Questions tagged [historical-linguistics]
The diachronic study of language and its evolution.
0
votes
0answers
22 views
“Br” part existing in many languages [on hold]
Could you recommend some articles or books available on the Internet about the "(-)b(-)r-" part of a word that means "to wander", "to go", "to move"? It exists in many languages and has similar ...
9
votes
2answers
312 views
Origin of h as a modifier letter
A silly what-if question that sounds a bit mad: I am curious as to why the letter "H" in English and some other European languages is used as a modifier to make diglyphs represent a single phoneme (ch,...
1
vote
1answer
73 views
What is a loan creation?
How is it different from a loanword? One example given was mitkind created on stimulus of English sibling. Does this mean mitkind is a new word but with a foreign sense? Is there such thing as loaning ...
0
votes
3answers
170 views
I have some questions about deciphering an ancient language
I’m very fascinated in learning new languages. I want to know:
It is possible to decipher and learn how to talk in a ancient language?
How to decipher at home any ancient language? Such as Ancient ...
2
votes
0answers
38 views
Pronunciation of Fermat in Gascon/Occitan
A math professor mentioned that the final segment of Fermat's name would probably have been pronounced [t] because of "where he was from." She didn't clarify further but I looked up where he's from ...
5
votes
1answer
88 views
What linguistic impact, if any, has the the Roman three name naming system left on modern Romance and European languages?
The ancient Romans had a three name system (tria nomina): praenomen, the birth/given name; the nomen, like a family name but marking the person as belonging to a specific gens; and the cognomen, of ...
7
votes
1answer
100 views
What makes certain sounds linguistically “rarer” than others?
Every sound is equally as capable of being performed by the human mouth, and I (correct me if I'm wrong) remember my psychology teacher telling me that infants go and say every sound babbling - even ...
0
votes
0answers
47 views
Jobs in Historical Linguistics
As a someone interested in Linguistics, after I leave school I would like to pursue this interest into my later life, as a career, but the majority of my nearby universities only teach the more ...
4
votes
2answers
116 views
How can all languages be considered equally “good” at expressing ideas when language had to evolve from something more primitive?
At the moment I am reading Guy Deutscher's "The Unfolding of Language", in which he hypothesises that modern human language began as sequences of individual words (e.g. "girl run climb tree" or "do ...
1
vote
1answer
19 views
What is the articulatory nature of [lʲ] and how is it normally lenited world wide, especially compared to [l]?
[l] is lenited in some languages like English (dark L), and in Polish (Ł). How is [lʲ] developed further if it does?
-3
votes
1answer
77 views
Why are anaphonic antonyms regarded as chance by many linguistic historians
Why are anaphonic antonyms regarded as chance by many linguistic historians, if this could be regarded as an Ancient mnemonic method of creating a logical and easy inverted spelling of antonyms?
...
2
votes
4answers
113 views
How “the case system collapses” in e.g. Latin
A comment on Understanding the purpose of determiners/articles/demonstratives in language suggested that case systems break down:
For unrelated reasons, the case system collapses, so that word ...
4
votes
3answers
182 views
Have linguistics found any evidence that Semitic languages influenced Germanic languages or vice versa (in ancient times)?
Have linguistics found any evidence that Semitic languages influenced Germanic languages or vice versa (in ancient times)?
BACKGROUND: I suggested to a forum of linguists that a certain Semitic word (...
-1
votes
1answer
53 views
Where can I find lists of homophonic heterographs that overlapped accidentally?
Is homophonic heterograph the correct term? I know that it doesn't restrict them to this question's only target: chance overlaps. See Linguistics: An Introduction to Language and Communication (2017 7 ...
2
votes
2answers
138 views
Germanic Philology: “translate” a word from indoeuropean language to the germanic language
I'm having a philology test next week. One of the questions will be to "translate" an indoeuropean word into a germanic word, like: i.e. Agros -> germanic Akraz (i.e. "g" --> germ. "k" for Grimm's Law,...
5
votes
0answers
72 views
Do we have to revise what we know about Thracian?
I have been reading the latest paper on Thracian by C. Brixhe (on the latest Handbook of Comparative and Historical Indo-European Linguistics) and I am really baffled by the conclusion.
In the 6th ...
-1
votes
1answer
64 views
The letter V in German, its sounds and visual symbolism [closed]
The word Fotze (cunt) has the irregular spelling Votze, which is usually explained as a reference to the denotated part. But comparing Vater (father), I don't know any reason why hat wouldn't be Fater....
