Monday, September 25, 2017

Sound Correspondence between Dutch and German

Dutch and German are Germanic languages with many similarities. These can also be observed in sound correspondences. A k in Dutch often corresponds to a ch in German. The German word is on the left and the Dutch word on the right. Here are examples:

Besuch bezoek (visit)
Buch boek (book)
Dach dak (roof)
ich ik (I)
Koch kok (cook)
Milch melk (milk)
Schuhmacher schoenmaker (shoemaker)
schwach zwak (weak)
Tuch doek (cloth)
wirklich werkelijk (really)

The German words reflect lenition. The velar plosive of Dutch became the velar and palatal fricative of German. The palatal fricative is present in ich, Milch and wirklich. This sound correspondence is not only in Dutch and German but in fact in other Germanic languages. The word for book is bok in Swedish and Norwegian. However, because of the similarity of Dutch and German, this sound correspondence is best illustrated by comparing the vocabulary of these two languages.

No comments:

Featured Post

Finding the Proto-Form

Related languages have a number of words which are similar to one another. In the branch of linguistics known as historical linguistics, the...