The Great Proto-Indo-European Thread's Sequel

[Talskubilos]

Talskubilos, do you think Indoeuropean languages originated from a single protolanguage or not?

In the sense of the classical genealogical tree model, definitely not.

[Talskubilos]

Agreed. It is pretty much useless to argue with him.

Not really. Simply, I don't believe in some dogmas of mainstream/academical linguistics, that's all.

[Talskubilos]

I was about to say that but you got to it first. Inherited words are obvious because they obey regular sound change in most cases, and when words are borrowed they typically don't follow regular sound changes.

That's right. Also notice "in most cases" and "typically" means PIE isn't some kind of mathematic entity, unlike some linguists seem to pretend.

[Zju]

Talskubilos, do you think Indoeuropean languages originated from a single protolanguage or not?

In the sense of the classical genealogical tree model, definitely not.

Every historical linguist keeps in mind that our reconstruction of PIE is an amalgam reflecting multiple dialects spoken during different time periods. How does this add anything to the discussion?

That's right. My own view is that the IE family is the result of a series (often complex) of expansion and replacement processes over several millenia, leading to several lexical strata in the reconstructed PIE. One example (but there're many other) would be the 'apple' words we've discussed before.

It looks uncovincing to me.

[Talskubilos]

It looks uncovincing to me.

[bradrn]

Talskubilos, do you think Indoeuropean languages originated from a single protolanguage or not?

In the sense of the classical genealogical tree model, definitely not.

Every historical linguist keeps in mind that our reconstruction of PIE is an amalgam reflecting multiple dialects spoken during different time periods. How does this add anything to the discussion?

That's right. My own view is that the IE family is the result of a series (often complex) of expansion and replacement processes over several millenia, leading to several lexical strata in the reconstructed PIE. One example (but there're many other) would be the 'apple' words we've discussed before.

It looks uncovincing to me.

Not so much ‘unconvincing’ as ‘refusing to give a straight answer’. I remember him ‘answering’ in almost precisely the same words when I asked him the same question, a while back. (And I never have seen him give any straight answer since then.)

[Talskubilos]

Not so much ‘unconvincing’ as ‘refusing to give a straight answer’. I remember him ‘answering’ in almost precisely the same words when I asked him the same question, a while back. (And I never have seen him give any straight answer since then.)

From my own research, I've found out the classical genealogical tree isn't an adequate model for the IE family, because the reconstructed PIE is made up from several linguistic strata/protolanguages, like a Frankenstein. This means IE languages must be the result of a series of expansion and replacement processes over many millenia, since the Mesolithic to the Metal Ages.

[Zju]

From my own research, I've found out the classical genealogical tree isn't an adequate model for the IE family,

If only there were hundreds years worth of linguistic research - done by dozens of linguists - which establishes and ascertains the tree model for the IE family...

This means IE languages must be the result of a series of expansion and replacement processes over many millenia, since the Mesolithic to the Metal Ages.

It looks uncovincing to me.

[Talskubilos]

From my own research, I've found out the classical genealogical tree isn't an adequate model for the IE family,

If only there were hundreds years worth of linguistic research - done by dozens of linguists - which establishes and ascertains the tree model for the IE family.

Truth doesn't depend on a majority vote. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Argument_from_authority

It looks uncovincing to me.

Not my problem.

[Zju]

From my own research, I've found out the classical genealogical tree isn't an adequate model for the IE family,

If only there were hundreds years worth of linguistic research - done by dozens of linguists - which establishes and ascertains the tree model for the IE family.

Truth doesn't depend on a majority vote. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Argument_from_authority

So this and what other arguments do you have to defend your hypothesis, as opposed to aaall the arguments in favor of the tree model?

[Talskubilos]

So this and what other arguments do you have to defend your hypothesis, as opposed to aaall the arguments in favor of the tree model?

As regarding to the +2000 items in IE lexicon (morphology has to be studied separately), I've found some internal correspondences among them, pointing to an origin from several strata/protolanguages, not just one single PIE, as stated by the mainstream theory. And there're also cross-borrowings and Wanderwörter, of course.

[bradrn]

From my own research, I've found out the classical genealogical tree isn't an adequate model for the IE family,

If only there were hundreds years worth of linguistic research - done by dozens of linguists - which establishes and ascertains the tree model for the IE family...

In fact the tree model is pretty bad, in general. François has a nice preprint which goes into considerable detail about why and how. I strongly recommend that Talskubilos read it, in order to understand how historical linguistics actually works.

[Talskubilos]

In fact the tree model is pretty bad, in general. François has a nice preprint which goes into considerable detail about why and how. I strongly recommend that Talskubilos read it, in order to understand how historical linguistics actually works.

