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walthamstowtoday at 9:59 AM3 repliesview on HN

My father in law is a Persian speaker. I was very surprised to learn that thank you (mersi) is the same as in French, and OK/indeed (baleh) is the same as in Spanish.


Replies

bradrntoday at 10:09 AM

Persian mersi is actually a direct borrowing from the French [1]. Not sure about the other one, but I guess it’s just a coincidence, as happens so often in language [2].

[1] https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/%D9%85%D8%B1%D8%B3%DB%8C#Pers...

[2] https://zompist.com/chance.htm

tralarpatoday at 1:56 PM

Spanish vale and English value have the same Latin origin. Persian bale is an Arabic loanword.

nephihahatoday at 10:17 AM

Arigato in Japanese is said to be a borrowing from Portuguese Obrigado (might want to verify that!).

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