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QuoteReplyTopic: The Norman invasion Posted: 28-Sep-2009 at 12:56
Originally posted by gcle2003
There's more to language comparison than words. The syntactical structures of English are heavily influenced by French.
At its very simplest consider the formation of the plural in English: virtually identical to the French. Or consider the time-place sequence: German 'Er war gestern hier' as against French 'Il était ici hier' and English 'He was here yesterday'.
An interesting post! I would make an assumption that "gestern = yesterday and hier = here!"
It is most obvious in English that "ici = here" never took any hold on common speech, since a common call of approval in England is "here, here!" But, wait, just what does "here, hear" mean? Maybe it was "hear, hear?"
See; http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hear,_hear
Where we are all told the correct spelling form to be used!
But, wait right here! Meaning "right now", or "this instant moment", etc. The Wikipedia post tells us; "Hear, hear is an expression used as a short repeated form of hear ye and hear him. It represents a listener's agreement with the point being made by a speaker."
But, just because "it is written" are we to believe it? Just consider that at some point in the development of modern English, some one, some where, made it popular to shout such words, concerning either someone's words or someone's arrival! Thus, a herald, might well shout "here, here" to notify a soon to be arrival of some importance to a village or convent, etc. It might well mean closer to "pay attention" or merely "attention?", or even "listen up?"
One definition of "hear" is "To attend, or be present at, as hearer or worshiper; as, to hear a concert; to hear Mass." In this case it is not really necessary to actually "hear" the sounds, but one is "seen" at the event, he or she is bodily evident! Thus with the addition of the word "come", as in "come here", meaning basically "come to this place or spot, etc.", there also exists "come hear", which basically means "come and listen!"
Another definition of "hear" is; " To accede to the demand or wishes of...", or more specifically be a supplicant!, or aceed to someone, etc.
Strangly, one definiton of "here" is "hair!", and in general one might well consider "here" to mean mostly "in the present place and time, etc."
Sometimes we are even confronted with the word "heir?", which is pronounded suspiciously like "here" and "hear!", as well as the words, "ere" and "err!", or the difference in the pronounciation and innotations, depends much upon one's accent and another's ear!
So, just what is the definition of "Heir?";
"(n.) One who receives any endowment from an ancestor or relation; as, the heir of one's reputation or virtues.
(n.) One who inherits, or is entitled to succeed to the possession of, any property after the death of its owner; one on whom the law bestows the title or property of another at the death of the latter.
(v. t.) To inherit; to succeed to."
So, considering just how the word is used "heir" could be similar to "next", as in "he is next to receive the fortune" or, depending upon certain conditions "he is awarded the fortune because he is the proven heir!" Thus "to be an Heir, is to be in the past, or "yesterday", and to actually take possession of those "past" articles, possessions, or titles, is the "present!"
So, what about the word found above spelled "hier?" Just what does it mean other than "yesterday?"
"hier- var. of hiero- before a vowel: hierarchy." And as well; "hiero-
a combining form meaning “sacred,” “priestly,” used in the formation of compound words: hierocracy. (How about a "social" or "political" position or a Titled post, that is "in-heirit-able?")
Also, especially before a vowel, hier-."
Well certainly any "hierarchy" could be considered but a "hierocracy?"
But what is a "hierarchy?"
But, first maybe you should look at this site?;
http://www.woxikon.com/fra/hier.php
Please pay particular attention to the orthographic section!
Now please look at the following;
http://www.answers.com/topic/hierarchy
Where amongst other things you will see the following; "[Middle English ierarchie, from Old French, from Medieval Latin hierarchia, from Greek hierarkhiā, rule of a high priest, from hierarkhēs, high priest. See hierarch.]"
I suggest that you might well remember that ancient church positions, or at least those mentioned as positions within ancient Judaism, were all "inheritable" posts. The positions passing from family to family, such as the "Levites", the "Cohens", the position of "High Priest", etc.
Some times one family held both the religious and the secular positions at one time! Caesar is a Roman version!
One must remember that England was reportedly Romanized twice in its reported history, once by the Romans first under Caesar, and a few years later almost fully colonized by the Romans, and later the "Norman", who spoke a Romanized language!
I am sorry, it seems I have become carried away, and have written way too much, and since I am now hurried, I cannot even remember my point to the entire thing. Maybe one of you can figure it out? oil?
