I was just looking at Wikipedia and linked articles
and was amazed by the all the scenarios.
Some do link Semitic, Tamazight and Egyptian and some
claim Egyptian and Semitic separated c. 6,000 BCE,
etc.
Some have Chadic linked to Egyptian, etc. There's a
plethora of scenarios.
I can well imagine Chadic has a very strong substrate
rooted in Nilo-Saharan and Niger-Kordofanian but the
Wik. article mentioned that Chadic languages in the
same sub-branch only share less than 30% of their
vocabulary. That's quite diverse.
Semitic word lists give the impression that Semitic
languages aren't much more diverse than Romance
--although I realize the lists are only including
cognates. There's not much on South Semitic languages
from Yemen--are they outliers?
--- Richard Wordingham <
richard@...>
wrote:
> --- In cybalist@yahoogroups.com, Rick McCallister
> <gabaroo6958@...> wrote:
>
> > While when I see a list of words from Semitic,
> > Egyptian and Tamazight I can see the relationship
> but
> > when the other branches are added, I need some
> > enlightened text to explain how they're related.
>
> Semitic, Egyptian and Berber languages are seen, at
> least by some, as
> forming a subgroup within Afro-Asiatic.
>
> Richard.
>
>
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