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started reading Phaedo

A bit of an off topic question, maybe? But how did the English language change so much from Old English to Moden English? I know it was influenced by French a lot, but it's pretty crazy how different Old English is from today's, no other language seemed to have change so much over time.

>>23818109
There's also the Vikings, and the big social upheavals produced by the plague that left a lot of people to wander around England for work in its aftermath, and improved the position of (surviving) workers because they were scarcer and could therefore command better wages.

>>23818109
>no other language seemed to have change so much over time.
That's because you're not familiar with any other languages.
Anyhow, sound changes and syncope, as was the fate of all Germanic languages.

>>23818172
>There's also the Vikings
Irrelevant in terms of leveling (which is usually what people mean), but highly relevant in terms of vocabulary.

>>23818261
German didn't change much.

>>23818103
I hope you're prepared for some beautiful writing and some very bad arguments for the immortality of the soul.

>>23818266
Yes, it did.

>>23818109
The change in vocabulary is, like you said, because of French influence. In particular the London dialect, which became standard, was strongly influenced by court and the judicial system, which, for a long time, were conducted in Anglo-Norman.

The change in grammar is less easy to explain. Obviously the main change is the loss of the inflectional system and the move to analytic syntax. What seems to have happened is that the inflectional endings became less distinct, and determining the role of a word in a sentence became more difficult. Eventually the endings were lost altogether or fossilized into just -e, with -s or -es for the plural, the genitive eventually being reanalyzed as 's. (This is in nouns; in verbs the situation is more complicated but suffice it to say there is also loss). Once this had happened the job of communicating sentence-role information fell to syntax, and boom we have an analytic language. Why did the inflectional endings begin merging? It's unclear. It was happening already on a small scale by late old English, but ramped up dramatically after 1066. Some people like >>23818172 credit viking invasions for muddling the endings with their native Old Norse. Some people point to the development of stress-timed prosody in late OE, which led to the reduction of unstressed vowels (in particular inflectional endings). If every inflectional ending sounds like -O or -ә, it's really hard to keep four distinct cases alive. Same thing happened to (vulgar) Latin.

>>23818313
board dosen't like my empty set unicode symbol. Should read:
>If every inflectional ending sounds like - or -ә, it's really hard to keep four distinct cases alive.

>>23818313
Some scholars say it's practically impossible to translate Beowulf to modern English while retaining its original meaning and structure, why is that so? A good translator could make a pretty close translation of French or Spanish books to English, why is this not the case for Old English?

>>23818261
>That's because you're not familiar with any other languages.
Eh, I get the impression English has in fact changed relatively drastically. Like, I can often understand more of thousand-year-old Japanese than thousand-year-old English, and I'm not even really fluent in Japanese.
>Irrelevant in terms of leveling (which is usually what people mean), but highly relevant in terms of vocabulary.
No? I've at least heard it hypothesized it had some role, because the Englishmen and the Danes spoke languages with a lot of recognizably cognate vocabulary but inflection systems that had drifted apart somewhat, so compromise forms between the two languages ended up just giving up on a lot of the morphology.

>>23818363
Translation is always difficult, but it's especially difficult when the original is written in a noticeably structurally different language, in a metrical form that's mostly alien to the target language, in a very different social and cultural context.

>>23818366
Middle English texts have a high degree of similarity with modern English. The most significant changes were between the Old and Middle English periods.

>>23818366
How long did it take for you to learn Japanese at that level?

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>>23818076
Whoever's running the FAQ please put in an Old English section with the following two books
>A Guide to Old English, by Mitchell & Robinson
>Introduction to Old English, by Peter S. Baker
and if we're accepting Middle English
>A Book of Middle English, by J. A. Burrow (meant to be a continuation of Mitchell & Robinson)

We might also point any LLPSI people to more than just familia romana; maybe pic rel?

>>23818363
No harder than Ancient Greek, say. There are good Beowulf translations.

>>23818366
>No? I've at least heard it hypothesized it had some role, because the Englishmen and the Danes spoke languages with a lot of recognizably cognate vocabulary but inflection systems that had drifted apart somewhat, so compromise forms between the two languages ended up just giving up on a lot of the morphology.
The forms weren't that different... which is why there's a mutual intelligibility theory in the first place (I do not know enough about it to opine on it).
>stæinn, stæin, stæini, stæins
>stan, stan, stane, stans
just an example, but anyhow
English started leveling long before the first Vikings ever set foot on the islands. The contact with the Vikings certainly had massive influence, but those were vocabulary. I mean, adopting an entire pronoun ("they") is fucking MASSIVE, but also pairs like skirt/shirt, egg/eyren, etc, and new words like "leg". This shit's HUGE. But the Viking invasion did not destabilize English phonology causing to level.

>>23818410
>Introduction to Old English, by Peter S. Baker
What is wrong with "Complete Old English"? The 'complete x' series is kino

>>23818410
>There are good Beowulf translations
Post them.

>>23818393
Early Middle English looks more alien, but Late Middle English is fairly familiar yes.
>>23818395
I started learning probably some time around 2013 or so but I haven't been actively on the study grind the whole time, once I had a certain basic level I just used the language when I had occasion to.

>>23818424
No idea, is it any good? Those two are constantly recommended. The ASNC course at Cambridge has them at the top, and doesn't have "Complete Old English" at all.

>>23818393
Early ME is much more like OE than Modern English, at least in the sense that if you know OE but not ModE you can read e.g. Layamon's Brut, but if you know ModE but not OE you can't.

>>23818426
my diary desu

>>23818498
Middle English is still better known for works from the 14th century such as Chaucer and Wycliffe.

>>23818498
>ASNC course at Cambridge
It is mostly focused on the grammar and vocab needed to read original texts. It has a less academic appearance but is great for actual reading. The whole 'complete' language methods are superb for understanding the TL rapidly.

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>>23818410
edited the FAQ
I added also your pic to the Latin section

How many hours per day do you guys study? Not just languages, but in general.

>>23818716
Never. Me no study no word things.

>>23818716
Typically I'll study languages for 2-3 hours a day but for the first month or so of studying new language I'll study for maybe 4-5 hours a day but that's hard to maintain long term
Languages and literature are my only main hobbies

>>23818731
But what do you do in those 3~4 hours? Are they all spent reading graded readers and acquiring vocabulary/inputing or studying the grammar of your TL?

