Talk:Proto-Indo-European language

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 Proto-Indo-European language was a good article nominee, but did not meet the good article criteria at the time. There are suggestions below for improving the article. Once these are addressed, the article can be renominated. Editors may also seek a reassessment of the decision if they believe there was a mistake.

Reviewed version: January 9, 2007
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Contents

[edit] Consensus

The first alinea reads:

The Proto-Indo-European language (PIE) is the hypothetical common ancestor of the Indo-European languages. The existence of such a language is generally accepted by linguists, though there has been debate about many specific details.

Surely "generally accepted" should be changed to "universally accepted"? Are there any linguists who dispute the existence of PIE as a common ancestor? Iblardi 20:49, 24 November 2006 (UTC)

There are plenty of Indian writers who do not accept the notion of PIE and feel that Sanskrit was the mother language. They don't publish in international fora nor do they submit their work to peer review, so I feel that their opinions are irrelevant for Wikipedia, but there are various Indian editors (just look in the archives of this Talk page) who loudly protest at their exclusion. CRCulver 21:01, 24 November 2006 (UTC)
Oops, I clearly missed that discussion. Should have read the archive, then. I actually decided to just go ahead and edit the section, but I chose to make the wording a little less strong by leaving out both terms. Of course, it could be reverted back anyway. Iblardi 21:12, 24 November 2006 (UTC)
I must add that I think the original wording is misleading to the general reader, myself included. Iblardi 23:00, 24 November 2006 (UTC)
Well, one more issue is that rather common suspicion that the PIE we know was never a real spoken language, but the reconstructions are merely an elucidation of the correspondences between various languages that have been in a complicated dialect-continuum relationship. The comparative method has taken many beatings in recent decades. CRCulver 23:46, 24 November 2006 (UTC)
the "Indian writers" are not the point, these are political authors, not linguists. But it is true that some linguists are reluctant to accept PIE as a historical reality, and prefer to see the reconstructions as algebraic symbols encoding regular relationships between the attested languages. dab (ᛏ) 00:32, 25 November 2006 (UTC)
I see where I went wrong. I equalled the notion that IE languages share a common ancestry to the theory of PIE as a historical, spoken language, which is of course not the same thing. Iblardi 17:07, 25 November 2006 (UTC)



CRCulver: There are plenty of Indian writers who donot accept Indian muslims or christians. We have heard a lot about indo-Aryan migrations as not being accepted, even though they are very different from invansions, and have occured and are occuring even today with immigration etc. Plenty of Indian writers don't accept under any circumstances despite overwhelming archeologiacl evidence that Kushans, indo-greeks or Scythians ever came to India let alone ruled and became Indians. That Indian civilization is merely 5000 years old, also many left leaning historians in India don't accept attrocities committed and forced conversions to Islam by Mahmud of Ghazni, Aurangzeb and Sikander butshikn in Kashmir, despite historical sources from their own courts describing these atrocities...Jahangir writes in Tuzuk-e-Jahangiri that a hindu(Sikh guru Arjun dev) in Beas is running a shop of kufr(preaching false religion) i have thought about having him punished and killed. It is well known that Akbar lifted the Jizya tax imopsed on non-muslims even acknowledged by the left but no one asks one question...why did he lift the tax??? because it was there for hundereds of years...wasn't it??? so wasn't it islamic opression to gain more converts by hook or crook??? Where else do you want me to go huh??? It is essential in 2007 and a sad fact that every reader interested in Indian subcontinental(pakistanis will insist on South-Asian for some reason)history must avoid any Indian historian(left or right) of today like a plague. Pakistan's islamo-centric historians never had any credibility anyway, try what you may but no one can change history or the fact that there was no nation called pakistan before 14 August, 1947, what next the South-Asian ocean??? Read and listen to the more neutral sources that are msotly concentrated in the West. March 25, 2007

I'd suggest to all read the following article: "Sanskrit and Proto-Indo-European" N Kazanas, Omilos Meleton, Athens: March 2004. saying that the IDE proto-language needs radical reconsideration. I fully agree to this author. In 21 ct. we can't base on conceptions and assumptions accepted 100 years ago. So Proto-Indo-European language article is heavily outdated. I think there is necessity for displaying also the new considerations about PIE language. Roberts7 15:03, 19 April 2007 (UTC)

It is an interesting idea, and it should receive some treatment in the specialised literature, but I don't think I would rely very heavily on it. For instance, the author posits the time of writing of Rig Veda should be revised on account of the Indus Valley Civilization, even though there isn't very much evidence holding the hypothesis that the people in that civilisation spoke any form of Indo-European (in fact, the best candidate according to scholarship is some form of Dravidian). For Wikipedia, at least, we should find some more evidence for these in order to reflect the mainstream position. --Wtrmute 19:48, 30 June 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Reason for success of indo-european langues?

