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[Boreades]

I fear my clumsy typo has led you rudely astray.

That

Hittite, English and Gaulic languages

Should have said

Hittite, English and Gaelic languages

(particularly Scottish Gaelic)

I would be excited to hear of Hittite and English connections though.

I hope your wish will be granted. The starter is this:

because of the occurrence of the form 'are' of the verb 'to be'. This form is found only in the modern Scandinavian countries, in modern Britain and in one of the oldest PIE languages - the now extinct Hittite language. We think that the 'are' form is very old PIE indeed since it occurs only on the periphery of Europe.

[Mick Harper]

Unfortunately I do not recognise Hittite as a language in the ordinary sense. It is akin to Latin i.e. an artificial formulation based on one of the local spoken languages. I do not know which one -- if it still exists. You eager beavers may care to find out and get the Nobel Prize for Rubbishing Academics who of course believe that both Latin and Hittite are genuine languages. And they've got the written records to prove it! So far as the Gaelic languages go, I can give you a sneak preview of a passage from my book due out next month.

-----------------------

The trouble with the orthodox version, as we saw with the Laws of Aethelbert, is that this process makes no sense in the sixth century but makes every sense in the twelfth century. Necessity was the mother of invention for both sides but only when there was a need to express the names of people and places in land charters. It is fascinating to hear that sixth-century Ireland was a land of estate agents requiring land charters but when it came to recording the people and places on the title deeds, whenever they were written, the Irish had an even greater need than the English for vernacular writing.

Latin, Anglo-Saxon and English are all Western Branch Indo-European languages and can be expected to have a certain commonality; Irish is not and does not. Claims that Irish, Welsh, Scots Gaelic, Breton, Cornish, Manx, Cumbric and Galician are Indo-European at all are extremely dubious. Linguistics is not a scientific endeavour and many of its assumptions are subjective, indeed subject to national interests.

Back in the eighteenth century, speakers of the Goidelic (or Gaelic or Brythonic or Proto-Celtic or P-Celtic or Q-Celtic) languages were anxious to be enfolded into the high-status Indo-European family, and the British Empire had its own reasons for letting them in. Whether all these people are truly members of one linguistic happy family is more political than philological. Academics of all ages are obliged to be politically correct as they are not only creatures of their time and place but are paid from the public purse. Those who pay the piper are entitled to hear their favourite songs off the first album.

[Boreades]

Unfortunately I do not recognise Hittite as a language in the ordinary sense.

I don't care what sense you recognise it in, that's dodging the issue. It is a recognised language that shares some unique and unusual things with British languages. I wish you were more interested in these anomalies than rushing away to circle the wagons round your rehash of other people's linguistic argy bargy.

Academics of all ages are obliged to be politically correct as they are not only creatures of their time and place but are paid from the public purse.

Do sales of TME via Amazon count as being paid from the public purse? Unless you are now slyly saying you are now obliged to be politically correct as well? I didn't think you were that way inclined, but it doesn't hurt to check. If you do want to apply for a politically-correct EU grant, I do know some Common Purpose people who would be delighted to help you with funding and admittance to a high-status EU academic family.

[Boreades]

Oh, by the way, when we've finished with the linguistic similarities, we'll be able to get started on the metrological similarities.

[Mick Harper]

Borry, you are getting a little carried away.

I don't care what sense you recognise it in, that's dodging the issue. It is a recognised language

That is my objection. It is not recognised as such by me and it makes a difference. Whether you recognise it or not.

that shares some unique and unusual things with British languages.

As I say, more power to your elbow if you find these. I was trying to explain why the concordances may be other than the usual reason -- a close relationship - but this is not something I've thought about much. It would be a bit like saying Classical Greek and Latin share some unique and unusual things. If they were created using the same principles these would arise other than naturally. Come to think of it, you and Tissie ought to be thinking about this aspect. Esdpecially if Phoenician is involved, a most mysterious 'language'. The clue's in the name.

I wish you were more interested in these anomalies than rushing away to circle the wagons

Far from circling the wagons, I am urging you to attack them.

round your rehash of other people's linguistic argy bargy.

As you know I take a pride in never rehashing other people's anything. Including my own. I am anxious to know what it is you mean by this in case I need to make a late change to the book.

Do sales of TME via Amazon count as being paid from the public purse?

Good grief, Borry, of course they don't. Public purse does not mean the public's purses, it means money from the state (or similar). But in any case you of all people will know that the public's purse has not exactly been emptied by TME (which does not by the way deal with this subject -- you are thinking of THOBR, though that was dealing with a separate area of admittedly the same problem). And yes, you've got me bang to rights, that did earn me a few bob.

Unless you are now slyly saying you are now obliged to be politically correct as well? I didn't think you were that way inclined, but it doesn't hurt to check. If you do want to apply for a politically-correct EU grant, I do know some Common Purpose people who would be delighted to help you with funding and admittance to a high-status EU academic family.

Tell them to send me a cheque. I'm not proud.

[Boreades]

Getting down to some provenance...

‘They do not think it proper to commit these utterances to writing, although in all other matters and in their public and private accounts they make use of Greek characters. I believe that they have adopted the practice for two reasons- that they do not wish the rule to become common property, nor those who learn the rule to rely on writing and so neglect the cultivation of memory; and, in fact, it does usually happen that the assistance of writing tends to relax the diligence of the student and the action of memory…They also lecture on the stars in their motion, the magnitude of the Earth and its divisions, on natural history, on the power and government of God; and instruct the youth in these subjects’ (see De Ballo Gallico, VII, 15, 16.).

