Sheesh, you folks are too smart even for this college boy. But this is surely a good thing. Brains before beauty people!

Metric system vs. Pounds and Feet
 

The metric system, so neat and clean, increasing in multiples of ten, is the most scientific system of measurement. It was devised in 18th century France by scientists like Lavoisier (my favourite) under the rule of Louis 16.

Length: mm, cm, dm, meter, deca, hecto, kilometer
Mass: Grams... ... Kilograms
Temperature: Celsius.

Compare that with Pound-oz, inch-feet-yards, fathoms, furlongs, miles, leagues, fahrenheit system, with no head or tail, no co-ordination or interrelation!!! Just wondering, I mean no offence to anyone. :rolleyes:

Water boils at 100 degree Celsius and freezes at zero degree. Neat!
The Triple point of water is 0.01°C. :yes:

Now, water boils at 212°Fahrenheit and freezes at 32!!! Triple point of water is 32.018 °F. :no:

One cubic centimeter of water has a volume of 1 milli-liter, so 1000 cc = 1 L. Neat and clean, no confusion!

1 ounce= 16 drams = 480 grains = 1/12 pound :confused:
1 gallon = 231 cubic inches! :frown:
1 pint = 28.875 cubic inches. :p Bring me the calculator!

1 mile = 1760 yards = 5280 ft = 63360 inches. Wow! :(
1 Km = 1000 m = 100,000 cm. Smooth! :respect:

Without the concept of zero, invented in India, there would be no decimal system, Girlie!

WTF? Way to go off on a tangent.

Avoirdupois weights are far more complex than you imagine btw. You can blame the French for them too.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Avoirdupois

And as for the concept of Zero, sorry but what the fuck does that have to do with your faulty logic? Your shit still makes no sense.

Also, zero is not exactly an amazing discovery, it's not like every culture in the world had zero. Oh wait, they did. You don't get the importance of zero in the decimal system, it's not the role of zero as a number, but of the numeral zero's use as a positional digit that enables the decimal system. Although the use of zero in not actually essential, the use of any positional digit works the same.

Anyway, your logic is still faulty.


<Seseme logic>
Oh lets see, zero was first written in South America by the Olmecs, therefore the Indians must have copied them, all zero's everywhere originate from the Olmecs.
</>

Can you show us some pictures or post links?

Stone Artifacts, eh? It sounds fishy!!

The earliest human bones have been found in Tianyuan Cave, near Beijing, China.
http://newsimg.bbc.co.uk/media/image...e_pnas_203.jpg
Its 42000 years old, belonging to a fully developed Homo sepiens.
By the "Out of Africa" theory, Homo sapiens originated in E. Africa and then spread out across the globe about 70,000 years ago.
The first Homo neanderthalensis or Neanderthals were from Europe and Central Asia and lived around 500,000 years ago. The earliest humanoid species Homo habilis lived in Africa around 2.2 million years ago. But they moved on all fours! Apes basically. Homo erectus 2 million years ago existed in Africa, Eurasia, Java, they first stood on two feet. We only have fossils belonging to these 2 earliest species from around 2 million years ago.

Now, Anna, my clever friend, how can you get 2.6 million years old stone ARTIFACTS? Are you inventing them? Or did the aliens present you with the alleged artifacts?

Link

Lol, stumped you there eh?

Semaw, S., M. J. Rogers, J. Quade, P. R. Renne, R. F. Butler, M. Domínguez-Rodrigo, D. Stout, W. S. Hart, T. Pickering, and S. W. Simpson. 2003. 2.6-Million-year-old stone tools and associated bones from OGS-6 and OGS-7, Gona, Afar, Ethiopia. Journal of Human Evolution 45:169-177.

I don't have any pictures of the particular finds, but I can tell you the tools were Oldowan, which consist of Awls, Unifacial and Bifacial choppers, Burins (used for engraving) and Scrapers.

Australopithecus, Paranthropus and Homo Habilis were all know to use Oldowan tools. The first 2 were around before 2.6 million years ago, Homo Habilis apeared 2.2 million years ago so was late to the Oldowan party.

Pliocene 2.6 mill humanoid tools
I got it. Thank you Anna, honestly.

There you go. Follow my wisdom grasshopper.

:p There she goes again, boasting bush baby!

Fire was invented in China. You can't be serious Sesame.

