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Proto-language (historical linguistics) |
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This article does not cite any references or sources. Please help improve this article by adding citations to reliable sources. Unverifiable material may be challenged and removed. (October 2007) |
In all cases, the ancestral protolanguage is not known directly and it may be reconstructed by comparing different members of the language family via a technique called the comparative method, by internal reconstruction or other methods. Through this process only a part of the proto-language's structure and vocabulary can be reconstructed; the reconstruction remains the more fragmentary the more ancient the proto-language in question relative to the number of its descendants. Examples of unattested but (partially) reconstructed proto-languages include Proto-Indo-European, Proto-Uralic, Proto-Bantu and Proto-Paman.
The Proto-Indo-European language (PIE) is the most elaborated example of a proposed language. Although there is no direct evidence that this language ever existed, there is copious evidence for its existence in the many similarities of the Indo-European languages. A great amount of work has been put into the reconstruction of Proto-Indo-European, but there are no means of determining its success.
see: Attested language
Sometimes,citation needed however, the proto-language is a language which is known from inscriptions (perhaps due to misunderstanding), an example being the Proto-Norse language attested in the Elder Futhark runic inscriptions. For more examples of proto-languages, see the category "proto-languages" (below).
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