All Questions
Tagged with romance-languages etymology
24 questions
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Hypothetical ancestry and evolution of PGmc *auziwandliaz
This is cross-posted from r/asklinguistics, with influence from Wiktionary's Tea Room.
So I'm bundling up three questions regarding the PGmc. proper noun *Auziwandilaz.
First: The /w/ in the ...
- 21
2
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3
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273
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Are there Romance parallel descendants to Italian "cicalare" and Romanian "cicăli(re)"?
I am looking for the etymology of the Romanian verb a cicăli (to make reproaches repeatedly, to nag), which is reported of unknown origin, and I have found an almost identical word in Italian: ...
- 780
1
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0
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125
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Could the Romanian gând/gândi (thought/think) be ultimately of Latin and/or Albanian origin?
A gândi is in modern Romanian the common/main form of the verb "to think", based on the noun gând ("thought"). It is considered of Hungarian origin, from "gond".
I don't ...
- 780
1
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103
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Is there a Slavic equivalent of the Greek and Latin semantic transfer from "chest/vault" to "treasure", like θησαυρός/thesaurus?
I was looking at the etymology of the Romanian word comoară ("treasure", "hoard", "pile of precious things") and it seems based on the widespread Slavic form komora, ...
- 780
0
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3
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378
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Can it be that the etymology of the Balkan root for "tickle" stretches as far as Korean?
Some context first:
I am interested in the etymology of the Romanian word gâdila/gîdila ("to tickle; the â/î variation is only graphical: it's /ɨ/, the close central unrounded vowel which in ...
- 780
5
votes
1
answer
281
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Why are telling and counting related in many languages?
In many languages, verbs for telling a story are based on or related to verbs for counting. There are (at least) three groups of such verbs:
English "recount", French "conter" and ...
- 151
36
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3
answers
7k
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Why is the word "war" in Romance languages predominantly of Germanic origin instead of Latin?
I wonder why in all Romance languages the word "war" ("guerra", with their multiple intonations) is a term that comes from Germanic languages, and that no modern language resembles ...
- 535
5
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152
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Etymology of initial "g-" in Sicilian "giurana" (frog)
Most Romance words for "frog" derive from Latin rana (e.g. es. rana, it. rana, pt. rã. See also va. renoc ("toad")).
However, an unexpected initial g- appears in the cognates of several Gallo-:
fr. ...
- 3,132
4
votes
2
answers
945
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How does Metathesis work?
How does it happen? What motivated latin "parabola" to change into Spanish "palabra" and why does english "ask" is often changed to "aks"?
- 1,456
9
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2
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529
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What linguistic impact, if any, has the the Roman three name naming system left on modern Romance and European languages?
The ancient Romans had a three name system (tria nomina): praenomen, the birth/given name; the nomen, like a family name but marking the person as belonging to a specific gens; and the cognomen, of ...
- 626
2
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3
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413
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Gold in French, light in Hebrew
I am fascinated by questions of linguistic relation between Hebrew and the Romance Languages, but I feel here I may have stumbled on a false connection and would like to be properly put in my place.
...
5
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4
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1k
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Why did English "man" and Latin "homo" take both the senses "gender-neutral human" and "male adult"?
Why did English "man" and Latin "homo" take both the sense "gender-neutral human" and "male adult"?
According to etymonline.com, English "man", and incidentally Latin "homo" (which originally meant "...
- 359
1
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1
answer
579
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Etymology of Romance words for Marriage [closed]
There are a few different Romance etyma with the meaning 'marriage'. Some are derived from Latin casa 'house', some from mater 'mother', and some from mas/maris 'man':
L casa [+ -mentum] > CA ...
6
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1
answer
213
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How did ìritu evolve from digitus?
The Latin word for "finger" is digitus. In Italian, I assume the "gi" was lost, perhaps via some lenition of the "g" to *dijitus and then j was lost, giving *dītus, or perhaps accusative *dītum, ...
- 507
5
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1
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714
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Is /ɡ/ Germanic and /dʒ/ French in English ge-/gi- words?
I've recently noticed that in English words starting with "ge-" or "gi-", when the "g" is pronounced /ɡ/, they tend to be etymologically Germanic, while the words where the "g" is pronounced /dʒ/ tend ...
- 1,242
1
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1
answer
405
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How did the Latin past participle suffix -atus develop into modern French -é?
How did the Latin past participle suffix -atus develop into modern French -é?
Considering the two following examples: modern French état ("state; status") and été ("been"). Both derives ultimately ...
- 359
1
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0
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150
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Etymological development of forms of Spanish "seguir" from Latin "SEQVI" (*sequire)
I am seeking an explanation for the development of the forms of Spanish "seguir" from Latin "SEQVI" (Vulgar Latin: *sequire), especially the irregular forms.
Especially, why did the "e" become "i" in ...
- 661
7
votes
1
answer
3k
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Why were words for the four cardinal directions in Romance languages borrowed from Old English?
Why were words for the four cardinal directions (east, west, north, south) in Romance languages borrowed from Old English? They could have used their own words derived from Latin because these words ...
- 359
13
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1
answer
4k
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Do the words "angst" and "anxiety" share a common root?
The English word angst, taken from German Angst, seems to ultimately originate from Proto-Germanic *angustiz. This word has descendants in many Germanic languages, including, but not limited to, ...
- 898
18
votes
3
answers
783
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r in Romance names of London
Most Romance languages have an "r" in their renditions of the British capital's name: Londres, Londra etc.
Outside the Romance family, I only found it in Turkish Londra and Breton Londrez, but those ...
- 699
1
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0
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180
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Why were prefixes repeated as postverbal prepositions?
French: s'abstenir de Spanish: abstenerse de English: abstain [from] (v.)
[<--]
late 14c., "to withhold oneself," from Old French abstenir (14c.), earlier astenir (13c.) "hold (...
user5306
3
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3
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173
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Spelling Similarities in English and Spanish but not in Italian and Spanish
The spelling of the word 'admit' has a ⟨d⟩ in both English and the Spanish equivalent, admitir, but not in Italian ammettere. Why is the ⟨d⟩ absent in the Italian equivalent?
7
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1
answer
664
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Why are the plural and singular first person forms of the verb "go" so different in the Romance languages?
In many Romance languages, the first person plural and singular forms are completely different:
French (aller): je vais, nous allons
Italian (andare): io vado, noi andiamo
Catalan (anar): jo vaig, ...
- 345
30
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7
answers
16k
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Why do so many core Romanian words with Latin roots come from different roots than in the other Romance languages?
Romanian is a romance language like Catalan, Italian, French, Portuguese, and Spanish so much of its core vocabulary is derived from Latin.
Why then even in core vocabulary does Romanian so often ...
- 14.8k