Lol, I missed that one, I think Seseme is trying to replace the out of Africa Theory with out of Asia. lol.

A veritable plethora of linguistic equivalence examples, Sesame. As such it quite definitely puts the modest selection you originally requested from me firmly into the shade. Heigh-ho ! But it's still all you're going to get from me off-the-cuff ! !

Meantime, as etymological interest still seems to show a few signs of life in this thread, here's a little palindrome from Ancient Greece to keep your appetite sharp ! I haven't bothered to include the accenting it doesn't really affect the meaning of the words. No doubt you will tease out the translation as it's not too obscure :

niyonὀnomhma mh monon ὀyin ( could even make a good advert for detergent perhaps ! )

Goddamit, I want answers!!!

Anna, the Vedic concept of zero is generally attributed to Indian culture, as the concept is much larger than just fulfilling the role of a place holder, and here is perhaps why India is historically given credit for the development as opposed to other cultures. "Zero" functions as an obvious place-holder in our own base-ten numerical system of mathematics, but if we used a different base of numerology, the concept would lose significance. In fact, the idea of a place-holder is entirely theoretical, as a system of numerology could in fact have a hypothetical infinite number of symbols to represent each place of standing within said numerology.

As the Vedic conception stands, "zero" functions as MUCH more than just a place-holder, but a concept for the idea of "nothing" as can result from mathematical computations. At the broadest interpretation, zero is akin to the mythical conception of "Om," or a certain understanding of unity with the divine. More importantly, it puts the entire concept of numerology in a linear fashion whereby which numerology can be expressed as both positive and negative functions of values, whereby "zero" functions as a balancing point at the pendulum of this scale. This is a RADICAL way of thinking about numbers, if you can step outside of our current conception and look at the historical development of mathematics.

As to fire being "invented" (or more appropriately, "developed") in China, I would disagree with this larger premise, but I would suggest that Sesame chose a poor choice of words to express a larger concept. I suspect he meant to imply that "fire" was akin to "fireworks," or an artistry of using fire and flammable materials. I'll let him clarify his own position, but if this broader definition is applied, I most hardily agree, as our classical notion of "fireworks" is almost universally credited to the region of China.

For that matter, I don't think that Sesame necessarily espouses a Indo-centric perspective of human development, but I think that he attempts to counter the rather obvious Euro-centric view that has come to dominate MUCH of academia. Contemporary studies have done much to discredit the Euro-centric view, and this is admirable, but we still have MUCH to learn. The West still has much to embrace that came from the East, or farther. Even with our best hypotheses of how the "New World" came to be settled, it is our Mayan ancestors that developed perhaps the single best calendar in the history of mankind. Their calendar is more accurate (down to tenths or hundredths of a second) than our own Gregorian means of keeping time. This makes you really ponder what we consider "primitive" culture???

Zero
 

Mathematics is nothing without zero or the decimal calculating system. Anna is trying her best to undermine this fact. But argument without the courage to admit when a truth is arrived at, is not worth carrying on.

GRH, its easy to learn Sanskrit. Buy a Gita with the meaning analyzed underneath each line, word for word. This way you will see that several words are coming again and again, and some are just parts of speech. I learnt Sanskrit this way. Then you can know for yourself what is being said. Later on, learn some elementary Sanskrit grammer. Its quite easy. But dont expect to understand the Vedic hymns with such knowledge. The early Vedas are not really in Sanskrit. Its an ancient form which is very complex. When I tried to read it the first time, I felt that my teeth will fall off and my tongue will form a knot! Some letters have become extinct, their pronounciation vanished from known memory. Such is also the case with the rhythm, Vedic chhanda. Its extinct too... some obscure himalayan tribes and the South Indian Pundits are aware of a few.

Ther's some recent archaelogical eveidence of neolithic North American settlements which tends to support the second idea, but the first still holds good because of the geological evidence and the fact that North & South American Indians have certain Mongoloid features. It is also said that Tupac indians have a language with many features in common with Chinese, but this might just be fanciful thinking or some pushy academic trying to make a name for himself !

Zero
 

Mathematics is nothing without zero or the decimal calculating system. Anna is trying her best to undermine this fact. But argument without the courage to admit when a truth is arrived at, is not worth carrying on.

