The first systematic theory of the relationships between human languages began when Sir William Jones, "Oriental Jones," proposed in 1786 that Greek and Latin, the classical languages of Europe, and Sanskrit, the classical language of India, had all descended from a common source. The evidence for this came from both the structure of the languages -- Sanskrit grammar has similarities to Greek and to nothing else -- and the vocabulary of the languages. Thus, "father" in English compares to "Vater" in German, "pater" in Latin, "patêr" in Greek, "pitr." in Sanskrit, "pedar" in Persian, etc. On the other hand, "father" in Arabic is "ab," which hardly seems like any of the others. This became the theory of "Indo-European" languages, and today the hypothetical language that would be the common source for all Indo-European languages is called "Proto-Indo-European." The following table shows a genealogy for two "knowing" roots, which in modern English turn up as "know" and "wit."
4 posted on 08/17/2007 6:14:04 PM PDT by CarrotAndStick
(The articles posted by me needn't necessarily reflect my opinion.)
