Complimentary salutations and closings in letters in different languages

Factual Questions
1

English:

Formal: Dear Ms. Smith; informal: Dear Paul, both of which are clear enough.

Fml: Yours truly, or Sincerely yours, or Yours - all descendents of “I beg to remain truly (or Sincerely) your most obedient servant.”

Infml: Love, or Cheers,

French:

Fml: Chère Mme Desautels; infml: Cher Henri (“dear” again).

Fml: Veuillez (or Je vous prie d’)agréer l’expression de mes sentiments les meilleurs (or distinguées): Please permit the expression of my best wishes.
Infml: Hmm… You know, I’ve never had occasion to send an informal letter in French (I was going to say “French letter”, but I thought better of it). I’d ask my roommate, but he’s asleep.

Spanish:

Fml:
For women: Estimada señor(it)a (Esteemed lady).
For men: Muy señor mío (An odd sentence… “señor” means “Mr.” or “sir” or “gentleman”, of course, but here it’s an adjectival noun… “My distant superior”.)

Infml: Querido Juan or Querida Pilar (“dear” again).

Fml:
Atentamente, (Attentively,)
Infml:
Reciba un cordial saludo de, (Receive cordial greetings from,)

Esperanto:

Fml: Estimata sinjor(in)o or Estimataj gesinjoroj (Dear Sir/Dear Madam/Ladies and gentlemen)
Infml: Kara Kàlmàn or Karaj amikoj (“dear” again)

As for the closing, some different ones include:
Amike salutas, (the most common informal one: “… sends friendly salutations”)
Kore, (“from the heart”)
Dankon, (“thank you”)
Samideane, (“as a fellow member of the Esperanto movement”)
Or you can get as flowery as you want:
Atendas avide vian respondon, kaj dankas vin antaue,
("…eagerly awaits your response, and thanks you ahead of time.")

Other languages please, with translations?

Y’r most humble and ob’t svt,
Matt

2

I’ve lived in Korea for a couple of years, and have studied Korean a fair bit (but I’m NO expert! So forgive me if there are mistakes here…)

GREETINGS
Formal: Annyong Hashimnika? (Are you at peace?)
Informal: Annyong Haseyo? (Are you at peace? Used for friends, or those younger than you)
Very Informal: Annyong! (Peace! Good friends or kids)

CLOSINGS
Formal: Annyonghi Keshimnida (Exist in peace)
Informal: Annonghi Keseyo (Exist in peace, friends or those younger than you)
Very Imformal: Annyong! (Peace! Very good friends or children…)

3

>> For men: Muy señor mío (An odd sentence… “señor” means “Mr.” or “sir” or “gentleman”, of course, but here it’s an adjectival noun… “My distant superior”.)

What? My distant superior? what does that mean?

Let me try to clarify…

Mister comes from monsieur which means, literally, “my lord” in french, like “monsignor” in italian or like “mi señor” in Spanish. Muy means “very” and in this case acts as an intensifier so “muy señor mío” means something like “my lord indeed” or “very much my lord”.

You realise it is a formula and is not to be taken literally any more than “dear sir” or “yours truly”

Señor (from latin senior) meant lord but has come to mean any man (like lady in english).

4

You can say: avec amour, affectueusement, cordialement, très cordialement, cordialement vôtre, salutations, salutations distinguées, à bientôt, affectueusement, amicalement, amitiés… those are just what I can think at the moment.

5

I know all this about “señor”. My point is that in “Muy señor mío”, it’s being modified with “muy”, which is only used with adjectives. The adjective meaning of “señor” is “senior” or “superior”.

6

Dutch:

Formal: Geachte heer/mevrouw Jansen (“honoured/valued mister/mrs. Jansen”); informal: Beste Paul (“dear Paul”, as said to a friend), or Lieve Paul (“dear Paul”, as said to a close relative or loved one. There is a BIG difference in connotation).

Fml: Met vriendelijke groet (“With a friendly greeting”), or Hoogachtend (“Valueing [you] greatly”).

Infml: Veel liefs (“Lots of love”), or Groetjes! (“little greetings”).

7

Astro: I like the Korean version of “Ladies and Gentlemen.” It’s “Yuhrabun.” Sort of like, “Folks.” Now, that’s informal!

8

>> The adjective meaning of “señor” is “senior” or “superior”.

Not in Spanish it ain’t. Señor cannot be used as an adjective in Spanish. It is strictly a noun that literally means “lord” but in fact means any man.

9

In German:

Opening informal:

Lieber (male name), or Liebe (female name),

formal:

Sehr geehrte Herr (male)/Frau (female) X,
Sehr geehrte Damen und Herren, (unknown addressee)

closing informal:

Dein (male) Deine (female),

or more popular today: Schoene Gruesse or Liebe Gruesse (with Umlauts/beta-s since I have an English keyboard at the moment: scho"ne Gru"Be)

closing formal:

Mit freundlichen Gru"Ben, (Gruessen)

is most common, other more stilted ones are of course possible, but unusual.

10

ITALIAN:
Informal: Caro whoever (m.)/Cara whoverever (f.)

Formal: Egregio Signore, Egregia Signora, where signore and signora can be replaced by titles if necessary.

11

interesting how egregio/egregious , being the same word, have evolved contradictory meanings.

12

Irish:

Formal: A Chara (“friend”) or A Chairde (“friends”)
Informal: A Mhícheáil mo chara (“Michael my friend”)

Formal: Le meas or Sinne, le meas (“with respect”)
Informal: Slán (“goodbye”), slán go fóill (“see you later”) etc.

13

Thanks for taken up the slack ruadh .

My Irish is terrible . :o

14

Tá fáilte romhat, yojimbo :slight_smile:

15

Jesus, my English isn’t much better. taking.

Yojimbo leave now (quickly) .

16

Hrm, Hebrew:

Mr. is mar. I suspect that this is actually based on the English term Mr. Gever is equivalent to sir.
Mrs./madam/lady is geveret. These can be used in the third-person, to refer to someone - in fact, they’re rarely used any other way, as Israelis tend to be pretty informal in general.

In a letter, that would be geveret yakarah or gever yakar, which mean ‘precious madam’ & ‘precious madam.’

When adressing friends (pl.), the term is chevrei. This is informal.

Formal goodbye is l’hitra’ot.
Informal is yalla bye. I think this is actually Arabic.