Talk:Indo-European languages/Archive 5

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Holm and Kortlandt

Holm's hypothesis is held by no one but himself, and hasn't even been published yet. Its inclusion here is massive UNDUE weight on a single viewpoint that is not widely held. Kortlandt's paper is a red herring, as Kortlandt (like very many Indo-Europeanists) believes in the Indo-Hittite hypothesis. I didn't mind you removing the info about Indo-Hittite, Rokus01, because it was, as you pointed out, unsourced, but replacing it with the unpublished, untested, and unreviewed "Separation Level Recovery method" is preposterous. —Angr ^{If you've written a quality article...} 17:05, 2 February 2008 (UTC)

Please allow me a short answer: The above attacks reveal the absolute unability of this anonymous writer for any scholarly enquiry. At least my homepage would help. Thank you.HJJHolm (talk) 07:39, 15 March 2008 (UTC)

Let's analyse your stance.

The idea of the Anatolian languages, and all Indo European languages in general for that sake, being part of a (thus fairly recent) Bronze Age phenomenon is not new at all. Mallory hinted at it (to him essentially Bronze Age features were a mystery still to be solved) and Robert Drews is another respected name that published on the subject, even suggesting a Bronze Age arrival of Anatolian languages. Note, a Bronze Age spread is not the same as the formative stage, that might go back a lot further including pre-existing language splits already on the homeland spot. So far, nothing new or "fringy".

The other results of the SLRD method are not surprising, maybe except for the Balto-Slavic position on the geneological tree. This has been anticipated by the work of Kortlandt that already recognized satemization to be inducted on a pre-satem linguisitic substratum in the Balitcs. The linguistic affiliation of Tocharian with Greek has equally been proposed independently as well as earlier. Thus, all of these results are supported by linguistic evidence from different sources and are nothing new or "fringy" either.

I don't agree with your opinion on Holm. His contribution to alpha-informatica exceeds this investigation and is recognized on an international level. He cooperated in similar dialectometric research of other universities. Many accept this/his methodology, and hence would accept the results as reliable. Even though it is very common that different disciplines don't agree with the results of one or the other, still this does not invalidate the scientific level or methodology. In other words, the existence of this discipline is something that can't be denied, Holm is an established name in this discipline and the results of this kind of methodology can't be ignored. This publication has already been approved by the board: the scientific methodology and accuracy of the investigation is beyond any doubt.

I don't think it is POV to put more weight to the most recent research, though I agree with you that older, more "intuitive" subgroupings that are less scientifically quantified and based on overall linguistic features should have a place, especially (or only?) where these investigations significantly diverge from the SLRD results. Here, of course (see above), we talk basically of the Anatolian languages. I won't go as far as to support Holm's claims of having refuted the Indo-Hittite hypothesis already. My wording was: it contradicts earlier research.

Indeed, only time will tell if other disciplines will heed this evidence within their own research. I recognize precaution against representing only one point of view, still POV was not my intention in moving some linguistic desciptions to somewhere else. I am sure we could come up with some sourced arguments in favor of an early split of Anatolian languages, in a way that I reckon would be a lot more to the point. If this is what you require with your POV alert, I completely agree and I'll promise you to come back later with relevant details on earlier Anatonian geneologic research. Rokus01 (talk) 21:14, 2 February 2008 (UTC)

You did add the word "refute" in parentheses, though, leading the reader to draw that conclusion. And it is non-NPOV to put more weight on the most recent research, because the most recent research is the least likely to be what is the established and widely held view. As for Holm, I don't doubt he's the leading name in SLRD, since he's the only person who's ever written about it. And although the paper has been accepted for publication, it is significant that the volume where it is to be published is not a volume on Indo-European linguistics, so the peer reviewers were almost certainly not Indo-Europeanists. I don't even know what "alpha-informatics" is (presuming your "alpha-informatica" is a typo for that), but it's so unknown as a discipline that Wikipedia's article on it got deleted for being a neologism. Basically neither of these approaches has any weight of scholarly consensus behind it, at least not in regard to Indo-European linguistics, which is all that matters on this page. The only two hypotheses on the position of Anatolian that do have weighty scholarly opinion behind them are (1) the traditional view that Anatolian broke off either at the same time as the other branches, or at least only a century or two before them, so that the non-Anatolian branches did not have time to evolve together before splitting up, and (2) the Indo-Hittite view that Anatolian broke off many centuries or even a millennium or so before the non-Anatolian branches broke up, so that non-Anatolian did have time to evolve independently of Anatolian. Those are really the only two views widely held enough to be worth mentioning on a page as general in its scope as this one. —Angr ^{If you've written a quality article...} 23:51, 2 February 2008 (UTC)

Try "Alfa Informatica" or "Alpha-Informatica". This is a faculty in at least the universities of Amsterdam, Groningen and Freiburg. Indeed, the study is not confined to Indo European studies (I found a general description in German: [1]), though the methods are scientific and verifiable. We can have a discussion on this topic if you want, though I figure beforehand that Alfa Informatica don't compare with what I would consider fringe. To me such a denomination has too many connotations with the Velikovsky and Daniker kind, and can not and should not be applied to cutting edge university research.

Concerning your other comment, indeed the Anatolian results are the only clear deviation from sure and confirmed knowledge. However, in Britannica we can read there are THREE opinions on the Anatolian question, not two (the third one holding anatolina to be an even more recent split than Greek or Armenian). It says the Indo-Hittite hypothesis is neither definitely proved nor disproved (22:582). Actually, the encyclopedia makes a case against the hypothesis at page 494 and attibute a split of the same order as Celtic or Italic corresponding to your second view (like the SLRD results).

I will propose another edit. Rokus01 (talk) 16:57, 4 February 2008 (UTC)

I fully agree with Angr. Holm's hypothesis has no place in the main Indo-European languages article. A clear case of WP:UNDUE recentism if ever there was one. Try to be reasonable. dab (𒁳) 18:01, 4 February 2008 (UTC)

There is no such thing as "Holm's hypothesis". The only thing he does is to take a digital version of the most modern and acknowledged Indo-European dictionary, the "Lexikon der indogermanischen Verben" (Rix et al. 2002, second edition) that he calls "LIV-2" and to make his calculations, that are verifiable and repeatable. He does this on a fully scientifically endorsed level. The resulting picture mainly confirms generally accepted hypotheses on groupings, except for the case of the Anatolian group for the one and simple reason that here no generally accepted hypotheses exist to start with. His calculations give a clear picture of the impact of current knowledge on reconstructed verbs. If this would be undue "unacceptable recentism" you'd better turn off your computer right now. Rokus01 (talk) 23:27, 4 February 2008 (UTC)

you obviously do not want to listen. Holm's calculations are intersting and quotable, but their significance is nowhere even near what would warrant their mention in this article. I don't see why I should "turn off my computer" because you obviously have no grasp of the matters you are dabbling in. I have done similar calculations for fun, and they were laughed out of court by one of the authors of LIV. That's what this is: fun with dictionaries. Interesting if you are into these things, but of no consequence whatsoever to the question of Indo-European prehistory: you basically end up recovering the assumptions that went into the writing of the dictionary. The calculation is fair because it generally replicates communis opinio, not the other way round. Even if you decide you want to take this at face value, if you think the outcome for Anatolian or Tocharian has any significance, you clearly have no understanding of the underlying mathematics. dab (𒁳) 09:30, 5 February 2008 (UTC)

Obviously I didn't mean to interrupt your funplay by switching off your computer so rudely, don't worry. You have to recognize though, computers are acceptable recentisms, and so is the technology to make computers work and yield results - especially when the input is right. Indeed, there must be some circular reasoning behind using certified input in relation to retrieving "acceptable" output. More important, however, is a scientific repeatable and verifiable method that yields coherent output related to the input. No thanks, I am not going into mathematics, I'll do with a basic acquaintance with the necessary assumptions and rely on the alpha-informatica specialists. I bet the Indo-European linguists will do the same. Rokus01 (talk) 15:13, 5 February 2008 (UTC)

Britannica

I have access to the online Britannica, and there is no article entitled "Indo-Hittite hypothesis". There is a very brief article on "Indo-Hittite languages", restricting itself to the bare definition of the term and saying there is no consensus, without any of the details we attribute to Britannica.[2] It would be useful to cite the lemma in Britannica, and the lemma's authors, not just page numbers. Britannica has a good "Anatolian languages" article, signed by Philo H.J. Houwink ten Cate, H. Craig Melchert and Theo P.J. van den Hout, but I fail to find anything about "very Indo-European agricultural terminology" in Anatolian, as our article references to Britannica. dab (𒁳) 09:59, 5 February 2008 (UTC)

Indeed we are talking about the same lemma: "Anatolian languages", signed Ph.H.J.H.t.C. in the paper version (according to my knowledge paper and online versions of the 15th edition are virtually the same, except for some very necessary corrections and some extra secondary information, like full author names?). The last subsection has the "Indo-Hittite hypothesis" subheader written at the left side margin (maybe the same as your link, though I discover more details than you made out of it). However, your query refers to the first section "Historical background of Ancient Anatolia". My version reads: On the basis of the agricultural terminology used in Hittite, it has been suggested that the entry into Anatolia was not a warlike invasion of predominantly male groups. If such would be the case, the influence of substratum languages would have been likely, but, on the contrary, the word stems used are definitely Indo-European. In other words, Indo-European was used or preserved for words related to agriculture, even though (or because?) they roamed lands that were agricultural by tradition. The words are IE, even though not universal IE. Rokus01 (talk) 14:43, 5 February 2008 (UTC)

Ok, in the online version, the final section is entitled "Relationship with the other subgroups"

There have been two major responses to this dilemma. One approach has sought to show that Anatolian inherited but lost all the categories named above (perhaps preserving a few crucial remnants). A radically opposing viewpoint, widely known as the “Indo-Hittite” hypothesis, holds that Anatolian and Proto-Indo-European, the reconstructed source of all other Indo-European languages, are collateral (same-generation) descendants of a still earlier linguistic stage, Indo-Hittite, that lacked these characteristics. ... This issue is far from settled, but it is unlikely that either of the models just described is valid in their extreme form. ... no single viewpoint can be said to represent a consensus of scholars in the field.

The "Historical background of Ancient Anatolia" does mention agricultural terminology, but rather to the opposite effect of what you quote:

Although the Hattian and Hurrian peoples did influence Hittite culture, their contributions to the Hittite language were mostly limited to terms for local flora, fauna, and a few other categories. Comparisons of Hittite agricultural terms and those of other Indo-European subgroups indicate that the “Anatolians” seceded from the parent group before the creation of a common agricultural nomenclature

Interestingly, the text you quote is dumped verbatim on a giant page here. The bit on "definitely Indo-European word-stems" was apparently edited out. If it's in the 15th edition, we can still refer to it of course, but seeing that the authors "retracted" the claim, it would be worthwhile to cite some actual scholarly literature on this. But this goes too deep for the "Indo-European languages" and should be moved to Anatolian languages. dab (𒁳) 15:41, 11 February 2008 (UTC)

The "dumped verbatim" still mentions the "definitely Indo-European word stems", so I guess your online version doesn't. I can't confirm this would be due to summarizing or that it would have been actively retracted or refuted in any other way. All I can say, though, is my edit does not oppose your second quote at all. My quote: Points proffered in favour of the Indo-Hittite hypothesis are the (non-universal) Indo-European agricultural terminology in Anatolia and the preservation of laryngeals. Or did you wrongfully anticipate on any personal interpretation that would have something to do with migrations of Dutch Beakers? :) Even though the Britannica mention 2000 BC, I conform to the lack of explicit support to such a connection. Implicit support I could find in publications of Heyd, though this would be SYNC. Please remember I am a conscientious editor, this would be the wrong diff for making your point. Rokus01 (talk) 17:50, 11 February 2008 (UTC)

look, the agricultural thing does not support the Indo-Hittite hypothesis either way. The "old" Britannica quote brings it up in the context of the question of Anatolian "invasion" vs. "peaceful migration". This is very very weak in any case and has no place here. If someone has indeed "proffered" this agricultural terminology argument in favour of Indo-Hittite, you will need to state who that was. And you'll need to state it over at Indo-Hittite, not here. It is more than sufficient for the purpose of this article here to quote the Britannica to the effect that there is no consensus either way, and that neither "extreme" take on Indo-Hittite is likely to be correct. dab (𒁳) 18:03, 11 February 2008 (UTC)

You really lost me here. My paper version concludes: The differences in the terminology used in other Indo-European subgroups indicate that the "Anatolians" seceded from the parent group at an early date, before the common agricultural nomenclature came into being. Your online version produces: Comparisons of Hittite agricultural terms and those of other Indo-European subgroups indicate that the “Anatolians” seceded from the parent group before the creation of a common agricultural nomenclature. Knowing that parent group refers to the PIE branch yielding all other IE languages according to the Indo-Hittite hypothesis: then, what make you think this agriculture terminology argument is not presented here in favour of the Indo-Hittite hypothesis? By the way, proffered was a relict of your rephrasing. And though I don't know exactly what person or persons would or could or should have proffered such a thing (The ones that proffered the hypothesis? Or maybe this Indo-Hittite hypothesis was proffered in favour of Renfrew's Anatolian hypothesis and then proffered vice versa?), I proffer (basing myself on NPOV policy) the entry in Britannica would prove the argument is serious enough to mention. Rokus01 (talk) 19:42, 11 February 2008 (UTC)

Rokus, the statement that the agricultural terminology in Hittite is *not* related to that in other IE languages is hardly equivalent to the statement that the agricultural terminology in Anatolian is "very Indo-European". Can we please have this discussion at Talk:Anatolian languages, and restrict ourselves to merely reporting what the authors are saying without jumping to conclusions? dab (𒁳) 23:03, 11 February 2008 (UTC)

Okay, the problem might be in some anachronism introduced by quoting Britannica, that was published before Renfrew revived the Indo-Hittite hypothesis within the context of agriculture. Compare Robinson, The Search for the Hittites (2006):

:In a recent presentation, Charles Burney (2003) discussed how this hypothesis, first proposed in just a sketchy outline by Emil Forrer in 1921 and later expanded by Sturtevant in 1938 (see E. H. Sturtevant 1962, a posthumous publication of Sturtevant’s 1938 lecture on the Indo-Hittite hypothesis at the Linguistic Institute at Ann Arbor, Michigan), was largely dismissed until resurrected in the late 1980s in a number of publications espousing theories of Indo-European origin (most notably Renfrew 1987), and, gaining steady support, became the subject of a colloquium at the University of Richmond, Virginia in March of 2000. Burney states that the unavoidable conclusion of the hypothesis, strongly promoted by Colin Renfrew, is that some speakers of Proto-Indo-European migrated out of Anatolia, where speakers of Proto-Anatolian remained and began to diverge and form the Nesite, Luwian, and Palaic languages. Such a scenario has been reasoned to imply that the earliest Proto-Indo-European nucleus, evolving from Proto-Indo-Hittite, developed in the Konya Plain around 7000 BC.

The supposed autochthony of Hittites, the Indo-Hittite hypothesis and migration of agricultural "Indo-European" societies were intrinsically linked together to a separate version of the Indo-Hittite hypothesis, at least explicitly, by Renfrew. (Renfrew, C 2001a The Anatolian origins of Proto-Indo-European and the autochthony of the Hittites. In R. Drews ed., Greater Anatolia and the Indo-Hittite language. family: 36-63. Washington, DC: Institute for the Study of Man).

Though you have a point in the sourcing, this could be improved, I can't see any problem with the veracity of my edit.Rokus01 (talk) 08:40, 12 February 2008 (UTC)

I'll say again that discussion of the Indo-Hittite question belongs on the Indo-Hittite article. Burney may think it is "unavoidable" that Indo-Hittie implies an Anatolian homeland, but that's nonsense. I'll happily embrace moderate scenarios of IH, but I am very far indeed from concluding the IH homeland (let alone the IE homeland). Say you conclude PIH dates to 6000 BC and "PIE proper" to 4000 BC. It is still anyone's guess whether the Proto-Anatolians moved from the steppe to Anatolia, or whether the pre-PIEans moved from Anatolia to the steppe, and the PIE homeland will still be in the steppe no matter where you put the PIH one. That's really just a big non sequitur that doesn't even belong on this article. dab (𒁳) 12:49, 20 February 2008 (UTC)

Why you are so eager on imposing your single point of view by cutting out all references to other points of view? All this article should pretend to do is to inform the reader of multiple points of view. Even then, this article does not favour the Indo-Hittite hypothesis at all - if this is what you're afraid of. Rokus01 (talk) 01:42, 21 February 2008 (UTC)

my personal point of view has nothing to do with it. My personal point of view, if you'd like to know, is rather sympathetic towards moderate Indo-Hittite scenarios. There is nothing wrong with the IH hypothesis. It has its own article. All I am doing is preventing you from touting your thinly veiled ideological fringe theories. Really, there is no need to rehash the discussion, I think all has been said. dab (𒁳) 09:30, 21 February 2008 (UTC)

No more reference to mainstream please

Even though utterly undue to this linguistic article, actually I have something to add to my efforts to stop continuous Kurgan POV pushing and the erroneous representation of the Kurgan theory as "mainstream". In the Oxford Companion to Archeology, Mallory (p.348) names three main homeland hypotheses.

• the "broad homeland" hypothesis he categorizes as "one widely accepted theory"
• the different Anatolian variations (grouped together) are mentioned without reference to popularity
• the Kurgan theory is referred to as a theory that "enjoys widespread support".

I am very curious in knowing how a good faith editor would be able to interpret one theory (out of three) that happen to enjoy "widespread support" as "mainstream" above another "widely accepted theory". This book is from 1996, and ever since the Kurgan theory has not been further evidenced in any new research I know of and actually there is a tendency among archeologists to move away from this theory towards the broader concept (my observation). This discussion will lead to nowhere and for the sake or OR we can't allow to push views on our own terms, not at any place. Within this context, we'd better adhere to Mallories concept that the homeland issue remains "one of the most contested issues in prehistoric research" and avoid the hairraising use of "mainstream" altogether. Thanks. Rokus01 (talk) 10:44, 24 February 2008 (UTC)

"broad homeland" as "Kurgan plus": the steppe plus Northeastern Europe. In the Kurgan hypothesis proper corresponding to the early "Kurganized" cultures of the Corded Ware horizon, 3000 BC. (Yes! the Netherlands appear in orange - rejoice!)

lol, Mallory is one major Kurgan proponent. He is just being polite. I am happy with mentioning the three approaches you mention as those that enjoy notable support. Just as long as you don't attempt your WP:SYN stunts. The "broad homeland" theory is "widely accepted" because it is all-inclusive. It isn't necessarily in contradiction to the Kurgan one, it's just a more agnostic variant of the general Kurgan scenario. dab (𒁳) 20:01, 24 February 2008 (UTC)

I think you are exaggerating the support of Mallory, since he is honest enough to address its weaknesses and that apart from southeastern Europe, it "cannot demonstrate archeologically the progressive movement of Indo-Europeans into the rest of Europe". And besides, what would "support" need more than some crazed hooligans, or wouldn't it be better to let the issue to the acceptance of specialists on the subject? Rokus01 (talk) 19:28, 7 May 2008 (UTC)

by "support", I obviously mean "acceptance by specialists on the subject". dab (𒁳) 07:37, 13 May 2008 (UTC)

Change on World Map

Shouldn't China be coloured in light green as Portuguese and English are co-official languages in Macau and Hong Kong? —Preceding unsigned comment added by Afigueiro (talk • contribs) 23:51, 28 February 2008 (UTC)

I think it would confuse people if all of China were colored light green for that reason. It would definitely confuse me. Maybe someone could add light green dots over Macau and Hong Kong. —Angr ^{If you've written a quality article...} 05:19, 29 February 2008 (UTC)

Split to new page Language Families

I would be in favor of creating a new page, Language Families, as suggested in the dispute tag. The current Grouping subheading is not specifically a question of the Indo-European family, but of diachronics/typology more generally. Similar controversies over areal features, for example, exist among scholars specializing in other families (e.g. Austronesian).Cnilep (talk) 19:29, 3 May 2008 (UTC)

I agree some general explanations would be better off in the (already existing) Language families article. Rokus01 (talk) 08:00, 4 July 2008 (UTC)

Indo-European languages a theory

Just in case the reader may be confused, the hypothesis of the linking between Indian and European languages is still theoretic so far as I understand, and will always remain so given there are no living speakers of the "proto" languages. If it is not hypothetical, it would be nice to have the section with fully referenced (including citations) proof that the connection indeed exists--mrg3105 (comms) ♠♥♦♣ 00:11, 4 July 2008 (UTC)

I agree that much in any linguistic proto-construction is theoretical, but let's not go too far by inserting the words "theoretical" and "hypothetical" everywhere in the article. I've noticed you've already inserted it in quite a few places, but I think a brief explanation at the beginning of the article suffices. In places, it was already clear to me when it used the word "constructed". Kman543210 (talk) 00:33, 4 July 2008 (UTC)

The terms theoretical and hypothetical are well accepted in academic disciplines. Something constructed is far more ambiguous, and more akin with synthesis then hypothesis, wouldn't you agree? I only inserted the terms where they are qualified by the context, and supported by commonly accepted understanding within the discipline of Linguistics, so nothing controversial here, though largely lacking in citations. I also note that the article on Theoretical linguistics fails to mention that it is largely derived from the attempt to substantiate the 19th century hypothesis of IET.--mrg3105 (comms) ♠♥♦♣ 02:24, 4 July 2008 (UTC)

Your addition of the words "hypothetical" and "theoretical" was never exactly wrong, but it's starting to look like overkill - like we can't say anything about IE without reminding the reader "it's just a theory" over and over and over again. Evolution is "just a theory" too, but going there and adding the words "hypothetical" and "theoretical" all over the place will certainly be construed as contentious editing. —Angr 05:22, 4 July 2008 (UTC)

Well, is it a theory based on hypothesis, or isn't it? It shoudl say so in the introduction at least, and I have not said it "over and over and over again", but in three places in the overview although as with any theory, it should say so in the introduction, right? The article didn't say anywhere that Indo-European languages is a theory before I added it, so the "over and over" claim is overdone--mrg3105 (comms) ♠♥♦♣ 07:03, 4 July 2008 (UTC)

Well, don't forget this article is not about the proto-language, this article is about the family of languages. While it is true that, strictly speaking, the familial relationship among the languages "a theory based on a hypothesis", the same is true, for example, for the family of albatrosses – and that article (which is an FA) says in its introduction "Albatrosses, of the biological family Diomedeidae, are large seabirds allied to the procellariids, storm-petrels and diving-petrels in the order Procellariiformes (the tubenoses)", not "Albatrosses, of the hypothetical biological family Diomedeidae, are large seabirds theorized to be allied to the procellariids, storm-petrels and diving-petrels in the hypothetical order Procellariiformes (the tubenoses)." There comes a point in scientific discussions where a theory has gained such wide acceptance that it can be considered to be "proven beyond a reasonable doubt" even though it can never be proven in the mathematical sense. —Angr 07:29, 4 July 2008 (UTC)

With all due respect this is just utter nonsense! In science something is either proven beyond reasonable doubt, or it is not. Has the IET been so proven? Don't start quoting biology at me since that discipline has genetic relationships which are proven based on experimentation and genotype. Unless someone writes a section on the conclusive and unchallenged proof of the IET, I'll consider the attempt to deny that the article is based on theories and hypothesis an attempt to push original research onto unsuspecting reader. This is a reference work, and statements need to be explicit and not implied--mrg3105 (comms) ♠♥♦♣ 03:05, 5 July 2008 (UTC)

Historical linguistics is not exact science and cannot give definite answers. We won't ever know the exact phonology of PIE, just we won't ever exactly know the age of universe. But what we can is give pretty good estimate of either. It doesn't make it any less of a science, because the observable phenomena (i.e. attested etymons and properties of daughter languages) cannot be a result of coincidence, borrowings or parallel development (or as far as pure physics is concerned: divine intervention). The chances that modern IE languages haven't actually sprung from common source are as likely as that god created Tower of Babel.