Indo-european langues is the worlds largest langue family. Alsou indo-european langues, such as sanskrit had great influence (and importance) in non indo-european areas. And most of international langues is i-e, too. In central asia i-e langues losed they positions, but still i-e (russian) is used as lingua franca. Does there is known reasons for such succses and widespread of I-E langues? Some linguistic properties, learnability, langue richness, domestication of horse or just agresivity of i-e cultures? (Clearly not a race as tought in early 20th century) IMHO if it is known, then it must be mentioned in article.159.148.13.146 16:56, 1 December 2006 (UTC)

As far as I know, there is no such scientifical theory. I would say the influence of IE languages in the world today has more to do with the fact that those languages happened to be spoken in a region (Western Europe, generally) that acquired a great technological advantage after about 1500, and the subsequent expansion of the people living in that area, rather than with some kind of innate quality of the IE languages themselves, which would be extremely hard to prove. I would say social and cultural factors are much more important.
As for the case of Russia, it would have been relatively easy to dominate the not-so-densely-populated and technologically backward hinterland. Where the technological advantage came from in the first place is a question on its own that would also be very difficult to answer.
So no, I don't think it should be mentioned. Iblardi 18:37, 1 December 2006 (UTC)
In fact Greek was used as lingua franca in Europe, the Miditerrian and Middle-Eastern regions many centuries before 16th century and even before the era of Hellinism.--Nixer 18:49, 1 December 2006 (UTC)
That would be more easily explained by the fact that the Greeks were wide-spread as traders and colonists around the Mediterranean than by their language being Indo-European. Iblardi 19:05, 1 December 2006 (UTC)
Check out Guns, Germs, and Steel, not a linguistic book, but a book explaining how Europeans were able to acquire technology and take over the world.Cameron Nedland 18:06, 26 December 2006 (UTC)
I think the early spread of the civilization might have been due to a combination of the domestication of the horse and successful agriculture, possibly also trade and warfare etc. 惑乱 分からん 18:22, 20 January 2007 (UTC)
Another pondering, the idea that PIE would have been easy to learn seems completely unfounded. The grammar would, in big likelihood, have been an extremely case-oriented fusional language, with complex verb conjugation (See Proto-Indo-European_language#Verb) and rather arbitrary grammatical gender assignment, which would likely be very difficult to get correctly for foreign speakers with languages lacking these features. Compared with an analytic language like Chinese, I'd definively claim PIE grammar-wise would be difficult to learn. 惑乱 分からん 15:18, 24 January 2007 (UTC)
Depends on what your native language is. A speaker of Proto-Semitic, which is grammatically just as arcane as PIE, probably wouldn't find it that weird. And analytic languages have complexities in other areas of their grammar that make up for their morphological simplicity. —Angr 17:47, 24 January 2007 (UTC)
Angr, don't analytic languages have special 'case marking' words? Like a direct translation of a chinese sentence might be like 'I (noun indicator) like (verb indicator) cheese (noun indicator).' ?Cameron Nedland 14:34, 29 January 2007 (UTC)
I don't think Chinese does, at least not in that example, but then I don't know Chinese so I can't say for sure. —Angr 15:01, 29 January 2007 (UTC)
it strikes me that introducing the concept of "case marking words" to that of an "analytical language" somehow defeats the concept of distinguishing "analytical languages" in the first place. I think you might mean Chinese classifiers. dab (𒁳) 15:45, 29 January 2007 (UTC)
Classifiers sure are complex, but I don't think they're a feature that's inherent in all known analytical languages. 惑乱 分からん 13:06, 3 February 2007 (UTC)
In general, it is highly unlikely that the success of Indo-European languages had anything at all to do with any linguistic properties. People don't choose a language based on its easiness unless learning it is of little consequence (such decisions are a product of a very modern society). The spread of Indo-European languages is almost certainly explicable by the technology and behaviour of their speakers. garik 13:21, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Failed GA

As of [1], I failed this article for GA. The main reason is the prose, some stubby articles (there is {{cleanup}} tag}}) and a very very few inline citations. The lead needs some expansion also. As in the lead it says that the subject is hypothetical common ancestor of a language and has some debates/controversies about it, you should put a lot of citations to avoid elements of original research. Therefore the article does not satisfy what is a Good Article criteria. If you feel disagree about my reviews, then you can submit it to WP:GA/R. — Indon (reply) — 13:50, 9 January 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Phonology and morphology in separate articles

I moved phonology and morphology to separate articles, as was done in Italian PIE article. This was needed both in English and Italian PIE articles, because phonology and morphology chapters began to be really huge. I too added interwikis to English/Italian counterparts and return links to moved English chapters. Italian PIE phonology and morphology chapters are more advanced than English ones and has more comprehensive paradigms.—The preceding unsigned comment was added by Wikinger (talk • contribs) 07:30, 20 February 2007 (UTC).

Okay, but in keeping with Wikipedia:Summary style, there should still be brief summaries of those articles on this page, headed by {{main|Proto-Indo-European phonology}} and {{main|Proto-Indo-European morphology}} (rather than {{see also}}). —Angr 15:58, 20 February 2007 (UTC)
I agree with Angr here. You have just gutted a good article. If you want to do such a major change, you could have requested input first, or at least done it all the way. As it is, you just copy-pasted a lot of stuff here and there, and leave us with the cleanup work. dab (𒁳) 07:47, 27 February 2007 (UTC)
Why paradigms and tables are duplicated in main and secondary articles? Italians moved all tables to secondary articles only, removing them from primary article.—The preceding unsigned comment was added by Wikinger (talk • contribs) 09:30, 27 February 2007 (UTC).
Unlike the Italian article the English article did not need to be split, for it already had sub articles under Morphology. Perhaps the way to avoid duplicating tables is to merge Phonology and Morphology back into the main article. --teb728 17:48, 27 February 2007 (UTC) Perhaps the reason the Italian article doesn’t have duplicate tables is that its main article is incomplete—lacking summaries of Fonetica and Morfologia. It seem to me that it would be difficult to provide meaningful summaries without tables. --teb728 23:37, 27 February 2007 (UTC)
I cross-updated all interwiki links in all PIE articles, creating situation that now each language refers to all other languages without exception, making possible easy searching for best PIE paradigms. After comprehensive searching and comparing, I finally discovered that:
  • Italian PIE article has highest ever number of paradigms, as compared to Wikipedias in other languages.
  • Italian PIE article has single PIE reconstruction, without contradictions between Buck, Beekes ans Ramat.
—The preceding unsigned comment was added by Wikinger (talk • contribs) 23:57, 28 February 2007 (UTC).
I support merging back the morphology article, and doing "noun", "pronoun" and "verb" sub-articles instead (except for the "verb" case, we already have them). I am frankly not particularly interested in how the Italians do it, we were doing fine. Having the "phonology" sub-article otoh makes sense. dab (𒁳) 09:53, 1 March 2007 (UTC)
I'm in accord with removing some of the tables; a reader who wants to know the hypothetical noun inflections can read it the appropriate article. At the very least, that table should be removed, it looks like a grizzly bear in a rabbit cage on my 1024x768 monitor, and I imagine it's even worse on 800x600. For now, I'll remove it, but I'm open to some reasoning to keep it. The ikiroid (talk·desk·Advise me) 14:43, 13 March 2007 (UTC)


