Mongolian and Indo-European language similarities

[AntonyCapolongo]

One thing is sure, this forum isn't about Altaic preservation, my dear mongolovitch "friend".

[demiirel]

The z ~ r variation is inner-Turkic: it is *z in Common Turkic but *r in Bolgharic branch (today only Chuvash). Mongolic has borrowed the word from Bolghar Turkic, so Mongolic -er does not correspond to IE -es.

What's the source for this?

Such connections are way too arbitrary. You can always find some semantically fitting word using such “logic”. (Take ‘under’ for example: you can connect almost everything to it, as ‘mouse’, ‘grass’, ‘earth’, ‘knee’, ‘foot’ etc. are all ‘under’ us.) Such a method is not scientific, because you can “prove” any two languages relatives by that method. You must start with exact semantic parallels: ‘heart’ ~ ‘heart’, ‘father’ ~ ‘father’ or 'chest' ~ 'chest, box' and 'migrate' ~ 'walk, go'.

Well I said in the beginning that I'm not placing too much importance on cognates yet. Arbitrary as it might seem, you can't absolutely deny them outright in one sweep. Remember I said Very-Proto-Mongolian and PIE were (hypothesis) sister languages, descended from a common proto-language, like Germanic and Romance, so a gradual divergence of vocabulary is not impossible. The core structure similarities are still evident.

[demiirel]

One thing is sure, this forum isn't about Altaic preservation, my dear mongolovitch "friend".

I have not advocated "Altaic preservation". I'm focusing on connections of Mongolian to Indo-European. This means I've got nothing against Indo-European, but am trying to connect with and promote Indo-European, as opposed to talking a confrontation stance to Indo-European.

[Jaska]

What's the source for this?

Common Turkologic knowledge:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Turkic_...Classification

The r is only found in the Oghur (= Bolgharic) branch, while all the other branches have z. The *z is seen to have been there in Proto-Turkic.

Well I said in the beginning that I'm not placing too much importance on cognates yet. Arbitrary as it might seem, you can't absolutely deny them outright in one sweep. Remember I said Very-Proto-Mongolian and PIE were (hypothesis) sister languages, descended from a common proto-language, like Germanic and Romance, so a gradual divergence of vocabulary is not impossible. The core structure similarities are still evident.

Of course there have occurred also some semantic shifts in every language family. But when a brand new relation is presented, first one has to to find out the semantically identical and phonologically regular cognates. Only after this has been done and the relation thus argued to be plausible and credible, one can add cognates with semantically identical or phonologically regular form. And only with very water-proof language families we can accept cognates with neither semantically identical nor phonologically regular forms (= irregular cognates).

If the first stage cannot be applied, there is no relation between the languages, and therefore no need for further comparison.

[Foxy]

I've studied Romance languages a lot, so when I studied German and Russian (I never learnt it well when I was young) I was amazed by how individual words looked so different from Romance.

Of course German and Russian are different from Romance languages. You took as exemples a Neolatin, a germanic and a slavic language. Apart the slavic languages that I dunno and I cannot use as exemples, I can make you rationa exemples of the genetical closeness of Germanic and Romance words. Compare random words in English, Italian and German:

red-rosso-rot (same meaning, same root);
horn-corno (like before)
no-no-nein (I add also Russian, niet)
night-notte-Nacht
my-mio-mein
I-io-ich
he-egli (from Latin eo) -er
yellow-giallo (pronunce jalloh) - Gelb
Cat-gatto-Katze
mouth-mento (but in Italian it indicates the chin) - Mund
star-stella-Stern
eye-occhio-auge
Tooth - zanna (in Italian indicating the tooth of an animal) - Zahn
light - luce - Licht

etc. etc.

These are not arbitrarian exemples becouse these words, with an evident same root, have also the same identical meaning.

[demiirel]

The r is only found in the Oghur (= Bolgharic) branch, while all the other branches have z. The *z is seen to have been there in Proto-Turkic.

I already know about the internal Z-R distinction in Turkic. I meant, what is the source that Mongolian borrowed it from Bulghar?

Of course there have occurred also some semantic shifts in every language family. But when a brand new relation is presented, first one has to to find out the semantically identical and phonologically regular cognates. Only after this has been done and the relation thus argued to be plausible and credible, one can add cognates with semantically identical or phonologically regular form. And only with very water-proof language families we can accept cognates with neither semantically identical nor phonologically regular forms (= irregular cognates).

If the first stage cannot be applied, there is no relation between the languages, and therefore no need for further comparison.

Plenty of cognates can be brought up using the Nostratic and Eurasiatic lexicon compilations. I can add some more of my own too. I don't know which language is closest to Indo-European in "vocabulary proximity". That you must know. In the case of Mongolian the closest is Turkish, after that Tungusic, after that the Uralic languages, and after that Persian (Mongols still worship Khan Khurmast Tengri, or 'Khan Ahuramazda Tengri').

It seems that the pronouns (personal, interrogative, demonstrative) are pretty much "cognate" in Mongolian and Indo-European. The similar verbal and nominal morphology in addition encourages us to further explore this issue, without being overly stifled by the strictness of methodology.

[demiirel]

But when a brand new relation is presented

It's not really brand new, this idea of connection between Mongolian and Indo-European. The Indo-Uralic hypothesis, which is not new, also implies a potential Indo-Ural-Altaic, which includes Mongolian. Mongolian is very similar to the Uralic languages. It was once classified as being genetically related, and that classification could be renewed if more research is done. The Eurasiatic hypothesis also includes Mongolian.

[Jaska]

I already know about the internal Z-R distinction in Turkic. I meant, what is the source that Mongolian borrowed it from Bulghar?

Then I don’t understand the question. How Mongolic even could have Oghur-Turkic words otherwise than by borrowing?

It seems that the pronouns (personal, interrogative, demonstrative) are pretty much "cognate" in Mongolian and Indo-European. The similar verbal and nominal morphology in addition encourages us to further explore this issue, without being overly stifled by the strictness of methodology.

No, strictness of methodology can never be ignored. It is commonly known feature that many languages of the world have labial sound referring to me, and dental sound referring to you. The basic vocabulary and grammatical material should have similar regular sound correspondences between the two languages.

It's not really brand new, this idea of connection between Mongolian and Indo-European. The Indo-Uralic hypothesis, which is not new, also implies a potential Indo-Ural-Altaic, which includes Mongolian. Mongolian is very similar to the Uralic languages. It was once classified as being genetically related, and that classification could be renewed if more research is done. The Eurasiatic hypothesis also includes Mongolian.

No, Indo-Uralic hypothesis does not automatically imply anything else. Just the opposite: Indo-Uralic seems to be very different from the proposed Ural-Altaic, so they both cannot be true. Indo-Mongolic is also different even from Indo-Altaic. If the method cannot distinguish between the contradicting hypotheses, the method is invalid.

[demiirel]

The following is taken from the Eurasiatic (not Nostratic) database at http://starling.rinet.ru/cgi-bin/que...et&root=config. There are 104 pages of Eurasiatic cognates. The following are 43 cognates that have come up from only the first 5 pages, and I've only chosen the ones that have both Indo-European and Altaic together. Within Altaic, Mongolian has a prominent place, and the Mongolian examples more closely resemble "Proto-Altaic", in comparison to the more irregular Japanese and Korean. Since there are 43 Indo-Mongol cognates in 5 pages, there must be 894 "Indo-Mongol" cognates in 104 pages. I could add some more of my own and easily make the number 1000. The 43 cognates below are only 4.8% of 894. So we have at least 1000 Indo-Mongol cognates, at the present state of research. To take a conservative stance: of these 1000 cognates, 600 are very strong cognates, while 300 must be extremely strong cognates.

Meaning: that, this (prob. *Ha that, *He this)
Indo-European: *e-n-, *o-n- (also *e- in Hitt. and IIr.)
Altaic: *é (perhaps *a / *e mixed) Mongolian: *e-ne

Meaning: to breathe
Indo-European: *anǝ- 'breathe' (Pok. 38-39)
Altaic: Turk. *aŋkɨ- 'emit odour' ( > Mongolian. aŋgi-l-)

Meaning: member of the clan
Indo-European: *ar(y)- <PIH *a->
Altaic: *ā́ri ( ~ *ḗra) Mongolian: *ere

Meaning: back
Indo-European: *ors- <PIH *o-> Or *org'h-i- <PIH *o-> 2862
Altaic: *ằra Mongolian: *aru

Meaning: fish
Indo-European: *at-/*et-
Altaic: (Manch., Mongolian. atu 'female fish')

Meaning: deer
Indo-European: *el-n-, *el-k'-
Altaic: *ĕlV(-k`V) Mongolian: *ili

Meaning: to wound, kill
Indo-European: *ăwā- 'to wound'
Altaic: *ḗpo [perhaps *ḗbo, despite Mong.?] Mongolian: *aba

Meaning: this
Indo-European: *i-, *ey-; *yo-
Altaic: *i Mongolian: *i-nu-

Meaning: elm
Indo-European: *elem-
Altaic: *ʔilVmV Mongolian: *(h)ilama

Meaning: to see, search
Indo-European: *eis-
Altaic: *ič`V Mongolian: *(h)iča-

Meaning: to eat
Indo-European: *ed- 'to eat' (Pok. 287-288)
Altaic: *ite Mongolian: *ide-

Meaning: meat
Indo-European: *mēms-
Altaic: *úsu ( ~ o-, -i) [or to *waCV?]

