6 ms·

What’s the world’s oldest language?

49 points by LinuxBender 3y ago

zirgs 3y ago
What makes them think that there was just one proto-language not several ones that appeared independently from each other?
- LordGronk 3y ago
  There’s no evidence that Homo Sapiens, aside from some interbreeding with other hominids interacted with other hominids who were capable of complex language for that to be possible. And a multiple origin scenario for behaviourally modern humans flies in the face of modern science, archaeology, and palaeontology to such a degree that it would basically require magic.
  - ycombinete 3y ago
    That doesn’t seem to make sense. Surely interbreeding with other hominids requires interaction with other hominids?
    - LordGronk 3y ago
      History shows that many humans of the same species can “interact” without friendly communication, or, for that matter, preserving fully functional languages (Just look at the Minoans, Etruscans, Harappans, Rhetics, and the numerous other peoples who spoke something that we can’t read, or can understand but only with great effort)
  - arp242 3y ago
    How so? Early humans moved around and were all over the place, often with no or little contact. I don't see why two groups of humans couldn't have developed (proto)-language independently. There's lots of examples of things independently developing in multiple places.
  - pharrington 3y ago
    I think what zirgs meant is that since at least one group of humans developed a language, it makes sense that different groups of humans could also independently develop language.
    - Sprocklem 3y ago
      One (admittedly speculative) reason to believe that all natural spoken languages have a common ancestor derives from the fact that modern humans seem to rapidly develop new languages in the absence of an existing language, as was seen in the case of Nicaraguan Sign Language. There is no particularly compelling reason to believe that earlier homo sapiens – who were otherwise anatomically modern – would be any different before they began migrating out of africa. This is especially true given that all human populations do ultimately have both an apparently-innate capacity for language, and their own languages. If this is the case, then the first language would have probably rapidly spread between the early populations in africa – if, indeed, there were multiple distinct populations at the time – and new (homo sapiens–originated) languages would have only arisen if the chain of speakers were somehow broken and children raised without access to an existing language. With that being said, there are some cases where something similar has happened. Most obviously are sign languages, which are believed to have had multiple origins, since it is possible for deaf people to be born among non-signing populations. Something similar in the case of spoken languages is the phenomenon of pidgins evolving into creoles mentions elsewhere in the comments, although they still retain at least some aspect of one of their parent languages. The extent to which the latter count as proto-languages is questionable.
  - ffhhttt 3y ago
    I don’t think that we can conclusively say (or even close to that) that other Hominids were incapable of complex (to an extent) language.
- jcranmer 3y ago
  The short answer is "because it seems too difficult to have been independently developed." Of course, it was once thought that things like writing or farming were too difficult to have been independently developed, but archaeological evidence has made clear at least 3 (and possibly ~6-ish) independent inventions of the former and at least 9 for the latter. There are a few more concrete reasons to specifically believe against independent development of language. If you believe that language faculties arise very quickly after evolution of a biological organ to facilitate language, that suggests that the ability to have language is a key part of Homo sapiens and therefore language would have originated only once in the development in Homo sapiens as a species.
- retrac 3y ago
  This is a very good question. It seems quite possible that some human population at some point, may have endured a level of stress and adverse conditions, that proper language transfer to the children did not happen -- something like a mix of surviving adults from different cultures who do not speak the same language. There are apparent examples of languages being invented, with no clear parent language. [1] When education for the deaf is first introduced, children from many different families are brought together. Most do not have full language - they cannot communicate with language with anyone. Some are part of small clusters, families or small villages where many are deaf. [2] They often do have full languages. These languages are usually untraceable in origin. They're not related to each other, usually. Pool these kids these together in a school and they will create a full language, a creole [3], in just a few years. It's unclear, IMO, exactly how to interpret that effect. The children are not completely without language. They're obviously aware of the concept of language, a few of them may even have full languages (even if they can't use it with the other kids) and the teachers are also trying to teach them language, usually American sign if there's nothing local. So it can't be said to be language popping up in a true vacuum. But it is certainly curious. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nicaraguan_Sign_Language https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nicaraguan_Sign_Language [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Martha%27s_Vineyard_Sign_Language https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Martha%27s_Vineyard_Sign_Langu... [3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Creole_language https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Creole_language
