LL-L "Language survival" 2003.07.10 (07) [E]

[Lowlands-L]

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L O W L A N D S - L * 10.JUL.2003 (07) * ISSN 189-5582 * LCSN 96-4226
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A=Afrikaans Ap=Appalachian B=Brabantish D=Dutch E=English F=Frisian
L=Limburgish LS=Lowlands Saxon (Low German) N=Northumbrian
S=Scots Sh=Shetlandic V=(West)Flemish Z=Zeelandic (Ze굷s)
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From: Arthur Jones arthurobin2002 at yahoo.com
Subject: LL-L "Language survival" 2003.07.10 (03) [LS/V]

Lieve laaglanners,

During the very interesting debates of the recent past in this forum about
the role, rationale and future of Lowlands
Germanic speech, I was reminded of the historical importance and vibrance of
the ancestry of our family of languages.
The influences, both sub- and superstrate, of these echo hauntingly over the
millenia and still resonate today with a
familiarity that sometimes shocks.

Here is a good example. In about 370 A.D., the Gothic bishop Wulfila
("little wolf") translated much of the Christian
New Testament from Greek to Visigothic. One line in particular, from the
Book of Mark, Chapter 2, verse 6, goes:

"wesunuh than sumai thize bokarje jainar sitandans jah tha[n]gkjandans sis
in hairtam seinaim..."

The 21st Century Appalachian English equivalent would be: "They was then
some of these here 'bookers' yander a-sittin' and a-thankin' this in that
heart of their'n"

Or book English, "There were certain of the scribes sitting a distance away
at that time, and reasoning in their hearts..."

The original Greek for "scribes" was grammate/wn.

As recently as 1973, we saw Cyrillic script signs in small villages in
Macedonia and Kosovo for BOKARJE , translated as Notaries.

The point here is that, despite the passage of some 1600 years, the Gothic
ancestor of much of our Lowlands Germanic
is nearly comprehensible in places to speakers of modern English and other
Lowlands variants. We form part of a great
chain of cultural and linguistic history far too valuable to let disappear.

Thank all of you for preserving and strengthening that chain.

Met de besten groeten,

Arthur Jones

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