# Do you know a dead language? **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [May 24, 2008, 6:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-know-a-dead-language/450487 "2008-05-24T18:31:57Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![NinjaChick](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/71c47a/32.png) [@NinjaChick](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/NinjaChick)\ **Post date:** [May 26, 2008, 3:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-know-a-dead-language/450487/41 "2008-05-26T15:26:36Z")
[QUOTE=Noone Special] Agreed. Almost any high-school student can read the Bible in the original, with only some very occasional help for some of the **really** obscure vocabulary. [/QUOTE] Huh, I didn’t know that - I just based my assumption on the Hebrew language section of the library, where we have a number of “modern hebrew” texts and a number of “biblical hebrew” texts. I figured there was a significant difference. Neat that there’s not, though. ---
**Author:** ![Dr.Drake](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/ad7895/32.png) [@Dr.Drake](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dr.Drake)\ **Post date:** [May 26, 2008, 4:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-know-a-dead-language/450487/42 "2008-05-26T16:12:12Z")
Thanks for the reference, **Nava**. ---
**Author:** ![Svejk\_1](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ea666f/32.png) [@Svejk\_1](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Svejk_1)\ **Post date:** [May 26, 2008, 9:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-know-a-dead-language/450487/43 "2008-05-26T21:51:11Z")
[the hijack continues] On the topic of ducks, the following, from Buck’s ‘_Dictionary of selected synonyms in the principal Indo-European languages_’ (which is a kick-ass book, BTW): - Italian ‘_papera_’ is linkted to New Greek ‘_pappia_’ and Spanish ‘_parpar_’, to quack. It’s imitative. - French ‘_canard_’ is supposed to be related to all the words for duck that have as a base an ‘a’, an ‘n’ and a ‘d’ or a ‘t’, including many of those words mentioned upthread, and also Dutch ‘_eend_’ and Old English ‘_ened_’ and Middle English ‘_(h)ende_’ (note that the genitive of Latin ‘_anas_’ is ‘_anatis_’, for those who wondered where the ‘t’ is there). The ‘c’ here is also imitative. - as Arabic is not a IE language, Buck doesn’t have too much to say about it and whether it might be the origin of Spanish ‘_pato_’. He compares ‘_pato_’ to Serbo-Croatian, ‘_patka_’, Albanian ‘_patë_’ (goose), New Persian ‘_bat_’ (duck) and adds ‘all of imitating orig. (calling cry?)’. - finally, New English ‘_duck_’ is related to the verb ‘to duck’ which in turn is related to such words as Dutch ‘_duiken_’ and New High German ‘_tauchen_’, both of which mean ‘to dive’. There you have it. Lots of ways to imitate ducks. [/the hijack ends … for now] ---
**Author:** ![gardentraveler](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gardentraveler/32/3576_2.png) [@gardentraveler](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gardentraveler)\ **Post date:** [May 26, 2008, 10:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-know-a-dead-language/450487/44 "2008-05-26T22:07:36Z")
Old Norse (which I took just for fun), Old High German and Middle High German. I took them about a million years ago, but could probably still translate them with a little work… (Interesting hijack, too. Nice to learn where to go for Spanish etymologies, too…) ---
**Author:** ![IvoryTowerDenizen](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ivorytowerdenizen/32/17937_2.png) [@IvoryTowerDenizen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/IvoryTowerDenizen)\ **Post date:** [May 26, 2008, 11:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-know-a-dead-language/450487/45 "2008-05-26T23:34:28Z")
[QUOTE=RealityChuck] I know BASIC. That’s pretty dead these days. [/QUOTE] What I came to post. And Latin. Man, I loved Latin. Semper Ubi Sub Ubi: Always Wear Underwear 😃 ---
**Author:** ![wevets](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/e9a140/32.png) [@wevets](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/wevets)\ **Post date:** [May 27, 2008, 1:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-know-a-dead-language/450487/46 "2008-05-27T01:09:36Z")
I took 4 years of Latin in high school. Not much of that is still with me, but it really helped grow my English vocabulary. We read the _Aeneid_ in Latin, and only a few parts of Caesar’s Commentaries. I don’t miss those days. ---
