We have moved your interesting messages to the forum, so that everyone might read the messages and don’t repeat your questions and ideas.

Thank you.

btw., we’ll close the possibility of answering to old reports, so that no more spam is sent to it.

First of all, I must say that I have always been fascinated by PIE and all the work achie-ved by linguists for over 2 centuries in order to reconstruct it. This is why is was very in-terested in your website.

But let’s be practical. In addition to working on Uropi, I also happen to be teaching lan-guages, and though « I don’t deem myself intelligent enough to ascertain what is “easier” or “better” for Europeans », to take up your own words, I certainly know what difficulties my students have to master a foreign language like English (considered as being easy), not to mention Russian, German or even Spanish (which most French people regard as being easier).
In addition, you only have to spend some time on a Greek beach (or a Spanish one if you prefer – incidentally mi mujer es Andaluza ) to be appalled at the standard of linguistic exchanges in « English? » between average citizens of Europe.
PIE, in its original form, with all its grammatical complexity, could only be learnt by a handful of specialists in their ivory towers (whatever their University qualifications might be); it could never be learnt by the peoples of Europe even with some effort as you say (or with enormous ones). So how could it become the common language of the EU ?

My second remark is that PIE, however well reconstructed, will remain a pre-historic language, and you will have to make up more than half its vocabulary. In a recent comparison I made on a corpus of 700 words between Uropi, Dutch, English, Sanskrit, Hindi, Fârsi, Arabic and Indonesian, 70% of Uropi words (modern terms) simply had no equivalent in Sanskrit.
Then, what will you do, if you reject the use of any loan words whether they come from Greek or Latin, English or Arabic, Nahuatl or Arawak ? How will you tran-slate hotel, taxi, menu ,computer, chocolate, tomato, potato, to write (« scribere ») school, theatre, etc…, which are already international words used in all European languages, not to say throughout the world.
Here again, the comparison with modern Hebrew is relevant: the bulk of Ben Yehuda’s work was not to revive old Hebrew but to create « modern terms », to the great horror of traditional Jews for whom Hebrew had to remain a sacred tongue. And he never hesitated to borrow words from other languages; this is what natural languages have always done.

In Uropi, there are no « improvements » or « personal changes » as you say. Uropi is a very democratic language : most of the time the majority wins. Maybe I didn’t make myself sufficiently clear. Let me give you a few examples from the Uropi Etymolo-gical Dictionary :

gov = ox
(I-E gwous* = ox > Skr gáus = ox > Hin gây, Tzig guruv ( Pers gâv = cow, o-Arm kov = cow, m-Arm gov, Gr βους “bous” = ox, cow, Lat bos/bovis = ox > It bue, Sp buey, Port boi, Rum bou , Fr boeuf = ox, o-Ir bó, Gael. bó, Wel buwch, Bret buc’h = cow, o-Ice ky’r, ohG chuo, Ags cû = cow > Eng cow, Ge Kuh, Du koe, Swe, Da ko, Nor ku, Latv govs = cow, Lit gaujà = herd, oSl. govêdo = bovine > Rus [goviadina], SrCr govedina = beef, govedo = bovine, govedar = cattleman, Cz hovêzí = ox-, TochA ko, Toch B keu = cow

Here the Armenian or Latvian words have been chosen as they correspond more or less to the arithmetical average of the afore-mentioned words.

ito = to go
(I-E ei-*, ei-dh-*, i-ta-* = to go, Skr êmi, êti, imáh, yánti = to go, Zend aêiti, yeinti, vpers aitiy = he goes, Gr ειμι “eimi” = I’ll go, Lat eo = I go, it, ite he goes, you go, Sp ir = to go, iré = I’ll go, Fr. irai, iras, etc…, Got iddja = I went, o. Prus êit = he goes, Lit eiti = to go, Latv iêt, oSl iti, Rus [itti] = to go, SrCr ic’i, Cz jíti, Pol. isc’, Toch B yam = he goes, Hit i-it = go! o-Ir ethaid = he goes, Lat itio = going, iter/itineris = way (= Toch A ytar, Hit i-tar), Gr ιθμα (ithma) = walk)

