# Longest false "bilingual" word **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [January 4, 2022, 12:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/longest-false-bilingual-word/957168 "2022-01-04T00:00:18Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 7
**Author:** ![hibernicus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hibernicus/32/2802_2.png) [@hibernicus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/hibernicus)\ **Post date:** [January 6, 2022, 10:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/longest-false-bilingual-word/957168/121 "2022-01-06T22:13:15Z")
Another 5-letter offering: Irish _teach_ (meaning “house”) ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [January 6, 2022, 10:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/longest-false-bilingual-word/957168/122 "2022-01-06T22:25:33Z")
> [@Tusculan](#): > > _brand_ in Dutch means fire Isn’t that related, though? Fire → Hot thing → Hot piece of metal with a logo shape → Mark identifying something as one’s one. ---
**Author:** ![hibernicus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hibernicus/32/2802_2.png) [@hibernicus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/hibernicus)\ **Post date:** [January 6, 2022, 10:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/longest-false-bilingual-word/957168/123 "2022-01-06T22:27:33Z")
> [@dtilque](#): > > And I wasn’t 100% certain about this one. I’d be surprised if they aren’t related but would like confirmation. > > _pretend_ (portuguese) “intend” [HMS\_Irruncible] Both from Latin _praetendere_, to hold forth, from _pre-_ and _tendere_ (to stretch) ---
**Author:** ![Andy\_L](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/c67d28/32.png) [@Andy\_L](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Andy_L)\ **Post date:** [January 6, 2022, 11:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/longest-false-bilingual-word/957168/124 "2022-01-06T23:00:43Z")
> [@Tusculan](#): > > _brand_ in Dutch means fire “Brand” in English means a burning bit of wood (a bit obscure, I’ll admit) > **[Bible Gateway passage: Amos 4:10-12 - American Standard Version](https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Amos%204:10-12&version=ASV)** > > I have sent among you the pestilence after the manner of Egypt: your young men have I slain with the sword, and have carried away your horses; and I have made the stench of your camp to come up even into your nostrils: yet have ye not returned unto... > I have overthrown _cities_ among you, as when God overthrew Sodom and Gomorrah, and ye were as a brand plucked out of the burning: yet have ye not returned unto me, saith Jehovah. ---
**Author:** ![dtilque](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/d6d6ee/32.png) [@dtilque](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dtilque)\ **Post date:** [January 7, 2022, 12:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/longest-false-bilingual-word/957168/125 "2022-01-07T00:26:41Z")
> [@Andy\_L](#): > > “Brand” in English means a burning bit of wood (a bit obscure, I’ll admit) That meaning survives (sort of) in the term _firebrand_. Except the main use is metaphorical, rather than literal. ---
**Author:** ![I\_Love\_Me\_Vol.I](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/i_love_me_vol.i/32/521_2.png) [@I\_Love\_Me\_Vol.I](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/I_Love_Me_Vol.I)\ **Post date:** [January 7, 2022, 2:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/longest-false-bilingual-word/957168/126 "2022-01-07T02:45:48Z")
> [@Tabco](#): > > One of the possible conjugations of the Spanish verb _lavar_ (“to wash”) is _lava_ . The English “lava” (molten rock) and the Spanish “lava” (wash) both come from the Latin _[lavare](https://www.etymonline.com/word/lava)_ “to wash”, and before that, _leuə-_, the Proto-Indo-European root meaning “to wash.” ---
**Author:** ![Pseudonym](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/pseudonym/32/9895_2.png) [@Pseudonym](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Pseudonym)\ **Post date:** [January 7, 2022, 3:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/longest-false-bilingual-word/957168/127 "2022-01-07T15:30:40Z")
Don’t know if it counts since it’s a compound word that doesn’t really exist in English, thought I’d share it anyway because it made me chuckle: Badrock – Swedish for dressing gown, robe ---
**Author:** ![Frodo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/frodo/32/302_2.png) [@Frodo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Frodo)\ **Post date:** [January 7, 2022, 4:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/longest-false-bilingual-word/957168/128 "2022-01-07T16:17:09Z")
Also “molten rock” in Spanish is … “Lava”. ---
