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#126631 03/31/04 12:10 AM
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sjmaxq Offline OP
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As I dip my tentative Anglo-Indian toes into Hindi, I am often left laughing at the occurrence of words like kamiiz and kamraa (pardon the transliterations), for "room" and "shirt". My question is this: Are these, and others like them, simply coincidences, or are they, as they appear to be, PIE-cousins of their more familiar (to me) European counterparts?


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I'll let other folks handle this one Max. Up until recently, I though pie was only that round pastry you bake up in an oven with blueberry or apple in it.

Pie in you kamra = tart in your photo-taking apparatus.

Aye, but I am learning though. I look forward to seeing what folks have to say.


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zok, Bel. I'm still trying to figure out what European words for room and shirt sound like kamiiz and kamra...





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sjmaxq Offline OP
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Well, I found "camera" very disconcerting in Italy, since it never meant a machine of photography, but rather a room.


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ah! so, you had them reversed? kamiiz, like camisole? and camera, like... uh, room. huh.
I'll keep thinking...



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I'm pretty sure that kamiz is from the same root (possibly via Protuguese) as Spanish camisa is ultimately from Late Latin camisia 'shirt'. Camera, whence German Zimmer, as well as our chamber via French, means room in Latin.


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Well camisole means undershirt in French. Are the words reversed Max? Or are we just grasping at straws?


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sjmaxq Offline OP
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Thanks, jheem. That's what I was wondering - whether these words were Hindi "natives" displaying a similarity with European words because of a shared PIE heritage, or were simply borrowed, as you are suggesting happened with kameez (to use the transliteration from yet another of my Hindi books)


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I am completely at a loss on this one. I think I shall do the wise thing and sit back and watch what egress's from all of this. Learning a thing or two along the way.

Rev. Alimae


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I found "camera" very disconcerting in Italy, since it never meant a machine of photography, but rather a room.


yes, very early on, the roman discovered the camera obscura.. the process of having a small opening in the wall of an other wise dark room, would created a faint, (and upside down) image on the wall opposite the the opening.

we call camera's (the machines) because they are the mechanical evolution of the camera obscura.


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