Vocabulary
- Some words that passed into French and in English
The English words dolmen and menhir have been borrowed from French, which supposedly took them from Breton. However, this is uncertain: for instance, menhir is peulvan or maen hir ("long stone"), maen sav ("straight stone") (two words : noun + adjective) in Breton. Dolmen is a misconstructed word (it should be taol-vaen). Some studies state that these words were borrowed from Cornish. Maen hir can be directly translated from Welsh as "long stone" (which is exactly what a menhir or maen hir is).
To jabber in foreign tongue : French baragouiner from bara 'bread' and gwin 'wine'.
Sea gull (big one) : French goéland from gwelan same root as gull (Welsh gwylan.)
Read more about this topic: Breton Language
Famous quotes containing the word vocabulary:
“My vocabulary dwells deep in my mind and needs paper to wriggle out into the physical zone. Spontaneous eloquence seems to me a miracle. I have rewritten—often several times—every word I have ever published. My pencils outlast their erasers.”
—Vladimir Nabokov (1899–1977)
“The vocabulary of pleasure depends on the imagery of pain.”
—Marina Warner (b. 1946)
“A new talker will often call her caregiver “mommy,” which makes parents worry that the child is confused about who is who. She isn’t. This is a case of limited vocabulary rather than mixed-up identities. When a child has only one word for the female person who takes care of her, calling both of them “mommy” is understandable.”
—Amy Laura Dombro (20th century)