“apple” used to be a generic term for fruit. So it’s actually “fruit of the earth”, the French are poetic like that
The English for “ananas” is “pineapple”, did the English really think they grew on pine trees?
It’s their superficial resemblance to pinecones.
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It’s a bit cherry picked, but only a bit, since there are a few languages that just copied the English word later on.
Japanese and Korean come to mind.That actually makes it funnier to me because ananas would be easier to pronounce in Japanese vs pineapple. Ananansu(u is silent) vs Painappuru.
In Germany they are called Kartoffeln (which is also a slur for the Germans itself).
But potatoes are also called Erdäpfel (ground apples) or in southern dialect Krombire (bent pear).
More variants here:
Source (German): https://die-kartoffel.de/wissen/schon-gewusst/kartoffel-deutsche-dialekte/I thought it was more “apples of the Earth”, n’est-ce pas?
Not really cause then it would be “pommes de la terre”.
For the record, some of us also use the word “patate” which is straight up the equivalent of potato.