I discovered today that in Romanian a bookworm (a keen reader) is un şoarece de bibliotecă (a library mouse), which I rather like, being a bit of a bookworm / library mouse myself.
In French there is a simliar term for a bookworm – rat de bibliothèque (library rat), and in German voracious reader or bookworm is known as a Leseratte (reading rat), and in Spanish the equivalent is ratón de biblioteca (library mouse).
Are there interesting words for bookworm in other languages?
Today I saw a post on Facebook asking why words for horse are so different in languages like English and German, so I thought I’d investigate.
In English horse-related words include horse, stallion (male horse), mare (female horse), foal (young horse), filly (young female horse), colt (young male horse), pony (a small breed of horse), palfrey (a small horse with a smooth, ambling gait) and equine (a horse or horse-like animal; related to horses).
Horse comes from the Middle English horse / hors, from the Old English hors (horse), from the Proto-Germanic *hrussą (horse), from the Proto-Indo-European *ḱr̥sos (horse), from Proto-Indo-European *ḱers- (to run) [source]. This is also the root of the Proto-Celtic word *karros (wagon), from which we get the Latin currus (chariot, wagon), and the English words car, cart and chariot, and related words in other languages.
Stallion comes from the Middle English stalion, from the Middle French estalon and is of Germanic origin [source].
Mare comes from the Middle English mare / mere, from the Old English mere / miere (female horse, mare), from the Proto-Germanic *marhijō (female horse) [source].
Foal comes from the Middle English fole, from the Old English fola, from the Proto-Germanic *fulô, from the Proto-Indo-European *pōlH- (animal young) [source]
Filly comes from the Old Norse fylja [source].
Colt comes from the Old English colt (young donkey, young camel), from the Proto-Germanic *kultaz (plump; stump; thick shape, bulb), from the Proto-Indo-European *gelt- (something round, pregnant belly, child in the womb), from *gel- (to ball up, amass) [source].
Pony comes from the Scots powny, from the Middle French poulenet (little foal), from the Late Latin pullanus (young of an animal), from pullus (foal) [source].
Palfrey comes from the Anglo-Norman palefrei (steed), from the Old French palefroi, from the Late Latin paraverēdus (post horse, spare horse) [source].
Equine comes from the Latin equīnus (of or pertaining to horses), from equus (horse) [source].
The equivalent words in other European languages include:
Germanic languages
| German | Dutch | Danish | Norwegian | Swedish | Icelandic | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| horse | Pferd | Paard | hest | hest | häst | hestur |
| stallion | Hengst | hengst | hingst | hingst | hingst | graðhestur |
| mare | Stute | merrie | hoppe | hoppe | sto märr |
hryssa |
| foal | Fohlen | veulen | føl | føll fole |
föl | folald |
The German word Pferd and the Dutch paard come from the Middle High German phert / pherit / pferift (riding horse), from the Old High German pherit / pfarifrit / parafred, from the Late Latin paraverēdus (substitute post horse) [source], from para-, from the Ancient Greek παρά (from, by, near) & verēdus (a fast or light breed of horse), from the Proto-Celtic *uɸorēdos (horse) [source], *uɸo- (under) & *rēdo- (to ride; riding, chariot), from the Proto-Indo-European *(H)reydʰ- (to ride) [source].
The words hengst and hingst come from the Proto-Indo-European *ḱanḱest- / *kankest- (horse), which is also the root of the Welsh, Cornish and Breton words for mare, and of the Old English word for horse or stallion, hengest.
Romance / Italic languages
| French | Italian | Romanian | Spanish | Portuguese | Latin | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| horse | cheval | cavallo | cal | caballo | cavalo | equus |
| stallion | étalon | stalone | armăsar | padrillo | garanhão | celo |
| mare | jument | giumenta cavalla |
iapă | yegua | égua | equa |
| foal | poulain | puldero | mânz | potro | potro | equuleus equulus pullus vitulus |
In Latin there was another word for horse – caballus, which was only used in poetry in Classical Latin, and was the normal word for horse in Late and Vulgar Latin. It possibly comes from the Gaulish caballos [source]. This is also the root of the English words cavalry, cavalier, cavalcade and chivalry,
The word equus comes from the Proto-Italic *ekwos, from the Proto-Indo-European *h₁éḱwos (horse) [source].