Meaning: self
Indo-European: *oino- ?
Altaic: *oŋne (? cf. also *ni̯ŏŋe) Mongolian: *önü-

Meaning: that, this
Indo-European: *ou-, *u- 'that' (very sparsely represented)
Altaic: *ó Mongolian: *on-

Meaning: one
Indo-European: (*ed-inъ, *edъ-va)
Altaic: *i̯ude

Meaning: breast, belly
Indo-European: *owǝdh-
Altaic: *dṑ ( ~ t-) ? Mongolian: *do- / *du-

Meaning: cold
Indo-European: *ou-, *ouk'-, *oug'-
Altaic: *ipe ( ~ i̯a-) Mongolian: *ebül

Meaning: anger
Indo-European: *obhr-
Altaic: *i̯ắbò Mongolian: *(h)öɣe ~ *(h)eɣö

Meaning: near
Indo-European: *obh-
Altaic: *i̯obo ( ~ *i̯ubi) Mongolian: *ojira

Meaning: early, dawn
Indo-European: *aus- ?
Altaic: *éča

Meaning: to take care of, honour
Indo-European: *ais-, *aiz-d- <PIH *isHo-s>
Altaic: *ḕs[i] Mongolian: *asara-

Meaning: bad
Indo-European: *ag-
Altaic: *ĕ̀ka (~ -o) Mongolian: *(h)egel

Meaning: armpit
Indo-European: *ak(')s-
Altaic: *uk`V ( ~ *o-) Mongolian: *(h)ogo-da-su

Meaning: lie
Indo-European: *leugh-
Altaic: *uĺu(-kV, -gV) Mongolian: *ulig

Meaning: germinated seeds, juice of berries or trees (?)
Indo-European: *alut-, -d-
Altaic: *aĺV Mongolian: *(h)alir-su

Meaning: mother, woman
Indo-European: *mā-t-er-
Altaic: *ĕ̀me Mongolian: *eme

Meaning: to see, eye
Indo-European: *ney- 'to shine, sparkle; to see' [Blazhek proposes IIr. *vain- 'see'?]
Altaic: *ni̯ā̀ Mongolian: *nidü

Meaning: an ungulate
Indo-European: *ein-
Altaic: *ènŋù Mongolian: *unagan

Meaning: not, negative particle
Indo-European: *nē, *ne, *ney
Altaic: *ā̀ni

Meaning: to wish, help
Indo-European: *(o)nā-
Altaic: *naja Mongolian: *najida-

Meaning: to understand, brain (?)
Indo-European: *āw-
Altaic: *ēŋV Mongolian: *aɣuda-la-

Meaning: other
Indo-European: *An-
Altaic: *aŋV Mongolian: *aŋgi-

Meaning: door jamb, pole
Indo-European: *anǝt-ā-
Altaic: *uŋt`V Mongolian: *(h)uni-

Meaning: to put on, wear
Indo-European: *ou-
Altaic: *i̯òpe Mongolian: *ibeɣe-

Meaning: take, seize
Indo-European: *ap-
Altaic: *apV Mongolian: *abi-

Meaning: rise, up
Indo-European: *upo
Altaic: *épu ( ~ -b-) 'up, rise' Mongolian: *öɣe-, *ög-se-

Meaning: weak, exhausted
Indo-European: *āp[e]-
Altaic: *op`á(rV) Mongolian: *(h)obur

Meaning: food, to cook
Indo-European: *eps-
Altaic: *ep`ò Mongolian: *aɣag / *haɣag

Meaning: open space
Indo-European: *ārH- (also Hitt. hari- 'valley')
Altaic: *ā́rV Mongolian: *ar-

Meaning: to break, scatter, tear
Indo-European: *rAw-
Altaic: *ŏrV

Meaning: early
Indo-European: (*(o)rē(i)-)
Altaic: *ḗre ( ~ -i)

Meaning: a k. of insect
Indo-European: *orik-
Altaic: *ara Mongolian: *araɣalǯin

[Jaska]

Since there are 43 Indo-Mongol cognates in 5 pages, there must be 894 "Indo-Mongol" cognates in 104 pages.

Firstly, those are not Indo-Mongol words; those are Nostratic words with cognates in Indo-European and Mongolic. If we would reconstruct the protoform only on the basis of IE and Mongolic, it would look different from the Nostratic reconstructions. In Nostratic framework it is too easy to “find” a fitting protoform for some (any) Altaic branch and IE. Instead you (and them) should always compare only two entities, no more.

Secondly, as there are only about 1 000 critically accepted Proto-Indo-European etymologies and only about 500 Proto-Uralic at most, we can say that nearly 1 000 Nostratic or Indo-Mongolic etymologies cannot be true. There could not be any more than at most a couple of hundreds of them, if the relationship were real. This shows that the method is not critical enough.