Aerial view of English Bay....last photo would be up near the top here
Looks nice, blatham. (I'm not living neat the Alps: the hoghest mountains here are the Sauerland, starting some few miles south from my place:
"Sauerland, region, North Rhine-Westphalia Land (state), northwestern Germany. It is bounded on the north by the Ruhr River and its tributary, the Möhne, and on the south bythe Sieg River and the Wester Forest, a mountainous area east of the Rhine. It lies to the east of the Bergisches Land (plateau) and has historically centred on the city of Arnsberg (q.v.). Its name (meaning "Bitter Land") is allegedly derived from the fierce resistance of its Saxon inhabitants against Charlemagne and the Franks, but it may refer to the relatively poor soil and often rugged hilly terrain. Formerly dependent largely on forestry and pasturefarming, Sauerland has developed as an iron-ore mining region serving the heavily industrialized Ruhr area. Numerous dams and reservoirs in its deep river valleys supply water to the Ruhr area. Parts of the Sauerland have also developed tourist industries with climatic health resorts in the Rothaar, Ebbe, and Lenne mountains."
Sorry, Craven, for being totally out of the subject!
:wink:
Blatham, my posit was that wide circulation resulted from the mercenary motive, one which i, personally, do not disparage, so long as it is not criminal in execution. What i was trying to convey is that someone who was writing for the audience which Caxton served could well have been motivated to use the "dialect" of East Anglia, given that this was similar to that spoken in Middlesex and in London, and given that quite a few works of Chaucer, or translated by Chaucer, were then in circulation--nothing reprehensible about such an effort. Thomas Mallory was long identified with a thoroughly rotten scoundrel from Westmoreland--however, recent scholarship suggests a Sir Thomas Mallory from Yorkshire, who died while imprisoned in the south of France. It would not have surprised me, nor would i have considered it reprehensible of that Sir T, if he had lived to return to England, and had had his manuscript copied into the East Anglia "dialect" to reach a larger audience.
Setanta
Sorry, didn't mean to suggest profit motive being the very depths of evil. And I ascede to your knowledge here. You've undoubtedly bumped into the famous quote by an early linguist that the difference between a language and a dialect is that the speakers of one have a navy.
Craven
Your avatar is freaking me out.
No, infact, i'd never heard that one, Boss . . . it's a good one, though, and revealing--a Saxon would have precious little use for a Navy, but it was life and death to a Briton . . .
Just trying to remember, if the Saxons used a ferry when invading Britain :wink:
Don't be a wiseacre, Walter--i had in mind Saxony as it existed long after the Anglo-Saxon invasion of Britain. I actually had a picture of 17th Century Europe in mind. I don't think Augustus the Strong had much of a Navy--even after he was elected King of Poland . . .
Indeed, not much: the Saxons just had a dozen or so ships under their flag (in 17th century).
Walter, get serious . . . i let the other one go, but you're being an irritating pest on this subject . . . is this some kind of perverse German nationalism coming through? The one and only time Germans ever had an effective Navy was during the First World War, and their success during the battle of Jutland frightened that idiot Kaiser Willie II, that he never risked his fleet again--shame, too, since they had a good shot in a re-match against the English.
So let's examine your absurdities: The Saxons who invaded Britain used boats as transports, but as a Navy, definitely not. They were not known to fight from the decks, they were not known to overhaul other ships and make them captive, AND most significantly, the Roman imperial machine was dead in Britain, so there was no possibility of any true naval response to the Saxon incursions. I can get in a heavy duty truck, use it ram down the gate to your farm, and then drive through your front door to commit a home invasion--this doesn't make my truck an armored fighting vehicle. Just because the Saxons used boats to get to Britain doesn't mean they had a navy.
I frankly don't believe your contention about any Saxon navy in the 17th Century. If indeed they did have some ships in their possession, the contention that the existence of a "Saxon Navy" had any political or military significance is ridiculous. If you will look at my original post, it was to contrast the meaning of a Navy to the English and the Saxons. The lack of a Navy never presented a threat to the security or prosperity of Saxony--when the Swedes wanted to march across Saxony, or, as in the case of Charles XII, to invade Saxony, chase down the Elector and remove him from the Polish throne by force, the Saxons showed no military ability to interfer, and certainly the possession of any description of "Navy" would not have protected Dresden or Leipsic. By contrast, from the time of Henry VII onward, the English increasingly depended upon a Navy for national security and to increase and protect commercial prosperity--which was, after all Walter, the point of my post.
Get a grip, Walter, Germany had a good Navy for about 18 months in the course of the First World War--and that, in the entire range of recorded European history, is the only occassion. That Navy was squandered as a military or political tool, which leaves us with the inevitable conclusion that Germany never has been a naval power, and will not be one in the foreseeable future. In a pitched battle, i'd give the Canadian Navy 3-to-1 over the Germans.
Sorry, setanta, that I'm an irritating pest for you.
The first German (German, not by a single country) navy was founded by Prince Adalbert of Prussia on June 14, 1848. The first admiral of the fleet was Rudolf Bromme, aka 'Bommy'.
This fleet couildn't be established as the thought of 'Federal Navy' due to known circumstances.
Ships and soldiers became (partly) the new Prussian navy in 1852/3. These, later became the cadre of navy the North German Federation.
You are right, there hasn't been a 'navy' in common sense in Saxony (or elsewhere in German countries).
However, every country with some connection to the North and/or Baltic Sea had a fleet, showing its flag and manned with soldiers.
[At least, if I remember my lessons at the Naval Academy correctly.]
That is a far cry, Walter, from any suggestion that having a Navy was a crucial concern for a Saxon . . . and i repeat, that, apart from about a year an a hald during the first world war, Germany has never even had a shot at being a naval power . . . I'd still give odds on Canada over Germany . . .
Stricking the flag, "Ready Aye Ready".
Getting back to the subject, I believe it was Andrew Jackson who said he didn't think much of the intelligence of a man who could think of only one way to spell a word.
I suppose that might finally explain the 'phuk Jacsin' button handed down to me through all these generations.
Craven, Very erudite posting!
I have a dim memory of learning in an English course that after the Battle of Hastings 1066, royalty moved away from anglo-saxon words to Norman French words.
No longer did we eat pig. We began to raise pigs but eat porque (pork)
sheep, but eat mutton
cow boeuf
chicken poultry
There was also a change in mostly four letter words describing body parts and bodily functions. You figure out the Anglo-Saxon equivalent of excrement, intercourse, urine, derriere, penus, etc.
BillyFalcon we must have had the same English class. Amazing isn't it that words banned so long ago still exist and are favored when angry. This is proof that censorhip does not work.
It wasn't really censorship, just an evolution toward latin etc.
I feel SO sorry for foreigners,
when we have words like KNEW and NEW - SEW and SO
they sound exactly the same but not.
oh the other night my grandson and
I were thinking up all the REALLY weird
ones, but they escape me now.
