Alcanzar (“to reach”, in the sense of “to achieve” such as, reaching a goal) comes from the Latin prefix in– with the Latin calx meaning, limestone. Limestone? Huh?

The word for Limestone became the word for achieving because, quite simply, you need to step on it to get a bit higher, to be a bit closer to the stars. Think of the word reach itself — there is a literal sense of holding your hand a bit higher, a bit further, so you can get to something. A bit like stepping on a stone. But there is the metaphorical sense of both words, reaching a goal.

From the root calx, we also get the English… calcium. Calcium is just another really hard substance that looks just like limestone.

You know another hard substance that looks like limestone? Chalk. And yes, chalk comes from calx, too!

Also from calx we get, calculate and calculus. We can never forget that little pebbles (of limestone) were initially used to count. That’s what the word itself reminds us.

Regalo, Spanish for “gift,” comes from the Old French galer (“to rejoice; make merry”), with a re- prefix added for emphasis.

From the same root we get the English gala, as well as gallant.

It makes sense: a gala is a big, merry, ball after all. Gallant is a bit more subtle: it meant, in old French, courteous — but earlier, it had originally meant, “amusing, entertaining,” from which we can see a clear relationship to making merry.

So, it is noteworthy, therefore, that good manners (being courteous) originally began as… being fun.

And all share the same g-l root to make the connection clear.

The common Spanish word obra, for “a work” (in the sense of, “a work of art”) or “something done with effort” sounds pretty random at first. But if you think about it…

Obra comes the Latin opus, meaning “work” (in the same sense). From opus, we get various English words including:

• Opus (obviously) – used in music to mean the same.
• Opera – it was originally just a work of music!
• Maneuver – also related to the Spanish mano, for hand: it is a work you create with your hands, literally!
• Operation – yes, an operation is something you’ve created.

Although, there is no obvious English cognate, amargo is the Spanish word for bitter. Bittersweet, for example, is amargodulce: literally, bitter-sweet.

Interestingly, though, the very common Spanish word for “yellow,” amarillo, comes from this same root for bitter. It literally means “a bit of bitterness,” from the Latin amarus for “bitter” with the –illo diminuitive ending.

Yellow — the color of melancholy, of puke, of snot — is really the color of just a hint of bitterness.

A Spanish word that hopefully you don’t use much but unfortunately sometimes you must is ácaro, meaning, “mite.”

Ácaro comes from the Latin for the same, acarus which ultimately comes from the Proto-Indo-European root *(s)ker-, which meant “cut.” Perhaps the word for “cut” turned into “mite” because that’s what mites do, they cut you open?

From that same root, via German, English gets a bunch of words related to cutting, such as… scar. That’s just a big cut, right? We also get the English shore – that’s just where the land cuts the flow of the ocean.

We can see the c-r mapping in both languages, with the initial s- disappearing in Spanish.

Abarcar (“to cover, take in, take on”) comes from the Latin brachium for “shoulder.”

From the same Latin root brachium, we get the English brachial: as in your brachial artery, the artery that runs down your shoulder!

The b-r root is clearly visible from both.

Unsurprisingly, from the same root we also get the Spanish for shoulder… brazo as well as the English…. bra.

The Spanish lado (“side”) comes from the Latin latus (“wide”).

There are many surprising English words from the same Latin root. “Surprising” largely because the l-t sound was preserved in English but evolved into the similar l-d sound in Spanish–thus making the connection less obvious but still interesting.

Some examples include:

• Lateral, and its variations such as, unilateral, bilateral and multilateral.
• Latitude: the latitude is literally the width from one side to the other.
• Dilate: a dilation is indeed a widening.
• Relate: literally means, “to go back to the side”; relating to someone is going to their side of the fence!
• Elation: From the Latin ex-latus (and ex- is, of course, “above”); thus literally, “rising above the sides”.
• Collateral: From com + latus (com is Latin for “with, together”, like the Spanish con-); thus literally meaning, “side by side”.
• Translate: Since trans– is Latin for “across”, a translation is literally, “bringing something from one side across to another.”

Yerno (Spanish for “son-in-law”) at first sounds like nothing in English.

But let’s look closer! The g- and y- sounds are often mixed up between languages and even regions that speak the same language; in fact, the Old English g- transformed itself into a y- over time (compare the German gestern with the English yesterday, for example). And the n-r sound not uncommonly swaps to become an r-n sound; the two are easily mixed up, especially in slurred speech.

Thus, the bizarre-sounding y-r-n root of yerno maps to the g-n-r root of generic (Maybe sons-in-law are more generic in Spanish cultures than English ones?) as well as genus (which lost the final r-) — yes, genus as in Latin and now scientific classification of your spot in the universe! The son-in-law, I guess, is destined to be the son-in-law as his lot-in-life.