This thread is about "The Norman invasion", it is better that we discuss about these things in the thread that mentioned about Gauls or this new thread that I posted some hours ago: Gaulish Beltane & Galesh Baleno, Summer Festival, I believe there are some relations between similar names in the Indo-European cultures. You may be right to say some non-Indo-European words, like that Turkic word, could be in fact Turkified.
"Alp Arslan was the name of a Seljuq king, that is Turkic and means 'a valiant lion'."
Do you beleive such a name would be out of place in say Norway, or Sweden, or Dane-mark, or even Estonia, etc.? You must remember that a name such as Alp Arslan, might well be somewhat distorted since it had to survive numerous translations and languages, etc., before it reached our times!
You also wrote;
"One interesting this about the red hair: http://www.spiritus-temporis.com/red-hair/the-historical-distribution.html
'Red hair is most commonly found at both the west and eastern fringes of modern Europe. Although red hair in the human population is most commonly associated with those of British or Irish descent, dark red or reddish-tinged hair can be found in a few other Caucasian populations. The Galatian invasion of 275 BC gave modern Turkey a smattering of the present-day population who have red hair and green eyes, as well as some in Iran.'
I think about Iran it means 'Galesh' people who live in the north of Iran, A Galesh woman wearing an Iranian scarf:"
To your response I say ditto! A lot of historians place a great deal of credence to a "Celtic" invasion or movement of some Celtic tribe from its home somewhere in Central Europe into the Eastern realm of Europe, into the Greecian area, and into Asia Minor, and in the case of your information, even into what at one time may have been a part of Armenia, and is now part of an artifical nation called Iraq!
The greater question is why there exists so many places in our maps of the past which carry the letters "Gal" or Gaul", etc. Almost any place one looks when examining old maps, or at least our current historians version of how the world must have looked at one time or another, one quickly sees, the emrergence of places called either "Gaul", or "Galica", or "Galata", or a few other versions.
The really strange thing in Byzantine history is the group of people now considered as an influx of Celts, that ended up occupying central Asia Minor. It was one of those areas that carried a clearly similar name to Caesar's Gaul!
"Red hair is most commonly found at both the west and eastern fringes of modern Europe. Although red hair in the human population is most commonly associated with those of British or Irish descent, dark red or reddish-tinged hair can be found in a few other Caucasian populations. The Galatian invasion of 275 BC gave modern Turkey a smattering of the present-day population who have red hair and green eyes, as well as some in Iran."
I think about Iran it means "Galesh" people who live in the north of Iran, A Galesh woman wearing an Iranian scarf:
They mostly live in the province of Golestan (Land of Gol/Gaul) in Iran, as I mentioed in this thread: Where was the ancient "Gaul" located?, Unfortunately there is not much info about Gaulish language in Gaulistan province of Iran, I hope this project give us some info:
Documentation of the language and lifestyle of the Galesh, province of Golestan, Iran Helen Jahani, Uppsala University
Project Summary: The Galesh are herdsmen in the Alborz mountains. Their total number is unknown, but diminishing rapidly due to the modernisation of the Iranian society. This project attempts to find out if the language of the Eastern Galesh in Golestan is similar to any of the languages of the settled population in the area or if it should be regarded as a language of its own. In Galeshi there are many terms for husbandry and dairy production, which are not found among the agriculturalists. Since the lifestyle of the Galesh is severely threatened this project will document important aspects of it before it is too late.
Some Galesh kids in a village:
Even one of the early leaders of the Ottomans had the name Aps Arslan! (hope I spelled it correctly?) the name which to me at least has a very Norse sound to it, as well as spelling. Oh well, enough spouting off! Sorry for the mistakes, don't have time to check everything you know.
Alp Arslan was the name of a Seljuq king, that is Turkic and means "a valiant lion".
Since I have received no response to my previous post, I just felt that I might mention the Scots!
Some of you might well know that Scottish support went to the King(s) of France before those of England, and this support lasted for many years (if not hundreds?). The king(s) of France were a part of the body guard of these kings much like King David of the Bible was guarded by his, "mighty men of reknown", etc.
It is also thought that these men made up a special military group used to both protect the King and break the enemy lines if necessary, thus much like the Immortals of the Kings of Persia.
As far as I know, as long as the Low Countries were somewhat allied with England (maybe via language?), they were mostly the enemies of Scotland!