Celtic languages
| Breton | Cornish | Welsh | Irish | Manx | Scottish Gaelic | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| horse | marc’h | margh | ceffyl | capall | cabbyl | each |
| stallion | marc’h | margh | march stalwyn |
stail | collagh grihder |
greadhair |
| mare | kazeg | kasek | caseg | láir | laair | làir |
| foal | ebeul | ebel | ebol | searrach | sharragh | searrach |
The Scottish Gaelic word for horse, each, comes from the
Old Irish ech (horse), from Proto-Celtic *ekʷos (horse), from the Proto-Indo-European *h₁éḱwos (horse), which is also the root of the Breton, Cornish and Welsh words for foal.
The Breton marc’h (horse), the Cornish margh (horse) and the Welsh march (stallion) come from the Proto-Brythonic *marx (horse), from Proto-Celtic *markos (horse), from the Proto-Indo-European *márkos (horse). [source]. This is also the root of the Irish marcaigh (to ride), the Scottish Gaelic marcaich (to ride), and the Manx markiagh (to ride).
You can find more about Celtic words for horse on my Celtiadur blog
Slavic languages
| Bulgarian | Czech | Polish | Russian | Serbian | Slovak | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| horse | кон | kůň | kón konno |
лошадь | коњ | kôň |
| stallion | жребец | hřebec | ogier rumak |
конь жеребец |
жребец | žrebec |
| mare | кобила | klisna | klacz kobyła |
кобыла | кобила | kobyla |
| foal | жребец | hříbě | źrebak | жеребёнок | фоал | žriebä |
The Russian word for horse, лошадь, is a borrowing from a Turkic language, probably Tatar [source].
The other Slavic words for horse come from the Proto-Slavic konjь (horse), of unceratin origin [source].
Other European languages
| Latvian | Lithuanian | Albanian | Greek | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| horse | zirgs | arklys | kalë | άλογο ίππος |
| stallion | ērze | erelis | hamshor | επιβήτορα |
| mare | ķēve | kumelė | merak | φοράδα |
| foal | kumeļi | kumeliukas | pjellë | πουλάρι |
Sources: Reverso, Linguee, bab.la, Google Translate
Yesterday I say a post in the Silly Linguistics Community on Facebook challenging people to write a sentence in all the languages they speak. This is what I came up with:
Tha e duilich writing une phrase ym mhob språk atá agam, pero ich 試試 red ennagh symoil を書く, kaj nun я хочу říct že il mio tomo tawa supa está cheio de țipari.
This means “It is difficult writing a sentence in every language I speak, but I will try to write something interesting, and now I want to say my hovercraft is full of eels”.
The languages, in order, are Scottish Gaelic, English, French, Welsh, Swedish, Irish, Spanish, German, Chinese, Manx, Japanese, Esperanto, Russian, Czech, Italian, Toki Pona, Portuguese and Romanian.
It’s not the best sentence ever, perhaps, but I enjoyed the challenge of putting it together. It also got me thinking about how many languages and writing systems I could use in a version of my motto “one language is never enough“. This motto appears on some versions of my logo, such as the one above, and I usually try to write it in several difficult languages.
Here are some versions I came up with today. The first version incorporates some of the languages I speak and am learning, plus a few others.
Une singură 语言 är nikdy недостаточно – languages = French, Romanian, Chinese, Swedish, Czech / Slovak, Russian.
Ett seule 言語 ist nunca yn ddigon – languages = Norwegian / Swedish, French, Japanese, German, Portuguese / Galician / Spanish, Welsh.
Jeden lingua er niemals suficiente – languages = Czech / Polish / Slovak / Rusyn, Asturian / Chamorro / Corsican / Galician / Italian / Latin / Sicilian / Interlingua, Danish / Faroese / Icelandic / Norwegian, German, Spanish / Asturian.
Can you incorporate more languages and/or writing systems into this phrase?
In English you could say that you know a person, a place, a language or a fact. You could also talking about knowing about things, knowing of people, knowing how to do things, knowing hardship, knowing what’s what, knowing the ropes, and so on.
In Welsh to say you know a person or place you use adnabod or nabod. For exmple Dw i’n ei nabod nhw yn dda (I know them well), Wyt ti’n nabod Caerdydd? (Do you know Cardiff?).
When talking about knowing a fact you use gwybod. For example, Mae hi’n gwybod popeth (She knows everything), Dan ni’n gwybod tipyn bach am weu (We know a little about knitting).
In some cases you can use nabod and gwybod to show how well you know something. If you say Dw i’n nabod y gân ‘ma (I know this song), you mean that you are familiar with it, but can’t necessarily sing it. If you say Dw i’n gwybod y gân ‘ma it means you it well.
There are quite a few ways to say ‘I don’t know’ in Welsh: Dydw i ddim yn gwybod, Dw i ddim yn gwybod, Dwi’m gwybod, Sa i’n gwybod, Wn i ddim, ‘Dwn i ddim, and apparently in Bala they saw Wmbo.
