What makes a language Romance or Germanic?

Leasnam   Mon Aug 17, 2009 7:31 pm GMT
<<L'anglais à mon avis n'a plus que la racine de germanique pour ce qui est du ''feuillage'' c'est tout autre chose, autrement dit les fondements rudimentaires des langues germaniques peuvent se retrouver occasionellement dans les mots anglais malgré que la forme ou la morphologie en soit passablement altérée, mais en ce qui concerne la syntaxe il y reste encore moins de caractérisques germaniques que le vocabulaire, qui faut-il le rappeler est composé de plus de 50% de mots d'origine latine ou française et plus particulièrement si vous comparez l'anglais à l'allemand ou aux langues scandinaves vous aurez de la difficulté à vous y retrouver.

Donc, le point de jonction se trouve à être le néerlandais et le frison qui se rapprochent un peu plus de l'anglais quoique je soupçonne ces deux langues et plus spécifiquement le néerlandais d'être influencées par le latin ou le français, ce qui ferait de l'anglais une langue métissée. >>


If you think that English is "Romanticised" and therefore Dutch too due to it being similar to the English, rather than it being the other way 'round, please use correct byspels and examples to prove what you hypothesize is true.

Remember, that this is a hypothesis solely based on what you see. We will do this scientifically, and I will not bethink it any time ill-spent :-)
skcollob   Mon Aug 17, 2009 7:37 pm GMT
Some of the words quoted do have cognates in English but the meanings differ slightly.

hingst - Hengst - stallion (cf English 'henchman')
snor - Schnur - cord (cf English 'snare')
hurtig - hurtig - swift (cf English 'hurtle' ?)

Plus the words Platz, Brief, feiern, Mauer and Kirche are not Germanic in origin.
Leasnam   Mon Aug 17, 2009 7:56 pm GMT
<<Some of the words quoted do have cognates in English but the meanings differ slightly.

hingst - Hengst - stallion (cf English 'henchman')
snor - Schnur - cord (cf English 'snare')
hurtig - hurtig - swift (cf English 'hurtle' ?)

Plus the words Platz, Brief, feiern, Mauer and Kirche are not Germanic in origin. >>


Thanks skcollob!
I had forgotten that 'henchman' comes from an OE 'hengest' "stallion" + 'man'

If German 'Feier' (< OHG fira) is from Latin 'feriae' then it is not akin to English 'fain', 'fair', 'fawn'. Those words are native Germanic.

German 'hurtig' seems to be akin to English 'hurry': the German form coming most likely from the noun form ([hur- + -t] + -ig, cf 'fertig' from [far- + -t] + -ig). The OHG word corresponding to 'hurry' was 'hurscjan'.
The Scandinavian languages (Danish, Norwegian, etc) borrowed 'hurtig' directly from German.
skcollob   Mon Aug 17, 2009 8:21 pm GMT
<<
Thanks skcollob!
I had forgotten that 'henchman' comes from an OE 'hengest' "stallion" + 'man'

If German 'Feier' (< OHG fira) is from Latin 'feriae' then it is not akin to English 'fain', 'fair', 'fawn'. Those words are native Germanic.

German 'hurtig' seems to be akin to English 'hurry': the German form coming most likely from the noun form ([hur- + -t] + -ig, cf 'fertig' from [far- + -t] + -ig). The OHG word corresponding to 'hurry' was 'hurscjan'.
The Scandinavian languages (Danish, Norwegian, etc) borrowed 'hurtig' directly from German. >>

Yea. According to this source http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/Feier 'feier' does come from OHG fira which in turn comes from Latin feriae. This does make it related to English 'fair' but in the sense of 'fayre'.

Regarding hurtig. I admit, I was a little unsure of the connection between hurtig and hurtle. The form is similar and I thought with hurtle meaning something coming at you at speed it may be related to the German word meaning swift. But yea hurry does seem to make more sense in this case. Thanks for that.

