philosophical, ethical and historical-cultural meaning
The next sign of spreading evil and dangerous fight against God is the construction of the Tower of Babel (the creation of a pillar; hence the “Babylonian Pandemonium”). This parable contains the deepest generalizations. The tower appears as a symbol of vanity and pride, godless paganism, as a symbol of an empire that unites the world through violence, as the embodiment of a technocratic world in which human life and spirituality are devalued, as a comprehensive metaphor for the dead-end path of civilization. The mixing of languages that the Lord produces is a beneficial act for human culture: the diversity of languages and cultures is opposition to the leveling of consciousness, the unification of culture within the tower-empire. Babylon is then recognized in biblical texts as a certain principle of the “earthly city”, the domination of the material over the spiritual - in contrast to the opposite principle on which Jerusalem is based - the “Heavenly City”.
The parable of the Babylonian Pandemonium is one of the most famous. “Like many other biblical parables, it is distinguished by extreme laconicism, enormous power of generalization and depth of subtext, the possibility of ambiguous reading.”
“And throughout the whole earth there was one language and the same words. // And it came to pass: moving from the east, they found a valley in the land of Shinar and settled there. // And they said to each other: Let's make bricks and burn them with fire. And they used bricks instead of stones, and earthen resin instead of lime. // And they said: Let us build ourselves a city and a tower, with its head reaching to heaven; Let us make a name for ourselves, so that we are not scattered over the face of the whole earth. // And the Lord came down to look at the city and the tower that the sons of men were building. // And the Lord said: behold, there is one people, and they all have the same language; and this is what they began to do, and they will not retreat from what they have planned to do. // Let us go down and confuse their languages there so that they do not understand each other’s speech. // And the Lord scattered them from there throughout the whole earth; and they stopped building the city...” Gen. 11:1-9.
The Tower of Babel is a symbol of an empire that unites the whole world, but through violence, a symbol of totalitarianism, an inhuman civilization.
“The Tower of Babel, a grandiose symbol created by the biblical consciousness, continues to remain a formidable reminder and warning to humanity.”
The parable of the Babylonian Pandemonium completes the story of the creation of the world and man, the growth of the human race and the evil that they committed in the world. People again rebelled against the Creator. They were possessed by the spirit of power and omnipotence, and they decided to achieve world power by starting to build a tower, as high as the heavens, in order to reach God. The symbol of Godlessness and tyranny appears in the parable. Almighty. Angry at the stupidity and insolence of people, he punishes them by dividing them into many nations, which have their own language. As a result, a complete misunderstanding of each other arose and the construction of the tower became impossible. The confusion of languages happened so instantly that people did not have time to realize it. The panic began…. The people wanted to maintain unity through a single empire, symbolized by the city and the tower, but this plan turned out to be objectionable in the eyes of God and it was quickly destroyed. What can be learned from this parable is that you must always listen to the Word of God and agree everything with him, because he will not do anything bad for his creation. But even the most powerful cultures are destroyed if they do not coincide with Divine plans.
CHAPTER 1
ABOUT THE BACKGROUND OF ESPERANTOMultilingualism is a very old phenomenon. It is as many millennia old as humanity, which inhabited all habitable territories of the globe, spontaneously creating verbal tools of mutual understanding in the process of labor and mutual communication. Tribes encountered facts of multilingualism every time the struggle for existence or other reasons forced them to communicate with each other. The lack of a common language interfered with communication, business relationships, joint work, and friendship.
Multilingualism is not a universal evil, not a “curse of the gods,” as those who had to communicate with people speaking a foreign language believed in ancient times. Multilingualism is a natural phenomenon, akin to the wonderful diversity in the world of animals and plants, a blessed gift of nature that contributes to the creation of multinational cultures of earthlings in the process of spiritual creativity and obtaining material wealth. An annoying obstacle in direct communication between multilingual people was (and is) the absence of a single neutral language. This was felt and understood by the most prominent representatives of different civilizations, different times, and they tried, to the best of their ability and conditions, to eliminate this obstacle, making attempts to find or build a simple, convenient tool for communication between all the peoples of the earth. In this regard, the “pain for the fate of all mankind” of young Zamenhof and his subsequent creation of a project of a neutral ML is not an exception, but another attempt to overcome the language barrier, the daring plan of one person in a long chain of searches for a solution to this vital problem.
For a better understanding of the reasons for the emergence of Esperanto, the principles of language construction and the conditions for the development of a project into “living” speech, it is advisable to at least in general familiarize yourself with the history of attempts to create a linguistic language that preceded Esperanto.
1.1. THE LEGEND OF BABYLON
Many legends were created in ancient times about multilingualism, its causes and sad consequences. One of them, a very instructive legend about the Babylonian pandemonium, has survived to this day. The source of this legend was the following historical fact.
Many centuries BC, in Mesopotamia, covering the lands of present-day Iraq between the Euphrates and Tigris rivers, the high culture of the people called the Sumerians flourished. The capital of the powerful early slaveholding state was Babylon, a rich city, the largest city in the world at that time. In the suburbs of Babylon stood a huge, unfinished tower.
According to legend, the inhabitants of a prosperous city, having become proud and challenging God, decided to build a high tower whose top would touch the sky itself. Captivated by a daring plan, the Babylonians set to work together. Understanding each other perfectly, they worked successfully, the work quickly moved forward, an unprecedented structure grew before their eyes. This greatly alarmed the ruler of the “firmament.” Outraged by the insolence of the Babylonians, he decided to punish them severely. “They all have the same language and whatever they want will be done,” God reasoned and came up with a cruel “divine” punishment. He fragmented their common language into many dissimilar languages. The builders no longer understood each other, and terrible confusion began. There was no way to continue the work; the fantastic structure remained unfinished.
This legend contains an undeniable truth: if all people had a common language, if everyone understood each other well and strived for a common goal, humanity would represent a huge creative force; it could build not a Tower of Babel as high as the firmament, but a more perfect life on the firmament of the earth.
1.2. THE LANGUAGE OF OURANOPOLIS
In the Hellenistic states that formed on the territory from the Danube to the Indian Ocean after the death of Alexander the Great (323 BC) and the collapse of the huge empire he created, a new philosophy appeared - Stoicism. According to this teaching, which arose as a result of contacts between Greek and Eastern cultures, representing significant progress in the development of forms of social consciousness and the idea of equality of mankind, all people are citizens of the earth. All citizens of the earth - free and slaves, Greeks and barbarians (barbaros - not Greek, foreign), men and women - must be equal before the law that governs the world.
