if it wasn't for your videos i would've stopped consuming content on norse stuff almost a decade ago. the way you bring information, specially the standards you have regarding the sources of said information and how you let that shine in your videos, plus the soothing way you talk hahah, every one of those things keeps me coming back. thank you jackson!
I lived three years in Sisimiut - Greenland, snow till... actually it can snow all year, but in April-May it stops piling up and starts to melt as the sun bakes on it for 18+ hours a day. In late may enough is melted that you can start walking some areas in the wilderniss behind.
Intresting that there is a huge leap in language due to the black death. The previous big change is from proto-germanic to old Norse and that happens in the 6th-7th century. What happened back then? The aftermatch of the 536 (and onward) vulcanic climat catastrophy that is estimated to have ended up killing off up around 50% of the population in Scandinavia (the further north the higher percentage). Seems like a fair asumption that many of the same factors might have been at play in the 6-7th century language shift as it were in the language shift due to the black death...
You mentioned the example between portuguese and spanish, there is a dialect in north of Portugal near to the border of Spain, its not spanish or portuguese but a strange mix between both, a very old language only speaking in that area and its called "Mirandês"
The reasoning you give as to the Black Death inducing lasting language change, because of the break with previous generations, is very interesting! I read some ideas about how the Justinian Plague and other challenges with that era led to "rapid" language change in Europe. In the context of what I read, it explained Romance and Celtic languages becoming more like "themselves", but it could explain Proto-Norse becoming Old Norse.
Interestingly, Insular Celtic languages too changed massively during the 5th and 6th centuries... And that's also when Common Slavic emerged (but that can be explained as the consequence of the migrations etc).
If the Black Death of the 1300s sped up the language changes between Old Norse and the modern Scandinavian languages, might the volcanic winters and the Black Death of the 500s have had a similar effect on the changes between Proto-Norse and Old Norse?
In polish there are two ways to speak to a horse that is pulling a carriage: "heita/hetta wio" and "wiśta wio" where one means "turn right" and the other "turn left". One of them may also mean "go forward". I read on some blog by a polish woman living in Iceland that once at work her computer had some error and there were to options to click: "Haetta vid" and "Vista" which reminded her the way we speak to horses. If there are any Icelanders reading this, what does it mean? Could it be a Old Norse words remaining in polish?
A language can change quite a bit in a single generation through adoption of a foreign language layer. Japanese and Korean did this in the mid 20th century and North Korean defectors report considerable difficulty understanding South Koreans.
I sometimes feel like I shouldn't be watching your videos anymore, because I can't buy your books, support you on Patreon or Kofi etc , and it just makes me think I shouldn't be entitled to the free content if I can't contribute with my money. Like, I feel like people who can only watch the videos, don't get thanked enough for tuning in. Maybe I'm wrong, I don't know. Just how I've been feeling recently.
Don't feel guilty, he puts this content out there to be useful and applied by those who want to use it. This means you are his primary audience. He just relies on the others to provide him an income, so he can keep making this content for people like you. It's kind of like the PBS model at the individual level. If you do ever have the wherewithal, give the five dollars per month, if not, still watch his videos and share the knowledge you received with those who can use it. Either way, you are still an important part of his community of learners.
A recent DNA-preprint by the Willerslev group claim to find an almost complete population replacement in Southern Scandinavia i the centuries before the Viking age. If this is true then old Norse is the result of a migration... but we are still only beginning to see ancient DNA from he migration age.
What paper is this? The last evidenced population replacement in southern scandinavia i'm aware of was at the end of the Neolithic and is associated with the broader migrations from the steppe thought to also have brought the proto-indo-european language to these parts of europe. The common understanding is that proto-germanic developed from proto-indo-european in southern scandinavia and northernmost germany, and the germanic languages spread from there. The dialect of proto-germanic spoken in southern scandinavia then developed into proto-norse into old norse into the modern scandinavian languages. A nearly complete population replacement in southern scandinavia only centuries before the viking age sounds hella unlikely, especially since we know modern scandinavians are closely related to those steppe migrants that arrived many thousands of years before that. You sure it was centuries and not millennia?
@@anotherelvis ok, so this is an interesting read. Yeah so apparently specifically on the danish isles, there seems to have been a population replacement in the centuries before the viking age by people mainly from northern germany. Now, scandinavians and people in northern germany all spoke what one might call late common germanic at this time, but would have spoken different dialects, and this migration is suggested as a major factor behind the observed rapid change in the language spoken in scandinavia at this time, which was very little changed from proto-germanic at the time, but within just a few centuries was different enough that we start calling it old norse instead. Those centuries were incredibly tumultuous in European history though, with the fall of rome, the justinian plague, a little ice age, and massive population decline in scandinavia which could easily explain accelerated language shift all its own. Their arguments are persuasive though, and it's a fascinating read that adds nuance and context to the historical picture as we understand it, assuming their methodology holds up to scrutiny. Thank you
Any chance that Old Norse had simplification because of contact with other people like The Fins and Sami? This is purely me asking a question and not trying to insulate that there were influences. Just curious why it seems like Old Norse had so much simplification with word forms/structures. And I'm not making any type of comment on grammar or anything like that. I've just noticed that when I look at Finnish words they seem to have a lot of shorter more simplified words as well. Whereas continental Germanic languages are known for being heavily compounded into modern times.
Dude... snow shoes are thousands-of-years-old technology. I don't think Wodinaz will kill you in your sleep for catching up a little, even with non-Indo European tech.
What's with the disrespect for Ph.D.s? It's not like it's a new title. Prestigious academics have been called doctor since at least the 1300s although the term had been informally applied earlier to those who helped formulate church doctrine and theology going back almost to late Antiquity. The term, doctor, comes from the Latin docere, to teach, and originally had nothing to do with medicine but rather with what Dr. Jackson is doing. The conflation of doctor with medicine is a rather modern phenomenon. Although universities started to offer doctorates in medicine during the Middle Ages, it wasn't until the 19th century when common people started utilizing hospitals and clinics that one would have met a medical practitioner who actually had a doctorate. After that, because a doctor with a medical degree was the one type of doctor most people were likely to meet in their lives, the term has become associated with medicine rather than one associated with teaching despite the original meaning of the word. So, yes, DOCTOR Jackson Crawford who has earned this title through very hard work and has applied that effort in the most classical manner. Now that you learned something, I hope you will now show the term some respect.
