Re: Help me with semantic examples! (from Zomp's blog)

[Chuma]

I can only contribute a few from Swedish, which will probably not be very radical compared to English.

One that often annoys me in English is "play"; we have spela for sports and music, and leka for playing in the child sense. Similarly for "game", we have spel and lek.

Another annoying one is "hat". Most importantly, the kind of soft headgear you have in the winter is a mössa, certainly not a hatt. "Hard hat" also sounds silly to me, as it's clearly a kind of hjälm (helmet). Then I suppose I could mention "cap", which is pretty intuitively divided in kapsyl that you put on a bottle, and keps that you put on your head. The latter is one of surprisingly many loanwords from English which have kept their plural -s in the Swedish singular. Another is kex, from "cakes", meaning "cookie" or "biscuit", whose pronunciation is hotly debated; traditionally, k is fricativised before e, so some do that, but others stick to a /k/ as in the original.

The words for streams, rivers etc. are a little odd. I'm not sure what the distinctions are in English really, but in Swedish we have bäck for a small one, roughly one you can jump across, å for a somewhat larger one, fors for a river or part of a river that is particularly violent, and then typically flod for large ones, but with an interesting exception - the ones in Sweden (and I guess maybe Norway and Finland) are called älv instead, which somehow sounds smaller, even though some of them are pretty big. Maybe it's just typical Swedish humility.

What else... tak is both "roof" and "ceiling". "Cry" is gråta about tears, but ropa about yelling. "Leaf" is basically blad while on the tree, but löv after it falls off, or just becomes yellow. A plastic bag, or a fabric bag of similar design, is a påse, but if it's kind of large it can also be a kasse, whereas proper bags are väska (I seem to recall German uses the same word for "bag" and "pocket", which is pretty weird). A keyboard is keyboard if it's the musical kind, but tangentbord (direct translation of "keyboard") on a computer. Of course, a key on either one is a tangent, as opposed to a nyckel that you use in a door. Oddly enough, the Swedish national instrument, the key fiddle, is called nyckelharpa, even though it's not that kind of key, and also not a harp. Svamp is both "mushroom", "fungus" and "sponge". Another interesting one in German that I just thought of is essen and fressen, both meaning "eat", but the former about humans and the latter about animals.

[Astraios]

Lakota also has kȟolá and mašké, 'male friend of a man' and 'female friend of a woman', but no word for 'friend of a different sex'. Historically this is because the relationship of kȟolá and mašké was more like the English 'best friend' than just 'friend', and it was considered improper for men and women to have such a close relationship. Nowadays the verb okȟólaye 'X is a friend of Y' is conjugated and nominalized to denote more general friends.

[Qwynegold]

Finlay, in Japan, do you always refer to your coworkers with "-san"? In America/Britain, wouldn't you just use their first name instead?

I've learned that -kun is often used with coworkers. More often with males, but sometimes with females as well.

Oh, as far as "know", I'm not sure of the exact distinction in Japanese, but I think shiru covers the meanings of both kennen and wissen, but wakaru, which also means understand, is often used instead. I think I'm ok at using it roughly correctly, but I'm a bit hazy on how to explain it; perhaps that wakaru is more visceral than shiru somehow.

I've learned that, at least in the negative, wakaranai means that you don't know something that you should be able to tell, and shiranai means that you don't know something that you reasonably can't know.

- In English, for anything you put on your body, "wear" will suffice. In Japanese, things you put on top of your head require the verb kaburu, shirts, jackets, etc. on your upper body use kiru, things on your legs and feet use haku, and things like makeup, glasses, jewellery, etc. use tsukeru.

I've been taught kakeru about glasses, and suru about accessories and contact lenses.

I can only contribute a few from Swedish, which will probably not be very radical compared to English.

One that often annoys me in English is "play"; we have spela for sports and music, and leka for playing in the child sense. Similarly for "game", we have spel and lek.

It's similar in Finnish. Pelata is play games or sports, soittaa is play music, and leikkiä is what children do.

A plastic bag, or a fabric bag of similar design, is a påse, but if it's kind of large it can also be a kasse, whereas proper bags are väska (I seem to recall German uses the same word for "bag" and "pocket", which is pretty weird).

I would describe the difference like this: Påse is a small plastic or paper bag. You often put it inside a kasse when shopping, so that you don't have to carry tons of tiny bags around. The handles of a kasse is such that you can easily tie them together, when using it as a trash bag. A påse may or may not have that type of handles. When it comes to bags made of fabric, it's a påse if it's small and doesn't have handles at all, and kasse if it's large with handles.

