Armenian and Hindi/Urdu

[karoaper]

For some reason there are some very peculiar similarities between Armenian and Hindi/Urdu. For example, our numbers. Both in Armenian and Hindi, ten is "tas" and thousand is "hazar". There are other small similarities between eight: "oot" (Arm) and "aat" (Hindi) and four: "chors" (Arm) and "char" (Hindi).
Then there are other smaller similarities like "yar", "ha" (slang for yes). Are these similarities relatively modern or is there an Armenian link to Sanscrit. Probably former, but why are our numbers less similar to say Farsi or Greek or Arabic than to Hindi? But then again is the Sanscrit link, which would have to be a quite ancient link, part of any theory of Armenian origins?

[TomServo]

Re: Armenian and Hindi/Urdu

Perhaps this is why my mom likes Bollywood movies so much.

[Anonymouse]

Re: Armenian and Hindi/Urdu

Well, one thing is for sure, Armenian's and Indians are poles apart when it comes to the 7-Eleven industry.

[Siamanto]

Re: Armenian and Hindi/Urdu

For some reason there are some very peculiar similarities between Armenian and Hindi/Urdu. For example, our numbers. Both in Armenian and Hindi, ten is "tas" and thousand is "hazar". There are other small similarities between eight: "oot" (Arm) and "aat" (Hindi) and four: "chors" (Arm) and "char" (Hindi).

Both Armenian and Sanskrit belong to the family of Indo-European langauages and some similarities should be expected. Is Armenian closer to Sanskrit than to Latin? I certainly cannot answer the question; I know more than one language derived from the Latin, but I don't know Hindi or Sanskrit.
However, I can state that Armenian has many more similarities with languages derived from the Latin than the few that you mentioned above. Also, beyond a common vocabulary, are there any grammatical similarities? It is the case with what I will losely call "Latin languages" i.e. derived or substantially influenced by Old Latin.
The following is some of the similarities:
1- The Armenian "das@" is nothing but the Spanish "diez" or the French "dix." The same goes for "tchors," "hinq," "yot@," "out@" and "in@."
2- There exists three group of verbs in both Spanish and Armenian; "ir," "er," "ar" in Spanish and "il," "el," "al" in Armenian. French is a bit messier, but most verbs fall in one of the three above mentioned groups.
3- Many suffixes and prefixes are common:
- "tion" in French and "tioun" in Armenian
- "de" that means negation
- "in" in French and "an" in Armenian - "un" in English.
- "ab" that means negation i.e. "aboren"
4- The list of common words is too long; but it would suffice to limit ourselves to domestic animals such as
- "gadou" in Armenian and "chat" in French or "gato" in Spanish
- "gov" in Armenian and cow in English
- "shoun" in Armenian and "chien" in French
- "esh" in Armenian and "arse" in English

Then there are other smaller similarities like "yar", "ha" (slang for yes). Are these similarities relatively modern or is there an Armenian link to Sanscrit. Probably former, but why are our numbers less similar to say Farsi or Greek or Arabic than to Hindi?

Yes, it's probably a recent influence facilitated or made possible by the *urkish invasions. That remains a guess.
I believe that "he" means the same in *urkish. "Yar" may also be of *urkic or Central Asian origin.

But then again is the Sanscrit link, which would have to be a quite ancient link, part of any theory of Armenian origins?

Personally, I believe that there are multiple origins; but, the appellation "Armenian" is probably of Latin origin. "Armenians" were the "Germans" of the South???
In Old Latin, "german" meant something like brother or related, that became "germane" in English and "hermano" - in Spanish. The transformation into "armeno" does not seem far fetched.
Ratus Arminius - Armenian Rat - is "hermine" is French. The 'h', 'g' belong to the same group and the 'h' can be silent.
I'm not sure, but isn't the first name "Herman" "Kerman" in Armenian?


