INDO-GERMANIC LANGUAGES com prise that group of languages which took their rise in India and Iran and which now, by com mon consent, with a few slight exceptions, in dude all the tongues spoken in Europe. There are seven principal branches coming under that head, namely: (1) Germanic; (2) Slavo-Let tish; (3) Celtic; (4) Italic; (5) Greek; (6) Iranian ; (7) Indic. It is beyond question that all these idioms together are descended from one common root, the Aryan proper. Internal evidence in favor of this statement is too strong to be rejected. The structure shows it ; the stock of words shows it; the number of features in common show it; and finally the sounds them selves show it. Comparative philology has dem onstrated beyond cavil that only by assuming a common origin can the fact be accounted for that the most ordinary words and the basic part of grammar — the rough framework of language so to speak—are practically identical; such as the personal pronouns, nouns like mother, father, brother and sister, the earliest domesticated animals and the most indispen sable primitive foods and appliances, as the plow ; the most necessary verbs, particularly the aux iliaries. The differences between the several languages belonging to the Indo-Germanic, or Aryan, group, as, for instance, between Russian and German, Polish and English, Italian and Lithuanian, are many, in varying degree, but are simply somewhatgreater than those, let us say, between cognate idioms, such as Dutch and German, French and Italian, Czech and Jugo slav, or Hindu and Persian. Or rather, the de gree of similarity differs. But the structural similarity between all is undeniable. All Indo Germanic languages, too, are inflectional.
It is agreed that the entire body of the Aryan languages is derived originally from monosyl labic elements, and that of these there were two classes, verbal and pronominal, and that combining these two grammatical forms there arose gradually the rudiments of grammar and of vocabulary. In some of the Aryan tongues there have lingered forms which in the others had disappeared at 'an earlier date, such as the dual; the future of the verb came later and was made up with auxiliaries; the imperative ex isted at first only in the second person. Verbs in all of these idioms were originally of primi tive structure; some of the refinements of grammar, such as the subjunctive, are doubtful in their derivation; declensional inflections, on the other hand, were in olden days rather more complicated, having three numbers and eight cases, including one denoting instrumentality and one locative; sex distinctions, too, were indicated by the endings of cases. From this complex stage the tendency has been through out toward simplification. Relative pronouns were late in appearing, growing out of demon stratives or interrogatives; articles came to view not until a late period; numerals for long ran only up to 100. Of all the Indo-Ger
manic, or Aryan, tongues Sanskrit has pre served most of the original standards. Many, nay, the largest part of the changes wrought were due to phonetic influences, such as in English sing, sang, sung, song; or as in Latin fid, fido, foedus; in the Greek azorw, darov Anotra.
Necessarily, the close correlation of the Indo-Germanic idioms presupposes a common origin, the existence at some remote period of one united, and in numbers and territory held, rather limited mother tribe, within which the root idiom must have had time to grow and develop. Not only is there linguistic proof of this of the strongest kind, but the further fact that there was a common cycle of sagas, myths and legends of prehistoric heroes, of folklore and of archaic godlike beings worshipped, tends altogether in the same direction. Again, that the Indo-Germanic race derives from the same parent tree is proved by the indisputable fact that it is this race which throughout all historical time has been pre-eminent; first, the Persian, next the Greeks and Romans, and then the nations of modern times. In the main they did this because possessing the same set of qualities.
All the records, however, available do not go farther back than about B.C. 3000, and indi cate the Pamir region or the Punjab as the pristine home of the Indo-Germanic stock. The Vedas in their most ancient portions are not older than 2000 a.c. A number of Indo-Ger manic idioms amalgamated with others, or dis appeared, like Gallic, Etruscan, Burgundian, Scythian, Mesapian, Pelasgian.
Brugmann, K., (Kurze ver gleichende Grammatik der indogermanischen Sprachen> Strassburg 1902-04) ; Brugmann, K., and Delbriick. B.,
der vergleichen den Grammatik der indo-germanischen Sprach en> (ib. 1897 et seq.) ; Brunnhofer, U.,
Urzeit> (Bern 1910) ; Curtius, G., (Griechische Etymologie) (Berlin 1892) ; Del briick, B.,
in das Studium der in dogermanischen Sorachen) (Leipzig 1908, 5th ed.) ; Fick, Th., (Vergleichendes Worterbuch der indogermanischen Sprachen) (Gottingen 1890-1900) ; Grierson, G. A.,
Pisaca Lan
(London 1906) ; Helm, Victor,
pflanzen and Haustiere> (7th ed., Berlin 1902) ; Jevons, F. B., 'Prehistoric Antiquities of the Aryan Peoples' (London 1890) ; Meillet, A., 'Introduction a l'etude comparative des langues indo-europeennes) (Paris 1908, 2d ed.) ; Mul ler, Max, and Whitney, W. D., 'Lectures on Language' (Oxford 18%) ; Muller, Fried, 'All
Ethnographie) (Leipzig 1887) • ophus,
Europas> (Ger. ed., Strassburg 1905; French ed., Paris 1907); Penka, K.,