But I think regarding hurtig and quite a few others on that list, the similarities between German and Danish are down to Danish borrowing from German or even Low German. A lot of similarities between continental Germanic languages I think are because of areal influence.
wally   Mon Aug 17, 2009 9:40 pm GMT
<<But once again, Bozo>>

Why so aggressive and disrespectful, Leasnaam? Do you always react that way to people whose opinion you do not like?
You have to come up with much more than with invented words or cognates that have a completely different meaning, which even confirms the gap. It seems the Britons didn't know how to handle the Anglo-Saxon language :)
English is a "special case" Germanic language. Oh well, relax, I even called it a Germanic language!
wally   Mon Aug 17, 2009 9:46 pm GMT
Sorry, I meant "Leasnam".
Leasnam   Mon Aug 17, 2009 10:01 pm GMT
<<Why so aggressive and disrespectful, Leasnaam?>>

Only when I know it's you ;)

Cheers! :)
Woozle   Tue Aug 18, 2009 3:51 am GMT
"En anglais il est possible de tenir une conversation en n'employant que des mots germaniques, alors qu'il est difficile de construire une seule phrase avec seulement des mots romans. "

Wow. Fun with words!

It is manifestly impossible to maintain a conversation in English without employing Germanic lexicon, the obvious difficulty being that grammatical terms (prepositions, pronouns, auxiliary verbs, conjunctions, articles and particles) in the English language are virtually entirely of proto-Germanic origin.
====
hm.. every 'content' word above, except for "English", is of Latin and Greek origin, but every function word is Anglo-Saxon, and thus Germanic (Germanic itself is a Latin borrowing, of course, but of Germanic origin in Latin itself).
Woozle   Tue Aug 18, 2009 3:54 am GMT
Oh, yeah, and I cheated.. "grammatical terms" is NOT synonymous with "grammatical words". There's really no way to frenchify the word 'word' in English..
PARISIEN   Tue Aug 18, 2009 1:11 pm GMT
<< (Germanic itself is a Latin borrowing, of course, but of Germanic origin in Latin itself) >>

-- Of Celtic origin actually.

<< Oh, yeah, and I cheated.. "grammatical terms" is NOT synonymous with "grammatical words" <<

-- Use "grammatical lexemes"

;-)
Leasnam   Tue Aug 18, 2009 2:52 pm GMT
<<-- Use "grammatical lexemes" >>

Noooooooooooo! :-o

Use "staccraftlic quids" instead. That is our true 'urlave' (t.i. "heritage").

staccraft < OE 'stæfcræft' "grammar"
quid < OE 'cwide' "term, word"
urlave < OE 'yrfeláf' "heritage, heirloom"

Have fun with those
:-)
Leasnam   Tue Aug 18, 2009 5:26 pm GMT
<<It is manifestly impossible to maintain a conversation in English without employing Germanic lexicon, the obvious difficulty being that grammatical terms (prepositions, pronouns, auxiliary verbs, conjunctions, articles and particles) in the English language are virtually entirely of proto-Germanic origin.
====
hm.. every 'content' word above, except for "English", is of Latin and Greek origin, but every function word is Anglo-Saxon, and thus Germanic (Germanic itself is a Latin borrowing, of course, but of Germanic origin in Latin itself). >>

Yes, every content word in the passage you wrote was latinate, but the subjectmatter was grammar, and we no longer note any of our native terms for grammar due to the neglect of them back inthe day.

But the Germanic element is more evident when you disect it further (I will remove all Germanic particles):

"{} {} manifest{} impossible {} maintain {} conversation {} {} {} employ{} Germanic lexicon, {} obvious difficulty {} {} grammatical term{} (preposition{}, pronoun{}, auxiliary verb{}, conjunction{}, article{} {} particle{}) {} {} {} language {} virtual{} entire{} {} proto-Germanic origin. "

Other aspects I was unable to remove are:
1). Preposition of adjectives before nouns ("Germanic lexicon", "obvious difficulty")
2). A syntax, and especially a SVO syntax, which is germanic in origin

English is quintessentially a germanic language because the structure is germanic, that means that anytime a word--whether it be of Latin, Greek, Amerindian origin or whatever, enters English,it is incorporated into a germanic system. All words. For instance:

'prove' from < OFr 'prover' < L probare

we say "to prove", not "prover"
we conjugate it as: I prove, you prove, he proves (of origin, Germanic)
"I proved", "I have proven", "I am proving", "I will prove"
--it gets treated the same way as any Germanic verb would be treated. NOT like a French or Latin verb. Germanic.

