E 0123         BROTHER

The word " brother " is of Germanic origin .

H 0262            ר ב

Concept of root : belonging person

Hebrew word

pronunciation

English meanings

ר ב

bar

son, belonging person

Related English words

brother

Comparison between European words and Hebrew

Languages

Words

Pronunciation

English meanings

Similarity in roots

Hebrew; Aramaic

ר ב

bar

son; belonging  person

b . r

Greek

φρατηρ

fratèr

person belonging to clan

f . r

Latin

frater

fratèr

cousin, brother

f . r

Old English

broder, broðer

brother

b . r . d

English

brother

brother

b . r

 

 

Proto-Semitic *BAR --- *BRA-TER Indo-European

 

 

The similarity we present here regards words that in their origin referred to relationships in clans or tribes, or generally " extended " families . In modern languages their meanings are then more concentrated on strictly precise relations in families in the modern sense. But one observes that such words, son and brother, like in fact father, mother , daughter and sister, continue being used widely in what is considered today figurative sense.

 

English has no other word to indicate the sons of the same parents. The same goes for the other Germanic languages as well as for Latin and its daughters. All the same those many tongues continue in using the same word in very many situations in the original sense of "belonging person". As we just remarked, such use is then considered as figurative .

 

This Hebrew word, "bar", important also in Modern Hebrew, is generally considered as a "loanword" from Aramaic, because Hebrew also has the more well-known word "ב ן, B N, ben" . This same word is used, at least in plural, also in Aramaic and Syriac, "ב נ י ן, benin" Whatever be of that supposition of being an Aramaic loanword, which we do not believe, this would not change its position in a similarity between a Semitic word and the European words of this entry .

 

It is further important to note that Hebrew has as well another version of the word " bar", that is " bĕr'à" , considered a more emphatic way of expressing the concept of " son ". This "bĕr'à", indeed also present in Aramaic has a very short, dull "Ĕ", comes somewhat nearer to the European words in which there is no vowel pronounced at all between the first two consonants, as in Latin "frater" and English "brother". This is one of the most frequent differences between Hebrew and Germanic tongues, that in three consonant roots pronounce usually only one vowel. Hebrew in a three consonant root pronounces two vowels, but one of these may become a "schwa" , a kind of dull "ĕ". In modern Hebrew, spoken mainly by people of European origin and tongue, this "schwa" disappears in the pronunciation of the word.

 

 

Note:
  • Greek αδελφος , adelphos is another word, that today is used to say "brother" used in all those many variations we see in the other European languages. In Classic Greek "adelphos"also stood for "close relative". This is a bit surprising, if, as scholars believe the word is composed of a confirming (athroitos) A and the word "δελφυς , delphϋs" that says "womb". And if a womb gives the name of a related person, one would expect this person to be from the same womb, thus a real brother. The ways of languages can be complicated.

     

    The reader will note the similarity between the Greek words for "womb" and dolphin: "delphüs" respectively "δελφις , delphis". Naturally nearly everybody says that the words are the same. But there is not a shadow of evidence for that besides the near-perfect similarity in sound. And there is nothing that makes a dolphin look or act like the female womb. Imagine that before the word dolphin , travelling from Greece to Rome and onwards, became accepted in the West, a dolphin was called in Old English "mereswin", litterally "seaswine". German and Dutch had sisterwords for this. The French word for "crownprince", "dauphin", makes people fantasize about a link with the female womb, but in reality it is linked to the word dolphin only because the Counts of Vienne made the introduction of this title for the crownprince a condition for ceding their territory. Their familyname was in fact" Dauphin".

 

Note:
  • Ter, ther, der are the second parts we see in European languages in the words for a number of very close relatives, such as father and mother. This was the case already in Indo-European, but it is obvious that these syllables are suffixes. We think they indicate the concept of protection or taking care of, as seen in the Greek word τηρέω , tèréo, which has precisely those meanings.

 

Note:
  • Aramaic has cleared the matter of similarity by using the word "bar" also for people of a certain belonging that not are sons. Probably this is a continuation of its original message, identical to the Indo-European one.

 

Note:
  • Hebrew has another well-known word for "son" as well : "BEN". But it calls a brother " א ח ", agh". This brief word is again, as in European languages, used to express other, figurative, forms of brothership.

 

Note:
  • Proto-Semitic according to the common hypothesis had the same root as Hebrew in this case : "*ב ר, B . R ".

 

Note:
  • Proto-Germanic Most languages have "B R O D E R", in which the "O" often is pronounced near or actually as "U". In German "bruder" and Dutch "broeder" the U-sound is expressed in the spelling. English , with Old Saxon and Old Frisian, in a process that began already in Old English, has changed the "D" into "TH" : brother. Proto-Germanic most probably had "*B R O D E R".

 

Note:
  • Indo-European.

     

    Old Indian has "brātar-, brātrá-, brātrya- = brother, brotherhood, clan". The indication from this is "BR Ā T (Ă) R-"

     

    Avestan with "brātar- is similar to Old Indian. The same was valid for Old Persian.

     

    Celtic in Old Irish shows "brathir. Cymric "brawd, pl. brodyr, Old Cornish "broder and Breton "breuzr, later "breur, pl. breudeur show a development similar to Germanic.

     

    Baltic has a hypothesis without the second "R", similar to Old Prussian "brā, voc. brote(!)". This hypothesis is incomplete, because the plural "bratrīkai" still shows that "R". In fact also in some Latvian and Lithuanian words the second "R" can be found.

     

    Slavic Old Church Slavonic has "" BR Ă TR ŭ- , bratŭ" with the suffix shortened in two ways, as seen even stronger in Russian б р а т , brat = brother". An original Slavic "BR Ă TR-" seems right.

     

    The Indo-European hypothesis "*BHR Ā T ER" may be adapted into "*BR Ā TER-".

 

 

 

 

 
"...the town, to which was given the name Babel, because it was there that the Lord confused the language of all the world on the face of which He dispersed them. GENESIS 11,9"
 
Created: Tuesday 6 November 2007 at 22.30.54 Updated: 09/10/2012 at 16.09.28