False cognates

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DesEsseintes
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Re: False cognates

Post by DesEsseintes »

clawgrip wrote:One that I have thought about many times over the years but never actually posted here:
:jpn: 設定 settei
:eng: setting
Lol, the Chinese counterpart 设定 shèdìng also sounds suspiciously similar to the English word.
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Re: False cognates

Post by CMunk »

I don't know if this has been mentioned, but:

:idea: schwa ~ :deu: schwach

( :idea: = various languages, linguistics terminology)

When I first heard of schwa, I thought it was of German origin.The spelling is clearly German, and I thought it could easily be an ellipsis of Schwachdrucksvokal "unstressed vowel" or Schwachlaut "weak sound" or the like.

It only helps that Germans are known to shorten words to the first syllable as in Gestapo from Geheime Staatspolizei or Haribo from Hans Riegel Bonn. Now that I think of it, maybe the name Tanzania from Tanganyika and Zanzibar is a German invention.

In fact, :idea: schwa comes from Hebrew :isr: שְׁוָא shva.
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Re: False cognates

Post by protondonor »

And all this time I thought it was from a Yiddish cognate to schwach!
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Re: False cognates

Post by WeepingElf »

CMunk wrote:In fact, :idea: schwa comes from Hebrew :isr: שְׁוָא shva.
AFAIK, the latter means 'gap' or 'void', and originally refers to a vowel slot in a triconsonantal root that is not filled with a "real" vowel, but a reduced vowel is often inserted in such empty slots in order to break up unwieldy consonant clusters.
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Re: False cognates

Post by GrandPiano »

:eng: joke - :chn: Min Nan 笑詼 chhiò-khe "joke; humorous"
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Re: False cognates

Post by Alessio »

:lat: ite (2pl imperative of ire - to go)
:jpn: 行って itte (conjunctive of 行く - to go, used together with ください kudasai to form a polite imperative)
:ita: :eng: [:D] | :fra: :esp: :rus: [:)] | :con: Hecathver, Hajás, Hedetsūrk, Darezh...

Tin't inameint ca tót a sàm stê żōv'n e un po' cajoun, mo s't'armâgn cajoun an vōl ménga dîr t'armâgn anc żōven...
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All4Ɇn
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Re: False cognates

Post by All4Ɇn »

Alessio wrote: :lat: ite (2pl imperative of ire - to go)
:jpn: 行って itte (conjunctive of 行く - to go, used together with ください kudasai to form a polite imperative)
I actually started making a Japano-Romance conlang a few days ago after realizing how similar these two are
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Re: False cognates

Post by Alessio »

Ha, just found another one.

:jpn: 取る toru - to take
:ita: (Emilian local language) tōr - to take

Note that the <u> in <toru> is nearly silent.
:ita: :eng: [:D] | :fra: :esp: :rus: [:)] | :con: Hecathver, Hajás, Hedetsūrk, Darezh...

Tin't inameint ca tót a sàm stê żōv'n e un po' cajoun, mo s't'armâgn cajoun an vōl ménga dîr t'armâgn anc żōven...
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Re: False cognates

Post by GrandPiano »

Alessio wrote:Note that the <u> in <toru> is nearly silent.
Are you sure? AFAIK Japanese /i/ and /u/ are normally only devoiced when adjacent to voiceless consonants.
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Re: False cognates

Post by shimobaatar »

GrandPiano wrote:
Alessio wrote:Note that the <u> in <toru> is nearly silent.
Are you sure? AFAIK Japanese /i/ and /u/ are normally only devoiced when adjacent to voiceless consonants.
Yeah, I was thinking the same thing, although I can't say whether or not that's the case definitively.
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Re: False cognates

Post by All4Ɇn »

:jpn: 可愛いkawaii- cute
:jpn: 可愛ka ai- passable love or :chn: 可愛kě'ài- lovable
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Re: False cognates

Post by GrandPiano »

All4Ɇn wrote: :jpn: 可愛いkawaii- cute
:jpn: 可愛ka ai- passable love or :chn: 可愛kě'ài- lovable
This one's a surprise to me. I've always assumed that :jpn: 可愛い and :chn: 可爱 were related.
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Re: False cognates

Post by Imralu »

Swahili chumba "room" and English chamber. I saw someone speculating that chumba is probably a loanword... but it's simply a use of the nominal root -umba which is of Bantu origin.

nyumba (pl. nyumba) = normal-sized house
chumba (pl. vyumba) = room
jumba (pl. majumba) = building, mansion
Glossing Abbreviations: COMP = comparative, C = complementiser, ACS / ICS = accessible / inaccessible, GDV = gerundive, SPEC / NSPC = specific / non-specific, AG = agent, E = entity (person, animal, thing)
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Re: False cognates

Post by qwed117 »

Spoiler:
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Re: False cognates

Post by qwed117 »

Proto-Malayo-Polynesian *nayan 'name' vs :eng: "name"
Proto-Chamic *?antow 'ghost vs. :eng: "phantom"
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Re: False cognates

Post by GrandPiano »