The purpose of WP is not to provide to people like you "conclusive and unchallenged proof", as the purpose of WP is not to "prove" anything. Proofs and discussions about the theory itself are left to the experts of the domain, and WP is just to synthesize the scientific communis opinio and present it appropriately to the reader. As far as the 99.99% linguists out there are concerned, Indo-European theory (not the PIE language - just the claim that IE branches are genetically related) is taken for granted as a priori valid, because claiming otherwise would be insane. If you can find out there some respectable linguists that publishes in respectable journals/encyclopedias and that reasonably well bashes IET and gives an alternative explanation for hundreds of thousands etymon correspondences such as *ph₂tḗr, *méh₂tēr, *bʰréh₂tēr, *swésōr, *gʷḗn, wĺ̥kʷos, *ḱḗr, *h₁nḗh₃mn̥ etc. - you are free to mention him in the article. But you can't really find him can you, so you do logically fallacious argumentation asking for others to provide you with the "proof" against supposed "speculative character" of the claim that IE branches have genetic relatedness and that you imagine to be "original research" ^_^ Your removal of SIL/Ethnologue as a reference with the comment that it's "not a recognised academic organisation for study of languages" demonstrates how severely detached you are. If it's good for ISO - it's good for WP.

Interestingly, you don't apply the same fallacious reasoning to biological groupings, even though that ultimately there is absolutely no difference between postulating biological superfamily by comparing the amount of shared genome, and linguistic superfamily by comparing the common lexis, morphology etc. --Ivan Štambuk (talk) 05:29, 5 July 2008 (UTC)

The fact that the IE theory can never be proven, is just a fact of life, so try to accept it. proto- anything is in an even shakier theoretical boat. SIL may be good enough for ISO, but it is still not an accredited academic institution. Surely you can find other references from more mainstream linguistic sources?

What I said about proof is that if, IF, the article is not about a theory, than it must have become a proven fact, and therefore deserves a section that details this proof. However, as you acknowledge, no such proof is ever possible. As a reference work, Wikipedia is obligated to say explicitly if something is a proven fact or not, even if the assumptions are made in the more learned circles. Wikipedia is no place for voicing assumptions.

"The chances that modern IE languages haven't actually sprung from common source are as likely as that god created Tower of Babel." - are you saying that the IE languages have not sprung up from a common source? I'd remind you that God did not create the Tower of Babel.

"As far as the 99.99% linguists out there are concerned, Indo-European theory is taken for granted as a priori valid, because claiming otherwise would be insane." - pardon me for insanity, but proto- everything is completely manufactured. The IET is based on several very shaky assumptions that fail the multi-disciplinary tests not available in the 18-19th centuries. However, this has little to do with the article. What people do or don't believe does not influence the fact that as it stands the IE linguistics is a theory based on a number of hypothesis. SIL may base their assumptions of beliefs, but in linguistics one deals with facts and logic.

You realise of course that comparing the common lexis, morphology, etc. is not like observing genome in a lab, right? You do know that sequencing for many biological families has been largely completed, while historical linguistics has barely scratched the surface due to obvious anomalies, and wide-ranging differences of opinion on interpretation of data.

I'll tell you what, I'll come back and add cited authoritative sources that do acknowledge the IE linguistics to be theoretic in nature, and I will outline the hypothesis on which it is based, given no one has done so yet--mrg3105 (comms) ♠♥♦♣ 15:17, 5 July 2008 (UTC)

No one is denying that Indo-European linguistics is theoretical. But by adding words like "hypothetical" and "theorized to be" in every other sentence, you are skewing the POV of the article away from the neutral POV and away from scholarly consensus by subtly implying that it is just one of many competing theories, which it isn't. I know that it doesn't do that directly and explicitly, but it leaves that impression in the reader's mind. And that simply isn't the case. Absolutely no one who knows anything about it doubts that the Indo-European languages are genetically related and are descended from a common ancestor. There's simply no debate about it. It is proven beyond a reasonable doubt, period. There is no reason whatever for Wikipedia to be hedging about this. The genetic relationship among the Indo-European languages is as established a fact as anything in any social science (and many physical sciences, for that matter) ever can be. —Angr 16:29, 5 July 2008 (UTC)

"Indo-European languages are genetically related and are descended from a common ancestor. There's simply no debate about it. It is proven beyond a reasonable doubt, period." I look forward to the section on this proof to appear in the article soon if the knowledge is so common, right?--mrg3105 (comms) ♠♥♦♣ 01:43, 6 July 2008 (UTC)

The fact that "PIE cannot be proven" - which is yours more ambiguous and primitive formulation of the fact that the common ancestor language was not actually attested - does not invalidate the fact that IE language are genetically related. No one doubts that today, and your claiming/insinuating otherwise by contaminating the article with your misinterpretations of the methodology of comparative method and adjectives such is "theoretic" and "hypothetical" which colloquailly have very different meaning than in science is just pure POV you are insanely trying to push. Good luck finding a respectable reference claiming that IE languages relatedness is speculative. Until then, stop contaminating the article.

SIL/Ethnologue is the most cited and reputable source in the world for classification of world's languages. Hundreds of respectable academics contribute to it indirectly. You are probably the first person in the world claiming that it's Christian-originated fundings are reflected in it's being non-objective source for citing. Since apparently nobody else agrees with you, your removal of cited content and removal of references cannot be understood as nothing less than pure vandalism. Please don't do that again.

What I said about proof is that if, IF, the article is not about a theory, than it must have become a proven fact, and therefore deserves a section that details this proof. - What part of "linguistics is not exact science" you do not understand? theory here means "interpretative framework", not an abstract set of logically self-supportive mathematical formulas. And once again I emphasize : Wikipedia is not about proving anything (except for trivial/short/fun mathematical theorems ^_^) - that's the job of professionals in the field. We're here just to present their conclusions. And as far as 99.99% of them are concerned, IE "relatedness theory" is valid beyond and doubt.

Wikipedia is obligated to say explicitly if something is a proven fact or not, even if the assumptions are made in the more learned circles. Wikipedia is no place for voicing assumptions. - In the same sense, you can't prove evolution and most of the theoretical physics done in the last 3 decades, because no one has ever actually seen speciation of Homo sapeins sapeins in action or recorded it, or travelled at the beginning of time etc. Sooner or later all sciences bump into physical obstacles (there are provably unprovable theorems, uncomputable algorithms, unmeasurable lengths etc.) - but that does not invalidate their conclusions. Abiding by commonly established scientific principles can filter out most of the crap theories/speculations over the time. But this article is not about the PIE itself (which is susceptible to various interpretations because there is no attested evidence), it's about IE languages in general, and genetic relatedness of IE languages does not require a "proof", since it's so obvious even to a blind man (have you clicked those links I gave you?).

are you saying that the IE languages have not sprung up from a common source? I'd remind you that God did not create the Tower of Babel. - No he/it didn't, ergo "The chances that modern IE languages haven't actually sprung from common source" are next to zero.

pardon me for insanity, but proto- everything is completely manufactured. - yes it did, so is real 99.9% science out there. What's the problem with that fact? This theory has actual cultural implications? Oh I see.

The IET is based on several very shaky assumptions that fail the multi-disciplinary tests not available in the 18-19th centuries. - IET has been developed and supported for the last 2 centuries by lots of people much smarter than you or me, and I can assure you all of it's deficiencies have been carefully inspected in every possible interdisciplinary scenario that you can possibly imagine. And yet again - it all more or less comes down to details. No one todays would claim that the a priori assumption of genetic relatedness itself is controversial. No one except some insane nationalist no one cares about.

You realise of course that comparing the common lexis, morphology, etc. is not like observing genome in a lab, right? - Excuse you, but what is the difference, for I fail to see any? In both cases you have divergence (of language/species) that you didn't witness, you observe the second-hand data (DNA/lexis&morphology) you assume to have sprung from common ancestor, and compare the body of data in order to classify it in the philogenetic hierarchy that you have already established by applying the same speculative reasoning to other material. You even apply the same genetic algorithms (Starostin's STARLING can spit out cladistic tree diagrams directly on Swadesh lists input)

You do know that sequencing for many biological families has been largely completed, while historical linguistics has barely scratched the surface due to obvious anomalies, and wide-ranging differences of opinion on interpretation of data. - Nonsense. I sincerely doubt that you're qualified enough to give so confident statements of what historical linguistics is (not) capable of. --Ivan Štambuk (talk) 18:09, 5 July 2008 (UTC)

Ok, at a guess you are a linguist with a career at stake in a 19th century clap-trap called Indo-European Theory. There is a difference between application of "genetic" to biology as opposed to languages, but having spent your life trying to fit the languages into a theory concocted to suit 19th century rationale, and keen to promote something that is theorised as a foregone conclusion, you may have choosen to ignore hard science?

Just to remind you in case you have never visited the Wikipedia article, a "A hypothesis (from Greek ὑπόθεσις) consists either of a suggested explanation for a phenomenon or of a reasoned proposal suggesting a possible correlation between multiple phenomena. The term derives from the Greek, hypotithenai meaning "to put under" or "to suppose." The scientific method requires that one can test a scientific hypothesis. Scientists generally base such hypotheses on previous observations or on extensions of scientific theories."

Today it means that "a hypothesis refers to a provisional idea whose merit requires evaluation". ::Has the IET evaluation been completed?

No, because "In common usage, the word theory is often used to signify a conjecture, an opinion, a speculation, or a hypothesis", and "In science a theory is a testable model of the manner of interaction of a set of natural phenomena, capable of predicting future occurrences or observations of the same kind, and capable of being tested through experiment or otherwise verified through empirical observation." And yet, the Indo-European Theory, the original premise for the article, is found in one place in the entire Wikipedia. It is as if it never was, and the existence of relationship between Indian languages and those of Europe was a well know fact from millennia ago.

Now I know you think linguistics is not a science, but it is, because languages are logical constructs, and logic is a foundational discipline in science because it allows the questioning of statements like

• "interpretative framework" - which is another way of saying Scientific modelling, which does not mean a theory, but the methodology for testing solutions to the proposed hypothesis.
• "the common ancestor language was not actually attested" - which means the suggested solutions to the proposed hypothesis have not, and will not arrive at a conclusive proof of the proposed model
• "as far as 99.99% of them are concerned, IE "relatedness theory" is valid beyond any doubt." - with the exception that it remains a theory, the model for testing it continues to accumulate data in the attempt to dispel doubt, and which had to eventually branch off into pure speculation of proto- languages after coming under criticism for ignoring other disciplines and mounting evidence that all was not well with the original conception of the 19th century philologists. What a surprise given how few 19th century theories have actually survived to our time in one piece.
• "it all more or less comes down to details" - which is to say that if one ignores the details[3], it looks just like a foregone conclusion that all is an uncontested fact.
• "you observe the second-hand data (DNA/lexis&morphology) you assume to have sprung from common ancestor, and compare the body of data in order to classify it in the philogenetic hierarchy that you have already established by applying the same speculative reasoning to other material" - where logic allows to question the use of the two words "assume" and "speculative" that are usually found in hypothesis and theories, and not in "valid beyond any doubt" statements of fact that you seem to like making. The entire philogenetic hierarchy is assumed by the model/s. The "common ancestor" is assumed, and has been assumed for a reason. You and 99.9% of IET linguists speculate that there are relationships, and produce the data to try and find the proof that would qualify for acceptance of proof in the scientific world, however since the proto- data is entirely hypothetical, this will not happen.
• "Linguistics is not an exact science" - well, languages are! Languages have to be fairly exact to allow for means of transmitting ideas, that much is "attested". What you are in fact saying is better captured in the assessment on the difference between science and unscientific nonsense which was well caught in Wolfgang Pauli's famous comment on a paper he was shown: "This isn't right. It's not even wrong."--mrg3105 (comms) ♠♥♦♣ 01:43, 6 July 2008 (UTC)

No I'm not a linguist (far from that) but perhaps I've not been explaining myself very good, so once again:

We don't need to have a proof of the original premise that languages are genetically related, because the probability that they acquired their common traits by any other mean other than descending from common ancestor is basically 0. Languages just don't borrow entire morphology or accentual paradigms, or 90% of Swadesh lexis. It's as if your comparing the genome of a chimpanzee and a modern human and you see them being > 95% identical - what are you going to assume: 1) a common ancestor whence this similarity came or 2) something other (say divine intervention that created them so similar to make humans test their faith). Since you haven't actually seen or recorded speciation of either, and only have indirect proofs, you must speculate on some basic premises to create a valid self-supporting theory. Most of the cutting-edge theoretical physics developed in the last decades is based on just validating minor side-effects or consequences of theories, not the basic premises, yet I doubt you'll go to string theory and say it's all non-scientific nonsense just because 99% of it is out of reach of normal experiment-verify methodology.

Today no one, and I really mean no one credible questions the premise of genetic relatedness of IE languages/branches. That fact is so obvious and so necessary, that it would be insane to propose something else to explain so many correspondences (the only thing that comes to mind is religion). No one has proposed alternative interpretations, no one most likely ever will. By mentioning/emphasizing in the article that the premise of IE studies is "unproven" you'd be insinuating that there's some doubt to it, or that there are some other contesting theories who are based on "equally likely unprovable premises" - both of which there are none. By rewording the article in a manner like you've been doing, emphasizing "theoretical", "hypothetical" and "unproven" next to every NP that has "(P)IE" inside would be highly misleading to a casual reader, and giving false sense of uncertainty to what 99.99% of linguists take a prior for granted fact. Thus rewording the article the way you've been doing and proposing to do would not be a reflection of the established communis opinio, and would thus be necessary major POV-pushing.

and which had to eventually branch off into pure speculation of proto- languages after coming under criticism for ignoring other disciplines and mounting evidence that all was not well with the original conception of the 19th century philologists. - what "other disciplines" and "mounting evidence" has been/is being ignored, and which of them invalidate the IE? Do you have any references to support such nonsensical claims, or you just making these up? Find respectable quotes or stop making such general half-baked statements that there is something terribly wrong with the way IE linguistics has been performing in the last 2 centuries and you just happen to be one the only person in the world noticing so (you and some nationalists who don't like the idea of ancestorship and what to believe that all IE language sprung from Sanskrit or Ancient Greek - they also like emphasizing "hypothetical" part). Find quotes or otherwise: adieu. --Ivan Štambuk (talk) 08:04, 6 July 2008 (UTC)

Right, though it took a lot of time for arriving at this conclusion. All of this concerns are WP:OR without proper sourcing and nothing more. I regret so much good energy has been spent on this obvious violation of Wikipedia:Talk page guidelines, quote:"Article talk pages should not be used by editors as platforms for their personal views." Could we please remove this discussion? Rokus01 (talk) 08:42, 6 July 2008 (UTC)

If you think this is my personal view, than I will do as you ask, and edit as I do by substantiating contributions with cited sources. A bientôt --mrg3105 (comms) ♠♥♦♣ 09:03, 6 July 2008 (UTC)

Indo-European tree

Warnow, using the phylogenetic method, figured out the following tree for Indo-European languages:

	Anatolian
	Tocharian Italo‑Celtic Italic Celtic Albanian* Greco‑Armenian Greek Armenian Satem Core Indo‑Iranian Indic Iranian Germanic** Balto‑Slavic Baltic Slavic

'''*Albanian could have branched off before Italo-Celtic or after Greco-Armenian.
**Germanic left the Satem area before Satemization was complete and moved next to Italo-Celtic.

I've deleted the above and moved it over here for discussion. The reason I moved it is because this is only one of many proposed trees, as far as I know it doesn't have general acceptance. I think a separate page should be created showing the various proposals. Otherwise, just don't list any. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 207.112.64.80 (talk) 04:07, 14 August 2008 (UTC)

I agree. Including this tree was putting UNDUE weight on one person's analysis and includes several intermediate "nodes" that do not enjoy wide acceptance, such as Italo-Celtic, Greco-Armenian, and "Germano-Balto-Slavic". —Angr 04:24, 14 August 2008 (UTC)

Well, the German/Balt/Slav "branch" goes all the way back to Schleicher; Italo-Celtic has been questioned, in part because the prime exhibit for the grouping (the r-forms of middle and passive verbs) turn out to be conservative features, not innovations, but in fact there are some other, less dramatic, shared innovations, if not terribly important ones. The real problem is much more serious than such quibbles. It's been 150 years since anyone thought that languages branch off of one another this way. Baltic and Slavic are unquestionably satem languages, Germanic unquestionably isn't, but both share a unique detail of developing high vowels before syllabic resonants, and Baltic, Slavic, and Germanic have adjectives marked for definiteness (albeit with a different marker). Indeed, whole "branches" can be iffy: so-called West Germanic looks like a collection of innovations that spread over existing linguistic terrain (e.g. *ð > *d) rather than shared innovations of a branch (High German's anaphoric pronouns agree with Gothic, an East Germanic language, against the system in English and Old Saxon). North Germanic is a compact branch, but shares the change of *z to *r with West Germanic, and Old English shows many traits like certain kinds of vowel breaking that align with North Germanic, as does the much greater sensitivity of Old English to i-umlaut than is to be seen in High German. The trouble with trying to connect clean breaks to innovations is that different innovations require different breaks. In any case the matter has been very extensively discussed for a long time, and the clear consensus is that a branching structure, all by itself, is incapable of mapping important diachronic relationships. Alsihler (talk) 00:57, 4 March 2009 (UTC)

Mistakes in the map: Lebanon and Sudan

Neither French nor English are official in Lebanon, contrary to popular opinion. However, English is official in Sudan. Which makes the map look scary actually, man IE is dominating. --Karkaron (talk) 08:56, 29 August 2008 (UTC)

IE is dominating, but you still can't understand most of these languages. There's nothing scary. Everything is connected.--95.116.231.215 (talk) 20:30, 4 April 2013 (UTC)

Conjugation comparison

(Moved here from User talk:Angr):

I think the table is there to serve as an illustration of the early stages of IE splitting. It might make more sense to establish sort of a timeline, ie from PIE/IE > protolanguages > old attested > modern. I don't think it's irrelevant, just not complete enough to make sense.

If we put in a link to Old Irish, shouldn't the greek link be to Ancient Greek rather than modern greek? Cheers Akerbeltz (talk) 15:35, 30 August 2008 (UTC)

Without any text explaining its significance, it's just a random table that's not doing anything. Does the article even discuss the similarity of verb conjugations among the oldest languages? —Angr 16:26, 30 August 2008 (UTC)

I don't personally have the data to do that but establishing a timeline would be a good idea. As to the above point, the table is clearly relevant, although maybe you feel it isn't explained well enough, but my point is that it's counter-productive to just delete something without at least discussing first whether it can be improved or not, if it's deemed to be irrelevant by concensus then remove it, don't just delete right off the bat, that doesn't benefit any article. (84.13.253.245 (talk) 17:05, 30 August 2008 (UTC))

Ok I added some more examples and info and established a rough timeline. Nebulosity, I see you've added Old English but I'm not sure if that's needed - I think one example from each major family is enough to give a general idea of what's going on, so on balance I feel we should rather add a church slavonic or baltic conjugation rather than a second germanic example. Otherwise we may end up with a bias towards germanic or a table as wide as my desk ;) Akerbeltz (talk) 17:44, 31 August 2008 (UTC)

Good point. I've removed the Old English table. I agree we should add one example from the slavic and baltic families, and also indo-iranian to cover the major IE branches. (Nebulousity (talk) 19:40, 31 August 2008 (UTC))

Btw, now that the section has been expanded a bit, Angr do you still have any objection to the relevance tag being removed? (78.150.131.147 (talk) 21:48, 1 September 2008 (UTC))

Angr, glad you feel that way about relevance but the "call for citations" you've added is a little ... odd. Everyone can *see* that the PIE verb was synthetic and that the modern languages use largely periphrastic systems. It's like asking for a citation saying that it's usually brighter during the day ;) Same applies to the similarities/differences I would say, wouldn't you agree? I agree with the need for sourcing information, don't get me wrong but not every little statement is sourced, not even on featured articles if the info is totally obvious Akerbeltz (talk) 09:03, 2 September 2008 (UTC)

I'm not asking for sources showing that the older languages were synthetic and the younger languages are periphrastic. I'm asking for sources showing that "the differences [between the Indo-European languages] have increased significantly over time". The chart of the ancient IE languages shows that there were already tremendous differences between them, and I'm not seeing an increase in differentiation between the ancient languages and the modern ones. —Angr 09:07, 2 September 2008 (UTC)

Ah I see what you mean. I guess I was just wearing my linguist goggles when I wrote that. I'm quite happy to scrap that statement and simply say that the differences have increased over time. How's that? Akerbeltz (talk) 10:39, 2 September 2008 (UTC)

I don't think removing the word "significantly" is much of an improvement. The average person is going to see a chart showing several very different-looking ancient languages and then a chart showing several equally different-looking modern languages, and then wonder why we think the differences have increased. And why do we even have to say so? Isn't it fairly unremarkable that as related languages evolve, they diverge from each other more and more? And why should anyone care that they do? It seems to me that section is making a point that is both obvious and uninteresting, and then doesn't even succeed in using evidence to establish that obvious, uninteresting point. —Angr 10:46, 2 September 2008 (UTC)

Agreed... feel free to change/delete, I gotta rush to a workshop right now! Akerbeltz (talk) 10:48, 2 September 2008 (UTC)

I disagree, to a linguist the point might well seem obvious, and uninteresting, but to a linguistic layman (like me) the table presents an excellent visual indicator of how closely related the languages were at one time. For example Haitian Creole originates from contact with French, but the language has fundamental differences due it's substratal influences, and who knows some or all of the IE languages may have initially started out as a creole, by contact with PIE speakers, borrowing PIE vocabulary, but not necessarily grammatical structure. This table does show that that wasn't the case. (78.150.131.147 (talk) 12:26, 2 September 2008 (UTC))

