Looking for good resources on Gaulish...in English

[Zaarin]

Reasonably enough, I suppose, most major texts on Gaulish seem to be in French or German. My French vocabulary is lucky if it's 250 words, and all of the conversational variety. My German doesn't really go much past Deutschlandlied. So, can anyone recommend any good texts on the Gauls and their language? If it happened to touch on the pre-Roman Britons and Celtiberians that would be a bonus, but my primary interest is the Gauls. I'd also be interested if anyone knows of some good academic texts on the Picts and Pictish; I realize that our knowledge base about these people is very limited.

[Herr Dunkel]

I doubt there to be much on Pictish - it's assumed it's pre-European, though, and the Picts had a simmilar genetic makeup as the Basques.

[Travis B.]

I doubt there to be much on Pictish - it's assumed it's pre-European, though, and the Picts had a simmilar genetic makeup as the Basques.

Actually, from what I have read, it is more likely that Pictish is simply Brythonic rather than pre-IE. That still does not mean that we know much more about it besides what we know of Brythonic from other places, though.

[Zaarin]

I doubt there to be much on Pictish - it's assumed it's pre-European, though, and the Picts had a simmilar genetic makeup as the Basques.

Actually, from what I have read, it is more likely that Pictish is simply Brythonic rather than pre-IE. That still does not mean that we know much more about it besides what we know of Brythonic from other places, though.

Yeah, I've heard both theories, and I'm not surprised there's not much on it.

Chiefly I'm interested in good texts on Gaulish, though...that I can read since my technical French and German is pretty much non-existent.

[Herr Dunkel]

I have no knowledge whatsoever on Gaulish except its rough genetic placement.

[Dewrad]

You know, weirdly, you've actually asked in one of the best places. Gaulish is something of a specialism of mine. What, precisely, are you looking for? Information on attested Gaulish (i.e. the inscriptional evidence), or information on the Gaulish language as reconstructed as a usable linguistic system? I can help with either. Also, as a general guideline, what would you say your level of linguistic knowledge is? If you're basically looking for a Teach Yourself Gaulish course, you're shit out of luck as nobody who knows anything about the language is going to have the time to help you. If, on the other hand, you're familiar with any contemporaneous Indo-European language and don't flinch at terms like "paradigm" and "deixis", and are willing to do a bit of independent research, you could well be set up.

On the other hand, you're pretty buggered with Pictish. While academic consensus (at the moment!) posits it as being just a variety of Gallo-Brittonic, there's fuck all information to actually go on.

[Zaarin]

You know, weirdly, you've actually asked in one of the best places. Gaulish is something of a specialism of mine. What, precisely, are you looking for? Information on attested Gaulish (i.e. the inscriptional evidence), or information on the Gaulish language as reconstructed as a usable linguistic system? I can help with either. Also, as a general guideline, what would you say your level of linguistic knowledge is? If you're basically looking for a Teach Yourself Gaulish course, you're shit out of luck as nobody who knows anything about the language is going to have the time to help you. If, on the other hand, you're familiar with any contemporaneous Indo-European language and don't flinch at terms like "paradigm" and "deixis", and are willing to do a bit of independent research, you could well be set up.

On the other hand, you're pretty buggered with Pictish. While academic consensus (at the moment!) posits it as being just a variety of Gallo-Brittonic, there's fuck all information to actually go on.

I'd define my linguistic knowledge as "advanced amatuer"? I haven't had any formal training, but I'm familiar with most terminology--or can look it up, at any rate. I speak a fair amount of conversational French, and I'm in the (off-and-on) process of learning Icelandic. I have studied Irish, but I've forgotten most of it. I haven't formally studied Latin, but I know the basics of Latin except verb conjugations.

As for what I'm interested, I'm interested in either or both attested Gaulish and/or reconstructed Gaulish. The language fascinates me, and I'm always disappointed at how scant what little information I can find on it is. I'm also interested in the Gauls themselves--their culture, their religion, their technology, and so forth. I imagine that should be easier to find, but aside from pantheon lists I haven't found terribly much on that either.

[Dewrad]

You know, weirdly, you've actually asked in one of the best places. Gaulish is something of a specialism of mine. What, precisely, are you looking for? Information on attested Gaulish (i.e. the inscriptional evidence), or information on the Gaulish language as reconstructed as a usable linguistic system? I can help with either. Also, as a general guideline, what would you say your level of linguistic knowledge is? If you're basically looking for a Teach Yourself Gaulish course, you're shit out of luck as nobody who knows anything about the language is going to have the time to help you. If, on the other hand, you're familiar with any contemporaneous Indo-European language and don't flinch at terms like "paradigm" and "deixis", and are willing to do a bit of independent research, you could well be set up.

