Newsgroups: sci.lang
Path: cantaloupe.srv.cs.cmu.edu!das-news2.harvard.edu!cam-news-feed3.bbnplanet.com!news.bbnplanet.com!cam-news-hub1.bbnplanet.com!howland.erols.net!vixen.cso.uiuc.edu!uchinews!not-for-mail
From: deb5@midway.uchicago.edu (Daniel von Brighoff)
Subject: Essentially...[Was: Re: Scandinavian
X-Nntp-Posting-Host: ellis-nfs.uchicago.edu
Message-ID: <E4uKpp.CC8@midway.uchicago.edu>
Sender: news@midway.uchicago.edu (News Administrator)
Organization: The University of Chicago
References: <5c48sk$1uck$1@news-s01.ny.us.ibm.net> <holman-2901971049480001@news.helsinki.fi> <5cnf2t$l56@news1.sol.no> <32F0B873.3423@natlab.research.philips.com>
Date: Fri, 31 Jan 1997 00:44:12 GMT
Lines: 43

In article <32F0B873.3423@natlab.research.philips.com>,
Lenderink, dr. E. <lenderin@natlab.research.philips.com> wrote:
>Kaare Albert Lie wrote:

Eugene Holman:
>> >English is essentially bad Dutch with outrageously pronounced French and
>> >Latin vocabulary.
>> 
>> >French is essentially the first syllables of Latin words spoken with a
>> >headcold. 

I like to think of it as Germans speaking the bad Latin they were taught
by Gauls.

>[some more "essential" definitions of languages]
> 
>> Thanks! This was exactly the kind of essential list I was hoping
>> for! :-)
>> 
>> Some languages are missing, however. Can someone supplement this
>> list?
>
>Slovenian is essentially Russian with an Italian accent.

This is actually how I tend to view Bulgarian.

>Modern Greek is essentially classical Greek with all vowels and 
>diphthongs changed to "i".

Nonsense.  It's Classical Greek as spoken by Venetians.

Other languages are harder to classify.  Breton is obviously Welsh spoken
with an aoutRAAAAgeous Franch acSANT, but what is Welsh?  Some reasonable
language that had its stock of vowels pillaged by Polynesians, yes, but
which one?  Irish?  They really don't sound that much alike.

How about West Slavic?  Polish is, of course, Russian spoken by a
Frenchman, but where does that leave Czech?

-- 
	 Daniel "Da" von Brighoff    /\          Dilettanten
	(deb5@midway.uchicago.edu)  /__\         erhebt Euch
				   /____\      gegen die Kunst!
