Why do some words in different languages have the same multiple meanings?

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Take the English word “right”. It can mean “true, correct”, but it can also be used in something like “human rights”.

Now take the Arabic word حق. Again, it can mean “true, correct” and the “rights” in “human rights”.

It makes sense for a word to have the same single meaning across different languages. But what is the likeliness that two languages have a word that share the same multiple meanings?

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Anonymous 0 Comments

I haven’t been able to figure out the history of the latter meaning of haqq, but whether or not it’s true in this case, it’s true in general that ideas often move from one language to another not only by borrowing words but also by borrowing concepts and using existing words. That’s called a calque. An example in Arabic (which I don’t speak; I just happen to know the history of this word) is مشرق mashriq in the (archaic) geographic/civilizational sense of “the East, the Orient.” This was borrowed from French and later made its way from Arabic to other languages, including Urdu (with which I am more familiar).

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