Re: Huns (Was: Alanic horseman)

--- In cybalist@yahoogroups.com, george knysh <gknysh@...> wrote:

>
> [...]
> > Of course they did. Most influential of them were
> > East Germanic or
> > at least could speak East Germanic.
>
> ****GK: These "barbarians" were multi-lingual.

I think only few were in fact multilingual. Somehow it's difficult
to imagine a whole horde of linguists devastating Europe :)

BTW, Priscus wrote (46.5-10):
XUGKLUDES GAR ONTES PROS THi SFETERAi BARBARWi GLWSSHi ZHLOUSIN H
THN OUNNWN H THN GOTQWN H KAI THN AUSONIWN, hOSOIS AUTWN PROS
RhWMAIOUS EPIMIXIA; KAI OU RhADIWS TIS SFWN hELLHNIZEI THi FWNHi,
PLHN hWN APHGAGON AICMALWTWN APO THS QRAKIAS KAI ILLURIDOS PARALOU.
What you think was the native vernacular of the barbarians who had
to learn languages of Huns, Goths and Romans as foreign ones? Or
does it mean they taught each other? And is Priscus' linguistic
information to be trusted at all?

> But
> Hunnish was the Huns' first language, and according to
> Priscus,the first language of Attila's court.

Wasn't it Gothic instead (language of the court)?

> The most
> likely hypothesis, if Pritsak's reconstruction of
> "Attila" as a genuine Hunnish name is put aside
> (though he was certainly a master turkologist), is
> that the Hunnish word was so close (whatever it
> meant)in pronunciation that the Attilanic Germanics
> could easily twist it into their idiom's "Attila".
> Note that Pritsak mentions two other "Gothicized"
> Hunnish names: Balamir and Laudaric.****

On the whole I agree. And note, they didn't twist it into
*Astila "little twig". Why? If "daddy" = "regnator orbis terrarum",
then "little twig" = "flagrum dei" :)