Odd “Armenian” Words

There are many words in our everyday usage that we assume to be Armenian, and they come down from generation to generation. This is how we find those same words used by people who have never set foot in an Armenian school and those who have finished an Armenian elementary or high school, both by people who barely speak Armenian and those who speak it as their primary language.

In the end, when people hear the actual Armenian equivalent of those same words, they are prone to complain: “You speak very pure Armenian,” “That’s a hard word,” “Nobody can understand you,” “Where do you find those words?” One may even wonder whether they show the same self-respect for the level of their English vocabulary.

Children may even become defensive and say, “I have learned this word at home,” or, if confronted with a repetitive series of common words they believe are “Armenian,” come to the bitter and self-defeating conclusion: “Have we really learned Armenian?"

Here is a randomly compiled list of frequent words that people “think” they are Armenian, only because they do not care to look for their actual origin or to make a real effort to enrich their vocabulary. The list is indeed extremely short, and does not claim to be a representative sample. But it may give an idea of where we stand.

“Armenian”	Armenian	English
զէվզէկ (zevzeg)	շատախօս (shadakhos)	charlatan
թոմաթէս (tomates)	լոլիկ (lolig)	tomato
իշտէ (ishde) (1)	ահա (aha)	there
հէչ/հիչ (hech/hich) (2)	բնաւ (pnav) / ոչինչ (vochinch)	at all, ever, anything
մահանայ (mahana)	պատրուակ (badrvag)	pretext
մաղտանոս (maghdanos)	ազատքեղ (azadkegh)	parsley
չօճուխ (chojukh)	պզտիկ (bzdig) / երեխայ (yerekha)	child
պաճանաղ (bajanagh)	քենեկալ (kenegal)	brother-in-law (*)
պայաթ (bayat)	օթեկ (oteg)	stale
պէլքի (belki)	թերեւս (terevs)	perhaps
պիլէ (bile) (3)	նոյնիսկ (nooynisg)	even
սալաթ (salat), սալաթա (salata)	աղցան (aghtsan)	salad
տահա (daha) (4)	դեռ (ter), տակաւին (dagaveen)	still
րէզիլ (rezil), քէփէզէ (kepezeh) (5)	խայտառակ (khaydarag)	shame
փաթաթէս (patates)	գետնախնձոր (kednakhntzor)	potato
փիս (pis)	գէշ (kesh), աղտոտ (aghdod)	bad / dirty
քի (ki)  (6)	թէ (te)/ որ (vor)	what / that
օրթալըխ (ortalekh) (7)	մէջտեղ (mechdegh)	middle

(1) For example: Իշտէ քեզի խելք (Ishde kezi khelk, “There you have an idea”), instead of Ահա քեզի խելք (Aha kezi khelk).

(2) For example: Հէչ չեմ գիտեր (Hech chem kider, “I don’t know at all”), instead of Բնաւ չեմ գիտեր (Pnav chem kider); Հէչ մտածե՞ր ես այդ մասին (Hech mdadzer es ayt masin?, “Have you ever thought about that?”), instead of Բնաւ մտածեր ես այդ մասին (Pnav mdadzer es ayt masin); Հէչ բան գիտե՞ս (Hech pan kides?, “Do you know anything?”).

(3) For example: Չեմ գիտեր պիլէմ (Chem kider bilem, “I don’t even know”), instead of Չեմ գիտեր նոյնիսկ (Chem kider nooynisg).

(4) For example: Ռեզիլ եղանք (Rezil yeghank, “We were ashamed”) or Քէփէզէ եղանք (Kepezeh yeghank), instead of Խայտառակ եղանք (Khaydarag yeghank).

(5) For example: Տահա չեմ գիտեր (Daha chem kider, “I still don’t know”), instead of Դեռ չեմ գիտեր (Ter chem kider) or Տակաւին չեմ գիտեր (Dagaveen chem kider):

(6) For example: Ես չեմ գիտեր քի ի՞նչ ըսեմ (Yes chem kider ki inch esem?, “I don’t even know what to say”), instead of Ես չեմ գիտեր թէ ի՞նչ ըսեմ (Yes chem kider te inch esem?); Կը խորհիմ քի... (Ge khorhim ki..., “I think that”), instead of Կը խորհիմ որ (Ge khorhim vor...).

