German-English Consonant Correspondences

It is often easy to identify and predict German-English cognates by understanding common phonological correspondences between the languages.

Some such correspondences are obvious to anyone familiar with both languages. English /w/ corresponds to German /v/, with both being written ⟨w⟩. The English letter ⟨r⟩ corresponds to the same letter in German, with both languages following their respective rules for how the letter is pronounced. The example of ⟨r⟩ shows us how spelling, which often represents an older phonological system, can be an extremely valuable tool in determining cognates. Another example is the English digraph ⟨gh⟩, which, when silent or pronounced /f/, usually corresponds to the German ⟨ch⟩, /x/ as in night and Nacht, laugh and lachen.

The English voiceless stops /p, t, k/ are generally preserved from Proto-Germanic, while German has undergone the High German consonant shift. English /p/ corresponds to German /pf/ at the beginning of a word or after a nasal, and to German /f/ after a vowel or ⟨l, r⟩. For example:

English /t/ corresponds to German ⟨z⟩, /ts/ word-initially or after a consonant, and to German /s/ after a vowel. For example:

For Proto-Germanic *k, the situation is more complicated. In German, this sound shifted to /x/, ⟨ch⟩ after a vowel but remained /k/ word-initially and after a consonant. In English, the Old English /k/ palatalized to /tʃ/, ⟨ch⟩ in some environments, including before /i, iː, j/, before other front vowels for word-initial /k/, and after /i, iː/ unless a back vowel followed. The environments in Old English which produced the palatalization may not be represented in modern English spelling or pronunciation. Some examples of correspondences originating from Proto-Germanic *k include:

Another set of common sound correspondences concerns the German /b/. At the end of a word^[1], it corresponds with English /f/. Between two vowels, even if one of the vowels exists only in spelling, German /b/ corresponds with English /v/. This can be understood in light of the fact that fricatives in Old English were not distinguished by voicing. Instead, fricative voicing was determined by environment. German /lb/ and /rb/ before a vowel correspond with English /lv/ and /rv/, respectively. Word-initially, German /b/ simply corresponds with English /b/. Some examples:

The English ⟨th⟩, /θ, ð/ usually corresponds to German /d/, though in some cases it instead corresponds to German /t/. For example,

A sound change^[2] occurred in an ancestor to Old English which dropped nasals found after a vowel and before a fricative. In German, these nasals were preserved. Hence,

In many cases, a Proto-Germanic *d has shifted to /t/ in German^[3] but not in English. Some examples include:

Proto-Germanic *g developed to /g/ in German, but in English it has often become /j/ or silent. it is common for German orthographic ⟨g⟩ to correspond with English ⟨y⟩, especially word-finally or between vowels. These seem to be harder to predict from the modern pronunciations and spellings alone, but some examples include:

The English orthographic ⟨s⟩ usually corresponds to the ⟨s⟩ of German, with each language applying their own normal rules for how the letter is pronounced. These rules should be intuitive for those familiar with each language.

These are what I've found to be the most common and useful consonant correspondences for determining German-English cognates. Vowels are another matter, and probably a far more complicated one...

Notes

^back [1]: Note that word-final /b/ in German is devoiced to [p], unless the word is part of a compound.

^back [2]: known as the Ingvaeonic nasal spirant law

^back [3]: This also explains the cases where English ⟨th⟩ corresponds with German /t/.

More resources

• Wiktionary has extensive tables of regular German-English cognates, organized by the relevant Proto-Germanic phonemes.