78.151.173.120 (talk) 20:19, 27 March 2008 (UTC)Gabrys and Darius are nowadays Lithuanian names. Mardonius has the ending of Lithuanian or Proto-Indo-European origin and sounds very Lithuanian. Darius means the man who is doing/making and Gabrys means a capable/smart man. Mardonius like Xerxes means nothing in Lithuanian language. Very interesting shift in that generation from old Proto-Indo-European to new Persian names. Moreover Arijai (lith. for Aryan) originates from the word 'arejai'=ploughmen78.151.173.120 (talk) 20:19, 27 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] PIE and Adamic

Former discussion proofing that PIE=Adamic is placed here: http://www.wikinfo.org/index.php/Adamic_language 83.19.52.107 07:46, 8 March 2007 (UTC)

To save anyone else the trouble of actually visiting that page, let me tell you that what you are supposed to read there is about a "divine revelation" that PIE was the religion language of Adam. --teb728 22:57, 8 March 2007 (UTC) Oops, sorry. --teb728 08:26, 9 March 2007 (UTC)
PIE wasn't the religion of Adam, PIE was language of Adam. Thank you for correction. 83.19.52.107 06:55, 9 March 2007 (UTC)
If there actually was an original human named Adam, it is more likely that he spoke a language of the Middle East or Africa—probably something Afro-Asiatic, or maybe Sumerian, the oldest written language. The name "Adam" derives from the Afro-Asiatic root *d-m, meaning "blood" or "red," not PIE. If you are really into finding a single origin of language, you should probably take a gander at Nostratic languages. The ikiroid (talk·desk·Advise me) 22:46, 9 March 2007 (UTC)
I disagree. Catholic visionary Anne Catherine Emmerich knows better, that PIE is Adamic, because from PIE descended its first pure Indo-European daughters such as Bactrian, Zend and Indian. Read this: http://www.wikinfo.org/index.php/Adamic_language I don't believe in sumero-akkadian occult charlatans such as Zecharia Sitchin and Erich von Daeniken. I believe in God and His revelations. Adam and Eve descended from these PIE compounds: (source:[2])
3: ei- bright; reddish
ghðem-, ghðom-, genitive-ablative gh(ð)m-és earth, ground
in form such as ei-ghðem-
am(m)a, amī mama (nursery word)
3: guei-, and gueiə- to live
in form such as am(m)a-guei-
Much more etymologies from PIE to Hebrew are here: http://kamishiji.proboards21.com/index.cgi?board=edenics&action=display&thread=1168795948 and they all have logical sense.
83.5.33.208 14:04, 11 March 2007 (UTC)
You are not, in fact, serious, I take it (or should I say, I hope). dab (𒁳) 14:39, 11 March 2007 (UTC)
I have my own doubts on this, as I do on the genuineness of the "accent". garik 14:56, 11 March 2007 (UTC)
the 'accent' I find rather well done -- fitting the Polish IP. What are your doubts based on (out of curiosity)? dab (𒁳) 21:11, 11 March 2007 (UTC)
on second thoughts, I even tend to assume good faith after all :) dab (𒁳) 21:27, 11 March 2007 (UTC)
You're probably right. And we should assume good faith. My evidence for doubting the accent is poor in any case. garik 23:04, 11 March 2007 (UTC)
In any case, we shouldn't try to debate dogma. The ikiroid (talk·desk·Advise me) 23:13, 11 March 2007 (UTC)
oh, we should, but in Category:Religious philosophy and doctrine, not here :) dab (𒁳) 09:57, 12 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Summa Indoeuropaea

Here: http://www.britannica.com/eb/article-74567/Indo-European-languages is good proof that Grundriß der vergleichenden Grammatik der indogermanischen Sprachen by Karl Brugmann, Berthold Delbrück and Indogermanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch by Julius Pokorny are the latest completed full treatment of the whole PIE family and the most recent etymological dictionary of the whole PIE family. After buying these two books one can begin learning and utilizing PIE in its entirety.

Here [3] is proof that Grundriß=Elements.83.5.0.83 13:26, 31 March 2007 (UTC)

Better equivalent is PIE Dictionary with PIE Grammar in Foreword that contains most ever complete PIE treatise that joins and expands two abovementioned books, but written in German. 83.5.57.68 10:28, 17 June 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Did PIE lack a "have" verb?