(7) For example: Կեցեր է փողոցին օրթալըխը (Getser eh poghotsin ortalekhe), instead of Կեցեր է փողոցին մէջտեղը (Getser eh poghotsin mechdeghe)

(*) The Armenian term – which has no exact equivalent in English – refers to the relationship between the husbands of two sisters. The sister of a man’s wife is his քենի (keni), which makes the latter’s husband a kenegal.

Some Armenian Words That Sound (Almost) Like English... Or Not

As Indo-European languages, Armenian and English share vocabulary that comes from the depths of history, from the time when a common grandparent was supposed to have existed someplace in Eurasia around 3000 B.C. Proto-Indo-European (P.I.E.)—the reputed grandparent of all Indo-European languages, from Farsi to Spanish—has not been attested in any ancient document and has been reconstructed on the basis of language studies. For this reason, scholars use asterisks, as a convention, to represent any of its words. This is why we will actually find a cluster of stars below.

Armenian and English have in common, for example, the words “father” and “mother.” Although the latter look somehow different to their Armenian counterpart հայր (hayr) and մայր (mayr), there is no doubt that both share the same ancestors: P.I.E. *pǝter and *mater.

P.I.E.  * pǝter > Proto-Germanic *fader > English father P.I.E.  * pǝter> Proto-Armenian *hayer > Armenian hayr (հայր) P.I.E.  * mater > Proto-Germanic *moder > English mother P.I.E.  * mater> Proto-Armenian *mayer > Armenian mayr (մայր)

The replacement of *ter by yr (յր) in Armenian may look odd. Comparative linguistics has found out that most Indo-European languages have kept something closer to a *t, such as t, d, or th, to say “mother” or “father,” while it is only in Armenian where P.I.E. *t became y over a certain amount of time. Another example of this rule is seen in the word այրել (ayrel , “to burn”), whose root ayr comes from P.I.E. *ater.

It is not strange, then that Proto-Indo-European *p, after its division, yielded different sounds, such as a*f in Proto-Germanic and a*h in Proto-Armenian. This accounts for the relation between father and hayr (the first parts of mother and mayr are easy to relate). The same as its relatives, Dutch vader (it may well have inspired the name of the “dark father” of Star Wars, Darth Vader) and German vater, English father comes from their common parent, Proto-Germanic *fader.

This is not an isolated example. The oldest poem of Armenian literature, namely, the birth of Vahagn, god of storm, fire, and war, includes the following line in his physical description:

Նա հուր հեր ունէր (Na hoor her ooner, “Fiery hair had he”).

Today commonly used in poetic language, hoor (“fire,” hence “fiery”)—synonym to կրակ (grag)--has been or may have been the source for many proper and common nouns, such as the male names Հրաչեայ (Hrachya) and Հրայր (Hrayr), for instance, and standard words like հրշէջ (hrshech, “fireman”), հրաբուխ (hrapookh, “volcano”), and others. Both hoor and fire (< Proto-Germanic fōr) constitute another related pair, whose ultimate common source is P.I.E *puro.

Incidentally, someone might relate Armenian her and English hair; the latter is derived from Proto-Germanic *hera, which at its turn came from P.I.E. *k’er(s) (“stiff hair, bristle”):

1. Both her and hair look alike and have the same meaning.
2. Even though the standard Armenian word for “hair” is մազ (maz), we use her in compounds like շիկահեր (shigaher, “red-haired”) or հերակալ (heragal, “headband”).

However, this is an optical illusion. In the 1920s, Hrachia Adjarian had already stated in his etymological dictionary that the similitude between her—whose actual origin is unknown— and hair was just casual. Since then, it has been shown that the poem about Vahagn, where the word her is already present, reflected words and images belonging to the common Indo-European time (third millennium B.C.), probably long before the ancestors of the English language washed their . . . *hera.

