The Indo-European Family

of Languages
Based on A History of English
language by
1. Albert C.Baugh
2. 2.Dr.R.Venkataraman

Approximate distribution of IndoEuropean languages around the

world.

Genealogical (record of ancestry)Classification of a

language

What is a language family ?

Family:Languages that share common
characteristics.
Easily understand that such languages belong to
one family.
Ultimately descended from a common parent.
Eight families of world languages:

1.Sino-Tibetan
2.Indo-European
3. Dravidian
4. Afro-Asiatic
Niger-Congo
6. Malaya-Polynesian
7. Nishadha languages
8.Khosian dialects

No significant historical evidence to

suggest English descended from IndoLexicon
European family.
(vocabulary)
Similarity in sounds, words

Language
families

Phonology
(sound)
contai
n

similar
features

of

Morphology
(word structure)

Syntax
(Grammar)

English is part of Indo-European language

family.
Contains 140 languages
11 sub-groups
Why Indo-European?
Sanskrit in the Indian context
Other European languages bear
similarities in vocabulary and inflections.
Home of Indo-European:3 areas:
Scandinavian and northern part of
Germany
The Hungarian plain
The steppe region in the southern part of

Origin speculation

The Indo-Europeans (Aryans) invaded

the Indian sub-continent
Segment of I.E. population in
northern part of India/Pakistan
Around 2000 B.C
Original home of Aryans was India,
they left around 8000 B.C. to return
later.

Indian
Sanskrit ---- literary language
Prakrit ----- accounting for dialects
Earliest Sanskrit division Vedic
Prevailed between: 2000 B.C 1500 B.C
Language of four Vedas (hymns of
Brahman)
I 4th Century B.C : evolution of strong
grammatical systemPanini gave fixed
literary form aided in literary
status(classical Sanskrit)
6th Century: Pali Prakriti dialect rose to
literary status language of Buddhism

Classical Sanskrit : Mahabharata, and the

Ramayana
Drama, lyric and didactic poetry
Scientific and philosophical works
similar position as Latin had in Europe
A large number of dialects in colloquial use
Other descendent languages now spoken in
Bangladesh, India and Pakistan : Urdu(closely
related to Hindi, derived from Hindustani, colloquial
form of speech for 4 centuries used widely for
intercommunication throughout northern India)
Main difference in Urdu and Hindi:considerable
mixture of Persian and Arabic
Written in Perso-Arabic script instead of Sanskrit
character
Other: Bengali, Punjabi, Marathiand India

Language of gypsies: Romany a

dilect of northwestern India
5th century: carried through Persia
and into Armenia
From there to Europe and even into
America wherever nomads have
wandered

Iranian:
Iran, formally known as old Persian region
Primitive Indo-European population settled
down in this region.
Two languages evolved: Old Persian and Zend
Nomadic north Indian population mixed up
with the Persians
Consequently an amalgamation of linguistic
features.
Travelled to parts of central China, southern
parts of Russian region.
Contact with people today called Latvians
features of Sanskrit entered Lettic
Pushtu, Balochi, Kurdish, and host of dialects

Armenian:
Initially thought to be part of Iranian group
independent language of I.E
Old Armenian: language of Christian
scriptural matterliterary Armenian
Known to otside world from 5th century
onwards
Region : south of Caucasus Mountains and
eastern end of Black Sea.
Similarities with Iranian
No grammatical gender like south
Caucasus languages
Contacts with Greek and Turkish accounts
for its mixed character.

Albanian
Language of ancient Illyria.
Identity known from 17th century
Geographical are: eastern coast of
Adriatic sea , northwest of Greece
No separate identity
Mixed character with Latin, Turkish,
Greek, and Slovene
Independent , interesting for philologists
Southern variation known as Gheg and
the Northern variation:Tosk

Balto-Slavic:
Baltic languages: Prussian( extinct) Lettic,
Lithuanian
Interrelatedness between Lettic and Sanskrit
North Indian Persian mixture of population
with strong Sanskrit characteristics , settled
down in Latvian region thus, strong
Sanskrit characteristic.
Two groups of Slavic languages:
The southeastern: Russian, Bulgarian, Illyrian
The the western : Czech, or Bohemian,
Polish, Serbian or Wend
These languages preserve the archiac
Teutonic elements.