:tan: Swahili kusaidia "to help" - :jpn: Japanese くださる kudasaru "(honorific or respectful) to give; to kindly do for someone", imperative form ください kudasai
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Re: False cognates

Post by Imralu »

:tan: Swahili: kukata "to cut" (ku-kat-a - INF-cut-INDIC)
:aus: Aus. English: cut [kʰat̚]
Glossing Abbreviations: COMP = comparative, C = complementiser, ACS / ICS = accessible / inaccessible, GDV = gerundive, SPEC / NSPC = specific / non-specific, AG = agent, E = entity (person, animal, thing)
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Re: False cognates

Post by Imralu »

Oh, and not sure this is the right thread for it, but the Swahili word for "walk" (I think as in go for a walk, more like German spazieren rather than walk somewhere, I think) is kutembea, with the root -tembe- and I saw some speculating about whether it's related to the words "amble" and "ambient" and words like that ... you know, because it has "mb". This was then justified with "you never know" ...
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Re: False cognates

Post by GrandPiano »

An orthographic false cognate:

:jpn: 撮る toru "to take (a photo)" - :chn: 摄 shè (tr. 攝) "to absorb; to take (a photo)" (usually used in compound words like 摄影 shèyǐng (tr. 攝影) "to take a photo; to shoot a movie; photography")

Since Japanese has many characters that were simplified differently from Chinese (e.g. traditional Chinese 關, simplified Chinese 关, Japanese 関), I assumed at first that this was another one of those cases, that 撮 was a Japanese variant of 摄. How ever, 撮 is actually a completely different character that also exists in Chinese (pronounced cuō meaning "to pick up with one's fingertips; to scoop up" or pronounced zuǒ as a classifier for a tuft of hair or grass). Also 攝 exists in Japanese, it appears to be very rare; Jisho.org only has it in the entry for the name of a Japanese basketball player named Tadashi Settsu (攝津正).

Even worse:

:jpn: 撮影 satsuei "photography; filming" - :chn: 摄影 shèyǐng (tr. 攝影) "to take a photo; to shoot a movie; photography"

(Actually, this kind of makes me wonder if 撮 in some cases is indeed a simplification of 攝 and that 撮 and 攝 are simply conflated in simplified Japanese. Since I can't find any sources confirming that this is the case, I'll have to assume for now that it's just a crazy coincidence.)
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Re: False cognates

Post by Lao Kou »

GrandPiano wrote: :jpn: 撮る toru "to take (a photo)" - :chn: 摄 shè (tr. 攝) "to absorb; to take (a photo)" (usually used in compound words like 摄影 shèyǐng (tr. 攝影) "to take a photo; to shoot a movie; photography")

Since Japanese has many characters that were simplified differently from Chinese (e.g. traditional Chinese 關, simplified Chinese 关, Japanese 関), I assumed at first that this was another one of those cases, that 撮 was a Japanese variant of 摄. How ever, 撮 is actually a completely different character that also exists in Chinese (pronounced cuō meaning "to pick up with one's fingertips; to scoop up" or pronounced zuǒ as a classifier for a tuft of hair or grass). Also 攝 exists in Japanese, it appears to be very rare; Jisho.org only has it in the entry for the name of a Japanese basketball player named Tadashi Settsu (攝津正).

Even worse:

:jpn: 撮影 satsuei "photography; filming" - :chn: 摄影 shèyǐng (tr. 攝影) "to take a photo; to shoot a movie; photography"

(Actually, this kind of makes me wonder if 撮 in some cases is indeed a simplification of 攝 and that 撮 and 攝 are simply conflated in simplified Japanese. Since I can't find any sources confirming that this is the case, I'll have to assume for now that it's just a crazy coincidence.)
My go-to online dictionary source, Tangorin, has confirmed everything you've put forth here. As anyone who's read me here over the years might expect, I'm simply beside myself at this turn of events. [B)]

Working backwards -- 攝 (simplified in Japanese as 摂) does seem confined predominantly to names, with the onyomi of "setsu" and kunyomi "osamu". (Frankly, I couldn't tell you how to sightread many Japanese male names to save my life.) (and other readings exist which needn't concern us here)

My unerträgliche Angst would be about the conflation of 攝 and 撮. Since the bottom half of 撮 (toru, take a picture) includes 取 (toru, take), this doesn't especially surprise. But that it should be coöpted to be read as onyomi "satsu" is simply a sign of the end of days (O tempora! O mores! :roll: ). Personally, I most generally use Chinese cuō 撮 for "a pinch of salt" (which my mainland dictionary is describing as "dialect" [D:]) , and Japanese seems to play along with 撮む (tsunamu, though other kanji are available),(if anybody writes kanji anymore :roll: ). For "a tuft of hair/grass", 撮 (read zuǒ, is new for me, so yay! [:D]). I'm most likely to run with "簇" (cù), to show, in my more persnickety moments, that foreigners have a vocabulary beyond "hello". But we'll try out "zuǒ" and see how it goes ("It sounded like the foreigner said, 'a tuft of hair'; I wonder what it was really trying to say.").
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