Anyone know of any interesting German words (seemingly) related to English? If so, it would be fun to know.

For example:

- Traum (dream): I don't know if there is a connection, but I immediately think about the English "trauma." I like how a dream in one language might be somehow related to a somewhat dream-like psychological state while awake in another language. It makes me think our trauma is something we could more easily wake up from if we knew how. Even if it is a false cognate, I still like it.

- anrufen (to call): In English, dogs speak German! "Ruff! Ruff! Ruff!"

- Flasche (bottle): The French boteille replaced our "flasche" in English. But our alcoholics still use their flasks! Maybe if you could only afford a little bottle for your alcohol, you were more likely to keep using the Germanic word instead of the Norman-French one.

Edited 10/22/2016 10:32:22

ICH BIN EINE KLEINE MUSIKBREZEL!

Donaudampfschifffahrtsgesellschaftskapitänskajüte.

You're speaking dutch so badly it sounds like dog barking. Let me help you out and correct those incorrect hillbill high-German words.

Traum -> Droom
Anrufen -> Roepen
Flasche -> Fles

Ah... that is so much better, isn't it? My goodness, High-German requires so much saliva that my mouth is running dry. Finally to top it of, we can also use my superior dialect instead.

Droom-> Droom
Roepen-> Tier'n
Fles-> Flesse

There are a lot of similar words between both languages, which isn't very surprising, because both languages belong to the same category of languages. The germanic language, which includes not only the english and the german language, but also the dutch and the scandinavian languages.

The other 2 big categories of languages u can find in europe are the romanic languages(french, italian and spanish)and the slavic languages (eastern europe).

Edited 10/22/2016 14:09:10

For a dutchman the German word "Schmetterling" (meaning butterfly) sounds very weird.

As the Dutch word "besmet" means "infected" (and the word "smet" means "stain".)
"ling" is used for words that describe a person such as "leerling" (=Student), "vondeling" (=foundling) and "beginneling" (=beginner).

So to anybody who speaks Dutch, the word "schmetterling" will not sound like a butterfly, but like a person infected with some sort of disease :O

Kakerlake always gives me the giggles for some reason.

Himmiherrgottsakramentzefixhallelujamileckstamarschscheissglumppvarreggts.

Just on a side note, the word "Trauma" exists in german aswell :P