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Re: Germanic and Celtic (was Re: Verb-second ... verb-penultimate languages?)

From:Jörg Rhiemeier <joerg_rhiemeier@...>
Date:Tuesday, April 25, 2006, 20:29
Hallo!

On Tue, 25 Apr 2006 08:10:19 +0100, R A Brown wrote:

> Is there any evidence that ancient Gaulish was VSO? Or is the > characteristic VSO order an innovation (like, e.g. conjugated > prepositions) of later insular Celtic?
It is definitely an Insular Celtic innovation. If my memory serves me right, Gaulish vacillated between SOV and SVO, and Celtiberian was plainly SOV.
> There is a stratum of non-IE vocabulary shared between the two, e.g. > landa, comba etc. But this would surely suggest nothing more than > borrowing from a common source, maybe some non-IE spoken around > headwaters of the Danube, who knows?
Yep. Borrowings from a common source. Possibly the same language which the "Old European hydronymy" comes from. ObConlang: I am building such words into Old Albic, which I fancy to be related to that unknown language. On Tue, 25 Apr 2006 13:18:31 +0200, Henrik Theiling wrote:
> But I think at least most generative grammarians would classify German > as basically SOV (in most subordinate clauses), having the > one-movement order VSO in questions (and in certain sub-ordinate > clauses) and the two-movements order TVSO in propositional sentences. > But I don't know to what extent the SOV in subordinate clauses is > pan-Germanic/was Proto-Germanic. Today, German, Dutch, Afrikaans, and > closely related langs/dialects have it. Others?
The oldest known Germanic inscription that contains a full sentence[1] is that on one of the Gallehus horns: EK HLEWAGASTIZ HOLTIJAZ HORNA TAWIDO Translation: 'I, Hlewagastiz Holtijaz, made the horn.' As clearly SOV as it can be. [1] The Negau helmet inscription is older, but doesn't feature a full sentence. On Tue, 25 Apr 2006 18:09:48 +0100, Joe wrote:
> Elliott Lash wrote: > > >I dont believe this is the case. The earliest Celtic > >languages, Gaulish, Celtiberian, Lepontic(?), all have > >word orders, morphology, phonology and some lexicon > >more similar to Italic languages than Germanic. > > > > > > Is it beyond reasonable doubt that they're closer related to the Insular > Celtic languages than Germanic is, though?
What do you mean by "they"? If you mean Continental Celtic, it is generally accepted that they are the closest kin of Insular Celtic; I don't know why Ray always puts "Celtic" in quotes. If you mean Italic, there is no such consensus, though some linguists feel that Celtic is closer to Italic than to Germanic. ... brought to you by the Weeping Elf

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R A Brown <ray@...>