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Which is the original language of your country?

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Topic: Which is the original language of your country?
Posted By: Guests
Subject: Which is the original language of your country?
Date Posted: 18-Nov-2007 at 11:46

Native languages are fascinating because they are linked to the land where you are.

Let's define Native language as the older language that was once spoken in the land where you are right now. For example, in the Americas the native language of Paraguay is not Spanish but Guarany. In Cuba is Taino. In some states of Canada and U.S. is Cree or Navajo. In Europe the native language of Ireland is Celt, of Italy is Latin and of Greece, ancient Greek. In Egypt is the Coptic language. In Australia is the aboriguine tongue and in New Zealand is Maori-Polynesian. In India is Saskrit and in Japan the native language could be the tonge of the Ainus.
 
How to distinguish a native language from newer ones?
 
Because native languages are usually perpetuated in history and in the toponimics of the region where you live. The hills, valleys, rivers and bays of your country usually have place names in native languages.
 
Why are they so fascinating? Because they are very descriptive and natural. An example, close to where I live there is a lake called "Vichuken", which in native language means "serpert lake". If you visit it or see a map of it you will notice the lake has the shape of a serpent. By the way, the native language of the part of Chile where I live is Mapudungun, the language of the Mapuches.
 
So, please tell us what is the native language of the place where you live. Not of your country as a whole, but of the state, province or region where you live right now.
 
You don't have a native language there? Common, hard to believe, figure it out LOL
 
 
 
 
 



Replies:
Posted By: Leonidas
Date Posted: 18-Nov-2007 at 12:40
IIRC there were around 400 - 700 or so different indigenous languages before Europeans crashed the relative peace, so take your pick. we dont have half that now




Posted By: Guests
Date Posted: 18-Nov-2007 at 12:59

Certainly, but in the province, state or region you live, perhaps there is a dominant language that left its mark in the landscape. I don't know where in Australia you live, but if you do in New South Wales, you have the following rivers that sound native:

Wollombi
Colo
Warragamba
Woronora
Moruya
 
Among many others.
 
What do they mean?
 
It is curious, but when I was a kid I read some cartoon about some air force heroes, and a pilot called Captian Cooper, whose base was somewhere in Australia, in a place called Woomera. It was a place where missiles and planes were tested. I found later the place was real, but only recently in this forum I learn that "woomera" is the spear thrower of the Australian Aborigins, and that the base got the name because of that reason.
 
A woomera:
 
 
 
I found that very interesting.
 
 
 
 
 


Posted By: jacobtowne
Date Posted: 18-Nov-2007 at 18:25
Here in New England, the aborigines spoke local dialects of Algonquian, a very large linguistic group. It's easy to distinguish from English.Big%20smile

There are hundreds of place names here derived from the Indian tongue - Megansett, Narragansett, Quabbin, Massachusetts, Quonset, Mashpee, Quisett, Naushon, Connecticut, Mohawk, Cataumet, Quoddy, Kennebunk (not sure about the last one) - to name a few. These names include towns, states, harbors or bays, islands, lakes, roads.

IIRC, the 'ett' or 'sett' suffix means 'place.'


JT





Posted By: Knights
Date Posted: 18-Nov-2007 at 19:34
As Leo said, Australia had hundreds of dialect groups, such as the Eora, Dharug and Ku-ring-gai peoples, who lived around Sydney. Of those rivers you mentioned, two are around Sydney. The Colo is just north, and Warragambah is actually a huge (well, not so full right now) dam which supplies much of Sydney's water. No dialects have remained dominant until today, however there are still nomadic tribes of Indigenous Australians in the North (eg. Arnhem Land and North Queensland). We do tend to name regions/landforms/places.etc after Aboriginal words in the local dialect.

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Posted By: Paul
Date Posted: 18-Nov-2007 at 20:25
Present day national bounderies didn't exist in prehistoric times so on that score alone you cannot talk about your country's original language in prehistoric terms.
 
