Humour (long)

[Andrew Carnie]

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From: adg1 at cornell.edu (Antony Green)
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Thainig seo do IndoEuropean-L an seachtaine seo caite:
This came to IndoEuropean-L last week:
>
>~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
>The History of the English Language
>
> Since there has been so much interesting in Irish pronounciation lately, I
>thought our Sassanach brothers should have their pronouns clarified as well.
> Hope this helps.   :-{)> 1066 and all that...
>
>The History of the English Language
>
>Owen Alun and Brendan O'Corraidhe
>
>In the beginning there was an island off the coast of Europe.  It had
>no name, for the natives had no language, only a collection of grunts and
>gestures that roughly translated to "Hey!", "Gimme!", and "Pardon me, but
>would you happen to have any woad?"
>
>Then the Romans invaded it and called it Britain, because the natives were
>"blue, nasty, br(u->i)tish and short."  This was the start of the importance
>of u (and its mispronounciation) to the language.  After building some roads,
>killing off some of the nasty little blue people and walling up the rest, the
>Romans left, taking the language instruction manual with them.
>
>The British were bored so they invited the barbarians to come over
>(under Hengist) and "Horsa" 'round a bit. The Angles, Saxons, and Jutes
>brought slightly more refined vocal noises.
>
>All of the vocal sounds of this primitive language were onomatapoedic, being
>derived from the sounds of battle.  Consonants were were derived from the
>sounds of weapons striking a foe.  "Sss" and "th" for example are the sounds
>of a draw cut, "k" is the sound of a solidly landed axe blow, "b", "d", are
>the sounds of a head dropping onto rock and sod respectively, and "gl" is the
>sound of a body splashing into a bog.  Vowels (which were either gargles in
>the back of the throat or sharp exhalations) were derived from the sounds the
>foe himself made when struck.
>
>The barbarians had so much fun that decided to stay for post-revel. The
>British, finding that they had lost future use of the site, moved into the
>hills to the west and called themselves Welsh.
>
>The Irish, having heard about language from Patrick, came over to
>investigate.  When they saw the shiny vowels, they pried them loose and took
>them home.  They then raided Wales and stole both their cattle and their
>vowels, so the poor Welsh had to make do with sheep and consonants.  ("Old Ap
>Ivor hadde a farm, L Y L Y W!  And on that farm he hadde somme gees.  With a
>dd dd here and a dd dd there...")
>
>To prevent future raids, the Welsh started calling themselves "Cymry" and
>gave even longer names to their villages.  They figured if no one could
>pronounce the name of their people or the names of their towns, then no one
>would visit them.  (The success of the tactic is demonstrated still today.
>How many travel agents have YOU heard suggest a visit to scenic
>Llyddumlmunnyddthllywddu?)
>
>Meantime, the Irish brought all the shiny new vowels home to Erin.  But of
>course they didn't know that there was once an instruction manual for them,
>so they scattered the vowels throughout the language purely as ornaments.
>Most of the new vowels were not pronounced, and those that were were
>pronounced differently depending on which kind of consonant they were either
>preceding or following.
>
>The Danes came over and saw the pretty vowels bedecking all the Irish words.
> "Ooooh!" they said.  They raided Ireland and brought the vowels back home
>with them.  But the Vikings couldn't keep track of all the Irish rules so
>they simply pronounced all the vowels "oouuoo."
>
>In the meantime, the French had invaded Britain, which was populated by
>descendants of the Germanic Angles, Saxons, and Jutes.  After a generation or
>two, the people were speaking German with a French accent and calling it
>English.  Then the Danes invaded again, crying "Oouuoo! Oouuoo!," burning
>abbeys, and trading with the townspeople.
>
>The Britons that the Romans hadn't killed intermarried with visiting Irish
>and became Scots.  Against the advice of their travel agents, they descided
>to visit Wales.  (The Scots couldn't read the signposts that said, "This way
>to LLyddyllwwyddymmllwylldd," but they could smell sheep a league away.) The
>Scots took the sheep home with them and made some of them into haggis.  What
>they made with the others we won't say, but Scots are known to this day for
>having hairy legs.
>
>The former Welsh, being totally bereft, moved down out of the hills and into
>London.  Because they were the only people in the Islands who played flutes
>instead of bagpipes, they were called Tooters.  This made them very popular.
> In short order, Henry Tooter got elected King and begin popularizing ornate,
>unflattering clothing.
>
>Soon, everybody was wearing ornate, unflattering clothing, playing the flute,
>speaking German with a French accent, pronouncing all their vowels "oouuoo"
>(which was fairly easy given the French accent), and making lots of money in
>the wool trade.  Because they were rich, people smiled more (remember, at
>this time, "Beowulf" and "Canterbury Tales" were the only tabloids, and gave
>generally favorable reviews even to Danes).  And since it is next to
>impossible to keep your vowels in the back of your throat (even if you do
>speak German with a French accent) while smiling and saying "oouuoo" (try it,
>you'll see what I mean), the Great Vowel Shift came about and transformed the
>English language.
>
>The very richest had their vowels shifted right out in front of their teeth.
> They settled in Manchester and later in Boston.
>
>There were a few poor souls who, cut off from the economic prosperity of the
>wool trade, continued to swallow their vowels.  They wandered the countryside
>in misery and despair until they came to the docks of London, where their
>dialect devolved into the incomprehensible language known as Cockney.  Later,
>it was taken overseas and further brutalized by merging it with Dutch and
>Italian to create Brooklynese.
>
>That's what happened, you can check for yourself.  But I advise you tojust
>take our word for it.
>
>Copyright (c) 1994 Corrie Bergeron and Ben Tucker all rights reserved
>
>Permissions:  This may be reproduced in SCA newsletters for non-
>commercial purposes only.  (i.e., If you make any money off of it, send us a
>cut. <g>)
>
>Owen Alun is a wandering Cornish poet and harper whose travels have taken him
>to EVERY group in the Northshield.  Ben Tucker helps keep the St. Paul School
>District moving into the Information Age. (He recently wired his elementary
>school into the Internet so the kids can get on-line!)
>
>Brendan O Corraidhe is a wandering Irish singer and storyteller.
>Corrie Bergeron is the design coordinator for the next generation of PLATO
>educational software.
>
>
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Antony Green                                       Antaine O hUaithne
Department of Linguistics         #          Roinn na Teangeolaiochta
Morrill Hall                      |                     Halla Morrill
Cornell University               (|)                Ollscoil Chornell
Ithaca, NY 14853, USA            }_{             Ithaca, Nua Eabhrach
H: (607) 272-7431               ( v )       Stait Aontaithe Mheiricea
adg1 at cornell.edu                  |                  adg1 at cornell.edu
                  Go maire na teangacha Ceilteacha!
                    Bywio yr ieithoedd Celtaidd!
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