>>23818765
It's mostly working through texts, searching up vocabulary, checking grammars as a reference occasionally, and then writing annotations to save my research for a future re-read.
I don't like studying grammar.

>>23818716
Like 4-6
2-3 Latin. Mainly reading, some flashcards & vocab study
1-2 other schoolwork
I dropped Greek (studied ~2 years) to get really good at Latin since I decided I didn’t have the time for both

What's a good English translation of Caesar, ideally including some commentary, to read through before diving into the Latin? Penguin vs Oxford, or something else?
I assume that the ones included in bilingual editions like Loeb are not meant to be read as stand-alone works but rather as a look-up for the Latin learner

>>23809110
you're right, we can't know anything about history. these languages we're studying are probably just big hoaxes. great point.

>>23819132
Why don't you just get the Loeb since then you won't have to buy 2 books. The translation seems fine to me. Or you could just listen to that epic (hate that this word has been ruined but it really is epic) audio recording on youtube that starts with drums and horns

>>23819282
it's on the channel CDNShuffle just found it

>>23818076
finally reading caesar easily... the grammar and word order is all starting to make sense now. i just had to review my grammar.

>>23818410
>>23818674
This chart needs a ton of work, clearly created by an amateur
>Gildersleeve & Lodge
No one uses this anymore except as a curiosity. Allen & Greenough is the standard
>Pocket Oxford
Cassell's is better in every regard, including price
>Cambridge Latin Course
>Learn to read Latin
Moreland & Fleischer is better than both of these
>Meta
Half of these are pop-sci tier
Woodcock's New Latin Syntax should be in Meta or Advanced Grammar but I doubt the creator of that chart has ever even heard of it

>>23819381
People use Gildersleeve. That was the grammar my professor recommended.

>>23819571
I have a degree in Classics. Every major university now recommends A&G. I have used both and while Gildersleeve is not bad it is a product of its time and clunky compared to more modern writing. Consider the chapter on "Accusative of Inner Object" rather than the Cognate Accusative. At best it should serve as a supplement to A&G because it has different examples and the section on prosody is more fleshed out, albeit out of date.
The fact remains that whoever made that chart does not know what they are talking about. It reads like someone skimmed a couple websites and made posts based on what others say, not on first-hand experience. Learn to Read Latin gets a mention but A&G doesn't? Pocket Oxford is 'best'? It isn't even good. Read Loebs and refer to the facing page to check meanings, repeat until you can read the Latin? That is pure memorization and perhaps the worst way to learn a language. No Catullus or Juvenal? Those are entry-level poets that every Latinist reads. Florus? Who the fuck reads Florus? I guarantee the creator of that chart hasn't.

>>23819636
>I have a degree in Classics. Every major university now recommends A&G.
2 weeks to stop the spread

>>23818716
>6hours Chinese
>2 hours Greek + Latin
>1 hour French and German
>1 hour free choice

>>23819748
You can gain an hour by switching to Sojlent.

In Classical Chinese you join nouns with 與 but for nouns which are considered to be of the same type you don't need to use 與 and you can just put them side by side
For example 行仁 which means kindness and righteousness

>>23819636
Imagine thinking anybody gives a fuck about your classics degree jfl
Go back to rεddit

>>23819636
Ok then you make one

>>23819636
It clearly says the Oxford is best, not the pocket Oxford

>>23819671
>>23820567
>>23820569
>>23820573
Look at this triggered samefag lol

>>23819338
How long’d it take you?

Caesar is easy if you're not a retard. So is Cicero and Virgil. Real 1000 IQ chads read la Vulgata.

>>23819636
For the record, I also have a degree in classics, and people do use Gildersleeve. Willing to bet that your professors don't like him because your uni was pozzed and discourages people from reading him because he was a Confederate

>>23820839
>So is Cicero and Vergil
>Calling other people retards
What’s up Juan

>>23820864
Many such cases

>>23819892
I would have read 行仁 as a verb-noun compound "carrying out 仁", where are you seeing it used as a dvandva? Or are you thinking of 仁義, based on the gloss "kindness and righteousness"?

Is it possible to learn 3 or more classical languages? 1 is already a herculean task that will take around 5 years or so, I think 3 would be impossible unless you dedicate your entire life to the study of languages.

>>23820936
No is not possible. If you want to do such a thing, maybe you should just give up and rope.

>>23820936
It's not impossible, but it is difficult. Learning one language does make it easier to learn another, though, especially if they're related.

>>23820936
Knowing Latin/Greek/Sanskrit to a very high level (especially first two) wasn’t uncommon in the 19th and 20th centuries. But the people who did started learning Latin from the time they were like 5 so take that into account.
Revilo P Oliver for instance (better known for his other work)

>>23820936
It is eminently possible, just not easy. Many Germanic philologists know Old English, Old Norse, Gothic, and Old High German, for instance. Milton and many other Renaissance scholars knew Latin, Ancient Greek, and Hebrew.

>>23820974
>Old English, Old Norse, Gothic, and Old High German
Which is kind of like knowing French, Spanish, Portuguese, and Italian. Hard, but not nearly so hard as knowing four unrelated languages.

>>23819754
?What is onions about my post? I lift more than you btw

>>23820959
> Knowing Latin/Greek/Sanskrit to a very high level (especially first two) wasn’t uncommon in the 19th and 20th centuries.
Proof?

>>23818410
put Adler's Latin course in the Textbooks, it is much better than Wheelocks IMO

>>23820959
Unlesss you were a dedicated lingust you were not learning Sanskrit, ever. Only Latin and to a lesser extent Greek was more common, and this was not to a 'very high level'. Being able to competently translate large texts properly was still something not many people could do, although far more than today.

>>23821129
How long does it take to learn sanskrit and is it worth it?

>>23821178
are you interested in ancient india?

>>23821129
Well yeah I was obvs talking about dedicated linguists.
>>23821085
Try to find a single Sanskrit scholar from the 19th century who didn’t know Greek and Latin

>>23821194
Yes, in hinduism and buddhism.

