OT: Impending death of a language

[Wilson Gray]

>From URA-List comes a note that, contrary to published reports, the
last-known speaker of Livonian has *not* died. There are probably as
many as five (5) native-speakers of this language still living,
ranging in age from 71 to 100.

(Was it the Livonians who thought that they could wash off their
forcible baptism into The One True Faith, once their German
missionary-conquerers were out of sight, only to have it brought to
their attention that acceptance of Christianity, together with the
language of its missionaries, is not a free choice, but the will of
God?)
--
-Wilson
–––
All say, "How hard it is that we have to die!"––a strange complaint to
come from the mouths of people who have had to live.
–Mark Twain

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