Morris Swadesh’, “The Origin and Diversification of Language”, 1968, was the topic of an earlier blog post.
Here I present : Morris Swadesh, “The Origin and Diversification of Language”, 1968 was the topic of an earlier blog post.
Here I present: Morris Swadesh, “The Origin and Diversification of Language”, 1968, PART TWO (II).
Morris Swadesh (1909-1967), was a linguist responsible for the creation of the lexico-statistical method of ‘glottochronology’.
Anthropologist often refer to division of a dichotomy of spheres of language influence. This dichotomy is (shown on the map ABOVE) is the divide of the Indosphere and the Sinosphere.
The Indosphere is equivalent to the linguistic phylum Nostratic; and, the Sinoshere is equivalent to the linguistic phylum Dene-Caucasian. The diagram BELOW shows Nostratic and Dene-Caucasian language groups, located on the far right side.
The Sumerian language is shown located at the top of the diagram. Sumerian is the oldest written language in the world.
| English | # | Mandarin Chinese | eme ĝir₁₅ 𒅴𒂠 13..9 |
| One | 1.. | 一 (yī) | aš, diš, did |
| Two | 2.. | 二 (èr)*, 两 (liǎng) | min |
| Five | 4.. | 五 (wǔ) | ya |
| Stone | 4.. | 石 (shí)*, 石頭 (shítou) | na4 |
| Hand | 4.. | 手 (shǒu) | buzur, šu |
| Not | 4.. | 不 (bù)*, 別 (bié)*, 沒(méi)* | nu |
| None | 4.. | 无 (wu) | nu |
| Sun | 4..11 | 太陽 (tàiyang) | ud |
| What | 4..14 | 什麼 (shénme), 哪個 (nǎge). | ana, ta |
| Tooth | 4..14 | 牙齒 (yáchǐ). | zu |
| Moon | 4..7 | 月亮 (yuèliang) | iti, itud |
| Tongue | 5.. | 舌 (shé), 舌頭 (shétou) | eme |
| Name | 5.. | 名 (míng)*, 名字 (míngzi) | mu |
| Water | 5.. | 水 (shuǐ) | a |
| Die | 6.. | 死 (sǐ) | ug4,5,7,8 |
| Blood | 6.. | 血 (xiě, xuè, xuě), 血液 (xiěyè, xuèyè, xuěyè) | úš, múd, ùri |
| Eat | 6.. | 吃 (chī) | gu7 |
| Ear | 6.. | 耳朵 (ěrduo) | ngeštug |
| Meat | 6.. | 肉 (ròu) | uzu, su |
| I | 7.. | 我 (wǒ) | ĝae, ĝe |
| You | 7.. | 汝 (ru) | zae, ze |
| Dog | 7.. | 狗 (gǒu) | ur |
| Louse | 7.. | 虱 (shī) | uh3 |
| Tail | 7.. | 尾 (wěi), 尾巴 (wěibā) | kun |
| Horn | 7.. | 角 (jiǎo) | si |
| We | 7..10 | 我們 (wǒmen) | menden |
| Rain | 8.. | 雨 (yǔ) | im |
| Egg | 8.. | 蛋 (dàn), 鷄蛋 (jīdàn)* | nuz |
| Hair | 8..14 | 頭髮 (tóufa) | siki |
| Fingernail | 8..4 | 指甲 (zhǐjia) | umbin |
| Night | 8..8 | 夜晚 (yèwǎn) | gíg |
| Drink | 9.. | 喝 (hē) | nag̃ |
| New | 9.. | 新(xin) | gibil |
| Star | 9.. | 星 (xīng), 恆星 (héngxīng)* | ul, mul |
| Hard | 10.. | 难 (nan) | dugud |
| Kill | 10.. | 殺 (shā) | ug4,5,7,8 |
| Eye | 10..12 | 眼睛 (yǎnjing) | igi |
| Dry | 11.. | 乾／干 (gān) | háda |
| Bird | 11.. | 鳥 (niǎo) | mušen, hu |
| Leaf | 11.. | 葉／叶 (yè), 葉子／叶子 (yèzi) | (ngiš)pa |
| Foot | 11.. | 脚 (jiǎo) | ngìri |
| Black | 11.. | 黑 (hēi) | gíg |
| Smoke | 12.. | 煙 (yān) | i-bí |
| Ashes | 12.. | 煙 (yān) | dé |
| Nose | 12..3 | 鼻子 ( bízi) | kiri3,4 |
| Who | 14.. | 誰 (shéi, shúi) | gu’e |
| Head | 14.. | 頭 (tóu) | sang, ugu |
| Mouth | 15.. | 嘴 (zuǐ), 嘴巴 (zuǐba) | ka |
| Tree | 16.. | 樹 (shù) | ngiš |
| Hear | 18.. | 聼 (tīng) | ngeštug |
ABOVE is a collection of Morris Swadesh items of fifty (50) words. The first column is English, second column is kanji-strokes (#), third column is Mandarin Chinese, and fourth column is Sumerian.
Here I presented: Morris Swadesh, “The Origin and Diversification of Language”, 1968 was the topic of an earlier blog post.
SUMMARY.
Sumerian is written eme ĝir₁₅ 𒅴𒂠 13..9. This is the term Sumerians themselves referred to their language. 𒅴𒂠 is composed two cuneiforms of 13 and 9 impressions, respectively. 𒅴 is pronounced “eme”; 𒂠 is pronounced “ĝir₁₅” (the 15 subscript refers to the #15 cuneiform choice).
COMMENTS.
This blog post presented Chinese and Sumerian as two ancient cultures from the viewpoint of Morris Swadesh lexicography.
The Nostratic (Sumerian) and the Dene-Caucasian (Chinese) are a dichotomy of terms used to discuss language populations.
The dichotomy of both Chinese and Sumerian is founded on the use of logograms for writing. The most ancient writings in the world were logographic in Mesopotamia’ and China.
The Indosphere and the Sinosphere are divided into culture spheres of language influence by the Himalayan Mountains.
The Himalayan Mountains are the divide between Nostratic phylum and Dene-Caucasian phylum languages.
In the ancient times Mesopotamia’ with Ganges-Indus Valleys Civilization were the parts of the Indosphere (shown on map ABOVE).
