Zompist Bboard Again

A part of me thinks that many of the more "radical" changes affecting northern Gallo-Romance were probably in some degree areal — Northern French is closer to Scandinavia, and to what are now the Netherlands and Germany, without there being such a mass of mountains and other inhospitable terrain in-between. I imagine this is also what conditioned the shift to the fricative-r — it likely started somewhere in what's now Germany, I would guess, and spread outward from there. Old French, having some V2 syntax, probably was, at least in its "higher" registers (the ones likely to be spoken by literate people, and consequently be written down), fairly significantly influenced by a Frankish upper class. Its "lower" registers, however, may well not have been as affected by it, whence its later disappearance.

Ares Land wrote: ↑Sat Mar 27, 2021 8:21 pm For that matter, French kept a handful of words of Gaulish origin; Occitan has practically none.

How uniform is the effective substrate of Occitan, and how Celtic was it? Which part of Gaul did the three parts make up? ("Gallia est omnis divisa in partes tres.")

Richard W wrote: ↑Sun Sep 19, 2021 5:20 pm

Ares Land wrote: ↑Sat Mar 27, 2021 8:21 pm For that matter, French kept a handful of words of Gaulish origin; Occitan has practically none.

How uniform is the effective substrate of Occitan, and how Celtic was it? Which part of Gaul did the three parts make up? ("Gallia est omnis divisa in partes tres.")

The Occitan domain comprises the Roman province of Gallia Narbonensis and parts of Celtica.
The key difference, though is between Narbonensis and the rest of Gaul. Narbonensis was Roman earlier, a lot more urban and more connected to the rest of the Mediterranean. The rest of Gaul, by comparison, was a rural, provincial backwater, and even more so North of the Loire.

The substrate wasn't very uniform besides. Very roughly, the cities were Latin or even Greek-speaking.

Rounin Ryuuji wrote: ↑Sun Sep 19, 2021 3:41 pm I imagine this is also what conditioned the shift to the fricative-r — it likely started somewhere in what's now Germany, I would guess, and spread outward from there.

The switch to uvular r was much later (around the 18th century.) I thought it originated in Germany too, but it turns out to be the other way around. The change started in France and diffused to Germany. (IIRC the change began in 17th century Parisian popular speech.)

Wasn't strong initial accent tha reason why Insular Celtic languaged changed much in a short time?

Otto Kretschmer wrote: ↑Mon Sep 20, 2021 5:11 am Wasn't strong initial accent tha reason why Insular Celtic languaged changed much in a short time?

For Goidelic (ie. Irish, Scottish Gaelic, Manx), that's certainly true. Brythonic (Welsh, Cornish, Breton) on the other hand had a strong penultimate accent.

Hence Goidelic languages have still kept some remnant of the Proto-Celtic case system for instance, but Brythonic has from its first attestations been caseless.

Znex wrote: ↑Mon Sep 20, 2021 10:34 am Hence Goidelic languages have still kept some remnant of the Proto-Celtic case system for instance, but Brythonic has from its first attestations been caseless.

"hence" implies a causality that isn't there at all.

hwhatting wrote: ↑Mon Sep 20, 2021 10:47 am

Znex wrote: ↑Mon Sep 20, 2021 10:34 am Hence Goidelic languages have still kept some remnant of the Proto-Celtic case system for instance, but Brythonic has from its first attestations been caseless.

"hence" implies a causality that isn't there at all.

Celtic nominal cases all occurred as the final syllable of nouns. Penultimate stress for the Brythonic languages conditioned that the following final syllables were reduced and ultimately lost.

eg. *tegos > *téɣəh > *tɨɣ > Welsh. ty {house}
*abonā > *aβónə > *aβón > Welsh. afon {river}

Znex wrote: ↑Mon Sep 20, 2021 11:03 am

hwhatting wrote: ↑Mon Sep 20, 2021 10:47 am

Znex wrote: ↑Mon Sep 20, 2021 10:34 am Hence Goidelic languages have still kept some remnant of the Proto-Celtic case system for instance, but Brythonic has from its first attestations been caseless.

"hence" implies a causality that isn't there at all.

Celtic nominal cases all occurred as the final syllable of nouns. Penultimate stress for the Brythonic languages conditioned that the following final syllables were reduced and ultimately lost.

eg. *tegos > *téɣəh > *tɨɣ > Welsh. ty {house}
*abonā > *aβónə > *aβón > Welsh. afon {river}

I'm not denying that these developments happened, I just object against that Old Irish keeping some traces of case while Brythonic being due to the difference in stress patterns. Initial stress could also have lead to a total loss of final syllables in Old Irish, or despite the penultimate stress in Brythonic, some final vowels could have been kept. Actually, languages with penultimate stress normally keep endings better than languages with initial stress (see Romance vs. Germanic). And Celtic had two-syllable case endings like Gaulish Dative pl. -V-bo, Old Irish -(V)ib, so the loss of case must have had additional causes.

