T he languages, from left to right, are English, Latin, Japanese, Greek, Portuguese, and Sanskrit. You probably noticed some similarities among all of the languages except Japanese. In fact, all except Japanese belong to the Indo-European family. U sing the comparative method, linguists examine words from two or more languages, concentrating on words that are likely to endure over time. Numbers, personal pronouns, basic verbs such as to be , and basic nouns such as milk are the beginning of any comparative study.
Linguists look for similarities - but they also look for regular differences.
It turns out that this change from d to t is part of a consonant sound shift that distinguishes the Germanic languages, including English, from their Indo-European relatives.