Quote:
Originally posted by Masklinn:
I found this explanation here :
"In 1066 England was conquered by William, duke of Normandy, which is in northern France. For several hundred years after the Norman invasion, French was the language of court and polite society in England. It was during this period that many French words were borrowed into English. Linguists estimate that some 60 percent of our common everyday vocabulary today comes from French."
This explains why Moiraine [img]smile.gif[/img]
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Exacta-Mundo! English's Germanic roots dictate its structure and much of its vocabulary. Then you have the 1066 stuff. Let's not forget that on top of the 60% French influence, other romance languages (i.e. derived from Latin) have many words which have made their way into the language. Oh, and being the courtly language, French dictated the legal language as well - that which was not directly latin (res ipsa loquiter, stare decisis, ipso facto, etc.).
This "bastardization" leaves English with *by far* the greatest number of words of any language. It's so huge that idiosyncracies within words have developed to allow an individual word to have a meaning that may take a combination of words in another language. You mention "freedom" and "liberty," which are similar but not the same of course. Some examples are really minute - try to get someone to explain the difference between careering and careening some day.
[edit] And don't even get me started on how the different language influences have left English-speakers and writers a bit schizophrenic about the use of passive and active voice in the language, as well as other forms of noun-object displacement, often resulting in contorting sentences that could be made simpler. If anyone is interested in this junk, I'm happy to direct you to a few good technical writing texts.
[ 02-17-2003, 04:17 PM: Message edited by: Timber Loftis ]