GRH, its easy to learn Sanskrit. Buy a Gita with the meaning analyzed underneath each line, word for word. This way you will see that several words are coming again and again, and some are just parts of speech. I learnt Sanskrit this way. Then you can know for yourself what is being said. Later on, learn some elementary Sanskrit grammer. Its quite easy. But dont expect to understand the Vedic hymns with such knowledge. The early Vedas are not really in Sanskrit. Its an ancient form which is very complex. When I tried to read it the first time, I felt that my teeth will fall off and my tongue will form a knot! Some letters have become extinct, their pronounciation vanished from known memory. Such is also the case with the rhythm, Vedic chhanda. Its extinct too... some obscure himalayan tribes and the South Indian Pundits are aware of a few.

Language of Jesus
 

In which Language did Jesus Christ speak to his fellow men?

1. Hebrew
2. Aramaic
3. Greek
4. Latin
5. French ;)
6. German
7. English
8. Arabic :p

Below is Titian's painting named "Noli Me Tangere".

Aramaic.

Okay Sesame next question and this time try to make it challenging.

Ok, Ila, your wish is my command.

What is Aramaic? ;)

Your two main points:

Vedic zero was the first concept of nothing invented. WRONG!
Zero only has meaning in base ten. WRONG!

Also, negative numbers were invented in Hellenistic Egypt, so this whole balance of negative and positive around zero didn't exist when it was invented by the Indians.

Sorry, but whats all this about numerology? I thought we were talking abut mathematics here.

Okay, sesame it's time to revive this thread.

Aramaic is a Semitic language that was thought to be the language that Jesus spoke. Aramaic belongs to the Canaanite languages which is includes Hebrew and Arabic. It is still spoken by small groups of Christians, Jews, and Arabs in the Middle East. If I'm not mistaken the alphabet used in Aramaic is the forerunner of the Hebrew alphabet.

This information is easily verifiable if one does an internet search. I did not however, do a search for any of this information. What I wrote is all from knowledge I have picked up over the years as well as my travels in the Middle East.

Now, sesame I asked you to challenge me. Ask me something that I will at least have to do a search on.

While you are trying to think of something I have several questions for you.

1. How many languages are in common use in the country of China (dialects excluded)?

2. What is the main language of China?

3. How did the main language of China become the main language?

4. How much influence did the Mongol language of Ghengis Khan have on the Chinese languages?

I look forward to your report, sesame. (BTW I don't know the answers to any of the questions that I posed)

مرحبا بكم جميعا

hi every body

اتمنى ان تكونوا بخير

I wish that you are fine

لغتي الام هي العربية

my native language is arabic

كما اني اتكلم الانكليزية

also , i can speak english

@@@@@@@@@@@@

What is Aramaic?

ila gave us the answer and it was so right

I would like to add that I got several friends in my country who are using aramic to communicate with each others side by side whith arabic language


I would like to say that in my country ( Iraq ) , there are several ethnic groups each have her own language

we have arabs ( majority ) speak arabic and should learn english in school from 5 th stage and up

and Kurd >> who are using Krdish language which differ completely from arabic and turky

and turman >> who speak turky

keldan - who speak aramic

in addition to paresian language which is used by peoples who live on Iraqian- Iranian borders


ila , and every one , any question about arabic language will be my pleasure to answer you


مع حبي

with my love

Thankyou very much for your informative post and your offer of help. It is so very nice to have a someone whose native tongue is Arabic give us some more information.:respect:

Edit: I forgot to thank you for the Arabic - English translation.

Golly!
 

Yeah, ha ha:lol:
Ila, you little turtle, it took you one whole year to answer my question. So, I will answer your 4 questions within the upcoming four years. Until then, rest in peace.:p

sesame, you might have gotten an answer much sooner had you not kept disappearing for months at a time.

Word Origins
 

Pitri ~ Pituh ~Pita (Sanskrit origin)
Padre (Portuguese, Spanish, Italian)
Father (English)
Bateren (Japanese)

alcool الكحول Arabic original word
alcool Early Portuguese
alcohol English, French

nagna (Sanskrit)
naakt (Dutch)~~Latin=nudo :p
nacod (Early English)
naked (modern English)

Al-Zabr (Arabic) الجبر
Algebra (Latin)
algebra (English)

ila (Sanskrit meaning, Earth, Word, Water) :p

What does Igirisu in Japanese mean?

Google was my friend in answering this since I know only a few Japanese words and cannot put together a complete sentence in Japanese.