karles 3y ago
[flagged]
causi 3y ago
But it’s impossible to prove the existence of a proto-human language—the hypothetical direct ancestor of every language in the world. Maybe not in the bulletproof sense, but it seems pretty obvious that since human beings raised without language cannot learn it as adults or even as teenagers, the facility for learning language at a particular age is an evolved trait. That and the fact there's strong evidence neanderthals used language means language is effectively older than our species. All known languages and language groups within the last fifty thousand years, therefore, are just the distant descendants of a language five, ten, or twenty times older. Those "bragging rights" are scientifically irrelevant.
- ffhhttt 3y ago
  I guess it depends on how we define a language. It’s not inconceivable that different languages might have developed from multiple different proto-languages. Or that languages were lost and developed again from some semi-verbal communication systems independently.
deleted 3y ago
[deleted]
flanked-evergl 3y ago
A bit offtopic, but if you are interested in languages, the great courses by John McWhorter are some of the most informative and entertaining resources on the subject that I have come across. He provides a wealth of knowledge on language evolution, both as to how they tend to evolve and how they actually did evolve, and he provides it in a way that makes you sad it's over. You can find them on Audible, I think some are available with the monthly subscription, but it is definitely worth the money.
bradley13 3y ago
There are so many fascinating things about languages. Here are a couple: - Toss people together who don't really have a common language, and they quickly evolve a pidgin, which is a very simplified kind of language that lets them communicate. Over a couple of generations, the pidgin evolves into a full language. This has happened repeatedly over history, often through things like conquering or enslaving other groups or nations. - Isolate people, and they quickly develop their own dialect. Continue the isolation, and the dialect will diverge into a separate language. Dutch is an evolved German dialect. On the other end of Germany, Swiss German is much the same, but isn't quite regarded as its own language. As another comment says: it really makes no sense to suppose there was one, unique, proto-language. Evolution is a gradual process, and the complexity of communication will have evolved just as gradually. Likely, different tribes will have had different communication patterns. Interbreeding, warfare and slavery will have mixed things up occasionally, but there will surely have been many different dialects and languages.
- retrac 3y ago
  > Over a couple of generations, the pidgin evolves into a full language. Yes, and full creole languages, ones with relatively little of the grammar of their parent languages, have a number of similarities in their grammar. These similarities persist whatever the parent languages. Different continents, different parent languages, grammatical similarities. For example, plurals are often formed by reduplication (dog -> dog-dog = dogs), word order is subject-verb-object or subject-object-verb, suffixes follow the morpheme they're attached to. The grammars are extremely regular, almost no exceptions, no complex sound-fusion rules. It's generally thought that creole languages, immediately after formation, are actually simpler than most other languages grammatically. Which may have been like creoles at one point but then picked up a bunch of useless nonsense you just have to memorize. (This view is sometimes challenged, and it must be admitted, it is hard to define and measure complexity in language.) That is one of those small hints that language may be physiologically innate, or an emergent phenomenon that recreates itself in similar ways each time it is invented by people who need to communicate -- i.e., universal grammar, that ever-so-tempting yet ever-so-unprovable idea that got everyone tangled up last century.
- linguistics__ 3y ago
LordGronk 3y ago
Historians and linguists generally agree that Sumerian, Akkadian and Egyptian are the oldest languages with a clear written record. All three are extinct Umm, what? Coptic is a (barely) living Egyptian. It is close enough for us to have deciphered hieroglyphs, hieratic, and demotic, at the old, middle, and late stages. Yes the Greek on the Rosetta stone helped but Coptic sealed the deal, particularly with transliteration. Thus I would say using the term “Egyptian” to refer to any particular language with obvious stages and then saying it’s dead when you have a stage still spoken is absurd, and does a great disservice to linguistic communities that need help. I expect better from a publication as “woke” as Scientific American. Copts and their language may not be thriving nor reviving but news of the death of the Egyptian language is a bit exaggerated.
- retrac 3y ago
  Coptic is as dead as Latin. No one speaks it as a native language.
  - LordGronk 3y ago
    it has a steady liturgical use and children are raised to understand it in church, along with small spoken revival groups here in the states so, while not exactly living, I would say it’s in a far better state in its community than Latin post vatican 2. But note, I never said it was alive. Just that it’s not as dead as, say, Sumerian (in fact it’s about as alive amongst the coptic community I know as Sumerian was at the time Akkadian was spoken, as a language of identity and education)
