, or adjectives, like good, bad, healthy, etc. Before
he put these words into his vocabulary, Zamenhof had their equivalents
in all the European languages before him, and then he took from the
whole list the root which was the most prominent, the root that occurred
oftenest, and this became Esperanto, the idea being that the words
selected should be common to at least four or five different languages.
Mr. TOWNER. You do not mean that, do you? You do not mean that the only
words you would put into the Esperanto vocabulary would be those that
might be common to at least four or five of the principal languages?
Prof. CHRISTEN. Yes; whenever it is possible to find such words, and the
words do not conflict with the general harmony of the language.
Mr. TOWNER. That is what I thought you meant.
Prof. CHRISTEN. The consequence is that a language formed on these lines
must be a Latin or Romance language because Latin gave birth to at least
six languages: French, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese, Roumanian, and
English, and besides, Latin and French have influenced and enriched the
literature and languages of every other modern nation. The dictionary
of Latin words contained, for instance, in Russian or German would be
a very large volume indeed. It is a fact that all modern attempts at
making an artificial language, and their name is legion, especially
since the acknowledged success of Esperanto, are based on Latin.
Pages:
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
26
27
28
29
30
31
32
33