Note: I have chosen to auto censor the words "*urk," "*urkish" or *urkic" because it is commonly perceived as unpleasant and offending, evokes unpleasant emotions and imagery and is pregnant with immoral and evil connotations!

[karoaper]

Re: Armenian and Hindi/Urdu

Both Armenian and Sanskrit belong to the family of Indo-European langauages and some similarities should be expected. Is Armenian closer to Sanskrit than to Latin? I certainly cannot answer the question; I know more than one language derived from the Latin, but I don't know Hindi or Sanskrit.
However, I can state that Armenian has many more similarities with languages derived from the Latin than the few that you mentioned above. Also, beyond a common vocabulary, are there any grammatical similarities? It is the case with what I will losely call "Latin languages" i.e. derived or substantially influenced by Old Latin.
The following is some of the similarities:
1- The Armenian "das@" is nothing but the Spanish "diez" or the French "dix." The same goes for "tchors," "hinq," "yot@," "out@" and "in@."
2- There exists three group of verbs in both Spanish and Armenian; "ir," "er," "ar" in Spanish and "il," "el," "al" in Armenian. French is a bit messier, but most verbs fall in one of the three above mentioned groups.
3- Many suffixes and prefixes are common:
- "tion" in French and "tioun" in Armenian
- "de" that means negation
- "in" in French and "an" in Armenian - "un" in English.
- "ab" that means negation i.e. "aboren"
4- The list of common words is too long; but it would suffice to limit ourselves to domestic animals such as
- "gadou" in Armenian and "chat" in French or "gato" in Spanish
- "gov" in Armenian and cow in English
- "shoun" in Armenian and "chien" in French
- "esh" in Armenian and "arse" in English






Yes, it's probably a recent influence facilitated or made possible by the *urkish invasions. That remains a guess.
I believe that "he" means the same in *urkish. "Yar" may also be of *urkic or Central Asian origin.







Personally, I believe that there are multiple origins; but, the appellation "Armenian" is probably of Latin origin. "Armenians" were the "Germans" of the South???
In Old Latin, "german" meant something like brother or related, that became "germane" in English and "hermano" - in Spanish. The transformation into "armeno" does not seem far fetched.
Ratus Arminius - Armenian Rat - is "hermine" is French. The 'h', 'g' belong to the same group and the 'h' can be silent.
I'm not sure, but isn't the first name "Herman" "Kerman" in Armenian?


Note: I have chosen to auto censor the words "*urk," "*urkish" or *urkic" because it is commonly perceived as unpleasant and offending, evokes unpleasant emotions and imagery and is pregnant with immoral and evil connotations!

Right, the link with Latin and Phoenician makes a lot of sense and the multitute of similarities attest to that. But I would never have thought there would be similarities with Hindi, especially so precisely similar.

Also, I wasn't talking about the origin of the word "Armenian" but rather the actual historic origin of Armenians.

I think you're giving too much credit to turks with the phrase "turkish origin". Very few things are of turkish origin, the "khazukh" maybe.

[skhara]

Re: Armenian and Hindi/Urdu

Karo,

Maybe it has to do with the Indo-European link. There are a lot of similar words between Sanskrit and Slavic languages as well.

[jgk3]

Re: Armenian and Hindi/Urdu

Personally, I believe that there are multiple origins; but, the appellation "Armenian" is probably of Latin origin. "Armenians" were the "Germans" of the South???
In Old Latin, "german" meant something like brother or related, that became "germane" in English and "hermano" - in Spanish. The transformation into "armeno" does not seem far fetched.
Ratus Arminius - Armenian Rat - is "hermine" is French. The 'h', 'g' belong to the same group and the 'h' can be silent.
I'm not sure, but isn't the first name "Herman" "Kerman" in Armenian?

This is preposterous... Ar-me-ni refers to land of the people of Ara. It has nothing to do with German. Besides, the phonetical relationship between K and H is non-existant in Armenian.