To know how to do something is also medru, e.g. Mae o’n medru darllen (He can/knows how to read), and to not know how to do something is methu, e.g Dw i’n methu siarad Basceg eto (I can’t / don’t know how to speak Basque yet), at least in North Wales. In South Wales they say Mae e’n gallu darllen and Dw i ddim gallu siarad Basceg eto.
Irish equivalents of the above Welsh examples are:
– Tá aithne maith agam acu = I know them well
– An bhfuil tú eolach ar Chaerdydd? = Do you know Cardiff?
– Tá a fhios aici gach rud = She knows everything
– Tá beagán eolas againn faoi chniotáil = We know a little about knitting
– Tá a fhios agam an t-amhrán seo = I know (of) this song
– Tá an amhráin seo ar eolas agam = I know this song (well)
– Níl a fhios agam = I don’t know
– Is féidir leis léamh = He can read
– Níl Bascais agam go fóill / Níl mé abalta Bascais a labhairt go fóill / Ní féídir liom Bascais a labhairt go fóill = I don’t / can’t speak Basque yet
The other Celtic languages have various ways to express knowing, as do quite a few other languages, such as French, Spanish, German, etc.
Incidentally, when asked which languages you ‘know’? How do you answer? At what level would you say that you ‘know’ a language?
Sources: Geiriadur Yr Academi, WordReference.com, Reverso, fócloir.ie
Corrections are always welcome if I’ve made any mistakes.
Here some nice examples of pictures made from words that illustrates interesting idioms in a variety of languages. I really like the way they’re done.
Idioms that get lost in translation, courtesy of Expedia.com
English is a bit of a mongrel. It is basically a West Germanic language, but contains words from many other languages, especially French, Latin, Greek and Old Norse. In fact, only about 26% of English vocabulary is Germanic, 29% is from French, 29% from Latin, 6% from Greek, and the rest from many other languages [source].
When English borrows words from other languages, which it does all the time, most people see the process as a positive one that expands and enriches English vocabulary.
There will always be some who object to the adoption of certain words, however, within a few generations, or even a few years, those words can become fully integrated in the language, and people might not even be aware they were borrowed in the first place.
Japanese is also open and accepting of foreign words, mainly from Chinese and English. These loan words are changed to fit Japanese phonetics, and some are shortened and combined to make original new words, such as リモコン (rimokon) = remote control, and オープンカー (ōpun-kā) = convertible car.
Borrowing between languages is common around the world where languages come into contact. The borrowing often flows from large languages, like English or Spanish, into smaller languages, such as regional, minority and endangered languages.
When smaller languages borrow from bigger languages, some believe the smaller languages suffer in the process, becoming corrupted, impoverished, polluted, etc. Such sentiments are much less common when talking about borrowing from smaller languages into bigger languages.
There seems to be a double standard here.
Borrowing will happen, even though language regulators, such as the Académie française, might object and try to stop it. Languages change and influence one another. They can borrow many words from other languages without losing their identity, and without breaking down into incomprehensible grunts.
What do you think?
Do languages benefit from borrowing?
The Polyglot Conference is over now for another year, and I arrived back to Bangor yesterday. Although the conference only lasted two days, a lot was packed into that time.
On the Friday I went on a Golden Circle tour with two coach loads of other polyglots. Unfortunately it was a wet, cloudy and cold day, so the views were not great, but the landscape we could see was rather fine.
The first stop was Þingvellir (Thingvellir), a World Heritage Site where the North American and Eurasian tectonic plates meet. It is also where the Iceland parliament (Alþingi) met from AD 930 until 1798.
Next we went to Geysir, and area of volcanic activity with a number of sprouting hot springs, including the famous Great Geysir, which is currently inactive, and Stokkur, which erupts every few minutes (see photo below). We also had lunch here – there are a number of eating places and souvenir shops in the complex near the hot springs. I was expecting the whole place to stink of sulphur, but it didn’t really.
Our final stop was Gullfoss (“Golden Falls”), waterfalls in the canyon of Ölfusá river. They were spectacular, and well worth seeing.
In the evening, after we arrived back in Reykajvik, I went for dinner at an Indian restaurant with a few other polyglots.
The conference started on Saturday morning with interesting speeches by Dr Sebastian Drude, the director of the Vigdís International Centre for Multilingualism and Intercultural Understanding, and Vigdís Finnbogadóttir, the former President of Iceland and UNESCO Goodwill Ambassador for languages.
