"package, parcel" in seven languages
Meaningpackage, parcel
Spanish
/paˈkete/
masc.borrowed · French paquet
French
/pakɛ/
masc.borrowed · Middle French pacque, from Middle Dutch pak, + diminutive -et
A parcel sent by post is officially a colis.
Italian
/ˈpakko/
masc.borrowed · Dutch pak
Pacchetto is the small packet: un pacchetto di sigarette.
Portuguese
/paˈkɔtʃi/
masc.borrowed · French paquet
A parcel sent by post is also an encomenda.
Romanian
/paˈket/
neut.borrowed · French paquet
Catalan
/pəˈkɛt/
masc.borrowed · French paquet
English
/ˈpækɪdʒ/
from Latin/French · pack (Middle Dutch or Low German pak) + -age
The ancestor
Middle Dutch pak‘bundle’
All six sisters descend from it, unless marked otherwise below.
The story
Not Latin at all: a trader's word from the Low Countries that spread through French. Spanish took the French diminutive whole (paquete); Italian kept the bare pak as pacco.
English relatives: pack, packet
Learn it
In a sentence
- esHe recibido un paquete.
- frJ'ai reçu un paquet.
- itHo ricevuto un pacco.
- ptEu recebi um pacote.
- roAm primit un pachet.
- caHe rebut un paquet.
- enI received a package.