"Curry" according to OED is from Tamil "kari," a sauce.

Piya Tan

On Tue, Mar 24, 2009 at 9:46 AM, gdbedell <gdbedell@...> wrote:

> Friends,
>
> I apologize for the late response, but I have been away (in India) for
> a week or so.
>
> Normally, to say that an English word (like 'curry') has an Indian origin
> (or has 'roots' in India) would mean that this word was borrowed into
> English from an Indian language, probably but not necessarily during
> the colonial period. That is no doubt the case with 'curry' and most
> of the other words listed by Yong Peng in his original post. (Of course
> it might sometimes be difficult to identify the source word or language
> precisely.)
>
> As has been pointed out, there are words on the list which do not meet
> this definition, for example 'father'. This word existed in English (with
> varying pronunciation) long before English had any contact with Indian
> languages. It is related to words in many Indian languages due to their
> common Indo-European origin, but it is simply a mistake to imagine that
> therefore 'father' has an Indian origin. Using this definition, one could
> equally well say that the Pali word 'pitu' (and hundreds or thousands of
> others) has an English origin.
>
> The list presented by Yong Peng is a good example of muddled or
> misinformed thinking about language. Apparently the problem is not
> so much with Yong Peng himself, as with the uncited sources where
> he got his list.
>
> George Bedell
>
> --- In Pali@yahoogroups.com <Pali%40yahoogroups.com>, "Ong Yong Peng"
> <palismith@...> wrote:
> >
> > Dear Gunnar, Jacques and Ardavarz,
> >
> > thanks for highlighting the words of contention. This is not exactly my
> area of interest, and I do recall now that we did discuss about "serpent"
> and Pali "sappa" many moons ago on this list.
> >
> > I believe the sources, which I refer to, include English words which have
> common Indo-European roots or are inherited indirectly from India. Just like
> what you have already discussed.
> >
> > metta,
> > Yong Peng.
> >
> >
> > --- In Pali@yahoogroups.com <Pali%40yahoogroups.com>, Jacques Huynen
> wrote:
> >
> > "serpens" probably comes, in all Indo-european languages, from a root SRP
> meaning "creep".
> >
> > > * father
> > > * mother
> > > These are common Indo-European stems, perhaps used already in Original
> Indo-European somewhere north of the Black Sea, and found in Teutonic
> languages long before England had any contact with India; also in Ancient
> Greek, in Latin (pater, mater) and in the Romance languages. I don't know
> about the Celtic, Slavic, Baltic, and Iranian languages.
> > >
> > > * serpent
> > > Borrowed from Latin (serpens), probably through French.
> >
>
>
>



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