yes, thank you twuwm-- Wow got it right (which is why i followed up and showed two root words for foil and thanks wow, that was a new one for me!)
Bear is an other..
gnome too..
one is a garden gnome.. a troll like creature..gnomus
but a gnome as in a maxim, comes from a similar looking root, but goes to the greek gnome-- for knowlegde...
sometimes very different meanings arise from the same root.. (cosmetics (make up)and cosmos (universe)-- and the connection is only clear when you look at the root.. (kosmos- to neaten, to be orderly..)we have looked at roots, and their families of words..Gen comes to mind.(genisis, aboriginal..etc.,)
homonyms.. are interesting too.. some times they are extended meanings of the root..
(rule is a good example.. all those different meanings are from one root word!)
but sometimes.. they are different root words that have come to be spelled and pronounced the same--and still kept their old meanings.
Cleave is the only example i know of totally opposite meanings.. but CASE might surprise you.. a legal case and brief case are two different cases!
one word goes back to chance or circumstanses.. (casus-to fall) and that is a case as in grammer or a legal case..or a police case..
the other case that goes back to caspa-- chest, is a suitcase, or or briefcase, or even, by extention, a casement of a window.
the legal brief that is carried in a brief case(2), about the legal case(1)..Case is two total different words, with totally different roots!
OP