Just thought I'd throw in my two cents! I would suppose that England, like France was always composed by numerous accents as it is today, and as it was more composed of 50 or so years ago. I would suggest that if any comonality existed between the English language and a continental language it would be the language spoken in Flanders, Holland and Frisia? This area was the nearest point on the continent to both England and Scotland and who really knows just were else the "Northmen" settled besides Normandy? Actually, I think they were actually hired as mercenaries to protect the area, and prevent other pirate raids!
But let us concede that the Dutch and Frisians were of a different breed! Maybe more Germanic than Norse in language. But, I contend that language is more a cause of seperation than anything else. And the language of the literate is and probably always will be different from the "great un-washed." It was only the push towards education that ever led to any great standardization of any language, and the invention of print, tended to settle the spelling problems, even though it took a long time.
For example, as a young man, here in the USA, I could tell the home town of many people eventhough they lived only 50 or so miles away, and this was during the period of say 1956-60. Needless to say that anyone from further away stood out like a sore thumb on a brain surgeons hand.
As far as language and people(s)moving around; there has been mention of the Varangian Guard, and many here may not know that this group was allegedly made up of a real mixture of people and languages. Supposedly within this group were English, Dutch, Germans, Swedes, Norse, Franks, and the so called Vikings that settled in what is now Russia, Ukraine, and the Black Sea area in general. The really strange thing in Byzantine history is the group of people now considered as an influx of Celts, that ended up occupying central Asia Minor, this very area was also the centre of the mysterious Hittite (Hatti?) Empire, and it has variously been said to have been located in places called Phyrigia, as well as Galatia, one of those areas that carried a clearly similar name to Caesar's Gaul / Galli! (it is most interesting that even today the French consider themselves as "Gallic", rather than French!)
Even one of the early leaders of the Ottomans (Othmen?) had the name Aps Arslan! (hope I spelled it correctly?) the name which to me at least has a very Norse sound to it, as well as spelling.
Oh well, enough spouting off! Sorry for the mistakes, don't have time to check everything you know.
One interesting thing (to me) that people rarely mention is that after the nobility in Lowland Scotland eventually became Norman. Many people assume a great hostility between the Normans and the Gaels, but there is very little actual evidence of this at least no more than the normal Lowland/Highland friction.
It is essential to keep in mind that the Normans in Scotland were there by invitation! What is frequently referred to as the Davidian Revolution took place in Scotland under King David I during his 30 year reign (1124 – 1153) during which he granted lands to many Norman knights and brought about the foundation of monasteries, the Normanisation of the Scottish government, and the introduction of feudalism by French and Anglo-French knights to whom he granted lands and titles.
Unlike in England, there was extensive intermarriage between Norman and the earlier Gaelic population. Robert the Bruce was, for example, half Gaelic and half Norman.
David I's reign is actually a fascinating one. He was quite an amazing many who in many ways transformed Scotland (better? worse? who knows?) The immense changes in Scottish culture, government and religion wouldn't have come about without the Norman Invasion, however.
I just wish people would call Anglo-Saxon Anglo-Saxon and reserve 'English' of any period for the language that resulted mostly from the merger of Anglo-Saxon with French. But I recognise it's one of my lost causes.
(Oxford) Whispering from her towers the last enchantments of the Middle Age...
Home of lost causes, and forsaken beliefs, and unpopular names, and impossible loyalties!
Mathew Arnold 1822-1888
Hodekin
A King he was on a carven throne in many pillared halls of stone,
with golden roof and silver floor and runes of power upon the door.
Calling Scots a different language from English is like calling Lëtzebuergesch a different language from German. Which of course I do all the time because of my neighbours
Lëtzebuergesch is just as influenced by French as Scots is by Gaelic, and it's remarkably similar to middle Franconian dialects, just as Scots is remarkably similar to English dialects along the borders.
I just wish people would call Anglo-Saxon Anglo-Saxon and reserve 'English' of any period for the language that resulted mostly from the merger of Anglo-Saxon with French. But I recognise it's one of my lost causes.
Sorry, it isn't. The closest according to the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages is Scots. Which developed from a distinct form of Middle English and was influenced by languages other than Norman-French (Gaelic, Norse and French among them).
Well, I did say 'fancy' and I did say 'perhaps' but thanks for the info Chookie
If 'Scots' is developed from 'Middle English', how does that go down North of the border?
hodekin
A King he was on a carven throne in many pillared halls of stone,
with golden roof and silver floor and runes of power upon the door.
There's more to language comparison than words. The syntactical structures of English are heavily influenced by French.