The philologist Alexarchus, the younger brother of Cassander, the Macedonian military leader, was influenced by the philosophy of the Stoics, and from 306 BC. e. king of Macedonia. Alexarch was seized by the idea of creating a fair state in which all citizens with equal rights would live together and speak the same language. To implement his bold plan, Alexarchus founded the city of Ouranoupolis - City of Sky (Greek ouranos - sky, polis - city-state). The inhabitants of the new city were newcomers from different countries. For them, Alexarchus created a common language, apparently the first planned language built by one person.
Until now, it has not been possible to establish what type of language this language was - whether it was based on the vocabulary of existing languages or based on the vocabulary invented by its author. The city-state, created by Alexarchus without taking into account real political conditions, soon ceased to exist, and with it its language.
1.3. THE WRITTEN LANGUAGE OF GALEN
In the second century AD, the physician and naturalist Claudius Galen (129-199) lived in Rome. He was the largest theoretician of ancient medicine, the creator of the foundations of anatomy, physiology and pharmacology. Among the enormous legacy of this scientist is a work devoted to the international written language. Galen invented a system of graphic signs, with the help of which, in his opinion, people speaking different languages could communicate. Alas, his ideas were not understood by his contemporaries.
1.4. LATIN AS AN INTERNATIONAL LANGUAGE OF THE MIDDLE AGES
Latin - originally the language of Ancient Rome and its region of Latium - as the Roman slave state grew, it spread to the entire Apennine Peninsula and the island of Sicily, and then covered a significant part of the possessions of the Roman Empire in Europe, East Asia and North Africa. After the collapse of the Roman state, Latin ceased to be a spoken language, but did not disappear without a trace. Based on folk Latin, dissolved in local dialects, from VI to XI centuries. national languages close to each other were formed: Italian, Sardinian, Spanish, Catalan, Portuguese, French, Provençal, Romansh, Romanian and Moldavian. From the Latin name of the capital of the Roman Empire, they received the name Romance and form one of the groups of the family of Indo-European languages.
In the Middle Ages, classical Latin became the language of science, school, church and international relations. Neutral Latin, which no longer belonged to any nation, for several hundred years has to a certain extent performed the functions of an international written language, and in some sections of educated society it is even a spoken language. In the 17th century The Latin language is losing its international significance and is gradually being replaced by literature in national languages. In the scientific world and in international relations, linguistic chaos arises, and the problem of creating a single auxiliary language becomes urgent. This social phenomenon was foreseen by the Spanish philosopher, humanist educator and teacher Luis Vives (1492-1540). In his treatise “De Disciplines” he wrote: “Latin will perish and then there will be turmoil in all sciences, the threat of alienation between peoples... It would be happiness if there was a single language that all peoples could use.”
In the Middle Ages, isolated attempts to create MN appeared. For example, Abbess Hildegard (1098-1179), abbess of one of the monasteries in Germany, was the author of a language project based on the vocabulary of Hebrew, Greek, Latin, French and German.
The system of written signs was developed by the Spanish philosopher Raymond Lull (1234-1315).
Several years ago, descriptions of a planned language created in the 16th or 17th centuries were discovered. in the Muslim East. The authorship of this language, based on the vocabulary of Arabic, Persian and Turkish, is attributed to Sheikh Muhmeddin.
These projects, created at different times and in different countries, were known only in the narrow circles of their authors and could not have a truly international significance. At that time there was no scientific theory that could serve as a basis for the design of planned languages.
1.5. INTERNATIONAL SLAVIC LANGUAGE
Until the beginning of the second half of the 9th century. The Slavs did not have their own written language. The functions of the written language were performed by Greek and Latin. During the period of the spread of Christianity, there were three privileged languages of the church: Hebrew, Greek and Latin. Other languages were considered barbaric and unsuitable for worship. The vital need of that time was the creation of Slavic writing and a unified Slavic language.
The first Slavic alphabet was created in 863 by the Slavic enlighteners brothers Cyril (c. 827-869) and Methodius (c. 815-885).
Cyril (before becoming a monk - Constantine) was educated in Constantinople at the court of the Byzantine Emperor Michael III. He was fluent in Greek, Latin, Arabic, Hebrew and Slavic languages. At one time he taught philosophy. Then he accepted the monastic rank and became a missionary.
In 863, Prince Rostislav invited Cyril and Methodius from Byzantium to the Great Moravian Empire to found the Slavic Church. In order to spread Christianity in Great Moravia and other Slavic countries, the brothers translated several liturgical books from Greek into the language now called Old Church Slavonic. Research has shown that this language was formed on the basis of the Solunsky () dialect of Bulgarian-Macedonian origin, supplemented by borrowings from other Slavic languages, and words, apparently created by the authors of the translation, not found in any of the existing languages.
The activities of Cyril and Methodius aroused sharp protest from adherents of Latin, the language of the church. A fierce struggle began between the two camps, ending in the victory of the Slavic enlighteners. However, the persecution of the Slavic language did not stop. After the death of Cyril, Methodius was thrown into prison. But this did not help the enemies of the new language. It continued to live, develop, enrich itself and became a common Slavic literary language, which was used first in Moravia, the Czech Republic, Slovakia, partly in Poland and among all the southern Slavs, and from the 10th century. also in Rus', where he played a significant role in the formation of the Russian literary language.
1.6. PHILOSOPHICAL LANGUAGES OF CAMPANELLA AND BACON
At the beginning of the 17th century. the first attempts to develop scientific foundations for constructing a rational ML appear. Independently of each other, two outstanding representatives of the culture of that time worked on the problem of creating a language based on classifications of named concepts - the Italian utopian communist Tomaso Campanella (1568-1639) and the English materialist philosopher Francis Bacon (1561-1626).
A fighter for the liberation of Italy from Spanish rule, Campanella was imprisoned, where he spent 27 years. In a prison cell, despite cruel torture, Campanella secretly wrote the book “City of the Sun” in 1602, published in 1623. This is an inspired poem about the happy future of earthlings who do not know social inequality, private property, work with joy, because work has become the honorable work of every person, and everyone speaks one common language. Campanella then outlined considerations regarding the future of the ML in his Philosophical Grammar.
Francis Bacon in his treatise “On the Dignity and Augmentation of the Sciences” writes about two grammars - literary and philosophical. The first of them, according to the author, should be a study of existing national languages, the second - a set of theoretical rules for creating a single, rational language common to all peoples. Bacon argued that “it would be a completely beautiful language, with the help of which thoughts and experiences would be properly expressed.”
Both treatises - Campanella's and Bacon's - are of undoubted interest for the history of the design of philosophical languages, created so that with their help “thoughts are properly expressed”, and not to facilitate verbal communication between people of different languages.
