Gary said:Happy St Georges day to one and all.
Rollnick said:I learnt something new there Toddy...thanks!
Happy St Georges day everyone...
King Arthur woulda been a Welsh-speaker...And suprisingly the early Welsh is very similiar to modern Welsh...!
Toddy said:It's the English patron saint's day. The United Kingdom is made up of at least 4 different countries; Scotland, Wales, England and Ireland...the Manx and the Shetlanders frequently claim autonomy too though and each country has it's own customs, Saints and flags.
Saint George slew the dragon, to earlier folks this was analogous to the English conquering the Welsh whose symbol is a dragon. It all ties in with the invasions that pushed the British (Welsh) out of their heartlands and into the west of the country. W. central Scotland down into Galloway use to be called Wallia and the inhabitants spoke Welsh (ancient British version anyway)
It's a busy wee island, ours
Cheers,
Toddy
I thought that Brythonic was the term used for the 'group' of Celtic languages including Breton, Cornish and 'Welsh' (Cymraeg or Cymric) Gary?Gary said:King Arthur would have spoken Brythonic (a form of celtic similar to welsh and Gealic) and latin Jake. And 'welsh' is derived from the anglo-saxon word Wylisc - or forienger.
I think you meant Scotland, Wales, England and 'Northern Ireland, unless I missed something on the news last nightToddy said:The United Kingdom is made up of at least 4 different countries; Scotland, Wales, England and Ireland...
andFor the Greeks of the Classical times, dragons were terrifying serpentlike earth-born remnants of an earlier age, dark creatures that had to be heroically eliminated.
Later, the tale of hero defeating evil dragon was used by the Church as an allegory for good (Christianity) defeating evil (paganism) and you can see that also as good (Christianity) defeating evil (Celtic paganism) in the context of the British Isles.Always, in the literary myths that have survived, the hero from the new Olympian age is seen to destroy the dragon, never to consult it; the dragon has been reinterpreted as having terrified and threatened the local populace
source:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/European_dragonThe later Babylonian dragon worshiped by the court of the Persian Cyrus the Great, in the narrative in Bel and the Dragon probably dates to the late 2nd century BCE. John's Book of Revelation Greek literature, not Roman describes Satan as "a great dragon, flaming red, with seven heads and ten horns". Much of John's literary inspiration is late Hebrew (compare Bel and the Dragon) and Greek, but John's dragon, like his Satan, are both more likely to have come originally through Persia. Perhaps our distinctions between dragons of western origin and Chinese dragons (q.v.) are arbitrary.
Moonraker said:I think you meant Scotland, Wales, England and 'Northern Ireland, unless I missed something on the news last night
Moonraker said:I thought that Brythonic was the term used for the 'group' of Celtic languages including Breton, Cornish and 'Welsh' (Cymraeg or Cymric) Gary?
I guess you could say that he spoke British as 'brython' itself is the Welsh word for Briton
It's a great shame your book has not been published Gary. I bet it would made very interesting reading.
Thanks for the clarification Gary.Gary said:Your right MR - BUT in the dark ages the languages were divided into slightly differently to modern britian.
Breton, Cornish and Welsh would have been the last surviving dialects of British (brythonic) - scotland would have been speaking either Pictish or a gaelic derived from the Atti cotti (irish raiders/immigrants) who settled along the west coast and borders of hadrians wall ect.
Breton - Brittany and much of france (amorica) would also have spoken a similar dialect but this was lost after the franks (from where france gets its name) over ran it and finally took control.
As for my book - never say never - Steven King got rejected Hundreds of times before getting published - so you never know.
Rollnick said:King Arthur woulda been a Welsh-speaker...And suprisingly the early Welsh is very similiar to modern Welsh...!
Rollnick said:I learnt something new there Toddy...thanks!
Happy St Georges day everyone...
King Arthur woulda been a Welsh-speaker...And suprisingly the early Welsh is very similiar to modern Welsh...!
Rhapsody said:I believe scholars these days think that if Arthur existed at all then he was from the Scottish border areas... Merlin was happily Welsh, though.
Gary said:Merlin never existed - but - there was a druid names Mryddin who seems to be the basis from the character.