At its very simplest consider the formation of the plural in English: virtually identical to the French. Or consider the time-place sequence: German 'Er war gestern hier' as against French 'Il était ici hier' and English 'He was here yesterday'.
Funnily I didn't notice the odd coincidence in that comparison. German 'hier' means English 'here' whereas French 'hier' means English 'yesterday'.
On the question of similarities, of all the Germanic tongues I rather fancy that Dutch is perhaps the closest to English!
Sorry, it isn't. The closest according to the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages is Scots. Which developed from a distinct form of Middle English and was influenced by languages other than Norman-French (Gaelic, Norse and French among them).
<side note> The Norse (Viking) presence in Scotland, Ireland and Wales was basically Norwegian and/or Icelandic, in contrast to England where most Vikings were Danish.
This debate is very interesting! on a side note however, it is beginning to remind me of the sketch in Monty Pythons 'Life of Brian' you know....'what have the Romans ever done for us'!
This time it's 'What have the Normans ever done for us'!
All things said thus far a true and the development of modern English must of course owe an amount to the French influence first brought to England by the Normans. I still believe however that the main consequenses of the Norman invasion was not the influence over the language but the direction it pointed England into future history.
But as I've said before, this is only my opinion.
hodekin
A King he was on a carven throne in many pillared halls of stone,
with golden roof and silver floor and runes of power upon the door.
There's more to language comparison than words. The syntactical structures of English are heavily influenced by French.
At its very simplest consider the formation of the plural in English: virtually identical to the French. Or consider the time-place sequence: German 'Er war gestern hier' as against French 'Il était ici hier' and English 'He was here yesterday'.
The French influence on English follows a trend. The words adopted are mostly big, hoity doity ones like "royalty", "honour", "splendour" and so forth, whereas the common everyday words were and still are of Anglo-Saxon origin, such as "man", "house" and most prepositions and personal pronouns.
If anyone is curious what the older forms of English might have sounded like:
The linguist who posted the last vid also has videoes on Old Norse, Gothic, Old Swedish, older forms of German and so forth, for comparison. He also has videos on modern Icelandic, and it's plain to see how similar it is to both Old Norse and Old English.
Thanks to Reginmunds most erudite reply you have a perfect breakdown of the common roots of English within the Germanic family of languages.
Getting back to your post however regarding the greatest consequence of the Norman Invasion, I do not share your opinion that it was 'language'. As you pointed out, the Latin French that was brought over with the Normans was largely used by the ruling classes, the vast majority of the common people however remained with their 'Saxon/English' tongue.
As has been pointed out, there were of course several loan words from the French that became prominent in everyday speech for the common people, Mutton and Beef spring to mind. But other than that, I do not believe that the usage of the French language by the ruling classes drastically influenced everyday spoken English to any major degree.
On the question of similarities, of all the Germanic tongues I rather fancy that Dutch is perhaps the closest to English!
Just my opinion though
hodekin
A King he was on a carven throne in many pillared halls of stone,
with golden roof and silver floor and runes of power upon the door.
In my opinion, the greatest consequence of the Norman invasion would be language. In pre-1066 England, there were a group of dialects spoken that were known as 'Anglo-Saxon'. As William the Conquerer took over England, he brought with him the French language. For the next 3 centuries, French would be the dominant language spoken in the court, higher culture, as well as royalty. French trickled down to the population and has greatly affected the English that we speak today. In fact, it affected it so much, that I heard pre-1066 'Old English' sounds similar to modern day Icelandic.
Hi.
Cultural influences from France, including language, entered more or less all European languages, regardless of whether they were ruled by French-speakers or not. However, the extent of French influence on English would no doubt be less had it not been for the Norman conquest.
English and Icelandic share a common root in the Germanic language family, so naturally the further back you go the more similar the languages become. Some linguists believe Old English and Old Norse were mutually intelligible, some disagree, but it can't be denied they were a lot more similar than now. Icelandic is a special case however, as Iceland's isolation has led to exceptionally little change in the language, so that it remains largely the same today as 1000 years ago, which is why modern Icelandic sounds similar to Old English. If you look at Scandinavia however, from where the Old Norse-speaking Icelanders came, the languages have changed so much that Old Norse is as alien to modern Scandinavians as Old English is to the modern English, with many French and German loan-words, but the Scandinavians were never ruled by a foreign language elite.
I'm not trying to disagree or undermine your statement here, I'm just elaborating it further to shed light on the complexities involved.
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