The mysteries of language are still infinite.

From Everything to Nobody

There are extremes, and there are middle points. This is how we have the words “everything” and “nothing,” but also “something” and “anything.” We have their equivalents in Armenian too, indeed, with two alternatives for the same word “thing.” The most common is բան (pan), which is a modern use of this word; the same word բան meant “word, speech” in Classical Armenian: «Ի սկզբանէ էր Բանն» (I sgzpane er Pann, “In the beginning was the Word”). 

Now, we have the following equivalences between Armenian and English

Armenian	English
ամէն բան (amen pan)	everything
բան մը (pan me)	something
որեւէ բան (voreve pan)	anything
ոչինչ (vochinch)	nothing

  

The word vochinch mirrors its English equivalent: a combination of the words voch (“no”) and inch (“thing”). This reveals that we also have ինչ(inch) as the second equivalent of “thing.” This word already meant “thing” in Classical Armenian. It later evolved into ինչ “what” and the composite forms ինչպէս (inchbes  “how”), ինչո՞ւ (inchu?  “why?”), and others.

 

 You can use pan and inch interchangeably in the case of “everything” (ամէն ինչ, amen inch)and “nothing” (ոչ մէկ բան, voch meg pan, although stylistically vochinch is better), butit would be plainly wrong to say ինչ մը (inch me)for “something” or որեւէ ինչ (voreve inch) for “anything.”

 

 When we talk about people, we have the following equivalences:

Armenian	English
ամէն մէկը (amen megue)	everyone (*)
մէկը (megue)	someone/somebody
ոեւէ մէկը (voyeve megue)	anyone/anybody
ոչ մէկը	no one/nobody

You can also say ամէն ոք (amen vok) for “everyone” or ոչ ոք (voch vok) for “no one.” It is less common, but it is still used, particularly in written language. The word vok is the plural of vo (ո), the Classical Armenian term for megue, from where the word voyeve is apparently derived.

The Classical Armenian ոմն (vomn, “someone”) is not used in Modern Armenian, except to note an anonymous donor, which until today is recorded as vomn). However, we often use the plural of vomn, which is ոմանք (vomank), to say “some people.” For example, «Ոմանք անօթի են» (Vomank anoti en, “Some people are hungry.”).

A final point that is the matter of much mistaken use: how do we use vochinch and voch megue in a negative sentence? The answer is: exactly as in English! 

You cannot use double negative in (Western) Armenian (except for understated affirmation). Therefore, you may say either Ոչ մէկը գիտէ (Voch megue kide) or Մէկը չի գիտեր (Megue chi kider) to mean “nobody knows,” but you cannot say ոչ մէկը չի գիտեր (Voch megue chi kider), which would be as grammatically correct as “Nobody doesn’t know.” 

Similarly, you may say «Ոչինչ ունիմ» (Vochinch ooneem) or «Բան մը չունիմ» (Pan me chooneem) to say “I have nothing” or “I don’t have anything” but «Ոչինչ չունիմ» (Vochinch chooneem) would be the equivalent of . . . “I don’t have nothing .”

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 (*) In this collection, the word “everybody” stands out, as its Armenian equivalent is not ամէն մէկը (amen megue), but բոլորը (polore, “all”). If you wanted to say, for instance, “Everybody has fun tonight” in Armenian, the translation would be «Այս գիշեր, բոլորը կը զուարճանան» (Ays kisher, polore gue zvarjanan).

How Did We End With 38 Letters?

It is common knowledge that Mesrop Mashtots invented the Armenian alphabet with 36 letters in the fifth century. The last of them was ք (k’). However, language evolved and made necessary to introduce two new letters; today, the Armenian alphabet has 38 letters. The first 36 letters also had a numeric value, still in use today, while the late newcomers did not have any such value.

 

O, օ (o, name “o”)

It is assumed that, in the fifth century, Armenians pronounced the diphthong աւ (aw) close to Spanish au (causa)or German au (sauerkraut), whereas the letter ո (currently vo)transcribed the sound represented by Greek omega (ω). Thus, the Greek name of Apostle Paul, Παῦλος (Paulos), became Պաւղոս (Paułos) in Armenian.