Did PIE lack a "have" verb? The have-verb comes from different source in every IE language I know and Latin has an alternative have-less construction with dative. I've also heard that Sanskrit lacks have-verb completely. --88.114.43.211 13:03, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

I can think of several languages, ancient and modern, Indo-European and not, that lack a verb for 'have'. The evidence certainly suggests strongly that there was no PIE word for 'have', and I imagine that there's been work on this, but I don't know of any specifically. My educated guess that the concept was expressed in PIE with expressions that would probably translate more literally as 'there is to me' or 'there is by me' or something like that. This is, for example, how Welsh and Russian (and, incidentally, Arabic) express the idea, and it was also an option (along with the verb habere) in Classical Latin. garik 13:16, 8 May 2007 (UTC)
I support Garik in general, but would like to add that, although no PIE word for "have" has been reconstructed (well, none that has been generally accepted to my knowledge, anyway), that's not proof that PIE didn't have one. Comparative linguistics, in principle, can't make final proofs of negative statements. There may conceivably have been a term which has just been lost. One may plausibly argue that a word for "have" would probably have left traces, but we can't prove that with 100% certainty. In this respect, comparative linguistics is similar to archaeology: just because something hasn't been found, that's not proof that it never existed. We can't categorically say that Julius Ceasar didn't own a laptop computer just because we haven't dug it up somewhere, but from the basis of our current understanding of history and technological development, we can plausibly surmise that he probably didn't have one. Bantaar (talk) 02:11, 2 January 2008 (UTC)

I do not agree on that because Lithuanian language has the form 'turi'=have which is essential for constructing the number 4. in Lithuanian language 'vienas'=one (the god name Anas in Shumerian language derived from this word and later became AMON/AMEN/MANA due to 'mana'=mine (as well as Mono- in Latin...and AMON and MONO is derived from both 'vienas'=one and 'mana(s)'=mine) later developed to the form 'manau'=I mean or mind), 'pirmas'=first means 'one finger' ('pirstas'=finger), 'du'=two (derived from 'tu'=you), 'dvi'=two in feminine, 'antras'=second, 'sekantis'=next, 'trys/tris'=three (this one is not derived from any other words) 'keturi'=four simply means 'what do you have?', while 'penki'=five is derived from 'lenki' and which means 'bend' (it probably describes some features of our 5th finger=a thumb); 'she-shi'=six means 'take this' and add it to already clenched five fingers; 'se(p)-tyn-i'=seven means 'take several=7' is derived from 'take two' ('tyn-i/tint-as/tunt-as'=~several, that is - 7th is 'sep-tint-as' and 8th is 'ash-tunt-as'), 'ash-tuon-i'=eight means 'me and tunt-as=7', 'de-vyni'=nine means 'take off one from a whole number of fingers' (because vyni/vieni/vienas=one), 'de-shimt'=hundred means 'take off a part from a hundred', 'shimt-as'=hundred, 'vienuo-lika/dvy-lika' and other up to 19 means 'one/two what remains on top of ten', 'tukstantis'=thousand means 'is somewhere beyond horizont standing/overlooking/emerging'...and this structure of numbers is the basis of whole Proto-IE numerical system.

By the way 'mist' is derived from Lithuanian word 'mysht'=to pee/piss...and English has much much more derivatives from Lithuanian language (and not only English, but and Sanskrit and Old Greek and Latin...and of course they lack such derivations between each other). Lithuanian language has much more basic roots even than Latvian language.

And 'proto/protan' in Lithuanian language means 'a mind' unlike in Greek which means 'the one or the first' and is derived from Lithuanian words 'pries tai'=before that or the very begining/very basis.


 —Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.140.114.210 (talk) 18:40, 13 January 2008 (UTC)
Could you please give yourself an ID and sign your comments by adding four ~~~~? Thanks.
Words like "to have" are used primarily to express a way of thinking. The question you have to put is: How the PIE people think? PIE was almost for sure purely inflectional, while the use of "to have" was introduced in many languages only later, together with new syntax rules that came up in a process of deflexion. Other examples are the currency in English, Frisian and western Flemisch/Dutch dialects of verbs like "to become" and "to do", the use of which seems to reflect either a previous incapacity to make sentences having a similar syntaxis, or (Peter Schrijver) reminiscence to an old substratum (see also Neolithic creolisation hypothesis). The results of language-change are generally recognized to have a profound influence on especially syntax. In other words, I don't think the verb "to have" gives any clou to PIE. In that sense I am agree with you, though I can't say this comes as a surprise or is otherwise revolutionary. It merely reflects the evolutionary changes that occurred from PIE towards the current languages and dialects. Remember languages can change for many reasons: cultural changes, migration, language contact, creolisation, etc. etc. A language might remain conservative when by coincidence in the backwaters of change, still this does not imply this language to be ancestral. Rokus01 (talk) 14:40, 20 January 2008 (UTC)