[Qwynegold]

Finnish
kaatua - fall down from a standing position. It can be either person or thing.
pudota/tippua - fall down from a height or into a hole. These two are more or less synonymous.

kynsi - nail or claw.

äiti - human mother.
emo - animal mother.

puu - tree or wood.

käsi - hand or arm. But arm can also be called käsivarsi (arm stalk).

jalka - foot or leg. But foot can also be called jalkaterä (leg tip).

hius - a strand of hair from the top of the head.
karva - a strand of hair from elsewhere on the body, or from an animal.
tukka/hiukset - the collection of hair on top of one's head. (Hiukset is actually the plural of hius.)


Swedish
klippa - cut with scissors.
skära - cut with a knife.

matte - female owner of a dog.
husse - male owner of a dog.

tvål - liquid or solid soap for washing hands.
såpa - liquid soap for washing floors.

siden - these two are difficult, but basically siden is silk fabric...
silke - ...and silke is like the raw material of silk. But when it comes to compound words with siden or silke, all of this is thrown out the window.

kaka - biscuit/cookie or type of cake, e.g. spongecake, or (chocolate) bar.

ljus - light (N.), light (Adj.), or candle.


Swedish/Finnish
apa/apina - monkey or ape. If need be, a great ape may be called människoapa/ihmisapina (meaning human monkey).

sköldpadda/kilpikonna - turtle or tortoise.

kamel/kameli - two hump camel.
dromedar/dromedaari - one hump camel.

hona/naaras & hane / koiras/uros - female and male, but only used about animals, not humans. Koiras and uros are synonyms as far as I know.

sten/kivi - stone or rock.

fjäll/tunturi - mountain in the north of the Nordic countries.
berg/vuori - mountain elsewhere.


Cornish

We have learned above “Ny² allav,” the Cornish for “I cannot.” The Cornish for “I can” is “Y⁵ hallav” so with this information we can now do the following exercise:

[exercise]

“Y⁵ hallav” implies that “I can” because I am physically able or because I am allowed. If “I can” implies that I have learned to do something it is more usual to use “Y⁵ hwonn, “ or “My a² woer,” both of which mean literally “I know (how to).” “My a² woer” is nominal and emphasises “I.” In the case of the verbal expression “Y⁵ hwonn,” the emphasis is neutral.
e.g. Y⁵ hwonn lywya karr tan I can drive a car.
My a² woer lywya karr tan I can drive a car.

[Qwynegold]

More...

Japanese
migaku - polish or brush (teeth)


Swedish/Finnish
paprika - paprika or bell pepper

matta/matto - carpet, rug or mat. However these small types are usually not called matta/matto by itself, but e.g. dörrmatta/ovimatto (door mat), badrumsmatta/kylpyhuoneen matto (bathroom rug).

lök/sipuli - (flower) bulb or onion. Garlic is vitlök/valkosipuli (white onion).

[clawgrip]

- In English, for anything you put on your body, "wear" will suffice. In Japanese, things you put on top of your head require the verb kaburu, shirts, jackets, etc. on your upper body use kiru, things on your legs and feet use haku, and things like makeup, glasses, jewellery, etc. use tsukeru.

I've been taught kakeru about glasses, and suru about accessories and contact lenses.

Quite right about glasses I had forgotten that one. I think suru and tsukeru are often interchangeable in these cases.

I can only contribute a few from Swedish, which will probably not be very radical compared to English.

One that often annoys me in English is "play"; we have spela for sports and music, and leka for playing in the child sense. Similarly for "game", we have spel and lek.

It's similar in Finnish. Pelata is play games or sports, soittaa is play music, and leikkiä is what children do.

Japanese 'play' (asobu) is also different from English. It's sort of like the opposite of 'work' and can be used for adults as well as children. For example, asobi ni kuru means "come over for a visit" but is literally "come to play" and is completely natural to use even for adults who are not going to do anything but eat, drink and talk, for example.

[finlay]

Finlay, in Japan, do you always refer to your coworkers with "-san"? In America/Britain, wouldn't you just use their first name instead?

I've learned that -kun is often used with coworkers. More often with males, but sometimes with females as well.