The eleventh century became a sort of watershed in the Armenian language. Krapar (Classical Armenian) ceased to be spoken and was confined to the realm of written language until its final demise for almost all purposes in the late nineteenth century.

Also about that time, the diphthong աւ started to be pronounced օ, similar to the English language (audit > ɔːdit). Such pronunciation was for “closed” syllables that ended with a consonant, for instance աւր (awr “day”), which continued to be written in the same way, but it was pronounced օր (or). To mark the difference in sound, they used conventional signs such as ^, ∞, or o over the diphthong աւ. The earliest transcription of the new sound with o appears to be the word փափագանօք (p’ap’aganok’ “with wishes”’), dated 1046.

The transition lasted around a century. In the meantime, the Armenian ո had adopted the sound vo at the beginning of words and ղ had become gh (like the r in Parisian French), instead of its past l-like sound. In the late twelfth or early thirteenth century, scribe Aristakes produced a work called «Գրչութեան արուեստ» (Art of Writing). The letter o entered officially the Armenian alphabet in the last chapter of this book, which became the oldest spelling dictionary of the language. It has been suggested that the letter was either derived from the Latin o or, which seems more plausible, patterned after the Greek omicron (ο), which was the actual source of the Latin letter.

Following these developments, a proper name like Պաւղոս started to be pronounced and spelled Պօղոս (Poghos, Western Armenian Boghos), and all closed syllables with the diphthong աւ changed their spelling. For instance:

Classical Armenian հաւտ(hawt) կարաւտ(karawt)                        տաւն(tawn)

Modern Armenian (Western Armenian phonetics) հօտ (hod “flock”) կարօտ(garod “longing”) տօն (don “feast”)

There was one exception to this rule: աղաւնի (*aɫawni, Modern Armenian aghavni “dove, pigeon”). It is assumed that the word was pronounced *aɫawəni, with the ը (schwa) following աւ, and that’s why it did not become աղօնի (aghoni).

 

Ֆ, ֆ (f, name “fe”)

The case of ֆ was different. The Armenian language did not have a sound f in the fifth century. Mesrop Mashtots, thus, used Armenian փ, an aspirated p, to render the Greek letter φ (phi), like Greek φιλόσοφος > Armenian փիլիսոփայ (p’ilisop’ay, Western Armenian pilisopa), which is the English philosopher. In this way, all foreign words transcribed into Armenian with the sound f rendered the latter as փ. Medieval Armenian historians and chroniclers, for instance, used փռանկ (p’rank) to name Europeans in general, which was the transcription of frank (name of the Germanic people that originated the term France).

The letter ֆ appeared for the first time in the eleventh century: patterned after the Greek φ, it was recorded in the proper name Մուֆարզին (Mufarzin, an Arab military post in southern Armenia) in 1037. It started to be widely utilized in the Late Middle Ages, apparently to transliterate loanwords from European languages.

However, Middle Armenian, a form of colloquial Armenian particularly used in Cilicia at the time both in speaking and in writing, has shown that the loss of the vowel coming immediately after an intervocalic ւ (v) turned the pronunciation of the latter into ֆ (for instance, հաւասար [havasar] > հաւսար [havsar] > հաֆսար [hafsar]  “equal”) and, thus, created the possibility to loan words with the sound f. After observing this phenomenon, famous linguist Hrachia Adjarian (1876-1953) has pointed out that the sound f was based on Armenian and not European phonology.

In any case, the sound also appeared in proper names: one of the most famous poets of Medieval Armenia was Frik (Ֆրիկ, ca. 1230-1310).

The Rule of One

An old joke says that, when there is no köfte (kufta) at home, you say: “Chi köfte” (No köfte).Of course, we all know that Turkish chi has nothing to do with “no,” since chi köfte is the raw variety of the meal (the name comes from the Turkish çiğ köfte).

