On 4/29/2012 0:56, Stephen wrote:
> I would say that Beowulf is Old English so it is not surprising that it
> sounds like a mix between Old Norse and German, it is.

I'm still with Warp on this one, tho. I want to know how they know this is 
what it sounded like. :-)  How does someone know what a language sounded 
like when nobody still speaks it?

-- 
Darren New, San Diego CA, USA (PST)
   "Oh no! We're out of code juice!"
   "Don't panic. There's beans and filters
    in the cabinet."

Post a reply to this message

On 29/04/2012 6:38 PM, Darren New wrote:
> On 4/29/2012 0:56, Stephen wrote:
>> I would say that Beowulf is Old English so it is not surprising that it
>> sounds like a mix between Old Norse and German, it is.
>
> I'm still with Warp on this one, tho. I want to know how they know this
> is what it sounded like. :-) How does someone know what a language
> sounded like when nobody still speaks it?
>

I still don't know but remember GIYE ;-P


-- 
Regards
     Stephen

Post a reply to this message

On 4/29/2012 10:38 AM, Darren New wrote:
> On 4/29/2012 0:56, Stephen wrote:
>> I would say that Beowulf is Old English so it is not surprising that it
>> sounds like a mix between Old Norse and German, it is.
>
> I'm still with Warp on this one, tho. I want to know how they know this
> is what it sounded like. :-) How does someone know what a language
> sounded like when nobody still speaks it?
>

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Old_English_phonology has some info on this.

Post a reply to this message

On a related note, there are some who doubt a virtuoso pianist of the 
19th century such as Liszt were all the good (despite the account from 
other composers that he would play difficult concerto pieces on first 
sight) because there was no recording.

I've also heard some jazz guys suggesting Bach's music was played more 
relaxed back them, rhythm-wise.  Which is too say, it'd sound quite a 
lot like jazz, rather than with its characteristic rhythmic sameness 
found in recordings.

Forgetting the past and then reimagining it has led to many works of 
fiction as well.  The greek forgot their past mycennean civilization and 
came up with the Illiad to explain the many wars in oral legends and The 
ages of man to explain the bronze obssession of the previous bronze age 
civiliations.

I wonder how future civilizations will reimagine our dark digital age. 
"These guys surely were a quiet lot!"

-- 
a game sig: http://tinyurl.com/d3rxz9

Post a reply to this message

On 4/28/2012 10:49 PM, Warp wrote:
> Kevin Wampler<wam### [at] uwashingtonedu>  wrote:
>> You might be interested in this reading of Beowulf:
>> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y13cES7MMd8&t=25
>
>    Sounds like a mixture between Old Norse and German.
>
Actually, from some of what I have read there was, until fairly 
recently, a "High German" and "Low German". The low version was very 
close to English, enough that it was fairly understandable.

Post a reply to this message

On 4/30/2012 9:15 PM, Patrick Elliott wrote:
> On 4/28/2012 10:49 PM, Warp wrote:
>> Kevin Wampler<wam### [at] uwashingtonedu> wrote:
>>> You might be interested in this reading of Beowulf:
>>> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y13cES7MMd8&t=25
>>
>> Sounds like a mixture between Old Norse and German.
>>
> Actually, from some of what I have read there was, until fairly
> recently, a "High German" and "Low German". The low version was very
> close to English, enough that it was fairly understandable.

High German, Low German, and Dutch are actually rather specific points 
along a very smooth spectrum.  I am told that if you were to walk from 
southern Austria up through Germany all the way up to the Netherlands, 
you will observe no sudden shifts in the speech of the locals at any 
given point.  The exceptions occur if you wander into a French-speaking 
area or a region whose inhabitants have consciously altered their 
dialect (in order to conform to another dialect).

In a like manner, walking from the tip of the boot of Italy, up the 
coast into France, and then down into Spain will result in to sudden 
shift in language along the way (although signs placed by the government 
will generally be in the official dialect).

Or I could be wrong.

Regards,
John

Post a reply to this message

> High German, Low German, and Dutch are actually rather specific points
> along a very smooth spectrum. I am told that if you were to walk from
> southern Austria up through Germany all the way up to the Netherlands,

You can even start in northern Italy rather than southern Austria.  Also 
I heard several times that when English people try to speak German it 
often sounds very Dutch, so I guess even though we (in England) have 
mutated the language a fair bit the accent is still there somehow to 
carry on the smooth progression across Europe.

Post a reply to this message

John VanSickle <evi### [at] kosherhotmailcom> wrote:
> High German, Low German, and Dutch are actually rather specific points 
> along a very smooth spectrum.  I am told that if you were to walk from 
> southern Austria up through Germany all the way up to the Netherlands, 
> you will observe no sudden shifts in the speech of the locals at any 
> given point.  The exceptions occur if you wander into a French-speaking 
> area or a region whose inhabitants have consciously altered their 
> dialect (in order to conform to another dialect).

> In a like manner, walking from the tip of the boot of Italy, up the 
> coast into France, and then down into Spain will result in to sudden 
> shift in language along the way (although signs placed by the government 
> will generally be in the official dialect).

  In contrast, if you were to walk from Sweden to Finland to Russia,
you'll find three languages that couldn't be much more distinct and
unintelligible to the others.

  (Of course inside Finland the dialect will change gradually from west
to east, but there are still very sharp divides between Swedish and
Finnish, and Finnish and Russian.)

-- 
                                                          - Warp

Post a reply to this message

On 5/23/2012 9:17 AM, Warp wrote:
> John VanSickle<evi### [at] kosherhotmailcom>  wrote:
>> High German, Low German, and Dutch are actually rather specific points
>> along a very smooth spectrum.  I am told that if you were to walk from
>> southern Austria up through Germany all the way up to the Netherlands,
>> you will observe no sudden shifts in the speech of the locals at any
>> given point.  The exceptions occur if you wander into a French-speaking
>> area or a region whose inhabitants have consciously altered their
>> dialect (in order to conform to another dialect).
>
>> In a like manner, walking from the tip of the boot of Italy, up the
>> coast into France, and then down into Spain will result in to sudden
>> shift in language along the way (although signs placed by the government
>> will generally be in the official dialect).
>
>    In contrast, if you were to walk from Sweden to Finland to Russia,
> you'll find three languages that couldn't be much more distinct and
> unintelligible to the others.
>
>    (Of course inside Finland the dialect will change gradually from west
> to east, but there are still very sharp divides between Swedish and
> Finnish, and Finnish and Russian.)

Primarily because at least two of these languages are next to the third 
because of recent (in linguistic terms) migrations.

Regards,
John

Post a reply to this message

Warp <war### [at] tagpovrayorg> wrote:
>   In contrast, if you were to walk from Sweden to Finland to Russia,
> you'll find three languages that couldn't be much more distinct and
> unintelligible to the others.

Swedish and Russian are both Indo-European languages.  Finnish, which is wedged
up between them, is totally unrelated.  It would be difficult to make a smooth
transition.

Post a reply to this message