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Matters Arising (The History of Britain Revealed)
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Mick Harper
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On the question of loanwords in English (page 95): the vast majority of them cluster in the non-basic vocabulary; the basic vocabulary contains only about 7% loanwords, some from French and some from Old Norse.

Here we have three bogus lists.

1) They have singled out English i.e. a list of one, instead of providing a number of comparable languages so the reader can judge what is normal and what is abnormal when it comes to loanwords. Needless to say, English is off the scale.

2) They have offered us a list of two when it comes to vocabularies, basic and non-basic. Why not many? Why not none? Because 'none' would revel it is 30% or so -- just as I say and which is off the scale. 'Many' would reveal the arbitrary nature of the division. But 'basic' allows them to say "only about 7%". Actually that is also off the scale since most languages use loanwords for technical items. Their basic words are all their own.

3) "Some from French and some from Old Norse." So, a list of two. Is that normal for loanwords? We shall never know, see above. Or might it be because England was occupied by Danes and Normans? Or, just possibly, is it because, as I say in THOBR, that English maps to 30% Romance and 70% Germanic and no linguist in the world can say precisely what is French/Old Norse and what is Romance/Germanic?

By the way, the poor old linguists can't say the British got their 'Romance' loanwords from source, the Romans, because the poor old linguists are stuck with the British speaking the language of the Anglo-Saxon who weren't ever in the Roman Empire. On the other hand you might say the French have loaned 100% of their language from the Romans. You have to feel sorry for linguists at some level.
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Mick Harper
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All right, I know, enough. Enough! I'll end with one baffler and then not me but them.

There are also problems with Harper’s reasoning. For instance, on the relationship between the origin of a language and its first date of attestation (page 92): the fact that Latin is not recorded until the first millennium BCE does not mean that it did not exist until then, any more than the fact that Navajo was not written until after European contact means that the language itself sprang into existence

I'll have to remember that. In fact I'd better write it down. Language doesn't spring into life when white man speaks with forked tongue. Though to be fair to this white man, since I claim Latin is an artificial language developed for writing the Lazio dialect of Italian, its first attestation would be precisely the date of its origin. But overall do I have much of a chance against people of this calibre?

Historical linguistics, in roughly its modern form, was developed in the nineteenth century. Darwin drew on our methods and results in The Descent of Man, and the anthropologists’ cladistic approach is again based on our methods. We'd best cast our gimlets on these as well then. The comparative method used by historical linguists is powerful and reliable, as shown by tests of various kinds send s.a.e. and it applies equally well to written and unwritten languages. Why, is there a difference? You haven't said and it's kinda important since unwritten represents 99% of all languages and it's only the one per cent you can actually study with any great certainty.

Using this and other extremely successful methods, send s.a.e. historical linguists have established dozens of language families all over the world, Why are there no independent verifications from statisticians?, reconstructed sizable chunks of undocumented parent languages You can't verify these because they are completely unknown apart from your reconstructions! and developed detailed accounts of enormous numbers of linguistic changes Why? A statistical sample is all that is required including changes involving languages in contact Can you name a language that hasn't been in contact? with results that extend back in time to at least 6,000 years BP.

You mean when literacy started? Why stop there? Your methods clearly allow delving back in time to the dawn of human speech.
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Mick Harper
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I got a press clipping, as we used to call them, from the Greanville Post which had included THOBR in a long piece about the reality of the Roman Empire https://www.greanvillepost.com/2021/09/05/how-fake-is-roman-antiquity/ What was nice was being treated as and cited in decent chunks as an 'amateur historian and linguist' alongside other orthodox and fruitcake people of the same kidney. If only everyone would play the words and not the man.

Naturally I was interested to know more of this Greanville Post which, having a picture of Kirk Douglas as a First World War French soldier on its masthead, is presumably a play on Granville Post (don't ask). I found this curious mission statement

THE GREANVILLE POST (TGP) is an antidote to the prevailing brainwash afflicting most people in the United States and much of the Western World. The Greanville Post is an independent left, non-dogmatic publication dedicated to seeking the truth wherever it may be found.

How anyone can claim to be non-dogmatic and to be seeking the truth anywhere it may be found and be left wing in the same sentence is beyond me. ["Ooh, that is so true... if only I wasn't left wing..."] But, in a relative world, good luck to them.
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Wile E. Coyote


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https://www.youtube.com/watch?app=desktop&v=0VxEQXABWDc

I found this interesting, here is orthodoxy arguing that the current paradigm on the demise of Romano-British culture, as the legions left, and the Anglo Saxons "invaded" as simply wrong. There is not enough evidence to justify it. She asks some serious questions about Old English, and the genetics. We are reaching the point where the current paradigm is staring to appear as a false trail, even for those teaching it in the universities.
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Wile E. Coyote


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Wile E. Coyote wrote:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?app=desktop&v=0VxEQXABWDc

I found this interesting, here is orthodoxy arguing that the current paradigm, on the demise of Romano-British culture as the legions left, and the Anglo Saxons "invaded" as being simply wrong. There is not enough evidence to justify it. She asks some serious questions about Old English, and the genetics. We are reaching the point where the current paradigm, is starting to appear as a false trail, even for those teaching it in the universities.
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Wile E. Coyote