Also no-one knows what original languages were. In Britain the first speaking inhabitants were probably homo-erectus over half a million years ago, maybe they spoke English, I'm not sure. Neanderthals may have had language too. Then CroMagnon man came 40,000 years ago, he spoke for sure, but I doubt we'd understand him. The post glacial paleolithic cultures then followed around 10,000 years ago, and for 8,000 years we have no idea what they spoke, it may have changed many times. Finally travellers from the Hellenic and Roman sphere came and recorded something about the language. They noted most importantly more than one language was spoken, just as in many countries today there are many languages. So even then there was no one language to be called original. The modern country was created in 1701, but not everyone spoke the same language, in fact it wasn't till the 20th century that everone in the country spoke English.
 
So with the pre-requisites, the existence of the country(required by the question) and one language spoken by all(implied by the question), the answer is English in the 20th century.
 
I guess the answer for the US too would be English in the 20th century. Ironically they may have acheived it earlier though.
 


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Light blue touch paper and stand well back

http://www.maquahuitl.co.uk - http://www.maquahuitl.co.uk

http://www.toltecitztli.co.uk - http://www.toltecitztli.co.uk


Posted By: Temujin
Date Posted: 18-Nov-2007 at 20:28
some celtic dialect.

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Posted By: longshanks31
Date Posted: 18-Nov-2007 at 20:32
it was gaelic here i think, after many waves of people coming here, its divided into three forms, welsh, scotch gaelic and the almost extinct cornish gaelic.
In the scheme of things english as we know it is quite modern.


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long live the king of bhutan


Posted By: longshanks31
Date Posted: 18-Nov-2007 at 20:37
i think the isle of man between ireland and great britain has its own indigenous language called manx, but im not sure if its still spoken today, it may be a dead language nowadays

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long live the king of bhutan


Posted By: longshanks31
Date Posted: 18-Nov-2007 at 20:44
english, the early form of it atleast comes from the old central kingdom of england called mercia, according to what is most recently known.

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long live the king of bhutan


Posted By: Guests
Date Posted: 18-Nov-2007 at 21:12
Originally posted by jacobtowne

Here in New England, the aborigines spoke local dialects of Algonquian, a very large linguistic group. It's easy to distinguish from English.Big%20smile

There are hundreds of place names here derived from the Indian tongue - Megansett, Narragansett, Quabbin, Massachusetts, Quonset, Mashpee, Quisett, Naushon, Connecticut, Mohawk, Cataumet, Quoddy, Kennebunk (not sure about the last one) - to name a few. These names include towns, states, harbors or bays, islands, lakes, roads.

IIRC, the 'ett' or 'sett' suffix means 'place.'


JT



 
That's interesting. It caugh my hear the name Massachusetts, because it is so widely known worldwide and from a song I can remember the title.
 
I looked for info about that about it in Wikipedia. And indeed Sett mean place. I wonder if the wiki definition is accurate:
 
The http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Massachusetts_Bay_Colony - Massachusetts Bay Colony was named after the indigenous population, the http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Massachusett - Massachusett , whose name can be segmented as mass-adchu-s-et, where mass- is "large", -adchu- is "hill", -s- is a http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diminutive - diminutive suffix meaning "small", and -et is a http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Locative - locative suffix, identifying a place. It has been translated as "at the great hill," "by the many small hills" "at the little big hill," or "at the range of hills," referring to the http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blue_Hills_Reservation - Blue Hills , or in particular, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Blue_Hill - Great Blue Hill , located on the boundary of http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Milton%2C_Massachusetts - Milton and http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Canton%2C_Massachusetts - Canton , to the southwest of Boston. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Massachusetts#_note-0 - [2] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Massachusetts#_note-Camp - [3] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Massachusetts#_note-1 - [4] (c.f. the http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Massachusett_language - Narragansett name Massachusęuck; http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Massachusetts#_note-Camp - [3] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anishinaabe_language - Ojibwe misajiwensed, "of the little big hill").
 
 
 
 
 


Posted By: Guests
Date Posted: 18-Nov-2007 at 21:15
Originally posted by longshanks31

it was gaelic here i think, after many waves of people coming here, its divided into three forms, welsh, scotch gaelic and the almost extinct cornish gaelic.
In the scheme of things english as we know it is quite modern.
 