**Author:** ![sturmhauke](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e47c2d/32.png) [@sturmhauke](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/sturmhauke)\ **Post date:** [May 27, 2008, 1:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-know-a-dead-language/450487/47 "2008-05-27T01:39:47Z")
[QUOTE=Alessan] Modern Hebrew and biblical Hebrew are the same language; at the most, “modern” Hebrew has a much larger vocabulary while “biblical” Hebrew occasionally uses some grammatical structures rarely used in modern speech. Basically, Hebrew spoken today is closer to biblical Hebrew than current English is to the English of Shakespeare. [/QUOTE] That’s very interesting. Why do you suppose Hebrew has changed so little over the millennia? If we’re counting dead computer languages, put me in for Pascal and a few dialects of BASIC (Timex-Sinclair 1000, Commodore 64, Apple II, Commodore 128, and QBASIC). ---
**Author:** ![Polycarp](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/82dd89/32.png) [@Polycarp](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Polycarp)\ **Post date:** [May 27, 2008, 1:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-know-a-dead-language/450487/48 "2008-05-27T01:50:44Z")
Whhile I fall into the Latin, and a little Greek group (a very small Hebrew vocabulary, from reading about translation issues, but no skill in the language itself), can I observe that there is one Doper who not only knows a dead language, but uses it regularly in everyday life? That would be **Lobsang** , who as a Manxman has learned Vannin, and is familiar with it on a dail basis from signs and such aimed at perpetuating its existence-- but it’s considered 'dead" in that there is no lineal historical sequence of people using it in the home or monoglot in it, just an effort to preserve what is no longer anyone’s main mode of ocmmunication on the part of the Manx government and people. (Same holds for Cornish, but I don’t know if we have any Cornishmen demanding to know the reason why.) ---
**Author:** ![Noone\_Special](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/noone_special/32/2863_2.png) [@Noone\_Special](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Noone_Special)\ **Post date:** [May 27, 2008, 5:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-know-a-dead-language/450487/49 "2008-05-27T05:29:51Z")
[QUOTE=sturmhauke] That’s very interesting. Why do you suppose Hebrew has changed so little over the millennia? [/QUOTE] Because it _was_ dead for nearly two millennia, and was resurrected a little over 100 years ago. The changes (and similarities!) in Modern Hebrew _vis-a-vis_ biblical are partly by design (of [Eliezer Ben-Yehuda](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eliezer_Ben-Yehuda), largely credited as being the “father” of Modern Hebrew; some of the changes, however, are – to a growing extent – from having been a living language, again, for a century or so. ---
**Author:** ![PharmBoy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/74df32/32.png) [@PharmBoy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/PharmBoy)\ **Post date:** [May 27, 2008, 5:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-know-a-dead-language/450487/50 "2008-05-27T17:35:00Z")
[QUOTE=RealityChuck] I know BASIC. That’s pretty dead these days. [/QUOTE] Me too. Also, some FORTRAN 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![puppygod](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/ce7236/32.png) [@puppygod](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/puppygod)\ **Post date:** [May 27, 2008, 5:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-know-a-dead-language/450487/51 "2008-05-27T17:57:30Z")
Does fictional languages count? If so, I know Quenya and a little Sindarin. Don’t know how is duck though. But gull is ‘maiwë’ in Quenya. ---
**Author:** ![An\_Gadai](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/d6d6ee/32.png) [@An\_Gadai](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/An_Gadai)\ **Post date:** [May 27, 2008, 6:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-know-a-dead-language/450487/52 "2008-05-27T18:25:56Z")
[QUOTE=Dr. Drake] Old Irish and Middle Welsh, with passing familiarity with a lot of their Indo-European relations, near and far. [/QUOTE] Alas, it seems that Nua-Ghaeilge is headed the same direction. ---
**Author:** ![UncleRojelio](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/unclerojelio/32/3160_2.png) [@UncleRojelio](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/UncleRojelio)\ **Post date:** [May 27, 2008, 7:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-know-a-dead-language/450487/53 "2008-05-27T19:09:12Z")
I see someone already mentioned Pascal. I just wanted to add that the last time I saw any Pascal code, it was the output from a compiler I had written in C for a compiler class. Also, and not that I ever actually knew or studied it, but I thought Ada was a pretty dead language until I read that [if you fly in a Boeing 777, your life depends on it.](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ada_%28programming_language%29). :eek: ---
