Talk:Indo-European languages/Archive 6

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Archive 6

Table in new section "Summary"

Thanks to editor Claamtiest (talk · contribs) for the new Summary section, including a table with sources listed at the top. Unfortunately, listing all your sources above the table, leaves it open for abuse later, as someone could add another thirty rows to the table, unsourced, and it would then seem to be sourced by the existing refs at the top, when it reality, that would not be the case. Please redo your table, with a new narrow column in last place (call it "Refs", "Sources" or similar, and make it a no-sort column, please) and place your ref in the cell in that column. I've moved the table here, to make it easier for you.

Copy of table from section "Summary" from rev 939316517 of the article

Summary Further information: List of countries by spoken languages, Lists of languages, and List of languages by number of native speakers The number of speakers derived from statistics or estimates (2019) and were rounded: Number Branch Languages Native Speakers Majority Main Writing System 1 Albanian language 4 7,500,000 Albania Latin 2 Armenian language 2 7,000,000 Armenia Armenian 3 Balto-Slavic languages 25 270,000,000 Russia Cyrillic 4 Celtic languages 6 1,000,000 Wales Latin 5 Germanic languages 47 550,000,000 United States Latin 6 Hellenic languages 6 15,000,000 Greece Greek 7 Indo-Iranian languages 314 1,650,000,000 India Perso-Arabic - Devanagari 8 Italic languages 44 800,000,000 Italy Latin Total Indo-European languages 448 3,300,000,000 India Latin References

If you can fix the table so it has per-row attribution, it should be fine in that section. Thanks, Mathglot (talk) 03:29, 6 February 2020 (UTC)

As a secondary issue, I'm not sure what the "majority" column adds to the table; in my view, it's almost a bit misleading, as it hides other information. Information about where it is spoken, is available one click away by clicking the language family name in the "Branch" column. If it were up to me, I'd leave it out. (Even if left in, I don't see what is gained by having flag icons; this is not a political issue, and languages transcend political boundaries as a rule, rather than as an exception.) Thanks, Mathglot (talk) 03:34, 6 February 2020 (UTC)

Agree with Mathglot, we should leave the "Majority" column out. I'd extend this to "Main Writing System": while it is self-evident for Armenian and Albanian, and also undebatable for e.g. Germanic and Celtic, having Cyrillic as main writing system for Balto-Slavic opens pandora's box for POV edits. By number of speakers, it is correct, but by number of languages, Latin is dominant. Speaker numbers are a maintenance nightmare, but I'll count on User:Claamtiest to keep an eye on that. –Austronesier (talk) 10:43, 6 February 2020 (UTC)

hi friends, Majority refer to main country or country with most population of native speakers. instead of majority we can use another words.Claamtiest (talk) 16:37, 6 February 2020 (UTC)

also about ref i will correct them. thanksClaamtiest (talk) 16:37, 6 February 2020 (UTC)

Number	Branch	Languages	Native Speakers	Origin/Majority	Main Writing System	Ref
1	Albanian language	4	7,500,000	Albania	Latin
2	Armenian language	2	7,000,000	Armenia	Armenian
3	Balto-Slavic languages	25	270,000,000	Russia	Cyrillic
4	Celtic languages	6	1,000,000	Wales	Latin
5	Germanic languages	47	550,000,000	Germany - England	Latin
6	Hellenic languages	6	15,000,000	Greece	Greek
7	Indo-Iranian languages	314	1,650,000,000	India - Iran	Devanagari - Perso-Arabic
8	Italic languages	44	800,000,000	Italy	Latin
Total	Indo-European languages	448	3,300,000,000	Asia - Europe	Latin

I modified the table this way. If you think this is a mistake, please correct it then add the correct version to article. Thankful

note:

origin refer to A country whose origins are languages or currently have most speakers.Claamtiest (talk) 17:00, 6 February 2020 (UTC)

I'm afraid I don't really find this table a good idea. First, the "origin" column was still a mess when I found it yesterday. It seemed to be mixing up at least three concepts: (a) the country or countries where most speakers of X live; (b) the country or countries where speakers of X are a majority; (c) the country or countries where the languages originally developed. This just doesn't work. Second, I don't like the way the table gives privileged treatment to the claims about "numbers of languages" per Ethnologue. Counting languages is always a problematic thing, given the ubiquitous language-versus-dialect delimitation issues, and the treatment by Ethnologue is notoriously messy in this respect. These numbers therefore have very little value. I'm not opposed to citing them somewhere in the article, but giving them this amount of visibility (first in the very first sentences of the lead, and then again here), making them the guiding principle of our presentation, is not good in my view. Third, I really don't see what "main writing system" has to do with anything. This is information quite extraneous to the issue of linguistic classification. Fut.Perf. ☼ 10:17, 1 March 2020 (UTC)

