So it seems like there’s quite a bit of words in Old Chinese that could have origins in an Indo-European language. There are many more examples, I just listed a couple. Ones I didn’t list, such as 社 and 祇 (earth god, OC *[g.d]e) might be related to gaia, are pretty interesting too.
Hanji
OC
MC
Taigi
PIE
OE
English
Comment
腹
*p(r)uk
pjuwk
pak
*bhelgh
buc
belly, bucket
夾
*kˤ<r>ep
keap
kiap
*ghrebh
græpsan
grasp
窟
*[kʰ]ˤut
khwot
khut
*kutą
cot
cot
歿
*mˤut
mwot
bu̍t
*mer
mort
mort
沸
*Nə.p[u][t]-s
pj+jH
hut
*bhreu-
broþ
broth
liquid that’s boiled
雁
*C.[ŋ]ˤrar-s
ngaenH
gān
*ghans
gos
goose
長
*Cə-[N]-traŋ
drjang
tn̂g
*dlonghos
lang
long
屯
*[d]ˤun
dwon
tun
*dhu-no-
tun
town
株
*tro
trju
tsu
*drew-o-
treo
tree
球
*[g](r)[u]
gjuw
kiû
*gleu-
cliewen
clew
號
*[C.g]ˤaw
haw
hō
*gal-
call
Old Norse: kalla. Also 吼、哮、嘷
何
*[g]ˤaj
ha
hô
*kwo-
hwæt
what
also why
磨
*mˤaj
ma
buâ
*mele-
mylen
mill
飛
*Cə.pə[r]
pj+j
pue
*pleu-
fleoge
fly
浮
*m.b(r)u
bjuw
phû
*pleu-
flowan
flow
先
*sˤər
sen
sing
*sen-
Meaning old. Root for senator, senior.
孫
*[s]ˤu[n]
swon
sun
*su(e)-nu-
son
son
帝
*tˤek-s
tejH
tè
*deiwos
tig
deity
OE name of a god. *deiwos also evolved to be Zues, Jupiter
馬
*mˤraʔ
maeX
bé
*márkos
meare
mare
Old Norse: merr
車
*C.q(r)a
kjo
tshia
*krsos
carre
car
Anglo-French
輻
*pәk
pjuwk
hok
*spei-
spaca
spoke
PIE meaning sharp point, i.e. spike
羆
*praj
pje
phî
*bher-
bera
bear
OC meaning brown bear, PIE meaning brown. Bears seems to be sacred to IE speakers, and Huangdi is supernaturally related to bears. One of his tribal names is 有熊
牘
*lˤok
duwk
to̍k
*dek-
doc
Also 劄. As in document, doctrine, doctor. OC meaning instruction, official announcement. PIE meaning instruction, teach.
Are these mere coincidences? Or could Old-Chinese be a creole with a Burmese-Tibetan substrate and an Indo-European superstrate?
I think some of them are definitely the case, such as 車 and many other chariot related words that I didn’t list. The horse one might be the case as well, as domestication of the horse, invention of the chariot and wheel were all likely of Indo-European invention. It was clear historically that these things were introduced to China from the steppes.
From my perspective, others that really seem to be the case would be 號, 長, 何, 先, 孫 and 羆. Some of them have no real reason of being that way in Chinese, such as using 羆 to refer to brown bears, while it makes perfect sense in Indo-European, as *bher- means brown, and there’s a cultural phenomenon of not calling bears by its real name, *rtko.
Is this your area of research? I studied linguistics alongside my major because I always had an interest in this sort of thing, but got too preoccupied with other classes to dig much deeper.
The Chinese word for “horse” (ma; Old Chinese mraʔ) and the English word “mare” (which can be traced through Old English mearh through Germanic marhijo- to old Gaulish marh/mark) may have a common central Asian origin. The Mongolian word is mori.
蜜is an interesting Chinese word which is believed to have been adopted via Proto-Tocharian (the Tocharians lived in modern day Xinjiang) from the Proto-Indo-European word médʰu. The Mandarin pronunciation is mi. In Russian we call honey мед myed. French miel. And then there’s English mead. And there are more examples in other European languages I know
If you want to connect Chinese to inIndo-European it makes more sense to find similar words to Indian or Iranian languages. China was almost mythical to Europeans as there were almost no contact before Marco Polo. China doesn’t even exist on most old maps.
Edit: Even Marco Polo’s writings are closer to myth than reality.
While that’s true, and there are plenty of Indic/Iranian loan words in Chinese through Buddhism, those linguistic exchange didn’t take place until Middle Chinese. Most of them are also easy to spot.
During and before the period when Old Chinese was used, Chinese had more contact with the Tocharians. Well, there were also contacts with the Scythians, who spoke Eastern Iranian, during the Han dynasty.