DOUBLET (LINGUISTICS)

In etymology, two or more words in the same language are called 'doublets' or 'etymological twins' (or possibly triplets, etc.) when they have the same etymological root but have entered the language through different routes. Because the relationship between words that have the same root and the same meaning is fairly obvious, the term is mostly used to characterize pairs of words that have diverged in meaning, at times making their shared root a point of irony.
For example English ''pyre'' and ''fire'' are doublets. Subtle differences in the resulting modern words contribute to the richness of the English language, as indicated by the doublets ''frail'' and ''fragile'' (which share the Latin root, fragilis): one might refer to a ''fragile tea cup'' and a ''frail old woman'', but a ''frail tea cup'' and ''fragile old woman'' are subtly different and possibly confusing descriptions.
Another example of nearly synonymous doublets is ''aperture'' and ''overture'' (the commonality behind the meanings is "opening"), but doublets may develop divergent meanings, such as the ''opposite'' words, ''host'' and ''guest'', which occur as a doublet in Old French hospes, before having been borrowed into English. Doublets also vary with respect to how far their forms have diverged. For example, the resemblance between ''levy'' and ''levee'' is obvious, whereas the connection between ''sovereign'' and ''soprano'' is harder to guess synchronically from the forms of the words alone.
Etymological twins are usually a result of chronologically separate borrowing from a source language. In the case of English, this usually means once from French during the Norman invasion, and again later, after the word had evolved. An example of this is ''warranty'' and ''guarantee''. Another possibility is borrowing from both a language and its daughter language (usually Latin and some other Romance language). In many cases involving Indo-European languages, words such as beef and cow, the one Germanic the other Romance, actually do share the same proto-Indo-European root. The forward linguistic path also reflects cultural and historical transactions; often the name of an animal comes from Germanic while the name of its cooked meat comes from Romance. Since English is unusual in that it borrowed heavily from two distinct branches of the same linguistic family tree, it has a relatively high number of this latter type of etymological twin.
A linguistic ''triplet'' is an etymological extrapolation with three results rather than the doublet's two. Consider a welcome ''from the heart'', in English: a hearty welcome, a cordial welcome, or a sincere welcome. The Indo-European ''ker'' or the proto-Indo-European ''kerd'' is the common root, from which the Latin ''cor'', modern Italian ''cuore'', French ''coeur'', Spanish ''corazón'' -- and German ''Herz'' came into English. The differences may even seem to reflect an "ethnic variation" of a welcome "from the heart"--all are positive, yet, similar to the shades of meaning in ''frail'' and ''fragile'', there is an appropriate place for a hearty welcome, a cordial welcome, and a sincere welcome.

Contents

Examples in English

Examples in Polish

See also

Examples in English

Examples in English include:

★ shirt and skirt (both Germanic, the latter from Old Norse)

★ chief and chef (both from French at different times)

★ secure and sure (from Latin, the latter via French)

★ plant and clan (from Latin, the latter via Old Irish)

★ right, rich, raj, regalia, reign and real (from Germanic, Celtic, Sanskrit, Latin, French and Portuguese cognates respectively)

★ carton and cartoon, both ultimately the augmentative of Latin ''carta''

★ ward and guard (from Norman, the latter via French); also warden and guardian.

★ chrism and creme (from French, in the 14th and 19th centuries, respectively)

★ cow and beef (from Proto-Indo-European; the former through Germanic — i.e. natively via Old English — the latter through Latin via French)

Examples in Polish

★ ''triplets:'' 'magister [1], majster [2], mistrz [3]'—from German ''Meister,'' Dutch ''meester,'' and from Latin ''magister;'' cognate to Italian ''maestro,'' English ''master, mister''

★ '(o-) pierdolić' (''fuck, babble, condemn,'' vulgar language), '(o-) pierdzielić' (''babble, condemn,'' informal language)—cognate to Russian ''определять'' (''determine'')

★ ''triplets:'' 'szczać' (''piss,'' gross wording), 'sikać' (''spout,'' plain, informal wording), 'siusiać' (''pee,'' childish, polite euphemism; however one could argue the latter being simply an irregular diminutive derivation from the former)

★ 'Bogdan, Bohdan'^{search, pl} (first names)

★ ''triplets:'' 'upiór [4], wąpierz [5], wampir [6]' (English ''vampire;'' detailed out in Polish ''Wikipedia'' entry on etymology of ''wampir'')

See also

★ Reborrowing

★ Cognate, specifically, those within the same language

★ Paronym

★ False friends that may develop in the same way