--- In qalam@yahoogroups.com, "Peter
T. Daniels" <grammatim@...> wrote:

> etaonsh wrote:
> >
> > --- In qalam@yahoogroups.com,

Marco

> > Cimarosti <marco.cimarosti@...>
> > wrote:
> > > Etaonsh wrote:
> > > > I found your post on Gaulish

and

> > > > Lepontic runes [...]
> > >
> > > Gauls and Leponti had nothing

to

> > do with runes.
> > >
> > That seems a rather peevish

point

> > particularly unfair on Celts,

who

> > have no Celtic word I know of to
> > describe letters found on

stones. I

> > could have said 'glyphs' but

that

> > would be Greek.
>
> The word "rune" in English refers

to a particular sort of alphabetic

> writing system that happens to be

attested mostly in Scandinavia and

> also appears in other

Germanic-speaking areas, whose
letterforms most

> likely derive from North Italic

alphabets that in turn developed out
of

> the Etruscan.
>

Granted. But as interest in the
Celtic equivalent grows we need to
use a word to describe the
individual letters in the Celtic
'abade.' And the very, Germanic
culture which suppressed and
suppresses Celtic languages turns
round and says, 'you can't use our
word.' Do you wish us to devise our
own?

>
> > > I guess that it is just a
> > coincidence that Latin had no

/th/

> > or /þ/ phoneme
> > > to use that letter for, right?
> > >
> > No, the point is that the Roman
> > influence repeatedly imposed

'th' on

> > cultures who had a single letter

for

>
> This is utter piffle. Or, perhaps,

balderdash. How does "Roman

> influence" "impose" details of

orthography?

>

1) By the sword - slaughter,
intimidtion, force, military
conquest.
2) Manufactured consensus: 'You KNOW
our alphabet's better.' Includes
ridicule (as above).

>
> Moreover, nowhere in the world did

a roman alphabet _replace_ a runic

> alphabet; in a few places they

coexisted in different cultural
realms,

>

Roman civic structures replaced
Druidic ones, with corresponding
alphabet change.

>
> but there are no instances of

runic texts being supplanted with
the same

> sorts of texts only written with a

roman alphabet.

>

Empires have often eliminated
written records of 'client cultures'
evincing intellecual competence to
challenge their supremacy.

>
> > it. Furthermore it could be

argued

> > psycholinguistically that the
> > absence of fricatives like 'th'

in

> > Roman expresses their psyche and
> > values: a mellifluous but
> > restrictive, pointless and
> > ultimately inefficient purity.
>
> No, it couldn't.
>

Except in a new atmosphere of
civilised, good-humoured discussion
beyond the old limitations of the
pre-psycholinguistic, reductionist,
blind-spotty linguistics of the
materialist secularist period.

>

R