The greatest French philosopher of the 17th century. Rene Descartes (1596-1650), who enriched mathematics and a number of other sciences with his classical works, made a significant contribution to the problem of creating MN.
In 1617, a short work by the French monk Herman Hugo was published in Antwerp, in which the author tried to justify the need to build a universal language. This work fell into the hands of the French scientist, Abbot Marin Marsenne, who constantly corresponded with many ministers of science in Europe, including Descartes, who lived in Holland at that time. Mersenne sent the work to Hugo Descartes.
On November 20, 1629, Descartes wrote a letter to the abbot, which became the theoretical basis for the science of linguistic design, the beginning of a new period in the history of interlinguistics.
Descartes, already a famous scientist at that time, really liked the idea of creating a universal language. He confirmed the idea of the possibility of building a language according to a certain plan, which in its qualities would surpass all existing national languages, but was critical of some of the statements of the author of the work in question. In his letter, Descartes outlined a deeply thought-out master plan for the construction of the ME.
According to Descartes, the ML should have only one conjugation of verbs, one declension of names; it should not contain irregular verbs. New words should be formed using prefixes and suffixes, and the affixes should be clearly defined and have a consistent meaning. The dictionary should include, along with root words, prefixes and suffixes.
Descartes puts forward demands to streamline language not only as a means of communication between all people. He proposes to streamline concepts, that is, to build linguistic language on the basis of classifications of concepts, to turn language into a thinking tool that allows one to draw logical conclusions and gain new knowledge. But such a language, the scientist claims, can only be invented on the basis of “true philosophy.” Using it, according to Descartes, “peasants will be able to judge the essence of things better than philosophers do today.”
As the subsequent practice of creating ML showed, Descartes’ requirements that the language be easy to learn, a convenient means of communication between multilingual people and at the same time a philosophical language are not feasible, but his views had a great influence on the creation of many ML projects.
1.8. PANGLOTIKA COMENIUS
The problem of creating a single language for all peoples seriously interested the Czech teacher, school reformer, writer and philosopher, John Amos Comenius (1592-1670). The great educator considered it necessary to give young people a broad, universal education, linking all educational work with language teaching. In an effort to bring his ideas to life, Komensky creates several unusual textbooks.
In 1631, his textbook was published in Latin under the title “Janua linguarum reserata” (“The door to languages is open”), which was soon translated into a number of national languages. This textbook is something like a brief encyclopedia containing one hundred articles that are not related to each other in content (On the creation of the world, On man, On inner feelings, On grammar, On dialectics, On eloquence, etc.).
In the preface to the Latin original, addressed to “erudite lecturers,” Comenius criticizes the teaching of languages, which consists in memorizing thousands of words - signs of things - without indicating these things, without taking into account the connections between words inherent in each language. Having spent many years studying a language in this way, there is no time left to begin the “real” - philosophy, theology, medicine, jurisprudence. Comenius claims that the presentation of the basics of the language should be brief, concise, and the study should be conscious, easy, and enjoyable. “I consider, first of all, an unshakable law of didactics that understanding (intellectus) and language should always develop in parallel. For he who studies things must necessarily resort to language; for the one who understands what he cannot talk about is no different from a dumb statue, and making sounds without understanding them is the property of a parrot.”
To facilitate students’ conscious assimilation of educational material, Comenius, based on this textbook, creates auxiliary aids - “School is a Game” (a cycle of plays) and “The World in Pictures”.
The thought about the role of languages in education does not leave the philosopher. Analyzing national languages, he sees their imperfections and complexity and comes to the conclusion that it is necessary to create an easy, perfect international language. With the help of this language, according to the author, it would be possible to spread the light of wisdom among all, even the most backward peoples, and thus prepare and make possible the unification of humanity.
In his essay “Via lucis” (“The Way to Light”), dated 1641, Comenius wrote that the world needs a common language, easier than all existing ones. Sending this work to the Royal Academy in London, in a covering letter dated April 1, 1668, he proposed the creation of an international corporation for the development of “pansophia” (universal wisdom) with a center in London and national branches. Scientists from different countries - members of this corporation and its branches - will correspond in a universal language, which needs to be created, since Latin is no longer suitable for this purpose due to the changed and increased demands of science.
In XIX ch. In his essay “The Path to Light,” entitled “The Structure of a Universal Language,” Comenius examines the basic principles on the basis of which a new language, common to all people, should be built. After all, he writes, “it is easier for everyone to study one thing than for one person to study everything.”
The basic principles of Comenius' project: the root fund of commonly used vocabulary should contain 200-300 words of Latin origin; word formation - affixal; grammatical categories are economical and rational, without exception; the language is easy to learn, harmonious, more perfect than existing ones. “From these principles,” writes Comenius, “we can hope to obtain a language ten times easier than Latin, because there will be no irregularities in it; a hundred times more perfect, since with its help it will be possible to express all the differences between concrete things and ideas; a thousand times more suitable for adequately representing material objects, since its individual words will be something like definitions.”
In 1935, the manuscript of another work by Comenius, “Panglotik,” was accidentally discovered. The purpose of this work, as the author himself wrote, is to create a simple instrument of communication between people of all nations. For the new language, Comenius offers several names: “pansophia”, “panglotika” (universal language), “rational language”, “harmonic language”, “philosophical language”, etc. The point is not in the name, but in the fact that the new language should to be “rich and comprehensive, like the mind itself, beautiful, like the world itself, harmonious, like music..., but at the same time laconic..., since conciseness and precision of speech is the path to wisdom.”
It is easy to see that Comenius, like Descartes, had in mind a “rational”, “philosophical” ML, which would be an effective tool of thinking and at the same time an easy, convenient means of communication between multilingual people, and these requirements are incompatible.
1.9. ALL-SLAVIC LANGUAGE OF KRIZHANICH
In the XVII century. The Old Church Slavonic language lost its significance as a common Slavic written language, and its functions were limited to the role of the language of the Orthodox Church.
The South Slavs, who were constantly attacked by neighboring peoples, developed the idea of Pan-Slavism. Oppressed by the Turks, Austrians, Hungarians, Romanians, they hope for salvation from Russia, which at that time is becoming a powerful national state.
In the second half of the 17th century. Croatian priest Yuri Krizanich (1618-1683) comes to Russia with his project for a pan-Slavic language. He tries to convince the tsar of the need for the political unification of all Slavs under the auspices of Russia and argues that a common pan-Slavic language will greatly help the positive solution and development of this historical process. Krizhanich’s political mission was not successful, but the project of a pan-Slavic language, developed in detail by Yuri Krizhanich, is of undoubted interest for interlinguistics.