= Slavic terms (old Slavonic and Russian) + Latin (it, ite)

ka = what?
(I-E kwo-*, kwe-*, kwâ-*, kwei-*, kwu-* = interrogatives, SEE kan, ke, ko, kim, kel
Skr káh, ka = who?, kâ = how?, Gr τις “tis” = who, what?, Alb kë = who? (object), çë = what?, Lat quid = what?, It che = what?, Sp qué = what?, Rum ce = what?, o-Ir cid = what? > Gael cad = what?, cé = who? Got hva = what?, Ags. hwæt = what? ohG. hwaz = what? > Ge was = que, what?, Eng what, Du wat = what?, Da. hvad = what, Swe vad = what?, oPrus. kas, ka = who?, Lit kás = who, what?, Latv kas = who?, what? oSl c’-to = what?, Rus [chto] = what?, Pol co = what?, Cz co = what?, SrCr ^sta, ^sto = what?,
Toch A kus = what? )

= Sanskrit & Baltic (Lithuanian & Latvian)

luc = light
(I-E leukos*, loukis*, louks* = light, louksnâ* = moon, SEE luns, lun > Skr rocís, Zend raocah- = light, Arm lois = light, lusin = moon, Gr λευκος “leukos” = white, λυχνος “lukhnos” = lamp, lantern, Lat lux, lumen = light, luceo = to light, shine, luna = moon > It luce, luna, Sp luz, luna, Port luz, lua, Rum luminä, lunä , Fr. lumière, lune = light, moon, m.Ir. luan = light, moon, Gael léas = ray, beam, loinnir = light, brilliance, Wel llug = gleam, brightness, lluched, Bret luc’hedenn = lightning, luc’h, luc’hañ = to gleam, Wel lloer, Bret loar = moon, Got liuhath, Ge Licht, Du licht, Eng light, Da lys, Swe ljus, oSl luc’, oBul. luc’a, Rus [loutch”] = ray, beam, Sloven lúc^ = light, SrCr luc^, luc^a = ray, beam, o.Bul luna, Rus [loona] = moon, Hit. luk(k)- = to gleam, tolight up)

= Italian and Slovenian

mar = sea
(I-E mori* = sea > perhaps Skr maryáda = frontier, limit, (seaside?), marús = sand desert, Lat mare > It mare, Rum mare, Sp mar, Port mar, Fr mer, Tzig muárja, o-Ir muir, Gael muir, Wel mor, Cor, Bret mor, Got marei, o-Ice marr (+lake), As meri, Ags mere (+ lake, pond), ohG mari, Ge Meer, Du meer (lac), Eng mere, oSl morje = sea, Rus [more], SrCr more, Pol morze, Cz mor’e, o.Prus mary = gulf, bay, Lit mãrios = sea )

= Spanish and Portuguese

pod = foot
(I-E pôts* = foot > Skr pât, pâdam, Zend pad- = foot, Arm ot-kh = feet, Alb posh = beneath, at the foot of, Gr πως, ποδος “pôs, podos”, Lat pes, pedis > It piede, Sp pie, Port pé, Rum picior, Fr pied, Got fotus, o-Ice fotr, ohG fuoz > Ge Fuß, Eng foot, Du voet, Da fod, Swe, Nor fot, Latv pêda, Lit péda = foot, péscias, oSl pés’- > Rus [peshkom], Cz pês’ky, SrCr pes^ice, Pol pieszo = on foot, Rus [pechekhod], Cz pês’ák, SrCr pes^ak, Pol pieszy = pedestrian, TochA pe, TochB paiyye, Hit pata- = foot)

= Greek

nom = name
(I-E en(o)mn*, nomn* = name, Skr nâma, Hin nâm, Zend nâma, Tzig anáv, Arm anoun, Alb emër, Gr ονομα “onoma”, Lat nomen, It nome, Sp nombre, Rum nume, o-Ir ainmm, Wel enw, Bret ano, Got namo, o-Ice nafn, Ge Name, Eng. name, Du naam, Da navn, Swe namn, oPrus emnes, oSl ime, SrCr. ime, Rus [imia], Cz jméno, Pol imie,, Toch A ñem, Toch B ñom)