>>23821220
probby worth it then, i don't know it but to my understanding sanskrit has a really impressive wealth of texts

>>23821220
For Buddhism, learn Pali.

>>23821212
no shit they learned greek and latin in hs back then

IMPORANT
Do. Not. Go. Into. Academia. Absolute cancer field and I went to Ivy-league/Oxbridge ok. Do not do it.

>>23821658
Reddit says they're mutually intelligible:

https://www.reddit.com/r/linguistics/comments/7ymq7i/compared_to_modern_romances_how_much_is_pali/

>>23821732
Ok, why? If you post that without any explanation no one will take you seriously.

>>23821661
You sound angry. You mean you didn't take Latin in High School.

>>23821661
Ok that's what I'm saying. Tons of people have known Greek, Latin and Sanskrit + maybe even Hebrew. Your question was "is it possible to learn 3 classical languages" and the answer is yes.
Why so salty?

>>23821766
I learned latin, greek, german, french, russian and english dawg

>>23821835
Lol no you didn't.

>>23821732
But I want something to complain about

>>23821835
and yet you're still retarded

>>23820936
If it takes 5 years to learn one, why would it take a lifetime to learn three?

You have one hour to prove any of this shit's is worth reading if not la santa Vulgata

>>23820920
I copied the entire phrase, decided to only include the two nouns but deleted the wrong characters lmao

>>23822043
"Santa" is Romance, dumbass.

>>23822062
It's the real Latin, who it actually sounded

>>23821882
Takes 5 for those who are under 25, after that your brain will keep declining and you it will take longer and longer to learn.

>>23822043
All the Church fathers were raised on the Greek and Latin classics.

>>23822138
...Why did they ever bother writing the "C" if it was never pronounced? Where did they even get the notion to write an extra letter there, and why a "C" in particular?

>>23820936
If by learn a classical language you mean learn it to the point that you're able to fluently read all major and some minor Latin or Greek authors then no, 5 years won't be enough time

I'm not really a fan of Kai Vogelsang's textbook and I think Rouzer's textbook is much more pedagogically sound, at least for self study and with no other materials used
I guess in a classroom setting you'd discuss all the passages and also be provided with extra reading
Also by some miracle I'm actually enjoying the English to TL exercises

>>23820649
I took it in high school but I really only got seriously starting a year ago. Going through grammar textbooks (the Intensive Course really helped) and learning a lot of vocabulary is definitely the way to go. I'm hoping to take Greek in university.

>>23819636
>Every major American university
Fixed that for you.

If I learn Japanese do I get Old Japanese for free as well or is it a case similar to English and Old English?

>>23819571
>That was the grammar my professor recommended.
>>23819636
>have a degree in Classics

Ngmi

>>23822150
So?

>>23822192
It's to make it more complicated for the elites

>>23821744
Not for technical texts. I don't know either of them, but you will notice that experts in Pali, and Sanskrit exist that don't list the other one. That's clue enough.

>>23821744
go back

>>23822317
And Cambridge and Oxford

>>23821178
Its going to be hell if you can't master the phonetics early on

>>23823957
Why would I care about the phonetics of a dead language? Lol

>>23824102
You're right. :(

>>23822386
I'd say it's on par with English and Middle English: Not a completely foreign language, but still a lot of difficult and obscure bits.

>>23824102
and then people wonder why dead languages are so hard

>>23824346
???
I really don’t follow your point. If you wanna learn the phonetics of a dead language that’s fine, but claiming it makes learning the language easier doesn’t make sense at all. I learned French without even bothering to learn anything about its phonetics because I was only interested in reading stuff, if I were to talk to a native they’d probably not even understand me, but I can read Proust while most people can’t and this is fine for me, on top of that French is an alive language, so if phonetics isn’t even important when learning an alive language, imagine for a dead one lol

>>23824366
i can only imagine the hell of being subjected to listening to proust in the head voice of a thickly accented burger

>>23824366
stupid fucking retard Sanskrit has rules for sound changes in word boundaries, and if you can perfectly pronounce the syllables the rule becomes intuitive very quickly, and if you decide not to, you will never be able to read classical sanskrit texts, and not to mention poetry, you are such a stupid fucking retard kill yourself immediately.

>>23824395
Well, he probably didn't speak like a modern French person today as well, so if you read him in the head voice of today's French you're not listening the the real Proust either lol

>>23824539
He only died a hundred years ago. Pronunciation doesn't shift all that much in a hundred years- you can listen to recordings of hundred-year-old French, it sounds much more like present-day French than burger French does.

>>23824102
Vintage /clg/

>>23823826
NGDAV had to be changed why?

We're such a lucky generation, we have access to old books just by learning one language. In the future, 1000 years from now, people will have to learn two languages if they want to read the old books and the current ones.

>>23819338
Also why is Cicero not recommended to beginners more? I'm reading a Cicero anthology and it seems far more straight forward compared to Caesar.

>>23825473
He is, just not on /clg/ which seems to be permanently stuck in the beginner textbook phase

>>23825408
Supposedly to show inflectional changes easier.
While this has some merit more likely it was change for the sake of change. Gotta justify selling a new edition to students somehow.

>>23825408
is not the case order NGDAAV standard? NGDAV is for Greek.

>>23825473
I did a course that covered both Cicero and Caesar, and I found Caesar to be the easier of the two.

>>23823957
Sanskrit doesn't appear to have the same phonological challenges that Greek and Latin do with having to guess vowel lengths and reconstruct pitch accents.

I am going to motivate my study of Sanskrit with my hatred of Indians

>>23826063
Hinduism includes the world's oldest formal grammatical tradition and places high emphasis on proper pronunciation, with the belief that prayers are "meaningless" otherwise.
Interestingly, there's still variation in the pronunciation for the anusvara (probably historically a nasal vowel but nowhere today realized as such) and visarga, but nobody really starts fights about them the way Greek and Latin students do. Everyone just seems to recognize them as regional/national variables.

>>23826644
You'll fit right in. Charles Rockwell Lanman's turn of the century Sanskrit Primer, still a standard text no doubt due to the lack of newer alternatives, includes incessant complaints about "Hindoo prattle" in between grammatical notes. It and many other philological texts seem to advance a quasi-Nietzschean narrative of Vedic glory receding into Hindu quietism.