Speaking of phonetical grounds, I'd say in this respect, Armenian is closest to Greek and Sanskrit, due to the fact that they stayed together in the Indo-European homeland longer (1000-2000 years) than the groups that branched off to migrate Europe, Tocharia, etc...

During this time, they developped phonetic transformations that eased the tension of many words and made them flow more fluently. Voiceless letters (T, K, P1, P2) for many basic words were transformed into semi-voiced ones (D, G, B1, *Ph-H2). The onset of such transformations must've been started by the Kartvelian speaking cultures intermingling with the Indo-European cultures... The Kartvelian languages are known for their rich phonetical variations... In Armenian, this is undeniably present too, an example being the P, Pb and B letters of our Alphabet (although they're more actively put into practice by the Eastern Dialect speakers, who by the way, sound sort of similar to Sanskrit language speakers due to that "fluent phenomenon" of semi-voiced letters)

*For example, the word for Father in Armenian is Hayr, while the one in French is Pere... Armenian followed the transformation for the P to a Ph, and later to a H. Although not necessarily related to the same event of phonetic transformation as the Greek, Armenian and Indo-Aryan (Indic, Iranian) group, English Father must've followed the same P-Ph transformation. It's curious to see some German family names starting with "Pf" (pronounced Ph), showing the transformation in Germanic languages in such an obvious context. Again, the Germanic phonetical transformations seem to be unrelated to the aforementioned groups.

Anyhow, when compared vocabulary with Indo-European groups, and even non-Indo-European groups, you're bound to find some similarities, but just because you find them in latin, doesn't mean you can't find their Sanskrit reflexes still standing today. Although I'm not too in touch with the basic Indo-European vocabularies of Sanskrit or Greek, I'd have to go with a hunch that they are closer to Armenian than other European languages.

[Siamanto]

Re: Armenian and Hindi/Urdu

Right, the link with Latin and Phoenician makes a lot of sense and the multitute of similarities attest to that. But I would never have thought there would be similarities with Hindi, especially so precisely similar.

They - Armenian and Sanskrit - belong to the same family of languages for a good reason. I have discussed this with many Indians; but, unfortunately, none knew Sanskrit well enough.

Does Armenian have "substantial" similarities with Phoenician - a (geographically) "remote" Semitic language? Would you care to explain?
Assyrians or Chaldeans were much closer to us.

Also, I wasn't talking about the origin of the word "Armenian" but rather the actual historic origin of Armenians.

I know, that's why I said: "Personally, I believe that there are multiple origins."
I'm sorry if that was not clear.

Yes, it's probably a recent influence facilitated or made possible by the *urkish invasions. That remains a guess.
I believe that "he" means the same in *urkish. "Yar" may also be of *urkic or Central Asian origin.

I think you're giving too much credit to turks with the phrase "turkish origin". Very few things are of turkish origin, the "khazukh" maybe.

So even "may be" and "*urkic or Central Asian" is too much credit?
Have you noticed that, at times, humans learn to reproduce noises that parasites make?


Note: I have chosen to auto censor the words "*urk," "*urkish" or *urkic" because it is commonly perceived as unpleasant and offending, evokes unpleasant emotions and imagery and is pregnant with immoral and evil connotations!

[jgk3]

Re: Armenian and Hindi/Urdu

chojukh is of turkish origin :P

[bell-the-cat]

Re: Armenian and Hindi/Urdu

For some reason there are some very peculiar similarities between Armenian and Hindi/Urdu. For example, our numbers. Both in Armenian and Hindi, ten is "tas" and thousand is "hazar". There are other small similarities between eight: "oot" (Arm) and "aat" (Hindi) and four: "chors" (Arm) and "char" (Hindi).

The 1,2,3,4, etc., decimal numerical system originated in India, in sanskrit. But I don't know if the actual words "one", "two", "three", etc., and their varients in other European languages originally came from there. A quick glance at a dictionary tells me that "four" and "ten" did though.