Proto-Indo-European Cognates

The Proto-Indo-European homeland according to the steppe hypothesis (dark green) and the present distribution of Indo-European languages in Eurasia (light green). Cropped, from Joe Roe, Wikimedia Commons.

Proto-Indo-European

The Indo-European language group consists of over 450 diverse languages spanning across Eurasia. Examples include Italian, Greek, Irish, Hindi, Spanish, German, Russian, and of course, English. It is the most spoken language group by far, with over 3.3 billion speakers worldwide.

The idea of an Indo-European language group was most famously put forward by William Jones in 1786 when he noticed similarities between the vocabulary and grammar of Sanskrit and those of Greek and Latin. He was not the first, but his work was the most influential in establishing the idea of a common proto-language. Since then, historical and comparative linguists have largely reconstructed an estimate of the Proto-Indo-European language and have worked out approximate timelines of the divergence of each language, though much debate still occurs in both areas.

Swadesh List

The Swadesh list, named for creator Morris Swadesh, is a list of basic words used in comparative linguistics. There are multiple versions of this list, ranging from 100 to over 200 words. Words were chosen for the list because of their universality and cultural independence, so that any given language should have nearly every word. By getting translations of these concepts in multiple languages and comparing them, linguists can determine how related those languages are and attempt to date their divergence.

Cognates

The following is a sample of words from the Swadesh List in a variety of Indo-European languages.

English	Rom- anian	Scottish Gaelic	Lithu- anian	Ukra- inian	Bengali	Urdu
three	trei	trì	trys	три try	তিন tina	تین tin
snake	şarpe	nathair	gyvatė	змія zmiya	সাপ sāpa	سانپ sanp
nose	nas	sròn	nosies	ніс nis	নাক nāka	ناک naak
to see	vedea	fhaicinn	žr	бачити bachyty	দেখা dēkhā	دیکھیں dekhen
to fall	cădea	tuiteam	kristi	падати padaty	পড়া paṛā	گرنا garna
lake	lac	loch	ežeras	озеро ozero	হ্রদ hrada	جھیل jhel
year	an	bliadhna	metų	рік rik	বছর bachara	سال sal

Three

It seems that every language on this list has a cognate of the English “three.” they all include the [t] followed by an [i], and most include the [r] as well. English, of course, uses the [θ] here instead of [t] due to Grimm’s Law

Snake

Romanian, Bengali, and Urdu all have [s], then [a], then [p]. These are likely cognates with the English “serpent,” through probably not “snake.”

Nose

Languages here with likely cognates of the English “nose” are Romanian, Lituanian, and possibly Bengali and Urdu. All of their translations start with [n], and the Romanian and Lithuanian both have the [s] like in English.

See

The only word that could reasonably be cognate the english “see” is the Lithuanian “žr,” pronounced like “zher.” The Romanian “vedea” is clearly related to English words like “vision,” though, and the Bengali and Urdu words seem to be very close cognates.

Fall

None of the languages here have words cognate with English “fall,” but interestingly it seems that the Ukrainian and Bengali words may be cognates. They both start with [p] and [a], and the Bengali “ṛ” is pronounced somewhat similarly to a [d].

Lake

The English “lake” is an obvious cognate of Romanian “lac” and Scottish Gaelic “loch.” The Lithuanian and Ukrainian words seem related too, as they both include a vowel followed by [z]/[ʒ] then [e] then [r]/[ɾ].

Year

Interestingly, none of the words in this row seem to be cognate with each other. Romanian “an” is related to English words like “annual,” though.