>>23826998
Have you studied Sanskrit?
What have been the most rewarding texts for you to read?
I'm mostly interested in the rigveda, ramayana, mahabharata and the upanishads

>>23825675
Recently there's been a push to put NV together as they share most forms. In reality it is just meddling for the sake of meddling

My main motivation is to read Homer in the original language, is it best for me to start with Attic?

>>23827207
Yes, do a textbook which will inevitably be Attic and then go for Homer. His dialect is a little difficult at first but you'll quickly get the hang of it.

>>23827067
I would not say I've studied deeply. I did Devavanipravesika, Lanman, then parts of MB and Ramayana and Vedic texts with a dictionary. Some attempts at Kalidasa but he's much harder than the others. Vedic is also very hard and has many irregularities. Maybe I'll read more later.
I think the Upanishads are the most interesting. They tend to be the easiest of the Vedic texts, with simpler syntax than the rest but still some exotic vocabulary. If you like Lucretius, Parmenides, or the Pre-Socratics, these texts start from a similar place but go much further. These are imo the best reason to learn Sanskrit. The Vedanta society has excellent, cheap glossed editions if you don't mind being evangelized a bit.
The next most interesting to me is love poetry, like Govardhana, Bhartrihari, and Amaru. All of these are analogous to the Troubadours in that they explore romantic love through nature metaphor, which is in turn a contact with the divine. The principle difference is that they are all far more sexually frank than the most prurient troubadour.
Next comes Kalidasa. He might come first if I could read him. He is Shakespeare: the analogy is not a stretch. All we have from him comes from ancient mythological sources, which he improves upon immeasurably while renewing the language with new poetic forms. He is probably also the most consequential/canonical for general students of Western literature, since translations of Shakuntala had a profound impact on the Romantics and beyond.
Next is Rgveda. It is the oldest Indo-European text we have and the strangest.
Next is Ramayana. It is frankly a slog at times but never not beautiful in verse.
Mahabharata has both excellent parts and arid parts. Honestly, Vyasa is like Homer if he sucked at his job. It makes one appreciate the Homeric tradition that much more, because while stylistically inconsistent, Homer is almost never arid or even unbearable as parts of MB are. The Bhagavad Gita stands out, of course. So do Nalopakhyanam and Ramopakhyanam.

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Monster? Cracked open.
Caesar? Opened.
Audiobook? Prepped.
Yep, it's Latin time.

>>23827207
No, just start with Pharr's Homeric Greek if that's what you want to read. Motivation is the most important thing and Homer is one of the easier authors since he's very repetitive so he's a great starting point.
Pharr even has a whole essay at the start giving the case for starting with Homer.

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>>23827234
> Honestly, Vyasa is like Homer if he sucked at his job. It makes one appreciate the Homeric tradition that much more, because while stylistically inconsistent, Homer is almost never arid or even unbearable as parts of MB are.
I completely agree with this, Mahabharata is mess, a good chunk of it isn't in meter. However, there are sections like the Gita, where Krishna switches to a vedic meter instead of a classical meter to put some of his more serious teachings on the spotlight, I think Mahabharata would be alot better if it didn't have chapters upon chapters of unpoetic theology.

Also if you want to read easy Sanskrit texts, classical plays are always a safe option.

>>23827890
Which Vulgate edition with side-by-side English has the best translation?

Is anyone in this thread learning Classical Chinese? I'm pretty fluent in mandarin, and would be keen to get some insights on it.

>>23828110
It's just getting used to characters not really meaning what you're used to them meaning. Plenty of great books on Classical Chinese, knowing Mandarin (or even Japanese) just makes things easier, albeit weirder.

>>23828268
Does it get in the way of your knowledge of Mandarin or does it enhance it?

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>>23818878
et tū? Ego laetus linguam latinam sciō. Estne meī latinam bonam? Mea Latina bonus nōn est. Sed, cūr linguam latinam scīre sī nōn loquor et scrībō bonum? Simplum! Lūdus est!

>>23828471
Little man talmbout writing Latin poetry when he ass be typin "estne mei latinam bonam?" bruh I fuckin can't w this general no more

>>23828307
learning any language does get in the way due to code switching and stuff like that. When you speak 1 language, your brain is actively suppressing all the others

>>23828110
Yeah I'm studying it now
I've used
>Classical Chinese for Everyone by Bryan W. Van Norden
>Introduction to Classical Chinese by Kai Vogelsang
>New Practical Primer of Literary Chinese by Paul F. Rouzer
The first book isn't really a textbook, it's more of a taster for CC
I got around 100 pages into Introduction to Classical Chinese but sometimes it's frustrating to check your work because the author doesn't provide translations for the extracts, you've got to track them down yourself
New Practical Primer of Literary Chinese has the solutions for the first 11 chapters and it has English to CC translation exercises
If there were translations provided for Vogelsang's book I'd like it a lot more
The book progressively builds up the grammar and explains it well, it's just frustrating having to trawl through entire chapters of Zuo Zhuan to find the correct translation
Rouzer's book has a lot of passages that he wrote himself which are useful for testing your knowledge

How difficult would it be for an American retard to learn Hebrew? Not at a conversational level, but enough to supplement theological research. How different is modern Hebrew from biblical Hebrew?

>>23828978
also, I heard that the old testament rhymed, so that it could be memorized by song, anyone care to expound upon that?

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>>23828694
vidē. simplum est. ego nōn agam dēsistere. sciō.. VGH sciō... paeniteō!!! Ego iūstus nōn agam dēsistere, id totum est, hahahahae!

>>23828307
No, it will enhance your knowledge, as long as you aren't an absolute midwit.

How many literary languages is it possible to learn to read with a dictionary?
Do you find that your instinct for inflection is lost very quickly in between languages?

Okay, so it seems to me that one ought to be able to -- if one has the time & the Internet -- decline or conjugate a Latin noun/verb properly, even knowing no Latin: simply search for the word on (e.g.) Wiktionary; find the handy chart; choose the right form!

Now, at first blush, this appears to have a fatal flaw: how do you know which one is "the right form"? Aha, "appears"!:
...

