I learned an interesting French word last night: maille [maj], which means stitch or mesh and appears in such expressions as:
– maille à l’endroit = plain stitch
– maille à l’envers / tombée / coulée = purl stitch
– maille Jersey = stocking stitch
– doublure maille = mesh lining
– maille du tricot = knitting stitch
– maille du crochet = crochet stitch
– à maille serrée = close-woven
– avoir maille à partir = to be in trouble
– avoir maille à partir avec qn = to have a brush with sb
– à mailles fines = with a fine mesh
– passer à travers les mailles du filet = to slip through the net
– cotte de maille(s) = coat of mail; chainmail
Maille comes from the Old French maille (loop, stitch, mesh, link), from Vulgar Latin *macla, from Latin macula (spot, speck, stain; mesh; cell) from From Proto-Italic *smatlo-, from Proto-Indo-European *smh₂tlo- (possibly meaning “wiping”).
The English word mail, as in chainmail, comes from the same root via the Middle English maille (mail armour) the Old French maille.
The English word mail, as in letters and parcels, originally meant a bag or wallet, and came to mean a bag containing letters to be delivered by post, and then the letters themselves. It comes from the Middle English male, from the Anglo-Norman male, Old French male (bag, wallet), from the Frankish *malha (bag), from the Proto-Germanic *malhō (bag, pouch), from the Proto-Indo-European *molko- (leather pouch).
*molko- is also the root of the French words malle (large suitcase, trunk) and mallette (briefcase); and the Spanish mala (suitcase, mailbag, mail, post), and maleta (suitcase).
Mail (letters) in French is (le) courrier and the postal service is la poste. Email is officially courriel or courrier électronique, though many people use e-mail. Courrier is borrowed from the Italian corriere (messenger, courier), from correre (to run, hurry, rush), from the Latin currere, from currō (to run, hurry), from Proto-Italic *korzō (to run), from Proto-Indo-European *ḱers- (to run), also the root of the English words courier and current.
Sources: Reverso, Wiktionary
French also uses the loanword “mail” to mean email specifically. This is a homograph of the existing but not-so-common word “mail” (pronounced à la française of course), which I think is an old-fashioned word for hammer, presumably cognate with “mallet”. Meanwhile, the addition of an acute accent to “email” gives “émail” meaning “enamel”. 🙂