Meaning

2 senses
  1. A word in a language that bears a deceptive resemblance to a word in another language but in fact has a different meaning.

    A word and its false friend may well be etymologically related: in such cases semantic shifts have made them drift apart.

    falscher Freund, Übersetzungsfalle

    ло́жный другlóžnyj drug

    хи́бний другxýbnyj druh, фальши́вий другfalʹšývyj druh

  2. Used other than figuratively or idiomatically: see false, friend.

Examples

10 sentences
  1. There are false friends in every language.

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  2. Do you know what the term "false friends" means?

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  3. False friends are pairs of words in two languages that are similar in spelling or pronunciation, but differ in meaning.

    Хибні друзі перекладача — це пара слів у двох мовах, схожі по написанню або вимові, але різні по значенню.

    ruЛожные друзья переводчика - это пара слов в двух языках, похожих по написанию или произношению, но разных по значению.

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  4. I don't need false friends.

    ruМне не нужны фальшивые друзья.

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  5. One ought to be wary of "false friends" in translation.

    ruПри переводе надо остерегаться "ложных друзей переводчика"!

    deBeim Übersetzen muss man vor „falschen Freunden“ auf der Hut sein!

    CC BY · Tatoeba · Ooneykcall · C1Open on TatoebaReport a problem

Translations

9 languages
Українська
By meaning 1
type of word:
Русский
By meaning 1
type of word:
Deutsch
By meaning 1
type of word:

Origin

Calque of French faux-ami, from the longer phrase faux amis du traducteur (“false friends

Calque of French faux-ami, from the longer phrase faux amis du traducteur (“false friends of a translator”), first used by Maxime Kœssler and Jules Derocquigny in 1928 in their book Les Faux Amis ou les trahisons du vocabulaire anglais (False Friends, or the Pitfalls of the English Vocabulary).

Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0 · source

Forms

plural: false friends
Singularfalse friend
Pluralfalse friends

regular

Synonyms

2 synonyms

Word family

2 related words

See also

neighbours in the dictionary
false friend — meaning, examples, forms, synonyms | Krumeto