Curing, cleaning and caring

Yesterday I discovered that there are quite a few different French translations of the verb to cure, depending on what kind of cure you’re talking about.

If you’re curing food by salting, the French equivalent is saler (to salt); curing by smoking is fumer (to smoke), and curing by drying is sécher (to dry). Curing leather is traiter (to treat), and curing illnesses, problems or habits is guérir (to cure, heal, recover).

The equivalents of these words in Welsh are:

– halltu = to cure (by salting)
– cochi (“to redden”); sychu mewn mwg; sychu trwy fwg = to cure (by smoking)
– sychu = to cure (by drying)
– cyweirio; barcio; cwrio = to cure (leather)
– gwella; iach’au; mendio = to cure (illness, problem, habit)

Do other languages have separate words for these?

The English word cure comes from the French curer, which means ‘to clean out’ in Modern French, and meant ‘to take care of, to clean’ in Old French, and comes from the Latin cūrāre (to care for, take care of, cure), from cūra (care, concern, trouble), from the Old Latin coira-, from the Proto-Indo-European root *kʷeis- (to heed).

Sources: Reverso, OED, Online Etymology Dictionary, Wiktionary

Producing oneself

I came across an interesting expression in a French newspaper article I read today – se produire – which means to produce, occur, take place, perform, appear, and appears in such phrases as:

– devoir se produire = to be bound to happen
– se produire sur scène = to appear on stage
– ce qui risque de se produire = what could well happen; what might happen
– laisser se produire = to allow to happen
– se produire en concert = to play in a concert

One literal translation of this expression is “to produce oneself”, and I like the idea that I produced myself (as if from a hat 🙂 at a gig last week.

Source: Reverso

Les mots de le semaine

français English Cymraeg
fin thin (layer, cable, wire, fingers, paper) tenau; main
maigre thin (person, animal, smile) tenau; main
mince thin (face, argument, evidence) main
léger thin (fabric, coat) tenau
peu épais thin (soup, sauce) tenau; dyfrllyd
clairsemé thin (hair) tenau; moel
désépaissir to thin (hair) teneuo; moeli
éclaircir to thin (trees) teneuo; mynd yn denau
délayer to thin (sauce, paint) teneuo
fluidifier to thin (blood) teneuo
susceptible thin-skinned croendenau
épais thick trwchus; tew
épaisser thicken tewhau; tewychu
insensible thick-skinned croendew
bête thick (person) twp; hurt; gwirion
au beau milieu de qch;
en plain cœur de qch
in the thick of sth yng nghanol rhywbeth
être au cœur de l’action to be in the thick of it bod yn ei chanol hi
contre vents et marées through thick and thin drwy’r tew a’r tenau; doed a ddelo
la brochure (gen); le tract (pol) pamphlet llyfryn; pamffledyn; pamffled

Grammatical gender matters

Loup / Loupe

In languages with grammatical gender, like French, you can often get away with getting the genders wrong, although it’s best to try to learn them when you learn nouns. However there are some words that have different meanings in different genders.

An example in French is loup(e): le loup [lu:] (masculine) is a wolf, and la loupe [lu:p] (feminine) is a magnifying glass – the context will clarify what you mean if you get the genders mixed up, and the pronunciation helps as well.

The following French words have the same pronunciation but different meanings in different genders:

– le boum = bang, explosion / la boum = party
– le bout = tip, end / la boue = mud
– le cave = idiot, sucker / la cave = basement, cellar
– le chêne = oak tree/wood / la chaîne = chain, channel
– le col = collar, neck / la colle = glue
– le livre = book / la livre = pound (curreny/weight)
– le manche = handle / la manche = sleeve / la Manche = English Channel
– le mur = wall / la mûre = blackberry
– le rose = pink (colour) / la rose = rose (flower)
– le vase = vase / la vase = silt, mud

More words like this: http://french.about.com/od/vocabulary/a/dualgender_2.htm

One way to avoid getting your genders in a muddle is to talk about everything in the plural.

