Meanings: Semantic Fields

The words collected in the World Loanword Database (WOLD) vocabularies are based on the 1460 lexical meanings of the Loanword Typology meaning list. This list is divided into 24 semantic fields (following the 22 fields of the IDS list). The meanings can be viewed by semantic field, or as a complete list.

The number in this column is the semantic field number. It is the first part of the Loanword Typology Code of the words in the corresponding field.

The first 22 fields are the fields of the Intercontinental Dictionary Series meaning list, proposed by Mary Ritchie Key, and ultimately based on Carl Darling Buck's (1949) Dictionary of selected synonyms in the principal Indo-European languages. The other two fields were added for the Loanword Typology project.

This gives the number of different meanings in each semantic field.

This gives the average borrowed score of all words corresponding to a meaning in this field. The following borrowed scores are assigned to words depending on the degree of likelihood of borrowing:

	score
1. clearly borrowed	1.00
2. probably borrowed	0.75
3. perhaps borrowed	0.50
4. very little evidence for borrowing	0.25
5. no evidence for borrowing	0.00

This gives the average age score of all words corresponding to a meaning in this field. The following age scores are assigned to words depending on the estaimated age of their age class:

	score
1. first attested or reconstructed earlier than 1000	1.00
2. earlier than 1500	0.90
3. earlier than 1800	0.80
4. earlier than 1900	0.70
5. earlier than 1950	0.60
6. earlier than 2007	0.50

This gives the average simplicity score of all words corresponding to a meaning in this field. The following simplicity scores are assigned to words depending on their analyzability:

	score
1. unanalyzable	1.00
2. semi-analyzable	0.75
3. analyzable	0.50

Field No.	Semantic field	Number of meanings	Borrowed score	Age score	Simplicity score
[help]	[help]	[help]	[help]	[help]	[help]
1	The physical world	86	0.21	0.83	0.85
2	Kinship	102	0.23	0.84	0.80
3	Animals	155	0.32	0.80	0.91
4	The body	171	0.17	0.83	0.86
5	Food and drink	103	0.37	0.81	0.87
6	Clothing and grooming	68	0.40	0.80	0.88
7	The house	53	0.40	0.80	0.86
8	Agriculture and vegetation	128	0.45	0.80	0.91
9	Basic actions and technology	112	0.33	0.81	0.89
10	Motion	89	0.21	0.83	0.84
11	Possession	53	0.34	0.82	0.84
12	Spatial relations	77	0.15	0.83	0.86
13	Quantity	47	0.33	0.84	0.85
14	Time	62	0.28	0.83	0.84
15	Sense perception	55	0.19	0.82	0.84
16	Emotions and values	63	0.30	0.84	0.81
17	Cognition	58	0.29	0.82	0.81
18	Speech and language	53	0.36	0.82	0.85
19	Social and political relations	76	0.64	0.82	0.89
20	Warfare and hunting	48	0.34	0.80	0.83
21	Law	28	0.36	0.79	0.72
22	Religion and belief	40	0.49	0.79	0.85
23	Modern world	58	0.64	0.76	0.86
24	Miscellaneous function words	29	0.44	0.76	0.93