5 weird questions you've never googled

At one time in Britain the English language was outlawed and the only languages that could be spoken were French and Latin. The present English language contains words from just about every language spoken including Celtic, French, German, Latin, Spanish spoken Hindi, Chinese Mandarin, Japanese, the Norse languages, Spanish, Italian, Welsh, Scottish and Dutch, just to name a few. For example the word pyjama is Hindi, the word sabotage is Dutch comes from when the Germans were using the Dutch as slave labour during WW2 they used to take off their wooden shoes (Sabot) and throw (tage) into the machinery. The word Real Estate comes from Spanish and translates as kings land when explorers claimed new land they would do so in the name of the king so it became the property of the king and he would grant the land. Because of this “borrowing” that is why there so many different words for the same thing. The only language that hasn’t been borrowed from is the American Indian language and because it hadn’t been written down and translated it was used during WW2 for radio transmissions because it couldn’t be broken. It was a language and the same idea could be expressed in many different ways without repetition. Much like the Egyptian hieroglyphics couldn’t be translated until the Rosetta Stone was discovered.

The change of name of animal to meat is well depicted in Sir Walter Scott's "Ivanhoe". One character says that while the animal is in the farm and needs hard work to keep, it has a Saxon name, but when it is served at the Norman lords table, it takes the French name. Cow becomes beef, pig becomes pork, sheep turns to mutton, calf to veal and deer to venison.

I loved it, good information on stuff I didn't know I needed to know.

I remember as a little girl asking Dad , how come the birds dont get electrocuted ,sitting on the powers lines and that’s exactly the answer he gave me .

Another fan of the birds on the wire. Any other UK residents remember Busby the BT bird?

Michael Swick, That's good work, but I was taught the origin of "sabotage" was quite different There is a popular story that sabotage emerged in 15th century Holland. It occurred when textile workers threw their sabots (clogs) into the gears of new automated looms fearing that their jobs would be lost. This deliberate attack on machinery then was called sabotage. This Dutch workers’ movement predates the industrial revolution by several centuries. The true origin of sabotage is slightly more mundane. It is more likely to be derived from late 19th-century French slang use of sabot to describe unskilled workers. The unskilled workers wore clogs because they could not afford leather shoes. Its meaning shifted to describe the poor quality work which such workers produced via saboter meaning to knock with the foot, or work carelessly

Elaine Bauer, Not so. The angels blessed them with this protection. BTW, it's also the angels that gave them wings.

Boyd Welsch, Filipino is the Hispanized (or Anglicized) way of referring to both the people and the language in the Philippines. It is also correct to say Filipino for a male and Filipina for a female.

Lynne Cage, But we can't rewrite the song as: "When the grey-brown pigeon comes bob-bob-bobbin' along."

Boyd Welsch, They're not!

Pig and cow weren't replaced- we just use pork and beef to refer to their meat.

Why are people from the Philippines called fillapinoes?

Marija Malella Valentekovich, Actually they do.

Michael Swick, as a linguist I love this comment! Thank you!

Found all this information very interesting. I would like to know more of the many words & how the changes & uses cam into being!

Regarding American Indian(preferably Native American) languages: there are hundreds of them. Many animals and place names originated from them. The one used during WW II is from the Navajo people. Michael Swick,

#4: you didn’t answer the question; why do they do it? Anyone who’s passed elementary school knows why they survive it!

Satish Chandran, no as long as the bird doesn’t complete a circuit between two wires by touching a bird on the other wire or that other wire they they are safe. As long as the bird is not grounded or touch two different phases they cannot be electrocuted.