Re: Umlaut, Vowel Harmony etc

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>Take a look at almost any "proto-" lang.  Almost invariably they are highly
>structured and regular.  IMO, it's interaction with other langs that bends
>pre-existing structure in a lang.  Eventually, the structure collapses, or
>becomes filled with so many exceptions to the rules that the rules
>themselves become basically worthless (again, see English :) )
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>What do you people think?
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Well, I can kindof cite a counterexample: the language I'm currently
learning, Basque. Basque has borrowed massively from Latin, Spanish,
French etc because of where the Basques are, but the case system is
really quite simple, and the verbal system is probably in all of
comparible complexity to any other language. Its a very regular
agglutinating language which has had a massive influx of foreign words
over the centuries.