The Indo-European Family

English is a member of the Germanicbranch of the Indo-European (IE) family. ‘Indo-European’ is the name scholars have given to the family of languages that first spread throughout Europe and many parts of Asia, and which are now found, as a result of colonialism, in every part of the world. The parent language, generally known as ‘Proto-Indo-European’ (PIE), is thought to have been spoken before 3000 BC, and to have split up into different languages during the subsequent millennium. The differences were well-established between 2000 and 1000 BC, when the Greek, Anatolian, and Indo-Iranian languages are first attested.

In the 19^th century, it was usually held that the original home of the Indo-European people lay in Central Asia, and that successive waves of emigration from there carried the various members of the family to Europe.

Later, archaeological evidence showed the existence of a semi-nomadic population living in the steppe region of the Caspian Sea around 4000 BC, who began to spread into the Danube area of Europe and beyond from around 3500 BC. The people are known as the Kurgans, because of their burial practices (‘kurgan’ being the Russian for ‘burial mound’). Kurgan culture seems to have arrived in the Adriatic region before 2000 BC. The ancestors of the Kurgans are not known, through there are several similarities between Proto-Indo-European and the Uralic family of languages, and these may well have had a common parent, several thousand years before [Crystal 1997].

Over the centuries the members of the IE family spread as far east as India, as far west as the Atlantic Ocean, as far north as Northern Russia, etc. During their travels their languages changed continuously and independently, but regularly enough so that by means of special linguistic (reconstructive) techniques we can show that they are related in kinship.

Germanic is specifically a north-western IE branch; it shares a number of major affinities with Slavic (Russian, Polish, Czech, etc.), Baltic (Latvian, Lithuanian), Celtic (Irish, Scots Gaelic, Welsh) and Italic (Latin and its descendants, e.g. French, Spanish, Italian, etc.). The major IE branches are as follows (*indicates an extinct language):

(1) INDO-IRANIAN /ˌindəui'reiniən/. This branch comprises two large groups, known as INDO-ARYAN /-'ԑəriən/, or INDIC, and IRANIAN.

There are over 200 Indo-Aryan languages, spoken by over 825 million people in the northern and central parts of the Indian subcontinent. The official language of India is Hindi. The early forms of Indo-Aryan, dating from around 1000 BC, are collectively referred to as *Sanskrit.

The Iranian group has over 70 languages spoken by over 75 million people. It includes *Avestan/*Zend, Persian, Tadzhik, Pashto, Ossetic, Kurdish, Baluchi, etc.

(2) *TOCHARIAN /tɔ'ka:riən/. Two dialects of this language, now extinct, were spoken in the northern part of Chinese Turkistan during the 1^st millenium AD.

(3) ARMENIAN /a:'mi:niən/. This branch consists of a single language, spoken in many dialects by 5-6 million people. *Classical Armenian, or Grabar, is the language of the older literature, and the liturgical language of the Armenian church today.

(4) ALBANIAN /æl'beiniən/. This branch consists of a single language, spoken by nearly 6 millian people.

(5) ANATOLIAN /ænə'təuliən/: *Hittite, *Luwian, *Lydian, *Lycian, etc. A group of languages, now extinct, spoken from around 2000 BC in parts of present-day Turkey and Syria /'siriə/.

(6) HELLENIC /he'lenik/: *Mycenaean Greek, *Ancient Greek, Modern Greek. The branch of Indo-European, consisting now of a single language, represented in many dialects.

(7) ITALIC /i'tælik/: *Oscan, *Umbrian, *Faliscan, *Latin /'lætin/. The main language of this group, Latin, was the language of Rome and its surrounding provinces. From the spoken, or ‘vulgar’, form of Latin, used throughout the Roman Empire, developed the ROMANCE /rə'mæns, 'rəumæns/ languages – French, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese, etc.

(8) BALTIC /'bɔ:ltik/: *Old Prussian /'prʌʃ(ə)n/, Latvian, Lithuanian /ֽliӨju'einiən/.

(9) SLAVIC /'sla:vik, 'slævik/, or SLAVONIC /slæ'vɔnik/. East Slavic: Russian, Ukrainian, Belorussian; West Slavic: Polish, Czech /ʧek/, Slovak /'sləuvæk/, Sorbian (Germany); South Slavic: *Old Church Slavic, Bulgarian, Serbo-Croatian /krəuˈeiʃiən/, Macedonian /ˌmæsiˈdəuniən/, etc.

Old Church Slavic is evidenced in texts dating from the 9^th century, and its later form (Church Slavic) is still used as a liturgical language in the Eastern Orthodox /'ɔ:Өədɔks/ Church.

(10) CELTIC /'keltik, 'seltik/. Brythonic /bri'Өɔnik/: *Cornish, Welsh, Breton /ˈbretɔn/ (France); Goidelic /gɔi'dԑlik/ (or Gaelic /'geilik, 'gælik/): *Old Irish /'airiʃ/, Modern Irish, Scots Gaelic.

(11) GERMANIC /ʤə:'mænik/. East Germanic: *Gothic /'gɔӨik/, *Burgundian /bə:'gᴧndiən/, etc.;

North Germanic: *Old Icelandic /ais'lændik/, Icelandic, Faroese /ˌfԑərəu'i:z/, Danish /'deiniʃ/, Swedish /'swi:diʃ/, Norwegian /nɔ:'wi:ʤiən/; West Germanic: English, (High) German, Yiddish /'jidiʃ/, Frisian /'friziən/, Netherlandish /'neðələndiʃ/, Afrikaans /ˌæfri'ka:n(t)s/.

Date: 2014-12-22; view: 1531