SV: [gothic-l] Re: The Vandalorum Museum

[Bertil Häggman]

Francisc,

Well, it depends on what definition you use.

It is not my opinion, I found it in Wolfram's "Die Germanen", who used 
the term "gotische Völker" in a rather cultural acception, for peoples 
that adopted Arianism and used Wulfila's Bible as sacred book. Here he 
includes, beside the Goths and other East-Germanic peoples 
(Burgundians, Gepids, Vandals) also a West-Germanic people 
(Longobards) and a non-Germanic people (Alans; it seems that the Alans 
that migrated westwards until Spain and accompanied the Vandals in 
North-Africa were more or less germanicized).
Regarding the Gothic and Vandalic languages, having in view that they 
were both East-Germanic languages and that in the first centuries of 
our era the Germanic languages in general were not very 
differentiated, one can assume that at that time the difference 
between two East-Germanic idioms, like Gothic and Vandalic, was still 
at the dialect level, they were not yet distinct languages. Of course, 
the adoption of Arianism and of the Gothic Bible by the Vandals helped 
to maintain the close relationship between Gothic and Vandalic, being 
a convergent factor that braked the naturally divergent evolutionary 
tendence of languages.
There is also some evidence that Gothic and Vandalic were very closely 
related:
A. Direct evidence:
1. The two short Vandalic texts posted long time ago to this list by 
Reikahardus:
<<in Florentinus' poem we read: _Frója armés!_ translated in Latin as 
'Domine miserere' - it was called from the Arian altars in North 
Africa. [in Wulfilan Gothic: Frauja armeis] The second sentence is 
usualy treated as Gothic text, but can be Vandalic as well. It comes 
from a North African poem entitled "De conviviis barbaris". We read 
there: _Inter eils goticum skapjamatzjajadrincan_ / Non audet quisquam 
dignos edicere versus_. The Gothic (or Vandalic) sentence is here: 
_Eils! Scapjam matzja(n) ja drincan_. 
In pure [Wulfilan] Gothic it could be: 
_Hails! Skapjam matjan jah drigkan_.>>
2. The Vanadalic proper names are very similar to the Gothic ones.
B. Indirect evidence: some ancient authors (I can not remember now 
exactly who) wrote that the Goths and Vandals spoke the same language.

Maybe it would be more correct, from a pure linguistic point of view, 
to speak not about Gothic, Gepidic, Vandalic, etc. languages, but 
rather about an East-Germanic language with Gothic, Gepidic, Vandalic, 
etc. dialects.
But, since we don't know very much about Vandalic, all this is only 
speculation.

Francisc

--- In gothic-l at y..., bertil <mvk575b at t...> wrote:
> Francisc,
> 
> Thank you for your mail on the question of Vandals. Are you sure the 
Vandals can be regarded as a "Gothic people"? Earlier we discussed the 
Eruli on this list and I think it was Tore, who wrote that they could 
not be regarded as Gothic, when I claimed that Procopius wrote about 
the Eruli as Gothic. I guess Vandalic was influenced by Gothic 
especially through Wulfila's bible as both Goths and Vandals professed 
arianism. 
> 
> Gothic-vandalically
> 
> Bertil


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