thereallieutenantcommanderdata:

thejazzykittykat:

verbivore8642:

brigwife:

kidouyuuto:

how did they learn to translate languages into other languages how did they know which words meant what HOW DID TH

English Person: *Points at an apple* Apple

French Person: Non c’est une fucking pomme 

*800 years of war*

Fun fact: There are a lot of rivers in the UK named “avon” because the Romans arrived and asked the Celts what the rivers were called. The Celts answered “avon.” 

“Avon” is just the Celtic word for river.

Fan Fact #2: When Spanish conquistadors landed in the Yucatán peninsula, they asked the natives what their land was called and they responded “Yucatán”. In 2015, it was discovered that in those mesoamerican languages, “Yucatán” meant “I don’t understand what you are saying”

That’s almost certainly not the origin of Yucatán.  The most likely theories are that it derives from yucatá meaning “Land of yucas” or that it derives from yokot’an or yokot’anob, the native name of the Chontal Maya people, who live in the Yucatán.

However, one actual example of misunderstandings by Europeans – early maps of what we now call the Hawaiian islands (then known as the Sandwich Islands) had o- prefixed to the names of the islands, Ohawaii, Omaui, etc.  The word ‘o in Hawaiian means “this”, so the Hawaiians would give the names of their islands by saying “this is Hawaii”, “this is Maui”, etc. (a quirk of Hawaiian grammar – the grammar required the “this is” when naming something)  That misunderstanding lasted long enough for a distorted version of Ohawaii to become Owyhee, the name of a river in Idaho, Nevada, and Oregon.