Indo-European word origins in proto-Indo-European (PIE) language
Indo-European word origins
Purpose:
- to identify common origins of Indo-European languages and language groups
- to recognize the commonality of these words through sound changes
- to help English-speaking students of European languages to recognize how those words are similar to English words, and, thus, enhance the foreign language vocabulary
- todo: create pages for Indo-European language, Grimm's Law, etc.
Proto-Indo-European word roots =[edit | edit source]
- Proto-Indo-European (PIE)
- proto = "early" or "before"
- thus "prototype" = an example of something before making the real thing
- Indo-European = a major language group that originated in central Eurasia and spread across south and southeast Asia and Europe and formed the basis of many modern languages
- word roots = "morphemes" that form a basic sound from which words are built
- proto = "early" or "before"
- PIE word roots
- consist of a single vowel and one or more consonants
- these roots form the core sound of a word
- they are not important to know, but it is important to know that PIE morphemes changed as the language spread
- cognate = a shift in the sound of a word that forms a different pronunciation and spelling of a word from that of the origin language
PIE grammar[edit | edit source]
verbs[edit | edit source]
- all descendent PIE languages follow common verb forms from the PIE
- native English-speaker students frequently learn verb forms while studying a foreign language
- see for these verb forms