Egun on eta kaixo! Zer moduz gaur? Euskaraz badakizue, uste dut, baina nola ikasi duzue? Gero arte!

I take it you all understand the Basque passage above, at least according to a book I saw. It's a book about Ireland and Irish culture and states that:

Irish is a Celtic language (I think it went on a bit about how mysterious Celtic languages are...) so a person speaking Irish has no problems understanding Welsh and can understand quite a bit of Basque.

Long live factual knowledge. I wonder if the same publisher has a book about England and English culture, saying that a person speaking English has no problems understanding German and can understand quite a bit of Tibetan?

-----

By the way, the passage above says (in Welsh):
Dydd da a s'mae! Sut dach chi heddiw? Dw i'n meddwl bod chi'n siarad Cymraeg, ond sut dach chi wedi ddysgu. Hwyl fawr!

That is of course almost identical to Irish, don't you agree:
Dia is Muire daoibh! Conas tánn sibh inniu? Is dócha go bhfuil Gaelainn agaibh, ach conas a d'fhoghlaimíobhair í? Slán go fóill!

(Yeah, sorry for the rather basic phrases but my Basque is really elementary - and I exchanged the words Euskara, Cymraeg and Gaelainn respectively.)

wow...who was the author, that we might all beat him in places it'll show, so he'll have to explain the bruises?

This reminds me of a novel I was reading a little while ago (_The Portrait_ by Iain Pears). The narrator's grandmother taught him a little bit of Scots Gaelic, and he was able to speak with Bretons in that language and they for the most part understood him.

I suppose that's why they call it fiction :)

I speak Breton fluently and I have a basic knowledge of Scottish Gaelic (or a bit more). Now I can tell you that you won't find more than a handful of words that sounds quite the same way in both Scottish Gaelic and Breton. Maybe, "corn"/"korn" (a horn)... "leabhar"/"levr" (a book)... anyway, i think it's completely impossible to make any sentence that would be exactly the same (or even understandable) in both languages.

That's as stupid as to say that German and English people understand each other when each of them speaks his own language. (and I think that German is closer to English than Gaelic to Breton).

Yes, that's exactly what Nicole was saying, that it's not possible for speakers of Scottish Gaelic to understand Breton.

Here is a link to a really weird site for those who want a good laugh. Welsh and Irish come in at the end of it.

http://www.atlantisquest.com/Linguistics.html

By looking at "Da Mihi Manum" (which really needs to be reprinted -- but that's another story), it's pretty clear that there's not that much in common between the two.

(That said, I really dislike reading books that have mistakes like that -- just because one writes fiction doesn't mean one has to be clueless about those things. It ruins the mood when you're reading a novel and come across that.)

Nicole

>Morris-Jones concluded that the syntax most closely >resembling that of Welch is the Berber and Tamachek >languages of North Africa
>(both closely related to Basque).

ha ha ha

>In other words, language X is identified as belonging >to our Berber-Ibero-Basque complex, i.e., the Atlantean >language. It appears that the earliest language of >Britain is found--almost hidden at the root of the >Welsh, Erse and Gaelic languages--

Erse is the old name of (Scottish) Gaelic. What does he mean by "Gaelic" then? i dunno...

>to be the Atlantean language. Some scholars tend to >include certain pre-Indo-European Keltic languages of >Northwestern Europe in this category (Renan, 1873).

By definition, Celtic languages are indo-european. So a pre-indo-european language can’t be Celtic.
Anyway, 1873’s books about linguistics should not be used any more... really, much progress has been made in linguistics since that time...

As a matter of interest, would anyone have any idea what the language of Ireland sounded like as spoken by the Picts before the Celts arrived? Would the Gaeilge initially spoken here have taken on any pictish words or is that just being way too simplistic?

I have never heard any evidence that Ireland would have been inhabited by Picts. The Picts lived in what is now Scotland.

Some linguists argue that while Irish is an Indo-European language, it's phonology is not Indo-European and has been influenced by the unknown people(s) inhabiting Ireland before the coming of the Indo-Europeans. Obviously, most people in Ireland still belong to that people but their language has changed. First to Irish, with the coming of the Celts and later to English.

quote:

Erse is the old name of (Scottish) Gaelic. What does he mean by "Gaelic" then? i dunno...

Erse has been used for both Gaidhlig and Gaeilge

http://dictionary.reference.com/search?q=erse

I'd say he's just making up a good, mysterious yarn as he goes along, like those druids with refined English accents who celebrated the Solstice at Tara recently.

