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    English Word Origin Counts

    Uploaded by

    Ann Johnston
    Think English is a Germanic language? Take a quick look at this "back of the envelope" tally from the Oxford English Dictionary. I counted up a representative group of abbreviations that the OED uses to designate a word's origin. Not scientific, but then again you may feel the preponderance of Latin and Greek may obviate the need to be such.

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    English Word Origin Counts

    Uploaded by

    Ann Johnston
    17 views1 page
    Think English is a Germanic language? Take a quick look at this "back of the envelope" tally from the Oxford English Dictionary. I counted up a representative group of abbreviations that the OED uses to designate a word's origin. Not scientific, but then again you may feel the preponderance of Latin and Greek may obviate the need to be such.

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    Think English is a Germanic language? Take a quick look at this "back of the envelope" tally from the Oxford English Dictionary. I counted up a representative group of abbreviations that the OED uses to designate a word's origin. Not scientific, but then again you may feel the preponderance of Latin and Greek may obviate the need to be such.

    Copyright:

    © All Rights Reserved
    Download as PDF, TXT or read online from Scribd
    Flag for inappropriate content
    Download as pdf or txt
    17 views1 page

    English Word Origin Counts

    Uploaded by

    Ann Johnston
    Think English is a Germanic language? Take a quick look at this "back of the envelope" tally from the Oxford English Dictionary. I counted up a representative group of abbreviations that the OED uses to designate a word's origin. Not scientific, but then again you may feel the preponderance of Latin and Greek may obviate the need to be such.

    Copyright:

    © All Rights Reserved
    Download as PDF, TXT or read online from Scribd
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    of 1

    PERCENTAGE OF WORDS IN THE ENGLISH LANGUAGE

    THAT ORIGINATE WITH LATIN AND GREEK


    Abbrev. for lang. origin

    # in OED,
    (part 1)

    L. (Latin)

    1398

    1275

    2673

    Gr. (Greek)

    1138

    1332

    2470

    Zend (Old Persian)


    total

    # in OED,
    (part 2)

    2
    +
    1 =
    3
    ---------------------------------------------2538
    +
    2608 = 5146
    Percentages

    E. (English)
    ME. (Middle English)
    OE. (Old English)

    169
    105
    247

    +
    +
    +

    202
    87
    226

    =
    =
    =

    371
    192
    473

    F. (French)
    OF. (Old French)

    25
    134

    +
    +

    476
    172

    =
    =

    501
    306

    G. (German)
    MHG. (Mid. High German)
    OTeut. (Old Teutonic)
    Goth. (Gothic)

    292
    18
    37
    62

    +
    +
    +
    +

    327
    57
    18
    44

    =
    =
    =
    =

    619
    75
    55
    106

    I. (Italian)

    160

    147

    307

    Sp. (Spanish)
    OS (Old Spanish)

    203
    38

    +
    +

    195
    58

    =
    =

    398
    96

    ON. (Old Norse)


    OFris (Old Frisian)
    OIrish (Old Irish)

    71
    +
    230 =
    301
    12
    +
    31 =
    43
    0
    +
    0 =
    0
    ---------------------------------------------1573
    +
    2270 = 3843

    total

    Percent Latin-Greek in English = 5146/8989 = 57.25 %


    English-Group
    German-Group
    French-Group
    Spanish-Group
    Other-Group
    Italian-Group

    to
    to
    to
    to
    to
    to

    English-Lang
    English-Lang
    English-Lang
    English-Lang
    English-Lang
    English-Lang

    =
    =
    =
    =
    =
    =

    1036/8989
    855/8989
    807/8989
    494/8989
    344/8989
    307/8989

    = 11.53 %
    = 9.51 %
    = 8.98 %
    = 5.49 %
    = 3.83 %
    = 3.42 %
    + ----------42.76 %

    Percent non-Latin-Greek_to_Latin-Greek = 3843/5146 = 74.68 %


    (which is about 1.34 Latin-Greek words per each non-Latin-Greek word)

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