G'day Hamish - welcome a'Board; it's good to have you with us.

Like you, I'm fascinated by the similarities and differ3ences between languages. Of course, English is full of them, because of the large variety of sources on which it is based - Latin (from AD47?) Old german (Saxon/Jutish incursions from 6th Century) Scandinavian (Vikings, c. C7) French (1066 and all that) and then from successive waves of immigrants - Jewish, Flemish, Italian, Chinese, Polish, Russian, German - etc etc. Then the world-wide Empite of the C18/C19 brought African, Indian, and Arabic words into the language. Anmd they have adopted and modified English words.
So, wherever you go, almost, you find both true friends and flase ones in the language.
A bit like life, really!


I'm immortal until proven otherwise