English and German are both members of the Germanic language family. All modern forms of these languages originated from a common ancestor language spoken in the region of modern-day Scandinavia roughy 2500 years ago. Linguists call this language Proto-Germanic. To demonstrate the similarities between these languages here are a few examples of the word apple:
apple (English), äpple (Swedish), Appel (Low German), Apfel (High German), æble (Danish)
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