    - ClaraForm 3y ago
      As a Copt who speaks but doesn't understand very much of what I say, my father can speak it, as does anyone who has a liturgical inclination. I can always go learn more of it, and it will likely remain as alive as it currently is for the foreseeable future. It's impossible to be devout without speaking it, it's impossible to connect to our identity without seeking to be devout. Just supporting what you're saying.
blueyes 3y ago
Very disappointing article, and a reminder to me that, when the headline is a question, the article rarely contains the answer. It's as though the author went down a rabbit hole of her own curiosity for a couple hours, came up with next to nothing, but had to justify the time spent.
- politelemon 3y ago
  Yes I was thinking a better title would be, "It is difficult to determine the oldest language"
  - linguistics__ 3y ago
    Well, the question is in reality either unanswerable (we don't know - and may never know - how many and when the first proto-language(s) emerged) or meaningless (all live natural languages go back as far as we can reconstruct or attest to).
    - detourdog 3y ago
      I have started to plan some earth mounds. I keep walking over the same ground contemplating the optimal setting. Once I figured that out it occurred to me that it would be fun to make them 3 sizes small, medium, and large. The idea has evolved to the point where I'm now estimating quantity of stones and relative size based on seating capacity of the mound. I won't it even get in to site the entrances towards the east... My point, I think is that a simple tweaks to earth mound can evolve a complex language by using similar shaped river stones at different scales. The final result of the first phase will 7 mounds of 3 sizes and one large elevated platform. I realized doing planing the easiest way to communicate my idea to landscapers was to find a stone of each size to use a reference. I could then describe how many of which type go where. before covering with earth. Once they are done we start to mark celestial events with special stones from far away places to mark the significance...
- flir 3y ago
  > It's as though the author went down a rabbit hole of her own curiosity for a couple hours, came up with next to nothing, but had to justify the time spent. Authors have daily standups too?
canjobear 3y ago
Asking what is the oldest language is like asking what is the oldest species. The question is meaningless.
countWSS 3y ago
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vedic_Sanskrit https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vedic_Sanskrit Sanskrit is the only one with significant use due ancient religious texts. Sumerian/Egyptian/Akkadian are basically academic reconstructions and modern languages deviate significantly from their ancestors(e.g. proto-Armenian vs modern Armenian).
DonaldFisk 3y ago
This question keeps cropping up, and whenever it does, people claim it was their language. The question needs to be precisely framed. Oldest spoken language in the world? All equally old. Oldest still spoken language in a particular area? It's easier to answer this for islands or archipelagos, e.g. Great Britain: Welsh. New Zealand: Maori. Japan: Ainu (but maybe not for much longer). Oldest written language? Sumerian (extinct) or Egyptian (not extinct, despite what the article states). Oldest written language still in use? Coptic, a direct descendant of Egyptian used as a liturgical language in the Coptic Church, but not spoken as a vernacular for centuries. Oldest written language still spoken? Hebrew (originally Canaanite), in continuous use but not as a vernacular for about 2000 years. Oldest written language continuously spoken: Greek, but it wasn't continuously written. (There was a gap between Linear B and alphabetic script.) Oldest continuously spoken and written language: Chinese.
- celeritascelery 3y ago
  > Oldest spoken language in the world? All equally old. That doesn’t seem possible. Surely some spoken languages are older then others.
  - DonaldFisk 3y ago
    OK, excluding constructed languages such as Esperanto.
    - solumunus 3y ago
      “All spoken languages are equally old” but then in the next point: Welsh is older than English. You must have miscommunicated here? Obviously all spoken languages are not “equally old”…
      - heywhatupboys 3y ago
        are humans older than chimps? no, we share a common ancestor. Have chimps been in x country for longer than humans? maybe not the same question
tibanne 3y ago
Perl
Aloha 3y ago
I'd like to know what the oldest mutually intelligible language would be. With each spoken and written language that exists, from how long ago could you find a speaker (or reader) who could meaningfully have a conversation with an average fluent speaker from today. I specifically say average, because vocabulary registers shift with time - even when fundamentals of the language do not, even an english speaker from after the great vowel shift might have trouble unless the modern speaker was especially well read.
guidedlight 3y ago
This article does a poor job of even identifying candidates, because it narrows its scope to old world history (i.e. european, middle eastern, and asian history). It ignores for example, Aboriginal Australians whose history and language dates back over 50,000 years. Far preceding the timelines mentioned. Many African cultures and languages are likewise much older than those mentioned in the article.
robotguy 3y ago
I have a cuneiform tablet sitting right here on my desk. In English it says: Never gonna give you up Never gonna let you down Never gonna run around and desert you Never gonna make you cry Never gonna say goodbye

49 points by LinuxBender 3y ago

What makes them think that there was just one proto-language not several ones that appeared independently from each other?

LordGronk 3y ago
There’s no evidence that Homo Sapiens, aside from some interbreeding with other hominids interacted with other hominids who were capable of complex language for that to be possible. And a multiple origin scenario for behaviourally modern humans flies in the face of modern science, archaeology, and palaeontology to such a degree that it would basically require magic.
- ycombinete 3y ago
  That doesn’t seem to make sense. Surely interbreeding with other hominids requires interaction with other hominids?
  - LordGronk 3y ago
    History shows that many humans of the same species can “interact” without friendly communication, or, for that matter, preserving fully functional languages (Just look at the Minoans, Etruscans, Harappans, Rhetics, and the numerous other peoples who spoke something that we can’t read, or can understand but only with great effort)
- arp242 3y ago
  How so? Early humans moved around and were all over the place, often with no or little contact. I don't see why two groups of humans couldn't have developed (proto)-language independently. There's lots of examples of things independently developing in multiple places.
- pharrington 3y ago
  I think what zirgs meant is that since at least one group of humans developed a language, it makes sense that different groups of humans could also independently develop language.
  - Sprocklem 3y ago
    One (admittedly speculative) reason to believe that all natural spoken languages have a common ancestor derives from the fact that modern humans seem to rapidly develop new languages in the absence of an existing language, as was seen in the case of Nicaraguan Sign Language. There is no particularly compelling reason to believe that earlier homo sapiens – who were otherwise anatomically modern – would be any different before they began migrating out of africa. This is especially true given that all human populations do ultimately have both an apparently-innate capacity for language, and their own languages. If this is the case, then the first language would have probably rapidly spread between the early populations in africa – if, indeed, there were multiple distinct populations at the time – and new (homo sapiens–originated) languages would have only arisen if the chain of speakers were somehow broken and children raised without access to an existing language. With that being said, there are some cases where something similar has happened. Most obviously are sign languages, which are believed to have had multiple origins, since it is possible for deaf people to be born among non-signing populations. Something similar in the case of spoken languages is the phenomenon of pidgins evolving into creoles mentions elsewhere in the comments, although they still retain at least some aspect of one of their parent languages. The extent to which the latter count as proto-languages is questionable.
- ffhhttt 3y ago
  I don’t think that we can conclusively say (or even close to that) that other Hominids were incapable of complex (to an extent) language.
jcranmer 3y ago
The short answer is "because it seems too difficult to have been independently developed." Of course, it was once thought that things like writing or farming were too difficult to have been independently developed, but archaeological evidence has made clear at least 3 (and possibly ~6-ish) independent inventions of the former and at least 9 for the latter. There are a few more concrete reasons to specifically believe against independent development of language. If you believe that language faculties arise very quickly after evolution of a biological organ to facilitate language, that suggests that the ability to have language is a key part of Homo sapiens and therefore language would have originated only once in the development in Homo sapiens as a species.
retrac 3y ago
This is a very good question. It seems quite possible that some human population at some point, may have endured a level of stress and adverse conditions, that proper language transfer to the children did not happen -- something like a mix of surviving adults from different cultures who do not speak the same language. There are apparent examples of languages being invented, with no clear parent language. [1] When education for the deaf is first introduced, children from many different families are brought together. Most do not have full language - they cannot communicate with language with anyone. Some are part of small clusters, families or small villages where many are deaf. [2] They often do have full languages. These languages are usually untraceable in origin. They're not related to each other, usually. Pool these kids these together in a school and they will create a full language, a creole [3], in just a few years. It's unclear, IMO, exactly how to interpret that effect. The children are not completely without language. They're obviously aware of the concept of language, a few of them may even have full languages (even if they can't use it with the other kids) and the teachers are also trying to teach them language, usually American sign if there's nothing local. So it can't be said to be language popping up in a true vacuum. But it is certainly curious. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nicaraguan_Sign_Language https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nicaraguan_Sign_Language [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Martha%27s_Vineyard_Sign_Language https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Martha%27s_Vineyard_Sign_Langu... [3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Creole_language https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Creole_language

karles 3y ago

[flagged]

causi 3y ago

But it’s impossible to prove the existence of a proto-human language—the hypothetical direct ancestor of every language in the world. Maybe not in the bulletproof sense, but it seems pretty obvious that since human beings raised without language cannot learn it as adults or even as teenagers, the facility for learning language at a particular age is an evolved trait. That and the fact there's strong evidence neanderthals used language means language is effectively older than our species. All known languages and language groups within the last fifty thousand years, therefore, are just the distant descendants of a language five, ten, or twenty times older. Those "bragging rights" are scientifically irrelevant.

ffhhttt 3y ago
I guess it depends on how we define a language. It’s not inconceivable that different languages might have developed from multiple different proto-languages. Or that languages were lost and developed again from some semi-verbal communication systems independently.

deleted 3y ago

[deleted]

flanked-evergl 3y ago

A bit offtopic, but if you are interested in languages, the great courses by John McWhorter are some of the most informative and entertaining resources on the subject that I have come across. He provides a wealth of knowledge on language evolution, both as to how they tend to evolve and how they actually did evolve, and he provides it in a way that makes you sad it's over. You can find them on Audible, I think some are available with the monthly subscription, but it is definitely worth the money.

bradley13 3y ago

There are so many fascinating things about languages. Here are a couple: - Toss people together who don't really have a common language, and they quickly evolve a pidgin, which is a very simplified kind of language that lets them communicate. Over a couple of generations, the pidgin evolves into a full language. This has happened repeatedly over history, often through things like conquering or enslaving other groups or nations. - Isolate people, and they quickly develop their own dialect. Continue the isolation, and the dialect will diverge into a separate language. Dutch is an evolved German dialect. On the other end of Germany, Swiss German is much the same, but isn't quite regarded as its own language. As another comment says: it really makes no sense to suppose there was one, unique, proto-language. Evolution is a gradual process, and the complexity of communication will have evolved just as gradually. Likely, different tribes will have had different communication patterns. Interbreeding, warfare and slavery will have mixed things up occasionally, but there will surely have been many different dialects and languages.

retrac 3y ago
> Over a couple of generations, the pidgin evolves into a full language. Yes, and full creole languages, ones with relatively little of the grammar of their parent languages, have a number of similarities in their grammar. These similarities persist whatever the parent languages. Different continents, different parent languages, grammatical similarities. For example, plurals are often formed by reduplication (dog -> dog-dog = dogs), word order is subject-verb-object or subject-object-verb, suffixes follow the morpheme they're attached to. The grammars are extremely regular, almost no exceptions, no complex sound-fusion rules. It's generally thought that creole languages, immediately after formation, are actually simpler than most other languages grammatically. Which may have been like creoles at one point but then picked up a bunch of useless nonsense you just have to memorize. (This view is sometimes challenged, and it must be admitted, it is hard to define and measure complexity in language.) That is one of those small hints that language may be physiologically innate, or an emergent phenomenon that recreates itself in similar ways each time it is invented by people who need to communicate -- i.e., universal grammar, that ever-so-tempting yet ever-so-unprovable idea that got everyone tangled up last century.
linguistics__ 3y ago

LordGronk 3y ago

Historians and linguists generally agree that Sumerian, Akkadian and Egyptian are the oldest languages with a clear written record. All three are extinct Umm, what? Coptic is a (barely) living Egyptian. It is close enough for us to have deciphered hieroglyphs, hieratic, and demotic, at the old, middle, and late stages. Yes the Greek on the Rosetta stone helped but Coptic sealed the deal, particularly with transliteration. Thus I would say using the term “Egyptian” to refer to any particular language with obvious stages and then saying it’s dead when you have a stage still spoken is absurd, and does a great disservice to linguistic communities that need help. I expect better from a publication as “woke” as Scientific American. Copts and their language may not be thriving nor reviving but news of the death of the Egyptian language is a bit exaggerated.

retrac 3y ago
Coptic is as dead as Latin. No one speaks it as a native language.
- LordGronk 3y ago
  it has a steady liturgical use and children are raised to understand it in church, along with small spoken revival groups here in the states so, while not exactly living, I would say it’s in a far better state in its community than Latin post vatican 2. But note, I never said it was alive. Just that it’s not as dead as, say, Sumerian (in fact it’s about as alive amongst the coptic community I know as Sumerian was at the time Akkadian was spoken, as a language of identity and education)
  - ClaraForm 3y ago
    As a Copt who speaks but doesn't understand very much of what I say, my father can speak it, as does anyone who has a liturgical inclination. I can always go learn more of it, and it will likely remain as alive as it currently is for the foreseeable future. It's impossible to be devout without speaking it, it's impossible to connect to our identity without seeking to be devout. Just supporting what you're saying.

