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CLASSIFYING THE WORLD'S LANGUAGES *

A POSSIBLE NEW APPROACH

(Contact)

 

 

INTRODUCTION

 

          Starting during the 18th century, attempts have been made to classify the world's languages into one comprehensive genetic system of families. This effort has been very frustrating for many linguists because organizing languages into such a system has been like playing a game of musical chairs. Major languages were shifted from one language family to another, whole families were bundled into super families on very shaky assumptions, proto languages were concocted, others were split off and given their own family tree. Faulty reasoning and dreaming resulted in some of these assumptions to be accepted as gospel and given credibility by contrived systems of phonological correspondence, created by an obsessive group of linguists known as the Neo-Grammarians. The best-known example of this is the theory of the Indo-European Family of languages that is based on the crippled reasoning that if the observed relationship between the languages is not accidental, it must be genetic. Most of the Neo-Grammarians' inventions have long ago been put into the dustbin, but what remains of them is taken as evidence that modern linguistics in some important sense is still to be considered as a science. It now appears that modern linguistics is solidly founded on religion and not on academic substance.

 

          In a desperate attempt to make some sense out of the profusion of languages, linguists have been searching for the "Mother Tongue", also called "Proto-World". This initiative is now considered a most controversial contrivance in linguistic circles. Many linguists shy away from attempting to re-construct the ancestral language, calling such attempts speculative and sensational. The much quoted Dr. Vitaly Shevoroshkin (U. of Michigan) is a great supporter of the "Mother Tongue" theory and he assumes that "most words are stable and change very little, ....... words such as body parts have been with us from the beginning". This assumption could have been correct except for one small problem; during the past 4,000 years some of the major religions have put linguists to work, subjecting languages they wanted to be rid of to acrostic manipulation and mutilation. Their efforts were aimed at totally burying the original language of the world's first civilization, in many cases with the use of a strictly adhered to formula which now allows us to reconstruct the origin of the concocted words. Hundreds, if not thousands, of these fabricated words are shown in Edo Nyland’s web pages (see Pages). Their efforts have resulted in a very large number of invented languages, which on first sight have no relationship to the original language, but upon detailed examination can be shown to have originated from the ancient Saharan language. If it hadn't been for the drastic and intensive efforts of the ancient grammarians, a few genetic trees of languages would likely have done the job.

 

          Through the years, there have been a few courageous doubters among the linguists such as M. E. Landsberg (Columbia Univ. S.C.) who wrote: "Indeed, courses in historical linguistics at Universities all over the world, in spite of much perplexing evidence to the contrary, mostly still persist in adhering to strict Indo-European theories". Those who did not follow the Indo-European gospel and sounded the alarm bell risked their immaculate academic reputations by indulging in what was called "Trans Linguistic Investigations," resulting in being censored by the dogma-ridden majority that still rules the discipline. Students are forbidden to study the possible academic fraud behind the Indo-European theory and those who did look into it were stonewalled, isolated and ridiculed. Doubting the Indo-European theory became "taboo" and resulted in a quick forced exit from the profession. One professor to whom I explained my findings commented: "You are excavating recesses into which an academic with the instincts of a gentleman, would never venture". Is it surprising that this subject of invented linguistics is so much unexplored?

 

THE SAHARAN LANGUAGE

 

          The height of the Ice Age came about 16,000 bce. and was followed by rapid deglaciation which created enormous changes in air-circulation over large parts of the world. Hardest hit was North Africa where a dense population, spread over many independent tribes, had developed since about 38,000 bce The effect of this global weather change caused serious desertification that started to be felt around 10,000 bce. (See Climate).  The tribes occupying the Central Sahara had to adapt to ever increasing drought conditions. It is now obvious that the Sahara had been the location of the first true civilization on earth. It had a highly developed religion based on holy respect for the wondrous reproductive and nursing capabilities of the human female, a fully evolved language, a democratically organized and disciplined system of tribal groups, a strong oral tradition and a number of sciences such as astronomy, mathematics, architecture, agriculture, irrigation technology, leather tanning, boat building, sailing and star navigation. For thousands of years the tribes living along the shores, later called the "Sea Peoples", had been sailing and fishing on the oceans. Surplus population had been sent to colonize the lands of Europe that had been vacated by the glaciers. However, the forced exodus, which started after 6,000 bce.., meant that all tribes had to move away from the most affected areas in the center. These were being ferried by the "Sea Peoples" to available lands that had previously been explored by them around the Mediterranean and the Black Sea. They of course brought their religion, language and oral traditions along with them. The language was astonishingly complex and all encompassing for such an early Stone Aged people. In fact, it seems highly unlikely that this amazing Saharan language was formed naturally from the basic onomatopoeic language, which is embedded in it. Like the complex astronomical and mathematical knowledge of these people, their language was so well-organized and logical that it must have been the product of highly qualified linguists, even at that very early date. For details about this language invention, see "Translating Ogam". Therefore, Nyland has called the Saharan language the first highly evolved and invented language on earth.