Was Julius Caesar’s written history a forgery?

Or did pre-Roman Britons indeed have a written language that, if it wasn’t your-actual Greek, was at least a written language that closely resembled it.

Like Phoenician?

[Mick Harper]

More than likely Phoenician since they had been trading with them for yonks. Of course this did not mean the Ancient Brits were speaking Phoenician any more than they were speaking Latin in the period 43 AD to c 1750 AD when they wrote in Latin. You may be interested to know that years ago we had a discussion speculating that Phoenician was not a language (natural or artificial) but a way of phoneticising any language. A very useful attribute when trading with so many people with unwritten languages. (To rehash: the clue is in the name.)

[TisILeclerc]

Claims that Irish, Welsh, Scots Gaelic, Breton, Cornish, Manx, Cumbric and Galician are Indo-European at all are extremely dubious.

Bo means cow, related to bovine.
Tarbh means bull, related to Torro or Taurau etc.
Each means horse, eqqus
Taigh means house, related to thatch
Rathad means road
Muir means sea, Mer
Fear mean man, related to the old English Wer as in werwolf
aon, da, tri, ceithir, coig, sia, seachd, ochd, naoi, deich

Athair, father
Mathair, mother
Brathair, brother

The only odd one out is Piuthar, sister but I've got a feeling there is a Latin word that is connected.
Balla, means Wall
Baile, town
Cathair, chair, seat

Bi is the verb to Be. It changes to Is as it goes through the various forms.
Mi is me or I
Thu is thou

It seems fairly Indo European to me.

But assuming the Hittites and Phoenicians are non indo European then presumably Gaelic is a non Indo European development of Phoenician.

Are you hinting at phonemes or even phoney?

I can't see people communicating with basic phonemes although a written shorthand could do that. A bit like ancient text speak. lol.

[Mick Harper]

Yes, my brother pointed all this out to me and led me to qualify my original intransigence on the subject. I was in two minds to include the observation at all since it does not impinge greatly on the thrust of the book. It may disappear entirely if you continue your attacks! Though I would be obliged if, like my brother, you bent your considerable back to at least considering the obverse. For instance

Bo means cow, related to bovine.
Tarbh means bull, related to Torro or Taurau etc.
Each means horse, eqqus
Taigh means house, related to thatch
Rathad means road
Muir means sea, Mer
Fear mean man, related to the old English Wer as in werwolf
aon, da, tri, ceithir, coig, sia, seachd, ochd, naoi, deich
Balla, means Wall
Baile, town
Cathair, chair, seat

These may be rather loan words than cognates -- but you have to be careful to avoid what linguists so often do -- sieve through words until random hits are made. Not that I am accusing you of that.

Bi is the verb to Be. It changes to Is as it goes through the various forms.
Athair, father
Mathair, mother
Brathair, brotherMi is me or I
Thu is thou

Most curious since this is obviously more 'English' than Indo-European. As you may know, I put English way up the family tree i.e. where the Indics branch off from, say, the Hamitic, Semitic etc. But since I also believe the English-speakers were in Ireland long before the Gaels I do not rule out linguistic drift.

But assuming the Hittites and Phoenicians are non indo European then presumably Gaelic is a non Indo European development of Phoenician.

I don't see the connection. Hittite is generally regarded as Indo-European, isn't it? Latin is Indo-European in the sense it was backformed from Italian, an Indo-European language. I cannot say what the situation is with Phoenician qua a language though I generally assume it is backformed from a Semitic language (but mostly for a lack of other candidates, I haven't gone into any of these things with much conviction).

Are you hinting at phonemes or even phoney?

Well phonemes rather than phony.

I can't see people communicating with basic phonemes although a written shorthand could do that. A bit like ancient text speak. lol.

The theory (maybe Hatty can dig it up, it's on a very old forum) was along these lines. Comparable to a Japanese being able to read Chinese because the ideograms mean the same thing even though they are pronounced in two completely different languages. It was, I seem to remember, quite an ingenious system -- or at least our theorising was.

[TisILeclerc]

Regarding Chinese ideograms or whatever they're called the Americans did an experiment in the sixties or seventies where they taught people with 'learning difficulties' to read using Chinese characters.

They didn't learn Chinese of course, they learnt American but the characters gave them the ideas and avoided the use of alphabets. Basic sign language in a way.

As for English in Ireland. I would say that the key is Doggerland. The whole of northern Europe is Germanic for want of a better word. And that must have included Doggerland. And if it included Doggerland then it must have included Britain and Ireland. People simply moved.

We know that the Irish language is isolated from all languages in western Europe. As is Basque of course. And the Irish themselves talk about how their ancestors came to Ireland. They don't claim to have been indigenous at least linguistically.

An American, Brad Larkin, has been tackling this problem by comparing the spread of Irish clans in their historical lands, the Irish Annals and the legends, and dna which lots of Irish people have been getting themselves tested for.

He has been able to map the major clans with particular dna groups. And in all of this there is a group, a minority which is quite remarkable because it is the 'I' dna which is recognised as the only dna native to Europe. It is the earliest dna and is still carried by a minority of people and even in Ireland. He gives a talk about this to a conference in Ireland. It should be noted that there is another branch of the 'I' dna which exists but this is associated with the Norman settlers in Ireland whether through direct Viking intrusions or with Normans from England.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JvYagRMu7b0

Whatever your views on dna or the Irish Annals it's well worth watching.