Thanks Jonas, but are you sure "the unknown people(s) habiting Ireland before the coming of the Indo-Euorpeans" were not called Picts? And if not, what were they called? They must have some name. These are our ancestors we're talking about here! And they must have communicated using some form of language...

We're talking about events thousands of years ago, it would not be wise to be sure... :-)

What we do know for sure it that Ireland was populated before the Indo-Europeans arrived in the form of Celtic tribes. What is equally certain is that they spoke some language or languages. That is, I think, all we can say for sure.

We can be reasonably sure that the Celts were the first Indo-Europeans who arrived in Ireland. We can also be fairly sure that the present population of Ireland is largely made up of the original, non-Indo-European inhabitants of Ireland. The Celts who arrived were probably not a very large group, but they were the dominant one, so the original people(s) accepted the Celts Indo-European language.

What is probable is that in doing so, they used the sounds of their own language(s) - that is what people usually do. (When I, or any other Scaninavian speak English, we rarely use of the two sounds spelled "th" and we use of own vowels rather than the English ones.) It was probably in this way that Irish acquired its phonology.

Those are the things we might expect to be true, although we cannot know. I have never heard claim - not to mention any evidence - that the original inhabitans of Ireland would have been Picts. There is no evidence to support that theory. Based on genetics, researchers have indeed found a very strong connection between the Basques and the Irish, especially in Connacht, and the same genes are also common in Scotland and Scandinavia. This has lead some to talk about a pre-historic people inhabiting the Atlantic coast. Those are only vague theories at present without any firm pieces of evidence.

>As a matter of interest, would anyone have any idea >what the language of Ireland sounded like as spoken by >the Picts before the Celts arrived?

I heard somewhere (from a university teacher) that there were P-Celtic speaking people in Ireland before Gaels (Q-Celtic speaking) came. And non-Indo-European people before these P-Celtic people, of course.


>Some linguists argue that while Irish is an Indo->European language, it's phonology is not Indo-European >and has been influenced by the unknown people(s) >inhabiting Ireland before the coming of the Indo->Europeans.

Actually, i have seen very similar things in Irish and Russian phonology. They do have two kinds of consonants: palatalized and velarized ones (called slender and broad consonants, for Irish). Now it it a chance? is it because both Irish and Russian pronounciation have been influenced by pre-Indo-European populations? or what? :)

>Obviously, most people in Ireland still belong to that people but their language has changed. First to Irish, with the coming of the Celts and later to English.


>Erse has been used for both Gaidhlig and Gaeilge

>http://dictionary.reference.com/search?q=erse

I do know that, but "Erse" has been mainly used for Scottish Gaelic.

http://www.absoluteastronomy.com/encyclopedia/C/Cr/Cruithne_(people).htm

Two things to note about that link. It is taken from an encyclopeia that anyone can edit, and it at least partially goes against current theories about Picts. More importantly, the Cruithne were one of the first Celtic peoples to arrive in the British Isles (the Celtic tribes had different names) but they have no connection to the original, non-indoeuropean, inhabitants of Ireland.

I thought that the term "the British Isles" (even as a geographical term) has at least in this century fallen out of use? Even the Brits themselves have never considered Ireland to be part of Great Britain hence the term United Kingdom of Great Britain AND Northern Ireland. I have to say that I find the term British Isles makes me uncomfortable due undoubtedly to my Irish political sensitivities.

A Sheánín,

It's obvious that Jonas did not intend to offend anyone. If you visited the website AP mentioned, the term "British Isles" was used, and Jonas was merely referring to that site.

Also, considering the time period being discussed here, the term "British Isles" is not necessarily incorrect. These islands were, after all, referred to in classical times as Britanniae.

Please don't pick on people who, like Jonas, spend a lot of their free time helping others improve their Irish language skills. I don't think anyone would be posting here if he didn't care about Irish culture or language.


Nicole

(Message edited by nicole on August 11, 2005)

quote:

These islands were, after all, referred to in classical times as Britanniae.

I thought that in "classical times" Ireland was referred to as Scotia, or something like that.

But I agree that Jonas is a significant contributor to this website and agree with Nicole that Jonas didn't mean to offend anyone. That doesn't invalidate Seánín's right to correct the term British Isles when referring to Ireland.

I myself prefer to call the islands (both British and Irish) the Irish Isles. It has a nice ring to it and puts the shoe on the other foot. :)

Dáithí

"Irish is a Celtic language (I think it went on a bit about how mysterious Celtic languages are...) so a person speaking Irish has no problems understanding Welsh and can understand quite a bit of Basque. "

I don't know...I'm 1/2 Irish and 1/2 Welsh - fluent in both languages, but can't see how Basque can be related in any way to Irish or Welsh...

