Introduction
There's a very cool fact: cabbage, broccoli, cauliflower, kale, Brussels sprouts, collard greens, kohlrabi, and others are all the species of plant, namely Brassica oleracea, selectively bred for different parts of the plant. (https://www.google.com/search?q=brassica+oleracea+selection)
I had known that for many years before I noticed that many of the English words are related to each other too!
Teaser
cole slaw, kale, kohlrabi, cauliflower
Full Text
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Proto-Indo-European *keh₂ulós tube? cylinder? bone?
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Balto-Slavic *káuˀlas
- Lithuanian káulas bone
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Hellenic
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Ancient Greek καυλός kaulós stem, stalk, shaft
- Greek καυλί kavlí penis (vulgar)
- Latin caulis stalk, stem, especially cabbage stem, penis
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Indo-Iranian
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Indo-Aryan
- Sanskrit कुल्या kulyā creek, canal
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Italic
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Latin caulis stalk, stem, especially cabbage stem, penis
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Western Romance
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French chou cabbage
- French chou-chou
- Italian cavolo cabbage [1]
- Spanish col cabbage
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Old English cawel
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Middle English col
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English cole
- English cole slaw
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Middle English colwort
- English colewort
- English collard (greens)
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Irish cál
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Irish cál ceannann
- English colcannon
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Middle English cale
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English kale
- Japanese ケール kēru
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Old Norse kál
- Danish kål cabbage, kale
- Icelandic kál any Brassica plant
- Finnish kaali
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Old High German kōlo
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German Kohl
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German Kohlrabi
- English kohlrabi
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Vulgar Latin *cauli-flōre cabbage flower
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Western Romance
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French chou-fleur cauliflower
- Wolof sufëlëer cauliflower
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Italian cavolfiore cauliflower
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German Karfiol cauliflower
- Hungarian karfiol cauliflower
- Serbo-Croatian карфиол karfiol cauliflower
- Polish kalafior cauliflower
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Spanish coliflor cauliflower
- Tagalog kóliplór cauliflower
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- English cauliflower
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Visual
Collected English words
cole, cole slaw, colewort, collard (greens), colcannon, kale, kohlrabi, cauliflower
But note, conspicously not
- broccoli, despite the 'col' in the middle. broccoli is a plural dimunitive of brocco, just cannoli is a plural dimunitive of canna: "tube, cane" (see wff-cane). brocco is probably means "pointy", related to "brooch" and "brocade".
- kailan/gailan (or "Chinese kale") which, despite the 'kail' sequence, is really kai (or gai) + lan, and ultimately from Old Chinese *kreːds + *ɡ·raːn
- cabbage, of unknown origin, which is not explainable as some weird French version of caulis. Though it may be a weird French versions of caput: "head".
- Brussels sprouts, which of course is named after the city of Brussels. But the words for "Brussels sprouts" in most European languages other than English are in this family: in Romance languages, they are generally called "cabbage of Brussels", and uses the Romance "cabbage' words in this family (e.g., chou de Bruxelles, cavolino di Bruxelles, col de Bruselas); and in many Germanic languages they are called "rose-cabbage", and likewise uses the version of this word, e.g. rosenkål, Rosenkohl, etc.