"beard" in seven languages
Meaningbeard
Spanish
barba
/ˈbarba/
fem.inherited
French
barbe
/baʁb/
fem.inherited
Colloquially, la barbe ! means 'what a bore!'
Italian
barba
/ˈbarba/
fem.inherited
Che barba! 'how boring!', as in French.
Portuguese
barba
/ˈbahbɐ/
fem.inherited
Romanian
barbă
/ˈbarbə/
fem.inherited
Catalan
barba
/ˈbarbə/
fem.inherited
English
beard
/bɪɹd/
Indo-European kin · PIE *bʰardʰeh₂
English → ItalianbeardbarbaDistant cognateRelated only through Indo-European, thousands of years back (night ~ noche). But English has relatives: barber, barbed.What English and Italian share
The Latin ancestor
BARBAM‘beard’
All six sisters descend from it, unless marked otherwise below.
The story
The same word in all six sisters, give or take a final vowel. English beard is its Germanic cousin; barber came through French, the man who trims the barba.
English relatives: barber, barbed
Sound laws at work
Learn it
In a sentence
- esMi abuelo tiene barba blanca.
- frMon grand-père a une barbe blanche.
- itMio nonno ha la barba bianca.
- ptMeu avô tem barba branca.
- roBunicul are barbă albă.
- caEl meu avi té barba blanca.
- enMy grandfather has a white beard.