# Words that are similar in many languages



## tFighterPilot

Which words do you know that are from the same root in many different languages?

I know of Star, which has the letters STR in most Indo European languages (except Slavic languages)


----------



## Ben Jamin

tFighterPilot said:


> Which words do you know that are from the same root in many different languages?
> 
> I know of Star, which has the letters STR in most Indo European languages (except Slavic languages)


 
There are at least three different ways of answering this question:
1. Similar, because the words are cognates (have a common ancestor in a family of related languages, for example Indoeuropean, Semitic, Altaic)
2. Similar, becaase of spreading across cultures (borrowings)
3. Similar because of the same way of formation independent of language family (baby talk. for example 'mama')

You have chosen the three letter root, that accidentally work with the word star. This kind of root is typical of Semitic languages, it won't be fruitfull to look for them in the Indoeuropean family.

If we should try to answer yout question using the criterium 1, then the most widespread words will be numerals, which almost without exceptions are cognates in most of members of the Indoeuropean family. Many times, however, they won't be easily recognized because of phonetical changes (for example English 'four' and Russian 'chetyrye'). The first place I would award to the numeral 3, which is easily recognizable in almost all living Indoeuropean langauges and even more in the dead ones.
The numerals will be followed with words denoting family relations (mother, father, brother, sister), most common verbs (stand, sit, see, eat, know), adjectives (new , naked, big), natural objects and phenomenons (day, night, sun, earth, water, fire), prepositions, and others.
Those words are collected into a list, called Swadesh list, after the name of the creator, easily found in Wikipedia.
The languages from the Indoeuropean family are official languages in the largest number of countries, covering most of Europe, both Americas, Australia, more than a half of the area of Asia, and even most countries of Africe, despite not being a native tongue in any of them.


----------



## berndf

tFighterPilot said:


> I know of Star, which has the letters STR in most Indo European languages (except Slavic languages)


IE etymology works a bit differently than Semitic etymology. The root is not identified by a three letter consonant frame but a root has the general form <consonant cluster>+<root vowel>+<consonant cluster>. Contrary to Semitic languages, root vowels are part of the root itself. There are many unrelated roots which differ only be the stem vowel (e.g. English _back-beck_). In the development of IE languages, both consonants and vowels have been subjected to more or less systematic sound shifts. E.g. PIE /g/ becomes /k/ in the 1st German sound shift /k/ while /k/ becomes /h/ and /p/>/b/. Hence French _genou_ and English _knee_ are cognate as are Latin _capere _and German _haben_. In some West-Germanic dialects, certain /b/s become /f/, hence English _have_ ([v] was an /f/ allophone in Old English and not an independent phoneme). 

Latin _stella_, French _étoile_, German _Stern_ and English _star_ are also cognate. The PIE base is (probably) _*(h2)ster-_. Latin _stella_ is probably an assimilation of /r/: _ser-la>stella_. In VL the initial cluster _st-_ became _es-t-_. and in French the /s/ was lost, the long <e> in _stella _was diphthongized (_oi_) and the ending_ -a_ became _-e_.


----------



## tFighterPilot

Thank you both. I said "root" for lack of better word. And yes, I meant the first option you listed.


----------



## berndf

tFighterPilot said:


> I said "root" for lack of better word.


_Root_ is the right word. I just wanted to draw your attention to the fact that what constitutes a root in IE languages is quite different from what constitutes a root in your language.


----------



## origumi

tFighterPilot said:


> Thank you both. I said "root" for lack of better word. And yes, I meant the first option you listed.


There are zillions of similar words inside language families like Indo-European or Semitic, so listing them is not too productive.



Ben Jamin said:


> the most widespread words will be numerals, which almost without exceptions are cognates in most of members of the Indoeuropean family.


Six and Seven are the most interesting - they sound like (but not necessarly are) cognates among IE and Semitic languages. E.g. in Hebrew six = ses, seven = seva` (the "s" is pronounced "sh").



And there are of course the known examples of wine, rice, rose/red, cat, etc.


----------



## tFighterPilot

Semitic is a sub family, so obviously many words will be the same. However are there really that many words that are similar in, for example, English and Farsi?


----------



## berndf

tFighterPilot said:


> Semitic is a sub family, so obviously many words will be the same. However are there really that many words that are similar in, for example, English and Farsi?


There are so many words in one language and so many languages in the world. You'd be surprised how many chance coincidences there are. Just browse through this forum and you'll find enough examples of discussions about alleged connections based on nothing but superficial similarities.

Frasi and English are also related languages, hence you would suspect to find true cognates in those two languages.


----------



## origumi

tFighterPilot said:


> Semitic is a sub family, so obviously many words will be the same. However are there really that many words that are similar in, for example, English and Farsi?


Many, see here for example: http://forum.wordreference.com/showthread.php?t=1421310


----------



## Ben Jamin

origumi said:


> There are zillions of similar words inside language families like Indo-European or Semitic, so listing them is not too productive.



This is actually not true. No language has more than several thousands root words. The rest are either formed as derivatives from them or borrowed from other languages. If you exclude specialized technological and scientific words, the usual number of words understood by 90% of population do not exceed 25 000 to 45 000. 

The actual number of cognates between languages belonging to different Indoeuropean families (for example French and German) and having a similar meaning is not more than a couple of hundred. The rest are common borrowings from Latin and other languages.


----------



## berndf

Ben Jamin said:


> The actual number of cognates between languages belonging to different Indoeuropean families (for example French and German) and having a similar meaning is not more than a couple of hundred. The rest are common borrowings from Latin and other languages.


Maybe a few thousand. Not all cognates are readily identifiable. Why do you think, cognates have similar meanings? Or did I misunderstand you?


----------



## Ben Jamin

berndf said:


> Maybe a few thousand. Not all cognates are readily identifiable. Why do you think, cognates have similar meanings? Or did I misunderstand you?


Well, I was not precise enough, even if I wrote "are cognates ... *and* have similar meaning". I know that cognates may have or have not the same or similar meaning, but in the popular quest after "similar" words people expect related meaning, not only etymological relation. This is what I understood was the subject of the question.


----------



## berndf

Ben Jamin said:


> ...but in the popular quest after "similar" words people expect related meaning, not only etymological relation. This is what I understood was the subject of the question.


As we experience times and again in this forum, this popular quest is often motivated by the popular misconception that cognates must have similar meanings.

The original question of this thread was not concerned with similarity at all.


----------



## Ben Jamin

berndf said:


> As we experience times and again in this forum, this popular quest is often motivated by the popular misconception that cognates must have similar meanings.
> 
> The original question of this thread was not concerned with similarity at all.


That's not the way I understood this. 
I interpreted the question that tFighterPilot asked about words that mean "star"
The question would be virtually impossible to answer if it was concerned with all existing cognates. 
Maybe I was wrong, but tFighterPilot could clarify this.


----------



## terredepomme

> Latin stella, French étoile, German Stern and English star are also cognate. The PIE base is (probably) *(h2)ster-. Latin stella is probably an assimilation of /r/: ser-la>stella. In VL the initial cluster st- became es-t-. and in French the /s/ was lost, the long <e> in stella was diphthongized (oi) and the ending -a became -e.


In French, though, we also have _astre_(XII;lat._astrum_<gr. _astron_).


----------

