# Russian language has no native word for passport? **URL:** \ **Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\ **Created:** [March 10, 2022, 5:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/russian-language-has-no-native-word-for-passport/960797 "2022-03-10T05:45:47Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![psychonaut](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/psychonaut/32/4655_2.png) [@psychonaut](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/psychonaut)\ **Post date:** [March 11, 2022, 9:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/russian-language-has-no-native-word-for-passport/960797/41 "2022-03-11T21:41:37Z")
> [@Pardel-Lux](#): > > German, BTW, is the only language I speak that does not use the French word for passport, pasaporte, passaporto or similar. Germans say _Reisepass_ : A pass for travel. There must be a lot of other languages like that, but I do not speak them. In Hungarian it’s _útlevél_ and in Icelandic it’s _vegabréf_, both of which literally mean “road-letter”. ---
**Author:** ![Pardel-Lux](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/pardel-lux/32/20182_2.png) [@Pardel-Lux](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Pardel-Lux)\ **Post date:** [March 11, 2022, 10:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/russian-language-has-no-native-word-for-passport/960797/42 "2022-03-11T22:00:07Z")
Hungarian, of course, thanks! The _weird_ hard language. Every time I think of it, I feel a deep relief that I don’t need to learn it. ---
**Author:** ![madmonk28](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/madmonk28/32/20811_2.png) [@madmonk28](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/madmonk28)\ **Post date:** [March 11, 2022, 10:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/russian-language-has-no-native-word-for-passport/960797/43 "2022-03-11T22:31:37Z")
Yeah, I always thought of **Бутерброд** as the open faced sandwich and I associate it with pickles and vodka, but that could be more about my time in Russia, than anything else. ---
**Author:** ![Acsenray](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/acsenray/32/4519_2.png) [@Acsenray](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Acsenray)\ **Post date:** [March 11, 2022, 10:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/russian-language-has-no-native-word-for-passport/960797/44 "2022-03-11T22:57:19Z")
> [@Pleonast](#): > > orthogonal concepts I’d call them more parallel than perpendicular. They work in concert but are (usually) distinguishable. ---
**Author:** ![UDS1](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/e47774/32.png) [@UDS1](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/UDS1)\ **Post date:** [March 12, 2022, 7:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/russian-language-has-no-native-word-for-passport/960797/45 "2022-03-12T07:49:00Z")
> [@phs3](#): > > Another good example; “restaurant”, which is “ресторан” in Russian. Transliterated, that’s: r e s t o r a n > So they lost the trailing “t”. But unlike passports, or even sandwiches (which are relatively recent inventions), surely people were paying to eat food even before they were paying to get their hair cut! Even if the payment was in labor or other barter. It lost the trailing ‘t’ because the word was imported from French, where the ‘t’ is not voiced. And the English word, of course, is also imported from French. Restaurants are a French invention of the late 18th century. Sure, there were places where you paid to eat before then, but they weren’t restaurants. They were, e.g., inns. ---
**Author:** ![Cartooniverse](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cartooniverse/32/3084_2.png) [@Cartooniverse](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cartooniverse)\ **Post date:** [March 13, 2022, 2:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/russian-language-has-no-native-word-for-passport/960797/46 "2022-03-13T02:08:31Z")
As may have been mentioned above, many words have been co-opted aurally. I used to work with a Russian-born television reporter who will remain nameless. She told me that the Russian word for Steadicam ( the device I operated for 30+ years ) is “Steadicam”. There were other broadcast television-specific words that were simply spoken as English but in a Russian accent. Google Translate confirms. Стедикам Stedikam ---
