Kashubian language

Look what they have come up with:

KaszEd - Kaszëbsczi Editora

The program has been created to promote the use of the Kashubian language on the Internet and in the field of broadly understood computer science.

http://kaszed.zk-p.pl/index_en.htm

Originally written by Maxi Schwarz-Bastami on December 10, 2003 9:30 PM .Max, read The good soldier Švejk, if possible in English and just see what Radosveta said about Czechs and German language. It is hilarious though. Regards, Jairo I'll look for it, Jairo. Would it have exactly that title in English, do you know? The best way to find the translation of a book is by also knowing the author's name. Of course if there is no English version, a French or German tarnslation would work. Don't think I could learn Czech as well, though. Maxi

The Good Soldier Svejk and His Fortunes in the World War (Penguin Twentieth-Century Classics)
by Jaroslav Hasek
Amazon.com

This was one of my father's favourite books. I don't remember anything about it and it will be hard to find out here now.

Maxi, you can read some passages from it in different languages at http://vojtisek.tripod.com/hasek/17101_en.htm and do check out the pictures at http://odur.let.rug.nl/~vannoord/svejk.html.

Thank you so much, Jairo, for reminding me of this book.

My father, being an army doctor and a psychiatrist, would have been especially interested in this good soldier! And, of course, the unique humour.

Originally written by Tomás O Máille on December 9, 2004 10:51 PM ... Does that suggest that the Romans refered to the Celtic peoples as Gall(i)s, from where came Galicia and Galatia in Turkey and Gallia or Gaul (France)only because the Celts were refering to the Romans as Galls (foreigners).

Hi, Tomas!

Here's one (from many others) sites dealing with who the Celts were and where they had come from ...:

http://www.conjure.com/whocelts.html

I think, there is some good info there in answer to your most interesting questions.

As for:

So whichever way its said Welsh, Wal or Gal we are basically saying 'Ausländer'. Could it be that according to the Styrian woman Wälsh was less pejorative as it refered to a foreigner that lives closer to the borders of Austria than an Ausländer or in other words a Latin/Slav? speaking Ausländer. Tomás

Reading "Ausländer" and it means to me (not knowing much in German): "the  one who lives in outer lands = not in our lands"...

Hi Rossitsa,

Merci beaucoup for the link  I hadn't come across that one before.

What I have found out is that the Greek word for stranger is 'keltoi' which was the name given to the Celts by the ancient Greek writers. I am now wondering if the Greeks took that word from the Celts, or it would be funny if the Celts adopted it from the Greeks thereby christening themselves 'strangers'. Will have to check that one.

Also the modern Greek word for France is 'Gallia' as the romans also called it. It is also plausible that they refered to it as Gallia as the people themselves refered to themselves as Galls or Gauls, and that the Gaelic spaeking Celts of Ireland, Scotland etc. adopted this word to refer to foreigners, thereby the other Celtic neighbours. Again need to check on that.

And that leaves us with the Germanic work for 'stranger', walsh/waleas/wälsch. Could that also originally have been used to refer to the Celts? Hmmm

Sorry I have completely drifted away from the point of this forum, but I just find it fascinating.

Have a nice day,

Tomás

From what little I have learned about the Celtic tribes, at some point in the history of Europe, the wave of their "invasion" was very strongly felt. They, as historians obviously tend to think, had come from the East and had passed through the lands of ancient Hellas - one branch taking the route along the Meditterranean, reaching thus today's Spain and from there - to today Ireland,  Wales and from there to Scotland and then "poured" into "Luthany" (sorry! a hopless Tolkien fan! )

This might well mean that for the peoples who inhabited Europe in those times, the Celts were 'foreigners'.
I admit I 'm going to say this over my head , but I think this is how the name of this "invading" people must've come to mean a "foreigner". I think that as it used to happen in ancient times (and often in our times, too!) people "name" something/someone with the word/sound they hear from the source itself.

However, re. the origin of their language and name I'd like to quote from one source I have : http://www.ibiblio.org/gaelic/celts.html

"The people who made up the various tribes of concern were called Galli by the Romans and Galatai or Keltoi by the Greeks, terms meaning barbarian. It is from the greek Keltoi that Celt is derived. Since no soft c exists in greek, Celt and Celtic and all permutations should be pronounced with a hard k sound."

Another interesting thing about the language of the Celts is that:

"Philogists have shown the descendence of Celtic from the original Ur-language and from the Indo-European language tradition. In fact, the form of old Celtic was the closest cousin to Italic, the precursor of Latin. " (more information on this issue - in the above given source )

Hi Rossitsa,

Interesting link. So 'Gael' coming from 'Gwyddl' also means 'savage or barbarian' used by the Welsh to describe the Irish, who in turn became christened 'Waleas' or foreigner by their Saxon neighbours. 

