The Maps of Common Words

10 mins ago, I came across to a very interesting content about 8 common words and their distribution in Europe. The source also gives short introductions about their etymology! 🙂

I love such content because I kind of have a visual memory and when I see a word in a video game or in an ad, I just don’t forget them no matter how many years pass. I’m sure, as language learners and lovers, you experience this as well. That’s why it is a teaching strategy, adopted by most of second-language teachers.

Thanks http://www.businessinsider.com/ for this great compilation! I guess they get this content from Reddit though. In short, thanks whoever came up this idea and visualized the distribution of these words for us. 🙂

You can go to the source and read more by clicking the link at the bottom.

“The word for “church” shows the influence of ancient Greece:”

“Bear” appears to be influenced by Russia, where largest brown bear population in Europe can be found. Notice the dominant word literally means “honey-eater.”

“Apple” has a lot of diversity: Notice how the word in Finland and Estonia may come from a Indo-Iranian origin.”

“Orange” is an interesting one. In the west it comes form Sanskrit while the dominant word in much of eastern and northern Europe comes from a word meaning “apple from China.”

“Garoful,” the ancient Greek word for “rose,” only remains in northeastern Italy.”

“Most of Europe derives “pineapple” from the Guarani language, which is an indigenous language of South America, although the U.K. (and consequently the U.S.) get the word from Latin.”

Source: http://www.businessinsider.com/european-maps-showing-origins-of-common-words-2013-11

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