Indo-European is the largest language family by number of speakers, comprising most of the languages of Europe together with a broad band running through Iran and South Asia. Its branches include Germanic, Romance, Slavic, Celtic, Indo-Iranian, Hellenic, Baltic, Armenian and Albanian, along with extinct branches such as Anatolian (Hittite) and Tocharian. The family was recognized in the late eighteenth century when Sanskrit, Greek and Latin were shown to share systematic correspondences too regular to be coincidence, founding the comparative method that historical linguistics still uses. Whether Anatolian split off before or alongside the rest of the family, the Indo-Hittite question, remains debated among specialists.
Facts
RegionOriginating across Europe and southern and central Asia; today spoken on every inhabited continent through colonization and migration 1 Speaker CountAggregate across all Indo-European languages, the largest of any family by number of speakers; mid-2020s estimate. Proto-Language StatusProto-Indo-European is among the most thoroughly reconstructed proto-languages, established via the comparative method beginning with observations by Sir William Jones on the shared ancestry of Sanskrit, Greek and Latin, and refined over two centuries by Bopp, Grimm, Saussure and their successors. 3 Indo-European
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Connections
Ancestor Of
Anatolian (Hittite, Luwian and their relatives) is a primary branch of Indo-European, the first to split from the rest of the family.
Balto-Slavic, grouping the Baltic and Slavic languages, is a primary branch of Indo-European under the mainstream Balto-Slavic hypothesis.
Celtic is a primary branch of Indo-European, once spoken across much of western and central Europe.
Why this is disputed. Graeco-Phrygian is a proposed primary branch of Indo-European uniting Greek and the extinct Phrygian language on shared phonological and morphological innovations; the grouping is accepted by many Indo-Europeanists but not universal.
Hellenic (Greek and its ancient relatives) is a primary branch of Indo-European.
Indo-Iranian, grouping the Indic and Iranian languages, is a primary branch of Indo-European.
Italic is a primary branch of Indo-European, ancestral to Latin and the modern Romance languages.
Associated With
The dominant figure in early twentieth-century Indo-European comparative studies.
Source Wikipedia: Antoine Meillet
Schleicher produced an early systematic reconstruction of Proto-Indo-European and modeled its descendant languages as a family tree.
Source Wikipedia: August Schleicher
Pioneered the comparative syntax of the Indo-European languages, extending the Neogrammarian method beyond phonology and morphology.
Specialized in Indo-European poetics and the reconstruction of Proto-Indo-European verbal morphology, with particular attention to Hittite and Anatolian.
His comparative study of Indo-European institutions and vocabulary is a landmark of the field.
Source Wikipedia: Emile Benveniste
Source Memoire sur le systeme primitif des voyelles dans les langues indo-europeennesFerdinand de Saussure
Source Deutsche GrammatikJacob Grimm
A leading Indo-Europeanist whose reconstructions of Proto-Indo-European ablaut and accentuation shaped mid-twentieth-century comparative linguistics.
Co-authored the Neogrammarian Grundriss der vergleichenden Grammatik der indogermanischen Sprachen, the standard comparative grammar of the Indo-European languages.
A comparative philologist of the Indo-European languages who coined the term semantics in his 1897 Essai de semantique.
Source The Third Anniversary Discourse to the Asiatic SocietyWilliam Jones
Includes
Source Wikipedia: Albanian Language
Source Wikipedia: Armenian Language
Source The Cambridge Encyclopedia of LanguageDavid Crystal (editor)
Source Wikipedia: Bhojpuri Language
Source Wikipedia: Catalan Language
Source Wikipedia: French Language
Source Ethnologue: Languages of the World
Source Wikipedia: Germanic Languages
Source Wikipedia: Gujarati Language
Source Wikipedia: Iranian Persian
Source Wikipedia: Irish Language
Source Wikipedia: Italian Language
Source Wikipedia: Lithuanian Language
Source Wikipedia: Marathi Language
Source Wikipedia: Nepali Language
Source Wikipedia: Pashto
Source Wikipedia: Portuguese Language
Source Wikipedia: Prakrit
Proto-Indo-European is the reconstructed common ancestor of the Indo-European family, not a coordinate daughter classified alongside its member languages; recorded as associated rather than holds because this atlas has no dedicated ancestor-of relation type yet.
