[tied] Re: Black Athena: The Afroasiatic RootsofClassicalCivilizati

--- In cybalist@yahoogroups.com, Piotr Gasiorowski <gpiotr@...> wrote:

>
> On 2006-06-09 13:56, aquila_grande wrote:
>
> > Your examples of other areas having definite article in several
> > languages is actially going in fabour of my assumption, not

against

> > it.
>
> It only shows that the presence of the definite article _may_ be an
> areal thing. I don't think the Germanic and Romance article systems

in

> Western Europe are independent of each other, but that's because of

some

> characteristic typological features that characterise the "West
> European" convergence area and do not occur in the neighbouring

areas.

> Those features include the coexistence of (preposed) definite

articles

> with indefinite articles derived from the numeral "one" (ein, a,

un,

> etc.) and the rise of the category of determiners, of which the

articles

> are a subcategory. I don't think AA systems are really similar; the
> affinity is only superficial. Areal developments don't consist in
> unilateral diffusion anyway; the languages of a sprachbund co-

evolve in

> parallel and influence one another reciprocally.
>

I think I'll Popperize mr. Eagle's theory further: The use of the
article in Romance and Germanic has its origin in the ultimately
victorious sectarian language of the Christian minority, based
Semitic-influenced Greek. Such is the way of religions and language.
Walla, min habibi! as the I'm told the youth of Copenhagen say.


Torsten