Okay, so I had wanted to make this a real tour-de-force of a thread -- you know: ups & downs, triumph & loss, adventuring out into the philological wilds with yours truly -- before reaching the dénoûment of "and here is whereat I can go no farther... unaided, at least! for, gentle reader, it is your assistance I blah blah blah"...

...but, uh... well-- this may be where I got stuck. (At the first minor hurdle, the crueler sort of reader might say.)
Essentially: I seem to be able to read about the Dative vs. the Ablative all dam' day, but I am still at a loss when it comes to knowing which one belongs in the sentence I am trying to compose.

Oh, sure, when it's clearly within a certain category -- say, "Marcus Junius is my friend" -- it's not so bad; but even then, half the time, I'm proudly (and figuratively) clutching tight my recognition of "okay, clearly, X is possessing Y: gen.!" or "ah, A is receiving the action of B: dat.!"... only to find an idiomatic translation, lurking somewhere online, and oh look no it was actually supposed to be nominative u dummy lmao!
(or whatever the case -- heh, heh -- may be)
So... is there no way for the non-Latin-reader to reason it out, given tables & explanations?

I assume practice makes perfect, naturally, and I'd love to actually learn the language too -- but if there's some exhaustive list of examples + extensive technical explanations somewhere, in the meantime...

(That is: I've plenty of tables of what the case endings are, but help telling "this word in this sentence is going to be in the ablative case, but this word in this sentence would be accusative, rather" -- or, well, you know what I mean, right: that kind of thing, except not wrong and dumb -- would be truly excellent.)

(note: I have searched, and mostly what comes up are fairly brief treatments with a few simple examples; and we already know I'm too dumb to learn from that-)
Thanks a ton for any help, y'all! It is appreciated.

>>23828969
Thanks, I'll give it a shot then

>>23821178
>is it worth it?
Unless you're a linguist (which in this day, it's basically useless in the field) or obsessed with India/Sanskrit texts, no.

Hey Classical Chinese guys do you know any modern day Chinese. How mutually intelligible are the two?

>>23830106
Just started with Classical Chinese today.
There's a lot of overlap, knowing Mandarin is a big help towards learning CC. I wouldn't consider them mutually intelligible though, at least for me.

>>23830084
I want to believe this was sincerely posted somewhere

Oh my goodness, where do I even start with the epic saga that is learning Latin? It’s like diving into a labyrinth with no exit in sight! The grammar is a maze of bewildering cases and endless verb conjugations that twist my brain into knots. Just when I think I’ve finally conquered those pesky declensions, bam!—another set of exceptions hits me like a plot twist I never saw coming. Honestly, who thought it was a good idea to make a language so complicated? It feels more like an endless battle than a fun adventure!

And don’t even get me started on the “fellow” learners. Instead of finding a supportive guild, it often feels like I’ve stumbled into a ruthless competition. Some people act like they’re the ultimate scholars, ready to strike at anyone who dares to make a mistake. Seriously? It’s disheartening! I just want to enjoy the journey of learning, not feel like I’m constantly being judged by the grammar police. Where’s the camaraderie? This elitism just sucks the joy out of what could be a shared adventure.

Then there’s this unsettling vibe of romanticizing the Roman Empire, all while ignoring the darker chapters of its history. It’s like, hello? Can we please acknowledge that this language is tied to some serious issues? Elevating ourselves by claiming a connection to a culture built on conquest feels so out of touch. It’s frustrating to see some learners bask in the glow of ancient glory while sidelining the voices of those who suffered. Can’t we do better than that?

And really, why on Earth are we doing this to ourselves? In a world overflowing with modern languages that could open up actual doors, why choose to battle with an ancient tongue that feels utterly irrelevant? It’s like opting to fight a dragon when you could just hop on a magic carpet and explore new lands! Spending hours wrestling with Latin verbs instead of picking up a language that actually connects us today seems like such a missed opportunity.

>>23830794
stupidus anonymus!

Which Vulgate edition with side-by-side English has the best translation?

>>23831561
https://www.drbo.org/drl/chapter/01001.htm
Douay-Rheims translates from the Latin, not the Hebrew, with a good amount of fidelity, except where it would result in broken English.

>>23831571
*nor the Greek (talking about the NT)

>>23831571
Thanks bro

>>23826998
how far back does the pronunciation tradition go? would be kinda interesting to hear something like the oldest layers of the veda pronounced with some type of reconstructed old Vedic system

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Ō bēstia cornibus decorāta ab superiōre sphaerā trādita,
cape rādīcēs intrā custōdēs turris sculptōs.
Tēque illīc īnsessō, abs tē quaerimus surgās.
Saltā lascīvīque; pūrgā quae vīs omnia:
crūdēlitātem, dolōrem, et quī turrim vexant.
Pūrgā scortillī prōgeniem nēquam.

Why waste your time studying dead languages? With digital humanities and AI, everything will be perfectly translated soon.

>>23832440
Because it's rewarding

>>23832354
It's evident that Vedic phonology was different, because texts have been preserved both with and without Sandhi applied. Vedic has different phonotactics, allowing for a much greater incidence of vowel hiatus, and probably diphthongs where Classical has [e:] and [o:]. It also has a much greater incidence in writing of the Chandrabindu, which some traditions render as [əgəm].
I have heard short clips of isolated words pronounced in reconstructed Vedic phonetics, but I haven't found full Vedic declamations. Maybe I just don't know where to look. Sanskrit is funny because audio is much more readily available than for any other classical language, and it seems like the most rational choice just to adopt the general slightly hindicizing pronunciation.

>>23832461
So is being the best at a video game. You are no better.

>>23832682
You have an inferiority complex

>>23832440
ai fags are so annoying

>>23832440
And you'll know AI translated these works correctly because...?

>>23832711
I see you have no actual argument. In addition, the suggestion that this hobby makes you superior is as visible as it is concerning.

Someone link a pdf that will teach greek, do it

>>23832727
just the bugs

https://estudantedavedanta.net/Eight-Upanisads-Vol-1.pdf
Here btw is my first and favorite Sanskrit text. I think the first and most important one, the Isa upanishad, is a good litmus test for whether or not Sanskrit will be worth it for you. Read the whole piece, comprised of just 18 short couplets, together with the gloss and commentary. If it holds you, Sanskrit should be worth your while.

