One of the features of English that can make it especially frustrating to both native speakers and everyone else is its complex parentage.  One of the earliest of these columns that I wrote included a broad overview of English, which we generally see as beginning with a Germanic core (which overlaps with a number of languages with “Old” in their names, like “Old Norse”), which then became overlaid with Norman French (for one), neo-classical Latin, and ultimately a host of loan languages (some of which overlap with some of the previous).  Of course, that’s a vast oversimplification, but the point is that English is built out of a sometimes chaotic collection of language parts.

As a result, it is highly subject to confusing words that seem like they mean one thing when they do nothing of the sort.  Words that derive from a shared ancestor in a common language group are called “cognates”.  

On the other hand, you might think that the word “bark,” referring to the covering of a tree, was related to the word “bark,” referring to a wooden boat (or the obviously related “embark” or “disembark,” referring to the act of getting on or off a boat, plane, train, etc.). The words aren’t related, though.  The tree covering comes from a Scandanavian root and became the Old English “barken,” most likely serving as the origin of “birch”.  The boat comes from the Latin word “barca,” which is a Celtic loan word.  

Anyway, it’s a connection that is just a coincidence.  It would make sense for the words to be connected, but they aren’t except in the way they look, sound, and seem.  The same thing is true for the word “bank,” which has two main meanings that are not related except by coincidence.  You can decide for yourself which one is a cognate form to the action of “banking” a basketball on a board.

Those kind of misleading words that seem related are sometimes called “false friends,” and they are the bane of second and third language learners.  

Related to cognate confusion is the problem of homophones, which are words that sound the same as one another but mean different things.  In some ways, they are “sound cognates,” though often they are both kinds.  

I’ll just point out a few that seem to be pretty common, and can affect meaning in communication.

One set of terms is sometimes used interchangeably, though there is not any functional overlap among them.  “Wary” is a cognate to the words “aware” and “beware,” and they all derive from the Old English word “waer” that means “alert.”  

It is NOT related to the word “weary,” except that they both have Old English roots.  The OE word “werig” means “tired.”  In other words, they are almost opposites.

“Leery,” which straddles the sound between the other two words, means “cautious” or “suspicious”. It’s related, in meaning, to “warybut it’s history is mostly negative and has been historically associated with street criminals.

Because a combination of sounds and some meaning overlaps exist between them, you can sometimes almost hear people thinking out loud while they try to decide which one of the words to use.  Here’s my best pneumonic device: if you are weary of something, it will wear you out.  If you are wary of something, be aware of what comes next.  If you are leery of something, well…that’s pretty suspicious.

Another set of commonly mangled cognates includes the wonderfully Latin “devastated” (which means “to make empty”, or “lay to waste”) and the delightful word “decimate,” which sounds like it means basically the same thing, but (as you might expect by this point) doesn’t.  “Decimate” literally means “to kill one tenth.”  Historically, this was a method used by Roman military leaders to control their often unwilling soldiers.  In order to improve morale, the leader would order a random tenth of the men (if we’re being historically accurate) killed in front of the others.  Presumably, this would ensure compliance from the remaining force.

While obviously similar in the sense that both words deal with another cognate, “destruction,” they aren’t related except by their language of origin and the prefix “-de”.  If you were a soldier in Rome, you would definitely rather be part of a decimated force than a devastated or destroyed one.  However, you would probably be most terrified by the specter of decimation, which is surgical, efficient, and purposeful than destruction or devastation, which are blunt, catastrophic, and total.

There are plenty more cognates (which are helpful ways to expand your vocabulary) and perhaps even more “false friends” (which do the exact opposite, all while making you feel like you’re doing it right) in this evolving and convoluted revolutionary language of ours.