The reason why Goidelic languages still have case and the Brythonic ones not is IMHO the "broad vs. slender" thing - the palatalization of consonants by adjacent front vowels. This led to the preservation of traces of the old case endings in Goidelic even though the endings themselves are mostly lost. Brythonic did not have this innovation, so when the case endings fell of, the whole category of case was gone.

WeepingElf wrote: ↑Mon Sep 20, 2021 11:57 am The reason why Goidelic languages still have case and the Brythonic ones not is IMHO the "broad vs. slender" thing - the palatalization of consonants by adjacent front vowels. This led to the preservation of traces of the old case endings in Goidelic even though the endings themselves are mostly lost. Brythonic did not have this innovation, so when the case endings fell of, the whole category of case was gone.

Yes, but we're talking about Old Irish vs. Old / Middle Brythonic here. Old Irish has short vowel endings where older Celtic had *-V:C# (e.g. voc. pl. -u from *-o:s) while Brythonic deleted those as well.

Ares Land wrote: ↑Mon Sep 20, 2021 3:38 am

Rounin Ryuuji wrote: ↑Sun Sep 19, 2021 3:41 pm I imagine this is also what conditioned the shift to the fricative-r — it likely started somewhere in what's now Germany, I would guess, and spread outward from there.

The switch to uvular r was much later (around the 18th century.) I thought it originated in Germany too, but it turns out to be the other way around. The change started in France and diffused to Germany. (IIRC the change began in 17th century Parisian popular speech.)

This is very interesting.

Rounin Ryuuji wrote: ↑Mon Sep 20, 2021 8:06 pm

Ares Land wrote: ↑Mon Sep 20, 2021 3:38 am

Rounin Ryuuji wrote: ↑Sun Sep 19, 2021 3:41 pm I imagine this is also what conditioned the shift to the fricative-r — it likely started somewhere in what's now Germany, I would guess, and spread outward from there.

The switch to uvular r was much later (around the 18th century.) I thought it originated in Germany too, but it turns out to be the other way around. The change started in France and diffused to Germany. (IIRC the change began in 17th century Parisian popular speech.)

This is very interesting.

My question is how did it end up in English, right here in Wisconsin, surrounded by English-speakers with typically postalveolar /r/'s. Note that what's here isn't quite a uvular /r/ in the French or German sense, as it's pharyngealized except when following non-dental coronals and also non-syllabic, labialized initially except when syllabic, and doubly-articulated postalveolar-uvular after non-dental coronals except when syllabic.

Zju wrote: ↑Sun Sep 19, 2021 12:32 pm

Talskubilos wrote: ↑Sun Sep 19, 2021 6:01 am

Otto Kretschmer wrote: ↑Sun Mar 28, 2021 7:55 amCatalan did not originate in Iberia. It was brought there in late 8th century by Franks who reconquered a small part of Spain from Muslims

This is more a legend than a established historical fact.

Care to provide a source for that statement?

I'd be interested to know where Otto learned that Franks spoke Catalan.

The Franks did not speak a Romance language initially, as they were a tribe form the Lower Rhine area. As far as I know, they would have spoken something akin to Old Dutch.

Where did these roaming Franks then pick up Catalan?

I assume Franks is meant here as "people from the Frankish empire", the way the term was also used in the Middle East (later referring to (Western) Europeans in General). After all, the French are etymologically "Franks".

'Franks' here refers to the Carolingian kings, who established the county of Barcelona. The word refers to their political allegiances, with no expectations as to what language they spoke. (Or what their actual ethnicity was. The first count of Barcelona was a Wisigoth from Toulouse.)

IIRC Catalan was spoken on both sides of the Pyrénées but its geographic range expanded as the county of Barcelona grew.

I would pay real money for a podcast in which Talskubilos and Otto reconstruct Proto-World together.

Ares Land wrote: ↑Tue Sep 21, 2021 7:32 am 'Franks' here refers to the Carolingian kings, who established the county of Barcelona. The word refers to their political allegiances, with no expectations as to what language they spoke. (Or what their actual ethnicity was. The first count of Barcelona was a Wisigoth from Toulouse.)

IIRC Catalan was spoken on both sides of the Pyrénées but its geographic range expanded as the county of Barcelona grew.

And I doubt that such conquests had much effect on the vernacular languages.

Moose-tache wrote: ↑Tue Sep 21, 2021 8:42 amI would pay real money for a podcast in which Talskubilos and Otto reconstruct Proto-World together.

You're also on my ignore list.

WeepingElf wrote: ↑Tue Sep 21, 2021 9:09 am

Ares Land wrote: ↑Tue Sep 21, 2021 7:32 am 'Franks' here refers to the Carolingian kings, who established the county of Barcelona. The word refers to their political allegiances, with no expectations as to what language they spoke. (Or what their actual ethnicity was. The first count of Barcelona was a Wisigoth from Toulouse.)

IIRC Catalan was spoken on both sides of the Pyrénées but its geographic range expanded as the county of Barcelona grew.

And I doubt that such conquests had much effect on the vernacular languages.

The Reconquista did have an effect on the vernacular: Mozarabic dialects being displaced (to say nothing of Arabic.)

That said, in the 9th century the differences in the local vernacular were probably minimum.