How to Learn the Basic Word List 231
ENGLISH SWEDISH ENGLISH SWEDISH
wet vat that det
whale vai them dem
whistle vissla there dar
white vit these dessa
wide vid thine din
willing vilhg thou du
win vinna
witness vittne
wood ved
worst varst brother broder (bror)
worth vard father fader (far)
wreck vrak mother moder (mor)
In an English-Swedish dictionary there are many other words
beginning with th or sh with Swedish equivalents, recognizable as such
when these changes are made Of course, the family likeness is obvious
in a host of words without sounds which have undergone a shift of
this type Even if the English equivalent given in the dictionary does
not coriespond to a Swedish word, it is often easy to think of a related
one which does so Thus the Swedish word skara (cut) reminds us of
shear, and veta (know) is derived from the same Teutonic root as wit
(German ztnsseri), still used as a verb in Bible English and in the ex-
pression to wit
Similarities between English words of Teutonic origin and the
corresponding one in another Teutonic language are most difficult to
recognize at sight when the latter is German. From the phonetic point
of view, German has wandered farthest afield from the old Teutonic
homestead. So the similarities of German and English words are less
easy to recognize than the family likeness of English and Swedish ones
In the evolution of German, a compact group of changes called the
second sound-shift took pkce in middle and south Germany, and these
are reflected in German spelling. The most characteristic are the
following"
(a) At the beginning of a word (or in the middle after a consonant) t
was followed by a hiss, i e became ts (as in cats) This ts sound
is represented by Z in German script
(fy Inside the word after a vowel the t shifted further and became
a hiss, now spelt SS
(c) The initial p was followed by /, and the result is represented by
PF-
(d) After a vowel the shift went further,, / replaced p—in script FF-
Another sound-change which took place early in the High German