Words, Terms & Phrases: False friends: bald & bald

Since German and English both belong to the family of Germanic languages, there are many word similarities between them, e.g. trinken - to drink, Butter - butter, Milch - milk, grün - green. These similarities enable you to recognize words you may have never seen or heard before. But you will also come across a few "false friends", German words that look or sound like English words but mean something completely different.

Here is one example. Look at the two pictures and read the sentences under the pictures. Also listen to the short sound files. Fill in the gaps, then press [Check] to see if you were right.

Der Freund von der jungen Frau fährt mit dem Zug weg,

aber er kommt in drei Tagen wieder. Sie muss nicht lange warten,

er kommt bald wieder, deshalb sagt die Frau: „Bis bald!”

He has been bald for five years.

[Er hat seit fünf Jahren keine Haare mehr auf dem Kopf.]

The English adjective "bald" and the German adverb "bald" are written , but they are and mean . The "bald" means "soon".

Wörterbuch (LEO)

Wörterbuch (BEOLINGUS)

Wörterbuch (Linguee)

Wörterbuch (dict.cc)

Wörterbuch (PONS)

Terminologie A - Z

Tip: If you don't belong to the lucky few who possess a photographic memory, write down what you learnt while doing this exercise.