Repetition of words in the Kurdish language

Today, I want to present a phenomenon of the Kurdish language that I don't know of any other language.

In order to intensify the meaning of a word English uses the word "very", "a lot of" or simply uses a new word for it. Similar, in Kurdish a word can be intensified with the word "zor" (=very), however, in some cases the word itself can be repeated twice to intensify its meaning.

Here are some examples of this repetition

Kurdish	English	Kurdish Repetition	English
rang	color	rang-aw-rang	colorful
dûr	far	dûr dûr	very far
zor	very, a lot, much	zor zor	even more, exceedingly
wurd	tiny, little	wurd-a-wurd-a	slowly
koka	cough	kok-a-kok	a lot of coughing
bola	loud complaining	bol-a-bol	a lot of loud complaining
ming	???	ming-a-ming	grumble
qîzh	scream	qîzh-a-qîzh	a lot of screaming
shirr	squeak, squeal, scream	shirr-a-shirr	a lot of squeaking
taqa	banging, thud	taq-a-taq	a lot of banging, noise
tapa	stomp (once)	tap-a-tap	a lot of stomping
dang	sound, voice	dang-a-dang	noise
girm	boom, plop	girm-a-girm	thunder

So, if this word repetition looks familiar to your mother tongue then please let me know and comment.

Indo-European Swadesh Mapping #008 "THAT"

Today, I want to present a map for the word "THAT".

For more info, read my initial blog post.

How to see interactive maps:
1. Download map (gmp file).
2. Go to gmapgis.com.
3. Click "Project".
4. Upload map from your computer (the gmp file you just downloaded).
5. Click "Open".
6. Enjoy.

If you are interested to see the names of the included languages, I made a spreadsheet.

Indo-European Swadesh Mapping #006 "THEY"

Today, I want to present a map for the word "THEY".

For more info, read my initial blog post.

How to see interactive maps:
1. Download map (gmp file).
2. Go to gmapgis.com.
3. Click "Project".
4. Upload map from your computer (the gmp file you just downloaded).
5. Click "Open".
6. Enjoy.

If you are interested to see the names of the included languages, I made a spreadsheet.

Indo-European Swadesh Mapping #005 "YOU (Plural)""

Today, I want to present a map for the word "YOU (Plural)".

For more info, read my initial blog post.

How to see interactive maps:
1. Download map (gmp file).
2. Go to gmapgis.com.
3. Click "Project".
4. Upload map from your computer (the gmp file you just downloaded).
5. Click "Open".
6. Enjoy.

If you are interested to see the names of the included languages, I made a spreadsheet.

Indo-European Swadesh Mapping #003 "HE"

Today, I want to present a map for the word "HE".

For more info, read my initial blog post.

How to see interactive maps:
1. Download map (gmp file).
2. Go to gmapgis.com.
3. Click "Project".
4. Upload map from your computer (the gmp file you just downloaded).
5. Click "Open".
6. Enjoy.

If you are interested to see the names of the included languages, I made a spreadsheet.

Indo-European Swadesh Mapping #004 "WE"

Today, I want to present a map for the word "WE".

For more info, read my initial blog post.

How to see interactive maps:
1. Download map (gmp file).
2. Go to gmapgis.com.
3. Click "Project".
4. Upload map from your computer (the gmp file you just downloaded).
5. Click "Open".
6. Enjoy.

If you are interested to see the names of the included languages, I made a spreadsheet.

Indo-European Swadesh Mapping #002 "YOU"

Today, I want to present a map for the word "YOU".

For more info, read my initial blog post.

How to see interactive maps:
1. Download map (gmp file).
2. Go to gmapgis.com.
3. Click "Project".
4. Upload map from your computer (the gmp file you just downloaded).
5. Click "Open".
6. Enjoy.

If you are interested to see the names of the included languages, I made a spreadsheet.

Edit:

One interesting thing I noted is that the well conserved "tu" is followed by "v/w" in some languages.  These languages are all present in Asia.

Tocharian B: tuwe
Classical Armenian: dow
Old Persian (West-Iranian): tuvam, θuvām
Sodgian (East-Iranian): tyw
Sariqoli (East-Iranian): tɛw
Kata/Kati (Nuristani): tʷi
Vedic Sanskrit (Indo-Aryan): tvám

In some Indo-Aryam languages the "v" changed into a "m":
Nepali: timi, ta
Assamese: ti, tay, tumi, āpuni
Bengali: tumi
Oriya: tumɔ, to, apɔṇɔ-nkɔ,

The antrogenica user linkus showed me that "v/w" is actually also present in Baltic languages in some of the declensions of "you". In Slavic languages it is a "b". I also found the "you" declension of the reconstructed proto-Indo-European, which shows both "w" and "b". I also added German.

	Proto-Indo European	Lithuanian	Latvian	Polish	Russian	German
Nom.	*túh₂	tu	tu	ty	ты	du
Gen.	*téwe ~ *toy	tavo/tavęs	tavs	ciebie/cię	тебя	deiner
Dat.	*tébʰye ~ toy	tau	tev	tobie/ci	тебе	dir
Acc.	*twé ~ te	tave	tevi	ciebie/cię	тебя	dich
Ins.		tavimi	tevi	tobą	тобой
Loc.		tavyje	tevī	tobie	(о)тебе

Another thing that caught my attention is the prefix "e" in Gorani dialects, e.g. "etu" and Greek. Similar structures with "e":

Greek: εσύ/esi
Macho from Topzawa (Kurdistan-Iraq; Gorani): tu, etî
Shabaki from Qahrawa (Gorani): tu, etû
Bajalani from Arpaîi (Gorani): etci

Indo-European Swadesh Mapping #001 "I"

This is a new series about the Indo-European language family. Again, my approach is purely descriptive, I don't want to hypothesize about the origin and ancestral location of proto-Ind0-European language (PIE). Instead I thought it might be nice to have maps showing world wide variation of Indo-European languages on a map. In order to prevent discussions I put the location of PIE in the middle of the Black Sea...