From a lexical point of view, the Krizanich language is a mixture of several Slavic languages. According to the research of the Dutch Slavist T. Ekman, the vocabulary fund of the Pan-Slavic language consists of Russian words (60%), Church Slavonic (10%), Serbo-Croatian (9%), Polish (2.5%), Ukrainian, etc. Some of the words, apparently , the author himself came up with it, since researchers were unable to find them in the Slavic languages of that time.
The grammar of the Krizanich language is a mixture of rules borrowed from various Slavic languages with a clear preponderance of Russian elements. Several books were published in the Pan-Slavic language of Krizhanich. The main scientific work of the Croatian priest, conventionally called “Politics,” is also of interest to modern researchers. It was published in Russia twice, and in 1965 a third edition appeared in Moscow in the Pan-Slavic and modern Russian languages.
1.10. NEWTON'S PROJECTS FOR INTERNATIONAL LANGUAGE
In the 17th century, mainly in England and France, many works appeared devoted to the problem of a single ML. In some, attempts were made to simplify classical Latin, in others, systems of written characters were developed. There were proposals to create a single, universal alphabet for all languages of the world.
The problem of creating a magnetic cell keenly interested the brilliant English physicist, mechanic, astronomer and mathematician Isaac Newton (1643-1727).
In the notebook of young Newton, a student at Cambridge University, as well as in the recently discovered manuscript “On the Universal Language” of the already famous scientist, there are projects for a new universal language. Despite the incompleteness of the work, what is presented represents a fairly complete picture of the theoretical premises on the basis of which Newton began to create his language.
In Newton's designs, all concepts are classified and each class is assigned a specific symbol. So, for example, b means feelings, s - tools, t - animal, etc. New words are formed from the lexical material that forms the basis of the language, with the help of suffixes meaning concepts related to the root word, or grammatical categories of number, tense , degrees of comparison, etc. The first project has a dictionary in which words formed from 2400 initial elements are arranged according to a classification principle. The work “On the Universal Language” gives groups of words that are similar in content, formed from the same root using suffixes.
Newton's projects remained only interesting material for the history of interlinguistics, however, the principle of word formation with the help of suffixes that have a constant meaning (which is not in national languages that arose and developed spontaneously) found its embodiment in subsequent projects of a language created according to a specific plan, including including in Esperanto.
1.11. LEIBNITZ'S WORKS IN THE FIELD OF LANGUAGE
The brilliant German mathematician, outstanding philosopher, logician, lawyer, historian and geologist Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz (1646-1716) dreamed of creating universal symbolism, that is, a written language in the form of mathematical formulas suitable for expressing any thought. When he was twenty years old, he published a work in Latin, the long title of which began with the words “The Art of Combinatorics.” In his book, the young scientist outlined the essence of the mathematical analysis he proposed. Leibniz failed to create universal symbolism, but the idea of a single language for all people did not leave him.
In 1765, almost half a century after the death of the scientist, his main philosophical treatise, “New Experiments on the Human Mind,” written in 1704, was published in four volumes. The third book of this work, entitled “On Words,” is devoted to the philosophical problems of language and represents a kind of introduction to the essence of the language he proposed. Leibniz believed that national languages, which arose without a specific plan as a result of mixing various dialects of neighboring peoples, suffer from a number of shortcomings (ambiguity, imprecision, etc.) and therefore are not a perfect means of communication. The mathematician-linguist Leibniz argued that language as a tool of thinking should be created on a rational basis, to form a logical system in which, in particular, complex concepts and the words expressing them should be a combination of initial simple elements, just as in mathematics divisible numbers are the product of indivisibles. Leibniz tried to create such a system himself. In the grammar of his language there are two main classes of words - nouns and verbs, and the transition from one class to another is carried out according to strict rules. The grammatical forms of nouns are formed not with the help of inflections, but with the help of prepositions. There are no irregular verbs. There are no exceptions in grammar. Nouns differ by gender only where it is necessary to indicate the gender of living beings. Word formation is affixal.
At the beginning of this century, thanks to the interlinguist Louis Couture, previously unknown Leibniz manuscripts on the problem of a universal language were discovered, containing about 1000 pages, written in Latin, German and French. Judging by these materials, Leibniz’s ideas about the language of the future were completely clear and quite definite. He was sure that his language would be the language of science, artistic prose, and poetry. “This language,” Leibniz wrote, “will be the most powerful organ of the mind. I venture to say that this will be the last effort of the human spirit, and when the project is realized, their happiness will depend only on people, for they will master an instrument that will serve to inspire the mind no worse than the telescope serves to enhance the visual power of the eye. I am sure that no discovery will be as important as this, and nothing is capable of perpetuating the name of its creator to such an extent.”
The work he had begun, to which Leibniz devoted a lot of work and time, was unable to be completed due to his preoccupation with other issues.
1.12. LANGUAGE SOLRESOL
At the beginning of the 19th century. a project of a “musical” MYA by Jean François Sudre (1787-1862) appeared, named by the author saltresol.
Word elements are the names of the seven notes of the scale: do, re, mi, fa, salt, la, si. As a result of the combination of these primary elements, the author obtained 49 two-syllable words, 336 three-syllable words, 2268 four-syllable words and 9072 five-syllable words. There is a certain pattern in the formation of derivative words. For example, time is doredo, day is doremi, week is doref, month is doresol. Word sollasi“raise” is formed from three notes expressing an increase in sound, and the antonym of this concept - “lower” is formed from the same notes taken in the reverse order, i.e., expressing a decrease in sound - silyasol.
You can transmit information in the Solresol language in eight different ways: 1) write in letters of any alphabet, 2) write with the first seven Arabic numerals, 3) write in notes, 4) pronounce, 5) sing, 6) play an instrument that has a scale, 7) signal flags and 8) depict the seven colors of the rainbow.
Solresol has been approved by the Paris Academy of Sciences and many scientific societies. The author of the language took part in two international exhibitions: in Paris in 1851 he received a prize of 10 thousand francs, in London in 1862 he was awarded a medal of honor. Solresol received recognition from many representatives of Western European culture, including the great French writer Victor Hugo, the German naturalist, one of the founders of modern plant geography, geophysics and hydrography Alexander Humboldt. A society was founded to promote this language, the Sudra project was published, but Solresol did not find application in public practice. There were many reasons: novelty, a priori structure of the language, poor distinguishability of words, difficulties in learning the language, etc.