86.140.114.210 (talk) 00:21, 22 January 2008 (UTC)In Lithuanian language 'tureti'=have is used for expressing these - to possess, to own, to ought, to have, to contain (the word 'turet'=have has lots of derivatives 'turtas'=welth, 'turejimas'=possession, taure'=chalice/grail, 'tauras'=bull/taurus (from here juish have 'tora'), 'taurus'=sublime/noble, 'tureklai'=rail, 'su-turet'=hold/restrain, 'turinys'=content, 'turis'=volume, 'turgus'=market, 'turtingas'=rich, 'pa-si-tur-intis'=well-off, 'tarba'=scrip(sac)/purse, 'taukai'=grease, 'taupyt'=economy, 'tausot'=save, 'tauta'=nation, 'telkti'=mass). Our tenses' system is exactly the same as English, but we use 'to be' instead of 'to have' (I've been waiting='ash esu buves laukiantis' and 'esu'=I'm, that's why I do not agree that 'have' was introduced later, because it's essential to my language to be evolved at all) and we have more (at least 4 times) participles than English. Lithuanian language has a huge number of suffixes, preffixes and endings (these affixes can be used twice or more times in one and the same word). English use 'to' before the verb, we use after ('to be'='buti'). English have similar words, but with somewhy changed wovels (i.e. 'sunus'=son, 'saule'=sun (these two seem to have swept wovels - 'au' always degrade to 'o'), 'set'=sow, 'sekla'=seed, 'siut'=sew/suit ('iu'='ew'), 'statyt/det'=set ('det'=put, 'statyt'='build, 'statyt' is one of very rare words having two meanings (in fact in my language it's the same action, so we can keep it having one meaning)), 'skest/skendo'=sink, 'sukt'=scroll, sriegt'=screw, 'siubuot/supt'=swing, 'siule'=suture/seam, svyruot'=sway, 'seka'=sequence 'seklet'=shallow/shoal, 'persekiot'=pursuit, 'bet'=but, 'batas'=boot, 'buti'=be, 'bite'=bee, 'byla'=bill, 'baugint'=boggle (some of them just very similar, some almost identical) and many more). My language is very very old, in fact we do not have any not original words for describing very primitive things and moreover words are gradualy derived from some number prime words (i.e. my language developed independently, but of couse can be and other parallel and independently developed IE languages with very strong Lithuanian language influence). 'tapti'=become ('eit'=go, 'at-eit'=come - it's the very prime words, but as you see they are completely different, in fact 'go' can be the result of that shift in meaning, we say 'nu-si-gaut' or gaut-is' in the sense of traveling and reaching the point of destination, similar as English 'gaut'=get/obtain/recieve 'i-gaut'=gain), 'daryt'=do.86.140.114.210 (talk) 00:21, 22 January 2008 (UTC)

[edit] TITUS Index, etc

User:Gaia2767spm (contributions) has added links to the same page, the TITUS Index, to dozens of articles. It seems doubtful that any one web page can be relevant to dozens of articles. This alone is enough to make one doubtful of the usefulness of these additions. But looking at the page, I find nothing that seems relevant to any article. Perhaps part of the problem is that the page is mostly not in English; perhaps some deeper link at the site might be useful, but I can't find anything through the linked page.

In our article he has also added links to a glottochronological study (which duplicates a reference already in the article) and to a so-called Indo-European Database of uncertain usefulness. (At least the latter is written in English.) I will soon be the third person to revert these additions. Wikipedia is not a collection of links. If Gaia2767 wants to add these links again, he should defend their relevance here. --teb728 06:33, 16 June 2007 (UTC)

TITUS is indeed a very useful academic resource. It should not, of course, be added to articles indiscriminately, but it certainly makes sense to link it from articles dealing with old Indo-European texts. The "Indo-European database" is also on the respectable side, not extremely so, but it used to be one of the better IE reference sites online before the pertinent Wikipedia articles became more developed. Gaia2767 is over-enthusiastic, no doubt, but that alone does not discredit the sites in question. dab (𒁳) 07:26, 16 June 2007 (UTC)
From what you say I wonder if the audience of TITUS may be more academic than the audience of this article. And it may be more German-speaking: WP:EL discourages linking foreign language sites from English Wikipedia. In any case I can’t find my way through the user interface of the linked page to anything relevant. If the reference is to be restored, it should be accompanied by directions (or at least a hint) on how to find relevant content (hopefully content in English). Might a different page at the TITUS site be more useful? --teb728 07:03, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

[edit] PIE hypotheses

Indo-European theory includes two sub-hypotheses:

  • (1) Anatolian broke off from the others only a little earlier (say a couple of centuries) than the other broke up (Anatolian-as-daughter hypothesis).
  • (2) Anatolian broke off from the others a lot earlier (say a couple of millennia), allowing the rest to develop independently before breaking up (Indo-Hittite hypothesis).

It is true that initial reconstruction for Proto-Indo-European is identical for both sub-hypotheses, or is different in each of these two hypotheses? Wikinger 20:53, 26 July 2007 (UTC)

This is discussed at Indo-Hittite. There is no single reconstruction for PIE anyway, even within either hypothesis, but yes, camps (1) and (2) will tend to reconstruct some things somewhat differently. dab (𒁳) 21:34, 26 July 2007 (UTC)
To which camp [(1) or (2)] belongs Gerhard Köbler's dictionary from here: http://www.koeblergerhard.de/idgwbhin.html ? Wikinger 12:10, 27 July 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Chinese

If my reference[1] was

"not a proposal of genetic relationship. this is about early loanwords."

then please mention it elsewhere where more appropriate, instead of just deleting it to the winds. Jidanni 18:34, 13 October 2007 (UTC)

Where do you think it should go instead? Ƶ§œš¹ [aɪm ˈfɻɛ̃ⁿdˡi] 19:00, 13 October 2007 (UTC)
If there is a significant opinion among scholars of the Chinese language that there were Indo-European borrowings into Old Chinese, it perhaps should be mentioned in Old Chinese or Chinese language. But since there is apparently no significant opinion among Indo-European scholars that such borrowings are a source for Indo-European reconstruction, it does not belong anywhere in this article. --teb728 21:27, 13 October 2007 (UTC)
  1. ^ Tsung-tung Chang, 1988 Indo-European Vocabulary in Old Chinese
I disagree with the assertion that there is no place in this article for the influence that it may have had on other languages. There might be more space devoted to it in an article about the language which borrowed words from it, but a short mention of such borrowing in this article would be informative and provide narrative context for linking to an article discussing at greater length PIE loanword in Chinese etc. Robert Greer (talk) 17:52, 2 January 2008 (UTC)

[edit] How to trace and deduct our common IE roots?

