Semitic Languages - Common Vocabulary

Common Vocabulary

Due to the Semitic languages' common origin, they share many words and roots. For example:

English	Proto-Semitic	Akkadian	Arabic	Aramaic	Hebrew	Ge'ez	Mehri
father	*ʼab-	ab-	ʼab-	ʼaḇ-āʼ	ʼāḇ	ʼab	ḥa-yb
heart	*lib(a)b-	libb-	lubb-	lebb-āʼ	lēḇ(āḇ)	libb	ḥa-wbēb
house	*bayt-	bītu, bētu	bayt-	bayt-āʼ	báyiṯ, bêṯ	bet	beyt, bêt
peace	*šalām-	šalām-	salām-	šlām-āʼ	šālôm	salām	səlōm
tongue	lišān-/lašān-	lišān-	lisān-	leššān-āʼ	lāšôn	lissān	əwšēn
water	may-/māy-	mû (root mā-/māy-)	māʼ-/māy	mayy-āʼ	máyim	māy	ḥə-mō

Sometimes certain roots differ in meaning from one Semitic language to another. For example, the root b-y-ḍ in Arabic has the meaning of "white" as well as "egg", whereas in Hebrew it only means "egg". The root l-b-n means "milk" in Arabic, but the color "white" in Hebrew. The root l-ḥ-m means "meat" in Arabic, but "bread" in Hebrew and "cow" in Ethiopian Semitic; the original meaning was most probably "food". The word medina (root: m-d-n) has the meaning of "metropolis" in Amharic and "city" in Arabic and Hebrew, but in Modern Hebrew it is usually used as "state".

Of course, there is sometimes no relation between the roots. For example, "knowledge" is represented in Hebrew by the root y-d-ʿ but in Arabic by the roots ʿ-r-f and ʿ-l-m and in Ethiosemitic by the roots ʿ-w-q and f-l-ṭ.

For more comparative vocabulary lists, see Wiktionary appendices: