I watched a fascinating public lecture about Earth’s environment around 250 million years ago. Prof Kathleen C. Benison explained how rock salt carries evidence of conditions in this distant past.
Tiny spaces (inclusions) inside the salt crystals can contain water, algae, plant matter, and single-celled organisms. They are preserved in the salt in a way that makes me think of Jurassic Park’s insects in amber.
Thanks to this evidence, we know that conditions in parts of Pangea were extremely inhospitable.
You can watch a video of the lecture on the Geological Society of London’s YouTube channel. There’s lots to see on there. I can’t wait to watch another one!
At first, I thought Desketa was a bit old hat compared to interactive apps like Duolingo. It’s a website, and it certainly doesn’t adjust itself to fit your individual needs. Now that I’m more familiar with it, I’ve changed my mind. Desketa’s method is straightforward but effective.
The exercises include pairing words or phrases with pictures, audio recordings, or other words and phrases. There are gap fills with audio too. My least favourite exercises ask you to unscramble mixed-up words or phrases. They’re a real test of Breton spelling!
I’m just about to start Unit 10 of the course. It follows on from a fairly tough Unit 9, which introduces the negative of “to be” and shows you how to use prefixes to create antonyms. My favourite words from Unit 9 are skuizh (tired) and diskuizh (rested).
I’m surprised by how much I like Breton. From the little I know, it’s a very attractive language. You might be interested in this Breton music video:
Breton is spoken in Brittany in France. It’s a Brittonic language, closely related to Welsh and Cornish. Many of the ancestors of today’s Bretons left Britain for Brittany in the fifth and sixth centuries, just as Angles, Saxons, and Jutes from Northern Europe were settling in England.
Some people used to think that all speakers of Brittonic languages left England during this period (apart from Cornwall, of course). The evidence suggests that many stayed, surrounded by the first speakers of Old English.
As someone who grew up in England, I’m fascinated by the Brittonic languages. They’re a living link to England’s pre-English history. And, of course, they’re modern languages still spoken today in Northwest Europe.
I’ve studied Welsh to a basic level. I can see that Breton vocabulary has a lot in common with Welsh. To me, the two languages also feel quite different. I think I might find Breton slightly easier than Welsh, but time will tell. Here’s a Welsh music video that might interest you:
