• GreenBeard@lemmy.ca
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    13
    ·
    8 days ago

    Weird linguistic coincidences like that seem less weird when you remember that at its core English is just a strange dialect of German that’s been mugging other languages for loose vocabulary for a thousand years or so.

      • Treczoks@lemmy.world
        link
        fedilink
        arrow-up
        1
        ·
        6 days ago

        Celtic, West Germanic (Angles, Saxons), Latin, Northern Germanic (Scandinavian), French, whatever. English is a number of languages in a trench coat, pretending to be a language.

    • omega_x3@lemmy.world
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      4
      ·
      8 days ago

      Don’t forget the English were ruled by a French bastard for a while so the language ended up with a bunch of words that are spelled a little odd but pronounced like the speaker doesn’t have the energy to use half the letters.

      • GreenBeard@lemmy.ca
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        8
        ·
        8 days ago

        Yes, but at the end of the day, France and England are really more like one people divided by a thousand year old argument over whether German bastardized Latin or Latin bastardized German is the superior language.