The Lombard language belongs to the Gallo-Italic family and is a cluster of homogeneous dialects that are spoken by millions of speakers in Northern Italy and southern Switzerland. The language is also spoken in Santa Catarina in Brazil by Lombard immigrants from the Province of Bergamo, in Italy.
The most ancient linguistic substratum that has left a mark on the Lombard language is that of the ancient Ligures. However, available information about the ancient language and its influence on modern Lombard is extremely vague and limited. That is in sharp contrast to the influence left by the Celts, who settled in Northern Italy and brought their Celtic languages and culturally and linguistically Celticised the Ligures. The Celtic substratum of modern Lombard and the neighbouring languages of Northern Italy is self-evident and so the Lombard language is classified as a Gallo-Italic language (from the ancient Roman name for the Celts, Gauls).
Sanskrit is a classical language belonging to the Indo-Aryan branch of the Indo-European languages. It arose in South Asia after its predecessor languages had diffused there from the northwest in the late Bronze Age. Sanskrit is the sacred language of Hinduism, the language of classical Hindu philosophy, and of historical texts of Buddhism and Jainism. It was a link language in ancient and medieval South Asia, and upon transmission of Hindu and Buddhist culture to Southeast Asia, East Asia, and Central Asia in the early medieval era, it became a language of religion and high culture, and of the political elites in some of these regions. As a result, Sanskrit had a lasting effect on the languages of South Asia, Southeast Asia, and East Asia, especially in their formal and learned vocabularies.
Sanskrit generally connotes several Old Indo-Aryan language varieties. The most archaic of these is the Vedic Sanskrit found in the Rigveda, a collection of 1,028 hymns composed between 1500 BCE and 1200 BCE by Indo-Aryan tribes migrating east from what is today Afghanistan across northern Pakistan and into northwestern India. Vedic Sanskrit interacted with the preexisting ancient languages of the subcontinent, absorbing names of newly encountered plants and animals; in addition, the ancient Dravidian languages influenced Sanskrit's phonology and syntax. Sanskrit became tradition-bound, stopped being learned as a first language, and ultimately stopped developing as a living language.
Persian also known by its endonym Farsi is a Western Iranian language belonging to the Iranian branch of the Indo-Iranian subdivision of the Indo-European languages. Persian is a pluricentric language predominantly spoken and used officially within Iran, Afghanistan, and Tajikistan in three mutually intelligible standard varieties, namely Iranian Persian (officially known as Persian), Dari Persian (officially known as Dari since 1964), and Tajiki Persian (officially known as Tajik since 1999). It is also spoken natively in the Tajik variety by a significant population within Uzbekistan, as well as within other regions with a Persianate history in the cultural sphere of Greater Iran.
It is written officially within Iran and Afghanistan in the Persian alphabet, a derivative of the Arabic script, and within Tajikistan in the Tajik alphabet, a derivative of the Cyrillic script.
Modern Persian is a continuation of Middle Persian, an official language of the Sasanian Empire (224–651 CE), itself a continuation of Old Persian, which was used in the Achaemenid Empire (550–330 BCE). It originated in the region of Pars (Persia) in southwestern Iran. Its grammar is similar to that of many European languages.
my notes:
- the b and d are very, very, very soft, like a feather... the same with all the other consonants... I don't think any other language offers as much variation in the pronunciation as Portuguese.
- e is often [i], and disappears in the end of the word. In "bem"... it's almost Danish "ej". O is [u] and ou is [o] :-D
- some vowels sound like the Swedish ones - one must be very careful with the vowel sounds to get them right. Sometimes vowels are not pronounced, the bindings are interesting etc.
There probably are rules, but I don't know them yet, so I need to
struggle with them.
- m is sometimes almost n or ng
- r can be anything from the almost French r to the... er... there is a Swedish dialect that pronounces the R the Portuguese way, with a lot of roll and a bit of rock :-D (And every now and then there's a hint of L in the R, too... Here's quite a good example. The rock-and-roll R is about 1:50 when she sings "Rolar no meio de tanta riqueza"
Tu achas que eu sou uma selvagem E conheces o mundo Mas eu não posso crer Não posso acreditar Que selvagem possa ser Se tu é que não vês em teu redor (teu redor)
Tu pensas que esta terra te pertence Que o mundo é um ser morto mas vais ver Que cada pedra, planta ou criatura Está viva e tem alma, é um ser
Tu dás valor apenas às pessoas Que acham como tu sem se opôr Mas segue as pegadas de um estranho E terás mil surpresas de esplendor
Já ouviste o lobo a uivar sob a lua azul Ou porque ri o lince com desdém Sabes vir cantar com as vozes da montanha E pintar com quantas cores o vento tem E pintar com quantas cores o vento tem
Vem descobrir os trilhos da floresta Provar a doce amora e o seu sabor Rolar no meio de tanta riqueza E não querer indagar o seu valor
Sou a irmã do rio e do vento A garça, a lontra são iguais a mim Vivemos tão ligados uns aos outros Neste arco, neste círculo sem fim
Que altura a árvore tem Se a derrubares não sabe ninguém
Nunca ouvirás o lobo sobre a lua azul O que é que importa a cor da pele de alguém Temos que cantar com as vozes da montanha E pintar com quantas cores o vento tem Mas tu só vais conseguir Esta terra possuir Se a pintares com quantas cores o vento tem
