Translation
parrot
Word origin
Through French papegai and Spanish papagayo from Arabic babbaghā', the bird's name across the medieval Mediterranean trade. English took the same word twice: once as the archaic popinjay, and once, much later and by a different road, as parrot.
- Origin
- Arabic, via Spanish and French
- Root
- babbaghā'
- English cognates
- popinjay, papagayo
Examples
, .
The parrot repeats everything we say.
.
Her parrot has green and yellow feathers.
.
The bird in the cage is a big parrot.
No -ag- suffix, and no inside it either. This is the false seam worth naming, because both halves look real. Esperanto genuinely has papo for a pope, and it genuinely has ago for a deed, off . Put them together and ought to mean something like a papal act. It does not, and it never has: - is one indivisible root, borrowed whole from a chain of trade languages, and the resemblance to is the sort of accident that a productive affix system trains you to over-read. Esperanto has no -ag- affix at all. When a word ends in -ago, check the dictionary before you take it apart.
What it does with the roots it can take. A young one is o, a female is o, and the verb the language actually uses about parrots is i - to parrot, to repeat without understanding - which is the -um- suffix doing what it does best, standing in for a relationship too specific to have its own affix. is the neutral word for imitating; i carries the sneer.
The one to keep apart is plumo. A parrot's feathers are , and so is a pen, because Esperanto took the French e with both meanings attached. Context sorts it out every time, but a sentence about a parrot and a writing desk in the same breath will make you look twice.
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papago: worksheet, infographic and listicle
Free printable study downloads for the Esperanto word "papago" (parrot): a worksheet with the answer key built in, an infographic, and a sentence listicle. Open any one to view, print or save.
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Start your free weekThis word is part of lesson 46.