In every language, most words that most people use are still used from a very long time ago, we just pronounce them a bit differently.
*(H)óynos, *dwó, *treyes for example aren’t just uno, deux and tres, they are 1, 2 and 3 in English, French, German, Italian, Greek, Russian, Hindi, Farsi, Kurdish, Tajik etc. Literally the same word, just spoken by different groups of descendent speakers.
Some languages have undergone sound changes that make certain words sound more or less similar to how we think they sounded in PIE.
So even though though four, vier, quattuor and tessera sound quite different to us, they are all basically just how we say *kʷetwóres.
1 in russian is один, I think it’s quite different from one/uno/un (especially since the о is pronounced а). 2 and 3 are instead extremely similar (два три). Does it actually still come from the same root?
While not being competent in this subject, I found it very fascinatinf that ugro-finnic languages (which are not indoeuropean AFAIK) like Finnish or Estonian are so wildly different, so that 1 2 and 3 are üks, kaks, kolm (in Estonian), for example.
That example does sound quite different, but Wiktionary has it as from the Proto-Slavic *(j)edinъ, which is “ultimately from *h₁óy(H)nos.”
Finnish or Estonian are so wildly different
I know right?! I strongly remember the first Uralic language example I heard was the Finnish for merry christmas: hyvää joulua - it just sounded so different.
Close: it’s French quatre (4), not “quatorze” (14). It goes like this: PIE *kʷetwóres → Latin ⟨quattuor⟩ /kʷattuor/ → Old French ⟨quatre, catre⟩ /kʷatɾə/~/katɾə/ → contemporary French ⟨quatre⟩ /katʁ(ə)/.
French ⟨quatorze⟩ does contain that *kʷetwóres, but it’s only the “quator-”. The “-ze” is from Proto-Indo-European *déḱm̥ (10). This gets easier to see in Latin, as the word for 14 was ⟨quattuordecim⟩ (literally four-ten).
Note that almost all English words that you used to translate the PIE words are also examples of those PIE words being still in use nowadays - they’re direct descendants, for example *kʷis → who, *éǵh₂ → I, etc. In English, German, Swedish and other Germanic languages, this gets a bit obscured due to some old sound change called Grimm’s Law. (EDIT: the only exception is the second line - *túh, *te became “thou, thee”.)
We finns aren’t even a PIE language, and we still use some clearly from those.
The word for sea is basically exactly the same, depending on the pronunciation. We say “meri”, it’s marked down as “móri”. In Finnish yellow is “keltainen” and PIE says “ǵʰelh₃-”.
It is INCREDIBLE how many of these are basically still in use today.
I (1sg) *éǵh₂ == german “ich”
you (2sg) *túh, *te == french “tu” russian ты
we (1pl) *wéy == english
you (2pl) *yū, *yú
who *kʷis (pron.), *kʷod (adj.) == latin “quis, quod”
one *(H)óynos, *(H)óykos, *(H)óywos, *sḗm == spanish “uno”
two *dwóh₁; *dwó == french “deux”
three *tréyes == spanish “tres”
four *kʷetwóres == french “quatorze”… 🤔
Im no lingust, just uninformed observation.
In every language, most words that most people use are still used from a very long time ago, we just pronounce them a bit differently.
*(H)óynos, *dwó, *treyes for example aren’t just uno, deux and tres, they are 1, 2 and 3 in English, French, German, Italian, Greek, Russian, Hindi, Farsi, Kurdish, Tajik etc. Literally the same word, just spoken by different groups of descendent speakers.
Some languages have undergone sound changes that make certain words sound more or less similar to how we think they sounded in PIE.
So even though though four, vier, quattuor and tessera sound quite different to us, they are all basically just how we say *kʷetwóres.
1 in russian is один, I think it’s quite different from one/uno/un (especially since the о is pronounced а). 2 and 3 are instead extremely similar (два три). Does it actually still come from the same root?
While not being competent in this subject, I found it very fascinatinf that ugro-finnic languages (which are not indoeuropean AFAIK) like Finnish or Estonian are so wildly different, so that 1 2 and 3 are üks, kaks, kolm (in Estonian), for example.
That example does sound quite different, but Wiktionary has it as from the Proto-Slavic *(j)edinъ, which is “ultimately from *h₁óy(H)nos.”
I know right?! I strongly remember the first Uralic language example I heard was the Finnish for merry christmas: hyvää joulua - it just sounded so different.
Close: it’s French quatre (4), not “quatorze” (14). It goes like this: PIE *kʷetwóres → Latin ⟨quattuor⟩ /kʷattuor/ → Old French ⟨quatre, catre⟩ /kʷatɾə/~/katɾə/ → contemporary French ⟨quatre⟩ /katʁ(ə)/.
French ⟨quatorze⟩ does contain that *kʷetwóres, but it’s only the “quator-”. The “-ze” is from Proto-Indo-European *déḱm̥ (10). This gets easier to see in Latin, as the word for 14 was ⟨quattuordecim⟩ (literally four-ten).
Note that almost all English words that you used to translate the PIE words are also examples of those PIE words being still in use nowadays - they’re direct descendants, for example *kʷis → who, *éǵh₂ → I, etc. In English, German, Swedish and other Germanic languages, this gets a bit obscured due to some old sound change called Grimm’s Law. (EDIT: the only exception is the second line - *túh, *te became “thou, thee”.)
You forgot the proto-indo-european example for “I’m no linguist, just uninformed observation”
We finns aren’t even a PIE language, and we still use some clearly from those.
The word for sea is basically exactly the same, depending on the pronunciation. We say “meri”, it’s marked down as “móri”. In Finnish yellow is “keltainen” and PIE says “ǵʰelh₃-”.