I spent a few days reading some posts after signing up and before posting, and I noticed that there is at least one person whose first language is French. BelMarduk, could you, or anybody else, tell me if there is a connection between mercy and merci, or if it is just one of those alphabetical accidents. I know that these accidents can happen, I seem to remember my Max telling me that "gift" in German means "poison." So, I would like to know if mercy/merci is like that, or if there's a link.

Allo nemo,

The word merci has two meanings in French
a) merci / thank-you
b) merci / mercy – (both derived from the Latin merces, mercedis), which has a several meanings we are all aware of: compassion shown, granting of grace, clemency or leniency…

My French dictionaries do not say, but it is not a stretch to believe that the "thank-you" merci evolved from the "granting of a grace" merci.

quoth the OED:

The post-classical uses of merces are developed from the specific application of the word to the reward in heaven which is earned by kindness to those who have no claim, and from whom no requital can be expected. The Eng. uses explained below represent OF. senses that for the most part have not survived in Fr., where the word has been in great part superseded by miséricorde. The chief uses of merci in mod.Fr. are in the sense ‘thanks’ (cf. gramercy), and in phrases corresponding to those in 5 below. {to do mercy, at mercy, at the mercy of, etc.}

"gift" in German means "poison."
Even this is no accident, since both senses derive from the same root: give/geben. But don't tell me now that a poisoned gift is a pleonasm..

wseiber, you have just reminded me of something that happened in March where my use of the word pleonasm saved the day.

I was arguing with a client about two phrases she wanted to include on the label of a product we were creating for her - well not actually with her, but with the secretary to the president, who is supposed to be an expert in the French language and who corrects all of this buyer’s artwork proofs.

We had to have two pages of text in a 1 x 1 inch space, so I couldn’t afford to have useless sentences (a little exaggeration but very close to true) hanging about.

No matter how often I explained that the two phrases were redundant the secretary would say I was wrong until I said, “it is a pleonasm.” She got a quick blank look, and then said, “oh, I see what you mean.” Now, I wish I had won my point because she saw I was right but I realize I only won my point because she did not want to admit that she did not know what a pleonasm was.

Doing that would probably have lost me the account. You must have smiled very nicely!

You never saw so much teeth .