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I noticed that both 死ぬ and the 音読み of 死 share a し sound. Is this a huge
coincidence between Japanese and Chinese, or is there some sort of relation? I
guess the former, because I don't know any function ぬ may have after a
borrowed noun, but I don't know much about etymology.
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etymology readings history
Is there any relationship between the verb 死{し}ぬ and the 音読み 死{し}?
It is a tempting identification, but the 〜ぬ suffix is inexplicable. In fact,
there are only two n-stem verbs in Old Japanese – 死ぬ and 去【い】ぬ – plus one
auxiliary (the perfective 〜ぬ), all of which are conjecturally related.
[Linguistic coincidences](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/False_cognate) are not
unheard of: one well-known example concerns the word "dog" in English and in
Mbabaram.

For what it's worth, the 日本語国語大辞典 records the following etymological theories:

> 【語源説】
>
> (1)息がなくなる意のシイヌ（息去）の義〔日本語原学＝林甕臣〕。シイヌル（息逝）の義〔松屋棟梁集〕。
>
> (2)サリヌルの反〔名語記〕。
>
> (3)スギイヌル（過往）の義〔名言通〕。
>
> (4)シヲルル、シボム、シヒルの義と通じる〔国語の語根とその分類＝大島正健〕。
>
> (5)シは〆領る、ヌは歇了る義〔国語本義〕。

By contrast, it is generally accepted that words like 馬【うま】 and 梅【うめ】 are
ancient loanwords from Chinese.
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