Gaelic? That's a form of Celtic language, isn't? Does people in Britain still speak Gaelic? I found out a community in Argentina that still speaks Welsh. I hope that language is preserved. I wonder if it shows in the toponimics of your land.


Posted By: Guests
Date Posted: 18-Nov-2007 at 21:16
Originally posted by Temujin

some celtic dialect.
 
Are there where you live names that people don't know the meaning in German? That would be interesting to find out.


Posted By: longshanks31
Date Posted: 18-Nov-2007 at 21:44
pinguin, welsh is alive and well, id say although it is a guess there are atleast a million welsh speakers here minimum maybe two million at the most, a few hundred thousand scotch gaelic speakers and cornish im sorry to say is almost a lost language.
 
gaelic does have celtic heritage, but there are many celtic languages, many lost today i imagine.
 
the welsh were the origonal occupants of the island along with the scots and the picts, pictish as far as im aware is no longer alive as a language.
 
when the angles, saxons and jutes arrived in britain the celts were push north and westward settleing in wales, scotland and cornwall.
 
the picts possibly the oldest tribe of these islands were already in scotland, they became overwhelmed and consumed by the scots.
 
scots gaelic though linked to the welsh language is very very different its possible that the pictish language greatly influenced the scots language and hence the great difference.


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long live the king of bhutan


Posted By: longshanks31
Date Posted: 18-Nov-2007 at 21:51
i believe there is a lot of welsh descendants in argentina, many went there in years gone by to raise sheep, its nice to know the language has a new home there and is aliveThumbs%20Up, thanks pinguin

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long live the king of bhutan


Posted By: Styrbiorn
Date Posted: 18-Nov-2007 at 22:32
South Sweden: Swedish/Danish/Norwegian.
North Sweden: Sami.


Posted By: Guests
Date Posted: 19-Nov-2007 at 00:18
Originally posted by Styrbiorn

South Sweden: Swedish/Danish/Norwegian.
North Sweden: Sami.
 
Sami!
 
That's interesting! Besides the language of the Norse it is also interesting... samples please...


Posted By: Guests
Date Posted: 19-Nov-2007 at 00:23
Originally posted by longshanks31

i believe there is a lot of welsh descendants in argentina, many went there in years gone by to raise sheep, its nice to know the language has a new home there and is aliveThumbs%20Up, thanks pinguin
 
 
Yes. Please visit this thread. They still speak welsh there.. amazing.
 
http://www.allempires.net/forum_posts.asp?TID=19440 - http://www.allempires.net/forum_posts.asp?TID=19440


Posted By: Patch
Date Posted: 19-Nov-2007 at 01:35
Originally posted by longshanks31

it was gaelic here i think, after many waves of people coming here, its divided into three forms, welsh, scotch gaelic and the almost extinct cornish gaelic.
In the scheme of things english as we know it is quite modern.
 
No such thing as 'Cornish Gaelic' Cornish is a Brythonic 'p' Celtic language very similar to Welsh and Breton..  Gaelic is a 'q' Celtic language originally spoken in Ireland and related to the Celti Iberian 'q' Celtic.
 
Earliest known language of mainland UK was an early form of Welsh, which depending on which theory you believe was very similar to Gaulish. 
 


Posted By: Guests
Date Posted: 19-Nov-2007 at 01:51
Hey, and what place names in Britain are in Brythonic, Celt Iberian, Welsh et al?
 
That would be nice to know


Posted By: King John
Date Posted: 19-Nov-2007 at 02:12
Pinguin, you could try this site:
http://www.croeso-cynnes-wales.co.uk/iaith/meaning.html%20 - http://www.croeso-cynnes-wales.co.uk/iaith/meaning.html - http://www.croeso-cynnes-wales.co.uk/iaith/meaning.html

(just copy and paste it for it to work)

--------------------------------------------------
Janus Rook: (The hyperlink should be working now, you may just click the link).


