[gothic-l] Yiddish is based on Ostrogothic

[Tim O'Neill]

l_labkovsky at hotmail.com wrote:
>
>  Now I know the reason for the confusion regarding the Gothic origins
> of Yiddish. The Gothic language according to the Encyclopedia
> Britannica is actually two different languages: the Ostrogothic and
> the Visigothic, similar to the Mandarin and Cantonese branches of the
> Chinese language. Mandarin speakers can't even understand the
> Cantonese speakers.

I'm sure others will respond to this point as well, but
suffice it to say for now that this assertion that
Visigothic and Ostrogothic were as different as Mandarin
and Cantonese is simply nonsense.  *ALL* the evidence we
have indicates that the two branches of the Gothic language
were completely intelligible to each other right into the
sixth century - to the extent that they are usually simply
referred to as 'Gothic'; ie one language, though possibly
with some slight dialect differences.

Once again, if you cited some detailed evidence to support
these and the other claims you've made you might get a
little further in getting us to take this theory seriously.

> Back to Gothic, all existing Gothic texts
> according to Britannica are of the Visigothic origin. And let me tell
> you, this was one weird language, totally different from the
> mainstream German.

Because (i) it was spoken 1500 years ago and (ii), as has
been explained to you at length several times now, Gothic
is an East Germanic language and modern German is a
West Germanic language.  Old Norse is 'totally different
from mainstream German' as well for similar reasons.
Old High German is totally different to modern German
also.  This proves nothing.

> But the Ostrogothic language was quite similar to
> the regular German and also Yiddish.

Evidence please.  If we have no surviving Ostrogothic
texts, what are you basing this assertion on? Many of
the people on this list are linguists - if you want
them to take this theory seriously, please present
the detailed linguistic evidence you're basing it on.

>If you read "The Thirteenth
> Tribe" by A.Koestler he mentions an Israeli professor A.Poliak who
> compared Ostrogothic words used by Crimean Goths and found them
> similar to Yiddish words.

Poliak was not a linguist and his vague idea that Gothic
had some influence on Yiddish is based on shaky evidence
which he clearly didn't understand fully.  His book is
'Khazaria - The History of a Jewish Kingdom in Europe'
(in Hebrew - Mossad Bialik, Tel Aviv, 1951)

Koestler writes:

'Poliak has proposed an additional hypothesis concerning
the early origins of Yiddish, which deserves to be
mentioned, though it is rather problematical.  He thinks
the "shape of early Yiddish emerged in the Gothic regions
of the Khazar Crimea.  In those regions the conditions of
life were bound to bring about a combination of Germanic
and Hebrew elements hundreds of years before the
foundations of the settlements in the Kingdoms of Poland
and Lithuania." ' (Koestler, p. 157)

The evidence Poliak bases this on are the well known
accounts of Joseph Barbaro in the mid-fifteenth century
and Ghiselin de Busbeq, both writing about Crimean
Gothic speakers being intelligible to German speakers.
Of course, this is simply explained by the general
similarities between simple words and sentences in
many Germanic languages and certainly doesn't warrant
the hypothesis that Gothic is the origin of Yiddish.
And neither Poliak nor Koestler say anything
about Sarmato-Gothic 'mulattoes' converting to Judaism.

Koestler continues:

'Poliak considers this (Crimean Gothic) vocabulary to be
close to the MHG elements found in Yiddish.  He thinks
the Crimean Goths kept contact with other Germanic tribes
and that their language was influenced by them.  Whatever
one may think of it, it is a hypothesis worth the linguist's
attention.' (Koestler, p. 158)

I'll let some linguists comment on what they think, but it
is pretty clear that Germanic linguistics was not Poliak's
forte.

>  You wouldn't accuse Poliak, a Jew, of having nefarious
> intentions towards Jews, would you?

Poliak says nothing about 'mulattoes' or rabbis 'tricking'
Sarmato-Goths into converting to Judaism.  At most, he makes
a vague hypothesis regarding Yiddish and Crimean Gothic
which demonstrates that he didn't really know much about
Germanic linguistics, as has already been demonstrated to
you at length.  So no, no-one is suspecting *Poliak* of
anything nefarious at all.

> And I don't want
> to discuss u and i and a because you can go in circles all day long.

Then why post your strings of unsubstantiated assertions
to a *discussion* list if you aren't prepared to *discuss*
them and support them with evidence and detailed argument?

> Look at the big picture. In order for Yiddish to come from Middle
> High German you first have to prove that German Jews arrived in
> Eastern Europe in any significant numbers and no such proof exists.

This is a discussion list for Gothic language and history,
so it's not surprising we have no experts here on Jewish
migration into Eastern Europe.  The fact remains that your
theory is supported by no evidence at all and the majority
of historians do believe in the migration you dismiss.
Excuse me if I stick with the historians.

> Ostrogoths and Sarmatians however already lived in Ukraine. Haha!

You still have presented no evidence that (i) Gothic had
any lingusitic influence on Yiddish or (ii) that any Goths
and/or Sarmatians converted to Judaism.  Considering the
number of posts you've presented on this subject, this
complete lack of any detailed evidence  is strange, to say
the very least.

Tim O'Neill

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