Re:Tocharian Languages
by captainmuon on Thursday January 12, 2023 @08:49AM
(#34353410)
I read somewhere that Chinese "ma" for horse and English "mare" might be related, originating from a steppe people of horseriders. I find these possible connections from time immemorial really fascinating.
[ Parent
| on HN ]
Re:Tocharian Languages
by DonaldFisk on Thursday January 12, 2023 @10:39AM
(#34355118)
Here? https://languagelog.ldc.upenn.edu/nll/?p=44941
In Indoeuropean it's only present in the Germanic and Celtic branches (Protogermanic: marhaz, Protoceltic: markos), but in the Far East, as well as Chinese 馬 (mǎ) there's Mongolian морь, Korean 말 (mal), and Japanese うま (uma).
I can't find any Finno-Ugric or Turkic cognates, so it looks like there are two separate clusters.
In Finnish we still use word "mesi", which is a synonym for honey. The word has the same meaning in Finno-ugric and Uralian languages still spoken in Siberia and Volga areas such as Mari and Udmurt - and Hungarian.
At least the Finnish etymologic dictionary says it's related to Aryan words, e.g. medhu in Sanskrit.
https://kaino.kotus.fi/suomenetymologinensanakirja/?p=qs-art...