I found other strange things in the list of
French borrowings. About half of the words in English come from Old French (or Latin via French) in Norman times, when French was the language of the court of England. So I expect that only the recent French imports be mentioned here. However :
- the English word "bribe" does not come from modern French at all. The word "bribe" also does not mean "beg" in French as mentioned by "parts" (rare word anyway).
- "Corduroy" is not French at all, and doesn't come from Old French.
- "Denim" is not originally a French "word". It's a corruption of "de Nimes" (from Nimes) which is not used in that sense anyway. Same for "suède".
- These words come from French, but with a different spelling and meaning : maroon, rifle...
- These words come from Old French (some of which don't exist in modern French anymore) like tens of thousands of others : plaice, revenue, relay, saucer, saveloy, sirloin, somersault, tapestry, roast, satchel, umpire.
- Many words are not direct borrowings but had their spelling changed, and are therefore probably not recent (last 100 years) imports. E.g. : envoy, diplomat, memoir, mutiny, pioneer, publicity, ratchet.
- These words do not come from French but from Latin (they exist in French but pre-existed in Latin) : rectangle, regal, salvage, spiral, splendid, tranquil, torture, unique, velocity, version, visa...
- "Nomad" and "trophy" come from Greek, via Latin.
- "Rout" and "sport" are from Middle English.
- "traffic" could also come from Italian or Spanish.
- "wardrobe" comes from Old Norse or Old French.
Very dubious list, IMO.