= French and Italian

sedo = to sit
(I-E sed-*, sêd-* = to sit = Skr sad-, Zend had-, Skr sidati, Zend hi∂aiti = he’s sitting, Skr sádas = seat, Arm. nstim = I’m sitting, Gr εζομαι “hezomai” = to sit, εδος “hedos”, εδρα “hedra” = seat = Lat sedes, sedere = It sedere = to sit, Sp, Port sentarse, Rum a se as,eza = to sit down, o-Ir sa(i)did = he’s sitting, Wel sedd = seat, seddu = to sit, Bret azezañ = to sit down, sez = seat, o-Ice sit, as sittiu, ohG sizzu = I’m sitting, Ge sitzen, Eng to sit, Du zitten, Da sidde, Swe sitta, Lit. sédëti, Latv sêdêt, oSl sêdêti, Rus [sidiet’], Pol siedziec’, SrCr sjediti, Cz sedêti = to sit)

= Latin & Italian, Latvian, Lithuanian & Serbian

taur = bull
(I-E tauros* = bull > Gr ταυρος “tauros”, Alb tarok, Lat taurus > It toro, Sp toro, Port touro, Rum taur, Fr taureau, Gaul tarvos, o-Ir tarb, Gael tarbh, Wel tarw, Bret tarv, o-Ice thjórr, Got stiur = young bull, ohG stior > Ge Stier, Du stier = bull, Da, Nor tyr, Swe tjur, o.Prus tauris = bison, Lit tauras, oSl tur- = aurochs > Rus [tour”], Pol tur = aurochs, Cz tur = ox)

= Rumanian

vod = water
(I-E wódr-*, wedôr*, Gén. udnés* = water > Skr udaká-m, plur udá = water, Zend vaidi- = stream, ao∂a = wave, Arm get = river, Gr ‘υδωρ “hudôr”, Alb ujë = water, Lat unda = wave > It onda = wave, Fr onde = Sp, Port onda, SEE voln; o-Irl u(i)sce, Gael uisce = water, Got wato, o-Ice vatn, ohG wazzar, as watar, Ags wæter > Ge Wasser, Eng, Du water, Swe vatten, Da vand, Nor vann = water, o.Prus wundan, unds, Lit vanduõ, Latv udens = water, oSl voda, Rus [voda], SrCr, Cz voda, Pol woda, Hit wâtar = water, Toch.A wär, Toch.B war = water)

= panslavic

But the best argument in favour of Uropi is that any European (or Indo-European speaker), when he reads a Uropi sentence for the first time can understand between a third and over half of it immediately without having heard of Uropi before.
For ex:
Mi mata sedì ude de drev
Nekun moz ito gon li volad
Viz tu di dor ?
Ken vizì i ? Mi pater
Ka ven tu deto zi ? he pragì mo
Stajo ki ta, Pater
I avì lasen ta ki ti mata, ti frate id sestas.

= Extracts from the Uropi translation of a Rom (Gipsy) short story : « E pasledno vudar » (the Last Door)

One of my correspondents learnt Uropi by himself in less than a year, and is at present (i-e in his 2nd year) translating a novel from Spanish into Uropi (he has already translated 4 chapters).

As for the « western » approach, let me tell you that we received several thousand letters of support from Russia and the former « Soviet » republics (e.g Lithuania, Latvia, Tadjikistan, etc…), which I wouldn’t dare call « western », but of course, East and West are very relative notions.

Sorry for having been too long, but certain points definitely had to be cleared up.

Bis bald

JL

PS I hate the word « conlang ». For French people « con » is an insult (CF Spanish: coño), and conlang sounds like the language of bloody fools.

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I am the inventor of the conlang “sambahsa-mundialect” which is a kind of highly modernized MIE and I can assert that Mr. Quiles is not a reincarnation of Torquemada, even if he is a Spaniard too
As for myself, I fear that MIE would be too complicated a language for a EU-wide use and I have pointed out the “overlatinization” of the vocabulary. But that did not prevent me from having some interest in MIE. Mister Quiles friendly answered my interrogations and even accepted a minor modification I had proposed.
So let’s accept each other’s differences !
As Voltaire could have told in sambahsa-mundialect:
Ne samstehmo con quo yu meinte
bet katuiem kay yu poitte sayge id!

