Historical Linguistics

Historical linguistics, also called Diachronic Linguistics, the branch
of linguistics concerned with the study of phonological, grammatical, and

semantic changes, the reconstruction of earlier stages of languages, and
the discovery and application of the methods by which genetic
relationships among languages can be demonstrated. Historical
linguistics had its roots in the etymological speculations of classical
and medieval times, in the comparative study of Greek and Latin
developed during the Renaissance, and in the speculations of scholars
as to the language from which the other languages of the world were
descended. It was only in the 19th century, however, that more scientific
methods of language comparison and sufficient data on the early Indo-
European languages combined to establish the principles now used by
historical linguists. The theories of the Neogrammarians, a group of
German historical linguists and classical scholars who first gained
prominence in the 1870s, were especially important because of the
rigorous manner in which they formulated sound correspondences in the
Indo-European languages. In the 20th century, historical linguists have
successfully extended the application of the theories and methods of the
19th century to the classification and historical study of non-Indo-
European languages. Historical linguistics, when contrasted
with synchronic linguistics, the study of a language at a particular point in
time, is often called diachronic linguistics.
What is Historical Linguistics?

LINGUISTICS TOPICS
The study of linguistic change is called historical and comparative linguistics. Linguists identify
regular sound correspondences using the comparative method among the cognates (words that
developed from the same ancestral language) of related languages. They can restructure an
earlier protolanguage and this allows linguists to determine the history of a language family.
Languages that evolve from a common source are genetically related. These languages were
once dialects of the same language. Earlier forms of Germanic languages, such as German,
English, and Swedish were dialects of Proto-Germanic, while earlier forms of Romance languages,
such as Spanish, French, and Italian were dialects of Latin. Furthermore, earlier forms of Proto -
Germanic and Latin were once dialects of Indo-European.
Linguistic changes like sound shift is found in the history of all languages, as evidenced by the
regular sound correspondences that exist between different stages of the same language, different
dialects, and different languages. Words, morphemes, and phonemes may be altered, added or
lost. The meaning of words may broaden, narrow or shift. New words may be introduced into a
language by borrowing, or by coinage, blends and acronyms. The lexicon may also shrink as older
words become obsolete.
Change comes about as a result of the restructuring of grammar by children learning the
language. Grammars seem to become simple and regular, but these simplifications may be
compensated for by more complexities. Sound changes can occur because of assimilation, a
process of ease of articulation. Some grammatical changes are analogic changes, generalizations
that lead to more regularity, such as sweeped instead of swept.
Old English, Middle English, Modern English
Old English 499-1066 CE Beowulf
Middle English 1066-1500 CE Canterbury Tales
Modern English 1500-present Shakespeare
Phonological change: Between 1400 and 1600 CE, the Great Vowel Shift took place. The seven
long vowels of Middle English underwent changes. The high vowels [i] and [u] became the
diphthongs [aj] and [aw]. The long vowels increased tongue height and shifted upward, and [a]
was fronted. Many of the spelling inconsistencies of English are because of the Great Vowel Shift.
Our spelling system still reflects the way words were pronounced before the shift took place.
Morphological change: Many Indo-European languages had extensive case endings that governed
word order, but these are no longer found in Romance languages or English. Although pronouns
still show a trace of the case system (he vs. him), English uses prepositions to show the case.
Instead of the dative case (indirect objects), English usually the words to or for. Instead of the
genitive case, English uses the word of or 's after a noun to show possession. Other cases include
the nominative (subject pronouns), accusative (direct objects), and vocative.
Syntactic change: Because of the lack of the case system, word order has become more rigid and
strict in Modern English. Now it is strictly Subject - Verb - Object order.
Orthographic change: Consonant clusters have become simplified, such as hlaf becoming loaf and
hnecca becoming neck. However, some of these clusters are still written, but are no longer
pronounced, such as gnaw, write, and dumb.
Lexical change: Old English borrowed place names from Celtic, army, religious and educational
words from Latin, and everyday words from Scandinavian. Angle and Saxon (German dialects)
form the basis of Old English phonology, morphology, syntax and lexicon. Middle English
borrowed many words from French in the areas of government, law, religion, literature and
education because of the Norman Conquest in 1066 CE. Modern English borrowed words from
Latin and Greek because of the influence of the classics, with much scientific terminology.
Introduction to Historical Linguistics
Historical linguistics is the study of not only the history of languages, as the name
implies, but also the study of how languages change, and how languages are related
to one another. It might seem at first that this would be a rather dull, uneventful
field of study, but that is far from the truth. Historical linguistics is full of lively
debate and controversy (I'll point out controvercial things when they come), and
occasionally some nasty words are thrown around.
The main job of historical linguists is to learn how languages are related. Generally,
languages can be shown to be related by having a large number of words in common
that were not borrowed (cognates). Languages often borrow words from each other,
but these are usually not too difficult to tell apart from other words. When a related
group of languages has been studied in enough detail, it is possible to know almost
exactly how most words, sounds, and grammar rules have changed in the languages.
History of historical linguistics
People have thought about the origin of languages for a long, long time. Like other
early looks into nature and the universe, the early ideas about language where at
best obvious (realizing that two very similar languages were related) or lucky
guesses, at worst dead wrong, and almost always ethno-centric (only paying
attention to nearby languages. This, of course, wasn't always their fault, since
communication was so slow. However, for example, the Greeks simply considered
most languages in Europe to be "Barbarian", even though there were certainly
several distinct "Barbarian" languages).
One of the earliest observations about language was by the Romans. They noticed
that Latin and Greek were similar. However, they incorectly assumed that Latin came
from Greek. The reality is that both came from Indo-European. More on that later.
There were lots of people looking at languages in the middle ages. However, most of
them were trying to show Hebrew giving rise to all of the world's languages,
specifically European languages. This never really worked, since Hebrew is not
directly related to Indo-European languages.
When Europeans started travelling to India about 300 years ago, they noticed that
Sanskrit, the ancient literary language of India, was similar to Greek, Latin, and other
languages of Europe. In the late 18th century, it was first correctly theorized that
Sanskrit and the languages of Europe had all come from the same language, but that
that language was no longer living. This was the beginning of Indo-European. Since
then, many languages from all over the world have been studied, and we are starting
to get a good idea of how all the world's languages may be related.

Historical Linguistics

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Historical linguistics, also called Diachronic Linguistics, the branch

of linguistics concerned with the study of phonological, grammatical, and

What is Historical Linguistics?

Old English, Middle English, Modern English

Old English 499-1066 CE Beowulf

Middle English 1066-1500 CE Canterbury Tales

Modern English 1500-present Shakespeare

Introduction to Historical Linguistics

History of historical linguistics

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