They definitely work in a lot of languages. https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/derecho#Spanish https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/derecho#Spanish https://en.wiktionary

They definitely work in a lot of languages. https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/derecho#Spanish https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/derecho#Spanish https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/direito https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/direito https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/diritto https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/diritto https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/sinister#Latin https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/sinister#Latin https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/dexter#Latin https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/dexter#Latin https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/laevus#Latin https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/laevus#Latin https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/%CE%BB%CE%B1%CE%B9%CF%8C%CF%82#Ancient_Greek https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/%CE%BB%CE%B1%CE%B9%CF%8C%CF%8... https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/recht#German https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/recht#German and many languages related to these. Some Slavic languages have a close cognate between words meaning 'right (direction)' and words meaning 'right (correct)', although I didn't immediately find examples in current use on Wiktionary where the two forms are identical. A "dated" example is Polish https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/prawy#Polish https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/prawy#Polish Edit: a Finnish friend pointed out that this works in Finnish, which is European but not related to any of the other languages above. https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/oikea#Finnish https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/oikea#Finnish I don't know if these linguistic phenomena definitely occur in non-European languages, but I think that many people in the Middle East, many parts of Africa, and South Asia consider the left hand unlucky or impure not only because it's weaker in most people but also because it's conventionally used when going to the toilet. It would be a little surprising to me if that attitude didn't show up in languages from those places too. Edit: it looks like it works in Arabic too https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/%D8%B4%D9%85%D8%A7%D9%84#Arabic https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/%D8%B4%D9%85%D8%A7%D9%84#Arab... https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/%D8%A3%D9%8A%D8%B3%D8%B1#Arabic https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/%D8%A3%D9%8A%D8%B3%D8%B1#Arab... https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/%D8%A3%D9%8A%D9%85%D9%86#Arabic https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/%D8%A3%D9%8A%D9%85%D9%86#Arab...