**Author:** ![Northern\_Piper](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/northern_piper/32/5304_2.png) [@Northern\_Piper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Northern_Piper)\ **Post date:** [March 13, 2022, 2:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/russian-language-has-no-native-word-for-passport/960797/47 "2022-03-13T02:25:41Z")
> [@Al128](#): > > Hairdresser in russian is: парикмахер (Parikmacher) > > from the german Perückenmacher (wig-maker) > > I always found that odd … clearly somebody would have cut other people’s hair in russia before they came into contact with the germans (or jiddisch?) … The term is actually from French, but even then, apparently with Italian origins. The French, of course, were the height of _la mode_ for a long time, and what was worn at the French court, and what it was called, naturally spread across Europe. The local word for “haircutter” probably just didn’t have the same _cachet_ as using a local version of a French term, used by the high society. > **[periwig | Etymology of periwig by etymonline](https://www.etymonline.com/word/periwig)** > > PERIWIG: "peruke, artificial imitation of a head of hair," worn as a fashionable accessory or as part of a… See origin and meaning of periwig. See the etymology of the English word “periwig”, which is a derivation of the French word “peruke”. As French wikipedia puts it: > [@](#): > > C’est ainsi que, progressivement, les perruques devinrent un accessoire obligatoire de l’habillement masculin pour les personnes d’un certain rang social. Les fabricants de celles-ci y gagnèrent un prestige considérable. La corporation des perruquiers fut créée en France par l’édit du 23 mars 1673[4](https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Perruque#cite_note-4) ([Louis XIV](https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Louis_XIV) instituant la communauté des « Barbiers-perruquiers-baigneurs-étuvistes »), puis ce fut le cas partout en Europe. Il s’agissait d’un métier à haute qualification. C’est au cours de cette même année 1673 que le Roi adopta à son tour la perruque, dont la mode était déjà répandue dans son royaume, ayant [Binet](https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beno%C3%AEt_Binet) pour perruquier. Si l’objectif originel de la perruque était de masquer un manque de cheveux en imitant la chevelure naturelle, elle finit par rompre avec l’imitation de la nature pour devenir un objet de mode qui se portait sur un crâne rasé ; la lourde perruque _in-folio_ se développa ainsi à partir des années 1680[3](https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Perruque#cite_note-2011bologne-3). Which also points out that technically, one could argue that English doesn’t have a native word for “wig”, because the French word “perruque” gradually got Englished into “periwig”, and then shortened to “wig”. ---
**Author:** ![Acsenray](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/acsenray/32/4519_2.png) [@Acsenray](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Acsenray)\ **Post date:** [March 13, 2022, 3:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/russian-language-has-no-native-word-for-passport/960797/48 "2022-03-13T03:50:25Z")
> [@phs3](#): > > Another good example; “restaurant”, which is “ресторан” in Russian. Transliterated, that’s: r e s t o r a n > So they lost the trailing “t”. But unlike passports, or even sandwiches (which are relatively recent inventions), surely people were paying to eat food even before they were paying to get their hair cut! So why aren’t asking why English has imported the French word “restaurant” or “hotel”—surely, English people didn’t learn these concepts from the French! Can you imagine the bereft nature of a society and culture that had to learn the words “chair,” “country,” “fruit,” “table,” “stay,” “wait,” “money,” “art,” “music,” “dance,” “blue,” and “ **use** ” from the French? One can hardly imagine such a people being able to make it through an average day if they didn’t understand so many things required for human existence! ---
**Author:** ![phs3](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/8491ac/32.png) [@phs3](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/phs3)\ **Post date:** [March 13, 2022, 4:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/russian-language-has-no-native-word-for-passport/960797/49 "2022-03-13T04:10:53Z")
? I wasn’t asking anything… ---
**Author:** ![Napier](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/ce73a5/32.png) [@Napier](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Napier)\ **Post date:** [March 13, 2022, 1:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/russian-language-has-no-native-word-for-passport/960797/50 "2022-03-13T13:08:22Z")
We’re talking about cognates here – words that are the same in different languages. Some English cognates that come from Russian include borscht and dacha. Another that is sort of a cognate is babushka, which in English means a sort of head scarf worn by old women such as grandmothers, whereas in Russian it means grandmother. Different meaning but obviously connected. My favorite English cognate with any language is alcohol. It’s the same in ancient Mesopotamian. ---