But it doesn't. A linguistic layman looking at the tables is only going to see a few tiny similarities (Latin and Greek both end in -ō in the 1st person singular; the 1st person plurals all have an "m" in them somewhere) and otherwise wonder what on earth the table is trying to show. It certainly doesn't succeed in showing laymen any great similarities between the languages; you have to know some things about historical linguistics (like the fact that Greek -ousi is a phonologically regular outcome of -onti) to see through the surface forms and find the similarities. —Angr 12:45, 2 September 2008 (UTC)

Different point that aside - any objections to splitting off the PIE bit of the table into a seperate table and adjusting the width so the old forms sit directly above the now? Someone else would have to do that though, I'm no good with the table formatting. Akerbeltz (talk) 14:35, 2 September 2008 (UTC)

• Pardon my innocent remark, but in what languages, other than partially Hindi and Faroese, does this comparison table prove the "shift from synthetic to periphrastic systems" ? Also, the dual forms are missing, and this root also had athematic reduplicative present retained in Sanskrit, and there are more than a few notable Indo-Europeanists (Beekes, Watkins, Kortlandt, Jasanoff..) that would object to 2nd and 3rd-person present singular endings to be equal to athematic endings (i.e. *bʰere(h₁)y, *bʰere), which would render most apparent "similarities" parallel innovations (which casual reader cannot possibly know). I'm also pretty sure that most people don't know that e.g. -tъ in OCS beretъ is not of PIE *-ti, but in fact agglutinated demonstrative pronoun.. Highly confusing for a casual reader. If IP wants to prove otherwise well-known typological universal, he should not do it at the expanse of article's general appearance! --Ivan Štambuk (talk) 12:42, 27 September 2008 (UTC)

Thomas Young

I just added a reference to him as originator of the term "indo-european", adding that the term was popularized by Bopp. Compromiso (talk) 13:55, 23 September 2008 (UTC)

Okay; can you add a source for it, though? —Angr 14:36, 23 September 2008 (UTC)

the source is the thomas young page, which i linked to. isn´t that ok? Compromiso (talk) 18:31, 23 September 2008 (UTC)

Well not really, because that article doesn't cite its sources for the claim either, unless the footnote sourcing the previous sentence applies to the sentence making this claim too. —Angr 18:39, 23 September 2008 (UTC)

yes, you are right. the french wikipedia entry on indo-european languages writes: "En 1813, Thomas Young invente le terme de "langues indo-européennes" pour regrouper ces langues", but does not give a source either. my source was: Historia Universal Vol.1 Los orígenes, Barcelona: Salvat Editores, 2004, p.409, which is not helpful in the english wikipedia. maybe you have an english source?Compromiso (talk) 21:20, 23 September 2008 (UTC)

Are you sure Bopp coined the term? I have a recollection that Schlegel and his "successor" Bopp were both caught up in trying to derive European languages from Sanskrit and sort of came up with the comparative linguistics as an unintentional by-product and that it was only after Bopp that the notion of Sanskrit being the ancestor language was abandoned in favour of PIE? Akerbeltz (talk) 22:06, 23 September 2008 (UTC)

don´t understand, Akerbeltz, bopp didn´t coin the term. and i think the the proto- question is not relevant to the terminology.

thanks to contributor Ivan Štambuk for the reference for thomas young. i made a correction of the german term in the footnote (indogermanisch, not indogermanische, which is an inflection), and made a comment on the controversy in german. © (talk) 15:43, 26 September 2008 (UTC)

there isn't any "controversy in german", just a question of terminological preference. The origin of the term is discussed at length at Indo-European studies. --dab (𒁳) 16:48, 26 September 2008 (UTC)

ah, the acrimonious controversy which i referred to is reaching the english-language page too! User Dbachmann has written "(nonsense, a wikipedia talkpage isn't a quotable source.)" and deleted the addition i had made:

"In German it's indogermanisch 'Indo-Germanic' (though the term is controversial, see the acrimonious German discussion page http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diskussion:Indogermanische_Sprachen)"

his intervention rather proves my point, thank you for your imprudent and acrimonious (you write "nonsense"), Dbachmann. there _is_ an acrimonious controversy on the german discussion page which i linked to, even if you would prefer that there was not, and no amount of undebated reverting will alter that fact. Compromiso (talk) 17:56, 26 September 2008 (UTC)

no it doesn't. See WP:RS, WP:SELF. If you want to claim there is a "controversy" in article namespace, you will have to provide academic references stating there is one. --dab (𒁳) 18:21, 26 September 2008 (UTC)

I added a brief - and I believe harmless - explanation of the term "Indo-Germanic/indogermanisch" to the foot-note, a term which before WW II was in use not just in Germany:e.g. Columbia Encyclopedia 1942 edition, © 1935, 1938, 1940, 1942 , p. 881: "Indo-European or Indo-Germanic languages..." Marschner (talk) 09:56, 18 October 2008 (UTC)

Collaborative and adversarial paradigms in the wikipedia project

this little exchange on thomas young above is illustrative of diametrically opposed approaches to learning and knowledge. User:Angr wrote "Okay; can you add a source for it, though?" while User:Dbachmann reverted and wrote "nonsense". i know which form of exchange i prefer, and i think the wikipedia project continually suffers from the "yes it does - no it doesn´t" paradigm. we need more collaborative and less adversarial work!

unwittingly though, User:Dbachmann is right: i, also unwittingly, was undertaking original research, testing the hypothesis of a "controversy" through a "natural experiment": if a reference to a controversy is suppressed intemperately by an Indogermanist, then there is surely one there!

the controversy is not "nonsense", it has been in the academic establishment (cf. the use of "indoeuropäisch" in GDR academia), but perhaps more significantly on the political and ideological level, and therefore a source for this does not have to be an academic reference, contrary to what User:Dbachmann requires. i can modify the parenthesis to "(see, though, the German discussion page http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diskussion:Indogermanische_Sprachen)". it´s instructive, and there is no need to try to sweep all this under the carpet. Compromiso (talk) 09:40, 27 September 2008 (UTC)

What I said "Okay; can you add a source for it, though?" about is the claim that Thomas Young was the one who coined the term "Indo-European". What Dbachmann said "nonsense" about is the claim that there is an ongoing controversy in the German-speaking world about the terms indogermanisch and indoeuropäisch, and in particular about using a talk page from German Wikipedia as a source for that claim. The fact that there's a controversy on a Wikipedia talk page does not mean there's actually a controversy in the real world. —Angr 09:57, 27 September 2008 (UTC)

thank you, you are quite right, and i did not want to put it otherwise. i also appreciate the problem of the legitimacy of wikipedia as a source - in fact i myself never cite it as authoritative. there are two points: the veracity of the description "controversy" and its documentation. as i said, i´m quite happy to withdraw both "controversy" and "acrimonious", but would encourage that the link to the german talkpage be reinstated in the way i deswcribe above. i don´t want to start having footnotes to footnotes, so i won´t start compiling references documenting the controversy. Compromiso (talk) 11:46, 27 September 2008 (UTC)

Compromiso, Wikipedia is the "encyclopedia anyone can edit". Anyone. This means we get a lot of people passing by for a chat, or some idle provocation, or to vent some spleen. If there is anything you want, you are obliged to present a reference. Did you get that, yes? No reference, no discussion. See WP:RS for a description of what kind of references are deemed appropriate. We'll be happy to discuss your references with you. As long as you have none, you can hardly claim anything is being "swept under the carpet". --dab (𒁳) 11:52, 27 September 2008 (UTC)

see above - i suggest a link, not a reference. 'as i said, i´m quite happy to withdraw both "controversy" and "acrimonious", but would encourage that the link to the german talkpage be reinstated in the way i deswcribe above. i don´t want to start having footnotes to footnotes, so i won´t start compiling references documenting the controversy.' Compromiso (talk) 13:18, 27 September 2008 (UTC)

There's simply no acceptable way to link to a talk page at German Wikipedia from this article, because there is nothing that a Wikipedia talk page can be used as evidence for. —Angr 14:01, 27 September 2008 (UTC)

Exactly. Moreschi (talk) 14:05, 27 September 2008 (UTC)

Your long lost Urheimat is in Siberia,the most expansive and most indigenous european dna ties to siberia

The indo-european constructed language was probably a caveman adoption.No doubt it will be denied as the semites deny their ethiopian Urheimat despite endless genetic and linguistic evidence.Return to your Ket roots - part of the Basque, Sino-Tibetan and Ibero-Caucasian languages all groups share exact ancestral ties with most indigenous europeans. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 58.178.55.79 (talk) 14:36, 3 October 2008 (UTC)

Whatever. DNA evidence proves exactly nothing in linguistics. —Angr 16:14, 3 October 2008 (UTC)

What is the guy even talking about? The Indo-European language group originated in Siberia? I always thought it was NE of the Black sea. And the Kat language isn't even I-E. And what's the caveman part about? An insult? For whom? Europeans? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 77.185.198.244 (talk) 17:41, 6 September 2010 (UTC)

Baltic vs Baltic-Slavic or does the reader get the correct picture?

It is misleading to represent both the Baltic and Slavic by the same colour in the maps showing the distribution of the IE starting at around 100-500 AD. I can buy such a representation for the disputed period 3000-500 BC. However, avoiding discriminating between the Baltic and Slavonic languages in the later pre-historic and historic periods is nothing but a masked POV or even propaganda.

Moreover, the following facts are clearly ignored/overlooked in the article:

1. If the Baltic and Slavic are “genetically” classified as one group, there should be a clear statement, that the Proto-Slavic spin-off from the Proto-Baltic-Slavic stem in the beginning was just a peripheral dialect. See for example Encyclopaedia Britannica.

2. Many scholars agree about the occurrence of Baltic hydronims in a huge territory from Pomerania in the West to Volga River in the East. Namely, BALTIC and not Balto-Slavic. See Gimbutas for example. http://www.vaidilute.com/books/gimbutas/gimbutas-01.html

3. I learned at school that Lithuanian and, in particular, Old Prussian, are the languages, which preserved most of the archaic IE features, these features, in particular, can be found in unusually rich ancient Lithuanian dialects still spoken today (The Slavic are more innovative in this regard aren’t they?). That’s why these “insignificant” languages are studied in many universities across the world. Isn’t this fact worth mentioning? I understand that it might be a bit difficult to accept for the speakers of the “big” languages such as English, Russian or French, but it’s all about facts isn’t it?

4. As a layman I can only state, that the distance between Swedish and English or German is similar to the distance between the two major dialects of Lithuanian: Samogitian and Aukstatian. Not speaking about Latvian and Old Prussian. Thus, once you put together Baltic and Slavic into one group, you shouldn’t create a wrong impression, that the Russian, Latvian, Polish are “all the same”. Because other vice the reader can get a wrong impression that, in fact, the recent history of that part of Europe is nothing wrong, just a natural exchange within “very close dialects of the PIE continuum”. In such a case, we arrive in a situation when some nations are more important than the others ( i.e. some are small, they don’t have enough of Wiki editors, few recent publications in English consider their languages, etc.). 15:29, 28 December 2008 (UTC)Gotho-BalticGotho-Baltic 18:04, 29 December 2008 (UTC)

Baltic and Slavic are indeed comparatively remote. As are Ossetian and Marathi, and both are still Indo-Iranian. Your view of Slavic as a "peripheral" spin-off Baltic is Baltocentric. I take it you are a Balt, and you had an Balto-centric education. Which I grant is one point of view, although an ethnocentric one. That Baltic "preserved most of the archaic IE features" is wrong. It did indeed preserve some surprisingly archaic features, but other archaic features are found in other branches. --dab (𒁳) 20:38, 29 December 2008 (UTC)

This is certainly not my view. I’m not a linguist. See for example: ” 15/14th cent. BC – crystalization of the proto-Slavs in the southern periphery of the proto-Baltic continuum, localized from Silesia to Central Ukraine (Trziniec-Komarov culture).”- Novotna and Blazek, BALTISTICA XL I I ( 2 ) 2007 185–210, p. 208. The article in E Britannica says the same. Moreover, Endre Bojtár, (FOREWORD TO THE PAST, p. 72) notes that there has been found no archaeological evidence for a common Baltic-Slavic culture.

I’m writing this not in an attempt to deny the Balto-Slavic hypothesis. I have nothing against it. My point is that there are references, which put this hypothesis into question and/or provide a broader context. For example, the interaction between Baltic and Germanic, the widespread Baltic river names vs the relatively compact Proto-Slavic Urheimat, Baltic loanwords in Finish, finally the recent political flavor in “marketing” the Baltic-Slavic hypothesis. Now, I don’t want a discussion on these topics to occupy a half of the IE article, but I propose that an English-speaking user of Wiki with no intention to dig into linguistic theories and hypothesis should get an objective and realistic impression of what “all these Eastern” languages are like and what relative distances are between them.Gotho-Baltic 22:03, 30 December 2008 (UTC) —Preceding unsigned comment added by Gotho-Baltic (talk • contribs)

You're right. You're not a linguist and you don't understand what you're talking about (neither am I, but I more or less pretend to know what I'm talking about ^_^). Novotná & Blažek (2007) paper you mention deals with chronological dating of Balto-Slavic split (obviously ipso facto presuming that it does form a genetic clade), and in conclusion, which you shamelessly ripped out of context (where "Proto-Baltic" is used synonymously with "Proto-Balto-Slavic"), explicitely states that the reached numbers of BSl. divergence of 1400-1340 BCE "agree well with Trziniec-Komarov culture, localized from Silesia to Central Ukraine and dated to the period 1500–1200 BCE". And one sentence further from where your "proto-Baltic continuum" is mentioned is: "These results represent unambiguous evidence for Balto-Slavic unity." :)

Archeology alone means nothing. There is even less evidence for Proto-Italic or Proto-Anatolian culture too, but nobody questions those.. Languages only ideally map to archeological cultures or ethnicities, most of the time you have some chained dialect continuum across wide area. --Ivan Štambuk (talk) 18:30, 1 January 2009 (UTC)

Gotho-Baltic (talk · contribs) is invited to read our current Balto-Slavic article and then offer informed criticism on its talkpage. This talkpage here isn't the proper venue for this discussion. --dab (𒁳) 10:50, 2 January 2009 (UTC)

Gotho-Baltic has already commented at Talk:Balto-Slavic languages, and Ivan Štambuk has responded there. (Balto-Slavic is just a disambig.) In Gotho-Baltic's defense, his original comment was about the maps used on this page. —Angr 12:32, 2 January 2009 (UTC)

Certainly, I meant the IE language evolution maps when I started this discussion. I provided with several references, which project the Baltic-Slavic unity into separated geographic locations. Ivan Stambuk felt offended (if so- I apologize) and he suspected me “shamelessly” pulling the evidences from the context, which, of course is not the case- the article by Novotna&Blazek is fully available on-line. Moreover, you can read a nice summary on the Baltic-Slavic in Bojtar’s book (partially online via google books). He also refers to a theory by Ivanov&Toporov, which considers the Slavic originally as a peripheral dialect of proto-Baltic (ref Bojtar, p71). I think it is worth mentioning in this paragraph:

“9. Balto-Slavic languages, believed by most Indo-Europeanists[6] to form from a phylogenetic unit, while a minority ascribes similarities to prolonged language contact.”

And finally, consider extending the Baltic l. language area in the Diversification maps to comprise present-days Estonia and (maybe) the Baltic shore in southern Finland:

“The oldest (proto-)Baltic and (proto-)Germanic loanwords [in Finnish] mainly relate to nature. Particularly interesting in this sense are the sea-related words derived from the Baltic branch, meri (sea) itself and the fish-names lohi (salmon) and ankerias (eel). These words at least seem to imply that the proto-Finns, or more accurately the Finno-Ugrian peoples, had never lived by a salt sea before coming into contact with the Baltic peoples.”

http://virtual.finland.fi/netcomm/news/showarticle.asp?intNWSAID=25830

Also in Britannica, “Finnic Peoples”: “In prehistoric times, the Finnic peoples evidently came from central Russia, probably bringing with them the art of cereal agriculture. Those migrating to the area of Estonia may have met a numerous population of Balts and Germans already there, but those going on to Finland entered an almost uninhabited country”.

Good luck and see you at Talk:Balto-Slavic.Gotho-Baltic 13:59, 2 January 2009 (UTC) —Preceding unsigned comment added by Gotho-Baltic (talk • contribs)

Map question: China

There are Russian-speaking and Tajik-speaking minorities in northeastern and western [Sinkiang?] China, although I don't know what status they might have as relevant to the map shown here. However, Portuguese and English are coöfficial, in the SARs of Macau and Hong Kong, respectively. Tomer^talk 20:12, 25 January 2009 (UTC)

Interesting point. The Tajiks are an official minority in Tashkurgan Tajik Autonomous County. The Russians are an official minority too but have no autonomous area - it's only a tiny minority. So the languages have whatever status national minority languages in China have. Akerbeltz (talk) 21:21, 25 January 2009 (UTC)

Changed 'Snake' to 'Serpent'

For those who are latin and sanskrit challenged, Americans would comprehend the change to the latter, as it doesn't require much thinking. 146.235.66.52 (talk) 17:07, 15 February 2009 (UTC)

Are you sure this is more accurate though? It is my understanding that in English "serpent" refers not to mundane snakes but to snakes in some kind of ritual or mythological context. I recognise that the word serpent may be preferable as it is a cognate to the examples given, but it may also not be the best translation. --86.144.101.159 (talk) 01:46, 22 May 2009 (UTC)

Thank you, anon from J.C. Penny - since you posted from Dallas, I assume you are not an American, and are making disparaging remarks about the country of your employer - in any event, your comments are not welcome, un-encyclopedic, and against WIKI policy. — Preceding unsigned comment added by HammerFilmFan (talk • contribs) 04:32, 2 March 2011 (UTC)

Only a foreigner would ever disparage American education? Ha! —Tamfang (talk) 20:22, 2 March 2011 (UTC)

made a few corrections in the starting line

made a few corrections. i gave the reasons in the history section. i have to say this is quite a good article. it has good detail :)Dicst (talk) 11:29, 29 March 2009 (UTC)

Whe greek is missing from the family trees?

In the upper right board of the page "indoeuropean languages" is missing the Greek language as a separate family of languages.

Probably is a mistake that should be corrected.

Also there is a board on the discussion page, that is mentioned in "greaco-armenian family" languages, this is a hypothesis that is supported by only few scientists as far as I know.

Anyway in the board of the page "indoeuropean languages" is not mentioned neether "graeco-armenian" as family. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Konig82 (talk • contribs) 18:31, 31 March 2009 (UTC)

The board you're talking about includes Hellenic languages. garik (talk) 18:50, 31 March 2009 (UTC)

the group is in fact known as "Greek" in English. "Hellenic" is a pompous term used for oblique pov-pushing. --dab (𒁳) 11:12, 20 July 2009 (UTC)

Early cases

See http://sci.tech-archive.net/Archive/sci.archaeology/2006-03/Msg00564.html —Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.156.219.143 (talk) 09:59, 13 June 2009 (UTC) See Bernard Sergent, Les Indo-Europeens, Payot, 1995. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.156.219.143 (talk) 10:02, 13 June 2009 (UTC)

Loss

The article speaks of the "loss of pre-vocalic *s- in Greek". Actually, the "s" was shifted to "h". Admittedly, this "h" has been dropped in Modern Greek. At the least, the article is misleading on this point. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.137.170.8 (talk) 10:57, 27 July 2009 (UTC)

I changed it to "loss of intervocalic *s in Proto-Greek" so it can refer to things like *genesos > γένεος. +Angr 13:40, 27 July 2009 (UTC)

Bad French

In the table about the various modern and ancient equivalents of the verb "to bear", it mentions the French verb {con}férer. I am French-speaking, and "conférer" means to confer, not to bear. CielProfond (talk) 02:49, 5 August 2009 (UTC)

See: semantic change. It's a derived verb with different than meaning the original verbal base. --Ivan Štambuk (talk) 11:43, 5 August 2009 (UTC)

Köszönöm. I should have thought about that. Then again, maybe there should be a note that the meaning has changed since. CielProfond (talk) 03:17, 6 August 2009 (UTC)

It's just being used as an example of the conjugation, no claims as to its meaning are made. +Angr 05:27, 6 August 2009 (UTC)

Bad German

In the table about the various modern and ancient equivalents of the verb "to bear", it mentions the German verb "gebären". The third person singular is given as "er gebiert". I've never seen a male German give birth to a child :) This most certainly should be "sie gebiert".

THis might indeed be about conjugation, not meaning. Nevertheless, I am confused by you mentioning "to carry" in the beginning sentence of the section, then proceeding to conjugate "gebären", which is something completely different to the best of my knowledge. If a mother carries a baby she does not gibe birth to it (German "sie gebiert"), but moves it from one place to another (German "sie trägt")!? It might be a good idea to explicitly stress that those verb examples have different meanings and to avoid the impression that all those verbs from different languages are synonyms to a specific english verb. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 84.168.241.41 (talk) 11:01, 14 October 2010 (UTC)

Indoeuropean

Indoeuropean language is a theory. No one to date has proved the existance of such a powerful, society. A theory, that has not been proven so far. One would expect that evidence of such a powerful society's existance, (lending its language to significant portion of the world) would have been unearthed by archeologists so far. An inscription, a setting, a pot a drawing. Mothing so far. None. This fact is neglected, why? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 213.207.162.51 (talk) 13:22, 19 August 2009 (UTC)

Indo-European is a reconstructed language that was never written down. Archaeologists don't find evidence of languages unless the languages were written down. +Angr 18:44, 19 August 2009 (UTC)

Agreed, that is why indoeuropean theory, is a theorem that stands on air, there is no fundamental evidence to its existance. Never was. Angr, the language was never written down, but the society must have lived somewhere. A drawing, a pot, something of this great civilisation has never been found. Ever. Still, as if a matter of "faith", linguists insists that this great first european civilisation existed and gave its language to the masses. With this tactic one can support anything. It is irrational and nothing more than just a linguists impression of what was. Even if this great civilization never written anything down, surely their settings, utensils would have been found somewhere. Since they are not, why would anyone support the existence but not the inexistance of this imaginary civilisation? Perhaps not everyone is related, but they borrowed words from each other. Anyway indoeuropean to my understanding is simply another theory far from being scientifically proven. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 213.207.162.51 (talk) 11:31, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

While I disagree a lot with what you say, this isn't the place for debate. Your issue seems to be less with the Wikipedia article, and more with those in the Indo-European linguist and history research community. This article is about what mainstream IE linguist and history researchers believe, not a place to debate their opinions. If you can cite criticism of the IE/PIE theories that exists in academia, feel free to add it to the article but remember to cite your sources and discuss it dispassionitly. David Reiss (talk) 13:58, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

I know this is an old discussion, but I just want to contribute my thoughts, that the first users of Indo-European didn't have to be a particularly great civilisation. They just had to have the ability to invade and conquer one neighbour. From there on, it depends on the neighbours and time. HiLo48 (talk) 12:35, 31 July 2010 (UTC)

Please stop this curious discussion. It is nonsense because substitute for "IE" in 213.207.162.51's contribution above "the grandfather of the grandfather of my grandfather" (born in 1720 as I was told) and everything turns out to be the same! Therefore I do not exist.