On the other hand, you're pretty buggered with Pictish. While academic consensus (at the moment!) posits it as being just a variety of Gallo-Brittonic, there's fuck all information to actually go on.

I'd define my linguistic knowledge as "advanced amatuer"? I haven't had any formal training, but I'm familiar with most terminology--or can look it up, at any rate. I speak a fair amount of conversational French, and I'm in the (off-and-on) process of learning Icelandic. I have studied Irish, but I've forgotten most of it. I haven't formally studied Latin, but I know the basics of Latin except verb conjugations.

As for what I'm interested, I'm interested in either or both attested Gaulish and/or reconstructed Gaulish. The language fascinates me, and I'm always disappointed at how scant what little information I can find on it is. I'm also interested in the Gauls themselves--their culture, their religion, their technology, and so forth. I imagine that should be easier to find, but aside from pantheon lists I haven't found terribly much on that either.

OK. Have a go at this and get back to me with any questions.

[Zaarin]

You know, weirdly, you've actually asked in one of the best places. Gaulish is something of a specialism of mine. What, precisely, are you looking for? Information on attested Gaulish (i.e. the inscriptional evidence), or information on the Gaulish language as reconstructed as a usable linguistic system? I can help with either. Also, as a general guideline, what would you say your level of linguistic knowledge is? If you're basically looking for a Teach Yourself Gaulish course, you're shit out of luck as nobody who knows anything about the language is going to have the time to help you. If, on the other hand, you're familiar with any contemporaneous Indo-European language and don't flinch at terms like "paradigm" and "deixis", and are willing to do a bit of independent research, you could well be set up.

On the other hand, you're pretty buggered with Pictish. While academic consensus (at the moment!) posits it as being just a variety of Gallo-Brittonic, there's fuck all information to actually go on.

I'd define my linguistic knowledge as "advanced amatuer"? I haven't had any formal training, but I'm familiar with most terminology--or can look it up, at any rate. I speak a fair amount of conversational French, and I'm in the (off-and-on) process of learning Icelandic. I have studied Irish, but I've forgotten most of it. I haven't formally studied Latin, but I know the basics of Latin except verb conjugations.

As for what I'm interested, I'm interested in either or both attested Gaulish and/or reconstructed Gaulish. The language fascinates me, and I'm always disappointed at how scant what little information I can find on it is. I'm also interested in the Gauls themselves--their culture, their religion, their technology, and so forth. I imagine that should be easier to find, but aside from pantheon lists I haven't found terribly much on that either.

OK. Have a go at this and get back to me with any questions.

Sweet! I look forward to perusing this! Thank you.

[Wattmann]

Ó, þú ert að læra íslensku?
Mjög kúl! (Me too )

[Jana Masala]

OK. Have a go at this and get back to me with any questions.

Damn generative linguists with their [+continuant]s and phonemes in brackets.

[Sleinad Flar]

Damn generative linguists with their [+continuant]s and phonemes in brackets.

That's not the way to say: "Holy Crap, Dewrad, awesome work! Thanks for sharing this!"

[Jana Masala]

I'm sorry. But, still. Generative linguists.

[Ars Lande]

Awesome indeed.

Funny how, like Primitive Irish, it doesn't look Celtic at all, but rather like some mutant offspring of Greek and Latin.
I wonder if anyone tried to derive a conlang from Gaulish with historical French sound changes.

[Shrdlu]

I still managed to spot some cognates to Scandinavian languages. Top of my head, da, "to give" looks like Piitish "dje" and Swedish "ge[je:]", with loss of the dental in that case.

[Herra Ratatoskr]

Damn that's nice! Thanks Dewrad!

[Xephyr]

Awesome indeed.

Funny how, like Primitive Irish, it doesn't look Celtic at all, but rather like some mutant offspring of Greek and Latin.
I wonder if anyone tried to derive a conlang from Gaulish with historical French sound changes.

Man, why would you do that? Even putting aside the fact that it wouldn't be good alt-history, you said yourself that Gaulish looks like Latin-- it would just be French with different lexemes. Boring.

[Ars Lande]

Isn't it the whole point of Brithenig - except the other way around?

In any case. It's not interesting enough as alt-history to get anything serious started, but I'd be interested in the results - for instance, how intelligible it would be with French.

[Xephyr]

I would guess "not at all".

[Dewrad]

Awesome indeed.

Funny how, like Primitive Irish, it doesn't look Celtic at all, but rather like some mutant offspring of Greek and Latin.
I wonder if anyone tried to derive a conlang from Gaulish with historical French sound changes.

Man, why would you do that? Even putting aside the fact that it wouldn't be good alt-history, you said yourself that Gaulish looks like Latin-- it would just be French with different lexemes. Boring.

