Persian and English are both Indo-European languages so we would expect to find similarities between them. Yet modern Persian and English are vastly diffferent.

A recent discussion on a different topic got sidetracked onto this subject, (<a href="https://www.italki.com/discussion/212479" target="_blank">https://www.italki.com/discussion/212479</a>;) so I thought I'd start a new discussion dedicated to examining the similarities and differences and also the causes of the divergence between the two languages.

I'll get the ball rolling with a list of words that clearly have the same origin, some of these have come to both languages via Sanskrit (A very early Indo-European language). but linguists believe that some of these words pre-date Sanskrit and come from what they call the Proto-Indo-European language. (PIE)

bar-ā-dar = brother

sotoon (column) The same PIE word is the origin of the word "stone" in English

tāreek = dark (When you factor in in the shift in the consonants "T" and "D" and the extra vowel, you can see it's the same word.)

dokh-tar = daughter

dar = door

mā-dar = mother

moshk = musk

set-ā-reh = star (Identical consonants to the English word "star" it just has some additional vowels.)

sāl (year) The same PIE word is the origin of the word "Solar" in English

jan-gal = jungle

san-dal = sandals

sāree = sari

shek-ar = sugar

nām = name

ton-dar = thunder

Please note these are not "loan words", they are descendants of ancient words that pre-date both English and Persian and have been retained in both languages albeit in slightly different forms.

Do you know of any others?

But what about the huge differences that have developed between these two languages that originated in the same place?

A user named "Drasvi" posted this interesting quote in the other discussion :

"<em>There is also inconsistent classification of the language in terms of difficulty for English speakers. It is important to note that Persian (when taught as the modern language of Iran) is relatively easy to begin with because some of the basic vocabulary is cognate with English and the syntax is relatively similar. Beyond the initial hurdle of the strange alphabet, the student finds relatively simple sentences with familiar structures. Partly for this reason, introductory Persian classes are often relatively large. However, few students progress far into the intermediate level because of the increasing need to deal with vocabulary, syntax, and usage that are culturally alien to English speakers as a result of </em><em>the high degree of convergence with the major non-Indo-European languages in the region, Arabic and Turkish, as well as the importance of imported Arabic vocabulary</em><em>.</em><em> Enrolments in Persian (when taken for these essentially nonacademic, but now common, purposes) tend to fall off sharply after the first year, further endangering its future in the curriculum.</em>"

That sounds like a reasonable explanation as to how the two languages have become so dramatically different.

What are your thoughts about all of this?