Kun is for people socially 'lower' than you who are male, or for boys. You don't tend to use it with women (you'd use chan instead). I think people the same age in school use these with each other, but I haven't heard about it in a workplace situation except when you're talking to a subordinate. Pregnant women get called chan – my American friend said she was really put out when people suddenly shifted from "sensei" to "chan" when addressing her.

[gach]

Some completely innocuous Finnish verbs have a sexual double meaning, but only if the object is in the partitive (not in the accusative-genetive or nominative).

panna pane-, 'to put something somewhere' or 'to fuck someone/thing'.
naida 'to marry someone' or 'to fuck someone/thing'.

Except in the idiomatic phrase panna paksuksi "impregnate" (lit. "put thick-TRANSLAT") which takes an accusative object.

Koiras and uros are synonyms as far as I know.

Pretty much so, although there's a nice distinction here as well. In real usage uros is pretty much only used for male mammals and koiras for the males of all other classes of animals.

This looks like a case of the wider phenomenon where some classes of animals are far more likely to get special vocabulary than others. To use Finnish examples, mammals are special again in the words they get for their offspring. In addition to special words for the offspring of many more significant animals (including domesticated ones: varsa "foal", porsas "piglet" etc.) there are more general terms like vasa which is used for the offspring of many ungulates and pentu which you could translate as "pup" but is used for the offspring of all carnivora excluding seals. For most other animals, including all non-mammals, you just use poikanen (lit. "boy-DIMIN").

How much people associate themselves with other mammals affects also the fact that you will find ancient category words for animal classes like "fish" and "birds" while the word for "mammal" is pretty certainly going to be a fairly recent loan or a native composition. After all, it's a group that we see "from the inside" making its common traits less obvious. The Finnish words for example is nisäkäs, lit. "nipple-QUAL.NOM"/"one having nipples".

[Ulrike Meinhof]

fjäll/tunturi - mountain in the north of the Nordic countries.
berg/vuori - mountain elsewhere.

That's not really true; berg can freely be used to talk about Nordic mountains without it sounding strange in the least, however referring to Mount Everest as fjäll sounds quite weird. Actually, I think that at least in the dialects I'm used to, fjäll is more or less restricted to the definite plural i/till fjällen 'in/to the mountains' (which is what you use when you go there on vacation). Any single discernible mountain is a berg. Perhaps it's different in the dialects spoken where there are actually mountains around.

Swedish also distinguishes lim and klister, both 'glue'. The former is usually the harder kind and the latter more fluid, but the distinction is not that clear-cut.

[Rui]

In Mandarin, you can't "play" a sport or an instrument. You have to specify what action you are performing on the object (ball, instrument, etc.) when you are participating in the activity.

打篮球
da3 lan2qiu2
hit basketball

踢足球
ti1 zu2qiu2
kick soccer ball

拉大提琴
la1 da4ti2qin2
pull cello

etc.

There's also the famous example of the various names for Chinese language, and what they emphasize (but it's quite transparent due to compounding): 汉语 (han4yu3) can only refer to spoken Mandarin, because of the 语 character, but 中文 (zhong1wen2) can refer to either written or spoken language.

Another one that I thought was interesting is the word 以为 (yi3wei2), which is used to mean "[Subj.] thought" when there was a misconception about something that is now clear (e.g. "Oh, I thought you were coming with us," when it's now clear to the speaker that the addressee is not coming). The more general term for "to think/feel" is 觉得 (jue2de). I'm not quite so clear on this one, so I could be wrong about it.

Something I've noticed since coming to Beijing and working in a kindergarten, that may or may not be right: Apparently 帽子 (mao4zi), which I had thought only meant "hat", can also be used to mean "hood". No dictionary I've searched in agrees with me, though, but the teachers clearly were saying 帽子 to mean "hood" (as in "put up your hood" to the kids when it was super cold this past winter). I could've sworn they also used it to mean "helmet" when the kids had ice skating lessons, too, but again, no dictionary I've checked can confirm this. The teachers also would constantly say "穿衣服" (chuan1 yi1fu, lit. "put on your clothes") to mean "put on your jackets", too, so maybe it was just a context thing, and not a semantic thing.

[Ars Lande]

A few French examples, which hopefully you don't know about already.

English has owl where French has chouette and hibou (A hibou has ear-tufts, a good example is the eagle owl).
French doesn't distinguish between apes and monkeys, making do with singe for both (Despite the best efforts of the translator, that Discworld joke was hopelessly lost).
In English, cat can be used for the whole Felidae family; French restricts chat to species of the genus Felis. A Felidae is called a félin instead.

English has sibling, French lacks a generic term for this, making do with frères et soeurs.
French doesn't classify beer into lagers, ales and stouts, but has instead a color-based classification: blonde, brune and blanche.

[Ser]

Talking about interesting etymologies, it might be well worth it to say something about the use of a word originally meaning "forehead" in in front of (and Spanish en frente de, where the word frente continues to mean that).

Also: locative nouns in Ju|'hoan. According to Patrick Dickens in A Concise Grammar of Ju|'hoan, the language has a number of locative nouns who take arguments in a possessive construction—a few of these nouns are also parts of the body: din 'buttock; under [sth]', ǀhó 'face; on [sth flat]' (the first consonant is actually a dental click, we should really go back to the old symbols), ǃká 'heart; in the midst of [sth]', ǃ’óm 'side (of the body); beside [sth], next to [sth]', gǀà’á-nǃáng 'in the eye; in front of [sth], ahead of [sth]', gǃò’á-nǃáng 'in the chest; in front of, ahead of', ǃ’ó-nǃáng 'in the back; behind [sth], at the back of [sth]' (as you can see English also share the "back" thing with Juǀ’hoan).

Equally noteworthy is the use of tzí 'veld; outside [sth], around [sth]'.

In Mandarin, you can't "play" a sport or an instrument. You have to specify what action you are performing on the object (ball, instrument, etc.) when you are participating in the activity.

That reminds me, in Spanish, the verb tocar, which normally means 'to touch', is what you use for 'to play [an instrument]'. In fact, it's a common joke to brag that you can play (tocar) a certain instrument when you see a friend playing it well. Then, when they give you the instrument, you proceed to literally just touch it/poke it with the tip of your index.

In English, cat can be used for the whole Felidae family

Does it really do that?

English has sibling, French lacks a generic term for this, making do with frères et soeurs.
French doesn't classify beer into lagers, ales and stouts, but has instead a color-based classification: blonde, brune and blanche.

That reminds me, Spanish has no gender-neutral term equivalent to "parents" either: it just uses padres lit. 'fathers' instead: Manolo, ¿quiénes son tus padres? 'Manolo, who are your parents?' (lit. 'your fathers'). To translate "parent" in the singular, you would have to say both padre and madre.

[Terra]

That reminds me, Spanish has no gender-neutral term equivalent to "parents" either: it just uses padres lit. 'fathers' instead: Manolo, ¿quiénes son tus padres? 'Manolo, who are your parents?' (lit. 'your fathers'). To translate "parent" in the singular, you would have to say both padre and madre.

What if somebody is raised by lesbian women? Is it still "padres"?

[Yaali Annar]

Indonesian

1. Distinguishes between not-new (lama) and not-young (tua).
However, not-new can also mean slow.

So, recap:
young vs. old > muda vs. tua
new vs. old > baru vs. lama
quick vs. slow > cepat vs. lama.

There's a synonym for slow's lama though: lambat.

2. Distinguish between uncooked rice (beras) and cooked rice (nasi).
3. If I get this right. The word "macan" is a catch all term for big cats (tigers, lions, etc).
4. Lumps city and town into a word "kota"
5. Lumps leg and feet into a word "kaki" (I think this is kinda common)
6. Lumps feather and fur into a word "bulu" (I think this is also kinda common in asia)

[Ulrike Meinhof]

4. Lumps city and town into a word "kota"
5. Lumps leg and feet into a word "kaki" (I think this is kinda common)

Yes, the latter is common, but surely the former is even more so? In fact, I don't know of any language other than English that distinguishes town and city (and I'm not sure I fluently use them correctly when speaking English).

[Astraios]

In English, cat can be used for the whole Felidae family

Does it really do that?

If it's bigger than a lynx it's a [big cat], which is different from a [big] [cat], because the latter means a large domestic cat while the former means generally leopards and above.

Yes, the latter is common, but surely the former is even more so? In fact, I don't know of any language other than English that distinguishes town and city (and I'm not sure I fluently use them correctly when speaking English).

Hebrew does. There's ˁīr and ˁăyārā, but I wouldn't be at all surprised if this is a result of English influence.

[Ser]

4. Lumps city and town into a word "kota"
5. Lumps leg and feet into a word "kaki" (I think this is kinda common)

Yes, the latter is common, but surely the former is even more so? In fact, I don't know of any language other than English that distinguishes town and city (and I'm not sure I fluently use them correctly when speaking English).

Spanish distinguishes them as pueblo vs. ciudad.

In fact, my dialect has a further three-way distinction of cantón 'poor rural small community separate from a pueblo (yet even legally recognized as distinct from a pueblo)' vs. pueblo '(relatively large) town' vs. ciudad 'city'. It's not just an official thing, it's commonly referred to, it exists in people's minds. It's very common to belittle people for having grown up in a cantón and say it so.

That reminds me, Spanish has no gender-neutral term equivalent to "parents" either: it just uses padres lit. 'fathers' instead: Manolo, ¿quiénes son tus padres? 'Manolo, who are your parents?' (lit. 'your fathers'). To translate "parent" in the singular, you would have to say both padre and madre.

What if somebody is raised by lesbian women? Is it still "padres"?

It's not like I've ever heard a Spanish-speaker talking about (even the concept of) having two mothers anyway. I'd actually like to know what sexuality/gender-conscious people in Spain (where gay marriage is recognized) recommend using.

[Hallow XIII]

padres

It's funny because "parents" is a Latin loan

[Ars Lande]

In English, cat can be used for the whole Felidae family

Does it really do that?

If it's bigger than a lynx it's a [big cat], which is different from a [big] [cat], because the latter means a large domestic cat while the former means generally leopards and above.

I've seen cat used for big cats. (http://bigcatrescue.org/, for instance, generally uses big cat, but there are a few examples with cat here and there: save cats, caring for cats). But I'm not a native speaker, so it's entirely possible that I misunderstood that.

Just thought of another example: male and female can refer to human beings in English, their French equivalents mâle et femelle can't.

[Pole, the]

Polish:
• "wysoki" (tall, high)
• "niski" (low, short in height) vs "krótki" (short in length)
• "ramię" (shoulder, arm) vs "ręka" (arm, hand) vs "dłoń" (hand, palm)
• "dom" (house, home)
• "palec" (finger, toe)
• "wuj" (uncle) vs "stryj" (paternal uncle)
• "przyjaciel" (friend as a buddy) vs "znajomy" (friend as an acquaintance)
• "chłopak" (boy, boyfriend)
• "dziewczyna" (girl, girlfriend)
• "góra" (upside, mountain)
• "dół" (downside, hole in ground)
• "wiara" (belief, faith)
• "rama" (frame, border) vs "granica" (boundary)
• "lubić" (to like as to enjoy) vs "podobać się" (to be liked as to be found attractive)

[Ser]

Latin altus could mean either 'tall' or 'deep'.

Spanish doesn't necessarily distinguish between fingers and toes, using dedo (de la mano) and dedo (del pie).

When I was learning English, I was very shocked at sentences like I love chocolate, I love learning English, using the same verb as in I love [a person] (in a romantic way). Spanish amar can only be used for people, you can't use it even for your pets.

On the other hand, Spanish can use the same verb, querer, for 'to want [something]', and for something regarding relationships between people or between a person and an animal that approaches English to love but that is not necessarily romantical, translatable either as 'to love [a person, an animal]' or 'to esteem [a person]'. A hetero male can perfectly tell another hetereo male te quiero, hombre without implying any romantic interest, which we could translate as 'I esteem you, man', 'I value you, man'. (Note the use of the vocative hombre in order to soften any romantic implications. Taking it off it'd tend towards the romantic interpretation.)

old bofosh once said that he found it funny if you think of querer as meaning essentially "to want", because "to want [somebody]" in English strongly implies something romantical, or even plain gonzo sexual interest.

[gach]

Here's a nice semantic spread from Finnish. Because of the large spread in the meaning I'll just gloss the verb with its inflectionary stem laske- in the examples. Many of the meanings form parts of very transparent continua but definitely not all of them.

laskea:

• "lower" as in
  Laske käte-si!
  laske.IMP hand-2SG.POSS
  "Lower your hands!"

• "get down", "set" as in
  Aurinko laske-e.
  sun laske-3SG
  "The Sun is setting."
  
  or
  Talve-lla voi laske-a mäke-ä.
  winter-ADE can laske-INF hill-PART
  "In winter you can slide down hills."
  