Thank you for your contribution to a discussion that had been quiet for two years. —Tamfang (talk) 18:41, 21 August 2012 (UTC)

Removed suggested subfamilies

As an Iranian Persian myself, who has studied languages, I can tell you that Dravidian people and Australoid (non Aryan Indians closely related to aboriginals from Australia and Africans) and their language is NOT Indo-European. This section was put in this article using the wiki article on Nostratic languages as a source. I'm sorry, but this is just another example of propaganda. There is no historical evidence for this, and is not accepted in the scholarly community. This is an article on Indo-Europeans, NOT African or Asian languages. Joseph Greenberg's research is highly faulty and full of agenda (not to mention he is highly criticised) I think his information should stay in the Nostratic article on wikipedia and off this page.--CreativeSoul7981 (talk) 02:07, 22 August 2009 (UTC)

Nostratics is a very active research field, and deserves to be mentioned. --Ivan Štambuk (talk) 02:18, 22 August 2009 (UTC)

Again, I will reiterate that this information belongs on the Nostratics page and NOT the Indo-European page since the Linguistic community does NOT accept even accept this as a valid theory. Please leave this on the Nostratics page.--CreativeSoul7981 (talk) 05:00, 22 August 2009 (UTC)

I will add that this information needs to be agreed upon with valid sources and not theories by one or two people not even recognized by the Lingual Community. Otherwise, it's just propoganda.--CreativeSoul7981 (talk) 05:01, 22 August 2009 (UTC)

Lingual Community? What on earth are you talking about? ^_^ Illyč-Svityč, Dogolpolsky, Bomhard etc. are/were top linguists, their works are published in credible books and academic journals and hardly fit into some "propaganda" theory. There is a lot of skepticism for Nostratics in the West, but it doesn't invalidate the fact that it is being actively researched in the highest possible academic standards. This touches PIE as PIE is grouped as one of the Nostratic branches and it must be mentioned. All the other articles on major language families mention their still-controversial supergroupings (Nostratic, Altaic..), and the article on IE should be no exception. --Ivan Štambuk (talk) 05:49, 22 August 2009 (UTC)

I agree that it should be mentioned; however, I also agree that it is very controversial in the field and not accepted by the majority of linguists. I've attempted to make this clearer. garik (talk) 09:51, 22 August 2009 (UTC)

I agree with CreativeSoul7981. There has been huge INFLUENCE of indo-iranian on the Indian sub-continent to the dravidians, but they are Australoid not Indo-European. Iraj Ali (talk) 13:27, 8 August 2012 (UTC)

Not to worry. The only mention of Dravidian in the present article is in the paragraph about proposed macrofamilies such as Nostratic. —Tamfang (talk) 22:19, 8 August 2012 (UTC)

Language grouping: Baltic and Slavic

We have to take this topic again. Certainly, the Balto-Slavic group is a sort of mainstream view, especially if one judges from the available sources in English on Internet. Beside scientific arguments there are political reasons (systematic manipulation and propaganda of the Soviet science) that explain why the Balto-Slavic hypothesis became widespread compared to the other ones (see above, Bojtar, 1999). However, there is no doubt that the scientific dispute is not solved, the discussion is going on and this should be reflected in this article. Proofs? Henning Andersen (UCLA professor) states in his article “Slavic and Indo-European Migrations”, 2003, p 49, that there are at least three groups of theories dealing with the relationships between Baltic and Slavic. Moreover, organizers of a very recent special workshop (German, Austrian, Dutch) put it like this: “Despite many years of research, the reason for the striking similarity remains unclear. There are two competing, although not mutually exclusive hypotheses. One assumes an intermediate Balto-Slavic stage after the break up of Proto-Indo-European. The other hypothesis seeks to explain the similarities within the framework of language contact, i.e as a result of their longstanding geographic relationship. Both positions have been argued, but neither has been generally accepted.”, http://titus.uni-frankfurt.de/curric/colloq2.htm. Note, these are secondary or tertiary references.

The situation has to be reflected properly in this article, see WP:UNDUE, or we will need to look for some other remedies, e.g. WP:POV tag. My personal message to a couple of particular enthusiasts of Balto-Slavic hypothesis- Ivan S. and Angr: stop misusing WP policy for pushing your OR. This will be dealt accordingly.Gotho-Baltic 22:37, 28 August 2009 (UTC) —Preceding unsigned comment added by Gotho-Baltic (talk • contribs)

Diversification Section

Made minor corrections regarding the period 1500-2000 (covering attempted European colonization of West, Southern and South-East Asia and North Africa; and actual European colonization of Southern Africa, North Asia, and the Americas). Changes included changing the confusing reference to South Arica (as a region associated with IE 'romance languages'; specifically Portuguese, French and Spanish) to Sub-Saharan Africa; the more inclusive and actual area of Africa to which Romance languages where spread through forced European colonization.

The term 'South Africa' is confusing and inaccurate in reference to regions of Africa where Romance IE languages are spoken because South Africa is (currently) a country in Southern Africa where the principal IE languages spoken are Non=Romance, in fact Germanic languages(i.e. English and Afrikaans); Southern Africa includes Mozambique and Angola where portuguese is the main IE language, as well as Zimbabwe, Nambia, Zambia and Botswana where the main non-native IE languages are Germanic (English, German. English and German, respectively). However, 'Romance' IE languages are spoken in many countries of Sub-Saharan Africa (which includes the Southern African region), such as the aforementioned Mozambique and Angola (Portuguese), as well as Ivory Coast (French), Cameroon (French), and many more. Therefore the erroneous term 'South Africa' (which can be confused with the country of South Africa) has been changed to Sub-Saharan Africa.

In addition, the intent of this section is to define areas of the world to which IE languages were recently introduced (i.e. did not exist prior to the period of 1500-2000), therefore the reference to South Asia is too limiting and inappropriate as it gives the misimpression that IE languages spread to only that region of Asia AND as a result of the spread of English, which is clearly absurd as most of the inhabitants of Persia (Persian Iranian Aryan ethnic group and speakers), India/Southern Asia (Indo-Aryan ethnic group and speakers) have been native speakers of Indo-European languages for thousands of years BCE to present. The spread of English, Dutch, Portuguese and Russian to traditionally non IE speaking regions of Asia is more relevant as it pertains to the Geographic spread of IE languages during this period (1500-2000 AD). Hence I have included East and South-East Asia and North Asia (which where previously not covered) as regions where IE languages have been introduced recently (i.e. period of 1500-2000).70.83.175.116 (talk) 03:46, 8 September 2009 (UTC)

Can we explain the huge amount of non indo-european words and grammatical features(especially in local-non standard-indoeuropean dialects)by dene-caucasian,borean and cromagnic substratum ?

Can we explain the huge amount of non indo-european words and grammatical features(especially in local-non standard-indoeuropean

dialects)by dene-caucasian,borean and cromagnic substratum of pre neolihicly migrating(proto indoeuropean speaking anatolian

farmers)populations of europe?

Humanbyrace (talk) 00:55, 13 September 2009 (UTC)

Problem under "Diversification"

Second bullet states:

2000 BC–1500 BC: Catacomb culture north of the black sea. The chariot is invented, leading to the split and rapid spread of Iranian and Indo-Aryan from the Bactria-Margiana Archaeological Complex over much of Central Asia, Northern India, Iran and Eastern Anatolia. Proto-Anatolian is split into Hittite and Luwian. The pre-Proto-Celtic Unetice culture has an active metal industry (Nebra skydisk).

Yet Wikipedia's page for the Indo-Aryan Migration http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indo-Aryan_migration states:

However, recent extensive studies conducted on genetics and archaeogenetics of the South Asian population have found no proof of large population migrations, since at least 10,000 years, and that Indo-Aryan language speakers have a largely South Asian origin.

and sites three sources to substantiate this claim:

1. ^ a b c Sahoo, Sanghamitra; Anamika Singh, G. Himabindu, Jheelam Banerjee, T. Sitalaximi, Sonali Gaikwad, R. Trivedi, Phillip Endicott, Toomas Kivisild, Mait Metspalu, Richard Villems and V. K. Kashyap (2006-01-24). "A prehistory of Indian Y chromosomes: Evaluating demic diffusion scenarios". Proceedings of National Academy of Sciences of United States of America 103 (4): 843–848. doi:10.1073/pnas.0507714103. http://www.pnas.org/cgi/content/full/103/4/843.
2. ^ a b Sengupta, S.; et al. (2006-02-01). "Polarity and temporality of high-resolution y-chromosome distributions in India identify both indigenous and exogenous expansions and reveal minor genetic influence of Central Asian pastoralists.". Am J Hum Genet. (The American Society of Human Genetics) 78 (2): 201–221. PMID 16400607. http://www.pubmedcentral.nih.gov/articlerender.fcgi?tool=pubmed&pubmedid=16400607. Retrieved 2007-12-03.
3. ^ a b Sharma, S.; Saha A, Rai E, Bhat A, Bamezai R. (2005). "Human mtDNA hypervariable regions, HVR I and II, hint at deep common maternal founder and subsequent maternal gene flow in Indian population groups.". J Hum Genet. 50 (10): 497–506. doi:10.1007/s10038-005-0284-2. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/sites/entrez?db=pubmed&cmd=Retrieve&dopt=AbstractPlus&list_uids=16205836&query_hl=1&itool=pubmed_docsum. Retrieved 2007-12-03.

Is the page on Indo-European Languages using now defunct Aryan Invasion Theory? Scholars generally agree now that there was no Invasion via chariots. Specifically I point you to page 239 of Culture Throughout Time 1991 (Stanford University Press). I will come back with more sources to further substantiate this, if need be.

Derived (talk) 06:47, 20 September 2009 (UTC)

This is an article on languages, not genetics, which are of absolutely no use in determining how languages spread. +Angr 16:22, 20 September 2009 (UTC)

Satem and Centum languages

I notice this section is tagged. I just worked on Centum-Satem isogloss, which needed a lot of work. I notice this section contains a lot of issues already addressed and corrected in the other article. The incorrect picture is repeated yet once again (aren't there any others?) Either this write-up could be corrected, which would amount to doing another but shorter article similar to Centum-Satem isogloss or we can just defer to the other article, which contains everything mentioned here and more. I don't like to capture the same ground twice so if no one objects I am just going to remove the contents of this subsection. As far as the jargon is concerned - well, maybe. It is too conversational and it is too opinionated.Dave (talk) 12:53, 5 December 2009 (UTC)

Removed image

I removed this image:

• Image of Indo-European migrations from the Armenian Highlands

I have no criticism of the graphics, which are very fine. Nice work, I hope you get an A. You must know of course that this graphic represents one point of view about the origin of Indo-European; moreover, it is not the mainstream view, which places them between and above the Black and Caspian Seas. But again, there is plenty of room in Wikipedia for minority views; in fact, I think they ought to be encouraged in the people's encyclopedia. No, that is not my beef. Whoever's point of view it is needs to be identified. The author and publisher need to be stated. Who's view do you say this is? Who did the graphic? How do we know you didn't lift it from somewhere? Wikipedia asks that you try to use templates such as cite web, which provide a uniform look and ask for standard information. Now I find that we are all blocked from the site, which is provided by UPenn history department. That brings a further complication. Now, it appears as though you have a personal site at the department, which is generally true of students. That means, this could be your personal until now unpublished creative work, or more likely you did an imitation or rehash from Scientific American (the original publisher of this Russian point of view). So, I hope you will not be too astounded if I ask for references on this, and a location of the private pages of UPENN history department is not that. We have plenty of course blurbs but typically the professor gives his name and takes credit and responsibility and the blurb is already published in one form or another. Reference please. Ciao.Dave (talk) 02:37, 10 December 2009 (UTC)

the informations about the Aryans are resebled to Iranian which is a bigg mistake, that shouldnt be divided by sub-iranian branches . Afghans(Pashtons) and their language Pashto is not sub-iranian branch of language but its separate a North-Eastern-Aryanian Language of the Indo-European tree. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 84.49.128.102 (talk) 04:39, 19 January 2010 (UTC)

There goes the second image

I removed this:

• Indo-European family tree, showing Indo-European languages and sub branches

The problem with this one is basically the same. It is stored on Professor Clark Ford's site. Now, nothing on this image or with it identifies it as the work of professor Ford. He could just be keeping it there for personal reference. Moreover, the professor's field is far removed from Indo-European linguistics. I don't think he did this, especially as it turns up at a few other locations of the Internet without his name. You know, just because the Internet makes it possible to invade privacy even more than before does not mean we can use material obtained in this way. We need an author and a publisher here. If the author designated it for public use it does not matter if we view it in the good professor's site, just as he does. If not, it is against the law for the professor to publish it like that and for us to use it like this. Not to mentions the fact that as far as we know now it might be original unpublished creative material. Reference please. Ciao.Dave (talk) 02:57, 10 December 2009 (UTC)

I think it's a redrawn copy of a tree I've seen before, in old books: the loop of II around the BS limb is distinctive. —Tamfang (talk) 16:51, 3 April 2011 (UTC)

I think its free, because it first was published before 1900, and for such old works there is no copy right, scientists at that time were not crazy like those of our times. But it is a question of fairness to cite the author correctly, even if he lived together with those Jesuits, who first developped the idea of that language family some four centuries ago. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 130.133.155.66 (talk) 17:49, 21 August 2012 (UTC)

The file http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/4/4f/IndoEuropeanTree.svg, is not unproblematic either. It erroneously lists Norwegian as a West Scandinavian language. The only extant West Scandinavian languages are Faroese and Icelandic. //roger.duprat.copenhagen —Preceding unsigned comment added by 79.138.228.148 (talk) 07:03, 3 April 2011 (UTC)

Cite sources please. (Or list common innovations that define Norwegian as East Scandinavian. I don't even know a lot of diagnostic markers which are truly reliable as most, for example monophthongisation, are just tendencies not without dialectal exceptions; the one really old criterion, the ku/ko isogloss, squarely places Norwegian into West Scandinavian, in any dialect. To establish reliable isoglosses for East and West Scandinavian, you need to study all the medieval dialects, namely Old Icelandic, Old Norwegian, Old Swedish, Old Gutnish and Old Danish, as well as the modern dialects.) I'm curious. The scholarly consensus I'm familiar with is that Norwegian is, indeed, West Scandinavian. --Florian Blaschke (talk) 03:26, 13 May 2011 (UTC)

There is another glitch in there - it gives Pictish as indo-european, which is not proven and probably not true. All those Pictish words, especially place names, are not accepted as being of indo-european origin. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 130.133.155.66 (talk) 17:56, 21 August 2012 (UTC)

Not really, it's pretty much accepted by now among Celtologists that Pictish was indeed a Celtic language, quite possibly simply the part of Britannic cut off by the erection of the Antonine Wall and Hadrian's Wall, even if some placenames may have pre-Indo-European origins. But that is a relatively recent development, granted. --Florian Blaschke (talk) 22:40, 19 August 2014 (UTC)

Sorry, this is not right. May be some scholars want Pictish to be indo-european, but this is highly unlikely, since the indo-european language appeared in Britain not before 2000 before Chr., probably even not before 1200 before Chr.. Before there was the megalith-culture, and this certainly was not of indo-european origin, coming very likely from the mediterrenean around Spain by ship. It is more likely that Pictish is of that origin. To speak of Celtic before 800 before Chr. is highly speculative, at that time the Celts were a small, barbaric gang near the river Rhone in Southern France (Udolph). Some scholars even deny their existence at all, which in turn is to radical an idea. It makes sense, to explain some features of insular Celtic different from continental Celtic by an Pictish/Megalitic superstrat. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 171.100.79.6 (talk) 12:33, 29 November 2014 (UTC)

American Heritage Dictionary

To all of us Internet Indo-Europeanists the sudden pulling of the American Heritage Dictionary from Bartleby.com was a low blow. It is hard to remember what a great asset it was and how lucky we were to have it. Some people like to take candy away from babies. I remember when uemployment was made taxable, which ever after was greatly regretted, but no one seems to have the power to reverse it. Houghton-Mifflin is after all in business to make money, and why should they give us anything for free? I will not even wonder what Calvert Watkins thinks of this move. I remember him as a totally helpful man if you can accept being always wrong and never right. That is how it seems to students anyway. Regardless of why Houghton Mifflin did it and why the people allowed their unemployment to be taxed and what Calvert may think of this unhelpful act, it is done and we have lost a great intellectual asset. Things will never be the same. Oh well, you can buy the paper book; it is less than 100, or used to be - but it isn't the same as the Internet, you know that. But - there is a ray of hope. I do not know how long it will last. Internet Archive has got it. I have changed the link from Bartelby to archived Bartleby. There are a large number of online links to roots in the AHD so there is a tremendous amount of work to do in fixing it. Watkins is on Google also but you never can count on links to their material so we might be better off just referencing the paper books.Dave (talk) 05:05, 10 December 2009 (UTC)

Beekes' book

isbn=90-272-2151-0 (Europe), ISBN 1-55619-505-2 (U.S.) May be invalid - please double check

Is your typing hand broken? Check it yourself. Anyway I invoked "find it in a library" and what do you know, no library has it. There's some for sale second-hand in the usual places. "Find it in a library" also gave the publisher's info. Even though only one edition is listed, there are several ISBN's. This is the case with many books. In cases such as that I never list the ISBN as that is equivalent to plugging one edition, format or seller and not another. We told them enough to locate the book, we are not helping them to buy it or anyone else to sell it.Dave (talk) 02:01, 15 December 2009 (UTC)

ISBN's are generally worthless because there are different ISBN's for paperback, hardback, kindle, etc. (Taivo (talk) 05:54, 15 December 2009 (UTC))

Sidetrack section removed

(Removed sidetrack section. If you guys want to keep it, I won't object.) (Taivo (talk) 15:49, 20 January 2010 (UTC))

Sanskrit

to be fair, the three main pillars of PIE reconstruction are Vedic Sanskrit, Greek and Anatolian (Hittite), because these three give a "direct" glimpse of the Bronze Age. The point that Sanskrit records do not survive in any material manuscripts dating to the Bronze Age (as Taivo correctly points out) is of limited importance. --dab (𒁳) 07:37, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

Vedic is, indeed, one of the three pillars of PIE reconstruction, no question there. But that's because it preserves (in the early Iron Age) some archaic features that are not preserved in Anatolian and Greek. We surmise that it is a good record of the language of the Bronze Age, but because there is no actual documentation from the Bronze Age, we cannot be certain. We know that "orally preserved" languages may change less than living languages, but they still change nonetheless--Modern Ecclesiastical Latin is different than Medieval Ecclesiastical Latin which is different than Classical Latin even though there have been no native speakers since at least the fifth or sixth century or so. It's just part of the process. I'm not trying to downplay the importance of Vedic in reconstruction, just trying to put it into perspective. The date of attestation is very important in how much confidence we can place in the total accuracy of the form at a given time. If Vedic had not preserved structures that Greek and Anatolian had not, then its importance would be much less. Our records of Iranian predate Vedic, but while there is some importance to those languages in reconstruction, they still show more widespread changes than Vedic. (Taivo (talk) 13:37, 27 January 2010 (UTC))

well, you're telling me nothing I don't know, and I imagine I am telling you nothing you don't know. The point is, of course, that Vedic recitation isn't your basic oral tradition, it is oral tradition on steroids, with the effect that there is universal or near-universal consensus that the Rigveda preserves language of the Late Bronze Age without any alteration, especially after you do some trivial metric restoration to the Samhitapatha. The point is not that I believe this but that this is the mainstream position, which is, as I expect you are aware, extremely easy to establish. --dab (𒁳) 15:31, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

Agreed, it's probably not your typical oral tradition, and Vedic rightfully deserves an important place at the reconstructive table. But despite the fact that it's a lot better than just swapping the same old yarn around the campfire for years, it's still not quite the same as written attestation. If the sentence in the article is rewritten to reflect that, I don't have any objection, but as long as we're using the term "attestation", then it can't be listed. I'm sure you wouldn't have any objections to that either. (Taivo (talk) 17:37, 27 January 2010 (UTC))

it is in many ways more reliable than written attestation. Take cuneiform. About half of Hittite phonology is guesswork because it is written with the Akkadian syllabary, and the other half is unknown entirely because it was written with ideograms. --dab (𒁳) 11:08, 16 February 2010 (UTC)

But that's not the case with Vedic, which was written in a clear, phonological system without a lot of ambiguity or uncertainty. And without the written record, of course, we wouldn't know anything about it ;) It may have been a good oral tradition, but until pen hit paper it was still oral and unattested. (Taivo (talk) 13:21, 16 February 2010 (UTC))

(outdent) Vedic is not attested from the Bronze Age and it is only presumed to be based on oral traditions from the Bronze Age. But there's a difference between preserving traditions from the Bronze Age and preserving actual linguistic forms. In that respect, Vedic is rightly valued in I-E studies, but adding it to Bronze Age attestation is a leap of faith. (Taivo (talk) 00:21, 8 April 2010 (UTC))

Perhaps. Or not, that's not up to us to decide. We go by sources. For example Michael Witzel, a prominent Indologist and expert on all things Vedic. See Svādhyāya#Learning one's Vedic recension. Don't argue his position if you find this doubtful and Witzel too credulous, bring counter-citations if you disagree. I have to remind you that Wikipedia is all about appeals to authority. --Florian Blaschke (talk) 22:50, 19 August 2014 (UTC)

Conjugation table - position of Persian

Why exactly is the Persian declension listed under the Armenian column? Is there no modern Armenian descendent of *bʰer- to use, and an empty column would look weird? As it is, it looks like it claims Persian is a contemporary member of Armenian. So shouldn't it be replaced with examples from modern Armenian, or either just left blank? Baranxtu (talk) 17:31, 8 July 2010 (UTC)

Info Box: Subdivision

How can individual languages like "Albanian" have the same status as Language Family's like "Germanic"? The whole list seems utterly anachronistic and arbitrary. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 77.188.85.11 (talk) 03:31, 12 July 2010 (UTC)

Simple: an independent branch going back all the way to PIE having only one (living) descendant. Note that the only IE case is Armenian. Albanian is in fact a small family (macrolanguage) containing (at least) 4 member languages: Tosk (Standard), Gheg, Arvanitika, and Arbëresh. Moreover, the "dialects" of Arvanitika and Arbëresh are actually not (fully) mutually intelligible, and are thus more properly called languages in their own right. --JorisvS (talk) 11:18, 12 July 2010 (UTC)