**Author:** ![Alessan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/alessan/32/465_2.png) [@Alessan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Alessan)\ **Post date:** [March 13, 2022, 1:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/russian-language-has-no-native-word-for-passport/960797/51 "2022-03-13T13:24:40Z")
> [@Senegoid](#): > > I’d have guessed that Russian draws a lot of its loan words and roots from Greek. The Cyrillic alphabet is clearly largely derived from the Greek alphabet. Historically, the Russians have always admired French culture and language. When Peter the Great decided to make Russia more “western” and “modern”, what he mainly mean was to make it more French. ---
**Author:** ![Pardel-Lux](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/pardel-lux/32/20182_2.png) [@Pardel-Lux](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Pardel-Lux)\ **Post date:** [March 13, 2022, 1:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/russian-language-has-no-native-word-for-passport/960797/52 "2022-03-13T13:29:52Z")
Transliterations can be funny, have you heard of a poet named **[Уи́льям Шекспи́р](https://ru.wikipedia.org/wiki/%D0%A8%D0%B5%D0%BA%D1%81%D0%BF%D0%B8%D1%80,_%D0%A3%D0%B8%D0%BB%D1%8C%D1%8F%D0%BC)** (Uíliam Chekspír)? He is actually quite famous. > [@Napier](#): > > My favorite English cognate with any language is alcohol. It’s the same in ancient Mesopotamian. Cite? My Spanish Wiki says it stems from the Arab _al-kuḥl_ الكحول, or _al-ghawl_ الغول, «the spirit», «any pulverized substance», «distilled liquid», while the English Wiki writes “The word “alcohol” is from the Arabic _[kohl](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kohl_(cosmetics))_ ([Arabic](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arabic_language): الكحل, [romanized](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Romanization_of_Arabic): _al-kuḥl_ ), a powder used as an eyeliner.” ---
**Author:** ![Elmer\_J.Fudd](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/elmer_j.fudd/32/1211_2.png) [@Elmer\_J.Fudd](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Elmer_J.Fudd)\ **Post date:** [March 13, 2022, 2:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/russian-language-has-no-native-word-for-passport/960797/53 "2022-03-13T14:09:55Z")
> [@Alessan](#): > > Historically, the Russians have always admired French culture and language. When Peter the Great decided to make Russia more “western” and “modern”, what he mainly mean was to make it more French. French was the language of court for many tsars. I imagine a lot of government documents in Imperial Russia had French names. ---
**Author:** ![Wendell\_Wagner](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/8491ac/32.png) [@Wendell\_Wagner](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wendell_Wagner)\ **Post date:** [March 13, 2022, 2:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/russian-language-has-no-native-word-for-passport/960797/54 "2022-03-13T14:17:23Z")
> [@Napier](#): > > babushka Another occasional use of the word in English is for the nesting dolls which are called matryoshka dolls in Russian. Yes, this comes from a misunderstanding of the meaning of the two words, but that frequently happens when a word from one language is then transferred to being used in another language. So you are free to correct someone when they use babushka for the dolls, but the term is occasionally used in this way: > **[The Meaning and Symbolism of the Matryoshka Nesting Dolls](https://nestingdolls.co/blogs/posts/meaning-symbolism-nesting-dolls)** > > One look at these colorful and beautifully painted wooden dolls, and you’ll suddenly feel a cosmic-like force enveloping your spiritual being. The Russian nesting dolls, which are better known as matryoshka nesting dolls in their country of origin,... ---
**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:** [March 13, 2022, 4:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/russian-language-has-no-native-word-for-passport/960797/55 "2022-03-13T16:44:02Z")
I think cognates are words that are related through descent from a common ancestral language, not words that are the same through borrowing. So “real” (royal in Spanish) and “raja” (King in Hindi) are cognate words - they both come from an ancient Indo-European word for ruler. The English word “king” is also a cognate (a much harder to recognize one) - but words like “ruler,” “royal”, etc., are words that were forced into English from French due to the Norman invasion and descend from a different line (from Latin, of course). English had so many words forced into it and borrowed so many that sometimes we get multiple words borrowed at different times from the same language. Thus we have “Warden” (from Norman French) and “guardian” from later non-Norman French. Another interesting case is “make” - a cognate of the German “machen,” going back to proto-Germanic. But “macher” (an influencer - someone who can make things happen) was borrowed into English in the 20th century, from Yiddish (which of course got it from the German)) ---