Same for Nouns: 'people'
'People' is really a blend of a native word and an OFr word: OE 'leode' and 'pueple'--the etymon is clearly French, but it's use is English, we simply exchanged 'leode' for 'peeple', as it was spelt in Middle English. Even the tendency to use 'eo', a very Old English scribal practice was enforced. When first borrowed, 'peeple' was a singular noun (eg. "the peeple is..."). It received its plural aspect from association with 'leode' which was plural ("the leode are...")

Anywho, I regress...
'people' in English becomes
people (sing) => peoples (plur)
people's (sing gen) and peoples' (plur gen), just like every other Germanic English noun does.

Same for Adjective and adverbs:
calm/calmer/calmest
comical/more comical/most comical (--the use of more and most in comparatives was already present in Old English. It does evoke a semblance to Romance, though this similarity is purely coincidental and superficial)

So the operation of English is full Germanic. Only there are etymons with a non-Germanic origin sometimes, oftentimes. But English remains Germanic.
Ouest   Tue Aug 18, 2009 5:49 pm GMT
Lobo´s original question was "What makes a language Romance or Germanic?"

Shouldn´t the question be "What makes a language Latin or Germanic?"
Romance languages being Romance is redundant ...
PARISIEN   Tue Aug 18, 2009 5:52 pm GMT
<< we say "to prove", not "prover"
we conjugate it as: I prove, you prove, he proves (of origin, Germanic)
"I proved", "I have proven", "I am proving", "I will prove"
--it gets treated the same way as any Germanic verb would be treated. NOT like a French or Latin verb. Germanic. >>

-- Leasnam veut trop 'prouver'!

1. "to prove": a solution unknown in any other Germanic language.

2. "I prove, you prove, he proves, I proved", "I have proven" -- quite similar to French

3. "I am proving": unknown in any other Germanic language, but used in Spanish and Italian.


<< it gets treated the same way as any Germanic verb would be treated >>
-- Clearly wrong, case closed.
Leasnam   Tue Aug 18, 2009 6:35 pm GMT
<<1. "to prove": a solution unknown in any other Germanic language. >>

Really now!

Dutch '(om) te blijken'
German '(zu) prüfen'
Danish 'at belive'
Norw 'å bevise '
Swedish 'att bevisa'

English infinitives are traced back to Old English supines, themselves from Proto-Germanic

English: come/to come
Middle English: cumen/to cumen
Old English: cuman/to cumenne
Proto-Germanic: kwemanan/to kwemanjei

Nothing unique about English there...

<<2. "I prove, you prove, he proves, I proved", "I have proven" -- quite similar to French >>

"Similar" is not enough. In many respects English is "similar" to Chinese, but does that mean anything? It means nothing. Genetically, English verbs are 100% Germanic.

<<3. "I am proving": unknown in any other Germanic language, but used in Spanish and Italian. >>

Wrong. It is known in Scots, and it is known in Middle and Old English.

English: I'm coming
Scots: A'm comin
Middle English: ich am cumynge/ich am cuminde/I am cumende/ik am cumand
Old English: ic eom cumende/ic beo cumende

Who cares if it is known among other Germanic languages. Whether a language is Germanic or not depends SOLELY on the language's genetics, not how similar it is to its brethren. What if a Germanic language were the sole surviving language? Would it not be Germanic because there is no one left to compare it to?

Absurdity.

<<<< it gets treated the same way as any Germanic verb would be treated >> >>

No, that is a Correct Statement. Most borrowed verbs in English are treated exactly as if they are normal Germanic weak verbs. A few, like 'dig', 'strive', etc. which were originally Germanic to begin with, have become strong (eg dig/dug/dug; strive/strove/striven, strived)

You'd better reconsider you're point of view PARISIEN :)!