@Fut.Perf.: Agree. I suggest to scrap the table, if no one objects. Claamtiest won't, they were blocked for sockpuppetery. –Austronesier (talk) 10:48, 1 March 2020 (UTC)

About adding separate Baltic and Slavic language trees

I will start of with that there are two groups of linguists, ones who do believe in Baltic and Slavic languages as separate languages, and others who do believe in balto-slavic language group as one. While i am supporter for separate Baltic and Slavic language groups i do recognise other linguist opinion about topic. So my suggestion would be adding explanation that it is contested topic and add Baltic languages branch as separate to list. Janncis (talk) 11:04, 7 April 2020 (UTC)

Acutally, there are at least three groups of linguists, of very unequal size. The first group considers Baltic and Slavic first-order branches of IE, without having a special relationship with each other. A second group assigns these to a single Balto-Slavic branch, which later split into the Baltic and Slavic subbranches. A third group also assigns them to a Balto-Slavic branch, but divides the historically attested languages into three subbranches, viz. West Baltic (=Old Prussian), East Baltic, and Slavic. The second group is still by far the mainstream, while the first group is dwindling but still extant in isolated circles. The real debate in current mainstream scholarship concentrates about the third view, which is still a minority view, but absolutely makes sense (that's my personal opinion, but what counts is the NPOV). So no, presenting Baltic and Slavic as separate branches in this overview clearly gives undue weight to a minority opinion. The—largely historical—debate is sufficiently covered in Balto-Slavic languages. –Austronesier (talk) 13:08, 7 April 2020 (UTC)

Im not asking for removal of Balto-Slavic branch, but does sound fair to acknowledge that there are also different views on topic. After all this article contains language grouping. NPOV would be an interesting topic here, due to time and history it is really hard to figure out what is political opinion here, i can give you plenty of examples where solviet union changed facts to suit there needs, writing about languages when politic is we all are brother nations from one place (simple version) would not suprise me. So do you consider linguists in 2 counties to be minority? If so can you answer why Baltic language linguists are minority when they are supposed to be an experts in this field. This topic has plenty papers from all over world to prove its proven topic and not ood wish from two countries and there linguists. I do believe it has earned its place to be acknowledged in this article, even if it is minority view. And to be honest, I dont expect many linguists to be interest in this topic to actually research it not just read few papers and repeat them. Is not any easy task to do for archaic and conservative languages. Janncis (talk) 22:52, 9 April 2020 (UTC)

@Janncis: Please leave politics and conspiracy-theories out (WP:NOTFORUM) and try to present sources from the 21th century (1967 and 1981 is a while ago). And besides, the fact of being native speakers gives no priviledge over others when it comes to the study of the prehistory of these languages. International scholars of IE, Slavic and Baltic studies like Beekes, Fortson, Villanueva Svensson, Hill, Kortlandt or Olander do know what they are talking about. –Austronesier (talk) 10:21, 10 April 2020 (UTC)

Present Distribution

The world map in present distribution omits Armenia as a majority native county as well as Arthsak if it counts. As well as many Caribbean islands. It should be updated. Ron234 (talk) 19:54, 7 July 2020 (UTC)

A Commons file used on this page or its Wikidata item has been nominated for deletion

The following Wikimedia Commons file used on this page or its Wikidata item has been nominated for deletion:

• IE expansion.png

Participate in the deletion discussion at the nomination page. —Community Tech bot (talk) 20:01, 5 September 2020 (UTC)

Diagram in Grouping section

Currently there is a diagram in the Grouping section, a tree diagram that indicates the age of attestation of various languages.
Now, I admit that this diagram is exactly what it says on the lid, but I don't think it is very useful, and is probably misleading, given that it is in the Grouping section. The branches in this diagram do not relate to the grouping of the various families. For instance, it is now near universally accepted that the Tocharian family is one of the earliest families to branch off (probably second only to the Anatolian family). It might be better to provide a synthesis of the most widely accepted ideas of the relationship between the various groups.Ordinary Person (talk) 15:18, 26 September 2020 (UTC)