Source Wikipedia: Proto-Indo-European Language
Source Wikipedia: Romanian Language
Source Wikipedia: Scottish Gaelic
Source The Cambridge Encyclopedia of LanguageDavid Crystal (editor)
Source Wikipedia: Urdu
Source Wikipedia: Welsh Language
Source Wikipedia: Lahnda
Long-Form Articles
Sources
1. The Cambridge Encyclopedia of Language
David Crystal (editor), Cambridge University Press, 2010
2. Ethnologue: Languages of the World
3. The Third Anniversary Discourse to the Asiatic Society
William Jones, 1786The Third Anniversary Discourse to the Asiatic Society, 1786, on the Hindus; cross checked against Wikipedia, primary 1786 text not independently located this session
The Sanscrit language, whatever be its antiquity, is of a wonderful structure; more perfect than the Greek, more copious than the Latin, and more exquisitely refined than either, yet bearing to both of them a stronger affinity, both in the roots of verbs and the forms of grammar, than could possibly have been produced by accident.
- Associated With: William Jones
Wikipedia: Indo-European Languages (Family Article)
Wikipedialead section
A synonym is Indo-Germanic (Idg. or IdG.), specifying the family’s southeasternmost and northwesternmost branches.
History of Indo-European linguistics section
A synonym is Indo-Germanic (Idg. or IdG.), specifying the family's southeasternmost and northwesternmost branches.
View the Source Glottolog
Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology- Includes: English
- Includes: Spanish
- Includes: Hindi
- Includes: Latin
- Includes: Sanskrit
- Includes: Ancient Greek
View the Source Memoire sur le systeme primitif des voyelles dans les langues indo-europeennes
Ferdinand de Saussure, 1878Associated With: Ferdinand de Saussure
Deutsche Grammatik
Jacob Grimm, 1822Associated With: Jacob Grimm
Wikipedia: August Schleicher
Wikimedia FoundationAssociated With: August Schleicher, Career sectionView the Source Wikipedia: Antoine Meillet
Wikipedia: Armenian Language
WikipediaIncludes: Armenian, Classification sectionQuote, Includes: Armenian, Classification section
Armenian is an independent branch of the Indo-European languages.
Wikipedia: Emile Benveniste
WikipediaAssociated With: Emile Benveniste, Notable Works sectionView the Source Wikipedia: Germanic Languages
Wikimedia FoundationIncludes: Germanic, IntroductionQuote, Includes: Germanic, Introduction
The Germanic languages are a branch of the Indo-European language family.
Wikipedia: Proto-Indo-European Language
Wikimedia FoundationIncludes: Proto-Indo-European, Lead section, statement that PIE is the reconstructed common ancestor of the familyView the Source Wikipedia: French Language
Wikimedia FoundationIncludes: French, Infobox, Language familyQuote, Includes: French, Infobox, Language family
Indo-European Italic Latino-Faliscan Latinic Romance Italo-Western Western Romance Gallo-Iberian Gallo-Romance Gallo-Rhaetian Arpitan-Oil Oil Francien zone French
Wikipedia: Portuguese Language
Wikimedia FoundationIncludes: Portuguese, Infobox, Language familyQuote, Includes: Portuguese, Infobox, Language family
Indo-European > Italic > Latino-Faliscan > Latin > Romance > Italo-Western > Western Romance > Gallo-Iberian > Iberian Romance > West Iberian > Galician-Portuguese > Portuguese
Wikipedia: Urdu
Wikimedia FoundationIncludes: Urdu, Infobox, Language familyQuote, Includes: Urdu, Infobox, Language family
Indo-European > Indo-Iranian > Indo-Aryan > Central Zone > Western Hindi > Hindustani > Urdu
Wikipedia: Marathi Language
Wikimedia FoundationIncludes: Marathi, Infobox, Language familyQuote, Includes: Marathi, Infobox, Language family