-1
votes
1answer
88 views
Why and how do some words come to mean multiple completely unrelated things?
Take an example of the English word 'just'.
While it means 'morally fair' in "a just social system", it also means 'a little' in "just less than 8%".
For a myriad of colourful meanings of 'just', ...
0
votes
0answers
47 views
Nicknames in Various Historical Cultures
There are a variety of ways to form casual address terms.
Using family terms is common ('brother'), shortening/modifying a given name ('Teddy' from Theodore), or something based on the person's ...
4
votes
2answers
82 views
How did Gk. ταινία “band, ribbon” come from PIE *tn̥-yā- < *ten- “to stretch”?
AHD-IER (Watkin, 2011) P93 gives PIE *tn̥-yā- for Gk. ταινία:
Suffixed zero-grade form *tn̥-yā‑. taenia; polytene, from Greek tainiā, band, ribbon.
while EDG (Robert Beekes, 2010) P1444:
...
2
votes
2answers
78 views
Can we use etymology to determine the nature of synchronic semantic and morphosyntactic differences between (near-)synonyms?
I've recently joined a discussion in which some of the participants insist that if one doesn't understand the nature of the difference between two or more words (the ones discussed by us are synonyms ...
2
votes
3answers
258 views
Possible diachronic developments of th sounds
What are possible diachronic developments of th sounds?
Of course, I am aware of th-stopping /ð/,/θ/ -> /d/ and of th-fronting/θ/ -> /f/. Are there other developments of ð/ and /θ/ attested in the ...
0
votes
0answers
20 views
Are there any words which have the meaning 'Hello' or 'Hi' with Turkic origin? [duplicate]
In Turkish we say Merhaba or Selam when we want to say Hi to someone but both of these words have Arabic origin. I know that the same goes on with the other Turkic languages like Azerbaijani, Kazakh, ...
0
votes
1answer
53 views
What did Sapir intend to say when he wrote that 'whither' repeats all of 'where'?
I first learned of this quote on p. 105 Bottom. McWhorter, J. PhD Linguistics (Stanford). Our Magnificent Bastard Tongue (2009).
Primary Source: Language: An Introduction to the Study of Speech. ...
2
votes
1answer
69 views
Isn't it obvious that linguists must specialize in language contact to study the history of English?
McWhorter, J. PhD Linguistics (Stanford). Our Magnificent Bastard Tongue (2009).
p. 54 Bottom
There is ample scholarly work on how going to went from referring to locomotion to becoming a ...
3
votes
1answer
70 views
What is Songhay's Family?
What's the current thinking on genetic affiliations of Songhay?
My old texts confidentially place it as Nilo-Saharan. This places a likely proto-Songhay homeland back closer to the Nile, with its ...
2
votes
1answer
118 views
What are some of the most divergent cognate word forms?
I'm looking for examples like this pair:
Russian for 'grass snake' — уж, [uʂ]
Classical Latin for 'snake' — anguis, likely [ˈaŋ.ɡᶣɪs]
These word forms are both masculine nouns in the nominative, and ...
5
votes
2answers
235 views
What is the oldest language that we know enough about to construct a plausible sentence in it?
One exciting way to track the evolution of our understanding of Proto-Indo-European is to look at the different versions of Schleicher's fable from different years. The more time we spend studying the ...
9
votes
2answers
216 views
Can modern Icelanders really read the Prose Edda?
I've heard that Icelandic has changed so little in the past 1,000 years that even millennium-old texts (such as the prose Edda) are still intelligible to modern people who speak Icelandic.
Is this ...
6
votes
1answer
114 views
Is there any superstrate influence of Old East Norse left in East Slavic languages?
The word "Russia" is derived from the name "Rus", the name of a Viking tribe originating from Sweden who ended up founding kingdoms in what is now Russia, Belarus and Ukraine, most notably the so-...
0
votes
0answers
34 views
Are there examples of decreolization by which the creole language develops toward the substrate language?
That is, the influence of the substrate language dismantles influences from superstrate languages?
Because of the prestige and power etc. the superstrate language carrys, there would be difficulty in ...
3
votes
1answer
95 views
How did French take over Walloon in Belgium?
Wikipedia states
the use of Walloon has decreased markedly since France's annexation of Wallonia in 1795. This period definitively established French as the language of social promotion, far more ...
2
votes
1answer
46 views
Where do I find datasets for linguistic phylogenetics?
Where can I find machine readable datasets for use in phylogenetic estimation? I am looking for anything---lexical cognate data, phonological data, morphosyntactic data---in any language family.