**Author:** ![SciFiSam](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/47e85d/32.png) [@SciFiSam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SciFiSam)\ **Post date:** [January 7, 2022, 6:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/longest-false-bilingual-word/957168/129 "2022-01-07T18:33:04Z")
There are several between US and British English, but my favourite, and relatively long, is pavement and sidewalk. Pavement in the US - or at least some parts, I’m told - means what in the UK we call tarmac, the black stuff that goes on roads. In the UK it means the part people, not cars, are supposed to use. So they’re both parts of a road, but very different parts. So the etymology of the words is unconnected, and the meanings are not just different, but opposite, and can cause genuine confusion - I once saw a post on here talking about cars driving down pavemented roads and it really looked like a road full of lawbreakers. ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [January 7, 2022, 10:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/longest-false-bilingual-word/957168/130 "2022-01-07T22:05:23Z")
“Pavement” in the US includes all sorts of solid mineral ground cover. It could be used of macadamized asphalt (which Americans usually just call “asphalt”), or of poured concrete, or of set flagstones or bricks, or whatever. ---
**Author:** ![Andy\_L](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/c67d28/32.png) [@Andy\_L](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Andy_L)\ **Post date:** [January 7, 2022, 11:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/longest-false-bilingual-word/957168/131 "2022-01-07T23:07:31Z")
And it can refer to the area that people walk on or the area that cars use (“Stay on the pavement” means “stay on the sidewalk” - but “Get off the pavement” means “do try not to get run over”) ---
**Author:** ![md-2000](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/9d8465/32.png) [@md-2000](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/md-2000)\ **Post date:** [January 8, 2022, 1:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/longest-false-bilingual-word/957168/132 "2022-01-08T13:40:18Z")
Maybe runs afoul of the proper name issue, but the Austrian town of **Fugging** used to be spelled differently, but apparently tourists started stealing the road signs. > **[Fugging, Upper Austria](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fugging,_Upper_Austria)** > > Fugging (.mw-parser-output .IPA-label-small{font-size:85%}.mw-parser-output .references .IPA-label-small,.mw-parser-output .infobox .IPA-label-small,.mw-parser-output .navbox .IPA-label-small{font-size:100%}German: \[ˈfʊkɪŋ\] ⓘ), spelled Fucking until 2021, is an Austrian village in the municipality of Tarsdorf, located in the Innviertel region of western Upper Austria. It is 33 km (21 mi) north of Salzburg and 4 km (2.5 mi) east of the Inn river, which forms part of the German border. > Despit... > Fugging, formerly called _Fucking_ (German: [ˈfʊkɪŋ] (About this soundlisten); officially renamed in 2021), is an Austrian village in the municipality of Tarsdorf, …thus _Fucking_ means “(place of) Focko’s people”. ---
**Author:** ![Isilder](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/cc9497/32.png) [@Isilder](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Isilder)\ **Post date:** [January 9, 2022, 11:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/longest-false-bilingual-word/957168/133 "2022-01-09T11:48:33Z")
hmm… well how can words from before dictionaries keep the same spelling ? An exchequer isn’t for playing chess, not unless the UK has Chancellor for Playing Chess. but an eschequier is a chess board in french. But we know the connection, the grid on the table used by the treasurer looked like a chess board, as in you had places and months , or places and functions, and you allocated budget by placing a token down on the square… so its understandable that a word for a chessboard got transferred to the Treasurer/ Secretrary of the Treasury / Minister Well it seems that in a quiz , when the question is "what country is XYZ from ? " I can say “well that word looks Nipponese” … or south american, or Maori , or italian, or turk … Seems its unlikely that the accepted english language spelling of loan words would ever duplicate the spelling of an unrelated. existing english language word. The larger words are too few compared to the number of possible larger words… ---
