Re: for Alvin

From: richardwordingham
Message: 14386
Date: 2002-08-19

--- In cybalist@..., alexmoeller@... wrote:
> I dont want to make a big list here, I dont have the space for it.
But
> we should have to take a look at the simple things like numerals.
For
> instance eight and ten.
> They could never ever come from latin because normaly into romanian
the
> latin word "octo" should give perfectly into romanian "opt" . the
same
> ,ten, "dece" should give "zece". So is it , into romanian we have
opt
> and zece .But we have the months octombrie and decembrie .The
difference
> here is that octombrie and decembrie we know for sure trhey are
latin
> words ( rumanians old words are gustar and gerar) so the opt and
zece
> are supposed to come from latin. The comparation among
octombrie /octo
> /opt and decembrie /dece /zece shows that the romanins got something
> from latin ( the months) but not the opt and zece ( the numerals)

Octombrie / opt is very similar to the situation in French, where we
have octobre / huit. In French, -ct- became -it-, and this is what
we see in most simple words. However, other words have been (re-)
introduced, rather than inherited, from Latin.
(Admittedly 'octombrie' has undergone changes between Latin and
Rumanian.) The re-introduced words retain clusters that have been
modified in inherited words. The same process has operated, to a
lesser extent(?), in Rumanian. (This example does not show
that 'opt' was inherited from Latin rather than borrowed - that is a
different argument.)

English has many doublets where one form is a word borrowed from
French and inherited by French from Latin, and another form taken
directly from Latin, or at least with no evidence of borrowing via
French, e.g. 'frail' v. 'fragile', 'royal' v. 'regal'. One cannot
argue that only one form was ultimately derived from Latin. However,
only one form was _inherited_ by French from Latin. It is generally
the one which is most different from Latin, for there has been longer
for it to be modified.

Richard.