However, Armenian չի (chi) is effectively an auxiliary particle derived from the negative չ (ch). It may become a little nightmarish for writers or speakers of the language, even fluent ones, when they tend to ignore that there are strings attached when it comes to its use.

Thus, chi may be used only once in Western Armenian. It renders the negative form of a verb that complies with the following three conditions altogether:

1. Simple present (indicative mood)
2. Third person of the singular
3. Starts with a consonant

Here are three examples:

The boy/he does not receive letters: Տղան / ան չի կարդար // Dghan / an chi gartar
The woman/she does not speak: Կինը / ան չի խօսիր // Gine / an chi khosir
The dog/it does not bark: Շունը / ան չի հաջեր // Shoone / an chi hacher

As a follow-up, the contracted form of chi, namely չ՚ (ch’), is also used only once in Western Armenian. When a verb complies with the first two conditions mentioned before (simple present; third person of the singular), but starts with a vowel, the i of chi is dropped to avoid the collision with the initial vowel and an apostrophe replaces the i. Here is a set of examples:

The man / he does not work: Մարդը / ան չ՚աշխատիր // Marte / an ch’ashkhadir
The girl / she does not eat: Աղջիկը / ան չ՚ուտեր // Aghchige / an ch’ooder
The water / it does not boil: Ջուրը / ան չ՚եռար // Choore / an ch’erar

An unwritten schwa (as in English stay) before a consonant-starting verb does not count as a vowel. Thus, he/she/it does not receive can only be ան չի ստանար(an chi sdanar), but never ան չ՚ստանար (an ch’sdanar).

As a logical corollary to this rule, you cannot use either chi or ch’ in any other mood, tense, person, or number whatsoever.

In all other cases, you use չ (ch).
For instance:
Wrong: Եթէ ան չի սպասէ / Yete an chi sbase
Accurate: Եթէ ան չսպասէ / Yete an chsbase

Wrong: Դուք պիտի չի խաղաք / Took bidi chi khaghak (*)
Accurate: Դուք պիտի չխաղաք / Took bidi chkhaghak

Wrong: Չի սպասենք իրենց / Chi sbasenk irents
Accurate: Չսպասենք իրենց / Chsbasenk irents

Դուն չի գրեցիր / Toon chi kretsir
Accurate: Դուն չգրեցիր / Toon chkretsir

Ան չի կրցաւ գրել / An chi grtsav krel
Accurate: Ան չկրցաւ գրել / An chgrtsav krel

Եթէ անոնք չի լսեն / Yete anonk chi lsen
Accurate: Եթէ անոնք չլսեն / Yete anonk chi lsen

The conclusion is very straightforward: in this matter, the only rule is that there is one rule.
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(*) The same as in English, where we say “I will not write,” in Armenian we say «Ես պիտի չգրեմ» (Yes bidi chkrem). You cannot say «Ես չպիտի գրեմ» in the same way that you cannot say “I not will write.”

The Armenian Carpet

British polymath Sir William Jones (1746-1794) enunciated for the first time the existence of the Indo-European family of languages in 1786. It already comprised languages from England to India. In the early nineteenth century, the Armenian language was also incorporated into the family, and in 1875 German linguist Heinrich Hübschmann (1848-1908) demonstrated, contrary to generally held belief, that Armenian was not part of the Iranian branch, but was an independent branch.

For the past hundred and thirty years, extensive research has been carried to study the Armenian language and its relations with its relatives within the family. It has been shown that Armenian has the closest relation with Iranian and Greek, to the point that we may consider them first cousins.

Similar to other Indo-European languages, English is a distant cousin to Armenian. This would not be surprising, if we consider the geographic distance between the lands where Armenian and English were and are spoken. But it is surprising to find out that both languages, despite that distance, share a few words with practically the same phonetics and meaning.

One of them is our familiar term carpet. According to the Online Etymology Dictionary, it comes from Middle English carpet “coarse cloth” (late 13th century) and was derived from Middle French carpite “heavy decorated cloth”(< Old Italian carpita “thick woolen cloth” < Italian carpire, Latin carpere “to pluck”).