Igirisu - has been translated as England, Great Britain, and United Kingdom.

You missed pater (Latin)

alcool - (French, at least in Canada and therefore if not used in modern French alcool would be early French since that is the style of French spoken by Quebecois and Acadians. French Canadians please correct me if I am wrong.)

The Japs cannot pronounce 'L' ;). So, the word "English" became igirisu in Japanese tongue.

Where did the word Assassin come from?



Hash-shashin in Arabic, refers to an ancient Ismail-Persian sect, skilled in the art of killing. (sort of Arabic Ninjas). They lived in N. Iran near Alamoot between 780-1330AD; and were also called as Nissari's. They secretly formed a society that organised political and religious murders of the noblemen of antipathetic sects.

I believe the origin is in Persian. A ruler/tribal chief in Persia used to give his mercenaries hash to get high before they went out to eliminate their enemies. The orginal word was hashasin. (I didn't need your hint btw)

Ila, my friend, thats called cheating!!! :lol:
You read my ghostwriting!:D

Opium is of little importance in regard to these Nissari killers.:no:

Reread the part of my sentence in parentheses where I said I didn't need your hint. I didn't know that you had even put it in until I replied quoting your post and saw the ghostwriting then.

Word= Azure
 

Remember those Diazo Reactions in organic chemistry?
The word azo comes from Azure, meaning blue.
Where did Azure come from?

Ich sprech ein wenig Deutsche, enough to get by. Then I know basic words and phrases-"hello," "goodbye," "please," "thank you," etc.-of a few other European languages, Mexican Spanish and Japanese. Oh, and I can cuss people out in them, too!

The short answer I would guess is Latin, however it will have deeper roots than that. The root word might possibly be in Sanskrit, but for some reason I'm thinking Phoenecian. I will see what I can come up with.

I wasn't even close in the origins of azure. According to Wikipedia the word originated in Persian, was adopted into old French, and then into English.

Azure
 

Azure came from the Persian word Lazwardh meaning a deep blue mineral called Lapis Lazuli. Medieval Sanskrit has a word called Laajwant, also meaning Lapis. But I guess it's inherited from the Persian. Alexander the Great came to India in 326 BC after conquering Persia. At that time all the Brahmins spoke in Sanskrit, the general masses in Pali.


Now, speaking of Organic Chemistry, how did we get the word Chemistry?

hi

how did we get the word Chemistry?

some authors saied that it was derived from arabic from the name الكمي which mean the brave man

i think so ?

the Assassin came from hash-shashin , حشاشين in arabic , they were an insane killing-machines not only in north iran but also in a the great cities like Cairo and Demscus ( in syria ) but later on the حشاشين became more isolated non-violent organization that help weak peoples aganist the bad peoples !


many words are from arabic like

ameral _ the ship captin

which came from arabic ... امير البحر prounounced ( ameer al- bahr )


thank you all for those great info. about language

My native language is Dutch (Belgian version, Vlaams) and I can have a fairly fluent conversation in English, French and German. I can sort of comprehensively order something in a bar in Polish, Norwegian, Danish, Spanish, Portuguese and Italian but that's about as far as my liguistic capabilities go.

Az anyanyelvem magyar.
My mother tongue is hungarian.

Magical word origin
 

What is the origin of the word:

Quotes
 

What majesty should be, what duty is,
Why day is day, night is night, and time is time.
Were nothing but to waste night, day, and time.
Therefore, since brevity is the soul of wit,
And tediousness the limbs and outward flourishes,
I will be brief. Your noble son is mad.:no:

Alas, Gentle ila, nobe ila, is mad!:p


I'm just pulling your leg, ila dear!

Hi there.

That reminds me of a series of manuals:

How to be brief, in 36 volumes.

JohnDowe.

Hi there.

Ethimology, archeology paleanthology, mathematical theories, and all this because someone asked about the languages you spoke?

Facinating!

But i speak french and english, only?

JohnDowe.

Johndowe & ila
 

sesame, you only posted this yesterday. I didn't have time to answer it. I do have a life beyond this forum. I intended to do some research, on abracadabra, before answering. I would have been surprised at the results though because my original inclination was that the word has arabic origins.

Monogram
 

Ihesus Hominum Salvator (IHS) : some say that it stands for In His Service, but the truth is something else.

IHESUS HOMINUM SALVATOR

Its in Latin meaning, Jesus, savior of mankind.