1. Firstly, we need to start from each IE language analysis and try to find inner logic and other ties and links between words. 2. to deduct primary roots and gramatical structure. 3. to pick only the very primitive and prime words, like numbers, tenses, names of basic items, basic emotions, basic verbs allowing to start to comunicate. 4. to define which forms of words are the most ancient and archaic. 5. which roots are the most proliferous and to define what the oldest meaning of that root. 6. to define some rules how sounds were degrading (g become k, h or zh (English language do not have this sound at all, they have only z and dzh and the latter sound they denote by g letter)). 7. to define what clashes of consonents that language holds (kr-, skr-, st-, chrv- and so on). 8. then start to compare. 9. the least degraded language must be the mother of all IE languages (and I already know that that language is Lithuanian) 10. the names of plants will reveal genesis of not our comon language, but and where it sprang out. 11. the inner logic must persist (one words must be as the starting words, other must be derived from them and these derived must have the same or less archaic forms). 12. must be taken not the average occurence, but the form which has its strong relations with other related derivative words in any of these languages, to avoid such situation then the word taken from one language were changed in another language and later was spread in similar languages (f.e. word taken from German language can have such redistribution with altered meaning French-Spanish-Portugese-English-Russian and Later even come back to German language with a slightly different form and a completely different meaning) —Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.140.114.210 (talk) 01:50, 20 January 2008 (UTC)


In article http://www.omilosmeleton.gr/english/documents/SPIE.pdf was written not truth (due to lack of knowledge of Lithuanian language)

"2. In his The American Heritage Dictionary of Indo-European Roots C. Watkins gives three PIE roots for ‘man’ man, ner and wî-ro (p 51, 58, 101: all these without asterisk); he points out the older form of ner is *ë2-ner- and its basic meaning is ‘vigorous, vital, strong’. In all his derivations he cites Pokorny (1959), whose spelling and some conclusions for PIE reconstructions are now superseded, but he obviously has consulted many other studies although he does not cite more recent publications, like those of S.E. Mann (1984-7) or H.Rix (1998).

Let us start with *(ë2-)ner asking ourselves if this is indeed the original form. To begin with, the asterisk indicates clearly that this word is a conjectural reconstruction and does not exist in any extant early language; nor is there any means at all of verifying the conjecture."

The last statement is simply due to the ignorance. In Lituanian language both and 'inirshis' (=vigorous, vital, strong) and 'vyras' (= a man) are two distinctive forms and are not derived one from another (it's just an example how you can wandering not knowing Lithuanian language). Moreover Lithuanian language was not influential language during at least last two centuries, contrariwise it was highly influenced by Slavs and Germans and still survived almost unchanged.

"4. According to the rigvedic evidence ner could not be the PIE primary form but only a derivative. The alleged *ë2-ner- is based mainly on the Gk a-n£r-. Greek is well-known for its tendency to prefix phonemes not found in the cognates in other IE branches. E.g. the common IE stem for ‘horse’ (S aöva, L equus) is in Gk h-ippo-s, where the double -pp- is explained as substitution for the v/u while p is often equivalent for S/L ö/q; but the initial h (a rough breathing) is an addition since this usually corresponds to IE s or v and no IE cognate for horse has such an initial; in any case, the Mycenaean iqqo (much earlier form in Greece) has no h."

Another misleading analysis. In Lithuanian language we have 'zhirgas', Greek have 'hipp-os' and Mycenaean had 'ikko/iqqo'. Here you see the degradation of Lithuanian word 'zhirgas' explicitly - g become kk/qq (or pp), and zh or (z) was lost at all...English language lost both sounds and zh and g(not dzh!!). I fogot to mention that 'zhirgas' is derived from a very archaic Lithuanian verb which means bestride or straddle (and Lith. 'strikineti/strikseti/strikt/strakseti/strakalys'=tripping or frisk probably have the same origin as bestride and straddle...and tripping comes from Lithuanian words 'trypti/tripsenti/triplenti/trimplenti/tramplinti/tramplenti/trypseti/trypint' meaning trample/stomp/stamp/tread, and again stomp/stamp have similar words in Lithuanian language such as stot/stoveti/stimpinti/stipsenti/statyt and having similar meanings).

Moreover Lithuanian language have lots of similar root word with completely different meanings - 'nera'=is not, 'naras/nerti'=dive, 'noras/naravas'=desire, 'nerti/narstyti/nerinys'=lace, 'narvas'=cage, 'nirti/nartus/nirshti/ynirshis/ynirtis'=rage, 'narsus/narsa'=lion-hearted/courage 'narshyti'=browse/scrimmage/scour and that indicates that it's imposible to deduct by only similar writings or sounds, must be consistent and persistent meaning and inner logic. In fact by persistent meaning I can deduct that in Sanskrit 'narasamsa'=men's desire comes from Lithuanian 'nora/noras'=desire (and 'sam' in Russian language means himself or a man), and 'narapati'=king, 'naradeva'=men's god??? (it probably means the god of war, in Lith. it would be 'karo dievas') and 'narayana'=mandrawn cart comes from Lithuanian 'karas/karalius/kariauna/karvedys/karuna/karti/kartuves/karoliai/(kibet/kabot/karot/kybot)/karutis'=war/king/army/warlord/crown/strung/gibbet/riviers or beads/(dangle)/cart or barrow, because in Lith. 'pati/pats/patele/patinas'=wife,herself/husband,himself/male-animal/female-animal...and so on (have no time for everything) —Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.140.114.210 (talk) 03:46, 20 January 2008 (UTC)