1.13. RUSSIAN PROJECTS FOR SOLVING THE ISSUE OF INTERNATIONAL LANGUAGE
The problem of MN, which worried the minds of prominent representatives of Western European culture in the 18th century, was not alien to Russian scientists. Through the “window to Europe”, cut by Peter I, new trends in the field of science, technology and education penetrated into Russia. The country was trying to catch up with Western Europe. In the post-Petrine era, Catherine II, wanting to show the progressive nature of “enlightened absolutism,” ordered Russian scientists to create a world language. For this purpose, the empress founded a special language commission, which was supposed to engage in a comparative study of European and Asian languages.
The result of the activities of Catherine's commission was a dictionary published in St. Petersburg in 1787. It contained 285 words in 200 languages. A world language was not created, but two years later, a former member of this commission, Professor of St. Petersburg University X. Wolke, published his draft ML.
Wolke's project was a so-called digital pasigraphy (). The essence of Wolke's pasigraphy was that each word in national languages was assigned the same number. Using a specific number indicated by one interlocutor, the second had to find the word he needed in his dictionary. This was another unsuccessful attempt to destroy the language barrier between multilingual peoples.
In the second half of the 19th century. The problem of creating a world language is beginning to interest not only linguists, but also specialists in other fields. More and more new projects of auxiliary MN are appearing in Russia. The most valuable attempt is the work of the Russian diplomat A. T. Grimm. In his opinion, a universal language can only be a language based on national languages, but cleared of all unnecessary things. The grammar of such a language should be logical, simple, and it itself is easy to learn, rich, euphonious, suitable for science and fiction.
1.14. VOLAPYUK
250 years have passed since Descartes laid the foundation for the theory of ML design, but not a single one of the projects has become a “living” tool for direct communication between multilingual people. Skeptics argued that this problem would never be solved.
But in May 1879, the literary newspaper “Sionsharfe” (“Zion’s Harp”), published in German in the Bavarian town of Litzelstätten, published an addendum entitled “Entwurf einer Weltsprache und Weltgrammatik fur die Gebildeten aller Volker der Erde” (“ Project of a world language and a world grammar for educated people of all nations of the Earth"). The author of this four-page supplement was Johann Martin Schleyer (1831-1912), parish priest, writer, philologist, polyglot. Some of his biographers claimed that he knew 40 languages, others - 50, and still others - 70. A year later, in Konstanz (Bavaria), Schleyer published a textbook entitled “Volapuk, die Weltsprache” (“Volapuk, the world language”). The name of the language is formed by combining two English deformed words: world world and speak speak.
The Volapuk vocabulary is based on the vocabulary of Western European languages and Latin, but most of the words have been changed beyond recognition and seem to be the invention of the author. Therefore, Volapyuk is classified as a planned language of a mixed type - a posteriori-a priori. There are many different forms in grammar. Nouns are declined according to four cases and numbers. Verbs are conjugated according to tenses, persons, numbers, moods and voices.
Schleyer’s work was the first MN project in the history of mankind, which grew into a “living” tool for communication between multilingual people, became widely known and spread in many countries of the world. The appearance of Volapyuk opened a new era in the history of nuclear power plant design. Volapukist societies emerge in Europe, Asia, and Australia. The language is taught by experienced teachers in higher educational institutions in Austria, technical schools in Italy, Russia, China, and Japan. Detailed dictionaries are published. In large commercial offices in Europe, business is conducted in this language.
Since 1881, the bilingual newspaper “Weltspracheblatt - Volapukabled” (Volapukabled) has been regularly published - the central organ of the Volapuk movement. Since 1889, the newspaper has been published in only one language - Volapuk (existed until 1908), besides it there are 13 more newspapers in this language. 400 books in Volapuk were published.
According to historians of interlinguistics, in the 90s of the last century there were about a million supporters of the Schleyer language in the world.
The unprecedented success of Volapuk was due to several reasons: the increased vital need for a neutral auxiliary language in connection with the ever-expanding international contacts; Schleyer's trips with reports on his language to many cities in Germany; active propaganda of Volapük outside Schleyer’s homeland in German-speaking countries and in countries where Germans lived; phonetic spelling; ease of formation of derivative forms; correct system of inflection; the ability to express subtle shades of thought.
In France, one of the most active Volapukists was Augustus Kerkhofs (1835-1905), a Dutchman by birth, professor of German at the Paris Higher Commercial School. In 1885, he published the “Complete Course of Volapük” in French, and then the “Abbreviated Grammar of Volapük”. These tutorials have been translated into several other languages, including Russian. At the II World Congress of Volapükists, which took place in 1887 in Munich, the highest linguistic authority “Kadem Bevunetik Volapuka” (“International Volapük Academy”) was established. Schleyer was elected president of the Academy, and Kerkhofs was elected director.
The richness of Volapuk grammatical forms turned out to be unnecessary in practice and made learning the language difficult. For example, from the verb lofon “to love” the derivative forms alpilofonal were formed - “to be someone who was once loved”, peilofobla - “I would like to be someone who was loved for a long time.” Kerkhoffs insisted on simplifying the grammar. He was a supporter of Volapük reforms towards bringing the language closer to commutative functions, but Schleyer, considering himself the sole owner of his project, was categorically against any changes. In the process of using the language, other shortcomings also emerged. Although the Volapuk vocabulary was based on the vocabulary of existing languages - English, German, French, Latin, etc., Schleyer, trying to ensure that all root words were monosyllabic, began and ended with consonants, shortened the borrowed words as much as possible, often beyond recognition. For example, such well-known internationalisms as compliment, diploma, republic, problem, Schleyer transformed into unrecognizable doublets plim, plom, blik, blem. Having excluded the letter g from the alphabet, Schleyer even remade his own names in his own way. He has Russia - Lusan, Portugal - Bodugan, America - Melop, Africa - Filop. The author himself did not remember all the altered words; in a conversation in Volapuk he could not do without a dictionary and willingly switched to his native German language.
The spread of Volapük reached its culmination in 1889. Then the Third World Congress of Volapükists was held in Paris, convened on the initiative of the Academy, the actual leader of which was Kerkhofs. Schleyer boycotted the congress.
At this international forum of Volapükists, which was attended by 200 delegates from 13 countries in Europe and Asia, the working language was Volapük. The Congress proved the possibility of using a planned language as a means of communication between multilingual people. At the same time, the shortcomings of the language were clearly revealed. Congress instructed the Academy to compile a simple Volapuk grammar, eliminating from Schleyer's project all unnecessary forms not found in the main European languages, and to expand and improve the dictionary. This decision was a triumph for the delegates, led by Kerkhoffs. But Schleyer also had supporters and opponents of language reforms. The Academy made a number of decisions to simplify grammar, but Schleyer did not recognize them and broke with the Academy.