Exactly, that's the whole point. Of course it's not in any way related to the Celtic languages, but some people still think it is.

So the people inhabiting Ireland spoke a language that would similar or the same as the ancestor of the Basque language, Euskara? Until the nasty invading Celts came along and inevitably forced us to speak their foreign toungue. And now, some people learn this Celtic language to feel more "Irish", when they really should be learning the pre-Celtic language? How ironic.

Anyway, if people didn't change their sounds, resulting in the supposedly strange phonology of Irish, how come we can prnounce English grand, some would say to the detriment of our Irish pronounciation.

Also, Béarla used to refer to the pre-Celtic languages spoken in Ireland. I heard that on Peter Panu Hoglund's site. Don't know if it has anything to do with the discussion, but interesting no?

question:

what is 'strange' in the phonology of Irish?

(could it be that it doesn't resemble the phonology of English??)

"So the people inhabiting Ireland spoke a language that would similar or the same as the ancestor of the Basque language, Euskara?"

That is definitely not proved. It cannot ruled out, but neither can it be confirmed.

"Until the nasty invading Celts came along and inevitably forced us to speak their foreign toungue."

That is what has happened in all times and in all places. Indo-European languages first replaced the non-Indoeuropean ones. Later on, different Indo-European languages have taken over others. Latin killed off Gaulish, Iberian, Celtiberian, Etruscian and many others. English killed off the Celtic language in today's England in parts of Scotland, Wales and Ireland. Slavic languages entered the areas of Illyrian and Romance languages. The list can go on forever.

"And now, some people learn this Celtic language to feel more "Irish", when they really should be learning the pre-Celtic language?"

That is of course not possible, since there is no knowledge of those languages. Irish is the traditional language of Ireland, but it was not the first language spoken on the island.

"Anyway, if people didn't change their sounds, resulting in the supposedly strange phonology of Irish, how come we can prnounce English grand, some would say to the detriment of our Irish pronounciation."

Less than 50 years ago, most Irish speakers in the Gaeltacht used only the sounds found in Irish to pronounce English. See de Bhaldraithe.

"what is 'strange' in the phonology of Irish?"

Probably that it differs from Celtic phonology. I did not come up with the idea or the word, I think it might have been Wagner or Jackson who wrote about it.

>Less than 50 years ago, most Irish speakers in the >Gaeltacht used only the sounds found in Irish to >pronounce English. See de Bhaldraithe.

And many still do, at least in Donegal (I've not been in the other Gaeltachtaí). I've even heard 20 years-old people with an incredible Irish-Gaelic accent when speaking English (of course their first tongue is Irish). You will find such people in NW Donegal.

An amzer a zo brao e Dulenn

there's a theory about Hammitic or Semitic relation to Irish and there's a whole book (whose name I can't remember) that shows relation between Welsh and Hebrew.

On its face it's fun to see, but other than infuring from noticeable similarities (like structures and some verboids) it can't show or proove that relation. The missing links were not yet found.

>>Probably that it differs from Celtic phonology.

in which way?

>An amzer a zo brao e Dulenn

amañ ema brav ha tomm ivez. Re-domm, marsen!

>On its face it's fun to see, but other than infuring from noticeable similarities (like structures and some verboids) it can't show or proove that relation. The missing links were not yet found.

Similarities between Hamito-Semitic languages and Celtic ones are typological: sometimes they use very similar structures. That doesn't mean that they have any common origin.
Polynesian languages (such as Hawaiian, Maori, Tahitian) are verb-first languages as well, as Celtic ones (except Breton and Cornish that often begin with another word; but it is assumed that they were verb-first once), but there can't be any link between them.
That's just... chance.

Human language(s), because they are a product of the human species, are as different and as similar as human beings.

We don't know (yet) if language has a unique origin or multiple origins, but we know that languages evolve, and that there are recurrent paterns found in the different languages.
At any level (lexical, phonetical, syntactical), there will be chance similarities between languages that are as different as English and Chinese.
To draw any inference from these is a fraud in which, nowadays, only faux linguists indulge.

Reminds me what some people claimed in the 19th century: that Breton was the oldest language, the mother of all other languages and they tried to find a Breton origin to Greek and Hebrew words. Some people claimed the same for Irish, etc. Of course, that isn't serious nor scientific at all.

>> Breton was the oldest language, the mother of all other languages

Scéal eile a bhí ag na saoithe s'againne fadó. Ní máthair gach teanga eile a bhí sa Ghaeilge dar leo, ach an iníon a b'áille díobh go léir! Thugtaí "Béarla teibí" ar an nGaeilge. (Tá an téarma sin le fáil fós in FGB, dála an scéil.)

"Cia tucait ar a n-ebarar bérla teipide don Gaeidilg?"
(Cén fáth a ndeirtear ...?)

"Ní hansa, uair ro teibed as cach bérla."
(... ós rud é gur teibíodh/gearradh/baineadh as gach teanga í.)

An saoi a chum an Ghaeilge an chéad lá riamh, thogh sé na rudaí is fearr agus is áille as chuile theanga agus chuir sé i dtoll a chéile iad le teanga úrnua a dhéanamh!

Two of my favourite links ever, I found them years ago and still think they should be mandatory reading for amateur linguists. It would reduce a lot of talk about similarities between totally unrelated languages, such as Hebrew and Irish :-)

http://www.zompist.com/chance.htm

http://www.zompist.com/proto.html#maliqa

i just gotta..... if you put 100 monkeys in a room sooner or later they will write a novel like War and Peace. humans can only make a certain ammountof sounds, so it would make sense that various languages have similar words or sounds. common sense would also tell us they are NOT related. The Diné family with Basque
hogwash!

" just gotta..... if you put 100 monkeys in a room sooner or later they will write a novel like War and Peace"

What? If this were the case, one could theoretically generate all knowledge by running an infinite program to place all elements in all possible combinations. Of course, this is nonsense, as the world is not constructed from linear strings like language is, and anyway, how would one parse it?

Think of the constraints:

keyboard (1 type for all monkeys, say QWERTY)
language (English, 26 keys)
monkeys (X number)
book (900 pages x 350 words per page = 315000)
simian hand structure
unpractised keyboard hitting producing random strings

Question: ‘Will X monkeys typing for an indefinite amount of time produce the book lying in front of me” (Freud, ‘The Interpretation of Dreams’)

Hypothesis: "Random key typing will, if continued for an indefinite period of time, generate in perfect analogue, any human literary work, of any length and in any language”

Test: X monkeys for indefinite amount of time hitting in an unpracticed fashion using their hand digits.

Result: strings of this:

elktng wrjl;ier rgbjurgjbetourf rouro u rgubergjqru egoubhqgorg org eroghqrwog hqeroigh qrgihqr qwrfpigq piferpijg pqirj pwqpoj 2qewpoar57w4th68k
6u rgubergjqru egoubhqgorg org eroghqrwog hqeroigh qrgihqr qwrfpigq piferpijg pqirj pwqpoj 2qewpoar57w4th68k
670298h24pjiq3[#q45b [kqht[om gipmklfrgvg

Conclusion: the production structure of unskilled typing can only infinite and meaningless strings of characters but no human books

Discussion: Meaningful typing must have reference to the language of which it is devised to express. Typing involves a) conscious intent b) finely tuned hand muscles c) matching with a real language. Random hitting of keys will never produce a novel or book stretching to 900 pages for the reason that such a work required the specific placing of over 19 million keystrokes. These 19 million had to be picked out of over half a billion possible letters. Linguistic structure would have limited those possible combinations. Language has in all cases, a general structure that can be analysed. Unskilled simian and human keystrokes are generally repetitive, using only a smaller set of characters, and with higher entropy than meaningful sentence strings. In essence their patterns are irreconcilably divergent. To conclude, no amount of monkies, even if the whole universe was filled with them could write a book.

Some other random generator, perhaps based on language structure might produce all books if given infinite time. Similar types of information could be deemed to be set in a nebula of similarity. One might then demarc the ‘nebula’ for Indo-European and interrogate it in order to test notions on the development of the Celtic languages for example.

Sounds like the lazy pseudo-intellectualism that decrees that ‘the exception proves the rule’. Does it now?
http://www.tiscali.co.uk/reference/dictionaries/english/data/d0082039.html

Hogwash to all of it! Is doimhin é poll an amhrais

It was purely a cod answer to reply to the lazy thinking that accepts any sort of 'wisdom' at face value. I made a question, then an a hypothesis, test, and finally fabricated the results in order to pretend some data had been generated and discuss the conclusion.

After all I didn't have any real monkeys to test...did you?

"A Million Monkeys can inflict worse things than just Shakespeare on your system. - Stolen from John Carter "

http://gible.net/

Robert A chara
I used that cliche (and you proved it very well) to allude that one can rationalise just about anything, the fact still remains that these disparate languages really don't hve much in common except for communication and sound. That was my hypothesis which stands firm and square. the monkey comment was an attempt at humor that mark was missed on you Ní bhíonn saoi gan locht