Inconsistent map: Balto-Slavic and Indo-Iranian

On the infobox map, the Balto-Slavic languages are split in two different colours. Light green for Baltic; dark green for Slavic. However, the Indo-Iranian languages, which, like the Balto-Slavic languages consist of different groups (Indo-Aryan, Iranian, Nuristani), are lumped together in one colour: dark blue. I believe this should be addressed. - LouisAragon (talk) 12:02, 6 October 2020 (UTC)

Pinging @Alphathon: the map author. --Wario-Man (talk) 13:26, 6 October 2020 (UTC)

• One branch - one color Although there remains a small group of opponents to Balto-Slavic among certain circles, the mainstream of Indo-Europeanists accepts it with the same confidence level as for Indo-Iranian. Ergo: one shade of green for all of it. –Austronesier (talk) 16:11, 6 October 2020 (UTC)

While I did create the SVG version of the map, I am not the originator of it; I simply converted the original raster version to a vector file. If you pinged me so that someone able to make the changes could see the discussion that's fine. If however you were after my opinion in particular I cannot claim any special expertise.

Unfortunately the original author of the raster map seems to be no-longer active. However, there is a note on the subject in that file's source section:

The two articles "Balto-Slavic languages" and "Indo-Iranian languages" from Britannica.com stress the lack of scholarly consensus on these branches. That is, for the former, whether Baltic and Slavic developed from a common ancestral language, or that the similarities are the result of parallel development and of mutual influence during a long period of contact. To cater for both scholarly viewpoints, this map shows Baltic and Slavic with two distinct shades of green under "Balto-Slavic". For the latter, the dispute is whether the Indo-Iranian languages include just the Iranian and Indo-Aryan (or, Indic) language groups, or Nūristānī and Bangani too. To prevent disagreement (and also because this map only represents the primary branches of Indo-European), all of Indo-Iranian is represented with one shade.

Personally I think there is some merit to the splitting of some of the branches regardless of the original intent. With Balto-Slavic, I don't see any benefit to lumping them; all it does is reduce the amount of information shown on the map, and therefore reduce its usefulness. While it does seem to have been the original author's intent, I don't see why the "branches" shown need to be the most basal possible, particularly when the current multi-shade solution for Balto-Slavic is an option. Of course, by the same logic it could be argued that other groups should be split up (say, North and West Germanic), but you have to draw the line somewhere. Going the other way, grouping certain disputed branches but not grouping others (e.g. Italo-Celtic) is also an implicit rejection of those hypotheses. This may of course be acceptable depending on the level of consensus among professional linguists.

I tend to agree that it probably makes sense to split up Indo-Iranian. However, as I said, I have no particular expertise in the subject so making the call on the positions of Nūristānī and Bangani should not be down to me, but rather a solid consensus. (It may be worth noting that their English Wikipedia pages place Bangani unequivocally as Indo-Aryan and Nuristani as its own sub-branch of Indo-Iranian, while noting other hypotheses. However, the file is currently in use on (I think) 172 pages across 55 wikis, while the original raster version is used on 67 pages across 52 Wikis, so a fork of the file may be in order even with a consensus.) It would also mean finding a good source map for the distribution of each sub-group.

Alphathon /'æɫ.fə.θɒn/ ^(talk) 23:01, 7 October 2020 (UTC)

Classification

The classification here makes no sense in some cases and it introduces Mallorcan, a non existing language: https://en.wikipedia.org/enwiki/w/index.php?title=Indo-European_languages&diff=979382662&oldid=978993417 — Preceding unsigned comment added by 139.47.112.72 (talk) 14:02, 21 September 2020 (UTC)