In Greek, Jesus was spelt like Ihesus.

Very Old english
 

These are the Nineth century Anglo Saxon alphabets. Note that K, W, Y are missing and there's a new letter after T and there's an alien looking S instead of Z! To sum up, I must assume that the English alphabets were less than 26 at that time.

In the next picture, taken from the Library of Minerva, Rome, 9th century, K, W, X, Y, Z are missing. Again, there is an extra S. I think this S was pronounced like Z and was later placed at the end, where Z is now.

Мамицу вам болесну свима педерчине изопачене што вас не побаци, но вас роди такве,све би ја вас од ува до ува разрезо

Speaking of languages this question comes to my mind......
Which country has the highest number of recognised laguages??
I think it is INDIA

I think that you are right, although I'm sure PRC is not far behind. I'm pretty sure that our esteemed and learned friend sesame will be able to give us a definitive answer, or perhaps Jenae may know.

Indian Languages
 

The Total number of Indian languages, that are still in use will add upto 1,500 or more. That is because there are very twisted dialects of the same language structure if you move to different regions of the same state. There are 28 states in all.

The languages recognised by the govt. and spoken by the majority (more than 10,000) may be summed up as 122. And since there are 28 states, there should be 28 official languages, one for each state!:p
Well, there are 29 Main languages. Urdu, the Royal language of the Muslim poets, is also an Indian language.

The national language is Hindi. The name India is derived from Hindusthan. Hindu + Sthan meaning the abode of Hindus. The word Hindu came from the river Sindhu (Indus), on whose basin, the Aryan civilization grew up. In my opinion, the national language should have been Sanskrit, since it is the mother of all Indian languages.

Indian languages have assimilated many words from foreign tongues. They include Persian, Arabic, Portuguese, English, French, Turkish, Chinese, Greek, Roman and Bactrian (Bakhtar) (remember the Bactrians, Greeks, Greco-Bactrians who came with Alexander 325 BC ? They opened up a trade route with ancient India. Thats how Gandhara style of Art flourished.)

Parece-me que não há "falantes" de português neste forum.
(It seems there's no portuguese speackers in this forum.) Could be from: Portugal, Brasil, Angola, Cabo Verde, São Tomé e Príncipe, Moçambique, Timor and all over the world where the "diaspora" is.

That's probably because this is an English site. People that come on here communicate in English. Any other language limits the number of people that are able to read what is posted; and why would anyone want to limit the number of people that can read what is posted?

Since I live in a Latinamerican country (Colombia) my mother tongue is Spanish. I majored in English Philology which is my passion, and hopefully will follow an specialization in English-Spanish translation. I also studied some French and Japanese.
As for French, Je le souvien encore. Je ne le parle pas, mais j'aime lire en Francais.
I have completely forgot all the Japanese I learnt.

i am actially not.

СИТЕ ВЕ САКАМ:hug:

Does it say Mazel Tov?

Mazel Tov: מזל טוב (good luck)
I think it's something like make peace, create peace or so. But I can't read a word. That's what google said me.

Thanx, sesame for the info....some bit of research there....:respect:

languages: one of my favorite non-TS topics
 

I can't believe I missed this thread for so long. I decided at a young age that I wanted to be a polyglot, and so languages became my academic specialty. I read some and read/speak others. When I was young, beginning at junior high school age, I spent a lot of time trying to teach myself to read new languages. I went on to study Classics as an undergraduate and then got a PhD in ancient studies, which meant learning most of the Canaanite/Semitic dialects of the ancient Near Eastern world (Akkadian, Hittite, Moabite, Phoenician, Chaldean, etc.), as well as Hebrew, Aramaic, and Sanskrit. I taught Ancient Greek and Latin at the university level. In addition, I have learned to speak and read German and French (fluently), and I'm reasonably proficient in Spanish and Italian. I can get by in Portuguese and Romanian, and lately I've been challenging myself with other Germanic languages (since English is a Germanic language, and I know German): these include Swedish, Norwegian, and Danish, which I try to read on a regular basis. I've never learned any Asian languages, except for a bit of Vietnamese when I volunteered to teach English to immigrants from Vietnam a long time ago. They mostly spoke French, too, but I insisted on picking up some of their native language.

I have quite good Japanese fluency!

