A Foreign Language Vocabulary Thread: In Which We Look For Things That Have A Different, Non-Cognate Name in English/French/Spanish/German.

When I started the listthread

Looks like the French mare in cauchemare has the same meaning and origin... the French borrowed it from the Middle Dutch, which got it from the same Proto-Germanic word as Old English did.

So, fun cognates: nightmare and the Irish phantom queen from folklore called Morrígan, ultimately both derived from the Proto-Indo-European *mor- meaning (rolleyes) "malicious female spirit".

wizards of the coast you've led me astray yet again
http://magiccards.info/scans/en/5e/46.jpg

http://mrparsons.webspace.virginmedia.com/assets/images/KnightmareDL.jpg

tying all the loose threads together

this might be more different languages describing something that isn't exactly the same thing but close enough that no one bothers to create a new word for it:

en: doughnut
fr: beignet
de: krapfen
es: buñuelo
it: ciambella

little iffy on bunelo/beignet

No, I only had the three I had when I started the list. I had thought about a few others but hadn't chased them down and then I forgot about them until somebody posted them here. This thread is the list!

ah, I see. I thought when you said there were a bunch of these for fruits, you meant you had some more in mind before you started this thread.

I really like when you get place names that change between languages - Moscow, Mosca, Moskva, etc - but are these ever non-cognates?

we'd better start researching nouns in ye-ye song titles, because there seem to be a lot of those with non-cognate words in them. there's the two France Gall songs already mentioned, and there's this:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2RW0UBXdMQw

I really like when you get place names that change between languages - Moscow, Mosca, Moskva, etc - but are these ever non-cognates?

― Ismael Klata, Monday, February 25, 2013 8:19 PM (2 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

Yes! But I'm not sure this happens enough for the strictures of the thread. Best one (lifted directly from wiki):

in German the country is known as Deutschland, in Scandinavian languages as Tyskland, in French as Allemagne, in Polish as Niemcy, in Finnish as Saksa, and in Lithuanian as Vokietija.

And obviously, Germany in English.

my high school German teacher tried to convince my class that "German" literally meant "man with spear" (from the Germanic words "man" and ger"), but I think that's a false etymology.

The Alemans were a tribe as, obviously, were the Saxons. I believe Deutsch and Tysk are cognates (and related to tedesco).

There's Hungary-Magyarorszag and Suomi-Finland, as collectors of panini stickers will know. Extra point for those being Finland's two languages as well!

The Franks were purportedly named for their axes.

Yeah, some of the words for Germany are cognates, but there are a large number of disparate roots that haven't been homogenised in modern languages. The wiki is pretty good for this: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Names_of_Germany

Shqiperia-Albania too, and Hellas-Greece. What about cities, any of those?

Michael! We've been waiting for you.

English: deckchair
French: transat (from "transatlantique")
German: Liegestuhl
Spanish: tumbona
Russian: шезлонг ("chaise-longue")
Italian: sdraio

The problem with this one is that German "Deckstuhl" exists but as far as I can see it's used in the specific sense of a chair used on a ship's deck, but as far as I can see it's rarely used in the general sense of a folding chair used at the beach etc. Hence http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liegestuhl says <<Der Liegestuhl war ursprünglich ein Deckstuhl für Reisende auf Linien- und Kreuzfahrtschiffen>> ("the Liegestuhl was originally a Deckstuhl for travellers on liners and cruise ships").

English: Go!!!
French: Allez!!!
Spanish: Venga!!!
German: Hopp!!!
Italian: Vai!!!

The Venga Bus is coming!!!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t2MftBoioIM&feature=youtube_gdata_player

not to crash the Steve Vai/Vengaboys bus but aren't they from the same root?

As is 'allez', which is 'va' in singular

Okay, I'm pretty sure those better versed in linguistics will point out synonyms here, but from very basic research I have:

English: yob
German: Halbstarke
French: loubard
Spanish: gamberro

As I say, words like this are problematic, because there are just so many interchangeable synonyms, dialect terms, etc. But I figure I might as well post it up seeing as I spent ten minutes looking at it.

Also thought Venga meant come, not go

Fruit list was basically:
Vocabulary list in Portuguese instruction book
Poster in pizzeria on Northern Blvd with Latin American Spanish names for fruits that were possible sno-cone flavor mix-ins

One more thing about city names is the München/Monaco correspondence, to the point where somebody meant to go to one but went to the other one.

And another good one from Italian, Nizza for Nice. How often have I wanted to post "Nizza otm"

Shqiperia-Albania too, and Hellas-Greece. What about cities, any of those?

Donostia/San Sebastian?

Chennai/Madras was the only non-cognate candidate I could think of; but it appears it was named after one predecessor town, then was changed for nationalistic reasons to being named after a different predecessor town, so that doesn't work.

Yes! Donostia is right.

Dublin/Baile Atha Cliath is the same maybe? Except I believe Dublin translates as 'Blackpool', so not sure how it's acquired two quite separate names.

English: prank
French: farce
Spanish: trastada
German: Streich
Italian: burla

^ this might not be 100% accurate b/c I cheated and used google translate & picked the most applicable synonyms. none of the synonyms listed appeared to be cognates.

re: venga -- whoops, they would be different roots then. i looked it up -- it's used something like "come on"?

Don Ostia translates to San Sebastian in Basque.

English: mushroom
French: champignon
German: pilz
Italian: fungo
Spanish: seta
Russian: grib

I *think* these are the most common names for mushrooms but there are so many variations (wild vs cultivated vs specific common varieties) I'm not sure.

xp

ahh I see, did not check that.

would Swansea/Abertawe be another?

I feel like they should be numerous (but I'm ignorant) – like any small language group that has a big power next to it will produce them, bet there are a ton in the old Soviets.

English: prank
French: farce
Spanish: trastada
German: Streich
Italian: burla

Hmm, are 'prank' and 'farce' too close in English to allow this? Not sure. Also, is 'burla' the root of 'burlesque'?

this is kinda opposite this thread, but i blew my own mind a while ago learning that Jakob, James and Diego are all the same name

Oh man, if you track all the versions of 'John' you get some far-out shit.

there's a nena (of 99luftballoons) movie called "gib gas" that's supposed to mean "let 'er rip"
i don't know how to search for these in other languages without getting transliterations.

It's like the last time anyone thought up a new boy's name was 3000BC, until you started getting your Nikes and Adidases and so on (ha! and Adidas is from the Adrian root anyway)

Touched on Jacob, James, Diego, Tiago thing here Does anyone here speak Portuguese?, where there is another handy link.

xp

About one fifth of all males in the UK between 1800 and 1850 were christened John and the vast majority of the other men and boys around at the time were Joseph, James, Thomas or William.

http://www.lrb.co.uk/v32/n18/james-davidson/flat-nose-stocky-and-beautugly

Still can't find any more exotic fruit names aside from "abacaxi" and for sure it is doubtful for that I will find any that would satisfy the original requirements of this thread. Sorry to imply this linguistic El Dorado that turns out not to exist, unregistered.

James, your first interpretation of my original question is correct.

english: caterpillar
spanish: oruga/gusano
french: chenille
german: Raupe/Raupenfahrzeug
italian: bruco
irish: bolb

Perhaps there are better things i could be doing in my lunch break than looking up central / eastern European names for the tadpole but it's really interesting:

Belarus: Apoloniki
Bulgaria: Popova Lizhichka
Croatia: Punoglavac
Czech Rep: Pulec
Germany: Kaulquappe
Hungary: Ebihal
Latvia: Kurkulis
Lithuania: Buožgalvis
Poland: Kijanka
Romania: Mormoloc
Russia: Golovastik
Ukraine: Gugolovok

english: caterpillar
spanish: oruga/gusano
french: chenille
german: Raupe/Raupenfahrzeug
italian: bruco
irish: bolb

― gyac, Tuesday, February 26, 2013 6:56 AM (2 hours ago)

Lightning has a nice variety of roots, but plenty of cognates too:

English Lightning
German Blitz
French foudre/éclair
Spanish relámpago/rayo
Italian fulmine/lampo

I figured lightning and Blitz would eventually have the same Germanic or PIE root, but apparently not.

And there goes that lamp again.