Newsgroups: sci.lang
Path: cantaloupe.srv.cs.cmu.edu!bb3.andrew.cmu.edu!nntp.sei.cmu.edu!news.cis.ohio-state.edu!magnus.acs.ohio-state.edu!csn!nntp-xfer-1.csn.net!ncar!imci4!newsfeed.internetmci.com!news.sprintlink.net!news-stk-200.sprintlink.net!news2.noc.netcom.net!noc.netcom.net!netcom.com!netcom4!alderson
From: alderson@netcom4.netcom.com (Richard M. Alderson III)
Subject: Hungarian (NOT Re: Filia Pastoris)
In-Reply-To: sjoh0175@sable.ox.ac.uk's message of 27 Jun 1996 12:26:23 GMT
Message-ID: <ALDERSON.96Jun27184402@netcom4.netcom.com>
Sender: alderson@netcom4.netcom.com
Reply-To: alderson@netcom.com
Organization: NETCOM On-line services
References: <31D2B63E.4D75@innet.be> <4qsb37$sm2@news.ox.ac.uk> <4qtulf$g18@news.ox.ac.uk>
Date: Fri, 28 Jun 1996 01:44:01 GMT
Lines: 22

Posted and e-mailed:

In article <4qtulf$g18@news.ox.ac.uk> sjoh0175@sable.ox.ac.uk (Steven Pegg)
writes:

>As far as I can tell, Basque is the real "mystery" language of Europe as far
>as origins are concerned, surpassing even Hungarian in this respect.

In what sense are the origins of Hungarian a mystery?  The Magyars moved into
central Europe in the 9th century CE, and have been there ever sense.  There
was a monograph published in *1752* which established beyond the shadow of a
doubt that Hungarian and Finnish are related (beating out the better known
statement of Indo-European relationship by Sir Wm. Jones by 34 years).

The Finno-Ugric languages are the object of study of a number of linguists
around the world; there is even a mailing list on the Internet.  See Comrie's
_The World's Major Languages_ for a synopsis of the family.
-- 
Rich Alderson   You know the sort of thing that you can find in any dictionary
                of a strange language, and which so excites the amateur philo-
                logists, itching to derive one tongue from another that they
                know better: a word that is nearly the same in form and meaning
                as the corresponding word in English, or Latin, or Hebrew, or
                what not.
                                                --J. R. R. Tolkien,
alderson@netcom.com                               _The Notion Club Papers_