Cev's right. This entire Celtic thing is just a hobby for me: my major interest in linguistics is Romance diachronics. As such, it shouldn't be a surprise that I've tried it. It's like Old French, but with fewer /f/'s. For example, the first sentence of the UDHR in English, Gallo-Brittonic, "Jei Lévie" and French:

All human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights.

Pāpos donyos est gnātos riyos etic samalos canti balcoteron etic iānoterā.

Pèif deugne est né ri e sémaux chent bélquière e jéntère.

Tous les êtres humains naissent libres et égaux en dignité et en droits.

[Dewrad]

I still managed to spot some cognates to Scandinavian languages. Top of my head, da, "to give" looks like Piitish "dje" and Swedish "ge[je:]", with loss of the dental in that case.

Funnily enough, no: they're not cognate.

[Zaarin]

Awesome indeed.

Funny how, like Primitive Irish, it doesn't look Celtic at all, but rather like some mutant offspring of Greek and Latin.
I wonder if anyone tried to derive a conlang from Gaulish with historical French sound changes.

Man, why would you do that? Even putting aside the fact that it wouldn't be good alt-history, you said yourself that Gaulish looks like Latin-- it would just be French with different lexemes. Boring.

Cev's right. This entire Celtic thing is just a hobby for me: my major interest in linguistics is Romance diachronics. As such, it shouldn't be a surprise that I've tried it. It's like Old French, but with fewer /f/'s. For example, the first sentence of the UDHR in English, Gallo-Brittonic, "Jei Lévie" and French:

All human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights.

Pāpos donyos est gnātos riyos etic samalos canti balcoteron etic iānoterā.

Pèif deugne est né ri e sémaux chent bélquière e jéntère.

Tous les êtres humains naissent libres et égaux en dignité et en droits.

Huh, that's actually kind of cool.

[Salmoneus]

I doubt there to be much on Pictish - it's assumed it's pre-European, though, and the Picts had a simmilar genetic makeup as the Basques.

Actually, from what I have read, it is more likely that Pictish is simply Brythonic rather than pre-IE. That still does not mean that we know much more about it besides what we know of Brythonic from other places, though.

Yeah, I've heard both theories, and I'm not surprised there's not much on it.

To be honest, I think there's a big semantic issue here, actually.
On the one hand, we can guess with 99.99999% accuracy that there was a pre-Celtic language in Scotland. Possibly a succession of them.
On the other hand, we know that there ended up being a Celtic language in Scotland - Irish. And it seems quite likely that there may have been some non-Irish celtic language there before that.

Where the question lies is which point in history we want to call "Pictish", and whether that was one single language. Thus, 'Pictish' can range from strange-Irish, through a Brythonic language, to a non-Celtic Indo-European, or to a macro-IE (cf OEH) language, or to a completely pre-IE language. Complicated by the fact that, in the absence of records, we don't know whether these were distinct and clear stages.

For instance, one theory I've heard is that the "Pictish" of recorded names is indeed celtic, but that it represents the language of an aristocratic class of inscription-makers, while the 'real' Picts continued to speak a non-Celtic language. Alternatively, those recorded names could be the names of a group of immigrants, perhaps pushed north by the arrival of the Romans, who were at the time displacing the 'real' Picts, who may still have survived in more northerly areas without leaving inscriptions.

[Radius Solis]

Some five years back I looked up everything I could find on Pictish and the Picts, with some help from Dewrad plus my own hunting through the UofA linguistics library. The data is just this side of nonexistent, and boils down to some Celtic-looking names inscribed on rocks in roughly the right period, plus one or two bits we can't fully decipher that might or might not be short phrases.

So Pictish is a linguistic will o' the wisp, a faintly visible light in the midnight swamp of history that never comes into full view and only leads you deeper and deeper into the swamp until finally you drown in the mire and it feeds off your dissipating life energies, which manifest in the form of fact-free but overzealously defended theories. If you're smart, you'll steer clear of the damned thing.

[Zaarin]

Some five years back I looked up everything I could find on Pictish and the Picts, with some help from Dewrad plus my own hunting through the UofA linguistics library. The data is just this side of nonexistent, and boils down to some Celtic-looking names inscribed on rocks in roughly the right period, plus one or two bits we can't fully decipher that might or might not be short phrases.

So Pictish is a linguistic will o' the wisp, a faintly visible light in the midnight swamp of history that never comes into full view and only leads you deeper and deeper into the swamp until finally you drown in the mire and it feeds off your dissipating life energies, which manifest in the form of fact-free but overzealously defended theories. If you're smart, you'll steer clear of the damned thing.

My professor warned me about a similar swamp with alchemy and I didn't listen, but I think I'll take your advice on this one.