>>23818076
>do eye neeed go to skool to lern chiken scrashes?
serious question

>>23832711
Reminder this guy got filtered by month 1 Latin (no discipline) and spends his days spreading trolling in resentment.

im thinking of getting a tattoo on my collarbone
οἶνος καὶ ἀλήθεια.

>>23833028
Oikos and Alntheia

Home and garden? lol

>>23833028
Oh, it’s “wine and truth.” That is lame. I thought it was like Home and Country or something.

>une impression de tristesse et peut-etre meme une teinte de melancholie qui ne s'est jamais bien effacee.
Do you feel this way about classical cultures?

>>23832440
I enjoy reading things in Latin and like learning it.
I am not autistic and do not believe in only utilitarian ends to everything.

>>23833356
No
Next time post in English

>>23833613
If you've read classics papers, you'll know that people like throwing untranslated French and German in there all the time. You are expected to know those languages.

I have started reading "A New Practical Primer of Literary Chinese", I already know Japanese and I don't want to learn Mandarin or Kanbun, should I use go-on or kan-on pronunciation?

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Why did ancient cuneiform script look so demonic and evil?

>>23834200
It looks kind of like sigils.
https://youtube.com/shorts/u8MzrEB9AAk

>>23834009
I tend to use the modern Mandarin myself, but I'd suggest using kan'on. Use go'on if you're interested in Buddhist stuff.

Can CCfags make their own general? Fuck off

>>23834466
is there any advantage over using one or the other like rythm or something or is it just preference / tradition?

>>23834731
for example, the first text of the book I am using it:
知命者不怨天,知己者不怨人。
i could pronounce it: chi myou sha fu on ten, chi ko sha fu on nin
or: chi mei sha fuu en ten, chi ki sha fuu en jin

>>23834572
I wish there were enough of us to warrant our own general

>>23834764
I could say:
Ching chong
Or
Ving vong

>>23834200
They have been used in film as evil symbols. The programming sticks :^)

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I'm going through Adler's Latin course, and he talks of using accents in writing. Why is this is only course I've seen this in?
pic rel.

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>>23834200
>let's make a font that looks like hellfire wisping off the top of each character

>>23834926
that's peculiar, it's almost like a Greek-like system, I'm guessing though it's mostly for pedagogical purposes and the author still considers the accent system intensive

>>23834953
Set in stone, seared on flesh.

>>23834764
Seems like there's no absolute advantage with one over the other. It's probably as comparably valuable as using Korean or Vietnamese reflexes to read it.

As far as I can see Hokkien tends to be the living Chinese variety that pronounces things closest to Middle Chinese. Some Mandarinist might dispute this citing the absence of certain retroflex consonants, but practically speaking, to me "Tiong-hôa" more resembles the reconstructed "trjuwng hwae" or "ʈɨuŋ ɦˠua" than Mandarin "ʈʂʊŋ xua" does.

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>>23834953
Hebrew and Arabic script both always reminded me of flames and swords desu.

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I just did the exercises in Hacket's for chapter 16 and for the ones to be written in Hebrew, I couldn't think of what nikkud to write except for the obvious ones. Is this going to bite me in the ass later or is it a sign of being more advanced since you're supposed to forget the nikkud anyway?

>>23833826
Is this website a classics paper?

>>23834572
They tried, it failed immediately
Reminder that CC needs Latin and Greek, not the other way around

>>23834926
Read what you posted. Latin accentuation is a simple system. Once you know the rules you don't need to have it marked at all.

Αὐτὰρ ὁ γυμνώθη ῥακέων πολύμητις Ὀδυσσεύς,

Autar o yumuouthon rakewuo nolumnutos Odysseus,

ἆλτο δ' ἐπὶ μέγαν οὐδὸν ἔχων βιὸν ἠδὲ φαρέτρην

Alto de eni meyau oudo exwou biou nede Pharetronou

ἰῶν ἐμπλείην, ταχέας δ' ἐκχεύατ' ὀϊστοὺς
αὐτοῦ πρόσθε ποδῶν, μετὰ δὲ μνηστῆρσιν ἔειπεν·

Iwo emneleinu taxeas de ekxeaut oiktous
Autou nrothe nodwou meta de munktnraiu eeineu

This is a really rudimentary translation based entirely on the memory of teaching myself the Greek alphabet when I was 8.

>>23834764
If you don't already have a preference in mind, and aren't particularly interested in linguistic or specific topics, just roll the die on it, it truly doesn't matter. . . you could even use kun'yomi or English words.

>>23818109
All Germanic languages changed enormously

>>23832670
how much of Sanskrit is ‘corrupted’ by Indians/Dravidians?

Should you learn Latin like a living language from the start? should I use Lingua Latina?

>>23836448
If I were to learn Latin the only difference compared to learning a living language is that I would only use written language as learning material, I would completely avoid anything spoken. With a modern living language I would start from audio to have a better grasp of the phonology and try to get a better accent from the start, and then move onto the written language.

>>23836350
utterly barbaric. this is the guy forcing himself to every plato discussion a while back?

>>23836448
>like a living language
Impossible, because it isn't living.
Children grow up surrounded by language. Parents, relatives, friends, teachers, schoolmates, strangers - all speaking while children absorb intricacies and nuances. You reading a book or two is nothing like that.

>>23836920
He means a 2nd language.

You can learn French by literally just moving to France (not Paris) and having to cope

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>>23833356
>Ce n’est guère que dans le fumier que se trouvent les perles, témoin Ennius. Pour moi, je préférerais les perles du vieux Romain à tout l’or de Virgile ; il faut un bien gros tas d’or pour valoir une petite poignée de perles.
>Je trouve un singulier plaisir à déterrer un beau vers dans un poëte méconnu ; il me semble que sa pauvre ombre doit être consolée, et se réjouir de voir sa pensée enfin comprise ; c’est une réhabilitation que je fais, c’est une justice que je rends ; et si quelquefois mes éloges pour quelques poëtes obscurs peuvent paraître exagérés à certains de mes lecteurs, qu’ils se souviennent que je les loue pour tous ceux qui les ont injuriés outre mesure, et que les mépris immérités provoquent et justifient les panégyriques excessifs.
plus this.

podium arts is posting some Iliad readings lately by good ole Stratakis, but what do you think about this type of rendition?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=101NFAu9yhw
it's not very musical

>>23836920
It takes but one person to make a language living, besides, we are smarter than children and can learn a language much faster. Internilizing grammar is just constant drills, then constant reading and writing.