Please revise carefully the professional scientific strictly terms

Please revise carefully terms used to the related article Indo-European languages for a right origin of languages. Article holds inaccuracies specially regarding to Greek language, Greek alphabet and to Albanian language. According to Albanology and the works of albanologs as Gustav Meyer Johann Georg von Hahn and Milan Šufflay there are serious thoroughly studies and works of Meyer, Hahn and Suflai over the albanian language, works that prove unmistakably, undoubtfully that Albanian Language is the oldest language of Europe. Their work prove that albanian language was the basic language over which were created all other europian languages. So in the article about Indo-Europian languages must be included over all the fact that albanian language is the oldest of Europe and it is the basis of all other languages from Latin language and all other languages created after latin language. Declared is in the article the fact that the oldest written documents of albanian language date from 14th century A.D but in the secret archives of Vatican lay 6000 documents (not allowed to become public) written in albanian language which is the testimony that albanian language was written since in early records of first language writtings. There is a mistake in the article about Indo-European languages when it comes to the mentionin about Mycenaean Greek. As well it must be corrected the article itlself of Mycenian Greek for two reasons. First because of the use of the term "greek". There is no period known as "greek" in ancient times, specially during the time when the culture of old Mycene was brought alive. There is no evidence of any culture, civilisation, goverment, state country or nation called "greek" in ancient times according to the original writtings of that time. Scientifically from the point of view of a graduated historian it is illiteracy speaking about "greek" in the period of minoan civilisation and mycene civilisation. Term "greek" is created by some falsifier historians of 18th century A.D. Term "greek" have never existed 4000 year before when it was the time of Minoan and Mycenian civilisation. Term "greek" is created 4000 years after those ancient times. Even more names Minoa and Mycene can be explained only according to the rules and the meaning of the today albanian language. This is another very important point. And this is the second point why the article about Mycenian Greek and Indo-Europeane must be corrected which leds us to correct everything specially about so-called wrongly ancient greek language. There are no original documents of ancient times, there are no cronicles, there are not references or not even the smallest evidence to prove the existence of the greek language in ancient times. Even more according to carefully studies of today it results that there is not the smallest link between today modern greek language and so-called wrongly ancient greek language. They are totally two different languages that do not have any connection between them. Meanwhile all the evidences and all the studies specially brought here by Gustav Meyer, Milan Šufflay, George Von Hahn and too many other albanolgs prove that the modern albanian language is the only one language who can interpret, explain, give meaning and make understoodable what is so-called wrongly ancient greek language. One fact is sure. So-called ancient greek language does not have any link to modern greek language and at the other hand so-called ancient greek language can be explained and have a direct link to modern albanian language and the proof for this stands in the works of Meyer, Šufflay, Von Hahn and all others. For this reason and referring to Historical negationism the term "greek" must be removed from the article of Indo-European languages, from the article of Mycenian Greek and all other articles which is talk about "ancient greeks" and "ancient greek language". It must be an illiteracy if a schoolar or a historian graduated in the most famous dignified universities of the world will be speaking and spreading the false and fake term "greek". Things must be said as evidences show them to be. To be accurate we all must admit that greek language appears later more than middle ages A.D and is not at all ancient and have no link to ancient languages. For these evidences brought here the articles mentioned here must be corrected in basis of proofs. And for the reason of improving the articles according to the truth is opened this talking page. 92.60.27.42 (talk) 20:55, 16 April 2018 (UTC)

Greek is Slavic term "Grk", for Hellenic people and that become adopted by hellenic people and other foren Autors. "Greek" is name for larger group of people, not only Hellenic people but also Minoans...

Albanian can't be oldest european languages in europe, after Turkic language Albanian is probably the newest natural language in Europe.

Albanian Academy of Science is transparent by literacy and some Albanologist are oposed to this theory, and they recognised influence of Serbian, Hellenic or Romanic influece, for example Skenderbej is Serbian leader not Albanian, but some albanians were under his rule. And today some historians are indicating that Skenderbej (Đorđe Kastriotic Christian not muslim) with Konstantin the Great, Alexander Macedonian and Quin Elizabet are Albanian. But they are not. Ewerithing depends from Albanian Historian that your are reading... I can quote some other albanian, greek, serbian... scoolars that hawe strong proof of falsificating History of nordic-slavic and hellenic people in Albania. How i can see, you are part of that historical-linguistic block-out... Abanian language is part of Berber language group.

I can see that you know albanian language and history, than i alredy know that you will son discower that infuence of albanization on different non-albanian group of people who remembered they Historical figures or some words that are not part of alban languige but are part of dialect in albaninan languige, are only evidence of Albanian conecton with that people or they language... Some of them are considering Albanians-Arnauts and Sqipterians as diferent people who in past hawe spoken diferent language, later mixed in time of Othoman rule, bethwen New Epirus and Skadarska Kraina (Skenderia-Shkoder country)... For example, german scoolar Johann Georg von Hahn who was specialist for Albania, in 1855 year noted that albanian languige hawe no roots in europan language, Turkish influence is much stronger than european, he wrote... For example, Hellenic languige hawe mor incomon with some languiges in india than in albania.

