Re: Hobbits spoke Indonesian!

Quoting Roger Mills <rfmilly@...>:

> Joe wrote:
> > Rodlox wrote:
> >
> > >  according to recent archeological discoveries, it is now known that
> > > Hobbits existed in Indonesia...so, which language do you think they'd
> > > have known?  :)
> > >
> > 'Hobbits', you mean?
> >
> > Well, if the local legends are true, they had their own, 'murmuring'
> > language.  How likely that is, I don't know.
> >
> Hmm. If, as is proposed, the isolated island environment led to their
> miniaturization, the perhaps their language also got miniaturized :-)))
>
> This is a fascinating and remarkable find, if true. There must have been
> some contact, somewhere along the way, with Papuan/Australian peoples (who
> reached their modern locations at least 30-40,000 years ago). Maybe these
> "Hobbits" were a group that stayed behind during one or another migration,
> then became reduced in size and (apparently) skeletally different due to
> isolated environment +some bad gene(s) +interbreeding +poor nutrition over
> the millennia.  In that case, their language would have been Papuanoid or
> Australoid.
They're supposedly erectids, so they presumably had spent the better part of
forever in Indonesia when the ancestors of the Papuans and Australians came
there.

                                           Andreas

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