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Most sophisticated ancient language. | ||
Tags: Dead Languages | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Philological Room |  | |
| unityandoutside Diglot Groupie United States Joined 6014 days ago 94 posts - 149 votes  Speaks: English*, Russian Studies: Latin, Mandarin | Message 2 of 15 19 October 2009 at 9:46pm | IP Logged | ||
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I would have to throw my weight between Sanskrit. I've studied some Latin, and I own a Sanskrit book that I read through occasionally. From what I can tell, Latin isn't even a close second to Sanskrit in terms of sheer complexity.
Latin only has five cases, and has lost the dual. Not to mention that you don't have to worry about sandhi or vowel gradation, or learning compound formation. Don't forget the complex phonological system, and the new script with an extensive collection of ligatures. I would love to learn it, if only I had the time... 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Juan M. Senior Member Colombia Joined 5899 days ago 460 posts - 597 votes | Message 3 of 15 19 October 2009 at 10:28pm | IP Logged | ||
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Not only is Sanskrit much more complex than Latin, it is probably the most systematic language ever devised (the meaning of its name being put together or perfected). Furthermore, the grammar of पाणिनि (Pāṇini) was the most advanced work of linguistics until the European 19th century.
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| Akalabeth Groupie Canada Joined 5519 days ago 83 posts - 112 votes Speaks: English* Studies: German, Japanese | Message 4 of 15 19 October 2009 at 10:32pm | IP Logged | ||
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Just out of curiosity, when you say most sophisticated do you just mean most complex?
Sophistication is a pretty subjective thing, but I certainly don't see complexity as being at all desirable, if that's what you're getting at. And I would be surprised if any languages that were widely spoken were not capable of expressing everything that was needed was needed at the time; granted I've not studied any ancient languages, so I can't say for certain. 3 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| Gusutafu Senior Member Sweden Joined 5521 days ago 655 posts - 1039 votes Speaks: Swedish* | Message 5 of 15 19 October 2009 at 10:41pm | IP Logged | ||
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William Jones' famous quote bears you out on Sanskrit. He should know, he spoke 35 languages.
"The Sanskrit language, whatever be its antiquity, is of a wonderful structure; more perfect than the Greek, more copious than the Latin, and more exquisitely refined than either, yet bearing to both of them a stronger affinity, both in the roots of verbs and the forms of grammar, than could possibly have been produced by accident; so strong indeed, that no philologer could examine them all three, without believing them to have sprung from some common source, which, perhaps, no longer exists." 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
 Hencke Tetraglot Moderator Spain Joined 6894 days ago 2340 posts - 2444 votes Speaks: Swedish*, Finnish, EnglishC2, Spanish Studies: Mandarin Personal Language Map | Message 6 of 15 19 October 2009 at 11:13pm | IP Logged | ||
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As was already said above, it is not so clear what elements go into the concept of "advanced and sophisticated". Another thing is that to really compare between those ancient languages one would need to know a fair numer of them.
Apart from Latin and Sanskrit that have been mentioned, and not really having any kind of knowledge of the languages concerned myself, I feel ancient Greek should be mentioned, and classical Chinese should definitely be a candidate, possibly Arabic deserves some consideration too (or whatever old version of Arabic that was around in the heyday of ancient Greek and Latin). And what about "Proto Indoeuropean", the forefather of all Indoeuropean languages, including Sanskrit, Greek, Latin etc. ? Would any of the native languages on the American continent enter into consideration ? As I understand it, if the level of complexity decides, some of them might well be plausible contenders. 3 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| sebngwa3 Diglot Senior Member United States Joined 6164 days ago 200 posts - 217 votes Speaks: Korean*, English | Message 7 of 15 20 October 2009 at 12:51am | IP Logged | ||
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The beauty of the extremely developed Korean verb system has been seen as surpassing that of ancient Greek.
The Passing of Korea (1909) pg. 302-304 Korean is an agglutinative, polysyllabic language whose development is marvellously complete and symmetrical. We find no such long lists of exceptions as those which entangle the student of the Indo-European languages. In Korean as in most of the Turanian languages the idea of gender is very imperfectly developed, which argues perhaps a lack of imagination. The ideas of person and number are largely left to the context for determination, but in the matter of logical sequence the Korean verb is carried to the extreme of development. The Corean Language section (Chapter 8 of History of Korea by John Ross, 1891) Indeed, the beautiful flexibility of the Corean verb, can find no equal in the west among modern languages; old Greek being the only language it appears to me, which can compare with it. Edited by sebngwa3 on 21 October 2009 at 1:05am 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| irrationale Tetraglot Senior Member China Joined 6050 days ago 669 posts - 1023 votes 2 sounds Speaks: English*, Spanish, Mandarin, Tagalog Studies: Ancient Greek, Japanese | Message 8 of 15 20 October 2009 at 4:15am | IP Logged | ||
What do you mean by "advanced" and "sophisticated"? 2 persons have voted this message useful |
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