Book review: ‘Proto’ by Laura Spinney

In On the Origin of Species, Charles Darwin likened how we might classify organic species to how we might classify human languages—by genealogical descent:

It may be worth while to illustrate this view of classification, by taking the case of languages. If we possessed a perfect pedigree of mankind, a genealogical arrangement of the races of man would afford the best classification of the various languages now spoken throughout the world; and if all extinct languages, and all intermediate and slowly changing dialects, had to be included, such an arrangement would, I think, be the only possible one. […] The various degrees of difference in the languages from the same stock, would have to be expressed by groups subordinate to groups; but the proper or even only possible arrangement would still be genealogical; and this would be strictly natural, as it would connect together all languages, extinct and modern, by the closest affinities, and would give the filiation and origin of each tongue.

Proto explores how the members of one major group of the world’s languages, the Indo-European languages, relate to each other through common descent from a hypothesised shared common ancestor, Proto-Indo European. It explains how linguists, geneticists and archaeologists have worked together—sometimes in disagreement—to piece together groups subordinate to groups in a large family tree of living and extinct languages encompassing tongues as apparently diverse as ancient Hittite (a member of the extinct Anatolian group of languages); Sanskrit, Urdu, and Persian (Indo-Iranian languages); French, Latin and Romanian (Italic languages); Welsh, Manx and Irish Gaelic (Celtic languages); Old Prussian, Polish and Russian (Balto-Slavic languages); and Yiddish, Gothic and English (Germanic languages).

The book explores how these and many other languages all descend from a language spoken by a small group of people living near the Black Sea around 5,000 years ago. It describes how, as the descendents of these people spread and diverged, so did the languages they spoke, sometimes mixing and merging with other languages encountered on the journey.

The book is particular good at explaining how this family-tree of languages was gradually pieced together from a multi-discipline mix of clues concerning cultures (physical artefacts), peoples (genetics) and the languages themselves. It’s a fascinating read.