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Dwendish: Difference between revisions
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Pictish is an ahistorical, fictional tongue descended from a language spoken alongside Brythonic Pictish by a Thurse people, known in Classical sources as the Picti, before they were largely driven from Caledonia by the invading Scots. | Pictish is an ahistorical, fictional tongue descended from a language spoken alongside Brythonic Pictish by a Thurse people, known in Classical sources as the Picti, before they were largely driven from Caledonia by the invading Scots. | ||
Thurse is the usual term in English for any of the various ethnic groups possessing the European Pygmy phenotype. This phenotype is believed to have originated in the Hercynian forest zone of Central Europe before spreading all over the continent. Their most striking features are short stature and pointed ears. | Thurse is the usual term in English for any of the various ethnic groups possessing the European Pygmy phenotype. This phenotype is believed to have originated in the Hercynian forest zone of Central Europe before spreading all over the continent. Their most striking features are short stature and pointed ears. A Scandinavian sub-group of the Thurse also have striped skins. It is from this sub-group that the Picts originated. Their epidermal stripes were generally attributed by Classical authors to the practice of tattoing hence their Latin sobriquet, Picti, the Painted Ones. | ||
The Thurse speak a variety of languages from a variety of language families, some of which are shared with other Europeans, some of which, such as Pictish, are not. Pictish is a language isolate spoken by some 33 million Picts in Pictland, as well as by a small Pictish minority in Scotland. | The Thurse speak a variety of languages from a variety of language families, some of which are shared with other Europeans, some of which, such as Pictish, are not. Pictish is a language isolate spoken by some 33 million Picts in Pictland, as well as by a small Pictish minority in Scotland. It has no attested relatives in its purported Scandinavian urheimat although research is still ongoing. | ||
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