Indo-European > Indo-Iranian > Indo-Aryan > Southern > Marathi-Konkani > Marathi
Wikipedia: Lahnda
Wikimedia FoundationIncludes: Western Punjabi, Infobox, Language familyQuote, Includes: Western Punjabi, Infobox, Language family
Indo-European > Indo-Iranian > Indo-Aryan > Northwestern > Lahnda
Wikipedia: Iranian Persian
Wikimedia FoundationIncludes: Iranian Persian, Infobox, Language familyQuote, Includes: Iranian Persian, Infobox, Language family
Indo-European > Indo-Iranian > Iranian > Western > Southwestern Iranian > Persian > Iranian Persian
Wikipedia: Italian Language
Wikimedia FoundationIncludes: Italian, Infobox, Language familyQuote, Includes: Italian, Infobox, Language family
Indo-European > Italic > Latino-Faliscan > Latin > Romance > Italo-Western > Italo-Dalmatian > Italo-Romance > Tuscan > Northern Tuscan > Florentine > Italian
Wikipedia: Gujarati Language
Wikimedia FoundationIncludes: Gujarati, Infobox, Language familyQuote, Includes: Gujarati, Infobox, Language family
Indo-European > Indo-Iranian > Indo-Aryan > Western Indo-Aryan > Gujarati languages > Gujarati
Wikipedia: Bhojpuri Language
Wikimedia FoundationIncludes: Bhojpuri, Infobox, Language familyQuote, Includes: Bhojpuri, Infobox, Language family
Indo-European > Indo-Iranian > Indo-Aryan > Eastern > Bihari > Bhojpuri
Wikipedia: Prakrit
Wikimedia FoundationIncludes: Prakrit, Infobox, Language familyQuote, Includes: Prakrit, Infobox, Language family
Indo-European > Indo-Iranian > Indo-Aryan > Prakrit
Wikipedia: Catalan Language
Wikimedia FoundationIncludes: Catalan, Infobox, Language familyQuote, Includes: Catalan, Infobox, Language family
Top family: Indo-European languages; immediate parent branch: Occitano-Romance languages.
Wikipedia: Irish Language
Wikimedia FoundationIncludes: Irish, Infobox, Language familyQuote, Includes: Irish, Infobox, Language family
Top family: Indo-European; immediate parent branch: Goidelic (within Insular Celtic).
Wikipedia: Welsh Language
Wikimedia FoundationIncludes: Welsh, Infobox, Language familyQuote, Includes: Welsh, Infobox, Language family
Top family: Indo-European; immediate branch: Brittonic (within Celtic, Insular Celtic).
Wikipedia: Albanian Language
Wikimedia FoundationIncludes: Albanian, Infobox, Language familyQuote, Includes: Albanian, Infobox, Language family
Top family: Indo-European; immediate branch: Albanoid.
Wikipedia: Romanian Language
Wikimedia FoundationIncludes: Romanian, Infobox, Language familyQuote, Includes: Romanian, Infobox, Language family
Top family: Indo-European languages; immediate branch: Eastern Romance languages.
Wikipedia: Scottish Gaelic
Wikimedia FoundationIncludes: Scottish Gaelic, Infobox, Language familyQuote, Includes: Scottish Gaelic, Infobox, Language family
Top family: Indo-European; immediate branch: Goidelic (within Insular Celtic).
Wikipedia: Pashto
Wikimedia FoundationIncludes: Pashto, Infobox, Language familyQuote, Includes: Pashto, Infobox, Language family
Top family: Indo-European languages; immediate branch: Southeastern Iranian languages.
Wikipedia: Lithuanian Language
Wikimedia FoundationIncludes: Lithuanian, Infobox, Language familyQuote, Includes: Lithuanian, Infobox, Language family
Top family: Indo-European languages; immediate branch: Baltic languages (East Baltic).
Wikipedia: Nepali Language
Wikimedia FoundationIncludes: Nepali, Infobox, Language familyQuote, Includes: Nepali, Infobox, Language family
Top family: Indo-European; immediate branch: Indo-Aryan languages (Northern Zone, Eastern Pahari group).
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