Ph.D Olivier Simon

We are indeed interested in every effort made about using the reconstructed Proto-Indo-European language as a modern language within the EU.

About your ‘improvements’, I have to say clearly that we are not usually interested in such personal changes. There may be dozens of conlangers willing to share their IE-based projects with us, each of them with different phonetic-morphological-syntactical changes to be made on the PIE core (for example, without noun declension, with pronouns, with different “more western” phonetics, etc.).

However, it is that very PIE core which is interesting, as it is a scientifical reconstruction, using comparative grammar and historical linguistics, and widely accepted as being real (although, like psychological or archaeological findings, subject to strong criticism by sceptics). Knowledge and time is limited, and we don’t deem ourselves enough intelligent to ascertain what is “easier” or “better” for Europeans – we just know about a natural language, spoken some millenia ago, which may be used today with some effort.

To work seriously, with public subsidies and therefore under public and political scrutiny, criticized by professors and linguists alike, we cannot mix with personal projects like yours. We are currently trying to improve the grammar in a certain sense, namely to use a ‘purer’ PIE vocabulary, instead of loan-translated words of Graeco-Latin and English origin…

Congratulations for your work, I wish you good luck with your language, and hope to see you and the rest of IE conlangers work for a spoken Indo-European in the European Union.

Carlos Quiles, cquiles a t dnghu d o t org

Moreover, if M.I.E is to become a common language for the European Union – and I do believe that the E.U needs a common language to hold it together : in fifty years’ time the European Community has never become a « UNION » ; its citizens don’t feel European but French, English, German, Italian, etc… and see other Europeans as competitors rather than fellow-citizens, among other things because they can’t communicate with each other, except in a very poor English. Generalizing the use of English would only serve US interests and turn the E.U into the US backyard and a Chinese or Indian dumping ground. English is not a neutral language, but a « killer-language » which has already wiped out a sizeable number of « small » languages throughout the world (CF Halte à la Mort des Langues by Claude Hagège, a French linguist). The only guarantee to preserve the diversity of European languages is a common European language for the E.U. –
So, if M.I.E is to become a common language for the E.U, learnt and spoken by 500 million European citizens, it has to be as SIMPLE as possible. For example, its words should be closer to present European words than to the reconstructed P.I.E term*. Its grammar should be very simple too (unlike that of Esperanto with its 6 participles).
Besides, it should be very INTERNATIONAL, familiar to all Europeans, each of them finding in it, words and features SIMILAR to those of his own native language. This is only possible when one uses the common Indo-European roots which have given words in all Indo-European languages.
This is what Uropi has done : it is both a diachronic and synchronic synthesis of P.I.E and ancient and modern Indo-European languages and is is very simple and international.
The last step is to hand this common language over to European citizens so that each of them might take part in its elaboration, amend it making suggestions and criticisms, in short, take it over. I agree with you that, at this point, the comparison with modern Hebrew is relevant. There is no need to be hysterical about it : Eliezer Ben Yehuda has nothing to do with the holocaust; P.I.E has nothing to do with Hitler, all this is perfectly anachronic. Old Hebrew had long been a dead language (Jesus Christ spoke Aramaic) when Ben Yehuda revived it, and it was a success because, in addition to his enormous, remarkable work (a synthesis of old Hebrew and other Semitic languages among which Aramaic and even Arabic), he managed to convince many Jews from Palestine and from the diaspora to collaborate. One must never forget that, at the time, Yiddish, as a living language, was a very serious competitor.

* To illustrate this let me give you a few examples of NeoBlabo, a M.I.E created by Emmanuel Marcq and whose words are very close to the original P.I.E roots, together with their translation in Uropi. It‘s easy to see which language is the simpler.

EVEREM VLOM AD UHLQONES.
I perì de flor a de vulp I brought the flower to the wolf

APODEIN, PUIOMI EX KRASI TEUES, XOSTOS !
Domòr, i ve pivo od ti keb, stranior! Tomorrow, i’ll drink from your head, stranger!

ESMH ESUMENTOS TOLQONTES TOM DHNQAM.
I se felic voko di linga. I am happy to speak this language

MEIOM VREUHM EX DERUES
De miki drovipònt. The small wooden bridge.

