Re: Hi from Ukraine

Paul Sherrill wrote:
>
>On Sat, 1 Dec 2001 13:39:06 -0500, Andreas Johansson <and_yo@...>
>wrote:
>
> >Nicole wrote:
> >>--- Andreas Johansson froge sionk:
> >> > BTW, in Swedish literature the Polono-Lithuanian union is often
> >> > refered to
> >> > as simply "Rzeczpospolita". Is this in use in English too?
> >> >
> >>  doesn't 'rzecz' mean 'thing/item' in polish...?
> >
> >Not the slightest, but as "Rzeczpospolita" is ultimately from Latin "res
> >publica" I doubt it's related.
>
>But isn't Latin "res" used in much the same way as
>English's "thing"?  "Thing" is how my textbook says to translate "res", so
>it seems to me there could be a connection.  Perhaps either "res" was
>borrowed into Polish and then used in a calque of "res publica", or the two
>words were borrowed at the same time?
Not the slightest - I know neither Polish nor Latin.

                                          Andreas

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