Differences In Language
Why is it that some Spanish words are simply English words, some are a bit varied, and some are completely unalike......
Ejemplo:
English : Spanish
Hospital Hospital
Bicycle Bicicleta
Work Trabajor
5 Answers
"Hospital" is a French word, initially a guest house, from Latin hospitalis, meaning both guest and host. The term "host" also comes from French, and it is etymologically related to the Germanic "guest". Spanish has the term hospitalis directly from Latin.
"Bicycle" is a modern term coined with Greek roots: bi- (two) and kyklos (wheel). Spanish also had a long tradition adapting Greek roots, so the formation of "bicicleta" was straightforward.
"Work" is a Germanic word that originally meant "to do, to work". Latin lost this root (if I'm not mistaken), but Greek took it to form "ergon" (work, deed), from where both English and Latin have words like "energy", "surgery", "alergy", "argon", and also from Greek "organon" (instrument, "something that works"), we get "organ". Even the word "orgy" comes from the same root through Greek.
"Trabajar" comes from "tripaliare" (torture with a "three-sticks", an torture instrument) hehe. (not joking)
Some words have only a one-letter difference such as idiot and idiota.
Each language has its own ways. "Idiot" comes from Latin through French (surprise!), but ultimately from Greek "idiotes", from "idios" (one's own, personal). The terms "idiom" and "idiosyncrasy" also come from the same word.
no i meant that why are some spanish words the same as some english words
Summing up, and to answer your previous question: there are more than 50,000 words that look alike in Spanish and English, and I reckon that at least 95% (probably more) are either Latin taken through French, or modern terms recently coined using Latin and Greek roots.
As time passes, Spanish and other languages are borrowing lots of terms, especially technical ones, like "byte", "chip"... and eventually many languages will contain large amount of English proper terms, but at the moment coincidences are due to the sheer amount of Latin and Greek that English borrowed. Spanish did not have to borrow that much Latin, because it is modern Latin.
Be happy that there are such similarities. It will make your learning faster.
Or you could learn Chinese, and not be bothered by the fact that there are almost no similarities.
Your energy would be better spent studying Spanish and accepting what is and you will eventually find out all the why questions along the way.
That's a great observation wow.
Some words have only a one-letter difference such as idiot and idiota.
You just asked a question very similar to this less than an hour ago.
http://www.spanishdict.com/answers/203665/which-came-first-the-chicken-or-the-egg
Most words in Spanish come from Latin or Greek. English has words from Latin, Greek, German, Saxon, Gaelic, Celtic, Norse, Chinese, Malaysian, and people who took too many drugs in the 60's. The words derived from the same languages are similar, while the others aren't.