If Albanian is outrageous, what about Tocharian and Anatolian – branches with no members! —Tamfang (talk) 05:03, 14 July 2010 (UTC)

Roman Stopa

Using methods similar to those of Greenberg, Roman Stopa proved that I.-E. languges are related to the Bushman languages of Southern Africa. See the article in the Polish Wikipedia on Stopa for a reference to his work of 1972. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.132.159.91 (talk) 16:06, 23 July 2010 (UTC)

Well, the very title of his book states "Traces" which is hardly "proving" a relationship; however, any linguist who has read his works may wish to put a note in the article about what the peers in this discipline had to say about it. Was this mere coincidence? Were the wrong conclusions drawn? If not, how did an IE influence arrive in that portion of Africa without affecting the surrounding areas' peoples? HammerFilmFan (talk) 10:13, 2 March 2011 (UTC)

It simply proves the method is flawed. --JorisvS (talk) 18:16, 2 March 2011 (UTC)

Indo-Germanic

There is a redirect from "Indo-Germanic" to "Indo-European". I thought that it was an alternate name, albeit rare. I wouldn't count a mention of that as "vandalism", but I'm not going to do anything without discussion. TomS TDotO (talk) 09:47, 9 October 2010 (UTC)

"Indo-Germanic" is a translation of what the family is called in German --Indo-Germanisch-- but it's never called that in English. --Taivo (talk) 11:54, 9 October 2010 (UTC)

I don't see why it wouldn't be appropriate to mention that in this article. Especially as there is a redirect here from "Indo-Germanic". I suppose that someone would ask for a "cite". TomS TDotO (talk) 13:34, 9 October 2010 (UTC)

In the nineteenth century, wouldn't "Indo-Germanic" have been used in English as well? And the whole concept of Indo-European languages arose from German scholars in the nineteenth century. It might be worth mentioning. john k (talk) 13:54, 9 October 2010 (UTC)

I have collected information on this here. Perhaps a short summary wouldn't be superfluous in this article. --dab (𒁳) 11:26, 10 October 2010 (UTC)

Thanks. Looks good. But it does need a reference. TomS TDotO (talk) 14:07, 10 October 2010 (UTC)

I apologise for labelling it as "vandalism". The edit was done by an editor who had just changed German to the most spoken Indo-European language, so I just threw it in with that. "Indo-Germanic" is very rarely used in English, though. Hayden120 (talk) 01:32, 11 October 2010 (UTC)

This [4] any good as a source? Itsmejudith (talk) 14:32, 11 October 2010 (UTC)

Szeremennyi is a good linguist, and the book is a standard, but it's hard to wade through. If you're looking for an introduction to Indo-European that is readable, the Fortson volume published by Blackwell is the best in English, I think. --Taivo (talk) 15:42, 11 October 2010 (UTC)

Isn't the terminology of "Indo-Germanic" a bit outdated? I cannot find a single source earlier than 1915. I'm also gonna guess that this terminology is rooted in 19th century German nationalism.Volunteer Marek (talk) 05:56, 14 May 2011 (UTC)

Wough Marek, you have done nice research work! 1915 was the great war (WW I) and many German notations in the anglo-saxon world were changed to English. Another example: Berlin near Waterloo/Ontario was changed to Kitchener, remembering Lord Kitchener of the Sudan. But one name wasn't changed: Merck (from the NYSE and the Dow) remained Merck, although being a reparation from the German Merck (named after its founder), which still exists today. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 130.133.155.68 (talk) 07:54, 22 August 2012 (UTC)

Actually it originated from geographical considerations. Basically if you look at the extent of the IE languages before about 1492, the Easternmost languages were Indic, and the Westernmost was Germanic (Icelandic). So it was named after the furthest Eastern and Western families. I believe Germans still use "Indogermanik", but in English it is usually Indo-european. Ekwos (talk) 01:54, 22 May 2011 (UTC)

The notion ,indo-germanic' was introduced by a Dane, not by a German. It should not be used in an English written text (only in German ones - perhaps also in Danish ones), unless there is a conference, in which the majority of scholars accepts a change. But certainly a historical notion is more appropiate than a geographical one, do not confuse space and time. This applies especially to ,afro-asiatic' instead of ,semitic' . — Preceding unsigned comment added by 171.100.79.6 (talk) 13:10, 30 November 2014 (UTC)

the undoing of Dhruvekhera

I'll bite. Why is "the Iranian plateau and South Asia" preferred to "the Indian Subcontinent and the Iranian plateau"? At least the latter form clearly doesn't include Burma. —Tamfang (talk) 23:33, 5 November 2010 (UTC)

That wasn't the only issue involved. The main reason I reverted the edit was that it also removed information later in the article. The whole edit was heavily POV-oriented toward placing references to Indo-Aryan ahead of Iranian. If the sole point of the edit was to improve the wording that you spoke of, then I wouldn't have a beef. But when an edit is clearly and unequivocally to push a POV, then that is another matter. It wouldn't have mattered to me which direction the POV had been pushed, an edit solely to push a POV is not an acceptable edit. --Taivo (talk) 01:22, 6 November 2010 (UTC)

"Genetic"

The word "genetic" is not directly explained, and could be confusing to those who don't know the special linguistic meaning of the word... AnonMoos (talk) 00:51, 19 December 2010 (UTC)

"Genetic" is the correct linguistic term. If someone doesn't understand, that's why the term has a wikilink to Genetic relationship (linguistics). --Taivo (talk) 02:10, 19 December 2010 (UTC)

I'd say standard rather than correct; the metaphor is so weak as to make one cringe, if one happens to be me. —Tamfang (talk) 02:55, 19 December 2010 (UTC)

There are two separate questions, Tamfang. If you are asking, "What is the best term to have a perfect metaphor for language relationship?", then you can alleviate your "cringe" by stating that "genetic" is not correct. However, Wikipedia is not the place to be conducting original research. The second question is what we ask on Wikipedia, "What is the term that linguists use as a metaphor for language relationship?" That question has a correct answer, and that answer is "genetic". --Taivo (talk) 05:03, 19 December 2010 (UTC)

It's not even a metaphor. Because the term has nothing to with genes. "Genetic" is simply used in the literal Ancient Greek sense here, namely "with regard to origin (genesis)". Since Indo-Europeanists are expected to be familiar with Ancient Greek, it's not confusing to them, only to people who lack a classical humanist education – which is unfortunately true of most natural and formal scientists nowadays, who will connect the word "genetic" only with genetics as a field of biology. --Florian Blaschke (talk) 23:00, 19 August 2014 (UTC)

Conjugation comparison tables

I've modified the two conjugation comparison tables. In the basic sense, I've fixed the styling so that it's easier to read and doesn't have strange/redundant markup (for some reason, every table cell was colspan="4"); there is now a difference between header cells and regular cells, but I've retained the text centering on all cells.

Back in July, somebody made an edit to show that Persian was not part of the Armenian subgroup—it was a good thought, but it was executed poorly. I've rectified that by creating an "Iranian" column and putting that and "Indo-Aryan" under an "Indo-Iranian" column. I've also properly left a space for modern Armenian examples. In a subsequent edit, I rearranged the columns to match File:IndoEuropeanTree.svg, which is supposedly ordered based on specific evidence; I've excluded dead-end branches for simplicity. I added the "Albanian" branch, as well as a "Baltic" branch under the "Balto-Slavic" header.

Here's what's to be done: I've changed some of the names and expanded some of abbreviations; we can easily haggle over those changes, but they were motivated by the tree diagram and verbosity. What we really need are examples of the languages we are now missing:

• Ancient Representatives
  • an Iranian language
  • a Baltic language
  • Old Albanian
• Modern Representatives
  • modern Armenian
  • a Baltic language
    • Latvian or Lithuanian
  • modern Albanian

So if anyone can dig up some references for those, that'd be great. We may also want to note when the ancient representative did not directly evolve into the modern representative (e.g. Gothic and German). Hope that helps. —Gordon P. Hemsley→✉ 09:11, 19 December 2010 (UTC)

This example table perfectly illustrates the problem of Balto-Slavic. There is no word with this ber- root in Lithuanian. The closest would be the noun “bernas”, meaning nearly the same as “ett barn” in Swedish- a child, a boy. This now is my speculation, but a verb with possibly related semantics could be “pereti”, that means “to lay on eggs”. If that’s true, you once again have a case when Lithuanian forms are closer to Latin than to Slavic.Gotho-Baltic 15:50, 12 January 2011 (UTC) — Preceding unsigned comment added by Gotho-Baltic (talk • contribs)

I looked it up in Fraenkel's Lithuanian Etymology Dictionary here: http://www.indo-european.nl/cgi-bin/response.cgi?root=leiden&morpho=0&basename=\data\ie\fraenkel&first=1&text_word=&method_word=substring&text_etym=&method_etym=substring&text_pages=&method_pages=substring&text_any=berti&method_any=substring&sort=word According to this Lithuanian word "berti" (meaning 1. strew; scatter 2. break out ; 3. sow ;. shed tears) is derived from the indo-european * bher- 'bear, give'. My suggestion would be to include lithuanian as an ancient representative so that dual verb forms could also be mentioned as they are still used in dialects (the reference for this can be found here: http://www.lki.lt/LKI_LT/images/Padaliniai/Gramatikos_skyrius/3_skyrius.pdf in page 74). There is no space for dual in the table for the modern representatives. Then Latvian could be the modern representative if there is a word derived from *bher in Latvian. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Smurkst (talk • contribs) 12:22, 27 February 2011 (UTC)

The reason I added Lithuanian example for Proto-Indo-European(*bʰer- 'to carry') Comparison of conjugations under the "Ancient Representatives" instead of "Modern Representatives" is because there was no place for dual under "Modern Representatives". The example of how dual is conjugated in Lithuanian dialects can be seen here: http://www.lituanus.org/1969/69_3_02.htm

Singular aš einu 'I go, I am going' tu eini ('thou goest') jis eina 'he goes'

Plural mes einame 'we go' jūs einate 'you go' ie eina 'they go'

Dual mudu (mudvi) einava 'we two ('we two", fern.) go' judu (judvi) einata 'you two ('you two', fern.) go' jiedu (jiedvi) eina 'they two ('they two', fern.) go'19 — Preceding unsigned comment added by Smurkst (talk • contribs) 19:21, 19 April 2012 (UTC)

Then add a line for dual under the modern forms. Lithuanian is not an ancient representative. Adding dual and Lithuanian under the modern forms will be more relevant since readers can then clearly see that the Baltic languages are the only ones that preserve the dual. --Taivo (talk) 19:45, 19 April 2012 (UTC)

Where's the criticism?

Where's the criticism for this theory of a language family? 71.212.214.163 (talk) 07:00, 15 January 2011 (UTC)

Look for reliable sources and construct a NPOV section, and then collaborate with other editors to build a consensus view on the matter. Or are your plans just to periodically show up to inject criticisms on talk pages of contentious subjects without actually doing anything useful to them, as your contribs seem to suggest?Heiro 06:38, 18 January 2011 (UTC)

none has been voiced for about 100 years now. It's a bit like Newton's theory of gravity, everybody agrees that it doesn't capture the whole truth, but that isn't "criticism". --dab (𒁳) 06:40, 18 January 2011 (UTC)

http://www.thedyinggod.com/aryan-myth

http://www.khyber.org/articles/2005/TheGreatAryanMyth.shtml http://archaeology.about.com/od/indusrivercivilizations/a/aryans.htm — Preceding unsigned comment added by 70.59.22.166 (talk • contribs)

Irrelevant. Claiming that a large number of languages have a common ancestor is very different indeed from claiming that all their speakers are descended from the same group of people. This article is about the Indo-European language family, not any Indo-European "race". The existence of the language family is not disputed by any reputable scholars. garik (talk) 19:10, 21 March 2012 (UTC)

An Indo-European "race" in the sense that all speakers of Indo-European languages are descended from them obviously cannot exist. My favourite example is Philipp Rösler. His native language is German (with English as second language) and he quite possibly speaks not a single word of the language of his biological parents (Vietnamese), because he was adopted as a baby. I think he has stated he feels no connection with Vietnam at all and considers Germany his home country. But he may well not have a single ancestor from Europe, even if you go back into deep prehistory. Biological and linguistic ancestry are simply not correlated (at least not necessarily, especially on the individual level: the R1a1a Y-DNA haplogroup is widely spread among populations that have been Indo-European-speaking for a long time, as in since the Bronze Age, while in regions that have been linguistically and culturally Indo-Europeanised later, such as in Spain or Crete, it is rare). Also, speakers of Hungarian, Estonian and Finnish are biologically more Indo-European than some Indo-European-speaking populations. --Florian Blaschke (talk) 23:24, 19 August 2014 (UTC)

• Any "criticism" in the form of doubts about whether the Indo-European languages form an actual language family would be thoroughly fringe. "Criticism" in the form of discussion of how to improve the classification and understanding of indo-european prehistory is already present in the article.User:Maunus ·ʍaunus·snunɐw· 23:38, 19 August 2014 (UTC)

Classification is wrong

the oldest text of the gathas is written in gathic wich is so old that is why linguistics date zoroastrianism to 1800 bc it is older then just 1000 bc way older i dates from 1500-1200 bc actually that is why gathic is incredibly close to vedic sanskrit it can´t be from around 1000 bc the gathas is just way to old it whas written in very old avestan 1500 bc is a good date but atleast 1200 bc that is the minimum —Preceding unsigned comment added by 148.160.183.70 (talk) 14:44, 21 January 2011 (UTC)

No, you are mistaken. The dating of the Gathas is around 1000 BCE. (Mark Hale, "Avestan", The Cambridge Encyclopedia of the World's Languages (2004, Cambridge)). --Taivo (talk) 17:13, 21 January 2011 (UTC)

Recent IP additions

Can someone with access to the book cited check the recent IP additions here [5] and [6]. I don't have access to the book they cite, and their reasoning in the edit summary has me wondering. I am always a little distrustful of someone inserting something into an already existing sentence, especially with such reasoning. As they have already IP hopped to 3 different addresses, talking with them other than here may be difficult. Heiro 04:46, 20 April 2011 (UTC)

It would help if a specific passage in Renfrew's book could be cited, rather than the book as a whole. Also, can someone tell us how "Shared features of Phrygian and Greek and of Thracian and Armenian", without reference to features of II, define a grouping that includes II? —Tamfang (talk) 19:03, 20 April 2011 (UTC)

Unless the additions can be cited to a specific page and checked, maybe they should be removed?Heiro 19:28, 20 April 2011 (UTC)

IE Footprint in 1500

The principle difference between and the actual extent in 1500 is the push to the North in eastern europe, at this point the Duchy of Moscow hadn't become the Tsardom of Russia and begun its push to the Pacific. So saying the IEs had global extent any time before the 16th century is flat false and the coverage shown in the current map wasn't established until the late 19th with the Scramble for Africa. Lycurgus (talk) 13:50, 2 June 2011 (UTC)

This map is for 500 AD a very useful one, except for one tiny item: Germanic settlements in Morokko (in the Rif) are not proven, contrary to those around Karthago in todays Tunesia. And in Spain Gothic settlements were around Toledo, at least 80 km south of Toledo, the gothic capital, and perhaps along El Cid's route (and some in Galicia). Undoubtedly everything like that was wiped out with the moslem conquest of the peninsula. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 130.133.155.68 (talk) 08:06, 22 August 2012 (UTC)

So are you saying the North African kingdom of the Vandals was a myth, as well as the numerous accounts of its history and war with Byzantium - or that their patently East Germanic language was not Germanic at all? Harsimaja (talk) 16:24, 17 September 2012 (UTC)

Please Harsimaja, learn English. The preceding remark tells you, that the Vandals are proven around Karthago, that is in today's Tunesia, and not in Morocco, as coloured in this map (and never use the word so, because it needs a logical conclusion). By the way - travelling in the Rif mountains of Morocco, I found only one river name which might be from a Vandal language, which is far too little, to draw any conclusion from. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 171.100.79.6 (talk) 13:56, 30 November 2014 (UTC)

Homer composition.

I have changed a bit the Homer note.

The Iliad of Homer was composed in post-Mycenaean period (IX BC – VIII BC see Homer) due to the presence of modern variants of deities. However, the story took place in the Mycenaean period and it's been passed down orally from that period. The form that we know has been crystallized in writing probably around VIII-VII century BC when borned the modern alphabet derived from Phoenician.

Interesting is the fact of the passage of Bronze Age to Iron Age see Achilles armature made by Hephaestus. Indeed the Dorians used Iron.

--Andriolo (talk) 17:31, 3 June 2011 (UTC)

It doesn't matter when the story dates to, the written form is 8th century. This article is about the language, not the story of the Trojan War or the Bronze Age/Iron Age transition. --Taivo (talk) 00:27, 4 June 2011 (UTC)

Probably I am not clear. I agree with you about text became written down in VIII-VII century but I think that this sentence confuses the date of composition with the date of writing. “Tradition”, does not mean written but oral. The etymon of “tradition” is corpus consuetudinary (for a folk or group). So Homeric tradition doesn’t date 8th century BC because it is older (probably soon after the Mycenaean period in the Greek dark age). I propose to modify the sentence in “Homer written texts may date 8th century BC.” or “Iliad and Odyssey were probably written in 8th century BC”. --Andriolo (talk) 11:51, 4 June 2011 (UTC)

"Texts" is simpler and cleaner. I changed it to that. --Taivo (talk) 12:01, 4 June 2011 (UTC)

Ok... Ciao --Andriolo (talk) 12:05, 4 June 2011 (UTC)

Archeology re: Indoeuropean Language family.

Hi all! Can someone please help? I am not that much familiar with the subject of the article, and going through the article could not find anything relevant to archeology. I mean if there ever was this great civilization of Indoeuropeans surely they must have lived in an area before their migrations.

• Does archeology support the Kurgan hypothesis and the Indoeuropean theory at large?
• Are their any archeological findings? A city, a village, pottery or anything of the sort.
• Could someone please suggest a reference or point me to the right direction in order to answer this puzzling question?

The article right from the beginning reads as if the indoeuropean family of languages is a certain undisputed fact and not a theory. Is that the case? Thank you!! 23x2 (talk) 18:09, 19 June 2011 (UTC)

This is an article about languages, not archeology. Yes, the Indo-European family of languages is an undisputed fact, not a theory. I don't know where you'd find an article on archeology, but I suggest you start at Kurgan hypothesis and follow a couple of wikilinks. One theory links the Sredny Stog culture with the Proto-Indo-Europeans. --Taivo (talk) 21:03, 19 June 2011 (UTC)

There might not have been "this great civilization". There was definitely a language Proto-Indo-European, and it was definitely diffused, eventually to cover an area from Ireland to Bengal. Who did the diffusing, what their technological level was, whether it amounted to being "civilized", whether they kept herds of animals, grew crops, or both, is still a matter of speculation. Itsmejudith (talk) 21:40, 19 June 2011 (UTC)

Thank you both for your response. All the best! 23x2 (talk) 17:38, 20 June 2011 (UTC)

Tartessian

I would like to know what peer-reviewed paper says that is disputed as an Indo-European and Celtic language since John T. Koch first published his thorough attempt at translation and classification in 2008 with increasing confidence now that he has looked at the longest and complete inscription (see peer-reviewed chapters in books "Celtic from the West" and "Tartessian 2". All I have seen is support since from other academics in the Tartessian space (e.g. Guerra and Villar). Please tell me.Jembana (talk) 04:02, 27 June 2011 (UTC)

I'm not going to insist on the word "disputed", but it seems appropriate to give citations here - and, more importantly, edit the article Tartessian language to reflect recent scholarship. TomS TDotO (talk) 16:11, 27 June 2011 (UTC)

Sure - I will add the citations and I am currently editing the Tartessian language page to update it - there is a rather large amount of material to put there :)Jembana (talk) 22:06, 27 June 2011 (UTC)

Tartessian is not Celtic according to the vast majority of opinion on the matter. Paul S (talk) 19:22, 3 July 2013 (UTC)

Number of Speakers

Well we've been changing this number several times and we need to fix the problem. Ethnologue goes with 2.7 billion http://www.ethnologue.com/ethno_docs/distribution.asp?by=family A fellow told me that we don't know how many of them natives, but clearly Ethnologue are counting natives as can be seen in the section "Language size" http://www.ethnologue.com/ethno_docs/distribution.asp?by=size (English= 328 million). However, if anyone have doubts and wants to add new sources it would be interesting. --Bentaguayre (talk) 12:48, 11 July 2011 (UTC)

The sentence that you keep changing concerns speakers of the twelve biggest IE languages. That number, according to my adding-up of the numbers in the Ethnologue "Language size" page cited, is 1767 million. If there are another billion IE natives, let that be said in another sentence. —Tamfang (talk) 20:02, 22 July 2011 (UTC)

If Ethnologue says one table counts only native speakers, it's likely that another Ethnologue table also counts only native speakers, but not safe to assume in my humble opinion. —Tamfang (talk) 20:04, 22 July 2011 (UTC)

Removed obsolete terms from lede

"Indo-Germanic" and "arian" [sic] are obsolete terms that are only of minor historical relevance, and are thus too trivial for mention in the lede. "Indo-Germanic" is already mentioned in the lede, and "aryan" languages currently refer exclusively to a particular sub-family. Dominus Vobisdu (talk) 15:46, 15 August 2011 (UTC)

Balto-Slavic POW pushing

There is no consensus about BSl, see for example International Encyclopedia of Linguistics, William J. Frawley (Editor), Oxford University Press, 2003. The ongoing POW pushing certainly has consequences on misleading millions of readers. This let's-play-science-game went that far that in several other related WP articles the Baltic as a linguistic group “disappeared” at all. This is already about falsification of information. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 217.64.252.30 (talk) 21:55, 19 January 2012 (UTC)

International Encyclopedia of Linguistics, Page 196: "2. Classification. The shared features of Baltic and Slavic have led many scholars to propose an intermediate Balto-Slavic family within IE; however, this view has been disputed by scholars who argue for a separate, if parallel, evolution of Baltic from IE. This issue remains open."

