"tongue; language" in seven languages
Meaningtongue; language
Spanish
lengua
/ˈlengwa/
fem.inherited
French
langue
/lɑ̃g/
fem.inherited
Italian
lingua
/ˈlingwa/
fem.inherited
Portuguese
língua
/ˈlĩgwɐ/
fem.inherited
Romanian
limbă
/ˈlimbə/
fem.inherited
Romanian turned -NGU- into -mb-: LINGUAM → limbă.
Catalan
llengua
/ˈʎeŋgwə/
fem.inherited
Catalan palatalises initial l-: LINGUAM → llengua.
English
tongue
/tʌŋ/
Indo-European kin · PIE *dn̥ǵʰwéh₂s
English → Italiantongue; languagelinguaDistant cognateRelated only through Indo-European, thousands of years back (night ~ noche). But English has relatives: language, linguistic, bilingual.What English and Italian share
The Latin ancestor
LINGUAM‘tongue, language’
All six sisters descend from it, unless marked otherwise below.
The story
Tongue and language are one word in all three, as in Latin. The short i became e in Spanish and French (lengua, langue), but Italian kept i before ng.
English relatives: language, linguistic, bilingual
Sound laws at work
Learn it
In a sentence
- esEl español es mi lengua materna.
- frL'espagnol est ma langue maternelle.
- itLo spagnolo è la mia lingua madre.
- ptO espanhol é a minha língua materna.
- roSpaniola este limba mea maternă.
- caL'espanyol és la meva llengua materna.
- enSpanish is my mother tongue.