Often the French word ends up having more fancy, haughty, or high-class connotation and the the Anglo Saxon word ends up having more of a working person’s connotation, since the Normans were the rulers of England and the Anglo Saxons their subjects. One popular example is that words like “Chicken”, “Cow”, “Sheep”, “Pig” are the word for the animal, whereas the French “Beef”, “Poultry”, “Mutton”, “Pork” are the words for their meat because the English were the farmers raising the animals but the French overlords were the ones eating their meat.

But because the words have been there for so long they’ve drifted into slightly different meanings, allowing more subtle communication.

• Blossom: the petals of a flower

• Flower: the whole flower (petals, stamen, stem, leaves)

• Fowl: birds you can eat, including alive in the wild

• Poultry: chicken, as farm animals, meat, or eggs