# Forum Other Languages Germanic languages German  Danke

## Vladimir

Danke pravit und ODdo auch! Pravit ich muss sagen, dass du Deutsch ganz ganz toll sprichst! Nein gleich lern ich Russisch nicht! ICh kann ein bisschen russisch sprechen aber nur, einfuehrungen usw ja? 
Bitte schreib mir tschuess 
Mit freundlichen gruessen!   ::

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## Jasper May

Wenn du eine Antwort geben moechtest, dr

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## Vladimir

Sorry,ich bin ein wenig doof! MAnchmal  :P  
So jasper may wer bist du? haha  Wohnst du in Holland ja? ich denke dass Holland echt spitze ist    ::  besser als hier in kiel ja? 
Naja 
muss gehen tschuess

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## Pravit

Kein Problem(gah, the gender of that word always throws me off. It's feminine in all other languages...). Ich bin froh, dass du denkst, dass ich Deutsch OK sprechen kann. Hoffentlich werde ich es besser lernen...

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## Jasper May

Natuerlich ist es hier besser als in Kiel (ich weiss nicht einmal wo Kiel liegt)!  ::  Aber warum denkst du das? Wahrscheinlich weil es hier legal ist Wiet zu rauchen? Ich frage mich ob Deutsche auch andere Dingen ueber die Niederlanden wissen... 
@Pravit: Interestingly enough, in Dutch it's also not feminine (het Probleem). Maybe it's a Germanic thing. Strong and solid. We're no pansy effeminate Romance language speakers.  :: 
[edit:] seems that it's *le* probl

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## Pravit

Russian has the most influence over all of my foreign languages so it counts as "all other languages." And as I said earlier, my French is bad... ::  I think I once said "aviabiljet" when I was speaking German and everyone looked at me weird...

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## pernat

auch auf Polnisch "problem" ist maennlich also es ist kein "Germanic
thing". Das Wort ist eigentlich lateinisch also es ist wirklich unklar
warum die Russen das Wort angenohmen haben und gleich von maennlich zur weiblich veraendert haben.

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## Jasper May

Auf Italienisch und Spanisch ist 'Problema' auch weiblich... Sogar auf Lateinisch. O ja, und es ist ein Griechisches Wort.  ::

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## pernat

ja, vielleicht. Doch ist es wahrscheinlicher dass das Wort kam ins Russisch
von der deutschen Sprache

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## bad manners

πρόβλημα 
Notice the "a" in the end. In general, Russian keeps its Greek borrowings closer to the original than many other languages.

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## Oddo

Yes, but English is the only language I know of that keeps its Greek "eu"s sounding Greek 
Europe
like Eutopia, though it should really be Europa...but things change over the years anyway..

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## bad manners

> Yes, but English is the only language I know of that keeps its Greek "eu"s sounding Greek 
> Europe
> like Eutopia, though it should really be Europa...but things change over the years anyway..

 Really? ευ should be pronounced as "ef" or "ev", not as "you". The Russian pronunciation of "Europe" (Европа) and "euphemism" (эвфемизм) is very similar to the original, the English is absolutely not. Classic Latin also treats classic Greek decently (not when pronounced by a half-educated student of Latin, though).

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## alexnoe

> Auf Italienisch und Spanisch ist 'Problema' auch weiblich... Sogar auf Lateinisch

 Auf Franz

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## Jasper May

We don't _know_ how Greek was pronounced. Certainly, _Modern_ Greeks pronounce 'eu' as 'ef', but in Holland we learn it's pronounced like the Dutch 'ui' (Scottish 'ow' as in 'now'), English say it's like 'you', French say it's like the eu in 'deux'. Germans say it like 'oy', but that's of course completely wrong. I thought that in Latin, 'deus' was pronounced as 'day-oos' and that this was the same as in Greek. (Dzay-oos for 'Zeus')

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## bad manners

In Latin, "eu", which originally was "ev" ('u' was a late addition to the alphabet), was pronounced as a short "e" and then a short "u"; this is so because "v" is either English "w" or "oo" (they added 'u' for the latter case). That is still coherent with the way "ευ" should be pronounced. German and Dutch are closer to the proper sound because it is still a diphthong, English apparently adopted the French pronunciation, and the French, well, will always be French when it comes to pronunciation.  ::  What other language can transform "aqua" into "eau"?

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## Jasper May

Thou errst therein, my good Sir. Indeed, Romans didn't have the _letter_ 'u', but they did have the sound, in the form of a 'vocalic' v. Just as they didn't have the _letter_ j, only as a 'consonantal' i.
Devs and bonvs, for example, were pronounced Day-oos and Bone-oos, but vox and divitiae as Vox  ::  and Dih-vits-ee-aye.
It would be very hard to pronounce bonvs with a consonantal v, now would it?  ::  
[edit]I see that I overlooked the point you were trying to make. I apologise, but nevertheless this may be of interest.

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## alexnoe

> It would be very hard to pronounce bonvs with a consonantal v, now would it?

 Why?

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## Jasper May

Try it. Bonn-vv-zz.   ::

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## alexnoe

Yeah, exactly, Bonnvvzz.  It is just like 'aufs' instead of 'auf das', with the f being replaced by a 'v' and with an 'n' before ... maybe I have an advantage because clusters of consonants are very common in german :P

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## Jasper May

And it's also just like 'apple', only with an n before the 'app', v between the p and l, s at the end, and without the a, p, p, l or e.  ::  Come on, that's no comparison.  ::  I know it's easy to pronounce 'fs' or 'vz', English has loads of examples, like poofs, loves etc. The n before it is what's tricky. Try saying bonn-vv-zz quickly, and _not_ bonn-vus or bonne-vvzz. And then, please, agree that it's easier to say 'Bone-oos'. Which is what they did...

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## alexnoe

> And then, please, agree that it's easier to say 'Bone-oos'

 It isn't. I just need to find a german word with -nfs ... If you say the n is the tricky part, then Hanf is tricky for you, right?
The genitiv can be des Hanfes or des Hanfs ...

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## Oddo

It is widely accepted (though not universally) that a latin v was always pronounce u 
e.g. via = "wiya"
e.g. bonvs = "bonnus"

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## alexnoe

That much is clear. But the reason that nvs were inpronouncable is nethertheless invalid.

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## Pravit

> In Latin, "eu", which originally was "ev" ('u' was a late addition to the alphabet), was pronounced as a short "e" and then a short "u"; this is so because "v" is either English "w" or "oo" (they added 'u' for the latter case). That is still coherent with the way "ευ" should be pronounced. German and Dutch are closer to the proper sound because it is still a diphthong, English apparently adopted the French pronunciation, and the French, well, will always be French when it comes to pronunciation.  What other language can transform "aqua" into "eau"?

 Out of curiosity, is this where some surnames such as "de la O" came about? I was always curious what "La O" meant. What language would that be, anyway?

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## Jasper May

Why is the argument 'nevertheless invalid'? It's a simple rule that if a word is hard to pronounce for a certain people, the pronunciation changes over time. But I won't convince you, because you don't think nfs is hard to pronounce. You won't convince me either, so let's just leave it at that.  :: 
(btw, I didn't say 'inpronounceable', I just said it was harder that 'bonnus' or 'bone-oos')

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