Today, I want to present a map for the word "I".

The map shows just the word for "I", not the corresponding language. The words are extracted from various sources, mostly from the Indo-European lexical cognacy database. To see the interactive maps, download the gmp files I created and open them at gmapgis.com.

How to see interactive maps:
1. Download map (gmp file).
2. Go to gmapgis.com.
3. Click "Project".
4. Upload map from your computer (the gmp file you just downloaded).
5. Click "Open".
6. Enjoy.


If you are interested to see the names of the included languages, I made a spreadsheet.



I included living and extinct languages, my main focus are the Swadesh words and the Indo-Iranian languages.

The In-Laws

Today, I want to show you some old, old Kurdish words.

To address a relationship towards something or somebody, in English you can use the word "self", e.g. myself, yourself, itself, etc.
The Proto-Germanic root of the word "self" is *sel-bho-, which originated from the Proto-Indo-European (PIE) root *s(w)e. The same word can be found in Sanskrit, the ancient language of India, ("svah"), in Avestan, the oldest recorded Iranian language, ("hva"), in Old Persian ("huva" or "khva"; e.g. in "khva-data"="lord", literally "created from oneself"). The starting "S" mostly disappeared in Iranian languages. In Modern Kurdish and Farsi, you can still find this word, it changed from Old Iranian "khva" to "xo" and "kho", respectively.
Just a reminder, the pronunciation of the Kurdish letter "x" is equivalent to "kh" used in Farsi and "ch" used in German  (e.g. German: "Woche"="week"), e.g. "Kazakhstan" (the word "Khaki" is also mispronounced in English; it means "greyish" or "dusty").

Example:
English: I go myself.
Sorani Kurdish: (Min) xom darom.
Farsi: (Man) khodam miram.

So back to the Proto-Indo-European (PIE) root *s(w)e.
After marriage, the family of the wife and husband become part of one family. To address the new relationships within this larger family new words were created. All these new words have their roots in the Proto-Indo-European (PIE) word *s(w)e.

The mother-in-law is the "Self"-Mother:

Latin: socrus

Sankrit: śvaśrú

Kurdish: xasu

Armenian: skėsur 

Gothic: swaihro

Welsh: chwegr

Old High German: swigar

German: Schwiegermutter

The father-in-law:

Latin: socer

Sanskrit: śváśura

Kurdish: xazûr

Lithuanian: šesuras

Gothic: swaihra

Welsh: chwegrwn

Albanian: vjéhërr

Old High German: swehur

German: Schwiegervater

In-laws:

Kurdish: xezan

Relatives: 

Kurdish: xizim

The starting "S" mostly disappeared in Iranian languages (see Sanskrit versus Kurdish words above), but not always:

The brother-in-law and husband:

Old High German: swâgur (brother-in-law)

German: Schwager (brother-in-law)

Sanskrit: śvaśurya (brother-in-law)

Farsi: šouhar (husband) 

Kurdish: şû kirdin ("to marry")*

*In Kurdish, there are two versions for "to marry": 

Men say: "jin henan" ("to get/bring a woman")

Women say: "şû kirdin" ("to make a husband")

Kurdish verbs

I just want to share one observation I made about Kurdish verbs. Quiet a few verbs in Sorani-Kurdish are combinations of a 'main verb' and a second word.

To give you an idea what I mean, here a list of Sorani-Verbs; in some cases the verb was obviously shortened. I am writing the Sorani-Kurdish words in Latin script (Sorani is usually written in Arabic script) , so the proper spelling might be a little bit off.

Bida!                           Give!                           
  
Sar Bida!                     Visit!
Pishani (Bi)da!          Show!
Para Bida!                  Pay!
Iarmati Bida!              Help!
Haul Bida!                  Try!
Zuab Bida!                  Respond!
Baz Bida!                    Jump!

Example #2:
 

Bika!                             Do! 


Tatsruba Bika!              Test!
Supas Bika!                  Thank!
Safar Bika!                   Travel!
Pirsiar Bika!                 Ask!
Peida Bika!                   Find!
Malla Bika!                  Swim!
Ish/Kar Bika!             Work!
Iari Bika!                     Play!
Daua Bika!                  Order!
Dast Pe Bika!              Start!
Cauare Bika!               Expect!
Bir Bika!                     Think!
Bauir Bika!                 Believe!
Caki (Bi)ka!                Fix!
Chrap (B)ika!             Brake!
Tekall (B)ika!              Mix!
Tam (B)ika!                Taste!
Seir (B)ika!                 Look!
Ra (Bi)ka!                   Run!
Drust (B)ika!              Make!
Fer (B)ika!                  Teach!

 Example #3:

(U)asta!                     Stand!


Ra uasta!                    Stand (still)!
Halsta!                      Stand up!
Buasta!                      Wait!

Example #4:

Bigra!                        Grab! Hold!

Uar (b)igra!                 Receive! 
Hal (b)igra!               Pick up!
Ra (b)igra!                Stop!
Gue bigra!                Listen!

Example #5:

Biga!                     Arrive!


Te biga!                Understand!

Example #6:

Biba!                          Be! Become!

Fer Ba!                     Learn!

Some interesting aspects of this exercise:
The stem of the word 'to run' is 'ra' in Sorani Kurdish.
Ra (Bi)ka!                   Run! (literally "Do run!")

Ra (b)igra!                 Stop! (literally "Hold run!")
Ra uasta!                   Stand (still)!  (literally "Stand run!")

My personal favorite is:
Dast Pe Bika!              Start! (literally "Do hand foot!")    :-)