Re: The Birds and the Bees of Gender

Nik Taylor <fortytwo@...> wrote:
> Carlos Thompson wrote:
> > by the way, can cattle be used of sheep?
>
> No, cattle is only used of bovines.
>
> > Anyhow, in spanish the _singulars_ would be "cabeza de ganado" (lit. head
of
> > cattle) and "mueble".
>
> Hmm, interesting.  We also say "head of cattle".  Surely that can't be
> co-incidence.  I wonder if ours or Spanish's came first, or if they
> borrowed it from the same source?
>
Might be a Latin calque. In Spanish we have the expression
_por cabeza_ "per head" meaning "per person", as in
_una silla por cabeza_ "a chair per person". And the borrowed
expression _PBN per capita_ (PBN means Producto Bruto Nacional,
"Gross National Product"). (_Per capita_ is also used with some
other economic expressions.)


--Pablo Flores

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 The trouble with the rat race is that even
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                                             Lily Tomlin