As for the comment on Delphi, given that Delphi is Object Pascal, and pascal was also influenced by Modula-3, there’s no surprise there for me (also given Anders background).

I think it may be a bit of a stretch to assert that C# is a descendant of Algol. It’s easier to see Algol in the pedigree of languages such as Modula-3 and Pascal. Basic descended from Fortran, but later took on many Algol-like features.

C# (as Java), on the other hand, seems clearly to be derived from C. Garbage collection, (religious) use of interfaces, single inheritance and ‘safe code’ were all inspired by Java. Bell labs also added exception handling when defining the C++ language (a correction to the table above). Also, one could argue that templates and generics are quite similar syntactically (although quite different in execution)…and generics are new to the language in any case, so can’t be used to define direct ancestry.

When I first read the C# white papers in the late 90s C# looked very much like Java to me (even parts of the API), while adding features that I missed from C++ (such as operator overloading). I also found, as a Java developer at the time, that the move to C# was quite easy. I also believe Tom is correct that the advent of C# was born out of the Microsoft/Sun battle over J++. More info can be found in this 2001 article comparing Java to C#: http://www.extremetech.com/article2/0%2C1697%2C11777%2C00.asp.

And then there’s the name…C#…which seems to be using the syntax for a half-step in music. This communicated to me that the language promised the elegance of Java while maintaining much of the power of C++.

That being said, it’s impossible to deny the influence of Algol-based languages (as well as others such as LISP) on the continued development of the C# language. Although C# does not support multiple inheritance, it does seem to implement it (figuratively).

Of course, this is pure speculation on my part, with nothing to back it up.