Coppied this from Talk:Baltic languages:

"The vast majority of Indo-Europeanists accept Baltic as a valid single clade within Indo-European (see the various stammbaum offered in all the modern introductory texts on Indo-European--Fortson, Clackson, etc.). The notion that there was no Baltic clade is not supported within the mainstream Indo-European literature. The whole section "Modern interpretation" is not based on modern, accepted Indo-European scholarship, but is a WP:FRINGE position from the 1960s. It is not accepted in the 21st century by the vast majority of Indo-Europeanists. Fortson (2010, Indo-European Language and Culture), Mallory & Adams (2006, The Oxford Introduction to Proto-Indo-European and the Proto-Indo-European World), Szemerényi (1990, Introduction to Indo-European Linguistics), Beekes (1995, Comparative Indo-European Linguistics), Schmalsteig (1998, "The Baltic Languages," The Indo-European Languages, ed. Ramat & Ramat), Clackson (2007, Indo-European Linguistics), Baldi (1983, An Introduction to the Indo-European Languages), etc. all support Baltic as a clade. This is the mainstream position and the "Baltic is not a clade" is a minority view and to give it an entire section violates WP:UNDUE. --Taivo (talk) 17:38, 1 May 2011 (UTC)" Count du Monét (talk) 20:46, 24 May 2012 (UTC)

A clade is the set of all descendants of some common ancestor, at any level. Whether Baltic is a clade is independent of whether Balto-Slavic is also a clade — that is, none of these four possibilities is illogical:

• both are clades, one within the other (the usual model, which you want to suppress);
• Baltic is a clade and "Balto-Slavic" not (the model that you're pushing);
• Balto-Slavic is a clade which includes the "Baltic" languages as a non-clade;
• neither is a clade.

North Germanic is (I believe) an uncontroversial clade, and the present article doesn't mention it at all; yet it explicitly mentions Baltic more than once, so how is it suppressing Baltic cladehood? —Tamfang (talk) 21:25, 26 May 2012 (UTC)

compromise

Rather than censoring Balto-Slavic out of the article entirely, how about adding a passage to the effect that "since 1989 the validity of a Balto-Slavic group has increasingly been disputed"? —Tamfang (talk) 21:25, 26 May 2012 (UTC)

"increasingly been disputed" isn't accurate. It is a minority view being primarily pushed by linguists in the Baltic states. --Taivo (talk) 21:57, 26 May 2012 (UTC)

From zero to a handful of nationalist cranks would still be an increase. ;) —Tamfang (talk) 22:03, 26 May 2012 (UTC)

WP:UNDUE and WP:FRINGE apply. The view is essentially limited to nationalistic cranks, and isn't seriously discussed in the real academic community. Dominus Vobisdu (talk) 22:29, 26 May 2012 (UTC)

And, if you look down about halfway through the article, there is a brief mention of the minority view anyway in a listing of the constituent parts of Indo-European. That is more than sufficient for this article and need not be multiplied just to satisfy nationalistic fervor. --Taivo (talk) 22:32, 26 May 2012 (UTC)

There is an easy way out of this controversy: A wave of indo-european people, arriving from the southeast, was divided by the Pripjet swamps. Those who went north became the Baltics, those who went south became the Slavs. The Slavs hided in the Carpathian forests against the constant waves of riders from the east, an Ivan Grosny strategy, and sometimes were named forest-Skyths. This geographical meaningful theory must be completed by giving a date - and exactly that is the problem. Any time between 2200 BC and 200 BC has some merit. The only boundary condition to be included is, that it must have taken place after the Celtic, Italic, Germanic (and early urnfieldculture) invasions of Europe. The question is, can this date be derived from glottochronics, and/or a Gray & Atkinson approach? I think, this analysis should be done by someone without a Baltic or Slavonic background. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 130.133.155.68 (talk) 08:30, 22 August 2012 (UTC)

"possessing the longest recorded history after the Afroasiatic family"

What about Sino-Tibetan (Classical Chinese)? But then again, I suppose if we're counting oral literature, Indo-European might count, with things like the Rigveda and Zoroastrian texts. 216.54.22.188 (talk) 19:36, 6 February 2012 (UTC)

According to Oracle bone script("the oldest member and ancestor of the Chinese family of scripts") dates from "ca. 14th -11th centuries BCE to ca. 1200 to ca. 1050 BC", while Anatolian, the earliest attested branch of Indo-European has isolated terms in Old Assyrian sources from the 19th century BCE, and Hittite texts from about the 16th century BCE. So this would seem to make it older, unless there is something I've overlooked.. Heiro 20:29, 6 February 2012 (UTC)

Revert to former glory, please

Now when I look at this article, somebody has almost deleted it. Can anybody fix it?

Excuse me, can anybody make this article as it is now back to its former glory? Somebody almost deleted it. Hill Crest's WikiLaser (Boom). (talk) 01:32, 9 March 2012 (UTC)

Thanks, reverter. Hill Crest's WikiLaser (Boom). (talk) 01:38, 9 March 2012 (UTC)

Greenland

They speak Danish and English in Greenland, they speak into european languages. Should be on the map.46.194.202.154 (talk) 19:29, 1 August 2012 (UTC)

Greenlandic, an Eskimo–Aleut language, is the main language. --JorisvS (talk) 20:18, 1 August 2012 (UTC)

Opposition

Jespersen said that there was considerable opposition to and ill-feeling towards the comparativists from the classicists. This was in the German-speaking area. The classicists objected to the implication that they did not know Latin and Greek, or even German. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Alaskan Wanderer (talk • contribs) 15:51, 5 August 2012 (UTC)

See Jespersen's 1922 book. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Alaskan Wanderer (talk • contribs) 15:56, 5 August 2012 (UTC)

new origin paper

I'm reverting this addition

According to the research which is reported in Science paper in August 2012, the Modern Indo-European languages including English language is not originated 5,000 years ago in south-west Russia, but originated 9,000 years ago in Turkey.

"English language 'originated in Turkey'". August 25, 2012.

mainly because it was inserted into the section "History of IE linguistics", where it definitely doesn't fit, and I don't see a better place for it. —Tamfang (talk) 07:38, 30 August 2012 (UTC)

I agree, the anatolian hypothesis is not new and the statistical evidence in that aper is not likely to be considered decisive by most linguists.·ʍaunus·snunɐw· 12:30, 30 August 2012 (UTC)

Yes, and the University of Auckland's Simon Greenhill, Russell Gray, and Quentin Atkinson (who have been pushing for a 9,000 year old age and an Anatolian origin even before this new paper) probably don't offer anything new as statistical analysts authoring the paper. Can Bayesian "phylogeographic inference" really resolve the debates about human prehistory as the paper claims? I think it can to an extent. However, I think it is safe to leave the Science article cited in the comparison of the competing models mentioned in the "Proto-Indo-European Urheimat hypotheses" article. -Ano-User (talk) 10:20, 31 August 2012 (UTC)

Kazakhstan?

Kazakhstan's population mainly consists of Kazakh speakers - why is Kazakhstan in dark green? Harsimaja (talk) 16:18, 17 September 2012 (UTC)

Russian is official and widely spoken. StasMalyga (talk) 14:38, 17 September 2012 (UTC)

Yes, I realise that, but is the majority of the population Russian-speaking? When I read that I assume first-language speakers are meant, in which case the answer is no - otherwise Finland should certainly be in dark green too (most Finns CAN speak English, and many can speak Swedish or Russian). Harsimaja (talk) 16:18, 17 September 2012 (UTC)

Kazakhstan article indicates that Russian is more widespread than Kazakh. Most Finns learn English as a foreign language, and it has no status, Russian and Swedish are definably in minority. StasMalyga (talk) 22:06, 17 September 2012 (UTC)

Map question: Greenland

According to the wiki article about Greenland, the use of Danish, while non-official, is still widespread in some sectors, and a significant minority (>10%) speaks Danish only. Hence Greenland should be coloured blue in the map. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 82.48.132.13 (talk) 11:15, 22 October 2012 (UTC)

File:Americaslanguages (orthographic projection)-2.png

Hi,

I see that Greenland and Iceland are not coloured, although the inhabitants of these countries speak an indo-european language (Danish and Icelandic). can someone correct this? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Gertdk (talk • contribs) 15:24, 16 November 2012 (UTC)

This map shows Indo-European languages spoken in Americas and European countries they originally come from. I'm not sure about the status and placement of Greenland (for one thing Greenlandic is the only official language), but Icelandic is not spoken in Americas therefore it's not colored. StasMalyga (talk) 00:37, 17 November 2012 (UTC)

This may be of interest.

http://www.nature.com/ncomms/journal/v4/n4/full/ncomms2656.html — Preceding unsigned comment added by 98.203.97.65 (talk) 22:34, 24 April 2013 (UTC)

Article needs to be bought.

Still here are some parts of the text:

http://dienekes.blogspot.com/2013/04/mtdna-haplogroup-h-and-origin-of.html

Here is part of the text:

From around 2800 BC, the LNE Bell Beaker culture emerged from the Iberian Peninsula to form one of the first pan-European archaeological complexes. This cultural phenomenon is recognised by a distinctive package of rich grave goods including the eponymous bell-shaped ceramic beakers. The genetic affinities between Central Europe’s Bell Beakers and present-day Iberian populations (Fig. 2) is striking and throws fresh light on long-disputed archaeological models3. We suggest these data indicate a considerable genetic influx from the West during the LNE. These far-Western genetic affinities of Mittelelbe-Saale’s Bell Beaker folk may also have intriguing linguistic implications, as the archaeologically-identified eastward movement of the Bell Beaker culture has recently been linked to the initial spread of the Celtic language family across Western Europe39. This hypothesis suggests that early members of the Celtic language family (for example, Tartessian)40 initially developed from Indo-European precursors in Iberia and subsequently spread throughout the Atlantic Zone; before a period of rapid mobility, reflected by the Beaker phenomenon, carried Celtic languages across much of Western Europe. This idea not only challenges traditional views of a linguistic spread of Celtic westwards from Central Europe during the Iron Age, but also implies that Indo-European languages arrived in Western Europe substantially earlier, presumably with the arrival of farming from the Near East41.

It seems that genetic evidence supporting the Iberian hypothesis, paired with archaelogy, is ever-growing. A lot has been already published concerning the Iberian-Basque-British Isles connection. Now this seems to continue in other European areas like Germnay.

Pipon — Preceding unsigned comment added by 98.203.97.65 (talk) 23:04, 24 April 2013 (UTC)

This proves nothing, because the genes are not inherently linked to Celtic. What if the language of the Bell-Beaker people was a precursor of Basque or Iberian or some completely unknown and long-extinct language? The genes won't tell us on their own. That's the same fallacy criticised with "pots don't speak", only repeated for genes. You can't just simply assume a correlation, you have to argue for it.

Celtic is unlikely because in the mid/late first century BC, all attested Celtic languages are quite similar, and especially Lepontic in the 6th century BC is highly similar to reconstructed Proto-Celtic, their common origin, so Proto-Celtic and the beginning of the Celtic expansion is probably not 2000 years older. --Florian Blaschke (talk) 23:52, 19 August 2014 (UTC)

Mistake in the map

Turkey, Azerbaijan and Uzbekistan should be colored blue as they have significant minorities of IE speakers. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 68.4.123.133 (talk) 00:48, 23 June 2013 (UTC)

I'm not sure that is a mistake. It may be a design decision to show the main languages of an area. JamesBWatson (talk) 20:48, 5 October 2013 (UTC)

Also, the map makes a distinction between Lurish, "Persico" and Kurdish which should rather be grouped together under Iranian or Indo-Iranian (parallel to Slavic, Germanic, etc.) TomS TDotO (talk) 18:17, 5 October 2013 (UTC)

True, though you are talking about a completely different map from the one in the above post. I have edited the map you refer to, to correct that point. JamesBWatson (talk) 20:48, 5 October 2013 (UTC)

Official linguistic map of Europe

http://fc06.deviantart.net/fs70/f/2013/243/8/8/linguistic_map_of_europe_by_1blomma-d6k1i1x.png — Preceding unsigned comment added by 31.45.223.190 (talk) 00:22, 18 November 2013 (UTC)

Who made this? In what way is it official? It's very nice (although there are one or two oddities in country names). garik (talk) 17:30, 20 November 2013 (UTC)

Comment

"The Indo-European languages are a family (or phylum) of several hundred related languages and dialects." Speling12345 (talk) 2:29, 13 December 2013 (UTC)

What's your point? --JorisvS (talk) 08:45, 13 December 2013 (UTC)

Removal of Messapic, Philistine and Thracian from the infobox...

I removed the aforementioned languages from the infobox for the following reasons:

1. Philistine is not confirmed to be an Indo-European language. It was merely suggested, by some linguists, that Philistine might have been an Indo-European language but there's nothing that can conclusively prove it was. Adding it to the infobox would be as ridiculous as adding Hunnic to the infobox, since some linguists have also theorized that Hunnic was an Indo-European language.

2. Messapic and Thracian were indeed Indo-European languages, but they were not subfamilies. In fact, there's no consensus on the exact classification of these two languages. The infobox is meant to list the immediate (i.e. first order) subdivisions of the Indo-European family, therefore it was not appropriate to list Messapic and Thracian in the infobox as their precise classifications within the language family have not been widely determined.

--Nadia (Kutsuit) (talk) 08:50, 25 May 2014 (UTC)

Indo-European originated in Asia Minor

• http://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-19368988 --Kirov Airship (talk) 11:32, 11 May 2014 (UTC)

This is old news, and will remain little regarded by linguistic experts as long as Atkinson, Pagel & Co. stick to poor data and methods and completely miss the point.

Perhaps a link to Proto-Indo-European Urheimat hypotheses should be included in a prominent place within the article, as for lay readers, i. e., non-linguists, this is clearly a central issue. --Florian Blaschke (talk) 00:24, 20 August 2014 (UTC)

Guyana

Why is Guyana shown in light green on the map? The national language, Guyanese Creole is an English-based creole, therefore rather manifestly an IE language. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 60.242.48.18 (talk) 06:24, 19 October 2014 (UTC)

True, Guyana should be colored in dark green. Also, Lebanon should be grey. --Nadia (Kutsuit) (talk) 14:00, 8 November 2014 (UTC)

A note on the context, scientific validity and bias of the assertion of the existence of Balto-Slavic

An editor has been repeatedly trying to insert text in the articles on Indo-European, Balto-Slavic and Baltic. There are, by my count, three other editors who are reverting these changes. I want to add my name to those who find these changes inappropriate, and to note that they should be justified in the talk page somewhere before trying again. I observe that the language of these changes is "chatty", not encyclopedic, and is not supported by appropriate citations. I think that appropriate action is warranted by an administrator if this text continues to appear without discussion. TomS TDotO (talk) 10:53, 12 January 2015 (UTC)

Would you mind giving a bit of context? What exactly is being inserted? Am I correct in gathering that it's a "manufactroversy" in the vein of Holocaust denial or global warming skepticism, in the sense of an idea that <1% of scholars agree with? Tezero (talk) 15:37, 12 January 2015 (UTC)

• The "note on balto-slavic" is written in an entirely non encyclopedic style, as a personal essay, and it has no sources. We can certainly have a section about balto-slavic and the doubt about its validity as a grouping, but it would have to be written in an encyclopedic style and with reliable sources. It would be good to read our guidelines on editorializing and Verifiability.User:Maunus ·ʍaunus·snunɐw· 17:46, 13 January 2015 (UTC)

Add to the edit warring in four different articles the personal attacks that this single purpose account has posted on individual Talk Pages and you get an individual who isn't interested in encyclopedic content, but only in pushing an agenda. --Taivo (talk) 18:21, 13 January 2015 (UTC)

I suggest to move this talk to the appropriate main article. HJJHolm (talk) 15:36, 20 January 2015 (UTC)

Warnow or Tarnow

§ Diversification refers to the work of "Don Ringe and Wendy Tarnow", but in the references and other mentions ("Ringe-Warnow model of language evolution") the second name is "Tandy [or T.] Warnow", confirmed by a Google search for the phrase. AWB finds the name first appearing here in the edit of 18:48, 30 April 2014, described as "(→‎Diversification: Copied info from Indo-European migrations, added link)". I'm correcting it in both articles.

To discuss this, please {{Ping}} me. --Thnidu (talk) 03:35, 7 March 2015 (UTC)

Thanks! Joshua Jonathan -Let's talk! 05:30, 7 March 2015 (UTC)

Move discussion

A move discussion with connection to this article is open at Kurdish languages' talk page. Please read and join if you can help resolve it. Khestwol (talk) 17:29, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

Why remove the political map of Indo-European languages?

Both the political and non-political maps of the IE languages should be present in the article. Why remove something that makes the article more informative? 168.187.250.57 (talk) 10:18, 7 July 2015 (UTC)

because it is added by a sock of a banned editor who is block evading. And because the information presented is misleading. It shows most of Africa as Indo-European and all of Turkey (incl. Kurdish part) as non-Indo-European. We don't need such map. The other map, about the modern IE branches in Eurasia should stay in the top of this article. Khestwol (talk) 10:28, 7 July 2015 (UTC)

Looking back at the history of this article, the political map was always there. It's been in the article for many, many years. The onus is on the person who wishes to make the change to explain his/her changes instead of edit-warring. As for the maps, surely we can have both. We can relocate the political map to another section of the article instead of getting rid of it outright. The other maps aren't accurate by any means either. 168.187.250.57 (talk) 10:32, 7 July 2015 (UTC)

• I came up with a solution that makes all sides happy. You see, that's what editors should do on Wikipedia. We should give and take, and not let psychopathic power-hungry admins get in our way. 168.187.250.57 (talk) 10:41, 7 July 2015 (UTC)

The political map is inappropriate for the infobox. This article is about the language family, not politics. Moreover, the non-political map contains information about the branches of the family. Nevertheless, the political map is okay for somewhere in the body of the article. --JorisvS (talk) 10:47, 7 July 2015 (UTC)

Which languages should be used as examples?

We should have some criteria for selecting which languages will serve as examples. I suggest that it is not appropriate just to use the most familiar, or widely spoken languages. I'd rather suggest that the we include languages which show the range of differences. So there should be examples from all of the extant branches of Indo-European, and all of the subbranches of the larger groups. So, I would definitely include a few of the Indic group. In the Romance group, I suggest that we don't have to include all of the well-known languages, Portuguese, Spanish, Italian and French: rather, I think we could have Sardinian, Romanian and Catalan. In the Germanic group, I would have Yiddish, Icelandic and maybe Gothic. Meanwhile, if we are going to drop a language from the present list, I'd drop one of the Baltic languages or Italian or Portuguese or Spanish or English - yes - after all, all of the readers do not need reminders of the English words! TomS TDotO (talk) 15:22, 17 July 2015 (UTC)

I agree a discussion is needed (and a bit amazed by the current "all is fine except Pashto"). The way I see it, there are different ways to go.

1 We could focus on the major languages. Then Portuguese, Spanish, Italian and French all make sense, even though they are closely related, as all have a large number of speakers.

2 We could try to get one from each group. Currently, some groups have a large number and others are more or less absent.

3 We could consider historic languages.

3 We could combine aspects of this, but not entirely random.

I'm glad TomS TDotO opened the discussion. I disagree with quite many of the arguments, though. I think English is needed, how else are readers supposed to know what the words mean? I'm not sure I see the logic behind picking Yiddish, Icelandic and Gothic, except if the idea is to pick dead or marginal languages from each group (and if that's the idea, I don't agree with that idea). German, English and Swedish would seem the most logic Germanic languages if combining size and language groups (Dutch is of course larger than Swedish, but very close to German).Jeppiz (talk) 15:29, 17 July 2015 (UTC)

(edit conflict)Agreed that widely known is not a good criterion. First, we should decide how many languages can be added. The current table has 15, and has maybe some room for one more, but that may depend on the reader's screen resolution. So 15–16 seems reasonable. There are eight extant branches, which should obviously be represented. So, there are seven or eight slots left. Both Baltic and Slavic should be represented. The main subdivisions of Indo-Aryan should also be represented, which then leaves four to five slots for other languages. --JorisvS (talk) 15:38, 17 July 2015 (UTC)

Thanks. I agree on that. As you say, all extant branches are of course a given. In some cases, I'd say it's rather easy to pick a language, as in Lithuanian obviously being more interesting for a comparison than Latvian, and being bigger as well. So Lithuanian seems an obvious choice. I would not be alien to including some extinct languages, mainly thinking about Latin, Ancient Greek and/or Sanskrit.Jeppiz (talk) 15:47, 17 July 2015 (UTC)

Suggestion

This is just a suggestion, of course open to discussions, for sixteen languages. No particular order intended.
1. Albanian - a given, the only language in its branch.
2. Armenian - a given, the only language in its branch.
3. Greek - a given, the only language in its branch.
4. Lithuanian - almost a given, no reason to pick Latvian instead.
5. Russian - largest Slavic language, and all Slavic languages are close.
6. English - a given, relevant for readers to understand the words.
7. German - largest Germanic bar English, and conservative.
8. Irish - most conservative Celtic language.
9. Welsh - perhaps. The Goidelic and Brythonic branches are very different.
10. Persian - as the main Iranian language.
11. Hindi - largest Indic language.
12. Italian - most conservative of the major Romance languages.
13. Other romance - An argument could be made for any of them.
14. Swedish - possibly, to a Northern Germanic language.
15. Sanskrit - the oldest preserved IE language.
16. Latin - perhaps, but several other relevant options.
Again, this is just a suggestion, good arguments can be made for several other options.Jeppiz (talk) 16:04, 17 July 2015 (UTC)

As for the Romance languages,the best choises are Italian,as it is the most conservative of the major modern Romance languages and Latin .As for the Slavic languages,the best choises are Russian(East Slavic),Polish (West Slavic) and/or Serbo-Croatian(South Slavic).Anyways this is a suggestion.Rolandi+ (talk) 16:34, 17 July 2015 (UTC)

• Also add one Eastern Iranian language and one Nuristani language to complete the table. Welsh could be removed when we have Irish to represent the almost extinct Celtic branch. If editors are interested in extinct languages also add Tocharian language. Khestwol (talk) 16:53, 17 July 2015 (UTC)
  • Hittite as the oldest attested, and important for IE studies. As long as we're committed to English, I suggest that we drop the closely related German. If we're allowing extinct languages, Gothic is more interesting. As far as "other romance", Romanian as a representative of a different branch (and I realize that I'm not going to convince anybody of Sardinian). TomS TDotO (talk) 22:22, 17 July 2015 (UTC)
    • Actually, English has the least reason to be in the table. On the English Wikipedia, everybody knows the numerals in English. -- Kautilya3 (talk) 23:11, 17 July 2015 (UTC)
      • Entirely true, but please see below. When we update the table, we shouldn't just stick to numbers, not if the idea is the provide a relevant overview.Jeppiz (talk) 23:15, 17 July 2015 (UTC)
• What about Avestan? Or Ossetian (as a living descendant of Scytho-Sarmatian languages). --Zyma (talk) 08:50, 18 July 2015 (UTC)

• In general I think large lists or tables of cognates are not appropriate for articles on language families. Secondly I think English is of course necessarily included, since the meaning of the cognate set has to be given, and since being the English encyclopedia it makes sense to show any interesting examples where we have an odd cognate relative to the other languages. If we really need a table of IE cognates, I think we should spin it out as a list article with an in situ summary here. I would suggest including Hittite and Tocharian because of their importance for reconstruction and to use Icelandic as the sole example of a North Germanic language. Also Latin is better than Italian - and if we need a second Italic it should be a Sabellian language. ·maunus · snunɐɯ· 17:00, 18 July 2015 (UTC)

Another suggestion

There are 9 language families. So that is how many languages we need to put in the table, one language per family. Or, we might pick two languages per family, an old language and a modern one. Any extra languages we include should have a linguistic reason for being there. -- Kautilya3 (talk) 23:14, 17 July 2015 (UTC)

Good but for example how do you want to pick 1 or 2 for Balto-Slavic and Indo-Iranian families? --Zyma (talk) 18:00, 18 July 2015 (UTC)

I would pick two for each of those - butput them in a separate list article.·maunus · snunɐɯ· 19:03, 18 July 2015 (UTC)

Items

Apart from the discussion about which languages to include, it would seem very relevant to decide which items to use. Currently it's just the numbers 1-10, which seems rather uninteresting. Let's avoid too long tables, but I'd recommend numbers 1-5 and then around ten different items.Jeppiz (talk) 22:37, 17 July 2015 (UTC)

The table in question is in the subsection (in fact, makes it up in its entirety) "Numerals". It's current purpose (see my further comments below), i.e. the only reason it exists in the article, is to show the different forms of the numbers 1-10.--William Thweatt ^TalkContribs 00:34, 18 July 2015 (UTC)

Purpose of the table in question?

