LL-L "Language contacts" 2004.06.04 (04) [E]

[Lowlands-L]

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L O W L A N D S - L * 04.JUN.2004 (04) * ISSN 189-5582 * LCSN 96-4226
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A=Afrikaans Ap=Appalachian B=Brabantish D=Dutch E=English F=Frisian
L=Limburgish LS=Lowlands Saxon (Low German) N=Northumbrian
S=Scots Sh=Shetlandic V=(West)Flemish Z=Zeelandic (Zeêuws)
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From: Ruth & Mark Dreyer <mrdreyer at lantic.net>
Subject: LL-L "Language contacts" 2004.06.03 (03) [E]

Dear Sandy Fleming & all,

This is a fascinating subject.

    Referring to Dalgrano's glove, Robert Graves thoroughly discusses the
covert ogham spelling system used in the druidical colleges. I particularly
enjoy the notion of 'Nose Ogham' but in the end I have to say it means you
use the bridge of the nose as the stave, & lay one to five fingers past,
against, over straight or over diagonally to spell. It's surely slicker than
the imitations of the script alphabet I have been shown. A related system is
the shin ogham, but truth to tell you can use anything straight for a stave.

    Another thing tickling me is the newness of sign languages of today. In
the monastries of the Middle Ages there were regular & frequent austerities
of silence, & the less than dedicated Brothers would sign like stormswept
windmills, such is the tale they tell. According to extant records, it
wasn't so crude a medium as served to ask your fellow to pass this or that,
for they were accustomed in the same way to argue the most abstruse points
of Philosophy & Canon Law by the same means.

   I spent some time among the Vasiquela bushman in Namibia, & there was a
ten-year-old-boy who had contracted measles as an infant, which destroyed
his hearing. People 'spoke' to him in 'Hunter's Sign' which among the
Bushmen is very highly developed & which everybody knows. The kid certainly
wasn't at a loss for company or conversation.They even planned to send the
boy to school, but were first teaching the teacher to sign ---.

Yrs sincerely,
Mark

> The British two-handed
> alphabet is in turn derived from Dalgrano's Glove, a fingerspelling system
> devised by the Aberdonian George Dalgranoch around the year 1680.
> Statistical analysis suggests that Dalgranoch based his system on Ogham
> script, such as might be seen on standing stones in some parts of Britain.

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