Thank you for the reference!

[bradrn]

In fact the tree model is pretty bad, in general. François has a nice preprint which goes into considerable detail about why and how. I strongly recommend that Talskubilos read it, in order to understand how historical linguistics actually works.

Thank you for the reference!

You’re welcome! I hope this can help you refine your ideas around overlapping historical processes.

[keenir]

I'm still in disbelief... Talskubilos, could you confirm if this really is what you believe?

I am not sure about him, he is never explicit on his stance; but what I wrote is my impression from years of arguing with him.

I concur with this (although I haven’t known him as long as you have). He’s definitely denied the existence of PIE before, at least as commonly reconstructed.

the impression I get, is an argument thats basically "because PIE existed over several centuries, it can't possibly be the thing that we reconstruct, because thats too much a snapshot of a language"

hwat! ye awe-ful goode soul praytell?

(yep, still overall legible, despite centuries)

[keenir]

So this and what other arguments do you have to defend your hypothesis, as opposed to aaall the arguments in favor of the tree model?

As regarding to the +2000 items in IE lexicon (morphology has to be studied separately), I've found some internal correspondences among them, pointing to an origin from several strata/protolanguages, not just one single PIE, as stated by the mainstream theory. And there're also cross-borrowings and Wanderwörter, of course.

Wait...so, several different protolanguages, all shuffling between each other, and moving in and out of the region posited for PIE/IE, over the course of several thousand years...

I have two questions:
1. How did they all stay protolanguages for that long? (also, how did they stay distinct enough to be recognizable as different protolanguages?)
2. how many language families do these protolanguages represent/belong to?

thank you

[bradrn]

So this and what other arguments do you have to defend your hypothesis, as opposed to aaall the arguments in favor of the tree model?

As regarding to the +2000 items in IE lexicon (morphology has to be studied separately), I've found some internal correspondences among them, pointing to an origin from several strata/protolanguages, not just one single PIE, as stated by the mainstream theory. And there're also cross-borrowings and Wanderwörter, of course.

Wait...so, several different protolanguages, all shuffling between each other, and moving in and out of the region posited for PIE/IE, over the course of several thousand years...

I have two questions:
1. How did they all stay protolanguages for that long? (also, how did they stay distinct enough to be recognizable as different protolanguages?)
2. how many language families do these protolanguages represent/belong to?

thank you

(1) is a very strange question to ask. A protolanguage is simply a reconstructed ancestor language: PIE and all its ancestors ad infinitum have always been protolanguages, because they are ancestors of the modern IE family (if not others too). Although, in practice, it seems that the term is reserved for the latest common ancestor of a linguistic group, specifically.

As for (2), I suspect that he’ll respond by denying the existence of language families ‘in the sense of the classical genealogical tree model’ (to quote his previous words), because his own personal theory says something slightly different and hence all other models must be completely wrong.

[Talskubilos]

I have two questions:
1. How did they all stay protolanguages for that long? (also, how did they stay distinct enough to be recognizable as different protolanguages?)

Surely, I didn't mean these protolanguages lasted for so long, but the whole process which ultimately lead to the historical IE languages. This would be a series of successive expansions (= waves) which replaced the previous one. An example of this idea will be this diagram (not mine):

2. how many language families do these protolanguages represent/belong to?

If I understood well, you refer to the number of protolanguages involved and their relationship to the historical IE languages. Although I still think this is a simplification, the late Spanish Indoeuropeist Rodríguez Adrados, who studied IE morpohology, proposed 3: PIE II for Anatolian alone, PIE III A for the Indo-Greek group (Indo-Iranian, Greek, Phyrgian and Armenian), and PIE III B for NW IE European (Celtic, Italic, Germanic and Balto-Slavic) plus Tocharian.



But in my IMHO these would be the more recent expansions, because at lexical level, there're remnants of the languages spoken by Neolithic farmers and Mesolithic hunter-gatherers, which weren't necessarily related to the later ones.

[zompist]

From my own research, I've found out the classical genealogical tree isn't an adequate model for the IE family,

If only there were hundreds years worth of linguistic research - done by dozens of linguists - which establishes and ascertains the tree model for the IE family...

In fact the tree model is pretty bad, in general. François has a nice preprint which goes into considerable detail about why and how.

I liked this a lot, thanks for finding it!

[bradrn]

If only there were hundreds years worth of linguistic research - done by dozens of linguists - which establishes and ascertains the tree model for the IE family...

In fact the tree model is pretty bad, in general. François has a nice preprint which goes into considerable detail about why and how.

I liked this a lot, thanks for finding it!

You’re welcome!