Quoting that linguistic and historian Albanologist, can't go without larger discution... Mostly they were incorect — Preceding unsigned comment added by 79.140.149.155 (talk) 10:21, 30 November 2018 (UTC)

May I just add that wikipedia does not accept fringe theories. They are often in an article somewhere or other if they are vaguely plausible or sensible, however this albanocentric theory is utter nonsense, both as it is a ludicrous theory and as the only sources for it are, conveniently, from albanologists, not linguists. This leads to a greatly imbalanced, skewed, nationalistic conspiracy theory. Mr anonymous username (talk) 19:18, 11 February 2021 (UTC)

Comparison of conjugations an error

in last row, is wrote barand for persian, it is not correct, it must be Beravand بروند== — Preceding unsigned comment added by 194.225.31.80 (talk) 10:38, 13 March 2021 (UTC)

Cornish

Why is Cornish ignored, at least on the map???! — Preceding unsigned comment added by 92.18.121.97 (talk) 20:55, 29 November 2021 (UTC)

Template:White people?

Rua reverted Template:White people from the footer of the article, and did the same to Proto-Indo-European language . Not sure why, though? I'd suppose it's a due navbox context thing, if you don't mind awefully, do you? PPEMES (talk) 17:40, 9 April 2019 (UTC)

What on earth does Proto-Indo-European have to do with racial theories? Rua (mew) 17:41, 9 April 2019 (UTC)

Well, I guess languages and ethnicities tend to correlate slightly, along with associated study topics? I didn't come up with this specifically, but isn't the theory that Indo-European languages pertain ethno-linguistically to the theories on Indo-European peoples? Well, Indo-European peoples has recurred as a historical background to the societal concepts around "white people" etc., along with associated academic disciplines (e.g. white studies), doesn't it? Correct me if I'm wrong, but including templates where a topic is included, doesn't mean "stamping" this as an essential characteristics. In this case, I suppose it concerns a more or less arbitrary, social construct. I really don't want to force anything, and I may be wrong. It's just a pursuit of information transparency, in this case aboit a social construct. I am open to any arguments. PPEMES (talk) 18:13, 9 April 2019 (UTC)

I feel that mixing race and linguistics is a slippery slope to racial supremacism. It's not necessary, and is likely to go against wikipedia policy. Mr anonymous username (talk) 19:00, 11 February 2021 (UTC)

I cannot see how on earth discussing ethnicity is a 'slippery slope to racial supremacism' ... — Preceding unsigned comment added by 92.18.121.97 (talk) 21:04, 29 November 2021 (UTC)

I find that this section seemed to become relevant, highly insulting really. The very notion that "All white people are the same" is as insulting as "all brown skinned people are the same". Not even 'most' white people are Anglo-Saxon, that designation is unique sub-group of the mainland of England, and some migrants emerging from them. Even so, the majority of Britons are genetically Insular and Goidelic Celts who were subjugated by invading people-groups who imposed their culture and language. Caucasians in-general are, and have been, a varied and mixed group of shades of pink and tissue colors: Some with blond hair and blue eyes, some red hair and varied eyes, and some brown or black hair and brown eyes. So, 'White' is as varied as 'people of color', and this bigoted trend to genericism of Caucasian peoples and trying to tie that bigotry to language, is every bit as racist as previous tropes-for-color. Let's be clear: The myth of "Aryanism" is just that, a myth; and language has little, if nothing, intrinsically to do with nation or race. I respectfully submit that users Rua and PPEMES ask valid questions, while not making the point clearly enough, so I will: There is no causally implicit connection between racial-ethnicity and language, and we should not impose one on this topic. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.210.46.26 (talk) 23:16, 31 May 2021 (UTC)

Indeed! Anti-white racism is alive and well. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 92.18.121.97 (talk) 21:04, 29 November 2021 (UTC)

Celtic

About the map, I don't really know the situation in Wales and Scotland, but in Britanny, even in the western part, french is by far the native language of most people and not celtic. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 164.2.255.244 (talk) 11:09, 3 August 2018 (UTC)

It should still be shown as Celtic in part. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 92.18.121.97 (talk) 21:00, 29 November 2021 (UTC)

