linguistics1-8  Exercise 3: Finding Correspondences
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Two correspondences between Hungarian and Finnish:

  1. Hungarian h  ~  Finnish k
        hal   / kala     "fish"
        három / kolme    "three"
     Both words show it, so it looks regular.

  2. Hungarian final z  ~  Finnish si (or s)
        víz / vesi       "water"
        kéz / käsi       "hand"
     Both words show it. (The vowels also correspond: Hungarian é ~ Finnish
     ä in "hand", and Hungarian í ~ Finnish e in "water"; a larger word list
     is needed to settle vowel patterns.)

Why English father / Hungarian atya proves nothing:

  A single look-alike pair could be chance, borrowing, or the baby-talk
  words for "father" that many languages share (papa, atta, tata). The
  comparative method needs REGULAR correspondences across a large part of
  the vocabulary, including basic words such as numbers, body parts and
  water. Hungarian and English show no such regular pattern, while Hungarian
  and Finnish show many.