Re: no language no people

At 4:36 pm -0500 24/1/01, Padraic Brown wrote:
>On Wed, 24 Jan 2001, Eruanno the Linguist wrote:
>
>>> >>Welsh: Heb iaith, heb genedl.
>>> >>English: No language, no people.
>
>I like the Brithenig better: yn pobl seint yn lenghedig,
>yn pobl seint yn cordd.
OK, if we're going quote Welsh, let's do it prpoerly. The Welsh for 'no
language' is _dim iaith_; _heb_ means 'without'.  Thus the phrase above
literally means: without a language, without a nation.

And that doesn't seem to convey much meaning.

The Welsh phrase is actually:

  Cenedl   heb     iaith,          cenedl   heb    galon.
A nation without a language [is] a nation without a heart.

>I think it sums up pretty well.
>Oh right, not everyone knows what it means: A people
>without a language (is) a people without a heart.
...which is remarkably similar to the Welsh   :)

Pob hwyl!
Ray.

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A mind which thinks at its own expense
will always interfere with language.
                   [J.G. Hamann 1760]
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