The original writer of this section raises a perfectly valid point about the map: It's wrong. It shows the entirety of the United Kingdom and Irish Republic, as Germanic, and also northern Spain's Galicia as Romance. But that's not the case. Wales is an Insular Celtic language set (P-Celts), while Scotland and Ireland's languages are of Goidelic (Q-Celts) origin. Galicia's dialects were derived from an influx of Insular and Goidelic celtic as the result of first the Roman and then Saxon and Danish invasions of Britannian islands. While it may be true that Middle English and Modern English have been made the lingua-franca of Britannia, imported by Germanic tribal domination following the Saxon and Angle (Danish) invasions, Welsh and Irish Gaelic continue to be the native languages in those geographies, while Scotland has a strong under-culture working to bring Scots Gaelic back from the brink of extinction in much the same way that the Welsh did in the 20th century. Those regions on the map should therefore be colored Orange, not red. Cornish is an Insular Celtic dialect closely related to Welsh, but with just 550'ish speakers is all-but extinct, and so Cornwall might be reasonably classified among the red-zone of modern Germanic-derived geographies. I think the map should be updated to show Wales and the Republic of Ireland in solid Orange, and Scotland perhaps as a red-orange hatching - or perhaps all three of them red-orange hatching, to reflect their linguistically dualistic nature. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.210.46.26 (talk) 22:57, 31 May 2021 (UTC)

It is most certainly not the case that Wales should be solid orange. The majority of Welsh people speak better English than they do Welsh, and only a minority state that Welsh is their native language.

Contrariwise, Cornish is certainly not extinct, and the map is wrong in ignoring it. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 92.18.121.97 (talk) 21:00, 29 November 2021 (UTC)

Why is the above unsigned? By the way, Cornish is certainly extinct--died out in the 1800s. Of course, a few hearty folks are trying to revive it, but to my knowledge not tot he point that you could call it a living language again. Johundhar (talk) 05:08, 20 December 2021 (UTC)

Albanian

The entry "Other secondary sources, of lesser value due to extensive phonological changes and relatively limited attestation:[64] ... Albanian (c. 1450–current time)."
is absolute nonsense. This misinformation is indicative of the very low and limited level of the entire article. Neither does Albanian show insoluble phonological changes, nor is it in any way constrained in evidence (cf. e.g., Holm, Hans J. (2011b): "Swadesh lists" of Albanian Revisited and Consequences for Its Position in the Indo-European Languages. The Journal of Indo-European Studies 39-1&2. and the many references given there).HJJHolm (talk) 07:22, 8 January 2022 (UTC)

Two-branch division into Anatolian and Nuclear Indo-European

The Subdivisions currently listed in the infobox are the 10 traditional branches + Daco-Thracian + Illyrian + Phrygian.

But I believe modern studies of Indo-European fully accept an initial two-way branch into nuclear/core Indo-European and Anatolian. For example Andrew Garre (2006) describes it as "now widely accepted" and Thomas Olander (2019) says "At present, however, there is general agreement that the Anatolian subgroup of Indo-European was indeed the first one to branch off"

So would it make sense to change the infobox to list *two* branches: Anatolian and Nuclear Indo-European (maybe with the traditional non-Anatolian branches listed with indentation under Nuclear IE)? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Yaldi5 (talk • contribs) 20:07, 9 January 2022 (UTC)

Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment

This article is or was the subject of a Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment in Summer 2017. Further details are available on the course page. Student editor(s): Esotericbubbba. Peer reviewers: Reanna.shah, Jackpaulryan.

Above undated message substituted from Template:Dashboard.wikiedu.org assignment by PrimeBOT (talk) 00:27, 17 January 2022 (UTC)

Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment

This article was the subject of a Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment, between 14 July 2020 and 20 August 2020. Further details are available on the course page. Student editor(s): Shahrzad001.

Above undated message substituted from Template:Dashboard.wikiedu.org assignment by PrimeBOT (talk) 22:58, 17 January 2022 (UTC)

Extinct languages in infobox

A California based IP 2600:1700:E0D0:39B0:B8FF:E898:E58B:FFB4/48 (talk · contribs · WHOIS) has been persistently edit warring to include Cimmerian and remove Phrygian language, as well as splitting Thracian and Dacian in the infobox. Does anybody else strongly care about this? Dacian, Thracian (if they are separate), Illyrian and Cimmerian are very poorly attested. Should we include these languages in the infobox at all? Hemiauchenia (talk) 17:07, 19 January 2022 (UTC)

Cool similarity matrix

[1] not sure if some part of it can be used for graphics.. 46.240.139.215 (talk) 00:28, 7 February 2022 (UTC)

Indo European Languages tree image (Improvements needed)

The best way to make such a chart work: stop the lines of descent on the main chart, and add a reference number for a subsidiary chart where each line of descent continues. If there are cases where a language is of undetermined affiliation, perhaps add a question mark to the name of the language.

