Kilo Lingo

Line drawing of rubo
Coloured illustration of rubo
#2056 of 5,000 Core 5000

Translation

rubbish, refuse; rubble, debris

Examples

.

After the party only rubbish was left on the street.

.

The rubble of the old house lay on the ground.

.

Do not throw your rubbish into the river.

covers two things English keeps apart, and the connection between them is the whole meaning: it is what is left over after something has been used up or knocked down. Household refuse in the first sense, the rubble of a collapsed building in the second. If it is a heap of stuff nobody wants, it is .

The bin is o, on the -- of containers, and it is one of the most reliably useful derived words in the language. o is a piece of rubbish, o is the tip, senruba is litter-free. None of that has to be learned separately.

The reason this word needs a warning is its neighbours, and they are close enough to bite. is a ribbon. is the Russian currency, and it sits only a few dozen ranks along in this same chapter. Rubeno is a ruby. Rubriko is a heading or a column in a newspaper. Five words beginning rub-, no relation between any of them, and Esperanto's usual comfort (that a shared prefix means a shared root) does exactly the wrong thing here. Read the whole word.

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Esperanto · Free printables

rubo: worksheet, infographic and listicle

Free printable study downloads for the Esperanto word "rubo" (rubbish, refuse; rubble, debris): 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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This word is part of lesson 42.