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The English words “wheel” and “rickshaw” are extraordinary cognates (lemmy.sdf.org)

submitted 2 years ago by Deebster@programming.dev to c/linguistics@mander.xyz

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[–] lvxferre@mander.xyz 7 points 2 years ago

Another rather counter-intuitive cognate for both is "cycle". It looks nothing like either, and it's the result of

PIE *kʷékʷlos →
inherited: Ancient Greek ⟨κύκλος⟩ [kúklos]→[kyklos] →
borrowed: Latin as ⟨cyclus⟩ [kʏklʊs], accusative ⟨cyclum⟩ [kʏklʊ̃]. That [ʏ] only applies to erudite pronunciation, most folks likely used [ɪ].
[re]borrowed: French as ⟨cycle⟩ *[siklə] (modern pronunciation [sikl] ).
borrowed: English as ⟨cicle⟩~⟨cycle⟩ [si:klə]→[saɪ.k(ə)l].

The French step is disputable, as it's also possible that English got the word from the same source as French, straight from the Ecclesiastical pronunciation; that would explain the lengthened vowel. Either way, French certainly reborrowed the word, it cannot be inherited otherwise the vowel would be [e].