The proto-indo-european language, the mother of all languages in the world
The term 'Indo-European languages' refers to the family of languages spoken today across much of the globe. Since the 19th century, linguists have understood that all modern Indo-European languages descend from a single protolanguage, “Proto-Indo-European.” Today, wonder of wonders, it has been possible to reconstruct the sound of the mother of all languages.
Proto-Indo-European was spoken by a people who lived between 5000 and 2500 BC, but without leaving written texts.
Through comparative linguistics (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comparative_linguistics), the very strong similarities between these languages have been recognized, forcing researchers to assume that they are the continuation of a prehistoric protolanguage spoken about seven thousand years ago.
When linguists understood the common origin of almost all the languages of the globe, the challenge was to reconstruct the possible phonetics. In 1868, the work of the German linguist August Schleicher represented one of the cornerstones of Indo-European linguistics.
He was the first to propose the family tree model which identified and exemplified the relationships between languages and linguistic groups and their belonging to a specific family.
Thanks to his studies, Schleicher managed to reconstruct the vocabulary of the protolanguage, allowing him to compose a fable in the ancient language.
Originally known as “The Sheep and the Horses,” but known today as “Schleicher's Fable,” the short parable tells the story of a shorn sheep who encounters a group of decidedly unkind horses.
The fable turned out to be transcribed like this:
Avis, jasmin varnā na ā ast, dadarka akvams, tam, vāgham garum vaghantam, tam, bhāram magham, tam, manum āku bharantam. Avis akvabhjams ā vavakat: kard aghnutai mai vidanti manum akvams agantam.Akvāsas ā vavakant: krudhi avai, kard aghnutai vividvant-svas: manus patis varnām avisāms karnauti svabhjam gharmam vastram avibhjams ka varnā na asti. Tat kukruvants avis agram ā bhugat.
And here is the translation:
A shorn sheep saw some horses, one of which was pulling a heavy cart, another was carrying a large load, and another was carrying a man. The sheep said to the horses: “My heart aches when I see how man treats horses.”The horses said to her: “Listen, sheep: it is painful for us to see that man, our lord, makes a dress for himself with sheep's wool, while the sheep are left without wool”. After hearing this, the sheep ran away into the fields.
Schleicher's fable was the basis for subsequent advances in the study of Proto-Indo-European, allowing subsequent generations of linguists to progress in the reconstruction of the phoneme.
However, as there is considerable disagreement among scholars, no version of the fable can yet be considered definitive.
The latest update was introduced by the linguist Andrew Byrd of the University of Kentucky, who, based on the studies of H. Craig Melchert, recited the version of the fable with the pronunciation that emerged from his intuitions.