Hellenic:
Contains number of dialects: Doric, Ionic, Attic,
the north Greek of Phocis, Aetolia, Epirus,
Aeolic, Elean, Arcadian,Cyprian, Pamphylian.
Hellinic population entered the Aegean
region,containg diverse tribes f diverse dialects.
These populations were absorbed by the
Hellenes.
Attic of Athens became politically, and
commercially dominant.
Out of Attic descended: common Greek
(Demotic Greek)
Classical Greek/ pure Greek--- the language of
literature and intellectuals.

Italic:
Center in Italy
Rome and language of Rome:Latin
But Latin only one of many
Diverse culture: geographical situation, agreeable
climate of peninsula, led to settlements.
Little known about early Neolithic inhabitants.
Largely been absorbed or replaced before the
middle of the 1st millennium B.C.
The Italic peoples began their descent into the
Italian peninsulaaround the 2nd millenium B.C.
Two subgroups developed fromProtoItalic--SabellicandLatino-Faliscan, both attested
by 7th century B.C. inscriptions (the former
inUmbrian, the latter inFaliscan).

Number of languages spoken in different

districts .
In West: Tiber north, Etruscan, (powerful and
aggressive people)
In Northwestern Italy: Ligurian(little known now
Northeast: Venetic
Extreme Southeast : Messapian
Southern Italy and Sicily : Greek, of numerous
colonies as well
All except Etruscan were Indo-European
Chief of these languages: Latin,the language of
Latium, and its principal city:Rome
Closely related to Latin: Umbrian(northeast of
Latium),Oscan)Samites) and most of the
southern peninsula

All of these languages were driven out by

Latin as political influence of Rome became
dominant throughout Italy.
Extended to colonized Spain and Gaul, west
district of Black sea, northern Africa, islands of
the Mediterranean, even Britain.
the growing strength of the Latin speakers,
culminating in theRoman Empire, resulted in
most competing tongues inItaly(and many
elsewhere, for example Continental Celtic)
being extinguished.
With the collapse of the Empire, the
provincialVulgarLatin dialects rather
thanClassical Latinsurvived, and in time
developed into the Romance languages

Various languages which represent the

survival of Latin in different parts of Rome are
known as Romance languages. Or Romantic
languages.
Some of them have spread
The most expensive languages : French,
Spanish, Portuguese, and Italian.
French: primarily language of northern
France.
Middle ages: number of dialects: Norman,
Picard, Burgundian and Ile-de-France
Capetians king of France, the rise of Paris as
national capitol
Dialect of Paris won recognition as official
and, literary language

13th century: Paris standard French .

Southern half language difered from that of
North.
Language of north: langue doil ( French)
South: langue d oc(Provencal)
In 12th and 13th century Provencal was a
medium of literature ,lyrics, but then yielded to
superior political and social prestige of French.
19th century efforts: to revive Provencal, Irish,
Norwegian failed
Merely a peasant speechof South FranceIberian
Peninsula: Spanish and Portugese
Close proximity
Difference in vocabulary and inflection
Spaniard can easily read Portugese

Italian:longest continuous history in its

original location of any of the Romance
languages.
Still spoken in founding city : Rome
Language of : Dante, Petrarch, Boccaccio
vernacular language, Renaissance
language
Romanian: least important of six principal
languages
Northeastern: Catalan (affinity to Provencal)
Northwestern Spain: Galician (affinity to
Portugese)
Rhaeto-Romantic.. Nonliterary dialect
southeastern Switzerland

Roamnce languages not derived from

Classical Latin of Cicero and Virgil
Classical Latin: literary language, artificial
grammar
Vulgar Latin( vulgus:common people)
Simpler in inflection and syntax, divergent
in vocabulary
examples in book

2000-1000: Proto-Italic
1000-500: Sabellic; Latino-Faliscan
500-1BC: Oscan; Umbrian; Faliscan;
Latin
1-500AD: Classical Latin
500- 1000 : Vulgar
1000- 1500: Old Italian, Old French, old
Provencial, Old Spanish,old Portugese
1500-2000 : Romanian, Italian, French,
Provencal,Spanish,Portugese

Celtic:
Most extensive group
Beginning of Christian era: Celts in Gaul
and Spain, Great britain, western
Germany, and northern Italy greater
part of western Europe.
Greece, Asia Minor
Surprising phenomenon: steady retreat of
Celtic before advancing Italic and
Germanic tongues
Today: Celtic tongues in remorter corners
of France and the British Isles.
Celts in Gaul by Caesar Gallic

Proto-Celticspeakers moved generally

west from the PIE(Proto-Indo-European)
homeland, probably alongside groups from
the Italic branch, spreading across
southernEuropeinto centralTurkey,
northernItaly,France,Spain, and
eventually theBritish Isles.
As centuries passed, their language
evolved into one group of languages
labelledContinental(spoken by "Gauls"
across southernEuropeand mentioned by
Julius Caesar among others), and another
labelledInsular(spoken in the
British Isles).