Moreover in my knowledge the only language possesing inner logic in numerical system is Lithuanian (one word is derived from another even more ancient and having obvious meaning emerging from the very beginig of the language formation - much more earlier times than Proto-IE was present) see what I wrote in Did PIE lack a "have" verb? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.140.114.210 (talk) 04:45, 20 January 2008 (UTC)

First, the publication you refer to does not claim anything you suggest here. Quote: "I do not regard Vedic as the IE mother-tongue", so why Lithuanian should be regarded as such instead by way of "revision"? Second, the paper makes some interesting suggestions towards the components of words that have been lost in many languages except Sanskrit. You say Lithuanian would do an ever better job to identify those components. Well, I would say any results towards such an identification would be welcome, though it is my opinion the direct relation towards components is merely lost to our knowledge, not absent. For instance, the example the absence of credible cognates of components for "daughter" in all languages except Sanskrit merely means those components can't be recognized as such anymore. However, research from Sanskrit could revitalize the search of cognates of those components in other languages. The component "duh" in Sanskrit for both to milk and to grant, could create a key to identify the evolution of similar components in other languages. Some OR here, just for giving an example: "duh" could correspond easily with Dutch "dogen" (to accept, tolerate), that would be a passive equivalent to "to grant", ie. rather "to accept". The original meaning of "daughter" would change from a being given to a being accepted (by the parents). Also the process for extracting milk, while in Sanskrit the holy cow "gives" the milk, here in my country we "take" the milk ourselves for already thousands of years. Here we don't have cows coming to our doors for granting us our lot, we have to go to the cow and hope the cow will accept the extraction of milk in order it won't kick the bucket away. The difference would be in the way of thinking of different cultures, not in the linguistic component itself. So much for the credibility of Sanskrit, or any other langage, being the mother of all languages. By the way, didn't "duh" relate to some very general IE form for donation as well? (I'm sorry, lost in Dutch: we have a greedy tradition here and don't give so much, though we still tolerate ("gedogen") something being taken, or abused) Rokus01 (talk) 15:13, 20 January 2008 (UTC)


In my oppinion mother/wife, father/husband, son/brother, daughter/sister, mother/father/sun/daughter-in-law (these in English language were constructed in much later times then a law was already present, but Lithuanian language has prime and very old versions of these words and even different for each: the parents of a husband and a wife), uncle and aunt (unlike second line relatives such as grandpa, grandma, cousin (masculin and feminin), grandson, granddaughter) must be the very prime words and shouldn't be derived from any other words, because family members were always surrounding each other and of couse developed at more or less the same time.

In. Lith. we have 'dukra/dukte/dukryte/dukrele/dukraite'=daughter and derivatives 'kraitis'=dot or dower meaning the very stuff of the daughter-in-law, 'kraite/kraitele'=basket meaning the item where the stuff of the daughter-in-law were kept. In Lithuania we can say both 'duoti pieno'=give a milk and 'milzhti/melzhti'=take a milk...by the way the phallus comes from 'penis/peneti/penas'=feed and 'penis'=phallus originated from 'pienas'=milk, moreover 'myzhti'=piss/pee originated from 'milzhti'=to take a milk.

Moreover 'dyka/dykineti/dykauti'=mike, 'dukti/is-dyk-auti'=frolic, 'duok/duoti/do(va)noti'=give or donate, 'dovanoti'=gift (all these words are intervened and can be derived from each other 'frolic' from 'mike', and 'gift' from 'give/donate', but not 'mike' from 'give'!!! or otherwise, these are two prime roots, also Lith. 'duok' seams almost identical to Duch 'dog'), 'imt'=take, 'pri-imti'=accept (it do not originate from 'duok'!!! as in your language and 'imk/imt' is the prime root as well), 'gaut'=get, 'tur/turet'=have and his derivatives 'turtas'=worth/wealth 'tureklai'=rail (and here you can trace this degradation of Lith. word 'turet' in English language: rail=(tu)re(k)l(ai), worth='turt(as)' - the first 't' degraded into 'w' and the last 't' became less voiced 'th'...so Sanskrit has one form for lots of different meanings while Lithuanian has every single meaning slightly different (in form) from each other (and you can trace the evolution of language). The tendency is to have more meanings for one word unlike in Lithuanian, that is the indication of the degradation of Lithuanian language and becoming Sanskrit, i.e. some dielect of mother language (Lithuanian) less rich in forms. All of you must first study Lithuanian language to understand what I understand. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.140.114.210 (talk) 19:34, 20 January 2008 (UTC)