日本語はすきです！:p

To further confuse you all
 

Dear all, after having lived in Malaysia, i have been exposed to malay, (both versions spoken in malaysia as well as indonesia), thai, chinese, indian (several dialects) and some other european languages. Nevertheless, i shall gloat about being able to speak any one of the above mentioned languages. I can only manage my life, food, shopping, etc needs if i were to be stuck in these places. However, i would like to share with you the main reason why i could not learn chinese. There are 4 main dialects of chinese language (dialect but each is completely different from the other) and the official version, which is called Mandarin Chinese. In general chinese language has roughly about 2000 characters, and each character is an equivalent of a "word" in our so called western understanding. However each character has 4 inntonations (ways of reading/pronounciation). Each pronounciation would mean something completely different. Furthermore, there are four dialects - Cantonese, Hakka, Hokkien, Teo Chew, which each has 2000 characters with 4 inntonations. In order to be able to fully speak Chinese (or consider yourself to be fully able to speak chinese) the formula goes as such:

(Mandarin X 2000 characters X 4 intonations)+(cantonese X 2000 characters X 4 intonations)+(Hakka X 2000 characters X 4 intonations)+(Hokkien X 2000 characters X 4 intonations)+(Teo Chew X 2000 characters X 4 intonations) = God Knows What....

I don't really know what is the outcome of this formula, however, if i am not mistaken, the equivalent of "tea" from Japan to Greece (including all other countries in between) is "chay" or a very similar pronounciation of "cha"...

I've picked up a few books and audio CD's to try to brush up on my French. I took three years of French in high school, but I don't remember a whole lot of it, and I was NEVER good at hearing the language spoken.

I'd like to try to gain some French fluency so I can be more competent should I emigrate to Canada or France someday, something I have seriously considered.

I took French for six years in school and never really learned very much. A lot of the fault lies in the method of teaching languages in school. I learned more French in a few months out in the working world than I ever learned in the classroom. My hat is off to anyone that can learn any second language.

Oh no! Our polar bear has become a frog!



Just kidding! ;)

Nope, not really. I can barely speak any French at all.

I got 50% in Grade 9 and then that was it for me since it was no longer mantatory to take.;)

nessuno parla italiano?
nobody speaks Italian?

watashi wa nihongo chotto o hanashimasu.

Succulent Tongues
 

What will you opine about someone who can speak 5 other languages besides vernacular? Eh, eh, eh, Monsieur Papa Bear? :p

My first language is German but I prefer to speak English. I tried to learn Russian when i was younger but i screwed up :(

You can speak two languages. That is still pretty good!:respect:

I'm fluent in Elvish and Klingon.

Then you need to get out more. :lol:

I gotta hit the conventions and bring home an Elven maiden.

I wanna be the "Lord of her Ring". ;) lol

Yeah, I remember when I had my first beer. :lol:

Thanks to you, sir.
But I think English and German arent?t that hard to learn. There are languages like Japanese, Mandarin...you have to learn the "letters", the speech and the gestures. Thats a lot to handle :)

I have long argued with my students and others that German is the easiest language for English speakers to learn. In America, most young people think it is Spanish. But English is a Germanic language, and approximately 60% of English derives directly from Germany. I found it very easy to learn German and now speak and read fluently.

I do agree with you, smc. I found German very easy to pick up. The sentence structure is so similar that I was able to form correct sentences without having to think about it. It didn't take long for me to be able to think in German and when speaking or listening to German I never had to mentally translate between English and German to carry on a conversation.

Of all the dialects in German I like the Vorarlberg, Austria dialect the best. It is very easy to understand and native speakers speak slowly and clearly, enunciating their words.

Did you compared it to Dutch, Danish, Icelandic, Norwegian and Swedish (also Germanic based), but the grammar could be more similar to English.
Or only compared with World languages, witch wouldn?t exclude Dutch.

I read Dutch, which is in the West Germanic sub-group of Germanic languages, and thus most closely related to German and English. I find Dutch difficult to speak because of the odd, rounded vowel sounds; whenever I try, I sound really off. I also read Danish, Norwegian, and Swedish with varying degrees of proficiency, and can speak Swedish after I'm in Sweden for a few days (or my Stockholm friends visit). These are Germanic languages in the sub-group of North Germanic languages, also known as Nordic languages.

