Candice wrote:
>Yeah, say some more about the Uralics, wontcha?
>
Not at the drop of an Atherstone Hat, Candice, even at a party. First I'd
have to trek, barefoot, across the plains and then the mountains, to consult
a shaman, or play the drums in Chuvash. And then the answer could only be
delivered in throat-singing.
To an appreciative camel. Better off reciting the I Ching backwards, it'd be
less ambiguous. Them shells, them shells, them tortoise shells, now hear the
word of the ... (cracked).
plus:
> Or the even meta-heavier Tocharian A & B?
>
You see, just a simple phrase and you're lying around buried somewhere in
Chinese Turkestan. I once introduced into a poem the ludicrous comparison
'tocharian as eggs'. I was inordinately proud of this straining of credulity
as the whole poem snaked and slithered about underneath to reach it. Still
am, actually, ha!
and:
> OK, now you're talkin'! A well-fed loop back to Tacitus, who went to
> quite a bit of trouble to distinguish among all those Germanic tribes
> wandering in the same black woods--an effort conveniently ignored by the
> Tacitus-assimilating, purist-fixated Nazis--
>
Yes. Now you're talkin' too. That's right to the point.
Dave
----- Original Message -----
From: <[log in to unmask]>
To: <[log in to unmask]>
Sent: Thursday, November 30, 2000 12:29 AM
Subject: Re: Muller, Kiefer, Armin, Schama
> David Bircimshaw wrote:
>
> >Sayonara Candice
> >
> >I'd hazard an eyren on keeping the egg but foo yong sounds like a
Guangdon
> >cook jumped ship at Pompey or Cardiff. ( 'Foo Yong' is reputedly a small
> >town in southern China, it is my fantasy that one of the
tabby-in-the-litter
> >languages of the Miao-Yao family is spoken there - Hmong aka Meo or Yao
aka
> >Man)
>
> Sare, Dave, suspect this cat's gotcher tongue.
>
> >I'd suspect the background to Meika's original musing is as follows:
either
> >the putative 'non-Indo European' component in German is a) a confusion
with
> >the extinct East Germanic family, best known for Gothic;
>
> Or the even meta-heavier Tocharian A & B?
>
>
> >or b) a garbling of little Balto-Slavic dialects-was not Prussian one
such?;
> >or that the irony observed is not linguistic but one I've come across
> several >times: that the Germans are 'racially' a mix of Teutons, Latins,
> Slavs and >Celts, unlike all the other main population groups of Western
> Europe, who are >predominantly a mix of no more than three of the
long-term
> ancestral indigenous >breeding populations aka 'races', which of course
> considering Twentieth Century
> >history.....
>
> OK, now you're talkin'! A well-fed loop back to Tacitus, who went to
> quite a bit of trouble to distinguish among all those Germanic tribes
> wandering in the same black woods--an effort conveniently ignored by the
> Tacitus-assimilating, purist-fixated Nazis--
>
>
> >The other candidate for the creole cooking could be the Finno-Ugric
> >languages, and maybe the beginnings of the Rus have got mixed in the
recipe
> >there. But search me for an isolate out there on them plains sweeping in.
>
> Yeah, say some more about the Uralics, wontcha?
>
> Candice
>
>
> >From: <[log in to unmask]>
> >To: <[log in to unmask]>
> >Sent: Wednesday, November 29, 2000 5:50 PM
> >Subject: Re: Muller, Kiefer, Armin, Schama
> >
> >
> >> Lawrence: If a language--extant or presumed to have existed--is
> >> classified as "Baltic," then it's also considered Indo-European,
> >> by definition. As for how one decides or infers that a word is or
> >> isn't "Indo-European," you start with those language groups that
> >> are believed to be derived from "Indo-European" (a presumed common
> >> source in itself), namely, the Indo-Iranian, Balto-Slavic, Germanic,
> >> Italic, and Celtic. Would you infer that "egg foo yong" belongs to
> >> any of these language groups? --Candice
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >> Lawrence wrote:
> >>
> >> >No, it says "and some baltic group now disappeared", which implies to
me
> >> >that it *isn't one of those we know of and have therefore been able to
> >> >classify as indo-european - because we *don't know of it because it
has
> >> >disappeared already
> >> >
> >> >I, too, would like to know the source. I'd like to know how one
decides
> >that
> >> >a word in a language in a set of languages from which the linguist
infers
> >> >the parameters of indo european isn't indo-european... I'm not saying
it
> >> >can'tbe done but it is going to be induction / deduction dangerously
> >close
> >> >to bootstrapping.
> >>
> >>
> >> >| Meika wrote:
> >> >|
> >> >| >when, and I cannot remember where I heard this, the german
languages
> >> >| >contain the most non-indo-european words in their vocab which has
lead
> >> >some
> >> >| >to speculate that "german" was/is a creole of indo-europeans and
some
> >> >| >baltic group now disappeared, of course this hybridity would also
mean
> >> >they
> >> >| >would be like no one but themselves...
> >> >|
> >> >| Since the Balto-Slavic languages are _also_ Indo-European, this
> >> >| Germanic-Baltic "creole" theory doesn't make much sense. (I'd love
to
> >> >| know its source, Meika, if you recall it.) As for "non-Indo-European
> >> >| words" to be found in Germanic vocabularies, one such vocab.
(English)
> >> >| can probably claim "egg foo yong" by now.
> >> >|
> >> >| Candice
> >>
> >
> >
>
|