Quote:
Originally Posted by LindavG
We're now focusing on the similarities but there is of course also a long list of words that are completely different in German, Dutch and English. From the top of my head, here are a few examples I can think of just concerning food/eating:
[German - Dutch - English]
Kartoffel - aardappel - potato
Teller - bord - plate
Huhn - kip - chicken
Pilz - paddestoel - mushroom
Schwein - varken - pig
Möhre - wortel - carrot
Zwiebel - ui - onion
Frühstück - ontbijt - breakfast
Erdnuss - pinda - peanut
Essig - azijn - vinegar
Sahne - room - cream
Gemüse - groente - vegetable
Hummer - kreeft - lobster
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And here North Germanic plus English
[Swedish - Norwegian - Danish - English]
Potatis - Potet - Kartoffel - Potato
Tallrik - Tallerken - Tallerken - Plate
Kyckling - Kylling - Kylling - Chicken
Svamp - Sopp - Svampe - Mushroom
Svin - Svin - Svin - Pig
Morot - Gulrot - Gulerod - Carrot
Lök - Løk - Løg - Onion
Frukost - Frokost - Morgenmad - Breakfast
Jordnöt - Peanøtt - Jordnød - Peanut
Ättika - Eddik - Eddike - Vinegar
Grädde - Fløte - Fløde - Cream
Grönsak - Grønnsak - Grøntsag - Vegetable
Hummer - Hummer - Hummer - Lobster
As you see, a few is a bit different. But those names are self-explanatory, like for example breakfast is frukost in Swedish and frokost in Norwegian, but morgenmad in Danish. While morgenmad might be a different looking word, the name explains itself, cause morgenmad literally translates to morning food.
Morgen = morning, mad = food, in Danish.
Similarly, in Swedish, morning is "morgon" and food is "mat", and in Norwegian, morning is "morgen" (like in Danish), and food is "mat" (like in Swedish), anyway there is only 1 letter that is different. So therefore the Danish word morgenmad becomes self-explanatory for both Swedes and Norwegians.
Same thing with carrot, gulrot literally means "yellow root", gul = yellow, rot = root. Though that one might just be a little bit more tricky if it is a Dane or a Norwegian who reads "morot" on a Swedish menu since "mo" does not mean anything, but it still won't be very hard to guess what it means, also it is very common in North Germanic countries to know some words that are different in some other North Germnaic language, and those words are not many. For example, most Swedes and Norwegians
knows that kartoffel means potato, it is even used in some dialects of Swedish (in the south specifically).
And I bet that many Danes also knows that frukost (Swedish) and frokost (Norwegian) means breakfast, it is very common here that you travel between the Scandinavian countries here, and of course picks up words on the way that might be different. But there is not many words here that are completely different, just a few.
West Germanic languages are alot more far from each others.
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