Let’s go to Armenian. Classical Armenian (krapar) had a word, capert (կապերտ; the Western Armenian pronunciation is gaberd), which already appears in the Bible and means“piece of cloth.” It may or may not be related to the word cap “knot” (կապ, Western Armenian gab); the etymological dictionary of famed linguist Hrachia Adjarian (1876-1953) says nothing about that, which means that he did not consider it possible.

The colloquial form of capert was carpet, said Adjarian, and brought forward a collection of words in Armenian dialects very close to the English one: carpet (կարպետ) in Salmast, Van, Yerevan, and Tiflis, the same as in Kharpert and Sepastia (accented on the last syllable). They call it carpret (կարպրէտ)(accented on the first syllable) in Gharabagh, and called it garpet (կարբեդ) in Alashkert and Moush. The Armenians from Tigranakert (Diarbekir) used the word cârpit (գարբիդ), and the Armenians in Hamshen say carpit (գարբիդ). Interestingly, all of these words mean “rug without hair.”

At the turn of the twentieth century, the German linguist Erich Berneker published an etymological dictionary of the Slavic languages in two volumes (Heidelberg, 1908-1914). He noticed that the Armenian dialectal words were the same as the abovementioned European words, and also German karpet, Hungarian and Serbian karpit (“curtain”), and Serbian krpita (“rug to cover the table”). Adjarian took note of this and asked himself whether the source of these words was not, instead of Latin carpo “to knit wool or thread,” the late Armenian form carpet. In the end, the Armenian kingdom of Cilicia had been one of the main commercial venues for European traders in the Middle Ages, including carpets. Florentine merchant Francesco Balducci Pegolotti reported that carpets were imported from Sis, the capital of Cilicia, and Ayas, its main port, to Florence in the late thirteenth and early fourteenth centuries. What could have been a “thick woolen cloth” in Italian, if not a rug?

Thus, the ubiquitous carpet may have flown from Armenian, through Italian and French, into the English language, and centuries later, when Persian carpets were introduced in Europe, the word carpet went down to the floor.

Only One Way to Say All

“All peoples have the right to self-determination,” says article 1 of the United Nations International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights. How would you translate the beginning of this sentence into Armenian?

If you open Thomas Samuelian’s English-Armenian dictionary, you will find that the word “all” in Armenian is բոլոր (polor). Polor is a plural word, the same as “all.” Hence, the natural translation would be: Բոլոր ժողովուրդները ... (Polor joghovoortnere).

However, many people seem to believe that the word ամէն (amen) is a synonym of polor and, thus, we find, both in oral and written language, «ամէն ժողովուրդները» (amen joghovoortnere). This is grammatically incorrect. For starters, amen is a singular word. The root of this confusion is that amen actually means “every” and “each,” but just as you do not say “every peoples have the right” or “each peoples have the right,” you do not say «ամէն ժողովուրդները իրաւունք ունին» (amen joghovoortnere iravoonk oonin).

Therefore, the correct and indisputable use of both words is:
Ամէն ժողովուրդ (amen joghovoort)
Բոլոր ժողովուրդները (polor joghovoortnere)

Similarly, the word ամբողջ (ampoghch, “whole” is frequently mistaken with polor. Some English-Armenian popular dictionaries translate “all” as ampoghch and we have even come across one recently published English-Armenian student dictionary that translates “all” as amen, polor, and ampoghch. However, ampoghch is a singular word used only in connection with a collective noun (a singular word which indicates a plurality), such as աշխարհ (ashkharh, “world”), աշակերտութիւն (ashagerdootioon, “student body”), մարդկութիւն (martgootioon, “humankind”), and so on. You cannot say “polor ashagerdnere”and “polor ashagerdootioone,” and you cannot say “ampoghch ashagerdootioonnere” either.

You can only say, in conclusion:
amen ashagerd = “every student” / “each student”
polor ashagerdnere = “all the students” (or “all students”) ampoghch ashagerdootioone = “the whole student body”