Re: Latin vs. Germanic

[Michael Cargal <cargal -at- CTS -dot- COM>]

On 31 Jul 1997 18:46:27 -0500, Dave Whelan wrote:

>Another take on this is that after the Roman conquest, and later the Norman,
>Latin became the language of the leisured classes. The peasants who did all
>the work used Anglo-Saxon and other Germanic languages; the only ones who
>knew Latin were the rich and powerful from the aristocracy and church. The
>big wheels didn't have to do any work so Latin words lost their vibrancy to
>describe active work.

The Norman Conquest explains why food animals have anglo-saxon names
but cuts of meat have latin ones: Anglo-saxons cared for the animals
but Normans only ate them. William had an army but not a navy, which
explains why army ranks and terms are from Latin but naval ranks and
maritime terms from anglo-saxon (except a few ship's officers who were
army folk put onto the boats to keep the anglo-saxons in line, and
admiral, which is from Arabic).


Michael Cargal     cargal -at- cts -dot- com

 TECHWR-L (Technical Communication) List Information: To send a message
to 2500+ readers, e-mail to TECHWR-L -at- LISTSERV -dot- OKSTATE -dot- EDU -dot-  Send commands
   to LISTSERV -at- LISTSERV -dot- OKSTATE -dot- EDU (e.g. HELP or SIGNOFF TECHWR-L).
  Search the archives at http://www.documentation.com/  or search and
browse the archives at http://listserv.okstate.edu/archives/techwr-l.html