespeld, maar in woorden als 'rijden', 'open', 'zaken' en 'gouden' bleef hij gehandhaafd - en let wel: niet omdat hij daarin langer uitgesproken bleef of zo.

Daarmee komen we bij de onbenulligheid van ... 1/

yvanspijk, 9 months ago to random

After 2500 years, by utter coincidence, the second person plural pronoun in certain dialects of English is back at square one:
'yous' just happens to sound nearly identical to its Proto-Germanic ancestor *jūz.

Click the video to hear how after many wanderings it got there:

video/mp4

yvanspijk, 9 months ago to random

The words 'cherries', 'peas', 'skates', and 'assets' used to be singular forms.

However, they were reanalysed as plurals because they sounded like plurals. New singulars were created by removing the -s.

This linguistic phenomenon is called back-formation.

Here's how it went:

yvanspijk, 6 months ago to random

'Lady' stems from a compound meaning "bread kneader".

It consisted of West Germanic *hlaeb (bread), the ancestor of 'loaf', and *daigijā (kneader), a derivation of *daig, the ancestor of 'dough'.

In Old English it had become 'hlǣfdiġe', meaning "mistress of the household".

Hear how it changed in 2500 years:

video/mp4

yvanspijk, 11 months ago to random

In the Early Middle Ages, the ancestor of French borrowed many words from Old Frankish, a Germanic language spoken by the elite of the Frankish Empire.

When this elite adopted the Romance language, it got their name: 'françois', now 'français': French.

Here are some of the borrowings:

yvanspijk, 6 months ago to random

Dutch 'zolder' (attic) and 'solarium' (sunbed) are doublets: they both stem from Latin 'sōlārium'.

'Zolder' was inherited from an early Proto-Germanic borrowing from spoken Latin.

'Solarium' was borrowed from written Latin, via English.

Number 9 in my series: Dutch doublets from Latin.

yvanspijk, 8 months ago to random

Pronouncing 'restaurant' as 'restrant' is an example of syncope: an unstressed vowel is deleted from the interior of a word, taking its syllable with it.

The Romans did this a lot too.

'Calidus' (hot) became 'caldus' as early as the 1st c. BCE. It's 'caldus' that birthed French 'chaud' and Italian 'caldo'.

Here are more examples:

yvanspijk, 8 months ago to random

If you dissect the French adverb 'aujourd'hui' (today) etymologically, you get five Latin words: 'ad illud diurnum dē hodiē' (on the day of today).

Many more Romance adverbs and prepositions were formed by combining words, already in spoken Latin or later in the history of its daughter languages.

In the infographic you see a number of stacked words that have an interesting history.

yvanspijk, 7 months ago to random

Romanian 'femeie' (woman) and 'familie' (family) are doublets: they both stem from Latin 'familiam'.

'Femeie' was inherited from spoken Latin. It underwent the sound changes that turned Latin into Romanian.

'Familie' was borrowed from written Latin.

Number 6 in my series: Romanian doublets!

yvanspijk, 1 year ago to random

Standard French has a two-part negation:
'Il NE vient PAS.' (He doesn't come.)

However, colloquial French often drops 'ne', thereby returning to the Old French situation: a single negation word.

The same thing actually happened in English and other languages, such as German and Dutch.

This series of changes even has a name: Jespersen's Cycle. Here's more:

yvanspijk, 9 months ago to random

In het Jeugdjournaal gebruikt een meisje het vragend bijwoord 'hoezo' in een afhankelijke vraagzin:

'Dus hoezo gaat Prime dan eruit?'

• 'Omdat daar veel meer in zit dan in andere energiedrankjes.'
  'Aha! Ja, dan snap ik wel hoezo 't weggaat.'

Benieuwd of we dat vaker gaan horen!

Uitleg:
'Hoezo' is ontstaan als zelfstandig zinnetje ('Hoe (komt dat) zo?') en ontwikkelt zich tot volwaardig vraagwoord.

Stap 1, die allang achter de rug is, zien we in zin 1 van het meisje hierboven.

Stap 2 ... 1/

yvanspijk, 6 months ago to random

Galician 'palabra' (word) and 'parábola' (parable; parabola) are doublets: they both stem from Latin 'parabolam'.

'Palabra' was inherited from spoken Latin. It underwent the sound changes that turned Latin into Galician.

'Parábola' was borrowed from written Latin.

Number 7 in my series: Galician doublets!

yvanspijk, 6 months ago to random

'Lord' stems from Proto-Germanic *hlaibawardaz: "bread guardian".

This compound consists of two words:

• *hlaibaz, the ancestor of 'loaf'.
• *wardaz, which meant "guardian" and became English 'ward'.

Hear how over the course of 2500 years, its four syllables turned into one:

video/mp4

yvanspijk, 10 months ago to random

'Rich' stems from a Celtic word meaning "king".

This word, *rīxs, a cousin of Latin 'rēx', was first borrowed into Germanic.

Next, an adjective meaning "powerful; wealthy" was derived from it. It was this word that eventually became 'rich'.

Click the image to learn more:

yvanspijk, 1 year ago to random

The word 'very' comes from Old French 'verai', which became 'vrai' (true; real) in Modern French.

These words ultimately stem from Latin 'vērus', which has the same ancestor as German 'wahr' and Dutch 'waar' (true; real).

Had it survived, their Old English cognate 'wǣr' (which has only been attested once) would've become *wair in Modern English.

yvanspijk, 9 months ago to random

Sometimes you lend something which is then returned in an unrecognisable state.

That's what happened to reborrowings, words that traveled to another language and then back to the originating language in a different form and with a different meaning.

Two images, eight examples:

image/png

yvanspijk, 2 months ago to random

'Foreign' is etymologically related to 'door'.

'Foreign' stems from Popular Latin *forānus (outsider), a derivation of Latin 'forīs' (outside).

It got its silent G because people believed it had something to do with 'reign'.

Latin 'forīs' is a cousin of 'door'. Here's more: