> quite nice in the sense that it helps learn other languages
It's fun like that; I've studied a trivial amount of Dutch and German and kept running into words where the root was present in English in some really weird way. For instance, one of the first signs I saw at AMS was 'uitgang' (exit) which is clearly the same root as 'gangplank' and 'gangway' and which shows up in some really old folk songs (Why dois your brand sae drap wi bluid, and why sae sad gang ye, O?). Or "rustig", which is just "quiet", but has a certain specific rough-hewn country-living feel to it when you use it as the English word "rustic".
They also seem to use the old-fashioned form of the helper-verb "will" ("wil") to mean want/desire (as contrasted with "shall", which has been replaced in modern English, at least in America.)
And, of course, the word for boy-child is "jongen" - pronounced "young'n", like you're from Appalachia or something. (Actually, I think there are a lot of things like that. Don't put down the people with the 'uneducated' accents, they have a perfectly legitimate linguistic history.)
It's fun like that; I've studied a trivial amount of Dutch and German and kept running into words where the root was present in English in some really weird way. For instance, one of the first signs I saw at AMS was 'uitgang' (exit) which is clearly the same root as 'gangplank' and 'gangway' and which shows up in some really old folk songs (Why dois your brand sae drap wi bluid, and why sae sad gang ye, O?). Or "rustig", which is just "quiet", but has a certain specific rough-hewn country-living feel to it when you use it as the English word "rustic".
They also seem to use the old-fashioned form of the helper-verb "will" ("wil") to mean want/desire (as contrasted with "shall", which has been replaced in modern English, at least in America.)
And, of course, the word for boy-child is "jongen" - pronounced "young'n", like you're from Appalachia or something. (Actually, I think there are a lot of things like that. Don't put down the people with the 'uneducated' accents, they have a perfectly legitimate linguistic history.)