[seanhunter]

Two of my favourites: - Why do we have guarantee and warrantee that mean essentially the same thing? (Because one word was imported into English from French at two different periods in history) - Why do we have child -> children, brother -> bretheren (obv archaic but still would be understood by most people) but no other plurals that work that way? You can't say one sister many sistren for example. Even though that word existed in Old English it didn't survive into modern English.

[mbg721]

I have heard, I think from a user on here, that crimes are often listed as a pair of synonyms (e.g. "aiding and abetting") because one word was Norman French and the other was English, and the law required both to be understood.

[yissp]

On a similar note, I've heard that the words for animals, like cow or pig, tend to be Germanic while the words for their meat, like beef or pork tend to be Latin.

[seanhunter]

The food/meat words are actually from French because that was what the aristocratic classes would have spoken in England in the late middle ages/early Rennaisance and they were the people eating the meat for the most part.

Beef <- Boeuf

Pork <- Porc

Poultry <- Poulet

Salmon <- Saumon

Venison <- Venaison

Mutton <- Mouton

The latin words are in some cases the root of the French but it's not as clear or consistent.

[yissp]

What about ox -> oxen?

[seanhunter]

Interesting. Yes that's similer, although I was talking about "ren" as a suffice specifically.

But still we say ox and oxen and yet we don't say one axe many "axen". Yes I know people say "emacsen", but that's not really a word.

[euroderf]

Not to mention VAX -> VAXen.