I would say from my own experience that Danish is the easiest of the North Germanic languages, because Danish strikes me as the closest to German of these particular languages, both grammatically and syntactically. Of the North Germanic languages, Danish and Swedish share a similar sub-sub-group generally called East Scandinavian. Norwegian, Icelandic, and Faroese are in the West Scandinavian branch, further removed from the original German.

Icelandic is an interesting case, because while it is Germanic in vocabulary, it has an inflectional grammar that's like Latin and even more like Old English.

You can probably tell that languages are of great interest to me. :)

I read once that up to the widespread use of printing presses, when spelling was becoming standardized, that Dutch used to be considered a dialect of German.

I don't want to start an argument here about which is considered a language in its own right as the Dutch will claim, and rightly so, that Dutch is a language and not a dialect. There is also Frisian which I have heard some Dutch say is a dialect, but the Frisians will say that it is a language. I once saw a program on German television in which everyone was speaking Frisian. At first I thought that I was listening to English.

I have had the same experience with Frisian. It sounds very much like English. I won't take a position on the Dutch language or dialect question, but direct your attention -- just to muddy the waters -- to the question of Flemish. :rolleyes:

Frisian is spoken in Netherlands, German and Denmark, and is close to Scots.
Wouldn?t that make Dutch and Danish as easy as German to learn? (if you didn?t leaned German first)

I for one had always problems with languages, I wish they were more logic and simple, but that would make them less interesting.

You are muddying the waters, smc. I have known and worked with a great many Dutch and Flemish people. I would say that Flemish is only slightly different than Dutch, not even enough of a difference to call it a dialect. My Dutch friends, in my experience, would agree with me. My Flemish friends would disagree. I really don't want to take a side on this question and as I have a great deal of respect for all of the Dutch and Flemish friends that I have. I have been to both Holland and Belgium and I liked both countries. I did however often find Dutch and Flemish hard to follow.

I can't see that Frisian is close to Scots. Frisian is a Germanic language and Scots belongs to the Celtic family.

I feel like such a troglodyte reading through this thread.:blush:

That was my point precisely. I didn't express an opinion but only pointed a light on the Dutch/Flemish question. My experience is also the same with Dutch and Flemish people viz. how they would characterize their languages.

I am resisting the temptation to write this post in a language other than English. Here, shadows, are some possible new avatars for you, offered with my best wishes. :lol:

Frisian sounds very similar to English. I can speak it too, but I prefer to speak Westphalian. Has anyone of you heard Saxon so far? Its the funniest German dialect :)

"Funniest" is definitely the right word for Saxonian, although my friends in Dresden would not appreciate that characterization.

The last time I was in Germany, I visited them and late one night we were on Theaterplatz, in front of the Semperoper or the Zwinger museum (I can't remember for sure). There was a guy dressed as one of the Saxony kings, doing a street show. He had torchbearers and even his "wenchy" mistress by his side. He was doing a comedy show about Bavarians. He explained how he had sent his ambassadors to Munich to help them, and they reported back to him about the Bavarians: "they are rolling in the muddy streets all the time, fighting," and "they drink their beer out of barrels with handles on them." I was in Dresden with another friend, from Munich, and she had to help me understand the thick Saxonian of his speaking (she also taught at the university in Dresden, part-time, and had come to understand the dialect quite well). It was really funny: as she helped me with the parts I couldn't understand, and realized the insults, she became more and more agitated until she shouted out something in Saxonian that was a real insult to the king. One of his guards came at her with his lance, menacingly, and then everyone cracked up laughing!

I?m ungifted in speeches, for me, a middle strong dialect sounds like a different language, so I can only say what people told me or ask the internet. I even can?t remember if I ever heard someone speaking (Lowland) Scots.

answers.yahoo.com

Wikipedia Frisian_languages

mamalisa.com

I think ila's two points, both of which I agree with, are that a) Frisian sounds like English, and b) it is not considered a part of the Germanic family but is a Celtic language. These classifications are made on a basis that takes the sound of the language into consideration only marginally, if at all.

When I referred to Scottish I actually meant Gaelic which is not accurate since lowland Scots is descended from Old English. Gaelic is part of the Celtic languages, but is not called Scottish. Rather it is often referred to as Scottish Gaelic, Scots Gaelic, and Highland Gaelic. Reference is here

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scottish_Gaelic

While those are very nice pictures and worthy of consideration for Avatarhood, I will be sticking with the one I am currently using.;):)

Thanks for the funny pics, though.;):respect: