Jim, The similarities between Ancient Greek and Sanskrit (among others) were some of the original motivations for developing the notion of language families and the commonalities are indeed striking. Here's an example I particularly like that connects Greek, Roman and Sanskrit: Zeus is the well-known Greek father god his Vedic (Sanskrit speakers) counterpart is "Dyaus Pita" - both of these terms mean literally "Sky Father". Dyaus and Zeus show obvious similarities. This is driven further home when the comparing the full terms in Greek and Sanskrit: "Zeus pater" and "Dyaus pita". The connection to Roman becomes apparent when you say either the Sanskrit or Greek names quickly and repeatedly. If you're like me, the rapid slurred pronunciation begins to converge on "Jupiter" - who is the Roman Sky Father. -|<ipp "Zeus" is actually the shortened form of Zeus pater. > Date: Tue, 4 Oct 2011 20:05:13 -0400 > CC: > To: pbs@lists.ibiblio.org > From: jimmckenney@jimmckenney.com > Subject: Re: [pbs] planting offsets > > Kip wrote: " 9000 years has been long enough for French, Celtic, Greek and Hindi to diverge from a common tongue. The similarity is almost certainly coincidental. " > > > Thanks, Kip. > > I know nothing about Celtic and not much about French, but there are many similarities between Hindi (or rather Sanskrit) and Classical Greek - some of them striking. > > What I really want to know is how to grow those lilies here in Maryland. > > Jim McKenney > > > > > > > > > -----Original Message----- > From: "Kipp McMichael" [kimcmich@hotmail.com] > Date: 10/04/2011 07:47 PM > To: pbs@lists.ibiblio.org > Subject: Re: [pbs] planting offsets > > > > Now, here's a question for those of you with experience with the indigenous languages of western North America. Is the -san in Shuksan in any way related to the common Japanese honorific -san as in Fuji-san? > > > Jim, > > I don't think there are any established or theorized connections between Japanese (sometimes classified as an Altaic language) and any of the Amerind (American Indian) tongues. There have been studies linking certain Amerind languages to Asian tongues but Japanese is not one of them. Even if pacific northwest Indiana tongues and Japanese shared a common ancestor, the time separating them (6,000-10,000 years minimum - likely longer) is so long that linguistic divergance would likely have obliterated any straightforward similarities. 9000 years has been long enough for French, Celtic, Greek and Hindi to diverge from a common tongue. The similarity is almost certainly coincidental. > > -|< > > _______________________________________________ > pbs mailing list > pbs@lists.ibiblio.org > http://pacificbulbsociety.org/list.php > http://pacificbulbsociety.org/pbswiki/ > > > _______________________________________________ > pbs mailing list > pbs@lists.ibiblio.org > http://pacificbulbsociety.org/list.php > http://pacificbulbsociety.org/pbswiki/