Etymological Dictionary of Hungarian (EDH)

ALFRÉD TÓTH : ETYMOLOGICAL DICTIONARY OF HUNGARIAN (EDH)
13. Chinese and Hungarian
to the modern Hungarian forms than the standard (Mandarin or Cantonese) Chinese forms given by
Podhorszky. We cite only a few examples: Hung. akarni, Chin. uh-juh “to wish”, Hokkjen ük, ak “id.”;
Hung. árnyék, Canton. nik “to hide”, Hokkjen njek “id.”; Hung. átok, Chin. to, ta “mutual curse”,
Hokkjen tok, tak “id.”; Hung. bok, Chin. muh “wood, tree”, Hokkjen bok “id.”; Hung. csapni, Chin.
cha “to hit”, Hokkjen chap “id.”. Yet, Hokkjen (or Hokkien) is a local variant of Minnan, spoken in
Penang and is characterised by the pronunciation of words according to the Zhang-Zhung language
(Haarh 1968). This extinct language belonged to the Tibetan branch of the Sino-Tibetan language
family, and must have been under the strong influence of the Hsiung-nu language of the Huns
(Hummel 1975, 1976), since there is no other possible explication about the very noticeable closeness
of the Hokkjen and the Hungarian forms. Now, the Huns, whose empire stretched from the steppes of
Central Asia into modern Germany and form the Danube river to the Caspian Sea, settled in Central
Asia approximately from the 4th to the 6th century A.D. And, as Podhorszky (1877, p. 125) remarks
correctly, the Chinese-Hungarian comparisons represent still a period of the language, when prefixes
were used. This points also to approximately the same time-span like the settlements of the Huns in
China and confirmes our assumption, that Zhang-Zhung must have been influenced stronly by Hsiungnu.
4. Bibliography
Gostony, Colman-Gabriel, Dictionnaire d’éetymologie sumérienne. Paris 1975
Haarh, Erik, The Zhang-Zhung Language. København 1968
Hummel, Siegbert, Materialien zu einem Wörterbuch der Zhang-Zhung-Sprache. I, II. In: Monumenta
Serica 31, 1975, pp. 488-520.
Hummel, Siegbert, Materialien zu einem Wörterbuch der Zhang-Zhung-Sprache. III. In: Monumenta
Serica 32, 1976, pp. 320-336.
Podhorszky, Ludwig, Etymologisches Wörterbuch der magyarischen Sprache, genetisch aus
chinesischen Wurzeln und Stämmen erklärt. Paris 1877.
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