Old-Time Linguistics

chorus:

Gimme that old-time linguistics
Gimme that old-time linguistics
Gimme that old-time linguistics
It's good enough for me.

In decoding Mycenaean,
Good ol' Ventris used his be-an.
It was Greek that he was seein',
Written in Linear B
(chorus)

Each Egyptian hieroglyphic
Makes a sound that is specific.
A Rosetta Stone's terrific,
And it's good enough for me.
(chorus)

There's a grammar of Nostratic
Lying somewhere in my attic
There's a theory that's not static!^*
And it's good enough for me.
(chorus)
^*Substitute "that's been" for "that's not," depending on your stand on the controversy.

Oh, the speakers in Euskadi
Might seem a trifle dotty.
Still, ergativity's not shoddy:
It's good enough for me.
(chorus)

By me, 1998 and 2000. More verses if/when I think of them, much to your chagrin.

Way back when they read cuneiform
But now that script's against the norm.
If you ask me they lacked all gorm,
But it's good enough for me.

When they had to learn Akkadian
The scribes all worked circadian.
I just went out and spayed Ian.
And that's good enough for me.

I heard a class that learned Latin,
So I dropped by and I sat in.
No dogs out, but they let the cat in.
And it's good enough for me.

Moses read and wrote his Hebrew,
And taught it to his son as he grew.
It looked just like the crayon pictures he drew,
But it's good enough for me.

Cicero said he loved his Greek.
At muscly slaves he always took a peek.
Cicy's bedsprings always creak,
And it's good enough for me!

Now we know what linguists do on rainy Sundays. Kudos to Segram.