After the congress, discord began, new projects for a reformed Volapuk appeared. Conflicts arose between members of the Academy, and Kerkhoffs resigned as director. For some time, the activities of the Academy were led by the Temporary Committee. He published the “Normal Grammar” of Volapük, taking into account the simplifications recommended by the Academy.
In 1890, the Volapyuk Academy moved to Moscow. Its second director was V.K. Rosenberger, an engineer and interlinguist. For several years he published the Academy's bulletin, and then, disillusioned with Volapuk, he created his own language project, which he called idiom-neutral. The vocabulary of neutral idioms is based on the vocabulary of Latin and the modern national languages of the Indo-European family (English, Spanish, Italian, German, Russian and French). These same languages served as the material on which simple grammar was built.
The Volapyuk Academy turns into the highest linguistic authority of neutral idioms and changes its name. From 1898 to 1908 it was called "Akademi Internasional de Lingu Universal" ("International Academy of Universal Language").
Just like in Russia, the Volapyuk movement around the world is gradually dying out: circles cease their activities, Volapyuk newspapers appear less and less. The main reasons for the death of the Volapuk are the lack of a solid social foundation, the isolation of vocabulary from the vocabulary of modern world languages, and complex grammar.
Volapyuk, despite its shortcomings, brought undoubted benefits to solving the problem of creating a planned neutral MN and its widespread use in public practice. The world has become convinced that a language created by one person can serve as a tool quite suitable for communication between people of different languages. It also became clear that, having created a draft language, establishing unshakable, scientifically based rules for it, it should be given freedom for further development, enrichment, and constant updating.
1 Thessaloniki - Slavic name of the city of Thessalonica, in which Cyril and Methodius were born.
2 Term “Pasigraphy” to denote international semantic writing was introduced by J. de Memier in 1797 in one of his works devoted to this issue,
Myths of antiquity - Middle East Nemirovsky Alexander Iosifovich
Babel
Babel
At that time, the whole earth had one mouth and one dialect. When the people moved to the East, they found a valley in the land of Shinar and settled there. And they decided: “Let’s make bricks and burn them with fire.” And they began to use bricks instead of stones, and earthen resin replaced lime. And they said to each other: “Let us build a city and a tower with its head reaching to heaven. By this we will create a name for ourselves and will not be scattered across the surface of the earth.”
Yahweh looked at the city and the tower that the sons of men were building and said:
That's how! They are one people, and they all speak the same language. If they begin to do something or conceive something, there will be no obstacles for them in any way. Let us go down and confuse their language there, so that one does not understand the speech of the other.
And Yahweh scattered them from there throughout the whole earth, and they stopped building the city. That is why the name Babylon (Babel) was given to it, for God confused (Heb. “balal”) there the language of the whole earth.
1. A brief story about how people together built a city and a tower going into the sky and what resulted from this may seem like a foreign body in the unfolding narrative of the book of Genesis, especially since it follows from the previous chapter that the children of men have already settled across the face of the earth, separated not so much by deserts and seas, but by the misdeed of one of the brothers, who stained himself and his descendants with the name “Ham.”
The construction of the Tower of Babel can be seen as humanity's first collective disobedience to God, continuing individual disobedience (Adam and Eve). The reason for the rebellion is the same as in the Greek myths, conceit. “Dust of the Earth” planned to perpetuate his name - he wanted to rise with his hand-made creation to the very heavens. The crime is punishable by a relatively mild punishment, since it has already been promised that people will no longer be exterminated. Humanity, once united because it has a common ancestry, is divided into languages and scattered across the earth. This also prevents the possibility of a new joint encroachment on the celestial sphere.
The origin of this plot was once associated with the impression that Babylon made on the Jews who were captured. But against the 6th century. BC e. The timing of the inclusion of the story of the pandemonium in the Pentateuch is indicated not only by the history of the formation of its text, but also by the information reported in the book of Genesis that Babylon laid claim to dominance in the country of Canaan already at the time when Abraham was wandering in the steppes near the not yet destroyed Sodom and Gomorrahs. Therefore, one can think that long before the captive population of Jerusalem was used for construction work, the inhabitants of Canaan must have been impressed by the sky-reaching bulk of the Tower of Babel and other temple towers-ziggurats that towered over the cities of Mesopotamia. To date, no less than 33 of these sacred towers have been identified in 27 different cities (Galbiati and Piazza 1992, 180). One might think that functionally they played the same role of facilitating contacts with the upper world as the holes in the roofs of Etruscan and Italic atriums (Nemirovsky, 1983, 175).
From the book Reconstruction of True History author12. Babylonian Captivity “Babylonian Captivity” is the name given to several events in the Bible. The first is the Babylonian captivity of the 14th century, the era of the “Mongol” conquest. It is reflected in the history of the Catholic Church as the Avignon captivity of the popes. Its details are practically
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From the book Reconstruction of True History author Nosovsky Gleb Vladimirovich12. Babylonian Captivity “Babylonian Captivity” is the name given to several events in the Bible. The first is the Babylonian captivity of the 14th century, the era of the “Mongol” conquest. It is reflected in the history of the Catholic Church as the Avignon captivity of the popes. Its details are practically
From the book Rus' and Rome. Revolt of the Reformation. Moscow is the Old Testament Jerusalem. Who is King Solomon? author Nosovsky Gleb Vladimirovich5. Confusion of languages and the Babylonian Pandemonium The split of the Great Empire in the 16th–17th centuries led to the formation of independent states on its territory, headed by either former imperial governors or leaders of local political movements. Many of them
From the book The Richest People of the Ancient World author Levitsky Gennady MikhailovichPandemonium of Babel Man has long wanted to be closer to God. At first, people chose the simplest way for this: they climbed high into the mountains, the peaks of which seemed to touch the heavens, and there they asked for blessings. The Babylonians, who had no mountains nearby
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From the book World History. Volume 2. Bronze Age author Badak Alexander NikolaevichBabylonian legislation The laws of King Hammurabi are one of the most remarkable monuments of legal thought of the Ancient East, testifying to a truly high level of legal thought. This is the first such detailed collection of laws of a slave society,
From the book History of the Ancient World author Gladilin (Svetlayar) EvgeniyBabylonian captivity Many works are devoted to this period in the history of the Jews and Israelites. The main source of information is the Bible, but it lacks details and reasons for the so-called captivity. It contains another instance of slavery in Egypt, when
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Tower of Babel - a challenge to the Gods.
