Talk:Proto-Indo-European language

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This article is written in British English, which has its own spelling conventions (colour, travelled, centre, defence, artefact, analyse) and some terms that are used in it may be different or absent from other varieties of English. According to the relevant style guide, this should not be changed without broad consensus.

Proto-Indo-European language was a Language and literature good articles nominee, but did not meet the good article criteria at the time. There may be suggestions below for improving the article. Once these issues have been addressed, the article can be renominated. Editors may also seek a reassessment of the decision if they believe there was a mistake.

Article milestones
Date	Process	Result
January 9, 2007	Good article nominee	Not listed

Desinence?

Isn't a "desinence" always an ending, suffix, or terminator?

Opening sentence: 'Proto-Indo-European (PIE) is the reconstructed common ancestor of the Indo-European language family.'

The opening sentence does not say that the topic of this article "Proto-Indo-European language" is a language.

More accurate might be to say "Proto-Indo-European language is a postulated ancestral language that is the common ancestor of the Indo-European language family". The wording is borrowed from the Wiki article on proto-languages. Truly it is a language that is an ancestor or is suggested to be an ancestor, not an ancestor.118.210.119.62 (talk) 18:08, 17 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

I think it's fine the way it is. Really, it's more accurate to primarily characterize it as a reconstruction than as a language as such, if that makes sense. Remsense ‥ 论 18:12, 17 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Phonetics?

Would a section on phonetics be doable? At the very least an explanation of h₁ and h₂, accent marks on consonants such as ḱ, and under-circles such as on ŕ̥, and other such diacritics. Thisisnotatest (talk) 21:19, 17 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Terminology

The terminology indo-european / indo-germanic , is not scientifically proven. Instead it`s refuted since years. There is no archeological, historical and linguistical evidence for this pseudo theory. It`s not based on science. It would be good for wikipedia to stay as close as possible to the truth. Otherwise it could suppport, unwillingly of course, a fallacy. 2A01:C23:5C0C:FA00:142A:C582:4CA:93CF (talk) 18:42, 8 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]

What is refuted? That there is a language family that includes the Germanic languages of Europe and many of the languages of India? —Tamfang (talk) 03:43, 19 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]

I presume he means that in reality, the IE languages all descend from Sanskrit, which was created by Vishnu or something. India is a big country, and internet access there has been increasing rapidly in recent years.--62.73.72.3 (talk) 11:18, 15 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]

But it was posted from Germany. —Tamfang (talk) 05:55, 16 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Yes, that is unexpected. I am still betting on an Indian immigrant in Germany. :)--62.73.72.3 (talk) 23:10, 9 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]

It has been archaeologically proven, about a 100 years ago, when we found reflexes of de Saussure's laryngeal theory around 30 years after it was proposed. JungleEntity (talk) 19:41, 18 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Definition and first sentence of the article

"Proto-Indo-European (PIE) is the reconstructed common ancestor of the Indo-European language family"

The word "reconstructed" here being used as an adjective, which is the past participle form of the verb "to reconstruct", conceals the agent/s who did the reconstructing, and suggests that it is a completed endeavour, as in it is not 'being reconstructed' but is in fact 'reconstructed'. Also the use of the definite article "the" in "the reconstructed common ancestor" suggests it is the only reconstructed common ancestor, and that there are not any other competing reconstructed common ancestors to the Indo-European language family, which surely there are.

If one wants to use a cagey participle adjective, some more reasonable ones would be "postulated" or "hypothesised".61.69.197.171 (talk) 12:31, 10 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]

It's fine how it is, you're over-fixating a bit on connotations that aren't really there or (gasp) are dispelled with the prose that follows. If I over-fixate over here with you, each point of concern also applies to some degree to all of your suggested replacements. Remsense ‥ 论 12:36, 10 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]

And no, there aren't really reconstructed ancestors above PIE—not any with enough merit to factor in here. Remsense ‥ 论 12:40, 10 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]

I think IP means that there are competing hypotheses and hence no single definitive PIE reconstruction. I don't think they were talking about higher level reconstructions. Tewdar 12:52, 10 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]

I kinda prefer how they do this over at Proto-Celtic language: Proto-Celtic, or Common Celtic, is the hypothetical ancestral proto-language of all known Celtic languages. But it looks like most of the lower order proto- articles use a similar style to this parent article, so... Tewdar 12:57, 10 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]

I will split hairs in earnest also: I think hypothetical is mostly fine, but too strongly implies one of two things are vulnerable to being overturned root and branch: either the historicity of the Proto-Indo-Europeans, or the comparative method itself. I get we called the tau neutrino hypothetical before 2000 and that didn't worry anyone who understood the reasons it was predicted to exist, but we don't have quite that luxury here. I think reconstructed benefits by immediately putting focus on the process of iterative theorizing rather than unduly distracting with the inherent uncertainty of understanding anything about the past. Moreover, there's less of a sense where we're claiming to have precisely recovered something; instead, we're being plain that we've used tools available to us and worked backwards. Remsense ‥ 论 19:02, 10 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]

But the point is, it *has* been reconstructed, and 200+ years of scholarship has singularly failed to come up with an alternative that is even remotely convincing. The fact that it has been possible to base a coherent reconstruction on the huge and diffuse body of evidence from dozens of languages is all the proof that is required. --Pfold (talk) 18:38, 10 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]