[Colonol Dekker]

Because it would be a brick.

[colecampbell666]

It is a brick.

That's a cool list.

[Mobius]

Of course, German is derived from Latin, so you're partly correct there.

no it's not

It is

Hah, I actually ended up doing quite interesting surfing trip because of this topic. I should indeed soon get my bicycle back from the service, so I can get back doing the preferred stuff: smacking hands to a bag of rocks.

But in anyways, it turned out that when Tolkien synthesized the Elven language, Finnish played quite a major part in the grammar. No need to write the personal noun anywhere, making a single word a question that can replace a whole sentence, yup, both properties sound pretty familiar. Also conjugation forms seemed to be awfully familiar.

So how it works?
kysyä - to ask
(minä = I) kysyn - I ask
(hän = he) kysyy - he asks
kysyisinköhän - I wonder if I could ask
kysyisimmeköhän - We wonder if we could ask
tehdäksemme - In order for us to do

Then another example of a small error, which totally changes the meaning of a sentence and context:

"Pannaan pöydällä" - "Let's f**k on the table" (no need to explain)
"Pannaan pöydälle" - "Set it on the table" (about moving some crate)
Then imagine a Italian man saying this to a Finnish man when they are moving crates. Usually the result is hysteric sniggering from Finns part and they never answer if somebody asks what's so funny. They will probably only say that they understood what you meant.

So you thought you had seen difficult conjugation forms?

Mika

Tolkien's Quenya has been influenced by Finnish, ok, but I doubt Finnish had influence on Tolkien's Sindarin. It's not the case to generalize by saying "Elven" since the "Elven" of the films(the one everyone has heard at least one time) is Sindarin, not Quenya.

Long words...that's something Finnish has in common with Italian, the presence of words that in English can only be translated with sentences.

Ex.

Abbattetelo! = you <plural>, shoot him down! (imperative)

About the last part of your post. I don't know what does "Pannaan" suggest to an Italian, but pöydällä and pöydälle would have funny effects...

Poi dalla = then you <singular> give her, refered to the vag**a, it's a way to say "have sex". "Then have sex"(only for females, of course).

Poi dalle = then you <singular> give them(females, refered to "botte"), it's a way to say "have a fight".

Pannaan reminds "panna", however...

An ever so slight

However, my sister just e-mailed me this, thought it was relevant to this discussion

English language!
    
If you ever feel stupid, then just read on.  If you've learned to speak fluent English, you must be a genius! This little treatise on the lovely language we share is only for the brave.  Peruse at your leisure, English lovers.   

Reasons why the English language is so hard to learn:

Eh? English might give problems with the correct pronunciation of words but it can't match French and Italian in terms of complexity and difficulty.

[Mika]

Huh, for me it has always been like this:

- Grilling: hoat coals, wood, anything hot is used to fry MEAT (if not meat, it's not grilling). Best done with friends. Beer is typically included. Ends usually in a wrestling match.

- Barbecuing: the same as above but little more fancy with exotic sauce, marinades and alcohol, like wine, this is more related to the upper class behavior which can be found elsewhere than here. To be looked down if possible. Uppity stuff doesn't belong to the proletariat, comrade!

- Smoking (savustus): using smoke to cook food, as in smoked fish. Also can be done to cook food in a smoke sauna, where meat is hung slightly below the roof level. Again, a whole pig cooked this way is quite delicious.

- Bonfire (nuotio). A piece of salmon can be set on a wooden board (loimulohi), then this board is placed to the proximity of a bonfire - but not in contact. The fish is then cooked for several hours before it is eaten. Mostly delicious.

- Cold smoking (kylmäsavustus). This one is a little bit more difficult to explain so I won't even try it.

- Cookery in the criminal style (rosvopaisti). Is a relative to campfire cookery, but in this case meat wrapped inside a aluminum foil and the package is then dug under the burning logs. I.e. slaughter your neighbors sheep and cook it under the fire, and if he comes looking then say you don't know nuffin' about it.

Maybe Herra knows the words a little bit better here, my English vocabulary seriously lacks cooking words.

Mika

[Mika]

Speaking of funny words, here are some examples of the good-old-language:

suurtehokolmivaihekilowattituntimittari
high | power | three phase | kWh | meter,
or a Power meter that measures the transmitted energy of high power AC lines.

hääyöaate (Try to say this one, there are some wovels in it, right?)
wedding | night | thought

lentokonesuihkuturbiinimoottoriapumekaanikkoaliupseerioppilas
aircraft |  jetturbine | engine | co-mechanic | officer | student
This is an actual rank from the Defence forces. Too hard to translate in English without losing the information content.

atomiydinenergiareaktorigeneraattorilauhduttajaturbiiniratasva ihde
atom | nucleus | energy | reactor | generator | cooler | turbine | wheel | gear
 - "" -. Too difficult with the prepositions. This is an actual word, though.


Something from our neighboring country, but this is an exception. Swedish words are usually a lot more shorter than this:
nordöstersjökustartilleriflygspaningssimulatoranläggningsmater ielunderhållsuppfölningssystemdiskussionsinläggsförberedelsear beten

Swedish is such a beautiful language. Shade can translate that if he bothers.

Rymdsempiriet slår tillbaka!

Mika

[Herra Tohtori]

I think bonfire is more of a kokko... campfire is more appropriate term for nuotio.