In the previous article we examined the possible historical foundations of the myth about. I thought, but there are many such biblical stories. One of them is the story of the Babylonian pandemonium. This myth is usually presented as a cautionary tale of what human pride has led to. People set out to reach God by building a high tower, and for this they were punished. What is most interesting, based on the stories of the Old Testament, is not the first time that God (Gods) punish people for their desire for knowledge.
And so, let's first give the text of this myth itself:
The whole earth had one language and one dialect. Moving from the East, they found a valley in the land of Shinar and settled there. And they said to each other: Let us make bricks and burn them with fire. And they used bricks instead of stones, and earthen resin instead of lime. And they said: Let us build ourselves a city and a tower whose height reaches to heaven; and let us make a name for ourselves, before we are scattered over the face of all the earth. And the Lord came down to see the city and the tower which the sons of men were building. And the Lord said: Behold, there is one people, and they all have one language; and this is what they began to do, and they will not deviate from what they planned to do. Let us go down and confuse their language there, so that one does not understand the speech of the other. And the Lord scattered them from there over all the earth; and they stopped building the city. Therefore the name was given to it: Babylon, for there the Lord confused the languages of all the earth, and from there the Lord scattered them throughout all the earth... (Genesis 11:1-9)
In one of the articles, authored by LAI (Laboratory of Alternative History), I came across a rather interesting discussion about how “a single language could be mixed and scattered throughout the entire earth.” I’ll give a few short excerpts from it to make it clear what we’re talking about (full text of the article redov.ru/kulturologija/obitaemyi_ostrov_zemlja/p10.php)
Briefly, the reasoning in the article boils down to the following statements: The texts of the Bible have been studied in great detail and they contain a contradiction: “...even before the story of the Babylonian pandemonium, the Bible mentions the existence of not one, but many languages, and speaks of this as something self-evidently: “This is the genealogy of the sons of Noah: Shem, Ham and Japheth. After the flood, their children were born […]. From these the islands of nations were inhabited in their lands, each according to his own language, according to his tribes, among his nations" (Genesis: 10,1,5)" (P. Ricoeur, "Translation Paradigm"). How can this be?.. Either “one language, one dialect”, then “each according to his own language”... This is no longer just “inconsistency”. It turns out to be an inconsistency. But researchers find a way out, arguing that there could be a great variety of dialects and adverbs, but writing was uniform, and it was the basis for people’s understanding of each other. A significant part of the conclusions of historians and linguists about the similarity of ancient “languages” is based on the facts of the similarity of the written languages of cultures.
There is another important detail in one of the studies of the texts of the Old Testament: “The beginning of the story about the Tower of Babel in the Russian translation is as follows: “On the whole earth there was one language and one dialect.” This translation is incorrect. The original Hebrew says: “And the whole earth had one language with few words” [Gen. 11:1]” (E. Mendelevich, “Traditions and Myths of the Old Testament”) An interesting phrase - “one language with few words” - isn’t it?.. The 10th millennium BC turns out to be an important moment in the history of mankind.
At this time, something like a “revolution under external influence” is happening - the Gods are passing on to people a single “gentleman’s set of civilization” with a single written language, which, as a “side effect,” determines, in addition to the similarity of the main processes occurring and the similarity of elements of cultures in different regions, also providing people (different nations speaking different languages!) opportunities to communicate with each other and understand (!) each other. A period is coming, which is often called the “Golden Age” in ancient legends and traditions - people live next to the civilizing gods, calmly work for them and use the knowledge given to these gods...” The author of the article cites parallels in archaeological and linguistic research, where indicates the similarity in the semantic pictographic writing of different, distant peoples of antiquity. That is, it is indicated that during the period equated to the history of the Babylonian pandemonium, there was a change in writing from pictographic (semantic) to phonetic, a transition to a more variant letter. Gradually, more variability appears in the writing of signs, thus the people who use them to write texts become increasingly distant; after a certain time, the meaning of the transmitted text for a distant group of people is already lost.
Thus, the change in the writing system led to the separation and branching of various forms of not semantic writing, which was understandable to many, but phonetic writing, built not on an image - a pictogram, but on phonetics - sound. In the myth, people dared to challenge God(s), and this is rebellion and disobedience of slaves, if you accept the point of view that people were created by extraterrestrial intelligence to be used as labor. But if slaves rebel, they naturally suppress it.
Now I would like to move on to the other side of this story. Let's find historical parallels to the most legendary tower. (illustration - modern reconstruction of the ziggurat temple complex in Babylon)
. A similar theme is present in the legends of peoples living in different parts of the Earth. And although the legends about the Tower of Babel are not as numerous as, for example, about the Flood, there are still quite a lot of them and they are the same in meaning. Thus, the legend of the pyramid in the city of Choluy (Mexico) tells about ancient giants who decided to build a tower to heaven, but it was destroyed by celestials. The legend of the Mikirs, one of the Tibetan-Burman tribes, also tells of the giant heroes who planned to build a tower to heaven, but whose plan was stopped by the Gods.
Finally, in Babylon itself there was a myth about the “great tower”, which was “the likeness of heaven.” According to the myth, its builders were the underground gods of the Anunnaki, who erected it for the purpose of glorifying Marduk, the Babylonian deity. The construction of the Tower of Babel is described in the Koran. Interesting details are contained in the Book of Jubilees and the Talmud, according to which the unfinished tower was destroyed by a hurricane, and the part of the tower that remained after the hurricane fell into the ground as a result of an earthquake. It is significant that all attempts by the Babylonian rulers to recreate even smaller versions of the tower failed. Due to various circumstances, these buildings were destroyed.
There is another important detail in the study of the Old Testament text of the legend about the Tower of Babel. The researchers found that in the canonical text of the Bible, two legends about Ancient Babylon were combined into one story: about the construction of the city and the confusion of languages, as well as about the construction of the tower and the dispersion of people. These legends were dated to the beginning of human history - immediately after the flood. The Bible considers God's intervention to be the root cause of the linguistic and territorial disunity of people. According to the first legend, a city was built, according to the second - a tower to heaven. Both the city and the tower were thought of as the first great construction of the human race. But the city was built by sedentary peoples who spoke the same language and knew how to burn brick, and the tower was built by nomads from the East. The city was built for human habitation and for the sake of eternal glory, then the tower is like a landmark so as not to scatter. According to the authors of the biblical text, God was not pleased with the arrogant plans for large construction. He interfered in people's affairs. By his will, those who built the city ceased to understand each other, and those who erected the tower were scattered.
