I briefly touched on ancient languages in my last article, which was about how your methods can change from one language to the next. When it comes to ancient languages, however, you’re dealing with an entirely different animal.
Ancient languages are, for the most part, no longer in use. Some may survive in some small way (Latin is used in some liturgical settings as well as in science, for example), but they’re no longer part of the wider culture. The Romans are gone, as well as the Vikings, the Ancient Greeks, the Sanskrit speakers, and the Classical Chinese. We no longer have Old English or Old High German, their tongues having evolved too much to be intelligible to most modern speakers.
This means that my number one rule for starting a new language goes out the window: listening first. Without any good movies, sitcoms, TV series to binge, or music to listen to, you can’t retrain your brain for that language. Whatever we know about how the language may have sounded comes from the painstaking work of linguists, trying to reconstruct a language by following its evolutionary trail.
So, if you want to learn Babylonian, Aztec, or any other long gone language, you have to first start by checking pronunciation guides. Then, if you really want to try inputting your way through the language acquisition process, you need to make sure you have grammar books and dictionaries with you because you won’t have access to works made for different reading levels.
Tip 1: Don’t Jump Into Heavy Texts Right Away if You Don’t Have To
There are no Hungry, Hungry Caterpillar-type books for the little Egyptian kids, although Egyptian and Latin have enough small snippets of text (Romans were fond of graffiti and stuck their thoughts over everything). Starting with small texts, if possible is a good idea. However, sometimes you’ll be forced to jump into something big and dense.
This is the problem with ancient languages. Literacy wasn’t a vital skill like it is today. Nowadays, almost everyone is literate to one degree or another. For example, even my father, who made up my bedtime stories when I was young because even the Little Golden Books were too difficult for him to read, could still read basic driving directions. Given enough time, he could even read some newspaper articles.
We rely on everyone being able to send texts and emails, and reading and writing are part of everyone’s education. In the ancient world, however, average people weren’t expected to be able to do things like send letters or make out grocery lists. Roads weren’t all that confusing, so they didn’t need to read signposts, and so even the best storytellers among the peasantry weren’t likely to be churning out scrolls and books. Without a printing press, nothing was expected to be read by the masses!
The result is that there’s a limited number of surviving texts available for us. Beggars can’t be choosers, but when possible, choose the lighter stuff first. You won’t want to bash your brains out as you try and decipher Homer’s bizarre use of language.
Tip 2: Try to Avoid Dry Textbooks if You Can
Nothing kills interest in an ancient language faster than a dry textbook. Stick to books like Assimil and Teach Yourself at the beginning, as they tend to liven things up. There are also some great books for learning Old English, too.
College textbooks are usually grammar explanations, tables of vocabulary, and snippets of texts like The Iliad or Beowulf for you to translate. If you can wade your way through them without chucking the books against the wall, go ahead.
Tip 3: Remember That These Languages Were Once Alive
It’s easy to imagine that Ancient Egyptian is merely hieroglyphs on monumental walls, that New Testament Greek exists solely in the New Testament, or that Galilean Aramaic is holy because people act as though its one and only speaker was Jesus Christ. Seriously, my Aramaic teacher decided to have some fun by translating a scene from Star Wars into Galilean Aramaic and people freaked out because this was the language of Jesus Christ and mustn’t be used for joking around.
No, these languages were once alive. People weren’t just telling epic tales or spouting words that would one day become scripture; they were bargaining, flirting, singing, joking, cursing, scolding, shouting, and whispering sweet nothings in these languages. Parents brought their children up in these languages, farmers called to their animals in these languages, sailors sang sea shanties in these languages! Yes, rulers gave incredible speeches in them, proclamations were written, historical accounts given, politics conducted, scripture written, etc. But there’s more to them than that.
Regardless of how a language survives today, you mustn’t lose the humanity behind them. Keep a journal in these languages. Roleplay in your head or on the page that you’re, say, making a pilgrimage to the Oracle at Delphi and write out what you ask the Pythia, how you think she might respond, and if you feel satisfied with her answers or not.
Bring the people of old to life as best you can. That is the best way to keep from being burnt out as you study an ancient language.
Those are my tips! They may be brief, but they're definitely helpful.