As for the term 'Celt' itself apparently it was not until the 18th century that it first came into use when it was discovered by historians that the ancient language of Gaul was related to the indigineous languages of the British Isles which were previous to this refered to as Britonic. The 'Insular Celts' or Britonics had been seen as a different people from the 'Continental Celts' or Gauls. The referal to Keltoi was therefore previously used only for the continental Celts it seems. There may even have been a tribe who were called Keltoi somewhere in central Europe, from where the Greeks got the word. The reason why Breton, a Britonic language is spoken in Brittany is due to a colony of Cornish people who fled Cornwall from the Anglo-Saxons and brought the Celtic language back to the continent. Apparently Cornish and Breton is 85% the same, and Welsh and Cornish 65%. I found an interesting link on line as to if the Celts ever really existed as a people, or if it was only an 18th century ideal used to create a Celtic identity. http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/ancient/prehistory/peoples_01.shtml

Another interesting link I found which is an early historical timeline of the Celts. http://www.gallica.co.uk/celts/timeline.htm

According to this timeline the Gaels, the Celts of Ireland, arrived from Galicia, Spain in 500BC. Not something we learn in Irish schoolbooks!!! However they wouldn't have been christened 'Gael' until they met their 'Britonic Welsh' cousins up north I presume. The eastern colony of Galatia, Northern Turkey was founded later in 275BC when they fought their way eastwards from central Europe. These would probably have been the tribes that came into contact with the Greeks, the Keltoi? And according to this timeline the first Celts arrive in Britain in 100BC from I presume Belgium as the tribe was called the Belgae as they wished to escape Roman domination. Interestingly I've seen during my travels through Wallonia or Southern Belgium, many placenames which seemed to me to be Celtic, closer to Welsh or Breton. It could be that the Belgae brought the Britonic language (todays Welsh, Cornish and Breton) over to Britain.

And as to why the Walloons are called Walloon. Could it be that their northern Germanic neighbours refered to them as 'Walls' or 'foreigner' giving the name Wallonia.

What's funny is that so many of these peoples and nations adopted their neighbours name for them be it stranger, foreigner, barbarian or savage.

barbarian barbe.rian, sb. and a. Also 6-ien. a. Fr. barbarien (16th c.), f.Fr. barbarie or L. barbaria (see Barbary), on L. type *barbarianus; cf. OFr. chrestien:-L. christianus.

A. sb.1. etymologically, A foreigner, one whose language and customs differ from the speaker's. 2. Hist.a. One not a Greek. b. One living outside the pale of the Roman empire and its civilization, applied especially to the northern nations that overthrew them. c. One outside the pale of Christian civilization d. With the Italians of the Renascence: One of a nation outside of Italy 3. A rude, wild, uncivilized person. 4. Applied by the Chinese contemptuously to foreigners. 5. A native of Barbary. Obs

B. adj.1. Applied by nations, generally depreciatively, to foreigners; thus at various times and with various speakers or writers: non-Hellenic, non-Roman (most usual), non-Christian. 2. Uncivilized, rude, savage, barbarous. 3. Of or belonging to Barbary. Obs. 

*  *  * 

Edit: I just wanted to add this info:

http://iranianlanguages.com/indo-european.htm

And so ... this particular thread might well enough be re-named:

"One just cannot fight the Indo-European language hegemony !"

  

Originally written by Jacek Krankowski on September 9, 2003 12:55 PM The Japanese eat very little fat and suffer fewer heart attacks than the British or Americans. On the other hand, the French eat a lot of fat and also suffer fewer heart attacks than the British or Americans. The Japanese drink very little red wine and suffer fewer heart attacks than the British or Americans. The Italians drink excessive amounts of red wine and also suffer fewer heart attacks than the British or Americans. Conclusion. Eat & drink what you like. It's speaking English that kills you.

I have told this joke a few times now in other threads, but it seems to tie in with the following passage from a story carried by The Economist at http://www.economist.com/printedition/displayStory.cfm?Story_ID=3518542:

"It is tempting to think that life could be simpler, better and perhaps more peaceful if everybody could settle on one, or just a few, languages, leaving less room for misunderstanding. But there is little evidence that monolingualism promotes peace. In Northern Ireland, Protestants and Catholics speak the same language. Vietnam and Somalia are both predominantly monolingual. When Yugoslavia fell into civil war, most of its people were speaking Serbo-Croat. A shared language may even make people more bellicose. According to a legend of the Acoma tribe in New Mexico, the goddess Iatiku caused languages to multiply so that people would quarrel less. ...

In his book “Spoken Here”, Mark Abley, tongue slightly in cheek, argues that the story of Babel may have been misunderstood. The Lord urged Noah and his people “to be fruitful, multiply and replenish the Earth”. They duly multiplied, but stayed put and became overcrowded. Mixing up their language was a way of getting them to spread out. It was a blessing in disguise."

Fallen Leaves, Broken Lives
By Edward Tick, Utne magazine
VIET NAM: You'll note that in this article Viet Nam and Ha Noi are both spelled out in two words, as opposed to the Americanized spellings Vietnam and Hanoi. We maintained this spelling at the request of the author. "Vietnamese is a monosyllabic language, and all its words consist of one syllable," Edward Tick says. "When I write about Viet Nam, I use the original spelling as much as possible to restore cultural integrity and return a little of what we have taken through Americanization of the globe. It is small but it counts." -- Utne magazine, January/February 2005

http://www.utne.com/pub/2005_127/promo/11508-1.html