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>All of these differences can make it surprising and challenging for someone with an Indo-European language background to learn and use Kłeti. Ironically, Prot

>All of these differences can make it surprising and challenging for someone with an Indo-European language background to learn and use Kłeti. Ironically, Proto-Indo-European is believed to be far more complex than its modern descendants, as described by Wikipedia: >PIE is believed to have had an elaborate system of morphology that included inflectional suffixes (analogous to English child, child's, children, children's) as well as ablaut (vowel alterations, as preserved in English sing, sang, sung, song) and accent. PIE nominals and pronouns had a complex system of declension, and verbs similarly had a complex system of conjugation. So maybe a PIE speaker would have an easier time with Kłeti than we :-)

samus 4y ago
Several of its modern descendants are not that much simpler :) Most famously, Baltic and Slavic languages have retained large parts of the case system. Some of them even the dual forms of nouns. Their verbal system has become even more sophisticated. Germanic languages retain the Ablaut system, even though it is no longer productive and has decayed into a bunch of irregular verbs.
- jutrewag 4y ago
  [dead]
- int_19h 4y ago
  What I find especially amusing with Baltic and Slavic languages is that they also preserved much of the original corpora for bodily parts and associated activities, just as swear / taboo words. https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/Reconstruction:Proto-Indo-European/p%C3%ADsdeh%E2%82%82 https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/Reconstruction:Proto-Indo-Eur... https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/Reconstruction:Proto-Indo-European/h%E2%82%83y%C3%A9b%CA%B0eti https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/Reconstruction:Proto-Indo-Eur...
wizzwizz4 4y ago
> as well as ablaut (vowel alterations, as preserved in English sing, sang, sung, song) Interestingly, English is gaining instances of ablaut. For example, dived seems to be being replaced by dove.
- School-Cotton 4y ago
  Woah, I didn’t even realize dove was etymologically unjustifiable[0]. I speak a variety of American English that’s almost indistinguishable from the educated standard, and it wouldn’t even have occurred to me that “dived” could be used as the past participle of “dive”. Apparently “dove” is mostly common in North America. [0] not “wrong”, since language is arbitrary so it’s meaningless to claim that any naturally occurring colloquial dialect is more correct than any other. But “etymologically unjustifiable” is still a meaningful concept.
- euroderf 4y ago
  plead/pled (driving out pleaded)
TRiG_Ireland 4y ago
PIE had a more complex morphology, but correspondingly simpler rules about word order. You'll often hear that all languages are equally complex. This may or may not be true (no one has ever come up with a way to measure the complexity of a language, so the statement is fundamentally meaningless), but it certainly seems true that languages which are more complex in some areas are less so in others. It's possible that languages with smaller groups of speakers tend to be more complex, though, which might apply to PIE.

samus 4y ago

Several of its modern descendants are not that much simpler :) Most famously, Baltic and Slavic languages have retained large parts of the case system. Some of them even the dual forms of nouns. Their verbal system has become even more sophisticated. Germanic languages retain the Ablaut system, even though it is no longer productive and has decayed into a bunch of irregular verbs.

jutrewag 4y ago
[dead]
int_19h 4y ago
What I find especially amusing with Baltic and Slavic languages is that they also preserved much of the original corpora for bodily parts and associated activities, just as swear / taboo words. https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/Reconstruction:Proto-Indo-European/p%C3%ADsdeh%E2%82%82 https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/Reconstruction:Proto-Indo-Eur... https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/Reconstruction:Proto-Indo-European/h%E2%82%83y%C3%A9b%CA%B0eti https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/Reconstruction:Proto-Indo-Eur...

wizzwizz4 4y ago

> as well as ablaut (vowel alterations, as preserved in English sing, sang, sung, song) Interestingly, English is gaining instances of ablaut. For example, dived seems to be being replaced by dove.

School-Cotton 4y ago
Woah, I didn’t even realize dove was etymologically unjustifiable[0]. I speak a variety of American English that’s almost indistinguishable from the educated standard, and it wouldn’t even have occurred to me that “dived” could be used as the past participle of “dive”. Apparently “dove” is mostly common in North America. [0] not “wrong”, since language is arbitrary so it’s meaningless to claim that any naturally occurring colloquial dialect is more correct than any other. But “etymologically unjustifiable” is still a meaningful concept.
euroderf 4y ago
plead/pled (driving out pleaded)

TRiG_Ireland 4y ago

PIE had a more complex morphology, but correspondingly simpler rules about word order. You'll often hear that all languages are equally complex. This may or may not be true (no one has ever come up with a way to measure the complexity of a language, so the statement is fundamentally meaningless), but it certainly seems true that languages which are more complex in some areas are less so in others. It's possible that languages with smaller groups of speakers tend to be more complex, though, which might apply to PIE.