  Note also derivations lasketella ("do slalom", "slide/get down casually") and laskiainen ("Shrove Tuesday", it's when you go to slide down hills with a sledge)

• "let (in/out/loose ...)" as in
  Joku lask-i koira-t vapaa-ksi.
  Someone laske-PST dog-PL free-TRANS
  "Someone let the dogs loose."

• "pour", "let liquid run" as in
  Tarjoilija lask-i ministeri-n malja-an lisää viini-ä.
  waiter laske-PST minister-GEN glass-ILL more wine-PART
  "The waiter poured more wine into the minister's glass." (somewhat oldish)
  
  Note also juomanlaskija ("cupbearer")

• "count" as in
  Ilotulite-onnettomuude-n jälkeen on syy-tä laske-a sorme-t.
  firework-accident-GEN after is.3SG reason-PART laske-INF finger-PL
  "After a firework accident it's good to count the fingers."

• "calculate", "compute" as in
  Koulu-ssa opi-taan laske-ma-an.
  school-INE learn-IMPERS laske-3RD.INF-ILL
  "In school you learn to calculate (= do calculus)."
  
  or
  Tietokonee-lta mene-e kauan ennustee-n laske-mise-en.
  computer-ABL take.time-3SG long.time forecast-GEN laske-ACT.NOM-ILL
  "It takes a long time for the computer to compute the forecast."
  
  Note also derivations laskenta ("computing"), laskento ("calculus") and lasku ("calculation", "bill")

There are also a couple of verbs dealing with time, as you can see from the last example sentence. The notion of taking time can be expressed with the verbs kestää and mennä (as with the German verb dauern). This is, however, not the core meaning of either of the verbs. The basic meaning of kestää is along the lines of "endure" while mennä usually simply means "go". The temporal meaning of these verbs is always clear as it's typically accompanied by a time adverbial, although with kestää you can also have temporal expressions with no lexical references to time at all:

Tietokonee-lla kestä-ä ennustee-n laske-mise-ssa.
computer-ADE take.time-INF forecast-GEN laske-ACT.NOM-INE
"It takes time for the computer to compute the forecast."

[Qwynegold]

- In English, for anything you put on your body, "wear" will suffice. In Japanese, things you put on top of your head require the verb kaburu, shirts, jackets, etc. on your upper body use kiru, things on your legs and feet use haku, and things like makeup, glasses, jewellery, etc. use tsukeru.

I've been taught kakeru about glasses, and suru about accessories and contact lenses.

Quite right about glasses I had forgotten that one. I think suru and tsukeru are often interchangeable in these cases.

Ah.

I can only contribute a few from Swedish, which will probably not be very radical compared to English.

One that often annoys me in English is "play"; we have spela for sports and music, and leka for playing in the child sense. Similarly for "game", we have spel and lek.

It's similar in Finnish. Pelata is play games or sports, soittaa is play music, and leikkiä is what children do.

Japanese 'play' (asobu) is also different from English. It's sort of like the opposite of 'work' and can be used for adults as well as children. For example, asobi ni kuru means "come over for a visit" but is literally "come to play" and is completely natural to use even for adults who are not going to do anything but eat, drink and talk, for example.

Speaking of playing:
hiku - play (a string instrument or piano); pull AFAIK
fuku - play (a wind instrument); blow
tataku - play (a percussion instrument)

[Qwynegold]

Koiras and uros are synonyms as far as I know.

Pretty much so, although there's a nice distinction here as well. In real usage uros is pretty much only used for male mammals and koiras for the males of all other classes of animals.

Ah, that's how it goes!

fjäll/tunturi - mountain in the north of the Nordic countries.
berg/vuori - mountain elsewhere.

That's not really true; berg can freely be used to talk about Nordic mountains without it sounding strange in the least, however referring to Mount Everest as fjäll sounds quite weird. Actually, I think that at least in the dialects I'm used to, fjäll is more or less restricted to the definite plural i/till fjällen 'in/to the mountains' (which is what you use when you go there on vacation). Any single discernible mountain is a berg. Perhaps it's different in the dialects spoken where there are actually mountains around.

Hmm. Yes, there are berg even in the Nordic countries, but to me fjäll is something that's in Lapland and thereabouts. To me fjäll can be singular and indefinite as well.

Swedish also distinguishes lim and klister, both 'glue'. The former is usually the harder kind and the latter more fluid, but the distinction is not that clear-cut.

Oh, I never knew those two words were different.

[Hallow XIII]

German does too. Leim and Kleister, which both fall under the general category of Klebe.