I understand perfectly what you mean, even though I can't speak Lithuanian. The reconstructions of PIE has often been criticized for being too self-contained and relying too much on internal productivity, for being too beautiful. Indeed, such a flexible and productive language is fascinating and incredible, and is one of the very reasons why certain important linguists nowadays think of PIE as rather a new language that originated by way of creolization (ie. the Neolithic creolisation hypothesis): This, because the same feature of extreme productivity from just a few basic abstractions can only be found nowadays in creole languages. I understand from your explanation that much of the ancient linguistic components can still be recognized in Lithuanian and that much of it still makes sense. Also, I would be very interested in sourced references, if any, stating that new words can still be made using the same ancient components. Still, I guess this kind of productivity has been frozen in Lithuanian as well. I mean, even a creole language will be "finished" in its development once the vocabularity has evolved to a sufficient level for communication to make sense. When did this level of productivity stop for Lithuanian? How did the internal development relate to other branches? From your words I can deduct the language did not follow all later developments (like your example of ner?) and instead stayed behind with a fewer amount of productive roots, so with this I could tentatively imagine the splitting off of the Sanskrit/Greek branch from proto-Lithuanian (thus being an intermediate stage of PIE) when PIE was still somewhere in the phase of creolisation: similar words with similar meanings could still be concocted (derived) from the original components, still never "froze" in the same way as these meanings were frozen in the words of languages that have those words in common. This would define Lithuanian rather as an early, isolated offshoot: quite different from your proposal that Sanskrit, Greek and, why not, all other IE languages evolved from proto-Lithuanian by way of degrading. Rokus01 (talk) 21:02, 20 January 2008 (UTC)

I do not know everything. All referencies can be made only to Lithuanian language. I just follow some strict logical rules. Lithuanian language was already developed into very complex language when this split took place (it can be not only the degradation, but and mix with some other languages extinct nowadays, so we can never find a common roots, but we can determine the only language which was influential to all others), that's why we can recognize similar roots and deduct that the basic language must be that one who preserved all forms found in these languages (i.e. 'all forms' means not newly developed, but old ones). For example almost 70% IE languages (by number) uses 'alb' root for 'white', and in Lith. language we have 'baltas' and this form is more similar to English one (probably 'baltas'=white lost the ending becoming 'balt', then 'b' became 'wh' and finaly 'l' was lost, though the result is 'white'; the same is true and with 'alb', firstly they lost 'b' becoming 'altas', then lost the ending and finaly 't' changed to 'b') while 'alb' is not similar to 'white' at all. But not everything was preserved and in Lithuanian language. That is, 'ezheras'=lake in Old Prussian is 'asharas' which in Lithuanian language means tears (so probably 'asharas/asharos'=tears was the prime word for the lake), so we lost this sense, but in Old Prussian it survived. Lithuanian language has much more similarities with Sanskrit than Greek has. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.140.114.210 (talk) 21:48, 20 January 2008 (UTC)

This examples are not supported by sourced references. According to the linguistic research I know of, different roots are involved. Any attempt to glue those roots together should be supported by academic publications. Rokus01 (talk) 23:29, 20 January 2008 (UTC)

You see that these roots are similar, and every Lithuanian can tell you what they mean and that they logicaly tied (some forms are exactly the same, but due to Lithuanian language flexibility (in different forms: one can be an adjective another word can be the tense of verb in plural and so on, but they always differ in the accent, not in the letters) they come from different roots). No one in Lithuania write to journals (or maybe do?) such obvious to us things (the question remains if the translation to English is exact, but not the inner logic and continuing transitions between Lithuanian roots). I've noticed some shift in meanings of the same roots in different languages (in Russian and English with respect to Lithuanian). For example, 'imti(Lith.)'=take, but in Russian language it means 'imet(Ru.)'=have, and the similar situation in English I have described above for 'zhirgas'=horse. I have met in English and more such shifts. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.140.114.210 (talk) 22:18, 21 January 2008 (UTC)

[edit] A suggestion

Should we mention that the IE languages are descended from Vulgar PIE, and not Classical PIE?--121.209.160.108 (talk) 14:17, 15 March 2008 (UTC)

not unless you can show any quotable usage of such terms... dab (𒁳) 16:18, 15 March 2008 (UTC)

Take for instance the Vinča signs (especially the Tărtăria tablets). Some scholars think they represent a Slavonic dialect or Turkish, but the vast majority think they represent PIE. However, anyone who reads these signs will think that the modern IE languages are descended from that language! But it's quite clear that the language of these signs is actually a highly stylised literary register, which, like Classical Latin, was used for inscriptions and literature but was not actually spoken by the masses. So, to avoid giving people the wrong impression, we need to state that the IE languages are descended from Vulgar PIE and not Classical PIE (as used in the signs).--121.209.160.108 (talk) 05:29, 17 March 2008 (UTC)

Proto-Indo-European was never written down, so it doesn't have a literary register. No one knows whether the Vinča signs even represent writing, let alone what language they're in if they do, so it's premature to label it "Classical PIE". —Angr If you've written a quality article... 05:36, 17 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Indo-European origins in South East Europe

Interesting article. http://www.geocities.com/dienekesp2/indoeuropean/ —Preceding unsigned comment added by 134.121.247.116 (talk) 23:14, 17 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Nine and new?...

Is the PIE word for 9 the same as the word for "new?" They seem to be similar words in many IE languages. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 203.109.210.129 (talk) 10:02, 11 April 2008 (UTC)

See dictionary.com's Indo-European roots for nine[4], and new[5] respectively. They aren't cognate but even in Proto-Indo-European they were phonetically similar. — Ƶ§œš¹ [aɪm ˈfɻɛ̃ⁿdˡi] 10:18, 11 April 2008 (UTC)

I think it has been proposed that they are ultimately related. Impossible to be sure of course. I think the explanation was related to "eight" being a dual, viz. two fours, and nine would then be two fours plus one. dab (𒁳) 20:37, 28 May 2008 (UTC)

Hmmm... that sounds about as plausible as the etymology of *penkwe being a phrase meaning "and the thumb". —Angr 21:11, 28 May 2008 (UTC)
Well, I didn't say I believed it, I just said I read it somewhere... dab (𒁳) 21:38, 28 May 2008 (UTC)