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Re:How French Was Medieval England? by gerdesj on Friday January 26, 2024 @06:15PM (#39150170)
On the beef thing: French: "biftek" from the English: "beef steak", beef from boef. The borrow words come full circle!

The French used to routinely boil their beef but during a lengthy Parisian siege, the locals noticed that the peoples that they came to call "les rosbifs", roasted their beef (phnaaar!) We were chucking steaks on the barbies long before Australia was even thought of ... or something jingoistic 8)

These essays are a bit of fun, as you say. History and life and language are rather more messy than many would like. At one point the article witters on about France and Wessex. Both terms were valid "back then" and are still valid now but they are sodding complicated ideas and neither mean the same now as they used to.

Even the notion of English (and French - obviously) is pretty tricky. Nowadays, in the UK alone we have a largely homogenised language, with some localisations ... on the surface. For example: jitty - allyway, bairn - child, skritch - cry. Then we have the collisions between the Brythonic languages (Scottish, Welsh, Irish, Cumbric, Cornish and the rest) and English. So a Devonshire bird like my mum spoke what sounded like complete twaddle to a modern (!) lad like myself, when she was a child.

You (@gumby) might know the difference between twaddle and twiddle but I am sure I've lost a few readers right there.

My point is that language, nationality and the like are rather more fluid than people generally think.

Was hal!

Re:How French Was Medieval England? by fuzztester on Friday January 26, 2024 @07:46PM (#39151049)
>biftek

Seen that word, with that spelling, IIRC, in Iranian restaurant menus in India.

Re:How French Was Medieval England? by prawn on Friday January 26, 2024 @08:23PM (#39151346)
I remember biftek in Turkey also? Bistek appears to be "beef steak" in the Philippines?
Re:How French Was Medieval England? by bitbckt on Friday January 26, 2024 @08:33PM (#39151409)
“Bistec a la X” for many types of X is part of the Spanish-speaking world, including the Philippines. The spelling with a “k” is a loan word into Tagalog.
Re:How French Was Medieval England? by fuzztester on Friday January 26, 2024 @10:19PM (#39152130)
And what does the X stand for in that?
Re:How French Was Medieval England? by jdminhbg on Friday January 26, 2024 @11:10PM (#39152461)
Anything. Bistec a la Mexicana is “Mexican-style steak.” Replace with any nationality or style or whatever.
Re:How French Was Medieval England? by teknico on Saturday January 27, 2024 @02:05AM (#39153340)
“Bistecca” in Italian.
Re:How French Was Medieval England? by narag on Saturday January 27, 2024 @06:51AM (#39154793)
Bistec a la X” for many types of X is part of the Spanish-speaking world

Right, even for X = pork. But lately, it's fading in favour of "filete" (slice) of X, at least in Spain.

Re:How French Was Medieval England? by fuzztester on Friday January 26, 2024 @08:35PM (#39151423)
Yes. Not been to Turkey, but I read about cuisines, for fun, including on Wikipedia and food blogs. And IIRC, steak is called biftek in Turkey.
Re:How French Was Medieval England? by cyberax on Friday January 26, 2024 @09:51PM (#39151949)
It's also similar in Russian and Ukrainian: "beefshteks"
Re:How French Was Medieval England? by nemo8551 on Saturday January 27, 2024 @01:53PM (#39158567)
This was definitely a tradecraft code word when two dudes passed a briefcase between each other in a cold park one day in Moscow.

Heavy, heavy pronunciation going on to near comical effect.

Re:How French Was Medieval England? by fuzztester on Saturday January 27, 2024 @02:29PM (#39158937)
Psst! Tovarisch! Next meeting at 11:00 p.m. Tuesday under the bridge just after Gorky Prospekt! Wear a grey checked coat, with a copy of Pravda under your arm. Da?

Oops, too many spy novels plus a bad sense of humour ... ;)

Re:How French Was Medieval England? by fuzztester on Wednesday January 31, 2024 @07:19PM (#39211388)
Or maybe, too many bad spy novels :)
Re:How French Was Medieval England? by nemo8551 on Saturday January 27, 2024 @01:50PM (#39158532)
I think there used to be a kebab place in Glasgow called bifteki.

It generally signalled the end of a night when you headed there.

Re:How French Was Medieval England? by lynguist on Saturday January 27, 2024 @07:12PM (#39161191)
English beefsteak -> French bifte(c)k -> Turkish biftek -> Greek bifteki
Re:How French Was Medieval England? by nemo8551 on Monday January 29, 2024 @07:39AM (#39175553)
Thanks, that makes a good deal of sense.

I guess there’s probably been a few places called bifteki around the uk and other countries then.

Re:How French Was Medieval England? by samstave on Saturday January 27, 2024 @02:53PM (#39159167)
Yep - Bistek is beef steak in PH. and Bifstek in India is likely due to colonialism. Its amazing that Chicken Makhani was actually invented in the UK.
Re:How French Was Medieval England? by hackernewds on Saturday January 27, 2024 @01:01AM (#39153027)
you're thinking of Bistek, also in indonesia
Re:How French Was Medieval England? by makapuf on Saturday January 27, 2024 @03:12AM (#39153659)
That spelling is not the generally used one in French (or other languages) : it's spelled bifteck

(See https://en.m.wiktionary.org/wiki/bifteck)

Re:How French Was Medieval England? by fuzztester on Saturday January 27, 2024 @11:05PM (#39162466)
Yes, but I've seen it the way I wrote it above, in restaurants in real life, that's why I wrote it the way I did. :)

Also, see the Czech, Macedonian, and other entries under the Descendants section at your own link above. Many of them spell it the way I did.

Re:How French Was Medieval England? by nottorp on Saturday January 27, 2024 @07:28AM (#39154981)
Romanian doesn't use K so it's "biftec" in menus and recipes :)
Re:How French Was Medieval England? by donall on Friday January 26, 2024 @11:43PM (#39152655)
> Then we have the collisions between the Brythonic languages (Scottish, Welsh, Irish, Cumbric, Cornish and the rest) and English

Small correction: neither Irish nor the two languages people might refer to as Scottish are Brythonic languages.

Drinkhail! ;-)

Re:How French Was Medieval England? by gerdesj on Saturday January 27, 2024 @05:21PM (#39160477)
Noted. I'm just a linguistic civilian 8)
Re:How French Was Medieval England? by samstave on Saturday January 27, 2024 @02:56PM (#39159190)
I have the etymology bug. Interestingly as I have been on meditative trail rides recently, I have been thinking about a desire to compile the etymology of the corpus of words used in tech.

And was wondering if there might be an easy way to build a a tech geneology/etemology tree.