Celtic and English Again

[iffr762 at utxvms.cc.utexas.edu]

On Sat, 6 Mar 1999, Peter &/or Graham wrote:

> On the lack of influence from Celtic in English:

> Perhaps a comparable situation can be found in Egypt, which was
> Egyptian-speaking for yonks, then Greek speaking for nearly a thousand
> years, but now speaks Arabic with very little, if any, trace of either
> "substrate".

> Does this suggest that languages can indeed be replaced without great effect
> on the invading language, if other circumstances are right, and that the
> lack of influence from Celtic on English is not really so remarkable?

	Yes, except that what we have in English is lack of lexical
influence.  Whether grammatical influences would occur depends to a large
extent on the nature of the two languages in question.
	By the way, did Greek ever really replace Egyptian?

					DLW