0
votes
1answer
85 views
Does Sanskrit निस् • (nis) “out, forth, away” come from PIE *ni- “in; down?” with meaning shift from “in” to “out”?
निस्·nis "out, forth, away" > nirvana "to blow out, extinguish; out of breath?"
नि·ni "down, back, in, into" < PIE *h₁én "in; down?"
My question is whether these words are from the same PIE root? ...
3
votes
1answer
187 views
Which is closer to Biblical Hebrew - Modern Hebrew, or Modern Arabic?
A couple of years ago I started to learn Biblical Hebrew - I still only know the very basics. Lately I've been starting to learn Arabic.
Often when I learn a new word in Arabic, I notice that it is ...
1
vote
1answer
93 views
Where do personal pronouns come from?
Studying some languages I noticed that many European languages have a first, second and third person.
In a philosophical sense, I was wondering how it shapes reality, but that's off topic here. What ...
2
votes
1answer
272 views
Do all colonized countries use formal second pronouns person in daily life?
In Spanish vosotros/tu is used in an informal conversation and usted(es) in an formal one.
Whereas in the majority of the countries in Latin America, usted(es) is used constantly.
The same goes with ...
3
votes
1answer
88 views
When was Proto-Italic spoken?
I've tried looking at Wikipedia but it is extraordinarily vague. Is it even known at all? I ask about this because I'm working on a very informal hypothesis about a period of common development ...
2
votes
3answers
178 views
If speech language was before written language, isn't non verbal before speech?
I'm reading "Introducing Phonetic Science" by Michael Ashby and John Maidment and they say:
Speech is the original channel for which human language evolved and all written languages have (or once ...
2
votes
1answer
110 views
When does the “dark l” sound in English date back to?
There is no "dark l" sound in Proto-Germanic language and Proto-Indo-European language.
6
votes
1answer
92 views
Early Middle English diphthongs
Wikipedia has a helpful page on Middle English phonology: but there are two diphthongs in its table which I cannot identify: the close-mid diphthongs “/oi/, developing into /ui/” and “/ei/, developing ...
2
votes
4answers
580 views
What was the original pronunciation of 'ä' in German?
I always learnt it was pronounced the same as how 'e' is usually pronounced in German (in either its short or long forms respectively). But then the question is: why have a different letter for it? ...
7
votes
4answers
512 views
Why are the reconstructed forms of PIE root in Etymonline and Wiktionary different?
I found PIE roots described in Etymonline (or American Heritage Dictionary) and Wiktionary are quite different. For examples:
agō: *ag- (Etymonline),
*h₂eǵ- (Wiktionary)
laxō: *sleg- (...
0
votes
1answer
92 views
What were the Proto-Bantu -ATR vowels?
It seems to be widely accepted that Proto-Niger-Congo had ten vowels, with ATR harmony: /i-ɪ e-ɛ ə-a o-ɔ u-ʊ/. Similarly, it seems widely accepted that Proto-Bantu lost three of these vowels and ...
0
votes
1answer
99 views
Luna and לבנה, two similar ancient words for “moon”
What is the linguistic relationship, if any, between the Latin word luna and the biblical Hebrew word לבנה, which are phonetically similar and both mean "moon"?
-1
votes
2answers
199 views
Are Andean and Tibetan languages connected?
Was reading The Snow Leopard by Peter Matthiessen and there was a map that showed a mountain named “Machhapuchare”. So close to Machu Picchu that it made me stop and think. I have found that Andean ...
16
votes
2answers
1k views
What is the meaning of the number 2 in Proto-Indo European reconstructions? e.g. As in *tewtéh₂, meaning “people” or “tribe”
I am a writer doing some research into ancient languages for a story I am creating. Despite having done some formal and informal study on linguistics (I am familiar with a phonetic chart) and informal ...
1
vote
1answer
169 views
Can these new etymological pairs of PIE roots be true?
I find a paper containing new lists of cognates on PIE root level, and don't know such phenomena or rules are convincing or not, the list follows below:
1. The voiceless stop vs. voiced aspirated ...
4
votes
1answer
70 views
In what language and when did people first start saying “Good morning” / “Good Day” as a greeting?
The Good Morning/Good Day formula is pervasive in European languages, but is presumably not universal, and presumably it has not always been around. Do we have any evidence of when and where it first ...
3
votes
0answers
35 views
When were numbers first used as code/shorthand for unrelated meanings?
I was considering this xkcd, which got me wondering, were there any examples of number based shorthand like “ten-four” in the comic used in the time periods this comic considers “old-timey”?
In other ...