**Author:** ![dtilque](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/d6d6ee/32.png) [@dtilque](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dtilque)\ **Post date:** [January 9, 2022, 12:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/longest-false-bilingual-word/957168/134 "2022-01-09T12:52:07Z")
> [@Isilder](#): > > Seems its unlikely that the accepted english language spelling of loan words would ever duplicate the spelling of an unrelated. existing english language word. That’s irrelevant to this question, since this thread is about words in different languages. But it turns out there’s a couple examples of borrowed words matching the spelling of unrelated words. Well, one has accent marks to distinguish, but lots of people don’t bother writing those. The two are _sake_ “benefit” or “rice wine” and _pate_ ( _pâté_ ) “head” or “paste”. There’s also _resume_ ( _résumé_ ), but those are related. > [@Isilder](#): > > The larger words are too few compared to the number of possible larger words… The reason I asked about longer ones is _because_ they are rare. ---
**Author:** ![Darren\_Garrison](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/darren_garrison/32/92_2.png) [@Darren\_Garrison](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Darren_Garrison)\ **Post date:** [January 9, 2022, 5:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/longest-false-bilingual-word/957168/135 "2022-01-09T17:00:38Z")
Not longest words, but I’m guessing that there aren’t etymological connections between poke (fish) and poke (plant) or between tuna (fish) and tuna (cactus). ---
**Author:** ![Dr.Drake](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/ad7895/32.png) [@Dr.Drake](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dr.Drake)\ **Post date:** [January 9, 2022, 7:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/longest-false-bilingual-word/957168/136 "2022-01-09T19:06:22Z")
Looking up “tuna,” I was surprised to see that the cactus meaning in English was older by several hundred years (1555 vs 1881). Both come via Spanish, but the cactus is surmised to be from an indigenous languge of Hispaniola (so, I guess, Taino), while the other one seems to be Greek \> Latin \> Romance languages. The English word “tunny” for the same thing is attested from 1530 (spelled “tonny”), though. ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [January 9, 2022, 8:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/longest-false-bilingual-word/957168/137 "2022-01-09T20:44:06Z")
“Mole” is another one with different meanings from different etymologies. I think the skin blemish and the chemistry unit are connected, but certainly neither is connected to the Mexican sauce, and I’m pretty sure the burrowing mammal is likewise unconnected. ---
**Author:** ![hibernicus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hibernicus/32/2802_2.png) [@hibernicus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/hibernicus)\ **Post date:** [January 9, 2022, 10:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/longest-false-bilingual-word/957168/138 "2022-01-09T22:04:40Z")
I thought of a good 6-letter one today. Quince (Spanish for 15) = quince (fruit) > [@Chronos](#): > > I think the skin blemish and the chemistry unit are connected, but certainly neither is connected to the Mexican sauce, and I’m pretty sure the burrowing mammal is likewise unconnected. Yet another meaning with an unrelated etymology: [mole](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mole_(architecture)) means pier, breakwater or causeway Also in Latin mole means mill (as in the imperative mood, telling someone to mill). ---
**Author:** ![Hakushon](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hakushon/32/5503_2.png) [@Hakushon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hakushon)\ **Post date:** [January 10, 2022, 7:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/longest-false-bilingual-word/957168/139 "2022-01-10T07:20:46Z")
In Icelandic: banana = plural of bani, i.e. - deaths, or killers. In German: stricken = to knit. According to Wiktionary: From Old High German _stric_ , most likely from Proto-Indo-European _streyg-_ (“line”). ---
**Author:** ![Q.Q.Switcheroo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/q.q.switcheroo/32/5713_2.png) [@Q.Q.Switcheroo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Q.Q.Switcheroo)\ **Post date:** [January 11, 2022, 4:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/longest-false-bilingual-word/957168/140 "2022-01-11T16:34:33Z")
In English, **focal** means “relating to the focus of a lens.” In Irish, it means “word.” [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/longest-false-bilingual-word/957168.md?page=6) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/longest-false-bilingual-word/957168.md?page=8)