Les mots de la semaine

français English Cymraeg
la (jeu de) boules bowls bowliau; bowls
jouer aux boules to play (lawn) bowls chwarae bowls/powls
le terrain de boules bowling green lawnt fowlio; grîn fowlio
le bowling bowling bowlio
le piste de bowling bowling alley ala/ale/ali fowlio
le boule bowl bowl; powl
la quille skittle sgitlen (sgitls)
la route de contournement bypass (road) ffordd osgoi
le pontage bypass (operation) dargyfeiriad
le domaine; la propriéte estate tir; meddiant; tirogaeth
le lotissement housing estate ystad o dai
la ferme farm; farmhouse ty fferm; ffarm; ffermdy
la fermette small farmhouse ty fferm bach

Mountains and molehills

Making a mountain out of a molehill

I discovered yesterday that the French word for mole is taupe /top/, and I wondered if this might be related to the English word taupe, which, according to the OED, means ‘A brownish shade of grey resembling the colour of moleskin’ or in others words, mole-coloured.

The English word taupe comes from the French, which comes from the Latin talpa (mole), which is of unknown origin, according to Wiktionnary.

Mole-related words and expressions in French include:

– taupinière = molehill
– taupier = mole catcher
– être myope comme une taupe = to be blind as a bat
– noir comme une taupe = pitch-black

The French equivalent of to make a mountain out of a molehill is se faire une montagne d’un rien or faire une montagne d’une taupinière. What is the equivalent of this phrase in other languages?

Les mots de la semaine

français English Cymraeg
la taupinière molehill prid y wadd; priddwal; twmpath gwadd
le taupin click beetle; maths student chwilen clic (?); myfyriwr mathemateg
noir comme une taupe pitch-black pygddy; purddu
myopes comme une taupe blind as a bat yn ddall bost; mor ddall â’r nos/garreg/thwrch daear
le tableau (d’affichage) scoreboard bwrdd sgorio; bwrdd cadw sgôr
la cible (de jeu de fléchettes) dartboard bwrdd darts
le centre (de la cible) bullseye llygad (tarw); canol y nod; bwl
mettre dans le mille; faire mouche to hit the bull’s-eye ei tharo hi yn y canol; sgorio/cael bwl
faire un carton to hit the mark bwrw’r nod, taro’r nod

Breadcrumbs & Scotch Eggs

Scotch Egg / œuf dur enrobé de chair à saucisse et pané

Yesterday I discovered an interesting French word: paner, which means to coat with breadcrumbs or to bread.

So a Scotch Egg, which is a hard boiled egg wrapped in sausage meat, breaded and deep fried, can be described as a œuf dur enrobé de chair à saucisse et pané in French – it sounds better in French, although it’s not something you’d find in France or other French-speaking regions, as far as I know.

Restaurants in the UK often use French names and descriptions for dishes as they sound better and more sophisticated than their English equivalents. Do restaurants in other countries do this?

Would you rather have toad-in-the-hole or saucisses cuites au four dans de la pâte à crêpes?

Or how about pudding aux raisins instead of spotted dick?

Les mots de la semaine

français English Cymraeg
l’anneau (m) ring modrwy
le rond de serviette napkin ring cylch napcyn; modrwy napcyn
la bague de fiançailles engagement ring modrwy ddyweddïo
une vague de froid (de courte durée) cold snap pwl/sbel o dywydd oer
le craquement snap (sound of something breaking) clec
céder to snap (break) torri (‘n glec/gratsh)
(sorte de jeu de) bataille snap (game)
la brume mist niwl; niwliach; tarth; tawch
la bruine Scotish mist smwc; smwcan; smwclaw; ffwgen
le brouillard; la brime fog niwl; twach; niwlen; tarth
des nappes de brouillard patchy fog niwl ysbeidiol/bylchog (?)
brouillard à couper au couteau thick fog niwl trwchus
la miette crumb briwsionyn
la miette/mie de pain breadcrumb briwsionyn bara
les chapelure (fpl) (dried) breadcrumbs briwsion bara
œuf dur enrobé de chair
à saucisse et pané
Scotch egg ŵy selsig; ŵy mewn sosej
paner to coat with breadcrumbs taenu briwsion
pané (coated) in breadcrumbs; breaded wedi ei daenu briwsion