 

LEVELS OF INVENTED LANGUAGES

 

FIRST LEVEL INVENTED LANGUAGE

 

          There is no way to tell when the Saharan language was brought up to this high level of linguistic proficiency, but it may well have been done before 10,000 bce. The most likely place where this could have been done was in the religious center of the Goddess in the Ahoggar Mountain massif in southeastern Algiers. By that time, the demand for leather sails had outstripped the available supply in the Sahara and a large hunting camp had been established on the migration route of a huge reindeer herd in Arctic Norway, at a place now called Mount Komsa. Petroglyphs, cut into the rock at Mount Komsa, tell an interesting story because they are very much like the drawings on stone at the 7,000-foot level in the Ahoggar Mountains as well as being similar to some of the art in the caves of the Pyrenees.

 

          The huge exodus from the Sahara started in earnest about 7,000 bce., reaching a peak between 5- and 6,000 bce. This extremely mobile civilization was familiar with the entire world. Refugees went to many countries, all maintaining their Goddess religion, their strong oral traditions and their language. While still in the Sahara these traditions had been centrally reinforced from the Ahoggar, now that the population was mostly shifted to Europe and the Near East, the religious center was moved to Malta, which was accessible to all tribes of the Atlantic coast, the Mediterranean and the Black Sea. The megalithic remnants of their Neolithic cathedrals attract thousands of tourists today to Malta. When the new religion of the male gods arrived, several new names were given to the same Saharan language. They are still spoken in outlying areas such as: Elamite (Mesopotamia), Canaanite (Canaan), Minoan (Crete), Hatti (Anatolia), Ligurian (Italy), Pictish (Scotland), Cruithin (Ireland), Cythian (Black Sea), Basque (Pyrenees), Ainu (Japan), Dravidian (India), Olmec (Central America), Polynesian (Oceania).  All of these languages changed and evolved but those that are still spoken, such as Ainu and Dravidian, can easily be recognized as belonging to the genetic group of Saharan languages. Of all these isolated languages, it appears that the Basque language is still the closest, by far, to the original language.

 

SECOND LEVEL INVENTED LANGUAGES

 

          Because of the religious work, probably in the cult town of Nerik, in the Hittite Province of Kizzuwadna, a new male-dominated religion was created.  It purposely inverted all aspects of the Goddess religion and reduced the stature of the Goddess to spouse of the new God king, a forerunner of the later Judaic religion (See Raphael Patai: The Hebrew Goddess). The Saharan language was so dominant within the Goddess religion, its tribal organization and in its worldwide coverage that around 2,000 bce. the decision was made to destroy it, the oral tradition and its tribal system by any means possible. This order was repeated much later in Genesis 11:7 "Let us confuse their language so they may no longer understand each other's speech". They began with creating new languages for the Hittite empire: Lycian, Luwian, Palaic, Lydian and Hittite, creating each with its own script.

 

THIRD LEVEL INVENTED LANGUAGES

 

          Over many centuries, the religious center in Kizzuwadna sent out groups of highly educated missionaries to various parts of the world with orders to introduce male domination, a new religion, create a new language and an original script. This effort resulted in: Sanskrit (India), Ancient Egyptian (Egypt), Ge'ez (Ethiopia), Greek (Greece), Etruscan (Tuscani), Iberian (Spain), Hebrew (Israel), Ugaritic (Syria), Tocharian (China), Japanese (Japan), Toltec (Central America), and possibly a Yiddish/Gothic related language in Russia. Could these have been the Twelve Tribes of Israel?

 

FOURTH LEVEL INVENTED LANGUAGES

 

          Several of these languages spawned their own when: Hebrew scholars created the Semitic languages e.g. Arabic, Phoenician, Syriac, Aramaic. Sanskrit scholars created a host of Northern Indian languages: Maldivian, Sinhalese, Vedda, Kalasha, Kashmiri, Nepali, Bengali etc.


          Ge'ez spawned Tigre, Amharic, Tigrinia, Harari etc.


          Etruscan spawned Latin, Spanish, Portuguese and Catalan, French and Provencal, Italian and Rumanian.

 

FIFTH LEVEL INVENTED LANGUAGES

 

          The Benedictine monks, working from scriptoria on the east coast of England, developed the basic structure of the Germanic group of languages such as: English, German, Dutch, Norwegian, Swedish etc. Benedictine monks working from the Pannonhalma Scriptorium in Hungary created Hungarian, which special invention technique was taken north to create Estonian, Finnish and Lappish.


          With linguistic help from the Pannonhalma monks, the Eastern Orthodox monks, working from the scriptoria attached to the monasteries in Kiev and Novgorod, created the Slavic group of languages such as Russian, Ukrainian, Serbian etc.


          Polish was likely developed in the Benedictine scriptorium at Tyniec.

 

          All these languages have the Saharan/Basque language as their core. The above is very preliminary and needs more work. It appears that the Sino-Tibetan, Amerind, Austric, Australian and Khoisian language groups were not involved in this effort to distort and make over.  Nyland has proposed no changes in these.

 

 

Bibliography

 

 

==========================================

 

For further detail, please refer to:

 

          Nyland, Edo.  2001.  Linguistic Archaeology: An
               Introduction.   Trafford Publ., Victoria, B.C., Canada.

               ISBN 1-55212-668-4. 541 p. [ see abstract & summary]

 

          Nyland, Edo.  2002.  Odysseus and the Sea Peoples: A

               Bronze Age History of Scotland  Trafford Publ., Victoria,

               B.C., Canada.  307 p.   [see abstract & summary].

 

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