The UPenn IE Tree (a test)

[CONNOLLY at LATTE.MEMPHIS.EDU]

>On Tue, 31 Aug 1999 CONNOLLY at LATTE.MEMPHIS.EDU wrote:

>> How about this example: medieval Franch, Spanish, Italian etc. beside
>> medieval Latin, which certainly must be regarded as a living language
>> but was effectively indistinguishable from the "Vulgar Latin" that was
>> the actual source of these tongues?  Similarly, what about Sanskrit
>> (still living, for some Indians, and long kept alive for scholarly use)
>> and modern Indic languages?  If they are not descended precisely from
>> Sanskrit as codified by Pan.ini, that is mere chance; there would be no
>> *logical* problem in saying that they had, just as there is no logical
>> problem in saying that medieval Latin coexisted with its descendants,
>> the medieval romance tongues.

Sean Crist parried:

>In both the case of Latin and of Sanskrit, the earlier litrary/liturgical
>language was artifically preserved thru a specific prescriptive, scholarly
>effort.  Beyond a certain point, I doubt that they were anybody's native
>language.

I agree completely.  But what does that have to do with anything?  A language
is alive if it is used, i.e. spoken and often, as in these instances, written.
And we must concede that people -- even some Americans -- do use second
languages. -- On another track, doesn't your argument imply that Esperanto
could never be a living language, since it's nobody's first one?

>If I utter a novel sentence in, say, Tocharian B, does that mean that
>Tocharian B is a 'living' language?

No.  But if you said it to a group of people who understood it, and they could
and did reply in kind, the situation is different.  I realize that negatives
are difficult to prove, but what arguments could you present that Latin was not
a living language among medieval and renaissance churchmen and scholars?  They
could and did use it for all purposes.

Leo

Leo A. Connolly                         Foreign Languages & Literatures
connolly at memphis.edu                    University of Memphis