Q: Kannada words in a Greek play?

[Klaus Karttunen]

Thu,  3 Apr Lars Martin Fosse wrote:  
>
>Just for the record, similar imitations of "barbaric" languages are 
>also
>found elsewhere in Greek literature. Mayrhofer in his Handbuch des
>Altpersischen quotes a sequence of words from the Acharnoi of 
>Aristophanes,
>which he analyzes as an imitation of Persian and even turns into 
>correct
>Persian. (see Mayrhofer p. 91). 
>
>Best regards,
>
>Lars Martin Fosse
>
>
Another example: In the Latin play Poenulus by Plautus there is a speech 
supposedly given in Punic. The Punic language being a development of 
Phoenician and mainly known only from short inscriptions, Semitic 
scholars have had great trouble to explain this passage, but as far as I 
know nothing convincing has been achieved.

Last sunday my family was watching at an old Finnish movie, made about 
60 years ago. In this movie there were some Russians who spoke something 
which in Finnish ears perhaps sounded like Russian, but was not.