Continental Celts later adoptedLatin,

orGreekin the case of those inTurkey, and
theContinental Celticlanguages, attested
from the 6th century B.C., were lost.
Insular Celtic split into aGoidelicsubgroup
that developed inIreland, and
aBrythonicsubgroup that developed in
England & Wales.
Later in history, Goidelic Celts migrated to
Scotland; also later in history, Brythonic
Celts under pressure from the Anglo-Saxons
returned to the Continent and settled in
Brittany, on the western point ofFrance.

2000-1000:Proto-Celtic
1000-500:Continental;Insular

500_1BC:Celtiberian,Gaulish,Lepontic,Noric,Galatian,Goidelic,Br
ythonic
1-500AD: Ogham Irish
500-1000:Old Irish,Old Welsh,Old Cornish,Old Breton
1000-1500:Middle Irish,Middle Welsh,Middle Cornish,Middle Breton

1500-2000:Irish Gaelic, Scots Gaelic, Manx,Welsh,Cornish,Breton

Germanic:
Germanic or Proto-Germanic
Antedates earliest written records of the
family
Three groups: East Germanic, North
Germanic, and West Germanic
East GermanicGothic
3rd century: Goths spread from Vistula to
the shore of Black Sea
4th century: Christianised by a missionary
named Ulfilas(311-383) father Goth and
mother
Runic inscriptions in Scandinavia earliest
records

Gothic survived longest in Crimea

Gothicis the only attested language from
the east, with a 4th century translation of
the Bible, althoughVandalicis known to
have been spoken by Vandals who
migrated across the fadingRoman Empire
through Spain to north Africa
Most of the Goths blended into the Empire
and their language was replaced by local
Latin dialects, but some migrated east
intoCrimea, where their language
survived to the 16th century.

North Germanic:
Scandinavia and Denmark
Runic inscription :3rd century
Old Norse
11th century dialectic differences among
languages
2 groups:
Eastern group: Swedish and Danish
Western group: Norwegian and Icelandic
14thcentury : Norwegian ceased to be
literary language
Danish written language of Norway
Old Icelandic most important of Old
Scandinavian languages.

Iceland colonised in A.D. 874 by settlers

from Norway
Literature unsurpassed among Germanic
peoples
(Examples of literature page 31)
Limited amounts of "Northwest Germanic"
text survive from the 1st/2nd centuries
A.D., carved inRunic script; later, the
North Germanic languages developed in
far northEurope(primarily the
Scandinavian countriesDenmark,Sweden,
Norway, and their islands).Old Norsewas
the language of the Vikings, who settled
Icelandas well as Scandinavia.

West Germanic:
2 main group:
("High German") at higher elevations, in
southernGermany,Switzerland, and
Austria, and the other
("Low German") further north and along
the coast, including theNetherlandsand
Belgium.
(Sound shift analogous to that described
as Grimms law p,t,k,d)
Old English : Old Saxon, Old Low
Franconian, Old Frisian, Old English
Old Saxon: modern Low German or
Plattdeutsch

Modern Dutch in Holland and Flemish in

Belgium: mixture of Old Franconian,
Frisian and Saxon elements
Frisian: Dutch province Friesland
High German in midlands
Imperial chancery
Luthers translation of the Bible(15221532)
16th century: literary language of modern
Germany.

2000-500:Proto-Germanic
500-1BC: East, Runic
1-500AD: Gothic,Vandalic,North, West
500-1000:Old Norse,Old High
German,Old Saxon,Old English,Old Dutch
1000-1500:Crimean Gothic,Old
Icelandic,Old Norwegian,Old Swedish,Old
Danish,Middle High German,Middle Low
,German,Middle English,Middle Dutch
1500_2000:Icelandic,Norwegian,Swedish,
Danish,German,Swiss
German,Pennsylvania Dutch,Yiddish,Low
German,English,Dutch,Afrikaans

Recent Discoveries:
Hattite and Tochrian Ankara: 10,000
tablet