**Author:** ![ultrafilter](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/3d9bf3/32.png) [@ultrafilter](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ultrafilter)\ **Post date:** [May 27, 2008, 7:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-know-a-dead-language/450487/54 "2008-05-27T19:17:57Z")
Ada is more or less standard in systems that can kill people when they malfunction, largely because it’s designed with high reliability applications in mind. ---
**Author:** ![Dr.Drake](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/ad7895/32.png) [@Dr.Drake](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dr.Drake)\ **Post date:** [May 27, 2008, 7:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-know-a-dead-language/450487/55 "2008-05-27T19:20:34Z")
[QUOTE=An Gadaí] Alas, it seems that Nua-Ghaeilge is headed the same direction. [/QUOTE] All the Celtic languages except Welsh are in decline, some steeper than others. I think Irish is okay for now, but it seems like the government attitude is more preservationist than I’d like. In many ways the philosophy seems to be to halt the decline rather than to actively encourage growth. It’s always bothered me that commercials on Celtic-language radio & television are in English in the UK & Ireland, even when it’s animated or something easily dubbed. It’s like they’re not SERIOUS about it. Maybe we should start another thread, Who Speaks a Dying Language? ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Plastic\_Ninja](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/f07891/32.png) [@Little\_Plastic\_Ninja](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Plastic_Ninja)\ **Post date:** [May 27, 2008, 7:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-know-a-dead-language/450487/56 "2008-05-27T19:32:27Z")
Hooray, I will be the first to be able to actually read (fairly effectively, or I could once) ancient Egyptian hieroglyphs. Beyond the simple alphabet, even. It was one of the “I can’t believe this class exists and I’m so taking it for my minor” classes I took. Along with that, Latin. Middle English might not count. I’m passing fair in Sindarin, enough that I can construct a sentence given time and the grammar page. ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [May 27, 2008, 7:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-know-a-dead-language/450487/57 "2008-05-27T19:51:53Z")
Dico Latinam. And I know snippets of Quenya and Sindarin, though only snippets, and I often can’t remember which one is which. I did surprise myself a few years ago on a trip to Ireland, when I saw a flower and realized that I knew its name in Elvish, but not in English. And if languages like Latin are considered dead, then what word do we use for languages that nobody knows how to speak at all any more? ---
**Author:** ![AngryIrishLass](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/bbce88/32.png) [@AngryIrishLass](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AngryIrishLass)\ **Post date:** [May 27, 2008, 9:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-know-a-dead-language/450487/58 "2008-05-27T21:11:23Z")
I took Old English in college for no other reason than I wanted to speak it. I think my first semester class consisted of 7 people, by the 3rd and final semester we had wittled down to 5. Best part was that we met at the Italian prof’s house instead of the college so she could cook us dinner while she taught. ---
**Author:** ![Clothahump](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/51bf81/32.png) [@Clothahump](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Clothahump)\ **Post date:** [May 27, 2008, 9:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-know-a-dead-language/450487/59 "2008-05-27T21:15:05Z")
[QUOTE=RealityChuck] I know BASIC. That’s pretty dead these days. [/QUOTE] I took three years of Latin. But in the computer world, I was highly proficient in COMPASS, DATABUS and CLIPPER at various times. Made some decent money off two of those now-extinct programming languages. ---
**Author:** ![elmwood](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/elmwood/32/3060_2.png) [@elmwood](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elmwood)\ **Post date:** [May 27, 2008, 9:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-know-a-dead-language/450487/60 "2008-05-27T21:15:33Z")
[QUOTE=AngryIrishLass] I took Old English in college for no other reason than I wanted to speak it. [/QUOTE] Speak? I _drank_ Old English in college. 😃 [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-know-a-dead-language/450487.md?page=2) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-know-a-dead-language/450487.md?page=4)