Then there were talks on a variety of topics, with themes including Icelandic language and culture, bilingualism and autism, and maintaining ‘small’ languages. Some of the speakers were lecturers or researchers in universities, others were language enthusiasts. The talks I found most interesting were the one by Daniel Tammet and Sigriður Kristinsdóttir about how he learnt Icelandic in a week with her help; one about bilingualism and autism, one about the cognitive effects of language learning, and one about Mongolian.
There was plenty of time between the talks and at lunch to catch up with old friends, meet new ones and practise languages. During my time in Iceland, I had conversations in English, Welsh, French, German, Spanish, Italian, Russian, Mandarin, Japanese and Irish, and spoke bits of Czech, Scottish Gaelic, Breton, Manx, Swedish and Icelandic.
Lunch was provided – small sandwiches and wraps, though didn’t appeal to me, so I bought something else in a supermarket.
There weren’t any organised activities in the evenings, as there are at the Polyglot Gatherings. Instead babbles of polyglots went off to do their own thing. I went for dinner with some polyglot friends and had very interesting discussions about all sorts of things, not all of which were related to languages – we do have other interests.
The next Polyglot Conference will be in Ljubljana in Slovenia from 5-7 October 2018 (as you might have guessed from this photo). So next year I will learn some Slovenian before the conference in Ljubljana, and some Slovak before the Polyglot Gathering in Bratislava in Slovakia.
On Monday I did some work on Omniglot in the morning, explored Reykjavik a bit, had lunch in a restaurant in the old harbour area of Reykjavik, did some more work, then explored a bit more with the two Russian teachers who were staying in the same place as me.
Iceland is a very expensive place, which I expected. Meals in restaurants cost at least twice as much as in the UK, as do most other things. It wasn’t as cold as I expected – about 7-10°C during the day and 2-5°C at night. All the locals I met speak very good English, but if you speak Icelandic, they’re happy to speak it with you. There are apparently quite a few people who have moved to Iceland recently for work, most don’t speak Icelandic. On a clear, dry day, the scenery is spectacular. Even on grey, wet days, it’s still impressive and dramatic.
There are some more photos on Flickr:
Yesterday evening I went to Café Lingua – lifandi tungumál at the University of Iceland / Háskóli Íslands. It’s a regular meet-up for language enthusiasts, and last night there were a lot of extra people there who are in Reykjavik for the Polyglot Conference. It was great to see lots of familiar faces, and to meet new people.
I had conversations in English, Welsh, Irish and Mandarin, and spoke odd bits of Italian, Spanish, Portuguese, Cantonese, Swedish, Icelandic, Czech, Russian, Finnish and French. Other languages were available.
Today I’m going on a Golden Circle tour with other Polyglot Conference participants.
What’s the connecting between the words filibuster and freebooter?
The answer is, they both come from the same Dutch word vrijbuiter [ˈvrɛi̯bœy̯tər] (plunderer, robber), from vrij (free), buit (booty) and -er (agent suffix).
A freebooter as originally “an adventurer who pillages, plunders or wages ad-hoc war on other nations”, and apparently also means “one who rehosts online media without authorization”. It is a calque translation from Dutch, and was first recorded in English in the 1560s [source].
A filibuster originally meant “a mercenary soldier; specifically, a mercenary who travelled illegally in an organized group from the United States to a country in Central America or the Spanish West Indies in the mid-19th century seeking economic and political benefits through armed force”. Over time it also came to mean, “A tactic (such as giving long, often irrelevant speeches) employed to delay the proceedings of, or the making of a decision by, a legislative body, particularly the United States Senate”.
Filibuster was first recorded in English in the 1580s as flibutor. It was borrowed from the Spanish filibustero (pirate), from French flibustier (pirate), from the Dutch vrijbuiter.
I discovered this from Bill Bryson’s Made In America: An Informal History of American English, which I’m reading at the moment.
Filibustering freebooters! sounds like the kind of curse Captain Haddock uses in the Tintin stories. He does in fact say Filibuster(s)! and Fancy-dress freebooter!, but not Filibustering freebooters!, as far as I can discover.
I made it to Sabhal Mòr Ostaig last night. It started to rain very heavily as the ferry arrived in Armadale. Fortunately there was a bus to the college, but I got rather damp just walking from the ferry to the bus, and from the bus into the college.
So far on this journey I’ve heard quite a few different languages, including German, Lithuanian, Mandarin, French, Spanish and Dutch. I’ve had conversations in English, Scottish Gaelic and Irish, and spoken odd bits of Manx, Swedish, Russian and German.
My Scottish Gaelic is a bit rusty, but it’s coming back, and I fill in any gaps with Irish. On the way hear I listened to an audio book and some songs in Gaelic to tune my ears into the language.
