The English recruit and the Spanish crecer (“to grow”) seem like they have nothing to do with each other. But looks can be deceiving!
“Recruit” comes from, via French, the roots re- (“again”) and the Latin crescere, meaning “to grow” — from which we get the Spanish for the same.
Therefore, a recruit is literally a “new growth” — it is how the next generation is reborn!
Interestingly, we also get, from the same root, the English crescent as well.
Nerds love to pattern-match, to find commonalities among everything. Our approach to learning languages revolves (the same -volve- that is in “volver”, to “return”) around connecting the Spanish words to the related English words via their common etymologies – to find the linguistic patterns, because these patterns become easy triggers to remember what words mean. Want to know more? Email us and ask:
morgan@westegg.com
Here at ForNerds, we love meeting and talking to other people who love learning Spanish, etymologies, and any other topic in nerdy ways. Drop us a note and say hi!
morgan@westegg.com