>>23837126
>besides, we are smarter than children and can learn a language much faster
??

>>23837126
>we are smarter than children and can learn a language much faster
Then why don't you speak Latin?

ἔργον καλός ἀνήρ οὐρανός ἀνταπόδοσις διά ἀρετή. οὐ ἔργον καλός ἀνήρ οὐρανός ἀνταπόδοσις διά συμφορά.

>>23836401
Well, my intention was to ask if any on'yomi system would better capture classical Chinese.

>>23837221
>>23837223
Children have an advantage in neuroplasticity, and combined with 24/7 immersion they appear to learn faster. But that’s offset by the intelligence of adults who can employ better problem solving skills, reasoning, strategies for memorization, and discipline. If you gave the average child and the average adult the same amount of time and resources to learn a language, the adult would learn faster every time.

>>23837541
they think a 6 year old quoting cocomelon is on par with an adult who isnt lazy or retarded that can write an essay in a foreign language he's only studied for a year

>>23837097
it's definitely musical and his pronunciation is beautiful but rejects closely following the rhythm of the metre.

>>23836448
It worked pretty well for me but I did learn Greek with the gt method before so I already got most of the grammatical structure.

„only children can learn languages ):” is 100% just cope for lazy people. If you turned off the netflix you could learn another language too

Should I learn the Koine dialect?
I like older Ancient Greek, like Attic and Homeric
I chose Attic first, because it seemed common enough compared to Homeric, but still old and had this traditional (non-iotacised) pronunciation.

But then I heard Adrian Hundhausen recommendation to learn Koine first because it's the most "standard" dialect of Ancient Greek

I just like the diligent pronunciation and one symbol for one sound (or as close to it as possible)
All the simplifications like pronouncing ῃ as η etc are really annoying

>>23838366
you mean "should I learn Koine first?" ?
going from Attic to Koine is almost for free and doesn't require much effort, going backwards is probably going to be a bit more challenging albeit not excessively

your pronunciation concern is reasonable and one of the big reasons I like reconstructed

>>23836600
That transliteration was totally from memory. How the heck do they put two consonants like that - theta and nu sidy side in the second word?

>>23838366
The „Attic vs Koine” meme needs to completely die. I blame youtube „Biblical Greek” channels

>>23838455
elaborate please

>>23838457
There are like less than a half dozen notable differences. Most of it you’ll just pick up by reading. People put way way too much emphasis on the differences, probably because they’re trying to sell their “Koine Greek” textbooks. There are probably more differences between individual Koine and Attic authors than there are between Koine and Attic as a whole.

What is written in Koine Greek?

>>23838707
bible and thats about it

>>23838707
for me it's Plutarch™

It's frustrating not having any idea whether a specific usage of a verb or a particular adjective/noun is commonly used or very rare especially when you're reading texts from multiple authors

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>>23838707
the first novels

>>23839915
If only there were a resource, a reference of sort sort, that contained exactly that information. A large book perhaps, concentrating on diction.

>>23838707
90% of early theology

>>23837541
Most people take years to be able to speak in full sentences. An adult spending 3 years fully immersed in a language can almost certainly speak with sophistication in that language.

>>23838455
I got into a bit of an argument with one of my uncles over this, because he has the idea that the optative is somehow difficult. After learning Attic I can read the New Testament (with some vocabulary help) like flowing honey. I'd hate to be someone taught to be afraid of the optative and be confused when I try to read a bit of Plato.

>>23840259
To be fair I'm not sure the average person has ready access to a large LSJ.

>>23840365
It's totally online

>>23840365
Mega

>>23825408
Aren't different orders usual in America and Britain?

>>23828110
I am, what do you want to know?

>>23828978
>How difficult would it be for an American retard to learn Hebrew? Not at a conversational level, but enough to supplement theological research.
Not terribly difficult, just start with the alphabet and go from there.
>How different is modern Hebrew from biblical Hebrew?
The usual description I've heard is that it's like modern English vs. Shakespeare's English.
>>23828988
I've never heard of or noticed it rhyming, but it is traditionally sung. The Tiberian vocalization of Hebrew in particular really only makes sense in the context of cantillation. And a melody does help with memorization to be sure.

>>23830058
>How many literary languages is it possible to learn to read with a dictionary?
A lot, probably.
>Do you find that your instinct for inflection is lost very quickly in between languages?
What do you mean?

>>23830106
>do you know any modern day Chinese
A little.
>How mutually intelligible are the two?
Not really. Sure, there will be a lot of familiar vocabulary, but there will also be plenty of vocabulary that looks familiar but has a different meaning, and the grammar is different.

>>23832440
No such thing as "perfectly translated". There is no single most correct translation, because translation is always a series of tradeoffs and compromises. If you were not monolingual you would understand this.

>>23834009
Traditionally the Japanese would only use straight onyomi for chanting Buddhist sutras, and they would use kanbun kundoku for everything else. I can recommend some kanbun books if you're interested.

>>23834764
Or you could read it as:
Mei wo shiru mono ten wo uramazu, onore wo shiru mono hito wo uramazu.

>>23840343
I’m not sure what your point is. My point was that adults learn are better at learning than children.

>>23835030
Reconstructed Middle Chinese is also an option.

>>23835811
Provided you know how the word is pronounced, knowing which specific nikkud of the several that could make a given sound in modern pronunciation a word is written with isn't terribly important.

>>23838016
Or turn on the Netflix and put on a show in the language you're learning (without English subtitles).

For anyone who might be interested, I typed it up for another thread but here are the tips on language learning that I got from an acquaintance, an Irish linguist who is one of the most multilingual people I've ever met (in modern and ancient languages):
>Throw yourself into exposure, work out grammar as you go
>Use flashcards and labeling for vocabulary
>Use mnemonics
>Listen to music, memorize the lyrics and the meaning
>Use flaschards to learn new writing systems

>>23840879
this is effectively how i became fluent in french (except memorising poetry instead of song lyrics)
i aim to do this now with mandaring (and then classical chinese), which should be a more formidable task

>>23839837
he wrote in attic

>>23818410
is there a graph like this for ancient greek

>>23840879
>>Use flashcards and labeling for vocabulary
Repetamus nomina quotidiana, ut certius reddamus ea.