All of this discussion begs the question: what is the purpose including this table in the article? Before we start deciding on what to put in the table, we should make clear why the table is there. Is it just simply to list 1-10 in random IE languages? Is it to demonstrate the similarity of forms across the constituent language families to confirm the languages are indeed related? Is it to demonstrate outliers, divergent innovations or a variety of forms? etc., etc.? All the talk about what to include seems pointless (and subject to endless future debate and bloat) if we don't first define the purpose of the table's existence.--William Thweatt ^TalkContribs 00:34, 18 July 2015 (UTC)

Yes, good question. In many encyclopaedias, there is a similar table on Indo-European languages, usually with words that remain intact in many of the languages. "Father" and "mother" are rather typical examples. I would posit that a table that lets readers see the similarities, but without overdoing it (ie only going for words that are the same in all languages) would be the best thing.Jeppiz (talk) 01:49, 18 July 2015 (UTC)

I would argue that we don't need such a table in the article, but could make the table as a standalone list article. And I would argue that if we really really have to have a table of cognates it should have no more than 2 - 4 etyma, father, mother, brother, 2, would be good candidates.·maunus · snunɐɯ· 19:02, 18 July 2015 (UTC)

father, mother, brother are so similar that they would show much the same thing. But I'm afraid that we're looking for a perfect solution when we all can agree that Latvian (with no offense to its speakers) should be replaced with Hindi; and Spanish, Portuguese, and French should be replaced with Irish, Hittite, and Albanian. That should be simple. And then, if there is further interest, we can argue forever over making a perfect table. TomS TDotO (talk) 03:46, 21 July 2015 (UTC)

Actually, I dont think that it is a problem that they show much the same thing. The only thing the table should illustrate is the relatedness of all the branches (which is why it should show languages from all the main branches not the most populous languages today). It should be very few etyma - if a table is to be used at all (which I dont think).·maunus · snunɐɯ· 06:59, 21 July 2015 (UTC)

There is an article List of numbers in various languages which covers the subject very well.

There are three different lists which cover number words in various Indo-European languages much better than this list. If there is no objection in a couple of days, I will remove this list. TomS TDotO (talk) 03:40, 28 July 2015 (UTC)

Colour of Malaysia on the map

How do we justify the colouring of Malaysia, when the article Malaysian English does not seem to support any official status? Is there any objective (sourced) criterion by which the role of English in Malaysia is significantly more important than, say, French in Tunisia?--Lieven Smits (talk) 15:00, 31 August 2015 (UTC)

Colour of South Africa on the map

The article Languages of South Africa does not suggest a secondary official role for the IE languages English and Afrikaans, so it would seem justified to colour that country dark green. --Lieven Smits (talk) 15:14, 31 August 2015 (UTC)

Europe to India or India to Europe

There are two main reasons for listing Indo-European as being "From Europe to India":

• The majority of branches in IE are in Europe and the fewest in India
• The reading direction for English speakers, and, consequently, the normal direction for scanning a map, is left to right, thus, west to east.

--Taivo (talk) 21:51, 25 August 2015 (UTC)

Absolutely. I also don't understand comments like "origin of Indo first" and "linguistic order". Is this Indigenous Aryans and Out of India all over again? We have firmly established that they were fringe theories. - Kautilya3 (talk) 22:56, 25 August 2015 (UTC)

I supplied a citation which mentions the direction Western Europe to India. Δρ.Κ. ^{λόγοςπράξις} 23:36, 25 August 2015 (UTC)

TaivoLinguist, Kautilya3, Dr.K. Let's get a few things clear:

• This sentence isn't about how many more branches are in Europe or where it geographically originated from (as some above may assume with their Aryan obsessions), but an indication of how the word Indo-European was formed.

• The reading direction, left to right, Indo-European, Northeast India then Western Europe. I don't think anyone is thinking of a map when they are trying to found out the origin of the word Indo-European.

• This article is titled Indo-European languages. Describing it as extending from Western Europe to India right after explaining why it's called Indo-European doesn't seem fit.

• "Thomas Young coined the term "Indo-European" in 1813, from Indo- + European, after the geographical extremes of the language family: from Northeast India to Western Europe."

• The above sounds much better than what it is currently:

"Thomas Young coined the term "Indo-European" in 1813, from Indo- + European, after the geographical extremes of the language family: from Western Europe to Northeast India."

The above would sound better if the article and language family was titled Euro-Indian or something as Euro is the first part of the word and Indian is the second.

• So what if the citations said European first?

• What you're promoting is like saying the origin of the word Indochina is from China and India. Normally one would say India then China first, right? Why? Perhaps because it forms the first part of the word?

One would also say the Sino-Indian War was a war between China and India. China comes first (sino) then Indian. It LINGUISTICALLY sounds right. One wouldn't say the war was between India and China, even though it means the same thing.Filpro (talk) 03:36, 27 August 2015 (UTC)

With your reasons such as "Western Europe should be mentioned first because it has more primitive language branches blah blah Aryan invasion" sounds immature and it seems like you don't understand the context of these sections in the article or are trying to prove some other hidden point.

You don't seem to understand the way Wikipedia works. If reliable sources all say "Europe to India", then that's what we follow. And reading direction absolutely matters because this is the English Wikipedia. In addition, most textbooks on linguistics that cover the branches of Indo-European in English start with the European branches and end with the Indo-Iranian branch. The exceptions are few. That is just the way it is. English linguists learn Indo-Iranian last and the European branches first. Your arguments are just your personal opinion and have nothing to do with any facts. Opinion doesn't matter.

• "Indo-European Languages," International Encyclopedia of Linguistics (2:206): "...the languages of Europe...and extends across Iran to the northern half of the Indian subcontinent."
• David Crystal, The Cambridge Encyclopedia of Language, Second Edition (298): "...throughout Europe and many parts of southern Asia."
• P.H. Matthews, Oxford Concise Dictionary of Linguistics (192): "...its western limit...in Europe and, at its eastern limit,...all but the southern part of the Indian subcontinent."
• Edward Finegan, Language, Its Structure and Use, Seventh Edition (436): "...most languages of Europe...as well as most languages of Iran, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Bangladesh, and most of India."
• Strang Burton et al., Linguistics for Dummies (187): "Europe, Iranian plateau, South Asia"
• David Dalby, The Linguasphere Register of the World's Languages and Speech Communities (2:385): "...across much of Eurasia, from Iceland and the British Isles in the northwest to Sri Lanka in the south..."
• The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (921): "...the languages of Europe as well as those of Iran, the Indian subcontinent, and other parts of Asia."
• "Indo-European Languages," The World's Major Languages (33): "..a large part of Europe and parts of southwestern and southern Asia."
• George L. Campbell, Concise Compendium of the World's Languages (247): "stretching from Ireland to Assam, and from Norway and central Russia to the Mediterranean, the Persian Gulf, and Central India."
• Carlos Quiles, A Grammar of Modern Indo-European (23): "...most of the major languages of Europe, as well as many in Asia."
• J.P. Mallory & D.Q. Adams, The Oxford Introduction to Proto-Indo-European and the Proto-Indo-European World (6): "...the languages of Europe and some of those of Asia..."
• James Clackson, Indo-European Linguistics, An Introduction (2): "...lived in Europe, Iran, Turkey, Western Asia and the Indian subcontinent..."

Those are just off my personal shelves where I could quickly find a statement along the lines of "The Indo-European languages are spoken..." or something similar. Not a single time was India placed first and Europe last. Not once. There are two very simple reasons for this traditional ordering: 1) English speakers read maps from left to right, and 2) English speakers (this is the English Wikipedia) typically describe things from the point of view of England first. You don't have any basis for "India first" other than your personal desire. --Taivo (talk) 05:02, 27 August 2015 (UTC)

@Taivo I completely agree with Europe to India, but completely disagree with your map arguement. --YOMAL SIDOROFF-BIARMSKII (talk) 05:48, 4 November 2015 (UTC)

Indo-Germaans

Reference no. 9 states that " In Dutch, for instance, the general population uses the term Indo-Germaans." As someone with a Master's Degree in Foreign Languages from a Belgian/Flemish university, I can comfortably say I have never heard that term before, nor in scientific literature, nor in common parlance.

Ithvan (talk) 09:51, 11 March 2016 (UTC)

It does seem a strange statement (why would the general population be talking about this language family?). Since it is unsourced and dubious, I've removed it. W. P. Uzer (talk) 12:03, 11 March 2016 (UTC)

The normal term is nowadays Indo-Europees, much like in English there also used to be the term "Indo-Germanic". --JorisvS (talk) 18:42, 11 March 2016 (UTC)

Not science

I'm sorry but if you are an academic you should be angry at those who indoctrinated you and the universities who lowered their standards to allow you to be so. Arutun (talk) 15:00, 9 July 2016 (UTC)

@Arutun: And you're saying this based on what reliable sources? —C.Fred (talk) 18:30, 9 July 2016 (UTC)

duolingo.com

Is duolingo.com a good reference? There is a limited number of choices available. There are choices of learning English for speakers of several other languages. But there are very few choices for learning non-IE languages. TomS TDotO (talk) 00:42, 3 February 2017 (UTC)

No, it is not a good reference for this topic, because it doesnt have any information about the Indo-European language family.·maunus · snunɐɯ· 02:07, 3 February 2017 (UTC)

Missing from the chart

Basque and Farsi deserve to be included in the family tree. 68.2.235.85 (talk) 17:03, 31 March 2016 (UTC)

Basque is not Indo-European and the more common word for "Farsi" is "Persian" in English. --JorisvS (talk) 17:53, 31 March 2016 (UTC)

Old Prussian either does not have anything to offer in the conjugation chart or it does but nobody entered it in. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Myrrhfrankincensegold (talk • contribs) 03:45, 10 December 2016 (UTC)

Perhaps the Old Prussian corpus is too sparse. —Tamfang (talk) 09:54, 3 February 2017 (UTC)

"genetic"

In § Grouping, I'm adding a parenthetical note with a link to Genetic (linguistics):

(The word "genetic" here has nothing to do with human genetics; it refers to relationships between languages.)

The same page is linked from the word "genetic" in the immediately preceding sentence. While normally we wouldn't have a redundant second link so close to the first one, I feel that it's quite important to make it clear that words like "genetic" and "ancestor" here have nothing whatever to do with human genetics. There are already too many people who think that language and "race" are somehow intrinsically linked.

To discuss this, please {{Ping}} me. --Thnidu (talk) 03:03, 7 March 2015 (UTC)

I agree that genetic is an unfortunate word, an exceedingly weak metaphor. Or was it coined in this sense before gene was? —Tamfang (talk) 11:14, 3 February 2017 (UTC)

I understand the difficulty, but, in answer to the first editor, the OED tells us that the first usage of the word "genetic" in English was in 1750. The concept of a gene developed in the 20th century after the discovery of Mendel's work (done in the 1850s and 60s, but ignored). The OED cites a use of word "genetic" in this sense in 1907; another biological sense from 1860, and a sense of culture in 1870. We Wikipedians are stuck with what the world does, I'm afraid. TomS TDotO (talk) 13:57, 3 February 2017 (UTC)

Recent changes

I have reverted[7] the ip for following reasons:

• per WP:LEAD: Article dont have to mention ALL non-IE languages separately in the lead. Mentioning macro language families and their prominent members is more appropriate. The article do not have to mention almost all ancient isolate languages in the lead either. Those are off-topic.
• Italian and Ukranian are not "the most widely spoken" IE languages. It is an unsourced and false information.
• per WP:INTEGRITY; Indo-Iranian did not arise in 1800 BC. It's the date of the split as Iranian and Indo-Aryan, as the article and source say.
• Many duplicate and weasel words, links: Semitic is parent link of Afro-Asiatic languages which was already added to the "see also" section. There is no need to insert it. And language isolate is not that relevant to this article to mention it on the see also section.--185.112.248.88 (talk) 20:19, 1 June 2017 (UTC)

Intro

I think the intro gives redundant emphasis on which non-IE languages spoken in Europe, which is out of scope. I think it can be reworded, considering Wikipedia:out of scope and Wikipedia:Lead or such information can be given as 'footnote', if you think it is necessary. 91.235.143.218 (talk) 10:20, 12 June 2017 (UTC)

Yet Another Suggestion

1. The Great Vowel Shift should probably be included in this article(even though it predominantly applies to English).

2. We might want to touch on why Latin didn't some of these Indo-European languages(i.e. English) as much as it did others(i.e. French/Italian)

3. It could be worthwhile for us to better explain the difference between a "branch" and a "family"

Esotericbubbba (talk) 00:00, 30 June 2017 (UTC)

Regarding the second item, English is a German language, whose roots had little or no Latin influence. That may be a simple matter of geography and the timing of Roman imperial reach; I do not know. John McWhorter, in Our Magnificent Bastard Tongue, says (loosely paraphrased by moi) that English has features not found in any other Germanic language, perhaps coming from a creolization of Old English with Celtic languages such as Welsh and Cornish. (Later, Vikings may have had a pidginizing influence, "knocking off the corners" of various case inflections.) McWhorter's book struck me as a popularized account, but it did seem plausible. Just plain Bill (talk) 01:24, 30 June 2017 (UTC)

I have compiled some sources that could be used to supplement these suggestions(though I have yet to put them into MLA format)

1. Detachments for Cohension by M. M. Jocelyne Fernandez-Vest

2. Language Change at the Syntax-Semantics Interface

3. Words, the evolution of Western languages by Victor Stevenson.(1983)

4. In Search of the Indo-Europeans:language, archaeology, and myth by J.P. Mallory(1989)

5. Indo-European language and culture : an introduction by Benjamin W. Fortson(2004)

6. Archaeology and langauge:the puzzle of Indo-European origins by Colin Renfrew

Genetic vs. genealogical

Someone tried to re-interpret the concept "genetic" by a sense expressing the concept "genealogical". Choosing the correct term solves the unnecessary "explanation". Done. HJJHolm (talk) 13:07, 29 July 2017 (UTC)

Hittite is missing from the list of branches.

--Reciprocist (talk) 21:29, 13 December 2017 (UTC)

Extinct Indo-European languages

"There are about 445 living Indo-European languages, according to the estimate by Ethnologue", what about the extinct Indo-European languages, how many there were ? Is there any suggestion or potential amount ? Leo Freeman (talk) —Preceding undated comment added 23:39, 10 January 2018 (UTC)

About important languages for reconstruction

Sionkimzion (talk) 08:26, 10 February 2018 (UTC)The article mentions that Sanksrit and a few other languages are the "most important". I couldn't find the evidence for those languages' being "most important" I think the sentence needs a correction.

Characteristics?

I find it strange that an article on the most widely spoken language family that's well-recognized (I'm still holding out for Nostratic, woot woot!) includes no section on typical features of its languages. I'm sure there are a few that have been written about and that we could include, like fused person-number/gender/case (for nouns) and person-number/gender/tense (for verbs) suffixes, generally SOV word order, sex-based gender systems (usually male/female/neuter), and T/V second-person pronoun distinction. Tezero (talk) 22:31, 29 December 2014 (UTC)

I agree, it's what I came to this article for and it's not here. It's almost entirely historical. I'm not sure that SOV is general in the modern languages BTW. 82.4.129.255 (talk) 02:51, 5 September 2016 (UTC)

And I'm not sure that T–V distinction (unless you mean literal singular/plural) is typical. —Tamfang (talk) 09:59, 3 February 2017 (UTC)

T-V distinction means the distinction between formal and familiar forms of the second person pronouns tu-vous.·maunus · snunɐɯ· 10:37, 3 February 2017 (UTC)

SOV was typical for PIE but in modern IE languages most common word order is SVO.--Reciprocist (talk) 05:35, 24 April 2018 (UTC)

feudal language and planar languages?

Most of the language can be categorised as feudal languages. A few like English can be defined as planar languages.

This is an information many language 'scientists' do not want to take up for study. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2405:204:D38C:B31C:257A:C7FA:AE5D:AC4 (talk) 09:11, 20 June 2018 (UTC)

Sardinian"ferjo" in conjugations

This in Sardinian may be the word for hit, from ferio, not fero. Two unlike roots. https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/ferio#Latin Yoandri Dominguez Garcia 16:05, 29 September 2018 (UTC)

Error propagated from online version of Encyclopedia Britannica: Indo-Aryan Does not Relate to the Indian Subcontinent!

There is a serious need to correct all Wikipeida articles which reference or define "Indo-Aryan" languages as being specifically languages of the Indian Subcontinent.

Indo-Aryan is simply a synonym for Indo-European. All standard University level Linguistics and History faculties agree that Indo-Aryan is indeed just a Synonym for Indo-European - Again it is Encyclopedia Britannica's ONLINE VERSION that has propagated this error into Wikipedia as well as to some online dictionaries.

The phrase Indo-Aryan properly referes to "one of the early Indo-European invaders of southern Asia" which includes both the Iranian and Indian branches of this "invasion southward.

The confusion this has created is vast and the correction I am proposing encompasses many Wikipeida articles on this topic, but nevertheless it should be undertaken ASAP. Some feedback would be appreciated regarding this proposal. Xoltron (talk) 22:06, 30 November 2018 (UTC)

Map key is incomplete

The key to the map in the "info box" is missing a colour. Large parts of Asia are coloured in a pale green that is not explained. 86.191.146.73 (talk) 23:14, 26 January 2019 (UTC)

The legend says "striped areas indicate where multilingualism is common". That area is striped in green. AJD (talk) 04:04, 27 January 2019 (UTC)

Thanks, but it is extremely unclear that all that large area of apparent solid pale green is supposed to be "striped". Even if it was "striped" (which it isn't), we usually expect the colours of the stripes to be explained. 86.191.146.73 (talk) 13:28, 27 January 2019 (UTC)

Aha, clicking through to the very largest scale [8], I can see that there are indeed very fine stripes of grey and darker green. These are completely undetectable on my monitor at the size that the map is displayed in the infobox. Instead it appears to be a solid pale green. I suggest that the thickness of the stripes is increased. 86.191.146.73 (talk) 13:53, 27 January 2019 (UTC)

Map of official languages

Definitely, Israel should be painted blue because they have English as a state language (along Hebrew and Arabic).--Reciprocist (talk) 05:39, 24 April 2018 (UTC)

The map is meant for the original native distribution of the language. If the map were to include every single country with an Indo-European language as one of its official languages, most countries would get filled up with some tint of blue. Nigos (t@lk • Contribs) 22:36, 24 June 2019 (UTC)

Romanian/Moldovan

Why does this article list Romanian and Moldovan as if they were two separate languages? We don't do that with Catalan/Valencian, a pretty much parallel case: we just say "Catalan" which is the main term used internationally, as is "Romanian". (For the record, I'd have no problem with "Romanian/Moldovan" or for that matter with "Catalan/Valencian", but I think the separate listing of "Romanian" and "Moldovan" is misleading.) - Jmabel | Talk 19:54, 26 June 2019 (UTC)

I agree, this distinction is imaginary. The Moldovan constitution even states that it's language is "Romanian". Jeppiz (talk) 21:05, 26 June 2019 (UTC)

Fixed. –Austronesier (talk) 09:55, 27 June 2019 (UTC)

Hellenic languages

So I've been discussing with @89.210.251.100 about whether Greek is an Indo-European language, but we couldn't really agree on what to do. So could we have a Request for comment? Thanks! Nigos (t@lk • Contribs) 05:44, 23 June 2019 (UTC)

Hello, I am the anonymous user who discussed with "Nigos". There is an article, which, for some reason, I cannot find on the Internet and is contained in a book about the history of the Greek language, talking about toponymic findings that there were Neolithic civilizations in Greece, the Sesklo and the Dimini after the first one, in a period among 7.150 and 5.000 B.C.E (3.200 B.C.E if the Cycladic civilization is added before the arrival of the primarily known Hellenic tribes at 3.000 B.C.E) whose people spoke languages closely related to Proto-Greek and really divergent from the Proto-Indo-European language of the Yamna culture on the Crimean coast. Now, about Babiniotis• in his book "A brief history of the Greek language", he classifies Greek as Indo-European. This book was written in 1998. Around 1 year after its release, he was interviewed by George Papadakis in his breakfast show on television and was asked what changes he would make to the book, which I also cannot find online it was shown on television during some flashbacks of his show last year. Babiniotis responded saying that he reclassifies Greek as an isolate (the sole survivor of the Hellenic language family) due to a significant number of words whose origin is not Indo-Europoean. Furthermore, he stated that Greece played an important role in the evolution of many languages, especially Latin, because of the ancient Greek colonialistic policy and the the conquests of Alexander the Great, and that any Greek word looking like any other word of a foreign language is due to borrowing or language contact.

Demoule, Jean-Paul; Perlès, Catherine (1993). "The Greek Neolithic: A New Review". Journal of World Prehistory. Here is a journal article about the existence of the Sesklon culture at 7.150 B.C.E although it does not refer to any language. Just to clarify, most Greek linguists classify Greek as an isolate (the sole survivor of the, divergent from Indo-European, Hellenic languages).

