Gothic Alphabet, Religion, and Record Keeping

During the time in which the Battle of Adrianople was in full swing, the Gothic people were being converted to Arian Christianity by the half-gothic missionary, Wulfila, who developed a Gothic alphabet to translate the Bible. Before the development of the new Gothic alphabet, Goths wrote their language using their adaptation of the Futhark (Dr. Peterson mentioned this in class) alphabet—but it was considered to be of pagan origin. Wulfila combined the Greek, Latin, and Futhark alphabets to create a new Gothic language.

It is interesting to note that the Gothic written language (or alphabet I guess) was written as a result of the conversion to Christianity. Also, the only surviving documents that are written in Gothic are called the Codex Argenteus, Codex Ambrosianus, and Codex Gissensis, Codex Carolinus, and Codex Vaticanus Latinus, all written scripture.

Illustration of the Gothic people.

One of the reasons for the decline of the Gothic language is when it lost its function as a church language when the Visigoths (Capital One commercial) converted to Catholicism. Religion seems to have played a major role in the adoption and decline of the Gothic language (both written and spoken). Faith and religion tend to influence the majority of what was originally written down. The Christian religion was important to the Gothic people, and that is what they wrote down. Perhaps this is why there is not as much of information on the culture and customs of the Gothic people—as that was not something that they probably felt was important to write down.

This reminds me of an aspect of the LDS church that is embraced—record keeping through journaling. In my own journaling—I write down what is important to me—such as significant events (graduating high school, starting college, patriarchal blessing, etc…) but do I record things, even seemingly mundane things that could be a benefit to those who follow me? Wouldn’t it be interesting to know what our great-great-great grandparents did for fun? Or to learn about how different their education was from ours? Or how they first met their spouse? I think it would be very insightful. Written language/knowledge is the ultimate preservation of knowledge—however inconvenient to accomplish—it is the way in which we are able to recreate past events through words.

The Gothic Language Continued...

I attempted to find an "expert" on the gothic language by turning to german professors at various institutions. But in turns out that the gothic language is extinct so there aren't too many experts on the language...(or no one wants to help out a poor freshman).

However, I did find this video where a man is speaking (or at least attempting to speak gothic-- as no one really knows what it sounds like) gothic. He is reading the story of the prodigal son in Luke. All of the written gothic language is from the copies we have of the bible. Start at 4:17.

From how the guy in the video is speaking the gothic language, it sounds quite a bit different from the German language as we know it today. Since I don't have insight from a gothic language expert, my brother-in-law (who I've referenced before... he's a German literature major) let me film him reading the story of the prodigal son, Luke 15:11-17...

(pretend this is a video of Chris speaking German....it's taking eons to upload...it will be on soon!)

As I watched the first video in Gothic and the second in modern German, it made me think how languages can evolve and branch off-without any deliberate effort. Why didn't humans start speaking the same language? It started me thinking. I did some research on it and I thought these quotes are interesting...

"In 1866, a ban on the topic was incorporated into the founding statutes of the Linguistic Society of Paris, perhaps the foremost academic linguistic institution of the time: ‘The Society does not accept papers on either the origin of language or the invention of a universal language."

Evolutionist Carl Zimmer said this on the origin on language:

"No one knows the exact chronology of this evolution, because language leaves precious few traces on the human skeleton.  The voice box is a flimsy piece of cartilage that rots away.  It is suspended from a slender C-shaped bone called a hyoid, but the ravages of time usually destroy the hyoid too."

Just as we have no information on the sounds of the Gothic language, we really don't have that much information on the topic of oral language itself. There is no physical evidence of language-once said, it disappears- unless written down. There is this sort of mysteriousness with oral language as we never really know the exact way it came to be and how there can be many different languages, and how languages can die off.

Sources: 1, 2

The Gothic Language

When I received the assignment to write about the functions and systems of the Germanic gothic language, I was excited! But turns out, there is little information about the specific functions and systems of the gothic language. Here are some things that I did find out…

The gothic language, part of the Indo-European language family, has been extinct since the 8^th or 9^th century, though it was declining well into the mid-6^th century. It survived as a domestic language in the Iberian Peninsula (Spain, Portugal) until the 8^th century.  This decline in the gothic language can be attributed to a couple of things. One of the reasons is the military defeat of the gothic people by the Franks. Goths were also removed from Italy. In addition, gothic speakers were geographically isolated. In Spain, the gothic language lost its function as a church language when the Visigoths converted to Catholicism in the 4^th century. The reasons for the decline of this language are not out of the ordinary when compared to various languages that have lost their prominence. For instance, refer to Alyssa’s post on the Roman Republic and its Latin language. 

Codex Argenteus



Lacking any modern descendants, the gothic language is one of the earliest to have written text available. Most of the language is known from the Codex Argenteus, a 6^th century copy of a 4^th century translation of the bible made by a Visigothic bishop (see picture).

Since many languages are influenced by those around them, it was no surprise to me when I read that the gothic language assists in understanding the transition from the various Indo-European Germanic languages and their structures.  

My brother in law served a mission in Germany and is now studying German Literature here at BYU. I asked him to see if there were any similarities he could see by looking a a Gothic translation of the Book of Matthew.


This is what he said: "I included the German words I know with what I think they correspond to. It would be a lot easier to tell if I could hear the words, but from what I can tell I'd say the languages are definitely related, but they've drifted apart quite a bit. I think there's also some Italian or Latin influence in the Gothic which isn't in the German (words like minnistono)."

15 ... ak ana lukarnastaþin· jah liu teiþ allaim þaim ïn þamma garda·       
16 swa liuhtjai liuhaþ ïzwar ïn and wairþja manne/männer ei gasaihvaina/gesehen ïz wara goda waurstwa jah hauhjai na attan ïzwarana þana ïn himina/himmel:lg     
17 Ni/nicht/nie hugjaiþ ei qemjau gatairan witoþ· aiþþau/abbau praufetuns-propheten·ni qam gatairan ak usfulljan/ausfüllen:ld     
18 Amen auk/auch qiþa ïzwis· und þatei usleiþiþ himins/himmel jah airþa/erde· jota ains aiþþau/abbau ains striks ni uslei þiþ af witoda unte allata wairþiþ:le     
19 Ïþ saei/sei nu gatairiþ aina anabusne þizo minnistono· jah laisjai swa mans minnista haitada in     þiudangardjai himine/himmel ïþ saei/sei taujiþ jah laisjai swa· sah mikils haitada ïn þiudangardjai himine/himmel·       
20 qiþa auk/auch ïzwis þatei nibai mana

Sources: 1, 2, 3