Re: EU's language policy (was: new conspiracy theory)

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Article #3372

#3372

From: David 'Alwyn' Thomas
Date: Sun, 11 Feb 1996 00:00

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In article <4f8s0u$5s3@chleuasme.francenet.fr>, Marc Bonnaud <mbonnaud@francenet.fr> writes:
> - where the english, german, french ... speakers make a difference between 
> blue and green, the breton speakers only have one word .

I don't know about Breton, but I can speak for Welsh, its closest living relative.

Welsh has the word *glas*, which covers blue, green and grey, e.g. *awyr las*, "blue
sky", *gwellt glas*, "green grass" and *ceffyl glas*, "grey horse".

The language does have a specific word for "green", namely *gwyrdd*, borrowed from 
the Latin *viridis*.

The normal Welsh word for "grey" is *llwyd* (from which come the surnames Lloyd and
Floyd).

*Llwyd* can also mean "brown", but the normal Welsh word for this colour is the
same word borrowed from English.

The fact that names of colours have been borrowed from Latin and English suggests to
me that contact with the richer colour lexicon of these lanaguages created the need 
to make make the distinction in Britto-Welsh.

Alwyn

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From: dathomas@tymnet.bt.co.uk (David 'Alwyn' Thomas)
Subject: Re: EU's language policy (was: new conspiracy theory)
Date: 1996/02/11
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