Any claim that Greek is non-IE is a fringe position not supported by a substantial number of linguists—especially a claim that you can't even find a reliable source for. It may, as many IE languages do, have a non-IE substrate in its prehistory, but that doesn't make Greek non-IE itself. AJD (talk) 11:24, 23 June 2019 (UTC)

An isolate? Not Indo-European? You seem to avoiding overwhelming evidence showing otherwise. Roger 8 Roger (talk) 12:36, 23 June 2019 (UTC)

• There's really not need to be discussions at length WP:FRINGE theories. Yes, Greek has had a substantial number of loans from non-IE languages, but its Indo-European character has never been questioned in serious linguistics. If there are any proposals about a "Hellenic" language family, and they are backed up by substantial evidence, then of course they can be discussed somewhere (with due weight). – Uanfala (talk) 13:47, 23 June 2019 (UTC)

I guess you are not Greek like me and you do not know well. Prodicus, an ancient Greek linguist, who was mentioned by Plato in his writing "Protagoras", staits that a lot of words that do not look like Indo-European are not loanwords, because, as mentioned above, there were two Neolithic cultures (created by Hellenic tribes) living in Greece at 7.000 B.C.E while the primarily known theory says that Greeks came in Greece at 3.000 B.C.E. Also, there was another tribe, the Paenonian which dwelled the northern parts of Macedonia at around 3.500 B.C.E and, according to the related primarily known theory, they were of Greek derivation. What do you have to say about it? I think your sources are fringe. Plus, there is no actual evidence showing the Indo-European ancestry of Greek. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 89.210.251.100 (talk) 14:44, 23 June 2019 (UTC)

• I am trying very hard to assume good faith. It's hard, but here goes: science had evolved quite a bit in the last 3000 years. Whatever someone said 3000 years ago about linguistics does not trump modern scholarship. No source at all has been presented for the ludicrous claim Greek isn't Indo-European, but even if a source from an academic journal (not some tinfoil-hat amateur) was presented, it would still be fringe and not incorporated in the article, as we have literally hundreds (or rather thousands) of good academic sourced identifying Greek as Indo-European. Jeppiz (talk) 15:55, 23 June 2019 (UTC)

Every unreliable source tries to "prove" the Indo-European ancestry of Greek. History itself proves otherwise. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 89.210.251.100 (talk) 18:33, 23 June 2019 (UTC)

You could find very many sources at Indo-European languages#History of Indo-European linguistics. How are they unreliable? Thanks Nigos (t@lk • Contribs) 23:47, 23 June 2019 (UTC)

They are, because, as I told you, history proves otherwise. If you look somewhere above, you will find a source from me about archaeology talking about some pre-Indo-European cultures in Greece- the source does not include any language, since you like so much to work with sources. As I re-mentioned above, there was another article from a book talking about the history of the Greek language, which I cannot find online to use as a source, and classifies Greek as the sole survivor of the Hellenic language family and a language isolate, because its genetic relatives are dead- just like the Ket language. The true relatives of Greek were the Sesklo and the Dimini languages (Seslo and Dimini cultures, 7.000-4.500 B.C.E), the Cucladic (Cycladic civilisation, 3.200-1.600 B.C.E) and, perhaps Paeonian and ancient Macedonian (the last two may be Illyrian languages with heavy Hellenic influence). Since I am Greek, I assure you that during Junior High School we were being taught history with parts of that book, which, I repeat, I cannot find online, and that book was ginving, plus everything I mentioned about Greeks relatives, Babiniotis' reconstruction of Proto-Greek and a hypothetical reconstruction of Proto-Hellenic. The Seslo and Dimini languages left substrates to the other languages later spoken in Greece (Minoan, Eteocretan, Lemnian and Anatolian) and this is why you think that Greek has such a large number number of "loanwords". These are not loanwords but pure Hellenic words that worked as a substrate to the non-Greek languages of the area. Greek can be easily defined as a pre-Indo-European language. It was just too hard for the other languages of the area to affect Greek, because it had genetic relatives way before those non-Indo-European peoples settled Greece. Only Turkish managed to lend a significant number of words in Greek but that happened way after that. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 46.177.72.187 (talk) 07:06, 24 June 2019 (UTC)

• Remember that wikipedia relies heavily on sources for verifiability and prohibits the addition of your own research/knowledge. If you can find multiple, high-quality secondary sources that corroborate what you're saying (which shouldn't be hard if your statements about Greek are true), feel free to continue your discussion; we'd be more than happy to help. Here is a primer on what is considered a reliable source and not.--Megaman en m (talk) 07:53, 24 June 2019 (UTC)

https://www.dartmouth.edu/~prehistory/aegean/?page_id=424 about the existence of the Sesklo and Dimini cultures. https://books.google.gr/books?id=kSkjAAAAQBAJ&pg=PA32&lpg=PA32&dq=Language+of+Sesklo+culture&source=bl&ots=Z76kOi5Om5&sig=ACfU3U3pBy6KKddRTS3He9GRwBjejhAheQ&hl=el&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwig2teC24HjAhVmz6YKHbE7BV8Q6AEwD3oECAoQAQ#v=onepage&q=Language%20of%20Sesklo%20culture&f=false talks about the Dimini peoples originating from Hungary where the Greeks lived before the hypothesized Dorian invasion. There is this article I was talking about above, which I caanot find online, and talks about Cycladic being Hellenic and Greek a language isolate. https://alphaomegatranslations.com/foreign-language/three-ways-greek-has-influenced-other-languages/ about foreigh words of Greek origin. https://www.sciencemag.org/news/2017/08/greeks-really-do-have-near-mythical-origins-ancient-dna-reveals about Greek D.N.A not being Indo-European but similar to other Pre-Indo-European peoples of the area (meaning the Sesklo and Dimini cultures). https://www.pronews.gr/epistimes/452149_terastia-ereyna-8-panepistimion-katharo-dna-ton-ellinon-kai-idio-me-ton-arhaion talking about Greek D.N.A being a proof of a non-Indo-European tribe living in Greece until today, since, as the source clarifies, Greek D.N.A has not changed over the course of time and it is not simliar with other European or Indian peoples but with some Paleo-Europeans such as Minoan. This article is in Greek.

• Those sources are all focusing on archaeological findings and DNA, but the claim made is that the Greek language does not form a part of the Indo-European language family. To prove that claim, you'd have to find several sources (book, research paper, etc.) that focus explicitly on the linguistic aspect of Greek's history. You can use Google Scholar to find these sources. For example, I found this: "It is now generally believed that speakers of an Indo-European dialect or dialects arrived in the Balkan peninsula in the early second millennium BC ..., and that the language we call Greek developed its distinctive form there through the subsequent evolution and diversification of the speech of those of these newcomers who finally settled in the region." from a 2010 book entitled "Greek: A History of the Language and its Speakers". It then went on to give several characteristics that define Ancient Greek as an Indo-European language on page 9-10. Can you find a source which argues that Greek should not be seen as a part of the Indo-European language family?--Megaman en m (talk) 09:53, 24 June 2019 (UTC)

• Megaman en m already explained this well. To be crystal clear: we are not asking for sources that make you think Greek isn't an Indo-European language. That is not relevant. Similarly, we are not looking for your own thoughts on what Greek is or isn't. We are only and exclusively interested in academic sources clearly stating that Greek isn't Indo-European. Jeppiz (talk) 10:10, 24 June 2019 (UTC)

Here is my source. George Babiniotis in his book "A brief history of the Greek language" notes differences between Greek and Indo-European languages which, according to him easily distinguishes Greek from the family (not the classification within the family but a language isolate outside of it).

(page 57) Final consonats: In Indo-European, opposing to Greek, every consonant just like every vowel can be used at the end of a word.

For example: *genesom (*γενέσων> γενών, that is an Indo-European word borrowed from Hellenic γίγνομαι which means "I become")

Accentuation: In Greek the thesis of the tone, if it is distinguished from other Indo-European languages like Sanskrit, was not free. In Greek the tone cannot go any farther than the third from the end of the word syllable. Furthermore, Babiniotis staits that Lation borrowed its heavy tonal thesis from Aeolic Greek.

(page 61) Verbs: The passive and the neutral verb moods are creations of the Proto-Greeks. Furthermore, the Indo-European disambiguation between Past simple and continuous was borrowed from Greek. In Indo-European there were no Present Perfect Simple, Passive Future or Passive Past as opposed to Greek. Just like names,Indo-European verbs are categorized "stemmed" and stem-less (Feature borrowed fron Greek). In Greek, the "stemmed" verbs are split in baritone and conjugated according to the thesis of the tone.

(page 62) Syntax: Greek has created and lented to Indo-European various significant syntax while two features of it, the genitive and accusative absolutes, are not met in any other language.

(page 70) Vocabulary: There are words classified as pure Hellenic whichare shown in no other language

For example: "Δάφνη" (Sesklo and Dimini: "Dafmea", meaning "laurel"), "Αθήνα" [<"αθρέω" (="think"), the word means "Athens"), "Θάλαττα"(<"άλς" meaning "sea" while the Indo-European root is "mori", for example "Sub-marine". Greek also uses the words "πέλαγος" and "πόντος" for sea). About the pre-Greek substrate, the associated Kretschmer theory staits that there were Pre-Greek substrata deriving from Middle East due to toponymic evidence. But this theory has been largely discredited by most linguists. So, every different word is not due to a substrate but pure word roots from Proto-Greek. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 46.177.72.187 (talk) 11:35, 24 June 2019 (UTC)

• 46.177.72.187, to save you from putting more time on writing long texts that won't make a difference, please listed to what everybody here tell you. It seems like you believe that you need to convince us that Greek isn't Indo-European, and so you write long arguments. That's not how it works. What you need to post is a citation from Babiniotis in which he clearly states that Greek is not Indo-European. What you have posted this far is arguments that make you believe Greek isn't Indo-European. But that's exactly what WP:OR forbids. Even if you find a clear quote saying Greek isn't Indo-European we're very unlikely to make any changes as it would only be one academic saying so. However, then we could at least discuss it. Without such a quote, there isn't even anything to be discussed and this thread will soon be closed as Wikipedia is not a forum. Jeppiz (talk) 12:33, 24 June 2019 (UTC)

Wikipedia then does not provide valuable sources. And no, you are mistaken. I use logical arguments and everyone responds "We need more sources, those ones are not valid". Do not just work with sources, just try to criticize sometimes what you read. Just like you know about your language better than me, I know mine, Greek, better. And what I wrote about Babiniotis was a citation just not written as a Wikipedia reference, if you notice, I have written the pages of the book.

• If original research were to be allowed, Wikipedia would cease to be an encyclopdia and become a forum. The research and analysis is done by scientists in their respective fields, Wikipedia just reports on it.--Megaman en m (talk) 13:35, 24 June 2019 (UTC)

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=pKQ52103mMc. This video talks about the non-Indo-European ancestry of ancient Greeks using ancient writings as sources. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 46.177.42.254 (talk) 16:22, 27 June 2019 (UTC)

• If there were any relevant sources that support the point of view of Greek not being Indo-European, we might include it in the article, but certainly not without pointing out that it is a minority point of view. Centuries of research have established a strong consensus that Greek is Indo-European. --mach 🙈🙉🙊 16:37, 27 June 2019 (UTC)
  • True, but there are still theories that there was a Pre-Greek substrate in the Greek language. A number of Greek terms do not have cognates in other Indo-European languages, suggesting that they are loan terms from another source. Dimadick (talk) 17:13, 27 June 2019 (UTC)

I can accept the inclusion of this proposal just as a minority point of view with all the sources and explanations I gave. There is no pre-Greek substrate, becaus I referred to a source with an e-book talking about the Hellenic (Sesklo and Dimini) substrate given to the pre-Greek languages (second from the beginning source I referred to above). — Preceding unsigned comment added by 46.177.42.254 (talk) 17:31, 27 June 2019 (UTC)

• Dear 46.177.42.254, please note that the most important word in mach's comment is "if"! The "inclusion of this proposal just as a minority point of view" will simply not happen in this article, because it is a fringe view not endorsed by a single notable scholar (attributing this view to Babiniotis comes close to academic libel). And @Dimadick: Saying that there was a Pre-Greek substrate in the Greek language hasn't to start with a "but there are still theories..."; it is trivial and generally accepted, it is what you'd expect and almost always observe when a new language is brought to an area with an autochtonous population (unless the latter is marginalized/obliterated at a fast pace). It is nothing special to Greek/Hellenic within IE, but it also demonstrably happened with Indo-Aryan, and presumably also with other IE branches although for most of them scholars have to build solely on internal evidence (cf. Germanic substrate hypothesis for just one controversial example). –Austronesier (talk) 19:30, 27 June 2019 (UTC)
  • I was referring to specific theories concerning the source language/languages of the sub-stratum. And another explanation for words with no cognates is that they started out as neologisms, to reflect the changing circumstances of their speakers. Dimadick (talk) 19:36, 27 June 2019 (UTC)

The associated Kretchmer theory about the Pre-Greek substrate, according to Babiniotis, has been largely discredited by linguists. Also, I have been trying to justify my sayings with logical arguments and you all just do not take it for granted, every source positive about the inclusion of Greek into Indo-European is unreliable. As a native speaker, I know better. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 46.177.42.254 (talk) 19:42, 27 June 2019 (UTC)

• I don't know why this discussion is still going on. Could someone please remove the RfC header? And 46.177.42.254, if you know better and the rest of the world is wrong, then your first step should be to write down your arguments (but please not before reading up on historical linguistics) and then published them in an academic paper. Wikipedia is definitely not the place for that. – Uanfala (talk) 19:50, 27 June 2019 (UTC)
  • I've removed the RfC header. Nigos (t@lk • Contribs) 02:29, 28 June 2019 (UTC)

I know that the world is wrong, thank you for reminding you and me that. And Wikipedia then is just a place for naive people like you, because it provides any kind of "sources". — Preceding unsigned comment added by 46.177.42.254 (talk) 10:30, 28 June 2019 (UTC)

• Wikipedia needs reliable sources to make sure the information in it is accurate. If you could find a very reputable source stating that Greek isn't an Indo-European language, please do say so here. Nigos (t@lk • Contribs) 12:11, 28 June 2019 (UTC)

I have found and written many reliable sources about the being discussed issue. When one user staited that I have only written about archaeology and D.N.A he should check them out, becauseone of them was talking about languages. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 5.55.244.162 (talk) 10:48, 29 June 2019 (UTC)

• I fear the discussion is going in circles, with the IP either unwilling or unable to understand what everyone else is saying. One last try: IP, it is for you to back up your claims, you cannot expect others to "check out" evidence you fail to provide. You need a proper quote, page number provided, where the author states that Greek isn't Indo-European. Without that, no action will be taken. It's as simple as that.Jeppiz (talk) 12:49, 29 June 2019 (UTC)

I have said that Babiniotis classifies Greek as a language isolate. I just cannot write the source as a Wikipedia citation. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 5.55.244.162 (talk) 15:10, 29 June 2019 (UTC)

http://languagehat.com/the-perception-of-indo-european-in-greece/. This article talks about the perception of Indo-European in Greece.

https://www.quora.com/If-only-30-of-the-ancient-Greek-vocabulary-is-Indo-European-then-where-does-all-the-rest-come-from. And this one contains a case of unproven Indo-European descent. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 5.55.244.162 (talk) 15:27, 29 June 2019 (UTC)

1. Both of the sources you posted very explicitly contradict you. The first make it clear that the view that Greek isn't Indo-European is "pseudo-science", the others features a lengthy comment by a linguist saying that Greek is Indo-European. The only thing those sources might possibly be used for is the claim that some Greeks don't know much about linguistics (that's exactly what your first source says) but that's beside the point, and I'm not sure it's true either.

2. Do note that we wouldn't use these sources in any case. One is a blog, the other a forum. Neither of them satisfy WP:RS.

3. If you keep claiming that Babiniotis classify Greek as a language isolate, please write on which page he makes that alleged claim, and cite what he writes.

Jeppiz (talk) 21:35, 29 June 2019 (UTC)

I think this discussion should end: there were no reliable sources provided by the IP user to claim that Greek isn’t an Indo-European language. As what @Jeppiz said, this discussion is only going in circles. Also its terrifyingly long if you look at this from a mobile device. To the IP user: please provide a reliable source to support your claim. Nigos (t@lk • Contribs) 04:47, 30 June 2019 (UTC)

Babiniotis in his book "A brief history of the Greek language", page 13 staits• "Greek is the oldest living language of the world so its oldest and newest forms can be defined throughout a large period of time. Greek, like Basque, is a Paleo-European language, because its relatives lived in Greece even before the advent of the so-called Pre-Greeks. The Pre-Greek substrate is actually not words of other non-Indo-European languages but words borrowed from other Hellenic languages, especially Cycladic which lived among other unrelated languages, such as Pelasgian, Minoan, etc. So Greek is not an Indo-European language but a Hellenic, while the fact that it is the sole survivor of the family makes it a language isolate and the similarities between the two language families is due to borrowings. Furthermore, Kretschmer notes that a lot of ancient Greek words were not met in any other language, such as a lot of toponyms, gods' names and some verbs, such as φθίνω which means to end. This verb and its etymology are also mentioned at Charalampos Symeonidis' ancient Greek dictionary, page 293." — Preceding unsigned comment added by 89.210.252.4 (talk) 12:59, 30 June 2019 (UTC)

Symeonidis also mentions in his dictionary, page 6 "This dictionary has been written with the help of George Babiniotis' book about the history of the Greek language and it also contains verbs of the Sesklo and Dimini languages while the fact that there are a lot of unrelated words with other languages makes the language unique. Let us not forget to mention that the language isolate theory has also been accepted by George Xenis, Asimakis Fliatouras and George Triantafyllidis. It was also known from ancient times that Greek is a language isolate, because Plato, in his writing Protagoras, notifies Prodicus as the first big father of linguistics who proposed this theory." — Preceding unsigned comment added by 89.210.252.4 (talk) 13:16, 30 June 2019 (UTC)

This discussion should be closed. Roger 8 Roger (talk) 21:52, 30 June 2019 (UTC)

The following discussion is closed and will soon be archived.

---

Ok, I’ll close it. We got nothing much out of it anyway. Nigos (t@lk • Contribs) 06:50, 1 July 2019 (UTC)

PS: For all the WP editors who handled this discussion with great civility and patience, here is an interesting piece of reading that critically deals with the "breeding ground" for the school of thought that we have been exposed to: K. Sampanis & E. Karantzola (2018). "The perception of historical and Indo-European linguistics in the instruction of Greek" (PDF). Studies in Greek Linguistics. 38. –Austronesier (talk) 14:29, 2 July 2019 (UTC)

PeerReview Suggestions

Morphology 1. The sentence "The Greek root ‘morph’ means shape or form; thus morphology is interested in how words form." should have a comma after thus 2. Should be another parentheses after Fortson 3. After the third sentence under the bolded "Morphology", I would just say the examples w/o the repetition of the word similar/similarity and go into more depth on what you mean 4. "In terms of affixes, all Indo-European languages mark their nouns and verbs with various affixes to indicate a wide range of information such as number and case." -- put a comma before such

Ablaut 1. Change the wording of the second sentence -- you say "in English the verb infinitive sing", but that should be worded differently and should be to sing AND you should split up the sentence because it is too wordy and confusing 2. "Linguists do not yet completely agree whether or not ablaut is a phonetic or morphological process" -- incorrect grammatically so I would put the yet' with a comma in the beginning of the sentence

Word Structure 1. put a comma after optionally (1st sentence of this section) 2. Comma before such as in the second sentence 3. In this sentence, "In terms of placement, affixes can be divided into prefix, suffix, and infix", I would say affixes can be divided into subcategories: prefix, suffix, infix. 4. No comma after derivational affixes 5. Omit are those that serve to 6. no need for also in English

Root Structure 1. "Examples of each variation is shown in the following table" -- changes to are shows

Verb Structure 1. combine the first two sentences 2. say what PIE is or use the actual word

Syntax 1. Put a comma after grammar in the second sentence 2. would say that are underlying forms of a sentence's structure instead of unifying structures that underlie a sentence’s surface form 3. change the third sentence because it is confusing -- make sure to not keep repeating the word rare 4. No need for careful, persistent, and ingenious in the last sentence -- make it concise

Word Order 1. Refrain from saying IE languages or say beforehand what it is 2. Hittite came out of nowhere so sort of confusing -- maybe explain what it is 3. would not say school of thought because it is not supposed to be oppnionated

Clause Structure 1. put a comma before the moreover in the last sentence

Esotericbubbba

Reanna.shah (talk) 23:33, 16 July 2017 (UTC)

Without commenting on any of the above (this is just a convenient place to put my question), the text says about Hittite that "Although they are written in the Semitic Old Assyrian language and with the use of the Cuneiform script of Mesopotamia, the Hittite words and names..." I don't understand what this is saying. How can word in one language be written in a different *language*? I understand how they could be written in an unusual script, perhaps a script normally used for another language, but this doesn't mean that it's written in another *language*. If what this means is that Assyrian had Hittite loanwords (sort of like English has French loanwords), then this should be clarified. Mcswell (talk) 16:29, 20 September 2019 (UTC)

Proven or proposed

I would like to start a conversation about whether is it certain or not that there existed a Proto-Indo-European language. Some languages are quite difficult to be placed as "ancestors" of that "proto-language", because of a lot of divergent forms in them and significant and continuous language contact with other, possibly, unrelated languages. Give me your opinion upon this. 46.177.242.232 (talk) 14:19, 17 September 2019 (UTC)

Wikipedia is not a forum, the talk page is only meant for discussing the article.--Megaman en m (talk) 17:51, 17 September 2019 (UTC)

No, I just want everyone to provide some sources to make sure that this "family" does exist. And Wikipedia is a forum and a social networking site, where everyone discusses in talk pages about the inclusion and exclusion of sources from articles. I can provide sources which exclude Greek, Armenian, Illyrian, Albanian, Daco-Thracian, Phrygian, Paeonian, Elymian, Siani, Sicilian and some Romance languages. Indo-Iranian, Tocharian and Anatolian from Indo-European.5.54.182.77 (talk) 12:33, 19 September 2019 (UTC)

There is no serious linguist that denies the existence of an Indo-European language family. 8.36.251.209 (talk) 03:28, 21 September 2019 (UTC)

Undersourced subsection "Important languages for reconstruction"

The subsection Important languages for reconstruction is critically undersourced. It was inserted in May 2013 by User:Benwing without citing any sources. In September 2016, User:Taron Saharyan added {{cn}}-tags. User:ReconditeRodent eventually added two valuable refs in December 2018. In these references, Beekes (2011) is correctly cited as a source for the state of attestation and the degree of conservativity for seven of the languages mentioned in this subsection. Beekes also gives on p.30 a short list of sixteen branches of IE "in the order of their importance for the reconstruction of Proto-Indo-European". Apart from this, all other detailled statement in the subsection are totally unsourced, e.g. stuff like: "Early poetry is of special significance because of the rigid poetic meter normally employed, which makes it possible to reconstruct a number of features (e.g. vowel length) that were either unwritten or corrupted in the process of transmission down to the earliest extant written manuscripts."

Unless someone can bring up good sources for all these details specifically in the context "importance for reconstruction", I'd recommend to trim down the text to the content supported by Beekes (2011). –Austronesier (talk) 10:53, 30 October 2019 (UTC)