Celtic (Anglo-Saxon thread)

[Heikki Raudaskoski]

Umberto Rossi wrote:
  Vaska wrote:
> > And, apart from the mysterious Basque [linguistically mysterious
> > because no one seems to be able to figure out where it comes from,
> > what other language it might possibly be related to], there's also
> > Hungarian as the second extant non-Indo-European language still
> > spoken [and flourishing] right in the middle of Europe.  And, come
> > to think of it, Finnish would be the third. Right, Heikki?  
> 
> Yest, but those three languages of the Uralo-finnic family were (and
> are) spoken by peoples who came to Europe like our Indo-European
> ancestors.  They are immigrants like us, that's why I didn't mention
> them.  As for the Hungarians, they are the descendants of the Huns,
> and we know quite well when those peoples arrived in Europe.  

Tacitus the Roman historian described Finns approx. 1900 years ago in a
way that has led scholars to conclude that he actually meant the Sami
people, colonialistically called the Lapps. The Finnish invaders drove
them farther to the north little by little, as far as Lapland. Sami is
also one of the Finno-Ugric languages. But: what language these more
original North European dwellers spoke before the Finnish invasions,
has remained a mystery. Since the Sami people are of different racial
stock than the other Finno-Ugric peoples, it has been assumed that they
once spoke a non-Finno-Ugric language of their own. Anyway, it disappeared
completely after they got in touch with the Finnish; linguists have been
unable to find one single word of the ancient language in modern Sami. 


Quite a cleansing.


Heikki