The color key works well, because it's easy to see at a glance whether a language is still spoken or not. A few languages are being revived, however.

the original comment and post: https://www.reddit.com/r/IndoEuropean/comments/sw9g2c/tree_of_indoeuropean_languages/

~ OneOfManyWikiUsers ~ — Preceding undated comment added 18:43, 19 February 2022 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 12 August 2022

change "Italic" in the table to "Romance", the table is currently incoherent with the picture 2A00:D180:2030:2B0:F591:D804:406B:ECA6 (talk) 18:59, 12 August 2022 (UTC)

 Not done: How? As far as I can see the table is correct an coherent. Italic includes Romance. Aaron Liu (talk) 14:04, 17 August 2022 (UTC)

Israel

In the map Israel isn't highlighted in light green when more than 80% of Israelis speak English more than even most African countries which are green highlighted for speaking an Indo European language in the minority status. Even though Hebrew is the native majority followed by Arabic which are neither Indo European but still most speak English too followed by other European languages like Russian and German, Yiddish, French etc. Israel should be light green Nlivataye (talk) 15:24, 3 October 2022 (UTC)

Is this about the unsourced map with ungrammatical captions in "Present distribution" (which btw is all blue, not green)? To all page watchers: any objections if I remove it? –Austronesier (talk) 19:03, 3 October 2022 (UTC)

The complex evolution of Latvijan and Latgalijan

Diagram missing Latgalijan. Text missing Latgalijan. 199.253.243.19 (talk) 22:19, 2 November 2022 (UTC)

Last citation removal

I removed part of a sentence with its reference (the last one - #71) considering it not fully pertinent here and not reliable (blog). If there is some disagreement about it, just restore the commented out text. Thanks.Carlotm (talk) 21:32, 11 December 2022 (UTC)

Glottolog and "Classical IE"

(Rv. This article can only be about one thing, and that's IE in its entirety independent of issues like internal classification or terminological revisionism (which is actually at the core of "Indo-Hittite"). And with all due respect, you should know by now NOT to rely solely on Glottolog for such fundamental edits.)

Okay but the change in question was about, explicitly, what Glottolog calls it. —Tamfang (talk) 21:33, 21 February 2023 (UTC)

"It", or "them"? The thing is, Glottolog's "Classical IE" refers to a thing with a more restricted scope (= IE minus Anatolian) than the topic of this article. –Austronesier (talk) 21:36, 21 February 2023 (UTC)

I'm starting to feel we will need to officially have Glottolog listed as an unreliable source. There are good people involved, but they very often make quite radical suggestions that at times (rarely) are downright fringe, more frequently represents a minority position. The way Glottolog is then (ab)used by some users to make wholescale changes based only on Glottolog really causes quite a lot of disruption to many articles related to linguistics. Jeppiz (talk) 22:14, 21 February 2023 (UTC)

• I agree with Austronesier that this seems to be primarily a semantic dispute about clade names, rather than a dispute about the actual classification of IE. This article is clearly about Indo-European sensu lato (including the Anatolian languages), so I don't think adding the "Classical IE" glottolog classification makes sense here. Hemiauchenia (talk) 22:44, 21 February 2023 (UTC)

Northern Iran

Everyone in northern Iran speaks Persian. My grandparents (father side) are from Tabriz. Please change the picture. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 188.102.110.0 (talk) 11:35, 7 July 2015 (UTC)

ROFL. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 92.18.121.97 (talk) 20:55, 29 November 2021 (UTC)

You cant base all of northern iran on your grandparents. Mr anonymous username (talk) 19:20, 11 February 2021 (UTC)

It is fairly impossible to not speak Persian if you grow up in Iran. School is exclusively in Persian, everything written everywhere is exclusively in Persian. 149.233.35.210 (talk) 01:33, 10 July 2023 (UTC)

Probably it is to show the presence of other languages. The caption does say dotted/stripped shows where "multilingualism is common". Mellk (talk) 04:03, 12 July 2023 (UTC)

Actually, I can see that in older versions this was not dotted/striped, which would be incorrect. Mellk (talk) 04:04, 12 July 2023 (UTC)