Talking about confucing word plays, Finnish has an advantage to most languages because the words conjugate a bit more than in English, and the nouns have 14 (or 15 depending on which ones are counted, IIRC the accusative case has been removed from the table of cases on Finnish language relatively recently) cases that sometimes make verbs look like nouns, or nouns look like verbs, or something in between... Examples:


-Kokko, kokoo kokoon koko kokko. (Kokko [name], gather the whole bonfire together.)
-Koko kokkoko? (The whole bonfire?)
-Koko kokko. (The whole bonfire.)

Hae lakkaa satamasta kun lakkaa satamasta. (When it stops from raining, go and fetch lacquer from harbour.) lakka = lacquer, lakata = either "to stop" or "to apply lacquer to a surface"; sataa = "to rain", satama = harbour; satamasta = either "from harbour" or "from raining"... kinda. So "lakkaa satamasta" can mean either "lacquer from harbour" or "to stop from raining"...

"Kas vain", sanoi kasvain ja kasvoi vain. ("[mildy surprized expression]", said the tumor, and just grew.)

Keksijä Keksi keksi keksin. Keksittyään keksin keksijä Keksi keksi keksineensä keksin. (Inventor Keksi [name, means "Cookie"] invented a cookie. After inventing a cookie, inventor Keksi discovered that he had invented a cookie.)

There are numerous other FUN FUN cases like these that must be a nightmare to anyone trying to learn Finnish. I'ds say it's even more difficult for a foreigner to fully comprehend all the cases, conjugations and nuances on these than it is for a non-english people to figure out what the hell "Buffalo buffalo Buffalo buffalo buffalo buffalo Buffalo buffalo" actually means... than again, the buffalo sentence is complete hogwash for even most English speakers if I'm not much mistaken, whereas these examples are actually very understandable for native Finnish speakers...


Also, hääyöaie (wedding night intention) has one more vowel in a row than hääyöaate...

...and

lentokonesuihkuturbiinimoottoriapumekaanikkoaliupseerioppilas
aircraft |  turbojet | engine | co-mechanic | non-commissioned officer | student

Fix'd.

[chief1983]

Of course, German is derived from Latin, so you're partly correct there.

no it's not

It is

How so?  I've seen no references to suggest such a thing, and in fact the language tree I posted earlier seems to contradict your statement.

[Mobius]

German's not a Neo Latin language but has been influenced by Latin. German's birth was a very particular one, the "creators" of that language chose to use some features of Latin.

English has also been influenced by Latin even if it's not a Neo Latin language.

Even Chinese has been slightly influenced by Latin!

[Colonol Dekker]

Ich magst dritten bier SCHNELL! Lawl you're all cool FreeSpacey peeps'

[Mobius]

Non capisco quello che stai dicendo...

[colecampbell666]

- Cold smoking (kylmäsavustus). This one is a little bit more difficult to explain so I won't even try it.

Is it the type of smoking used when making dishes like lox?

Of course, German is derived from Latin, so you're partly correct there.

no it's not

It is

Actually I was under the impression that English and German were derived and matured under the influence of other languages like Gaelic.

[Mobius]

Then tell me why in English there are words like "battle", "actor" and "administrator". I don't think they come from Gaelic.

I don't speak German so I can't write examples...but I ensure you that there are many words coming from Latin. As far as I know, Latin has primarily influenced German's grammar, I don't think I can find a lot of words.

[Wanderer]

Individual words can and are loaned form surrounding languages.. But that has absolutely nothing to do with one language being derived from the other from which it has loaned a word or two. Or should we simply say that as 'sauna' is a word that exists in English language that the English language is derived from Finnish? (about as logical as saying it would be derived from Latin...) English in any case a Germanic language (West Germanic actually) and not derived from Latin or any other of the Romance language.. Influenced, sure, a great deal. Derived, certainly not.

People tend to dislike wiki but here goes:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Germanic_languages
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Romance_languages

[Mobius]

I was talking about influence. Italian, Spanish and French are obviously closer to Latin than English and German...I was saying that both German and English have been influenced by Latin.

English has been influenced by Latin twice: via Latin directly and via French.

[colecampbell666]

I was talking about influence. Italian, Spanish and French are obviously closer to Latin than English and German...I was saying that both German and English have been influenced by Latin.

English has been influenced by Latin twice: via Latin directly and via French.

Actually, English and German are very similar languages, more closely related to each other than either are to Latin. And English has been influenced by many languages.

[haloboy100]

I was lead under the impression that English started as a dialect of french and eventually became it's own language..

[Mobius]

Actually, English and German are very similar languages, more closely related to each other than either are to Latin. And English has been influenced by many languages.

I didn't say that English and German aren't "relatives" in the post above.

I was lead under the impression that English started as a dialect of french and eventually became it's own language..

Eh...

[redsniper]

Definitely not. English borrows a lot of French words though. I suppose because England and France have had so many dealings with each other throughout history, peaceful or otherwise.

[colecampbell666]

@HB: You don't speak French, do you? Not the same at all. French is a derivative of Latin, as is Spanish. They are sister languages, although I believe that Spanish is closer to Latin.

[TrashMan]

Meh...Tolkien's elven is the best language EVAR. Too bad I never truly bothered to learn it.