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Sometimes a word may be borrowed "blindly", so to speak, for no
obvious reason, to find that it is not wanted because there is no gap
in the vocabulary or in the group of synonyms which it could
conveniently fill. Quite a number of such "accidental" borrowings
are very soon rejected by the vocabulary and forgotten. But there
are others which manage to take root by the process of semantic
adaptation. The adjective large, for instance, was borrowed from
French in the meaning of "wide". It was not actually wanted,
because it fully coincided with the English adjective wide without
adding any new shades or aspects to its meaning. This could have
led to its rejection. Yet, large managed to establish itself very
firmly in the English vocabulary by semantic adjustment. It
entered another synonymic group with the general meaning of "big
in size". At first it was applied to objects characterized by vast
horizontal dimensions, thus retaining a trace of its former meaning,
and now, though still bearing some features of that meaning, is
successfully competing with big having approached it very closely,
both in frequency and meaning.
From this point of view borrowings are divided into
1) completely assimilated loan-words that are found in all
layers of older borrowings, following all morphological,
phonetical and orthographic standards, taking an active part in
word formation (street, wall, wine, cheese (Latin); husband,
fellow, gate, , take, ill, root, wing, wrong, etc. (Scandinavian);
table, face, figure, chair, matter, finish, etc. (French);
2) partially assimilated loan words (semantically: e.g.
sombrero, toreador, rickshaw, sherbet; grammatically: e.g. crisis
– crises, datum – data; phonetically: e.g. cartoon, police,
machine; graphically: e.g. buffet, coup, debris);
3) unassimilated loan words or barbarisms that are not
assimilated in any way, for which there are corresponding English
equivalents (e.g. the Italian addio – good-bye; Latin ad libitum –
at pleasure, etc.)

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