Thus construction was stopped. The city, which should have become a monument of eternal glory, received an inglorious name. According to scientists, in the Bible the West Semitic name of the city of Babylon - Bab El ("Gate of God") is interpreted as a play on the word of a late, East Semitic root with the meaning "to interfere." The Babylonian custom of constructing eternal monuments to oneself in the form of buildings and cities seems to the author of the biblical text to be sinful arrogance. God (Yahweh) in this myth is depicted very anthropomorphically, that is, similar in his reactions to a person: he is credited with ignorance of the thoughts and deeds of people and even fear of them. Well, it’s already absurd to attribute such human qualities to God. Therefore, the one who is mentioned in the text of the legend is not God, but perhaps, as in the case of the legend of the Flood, an extraterrestrial intelligence.
It is believed that both stories associated with Babylon arose under the impression of a huge but unfinished brick city and a tower lying in ruins. According to the German scientist G. Gunkel, the legends were inspired by historical reality. They talk about the multi-story temple of the god Marduk in Babylon. This temple was crowned with a tower. Archaeological excavations by R. Koldewey, A. Parro and others confirmed that the legend of the Tower of Babel reflected the construction of ziggurats in Babylonia, which were buildings of ritual and temple significance of gigantic proportions.
Mark Twain, who traveled around the East at the end of the 19th century, describes the ruins of the Tower of Babel as two tiers of brickwork, “dissipated in the middle by earthquakes, scorched and half melted by the lightning of an angry God.” Indeed, archaeologists have found traces of exposure to enormous temperatures inside and outside the tower. According to E. Tseren’s description, “the fire heated hundreds of bricks, melting the entire frame of the tower, which from the heat turned into a dense mass similar to molten glass.” What is this, heavenly punishment for the consciousness of man of those times, or evidence of conflicts, wars between extraterrestrial civilizations? Why not, at least studies of such material evidence based on the mythology of the ancients are being conducted by alternative historians.
I would also like to bring to your attention a video lecture on the topic “The Tower of Babel.” In it I heard a lot of sober thoughts about the peculiarities of translation from ancient languages and the change in meaning in different translations of the same text. And also many other interesting statements.
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Story from the Torah
The story of the construction of the tower and the subsequent punishment is contained in the book of Genesis (11:1-9).
According to the previous biblical account, all humanity after the flood descended from the common progenitor Noah, and the entire human race at first spoke the same language. People settled in the Shinar Valley, where they decided to build “a city and a tower high to heaven.” God was angry with people for this arrogant intention and frustrated their plans by “mixing” their language so that one did not understand the speech of the other, and scattered them throughout the entire earth.
(1) And in all the earth there was one language and few words.
(2) And it happened: moving from the east, they found a valley in the land of Shinar, and settled there.
(3) And they said to one another, “Let us make bricks and burn them with fire.” And they had bricks instead of stones, and they had mountain tar instead of clay.
(4) And they said, Let us build ourselves a city and a tower with its head reaching to heaven, and make a name for ourselves, lest we be scattered abroad over the face of all the earth.
(5) And the Lord came down to see the city and the tower which the sons of men were building.
(6) And the Lord said: Surely the people are one, and they all have one language; and they began to do this; and now will not everything that they plan to do be unattainable for them?
(7) Let us go down and confuse their language there, so that they will not understand each other’s speech.
(8) And the Lord scattered them from there throughout all the earth; and they stopped building the city.
(9) Therefore its name was called Babylon, for there the Lord confused the language of all the earth, and from there the Lord scattered them over the face of all the earth.
Historical information
According to modern scientists, the biblical tale of the Babylonian Pandemonium was inspired by the high stepped multi-tiered temple towers (ziggurats) that were erected in ancient Mesopotamia and sometimes reached very impressive sizes.
The ziggurat was always built with a core of mud brick and the outside was covered with baked brick. It did not have any internal cameras. Its base was usually square or rectangular, averaging 40 × 50 meters. Not a single ziggurat has been completely preserved. The best preserved ziggurat is from Ur.
Reconstruction of the Tower of Babel from the book Hansjörg Schmid, Der Tempelturm Etemenanki in Babylon (1995 Mainz)
Stage- 185 meters is the height of a modern 60-story skyscraper.
Apparently, the writer of section 11 of Bereishit was well acquainted with construction technology. He emphasizes the features of the Mesopotamian method: bricks and bitumen instead of the stones and clay used in Canaan.
The Babylonians believed that the ziggurat was built by the gods. Thus the statement in Genesis 11:5 "...that the sons of men have built" can be understood as a polemic against this belief. This tower, which was the object of such pride among the Babylonians, was the product of purely human activity, which could be quickly and easily destroyed in accordance with the Divine Will. Indeed, it is likely that the sight of the ruins of the ziggurat (which was destroyed in the mid-16th century BC with the destruction of Babylon by the Hittites) inspired the narrative of the Tower of Babel.
Parallels to the biblical tale in ancient Sumerian texts
Commentaries by modern religious authorities
The story of the Tower of Babel in art
The biblical story of the Tower of Babel appears repeatedly in medieval and Renaissance literature, seen as a historical incident with strong moral overtones. For example, the “Chronicon” of Isidore of Seville (c. 560-636), the “Weltchronik” of Rudolf von Ems (1200-1254), “Speculum humanae salvationis” (Mirror of Human Salvation) - a Dominican manual (c. 1324), which was often rewritten. Giovanni Boccaccio wrote on this topic in De cacibus virorum illustrum (On Extraordinary Occasions, 1355-60), and an unknown poet from. 15th century artists who used this theme were the Frenchman Jean Fouquet and the Italian Benozzo Gozzoli, who painted a fresco in Campo Santo, Pisa (later destroyed).
The tower was of considerable interest to early Flemish painters. It was customary to depict it either as a multi-story structure, decreasing in size as it grew, or, more often, as a square or round building surrounded by forests. Some artists depicted contemporary construction methods; a fine example of this is in the Book of Hours of the Duke of Bedford (Paris, p. 1423), where the construction of a tower takes place at night under the stars. In Pieter Bruegel's The Tower of Babel (1563), the building - slightly lopsided - is shown in a vast landscape near the banks of a river, with the king arriving to inspect the progress of the work.
Although the story of the Tower of Babel may be tempting for composers, confusion of languages can be expressed most effectively in music, in fact, very few works have been written on this topic. These are mostly oratorios, including Cesar Franck's The Tower of Babel (1865) and Anton Rubinstein's decidedly unsuccessful The Tower of Babel (1858, adapted into an opera in 1872). Two 20th-century works are René Barbier's The Tower of Babel (1932) and Igor Stravinsky's Babel, a cantata for narrator, male choir and orchestra (1944, published 1952).