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Posted By: Windemere
Date Posted: 19-Nov-2007 at 02:39
My father grew up on a farm in western Ireland in the early 1900's during a time when the language was changing over from Gaelic to English. Parents, grandparents, and children all lived together in the same house. Grandparents spoke Gaelic. Parents grew up speaking both Gaelic and English. The children spoke English, though they understood Gaelic. English was the language of economic opportunity and business while Gaelic limited people to local farming culture so it was advantageous to know English.
 
He moved to  western Massachusetts (already mentioned) and a few of  the local  towns here (such as Agawam and Chicopee) have names from the old Algonquian Indian language, especially the ones that were built on the sites of old Indian villages.


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Windemere


Posted By: longshanks31
Date Posted: 19-Nov-2007 at 11:02
Originally posted by Patch

Originally posted by longshanks31

it was gaelic here i think, after many waves of people coming here, its divided into three forms, welsh, scotch gaelic and the almost extinct cornish gaelic.
In the scheme of things english as we know it is quite modern.
 
No such thing as 'Cornish Gaelic' Cornish is a Brythonic 'p' Celtic language very similar to Welsh and Breton..  Gaelic is a 'q' Celtic language originally spoken in Ireland and related to the Celti Iberian 'q' Celtic.
 
Earliest known language of mainland UK was an early form of Welsh, which depending on which theory you believe was very similar to Gaulish. 
 
 
cheers patch, you dont know if cornish is still spoken atall do you


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long live the king of bhutan


Posted By: Al Jassas
Date Posted: 19-Nov-2007 at 14:41
My "English" professor was ironically a welsh nationalist, at home and communication with family, he only spoke Welsh. He memorized many beautiful welsh song that I understood nothing of them. He told me that in his home town, near Anglesey, English is very rare and even children do not speak the language amongst themselves.
 
Al-Jassas


Posted By: Styrbiorn
Date Posted: 19-Nov-2007 at 14:50

Originally posted by pinguin

Originally posted by Styrbiorn

South Sweden: Swedish/Danish/Norwegian. North Sweden: Sami.

 

Sami!

 

That's interesting! Besides the language of the Norse it is also interesting... samples please...


I don't know any Sami I'm afraid, so I can only link to wiki's page (written by Sami people, so it should be decent): http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sami_languages


Posted By: Temujin
Date Posted: 19-Nov-2007 at 17:20
Originally posted by pinguin

 
Are there where you live names that people don't know the meaning in German? That would be interesting to find out.


can't think of any at the moment...


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Posted By: Patch
Date Posted: 19-Nov-2007 at 23:30
Originally posted by longshanks31

Originally posted by Patch

Originally posted by longshanks31

it was gaelic here i think, after many waves of people coming here, its divided into three forms, welsh, scotch gaelic and the almost extinct cornish gaelic.
In the scheme of things english as we know it is quite modern.
 
No such thing as 'Cornish Gaelic' Cornish is a Brythonic 'p' Celtic language very similar to Welsh and Breton..  Gaelic is a 'q' Celtic language originally spoken in Ireland and related to the Celti Iberian 'q' Celtic.
 
Earliest known language of mainland UK was an early form of Welsh, which depending on which theory you believe was very similar to Gaulish. 
 
 
cheers patch, you dont know if cornish is still spoken atall do you
 
Cornish went extint in the 19th century but has recently been resurected.  Not sure how accurate the resurection is though. 
 


Posted By: Patch
Date Posted: 19-Nov-2007 at 23:34
Originally posted by pinguin

Hey, and what place names in Britain are in Brythonic, Celt Iberian, Welsh et al?
 
That would be nice to know
 
I used to have a book giving the placename origins of most UK settlements, unfortuneatley I lost it when moving.  I grew up in a village which in Gaelic means "field of the boggle".
 
For an idea below is a wiki link that gives some oringins of UK place names -
 
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_generic_forms_in_British_place_names - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_generic_forms_in_British_place_names


Posted By: pekau
Date Posted: 20-Nov-2007 at 00:36
Grunts and sign languages.

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http://swagbucks.com/refer/Malachi">      
   
Join us.


Posted By: andrew
Date Posted: 20-Nov-2007 at 01:43
LOL, everyone's having difficulty as for me this is easy.
 