Italo-Celtic vs. Balto-Slavic vs. Indo-Iranian

In the Subdivisions on the right corner Baltic, Slavic, Iranian and Indo-Aryan should be listed separately because they are separate language families, just like Italic and Celtic and listed separately and not as Italo-Celtic. Furthermore even subgroups of listed of already listed upper level groups are listed like Messapic which strengthens my argument. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 149.233.35.210 (talk) 01:31, 10 July 2023 (UTC)

The Italo-Celtic hypothesis is controversial and not very widely accepted, whereas Indo-Iranian and Balto-Slavic are well-established families. I don't know much about Messianic; which other family is it supposed to be a subgroup of? AJD (talk) 04:31, 12 July 2023 (UTC)

@Ajd: Probably they refer to Albanian–Messapic (see Talk:Albanian language#Messapic about different views regarding this very special subgroup). Btw, "Messianic" is a Freudian delight :) –Austronesier (talk) 19:01, 12 July 2023 (UTC)

Oops! Probably an autocorrect error, unfortunately. AJD (talk) 20:39, 12 July 2023 (UTC)

Proto Paleo-Balkan

My mistake.Comment should be deleted. I wanted to comment on. Proto IE, not hère — Preceding unsigned comment added by 178.223.38.230 (talk) 11:50, 19 July 2023 (UTC)

Citation 68 broken

Citation number 68 ( "Ethnologue list of language families" (22nd ed.). Ethnologue. 25 May 2019. Retrieved 2 July 2019. ) sends to a dead link Tacorebel (talk) 20:22, 21 July 2023 (UTC)

About Image

The previous Image used on this page showed primary branches of Indo-European, now it shows some primary branches and some sub branches... If the criteria to be shown on the map is no longer being a primary branch... What's the criteria now? It just feels weird since some of the categories on the map are not even on the same level of IE. Sameerhameedy (talk) 06:29, 31 July 2023 (UTC)

not to mention, Proto-Germanic and Proto-Indo-Iranian were spoken around the same time, with PII actually being spoken slightly later. So Germanic definitely isn't at the same level as Iranian or Indo-Aryan. Sameerhameedy (talk) 06:50, 31 July 2023 (UTC)

Relationship between Dalmatian and Serbo-Croatian

Did Dalmatian disappear or merely get absorbed into Serbo-Croatian as a dialect? 199.253.243.19 (talk) 22:21, 2 November 2022 (UTC)

Dalmatian is a Romance language, so it could not become a Slavic dialect. It went extinct in 189x iirc. Presumably its last speakers also spoke a Slavic language(s), or perhaps Friulian. —Tamfang (talk) 00:31, 6 August 2023 (UTC)

Citations desperately needed.

This is a very well-organized page, especially considering the vastness of the topic -- but it's *desperately* lacking in citations in several sections. There are too many instances to flag each one individually, so I've flagged the whole page in the hopes that people will help add citations (or at the very least include citations in anything new they add).

Obviously, it would have been better if the original contributor had just included citations. Considering the complexity of the subject, I'd expect that many/most of the contributors here are quite familiar with the concept (and expectation) of citing references. It's really not a difficult concept. Betsy Rogers (talk) 08:26, 15 August 2023 (UTC)

Bestie the same thing is true for you — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2A01:5EC0:7020:49F:1:0:13A2:3623 (talk) 23:45, 1 September 2023 (UTC)

First attestation

The first chart (first attestation) has a color legend labeling three colors; how-ever, there are four different colors, since there is a pale green and a dark green. The legend needs to explain dark green (major languages?), or all greens should look the same. Kdammers (talk) 19:33, 24 November 2023 (UTC)

Incorrect legend

 The following legend, though understandable, is incorrect.
"Countries where Indo-European language family is majority native
 Countries where Indo-European language family is official but not majority native
 Countries where Indo-European language family is not official"

For example, the U.S. does not have an official language, but it clearly does not fit into the third category. The third category's description should be modified to some- thing like "Countries where [one or more members of the] Indo-European language family is[/are] not [the] majority native [?] or official language." Wordy, but more accurate. Kdammers (talk) 19:39, 24 November 2023 (UTC)

Italic 125.164.97.185 (talk) 21:20, 6 January 2024 (UTC)

Outdated population figure

The population figure says that native IE speakers number 3.2 billion at 46% of the world population, but those figures calculate to a world population of 7 billion, when it's known to have exceeded 8 billion by now. Long story short, the population figure needs to be updated. 23.93.181.240 (talk) 20:26, 9 April 2024 (UTC)