Languages

I’ve been deeply in love with foreign languages since I was about eight years old. The more I reflect on this passion, the more I see its influence in my other pursuits. To code means to create using language subject to formal constraints, poetry does as well.

Academia

I completed my bachelor’s in historical linguistics at Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin in June 2023 with a focus on the comparative study of ancient Indo-European languages such as Sanskrit, Ancient Greek, and Gothic. Now, in pursuit of a master’s at Freie Universität Berlin, I’m enrolled in the general linguistics program. Currently writing a master’s thesis on the phonology of Greek loanwords in Coptic while attempting to juggle more languages than advisable.

At Freie Universität Berlin’s ZODIAC project, I get paid to read ancient astrological texts and harvest technical terminology from them.

Research interests

My interests include but are not limited to: computational analysis of metrical texts, phonology of ancient languages, traditions of recitation (Vedic, Greek epic, Qur’anic), premodern etymologies, constructed languages.

For these I have worked with Latin, Ancient Greek, Sanskrit, Tocharian, Lithuanian, Arabic, and Coptic material, as well as Python and Haskell for data analysis, NLP, and machine learning.

For example, I wrote software to analyse the metrical properties of Kristijonas Donelaitis’ Lithuanian epic Metai (around 1770) composed in a hybrid form of stress- and quantity-based hexameter. You can read more about my approach in the published paper (German). For my Bachelor’s thesis I explored the properties of the epic Sanskrit anuṣṭubh/śloka metre using a similar program. The analysis encompassed the 200K lines of the ‘great Indian epic’ Mahābhārata. My thesis was awarded the Humboldt prize.

In the final semester of my Bachelor’s at Humboldt-Universität, I collaborated with my institute to initiate an event that has now become a recurring highlight: The Leseabend der toten Sprachen (LetoS). LetoS offers a unique chance for language enthusiasts to chant, read and recite prayer, prose and poetry in dead languages close to their hearts. While its origins trace back to Universität Marburg, Berlin has embraced it with open arms. See my articles for more info.

This passion for bringing ancient languages to life also fuels my project Ⲙⲁⲓⲱϣ, Coptic for ‘fond of reading aloud.’ On this platform, I share readings of texts in various old languages.

Publications

You can download the full BibTeX data of the publications.

[1]
K. Meinhardt, “The return of the sower: Egyptian amulet,” Dec. 2022. Available: https://berlpap.smb.museum/die-heimkehr-des-saemanns-aegyptisches-amulett/?lang=en
[2]
C. Mooshammer et al., “Phonaesthetics of constructed languages: Results from an online rating experiment,” in Reading fictional languages, I. Noletto, J. Norledge, and P. Stockwell, Eds., Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 2023. doi: 10.1515/9781399529167-009
[3]
C. Mooshammer et al., “Does orkish sound evil? Perception of fantasy languages and their phonetic and phonological characteristics,” Language and Speech, vol. 67, 2023, doi: 10.1177/00238309231202944
[4]
K. Meinhardt, “Der Hexameter der Metai von Kristijonas Donelaitis: Chancen und Grenzen einer automatischen Untersuchung,” Baltistica, vol. 58, no. 2, pp. 225–251, 2023, doi: 10.15388/baltistica.58.2.2523

Projects and articles