**Author:** ![DPRK](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/4491bb/32.png) [@DPRK](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DPRK)\ **Post date:** [March 13, 2022, 5:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/russian-language-has-no-native-word-for-passport/960797/56 "2022-03-13T17:07:31Z")
> [@Wendell\_Wagner](#): > > > [@Napier](#): > > > > babushka > > Another occasional use of the word in English is for the nesting dolls which are called matryoshka dolls in Russian. Yes, this comes from a misunderstanding of the meaning of the two words, but that frequently happens when a word from one language is then transferred to being used in another language. So you are free to correct someone when they use babushka for the dolls, but the term is occasionally used in this way: > > [The Meaning and Symbolism of the Matryoshka Nesting Dolls](https://nestingdolls.co/blogs/posts/meaning-symbolism-nesting-dolls) I always figured most people knew what they were talking about when referring to babushka [scarves] (which Baba might wear) or matryoshka. Never heard anyone talk about a “babushka doll”, but that is a cromulent character to paint—indeed stereotypically it is some kind of peasant wearing a scarf and sarafan. ---
**Author:** ![Napier](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/ce73a5/32.png) [@Napier](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Napier)\ **Post date:** [March 13, 2022, 5:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/russian-language-has-no-native-word-for-passport/960797/57 "2022-03-13T17:39:40Z")
> [@Andy\_L](#): > > I think cognates are words that are related through descent from a common ancestral language, not words that are the same through borrowing. From > **[Definition of COGNATE](https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/cognate)** > > of the same or similar nature : generically alike; related by blood; also : related on the mother's side; related by descent from the same ancestral language… See the full definition 3 a **:** related by descent from the same ancestral languageSpanish and French are cognate languages. b of a word or morpheme **:** related by derivation, borrowing, or descent English “eat” and German “essen” are cognate. c of a substantive **:** related to a verb usually by derivation and serving as its object to reinforce the meaning (such as _song_ in “she sang a song”) ---
**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:** [March 13, 2022, 5:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/russian-language-has-no-native-word-for-passport/960797/58 "2022-03-13T17:42:49Z")
Does that apply to “borscht”? We stole that word straight from Russian - it didn’t descend in both English and Russian from a common ancestor. ---
**Author:** ![Napier](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/ce73a5/32.png) [@Napier](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Napier)\ **Post date:** [March 13, 2022, 5:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/russian-language-has-no-native-word-for-passport/960797/59 "2022-03-13T17:45:03Z")
> [@Pardel-Lux](#): > > Cite? My Spanish Wiki says it stems from the Arab _al-kuḥl_ الكحول, or _al-ghawl_ الغول, «the spirit», «any pulverized substance», «distilled liquid», while the English Wiki writes “The word “alcohol” is from the Arabic _[kohl](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kohl_(cosmetics))_ ([Arabic](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arabic_language): الكحل, [romanized](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Romanization_of_Arabic): _al-kuḥl_ ), a powder used as an eyeliner.” I don’t remember where I read that long ago – or perhaps I imagined it. But hunting around I only find origins like you posted. So, I think I got that wrong. Thank you for the correction! ---
**Author:** ![DPRK](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/4491bb/32.png) [@DPRK](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DPRK)\ **Post date:** [March 13, 2022, 6:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/russian-language-has-no-native-word-for-passport/960797/60 "2022-03-13T18:05:05Z")
Akkadian for booze is **šikāru** , still extant in Semitic languages today. **guḫlu** is the eye make-up. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/russian-language-has-no-native-word-for-passport/960797.md?page=2) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/russian-language-has-no-native-word-for-passport/960797.md?page=4)