blueyes 3y ago

Very disappointing article, and a reminder to me that, when the headline is a question, the article rarely contains the answer. It's as though the author went down a rabbit hole of her own curiosity for a couple hours, came up with next to nothing, but had to justify the time spent.

politelemon 3y ago
Yes I was thinking a better title would be, "It is difficult to determine the oldest language"
- linguistics__ 3y ago
  Well, the question is in reality either unanswerable (we don't know - and may never know - how many and when the first proto-language(s) emerged) or meaningless (all live natural languages go back as far as we can reconstruct or attest to).
  - detourdog 3y ago
    I have started to plan some earth mounds. I keep walking over the same ground contemplating the optimal setting. Once I figured that out it occurred to me that it would be fun to make them 3 sizes small, medium, and large. The idea has evolved to the point where I'm now estimating quantity of stones and relative size based on seating capacity of the mound. I won't it even get in to site the entrances towards the east... My point, I think is that a simple tweaks to earth mound can evolve a complex language by using similar shaped river stones at different scales. The final result of the first phase will 7 mounds of 3 sizes and one large elevated platform. I realized doing planing the easiest way to communicate my idea to landscapers was to find a stone of each size to use a reference. I could then describe how many of which type go where. before covering with earth. Once they are done we start to mark celestial events with special stones from far away places to mark the significance...
flir 3y ago
> It's as though the author went down a rabbit hole of her own curiosity for a couple hours, came up with next to nothing, but had to justify the time spent. Authors have daily standups too?

canjobear 3y ago

Asking what is the oldest language is like asking what is the oldest species. The question is meaningless.

countWSS 3y ago

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vedic_Sanskrit https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vedic_Sanskrit Sanskrit is the only one with significant use due ancient religious texts. Sumerian/Egyptian/Akkadian are basically academic reconstructions and modern languages deviate significantly from their ancestors(e.g. proto-Armenian vs modern Armenian).

DonaldFisk 3y ago

This question keeps cropping up, and whenever it does, people claim it was their language. The question needs to be precisely framed. Oldest spoken language in the world? All equally old. Oldest still spoken language in a particular area? It's easier to answer this for islands or archipelagos, e.g. Great Britain: Welsh. New Zealand: Maori. Japan: Ainu (but maybe not for much longer). Oldest written language? Sumerian (extinct) or Egyptian (not extinct, despite what the article states). Oldest written language still in use? Coptic, a direct descendant of Egyptian used as a liturgical language in the Coptic Church, but not spoken as a vernacular for centuries. Oldest written language still spoken? Hebrew (originally Canaanite), in continuous use but not as a vernacular for about 2000 years. Oldest written language continuously spoken: Greek, but it wasn't continuously written. (There was a gap between Linear B and alphabetic script.) Oldest continuously spoken and written language: Chinese.

celeritascelery 3y ago
> Oldest spoken language in the world? All equally old. That doesn’t seem possible. Surely some spoken languages are older then others.
- DonaldFisk 3y ago
  OK, excluding constructed languages such as Esperanto.
  - solumunus 3y ago
    “All spoken languages are equally old” but then in the next point: Welsh is older than English. You must have miscommunicated here? Obviously all spoken languages are not “equally old”…
    - heywhatupboys 3y ago
      are humans older than chimps? no, we share a common ancestor. Have chimps been in x country for longer than humans? maybe not the same question

tibanne 3y ago

Perl

Aloha 3y ago

I'd like to know what the oldest mutually intelligible language would be. With each spoken and written language that exists, from how long ago could you find a speaker (or reader) who could meaningfully have a conversation with an average fluent speaker from today. I specifically say average, because vocabulary registers shift with time - even when fundamentals of the language do not, even an english speaker from after the great vowel shift might have trouble unless the modern speaker was especially well read.

guidedlight 3y ago

This article does a poor job of even identifying candidates, because it narrows its scope to old world history (i.e. european, middle eastern, and asian history). It ignores for example, Aboriginal Australians whose history and language dates back over 50,000 years. Far preceding the timelines mentioned. Many African cultures and languages are likewise much older than those mentioned in the article.

robotguy 3y ago

I have a cuneiform tablet sitting right here on my desk. In English it says: Never gonna give you up Never gonna let you down Never gonna run around and desert you Never gonna make you cry Never gonna say goodbye