INAGO XRE?ONTHM.
I inìz famo. I ‘m getting hungry.

KATOS EDHTH MUSHM.
De kat jed de mus. The kat eats the mouse.

MUS VUT EDHTOS DE KATIES.
De mus vidì jeden pa de kat. The mouse was eaten by the cat.

VUM GENTS EN XESLO NEUHM KHNTOM OKTOKHNTH.
I genì in desnèv sunte ocdes I was born in nineteen eighty

NATALI, TUE ENQEIO A RESTORANTES EN ALI ANTI STRATES.
Po Krisgen, i invìt ta a de restoria tragòn de strad For Christmas I invite you to the restaurant across the street

Please don’t post your website again and again in the comments, as it may seem more spam than just flames.

I will always try to let comments here, however disgusting or absurd, or obvious flames they may seem to us; but evident spam will be deleted – you had 4 links in the above comment, I had to delete the links and approve it manually, as the software blocks it.

Please calm down and consider for a moment the fact that we are neither nazis nor from the KKK; it may help both of us to understand each other’s positions.

Good luck to you and your research too. I will try not to answer you in your blog anymore, so that you don’t feel attacked.

Carlos.

You yourself say I don’t have the right to make a play on words and call your MIE “proto-politics”. Why? Who are you to decide what anyone says? No one. No one, that is, but a bully. My points are based on reasoning. There is no rational means by which an artificial language of any kind, including MIE, can replace the most popular natural languages in the world whose speakers outnumber any of them by more than 100 times! Logic 101. The probabilities of your success are staggeringly minutial and even if successful would guarantee no constructive result at all, despite your intents.

And like a Nazi you adopt non-mainstream emotional rhetoric like the outdated Kurgan Hypothesis to envigorate your ahistorical propoganda of a “singular” Indo-European people that *CANNOT HAVE EVER* existed. Linguists understand that “Indo-Europeans” (a loose _un-united_ group of pastoralistic nomads) spoke many dialects of PIE and had most likely had many “cultures”, however one may define that. It may be hard for a non-linguist to wrap their minds around, but Proto-Indo-European is merely a purely abstract “averaging out” of the individual IE dialects that surely must have existed to contribute to it (ie. look up ‘dialect merger’). If you sincerely don’t understand still, please read in more detail in my blog.

Read it over and over until these infectious 19th-century views of yours are finally purged out of your mind. My blog entry includes valuable book references and hopefully easy to understand logical reasoning which disproves your blind assertions. While Gimbutas has some merit like any scholar, she is quite controversial because she indulges so readily in sensationalistic neopagan fantasy. No doubt there are many Wiccans out there who are sympathetic to her idealized concepts and as such her theories might be called “widely accepted”. They’re just not “widely accepted” by qualified IE specialists.

I hope that you can learn to one day let go of these farflung absolutist ideologies of yours (ie. “MIE is THE answer, not that crappy Esperanto, or Mandarin Chinese”, “Linguistic diversity MUST be remedied because societal multilingualism is somehow impossible”, “I’m an amateur but I DEFY anyone else’s expertise”, “The Kurgan Hypothesis is THE ONLY theory and you’re stupid for not accepting it”, “Everyone who disagrees with me is an Esparantist NEOCOMMUNIST”, etc). I don’t even know what you’re ranting on about half the time, really, and I’m not interested in joining along in your disturbing psychoses. I know that your dnghu plan is doomed, perhaps because I’m a good chess player and I can see more than three moves ahead. Just talking to a university professor might help you iron out many of your unfactual delusions. Professors don’t bite, Carlos.

I suspect that oftentimes irrational mandates are born out of an unresolved inner dissatisfaction in one’s personal life but it is a drug as insidious to the mind as heroine. So may you find a way to conquer your foremost vices. Good luck.

MIE is not about such things you mention, but I see you don’t care. Just read our FAQ if you are interested, we didn’t write them to repeat it again and again to everyone mad at us or our projects.

I hope you calm down, and care about your name appearing everywhere on the net, insulting us as “nazis”, “antisocial”, “conspiranoics”, etc. publicly without any reason for that…