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From Bill Bryson's The Mother Tongue--An Englishman, Sir William Jones, was sent to India in 1783, and taught himself Sanskrit--an odd thing to do, since it had been a dead language for centuries. He noticed a lot of similarities between that and European languages: bhurja was birch, for ex., and Sanskrit for ten was dasa, similar to the Latin decem. He proposed a theory that many of the classical languages--among them Sanskrit, Greek, Latin, Gothic, Celtic, and Persian--must spring from the same source.(p. 30.) Linguists delved eagerly into this theory over the next century, and this source language came to be called Indo-European.
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I had not known how this came by its name, and thought there might be others who would also like to know. And thanks again to you folks who led me to this book.
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Dear Max. Thank you for the kind words. Here is a URL about Sir William Jones. I had not realized his background was so impressive.Now I can go hunt for his word list. http://www.picatype.com/dig/da2/da2aa06.htmHere is a paragraph from one of his lectures: "The Sanskcrit language, whatever be its antiquity, is of 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 in the forms of grammar, than could possibly have been produced by accident; so strong indeed, that no philologer could examine them all three, without believing them to have sprung from some common source which, perhaps, no longer exists; there is a similar reason, though not quite so forcible, for supposing that both the Gothick and the Celtick, though with a very different idiom, had the same origin with the Sanskcrit; and the old Persian might be added to the same family..." Here is another URL about languages. some good stuff, but not as much as I hoped. http://www.exploratorium.edu/exploring/language/index.html
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Here is a couple paragraphs with quite a few of the early, basic words common to several languages: 2.Who were the Indo-Europeans? 1.What can we learn from their language? 1.common words for snow, winter, spring; for dog, horse, cow, sheep bear but not camel, lion, elephant, or tiger; for beech, oak, pine, willow, but not palm or banyan 2.I-E Cultural: complex sense of family relationship and organization; used gold and silver but not copper and iron; words for "wheel," "axle," and "yoke" show they used animals to pull wheeled vehicles; they farmed (not nomadic) with plows and kept domestic animals; they believed in multiple gods. 2.The bee problem 1.Many I-E languages have cognates for the honey bee and for a fermented honey drink (e.g. Greek "méli" (honey) and "mélissa (bee); Latin mel (honey); Old English milisc (honey sweet), medu (mead) and mildeaw (honey dew); Sanskrit madhu (honey); Dutch mede) 2.Bees are not found in any of the Asiatic sites proposed as the IE homeland. http://www.cord.edu/faculty/sprunger/e315/i-e.htm
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Here's a link that may be of interest to those who want to go WAY more in-depth than I do. It is on The Ergativic Stage of Early Proto-Indoeuropean. http://www.dabis.at/Anwender.htm/Alscher/contents.htm
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Dear Jackie: Thanks for that link. It is sufficiently technical that I am having a very bad time remembering the terms used. Just dandy for something to keep me busy when the board is slow.
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The Ergativic Stage of Early Proto-Indoeuropean
Funny you should mention, Jackie. The lovely AnnaS and I were just talking about the ergative stage of early Indo-European last night. Thanks for the link. You've saved my credibility.
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The lovely AnnaS and I were just talking about the ergative stage of early Indo-European last night.Boy, you folks sure know how to have a good time ... 
The idiot also known as Capfka ...
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The lovely AnnaS and I were just talking about the ergative stage of early Indo-European last night.
Ohmigawd. From you, I believe that...
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The lovely AnnaS and I were just talking about the ergative stage of early Indo-European last night.
Praise to Anu for bringing two such mated souls together.
Edit: [voice from background: oh David, you're so .... when you talk dirty]
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addict
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The lovely AnnaS and I were just talking about the ergative stage of early Indo-European last night.
I just wanna know what you whisper in her ear when you are being romantic!
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