592: slav and slave Jul 22, 2016

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The word 'Slav' comes from the Byzantine Greek word 'Sklabos', from the Old Church Slavonic 'Sloveninu' and is probably related to the word for "word, speech", since the name was used to describe a member of a community of speakers. The word 'Slav' itself gave English another word. Through the Old French word 'esclave' meaning ‘Slavic', Middle English gained the word, 'slave'. The reason is that some South Slavic people had been conquered in the 9th century, and the connection between the those Eastern Europeans and servitude lasted in the minds of the English.

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