Demotic. :)


Posted By: Tar Szerénd
Date Posted: 20-Nov-2007 at 07:56
Originally posted by Temujin

Originally posted by pinguin

 
Are there where you live names that people don't know the meaning in German? That would be interesting to find out.


can't think of any at the moment...
 
Maybe some village names by the sorbs?
(In most of the german heimatdokumentary :-)films I've seen was mentioned the - f.e. old frank or saxon etc- origin of the village/town name ,but I can't remember:-).


Posted By: longshanks31
Date Posted: 20-Nov-2007 at 10:29
pinguin, its only my estimate but id guess there are thousands of place names with a gaelic influence, from top to toe of the country, i say that because most place names in britain do not actually seem to mean or descibe anything in english, the romans, vikings danes and normans all have there influences with place names ie newcastle means something in english, but leicester the city i grew up in means nothing in english, many place names have a connection to the rivers that run through them, ie avonmouth or stoke on trent, after the avon and trent rivers that run through them, but the twist is, who named the rivers, if the river names are celtic in origin by and large then there influence is even greater.
English as we know it is quite a young language, the normans landed in 1066 and there influence on the native tongue would have been profound, its very likely due to the age of british settlements that place names that are 100 percent english language in origin are infact a minority.
I could be wrong, its just what ive found from skimming through my road atlas,


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long live the king of bhutan


Posted By: Roberts
Date Posted: 20-Nov-2007 at 12:51
Finnic - Livonian,  Baltic - Selonian, Letthigallian, Semigallian, Curonian.


Posted By: Temujin
Date Posted: 20-Nov-2007 at 18:38
Originally posted by Tar Szerénd

 
Maybe some village names by the sorbs?
(In most of the german heimatdokumentary :-)films I've seen was mentioned the - f.e. old frank or saxon etc- origin of the village/town name ,but I can't remember:-).


well Sorbs live in the east, i live in the south. but you are correct, the name of villages here give away when they were founded and by whom...

coming back to the Sorbs, many place names in eastern Germany are actually Slavic, like Leipzig and Chemnitz for example.


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Posted By: Guests
Date Posted: 08-Dec-2007 at 01:16

This may sound strange to Spaniards but, after thinking it a little bit, and seeing the evidence, I have the idea that the original language of the ancient Iberians was something very close to Basque!

I hope that idea don't produce a violent attack on me LOL
 
These are basic Basque phrases. If you find very strange, perhaps the reason is that, unlike Spanish that comes from Latin, Basque IS NOT an Indoeuropean language.
 
  • Bai = Yes
  • Ez = No
  • Kaixo! = Hello
  • Agur!, Aio! = Goodbye!
  • Ikusi arte = See you!
  • Eskerrik asko! = Thank you!
  • Egun on = Good morning (literally: Good day)
  • Egun on, bai = Standard reply to Egun on
  • Arratsalde on = Good evening
  • Gabon = Good night
  • Mesedez = Please
  • Barkatu = Excuse (me)
  • Aizu! = Listen! (To get someone's attention, not very polite, to be used with friends)
  •  


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    Posted By: longshanks31
    Date Posted: 09-Dec-2007 at 00:41
    well the basque were very powerfull in there time, that would be profound upon the iberian languages.

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    long live the king of bhutan


    Posted By: Guests
    Date Posted: 09-Dec-2007 at 04:23

    Yeap. That's a very interesting fact.

    It is amazing how much Spanish language is associated with the culture of Spain when, in fact, Spanish is nothing less than a popular variation of Latin, carried to Spain by the poor soldier and other uneducated people.
     
    The native languages of Spain become extinct, but it is tragical and ironical that perhaps the closest language to the Iberian natives of Spain is Basque...
     
    That could come as a shock for most Spaniards. For Latinos it just sounds funny. ( To get the feeling, a similar situation for a British could be to realize that the original language of England was Welsh or Irish Confused... that would be a shock)
     
     
     


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    Posted By: medenaywe
    Date Posted: 06-Feb-2015 at 04:21
    Original is one,we all around the world are speaking it's compounds!Big smile



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