Do any of you guys have kids or are planning to have?
Will you teach them your dead nerd language?

>>23841247
i'd rather raise my kids to be the kind of people who'd like to learn classical languages rather than forcing them to learn it when they're young
i'll make sure they know french and english tho

>>23841247
planning on having kids in a year or two. teaching them classical languages when they're young seems like a waste. there's no point to being able to speak them as a child, really. they're just gonna learn english & yup'ik (my partner's native language) & if they want to when they're older i'll help them with classical languages

>>23834926
It would surely help to see the previous page, but it seems like he wishes to denote both vowel length and accentuation (for each vowel?) and in his notation acute = accented and short, while circumflex = accented and long?

>>23841266
Reasonable answer. Read to your kid every single day and let them develop healthy curiosity. Have good conversations with them centered around asking them questions. Dole out punishments and rewards as necessary, but don't be emotional about it: have equal reactions to everything. When they find what they love doing, don't give it an external reward but rather put all resources reasonably possible into letting them pursue it. Do all of this well and they will develop a passion at least as interesting as classical languages.

https://fr.m.wikisource.org/wiki/Po%C3%A8mes_saturniens_(1866)/Prologue
Did Verlaine know Sanskrit? The level of familiarity on display here makes me think he did.

>>23840259
Well based on the languages I've studied, frequency information is just not present in dictionaries

>>23841498
i don't know, but it was rather trendy amongst intellectuals around that time to study it, so there's a good chance he had at least some familiarity with it

>>23841325
On the page before (see pic) he says "tone or empasis" in regards to accent. I almost wonder if he held that Latin had a pitch accent, since he only uses these on the accent and no other vowels.

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>>23841650
forgot pic

can anyone recommend latin learning resources in french?

>>23841898
Assimil le latin

any classical chinese resources in french?

I feel like a pseud because I can read the diplomatic and military bits of Caesar just fine but the second it gets slightly technical like with the boats in ch 3 my comprehension drops to like 5%

Bros... De Senectute... What an essay. Very comforting in times of great change, when you are reminded of the relentless march of time.

>>23842469
time doesn't march, it flows

>>23818076
Can anyone recommend a book for learning (ancient) Egyptian hieroglyph? Thanks.

>>23837058
>not Paris
Which city would you recommend?

Caesar didn’t take a single unjustified action in the Gallic wars.
Slaughtering rapefugees is based. He was extremely lenient to most tribes that rebelled and only wiped out like 2 or 3 to prevent further rebellions. And the Gauls were going to be conquered by the Germans if Rome hadn’t done anything so the choice was just between enlightened Roman rule and civilization or Germanic barbarism.
Most of the anti-Caesar arguments are the same as anti-European colonialism arguments, and you can see the fruit of those for yourself by comparing Rhodesia to Zimbabwe.
>AYYO BUT THEY CULTA THEY DRUIDS NEED TO BE ABLE TO SACRIFICE HUMANS AND LORD OVER THE PEASANTS NIGGA

>>23843784
NTA but anywhere but Paris, Marseille, Lyon. Paris is like every EU capital functionally an anglophone playground with local wallpaper. Marseille and Lyon and getting there too.

>>23843850
>Gauls were going to be conquered by the Germans if Rome hadn’t done anything
The eternal libtard argument (a banal term but completely correct here) is that the conquered are always benign, peaceful savages, undeserving of subjugation — in this case conveniently forgetting the Gauls were a brutal people who would have razed Rome if they had the means (they tried). Caesar fucking won

>>23844497
Certainly true. I more just meant the Gauls were bitches although certainly still aggressive

>>23843850
Caesar was just ancient George W Bush
Both conquered peaceful nations for no reason other than to satisfy their egos
Both overthrew democracy and appealed to the lowest elements of their respective societies (plebs; Evangelicals)
Both supported mass immigration

>>23842012
https://gallica.bnf.fr/ark:/12148/bpt6k6367410h
https://archive.org/details/GrammaireDeLaLangueChinoise?view=theater
https://books.google.fr/books?id=1K8xAAAAIAAJ&printsec=frontcover
https://books.google.fr/books?id=OVsWAAAAYAAJ&printsec=frontcover
And as a bonus, here's one in Latin:
https://archive.org/details/b30448955?view=theater
Note that these are all just from Lexilogos. Wikipedia also mentions a Manuel de chinois classique.

>>23845048
looks brilliant, thanks very much

>>23844962
but who was ancient spiderman?

Recently memorized 越人歌. It's pretty sweet.
noimnotafujoshiiswear

>>23841943
Does Assimil's latin course use audio? or just text? I love Assimil, didn't realise there was a latin course as well.

>>23845944
but isn't that the gay poem

>>23846281
Yes but I'm not a fujoshi, I promise.

>>23846173
you can find the audio + pdf on libgen. search "assimil latin" the people reading have a really thick French accent lol

This is how people ITT read the Aeneid:
ARMMM-a-vi-RUMMM-que-ca-NOOO-TROO-JAEE-KWEEE-PRIII-mus-ab-OHREES

Please stop doing this. You take the greatest poetry ever written and make it sound like it came from someone with a severe head injury.

>>23847547
How should they read it? You can't completely ignore the meter when reading poetry.

>>23848014
Yeah you can. I mean, not ignore it, but don't focus on it. Have you ever heard Shakespeare performed? They don't say the iambic pentameter lines like:
>But SOFT what LIGHT through YONder WINdow BREAKS?
They just speak like normal people

>>23848014
The problem is they confuse meter with accent, producing a completely unnatural rhythm that sounds nothing like the intended meter.
Ignoring long and short for the moment proper accentuation should be
>ARMa VIrumque CAno TROIae QUI PRImus ab ORis
Too many learners overaccentuate long vowels. The rules for Latin accents are quite simple and should be engrained early on to avoid this.