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https://www.youtube.com/watch?app=desktop&v=0VxEQXABWDc

I found this interesting, here is orthodoxy arguing that the current paradigm, on the demise of Romano-British culture as the legions left, and the Anglo Saxons "invaded" as being simply wrong. There is not enough evidence to justify it. She asks some serious questions about Old English, and the genetics. We are reaching the point where the current paradigm is starting to appear as a false trail, even for those teaching it in the universities.
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Ishmael


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Wile E. Coyote wrote:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?app=desktop&v=0VxEQXABWDc

I found this interesting,


Send her your book!
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Mick Harper
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You're way behind the eight-ball, my friend. Why does everyone I know think I'm a dope? Hey, it must be 'cos I'm a dope. But what kind of people choose dopes for friends? I got no choice. As a polymathic genius, everyone's a dope to me. But they don't have that excuse.
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Ishmael


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My problem is that I assume everyone who reads your books has their life changed by the experience. I therefore assumed she had not received a copy.
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Mick Harper
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No, just you so far. And then not necessarily for the better. But it's early days.
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Wile E. Coyote


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wiki wrote:


The study of Germanic zoomorphic decoration was pioneered by Bernhard Salin[5] in a work published in 1904.[6] Salin classified animal art from roughly 400 to 900 AD into three phases. The origins of these different phases remain the subject of debate; developing trends in late-Roman popular provincial art was an element, as were earlier traditions of the nomadic Asiatic steppe peoples. Styles I and II are found widely across Europe in the art of the "barbarian" peoples during the Migration Period.

Style I. First appearing in northwest Europe, first expressed with the introduction of the chip carving technique applied to bronze and silver in the 5th century. It is characterized by animals whose bodies are divided into sections, and typically appear at the fringes of designs whose main emphasis is on abstract patterns.[7]

Style II. After about 560–570 Style I, declining, began to be supplanted. The animals of Style II are whole beasts, their bodies elongated into "ribbons" which intertwined into symmetrical shapes with no pretense of naturalism—rarely with legs—tending to be described as serpents, though heads often have characteristics of other animals. The animals become subsumed into ornamental patterns, typically interlace. Examples of Style II can be found on the gold purse lid (picture) from Sutton Hoo (c. 625).




The Romans wore chip-carved belt-fittings, with these designs so this decoration is Roman. Haseloff who discovered this, in the 70s' thought the best explanation was that the Saxons must have captured Roman craftsman and forced them to reproduce these zoomorphic designs. The story goes that when the Saxons invaded Britain they took this design style with them.
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Wile E. Coyote


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wiki wrote:
The Sutton Hoo helmet is an ornately decorated Anglo-Saxon helmet found during a 1939 excavation of the Sutton Hoo ship-burial. It was buried around 625 and is widely associated with King Rædwald of East Anglia; its elaborate decoration may have given it a secondary function akin to a crown. The helmet was both a functional piece of armour that would have offered considerable protection if ever used in warfare, and a decorative, prestigious piece of extravagant metalwork. It is described as "the most iconic object" from "one of the most spectacular archaeological discoveries ever made", and perhaps the most important known Anglo-Saxon artefact.[1][2]



Whatever its Anglo-Saxon or Scandinavian origins, the Sutton Hoo helmet is descended from the Roman helmets of the fourth and fifth century Constantinian workshops.[588] Its construction—featuring a distinctive crest, solid cap and neck and cheek guards, face mask, and leather lining—bears clear similarities to these earlier helmets.[589] Numerous examples have a crest similar to that on the Sutton Hoo helmet, such as those from Deurne, Concești, Augsburg-Pfersee, and Augst, and the Berkasovo 1 and 2 and Intercisa 2 and 4 helmets.[590] Meanwhile, the one-piece cap underneath, unique in this respect among the Anglo-Saxon and Scandinavian helmets,[500] represents the end of a Greek and Roman technique.[591]


Saxons must have only gone and captured Roman craftsmen, who designed Roman helmets as well.
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Mick Harper
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Some piccies if technically possible would be helpful. Also, the preponderance of red & blue and the paucity of black means that the rest of us can't quite grasp entirely what you're driving at, except that it seems important on various levels. A purely but annotated Coyotian timeline would be equally welcome.
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Wile E. Coyote


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Mick Harper wrote:
A purely but annotated Coyotian timeline would be equally welcome.


I started a model of how cyclical time reacts with linear time, and what in fact is the critical moment when the predominant form of time, cyclical, linear, switches to the other, on the thread The Caucasian Eagle. Then when I got overly excited about using it, I stopped writing it up....

In general terms, I have now given up the battle of what should be The correct common era time line as the so called revisionists who want to miss out say two or fifteen hundred years or so, just to resurrect the CE idea, are as just as bonkers (in the sense of wanting a perfect linear line, or thinking that it will reveal truths) as the orthos.

I think Grant asked the question many many moons ago, about from when you could trust the current linear time line? Edwin Johnson concluded, if I understand him correctly, not before 1480(?).
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Ishmael


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And I say, not before 1812. Maybe 1850.
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