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Roughly half the world's population speaks languages derived from a shared linguistic source known as Proto-Indo-European. But who were the early speakers of this ancient mother tongue, and how did they manage to spread it around the globe? Until now their identity has remained a tantalizing mystery to linguists, archaeologists, and even Nazis seeking the roots of the Aryan race. The Horse, the Wheel, and Language lifts the veil that has long shrouded these original Indo-European speakers, and reveals how their domestication of horses and use of the wheel spread language and transformed civilization. Linking prehistoric archaeological remains with the development of language, David Anthony identifies the prehistoric peoples of central Eurasia's steppe grasslands as the original speakers of Proto-Indo-European, and shows how their innovative use of the ox wagon, horseback riding, and the warrior's chariot turned the Eurasian steppes into a thriving transcontinental corridor of communication, commerce, and cultural exchange. He explains how they spread their traditions and gave rise to important advances in copper mining, warfare, and patron-client political institutions, thereby ushering in an era of vibrant social change. Anthony also describes his fascinating discovery of how the wear from bits on ancient horse teeth reveals the origins of horseback riding. The Horse, the Wheel, and Language solves a puzzle that has vexed scholars for two centuries--the source of the Indo-European languages and English--and recovers a magnificent and influential civilization from the past.… (altro)
The focus of this book is, in my opinion one of the most interesting questions modern man can ponder: how is it that languages spread across vast distances and cultural divides can share so much in common? The very idea that English, Polish, Farsi, Armenian, and many more could have all come from the same linguistic root boggles the mind. In the same way that biological evolution seems to defy common sense, it goes against everything one feels when encountering these foreign languages to suggest that, actually, they all came from a nomadic group of pastoralists in Eurasian steppe 5000 years ago.
This book is full of examples of scientific work and discovery that give the layman a true appreciation for all the tedious, impossibly incremental work that builds a theoretical structure on which to hang such a ludicrous-sounding idea. The author discusses dozens or perhaps hundreds of different cultures and societies spread across continents and continental expanses of time. These cultures are known from artifacts that have first been discovered, then dug up, then catalogued and radiocarbon dated (a technique which i know understand to be incredibly complicated thanks to this book), then fit into the grand scheme of archeological data that only in the aggregate gives us a picture of some tiny shard of a life from thousands of years ago. Equally if not more impressive is the process by which linguists have triangulated similarities in far-flung languages in order to cast a ghostly apparition of what the Proto-Indo-European language might have sounded like. It makes your head spin to consider the huge amount of brain and man power spent to make even the smallest bit of progress.
The thing about archeology and linguistics in particular that has always drawn me to them over other sciences is they are really the study of what makes us essentially human. Learning more about deep space or quantum physics is cool and all, but the questions taken up in this book affect millions of peoples lives every day, but at such a deep level that its almost unnoticeable. Writing this review right now puts me in debt to the very nomadic people who are described in this book. The author mentions in the beginning of the book the short time frame that even very well known people have persisted in historical records. For the vast majority of humanity, no one will remember your name or who you were one hundred years after you die. The fact that the world we inhabit today will continue to evolve and change into what may seem like an alien planet, just as the people of the prehistoric Eurasian steppe would surely see us. It takes ingenuity and holy curiosity to excavate the ties that bind us to what happened thousands of years ago. This kind of work isn’t merely egghead research on esoteric topics, its a search for knowledge that has the capacity to revolutionize the way we see death, history, the passage of time, and especially, the meaning we attach to our language and identity. One of the great repeated shocks of life is both a cliché and a rarely heeded piece of wisdom: everything is always changing, nothing stays the same. This truism is especially true in anything human beings do. Too many lives are stunted (not to mention wars started and atrocities committed) by a poor understanding of time in its vast expanse. Maybe work like that described in this book can help make some people more aware.
The first quarter of this book is 5 stars. Like the urban civilizations that rimmed the vast Eurasian steppe, once you pass a certain point, you enter what might seem like a desolate, undifferentiated landscape to the untrained eye. Most of this book is about hardcore archeology, and I came for the language stuff. Trudging through hundreds of pages describing the pottery and burial rituals of sundry tribes and chiefdoms was definitely a slog, and made me wonder if this book we intended for a more specialized audience. When it enters into existential questions about human nature, society, and language, the writing is beautiful and clearly comes from a place of deep passion. Every once in a while i came across and little factoid or idea that, like a river or patch of forest on the steppe broke up the monotony. But it was soon back to the litany of sites and findings and cultural horizons that I’m just not educated enough to care about. ( )
I stopped reading this book at 30% because it was super boring to read about archaeological stuff in minute detail. Might be interesting for archaeologists, but not for me. ( )
Really interesting read! I read this book for a linguistic anthropology class and it was a perfect companion to the course. It mostly explores proto-indo-european language and gives an excellent overview of how languages and dialects began to evolve through trade and transit, as well as providing distinct examples of similarities between modern languages throughout the Eurasian area. Highly recommend reading this if you are interested in language evolution. However, I do wish that it had discussed some African languages, as they also may have a relationship with proto-indo-european, but I could be completely wrong. ( )
Finally got this book back out to finish it. I found the first chapters, which were more about the language, the most interesting. toward the end my eyes were glazing over, as the author went into minute detail about archaeological finds.. this is obviously his bread and butter and you can't blame him for finding it fascinating in all of its detail. I lost the thread of his argument in all the minutia though, so I finished the book feeling like maybe he hadn't defended his central thesis entirely. that being said, I did really enjoy most of the book, and consider myself better informed about proto Indo European and its probable culture. ( )
The Horse, the Wheel, and Language” brings together the work of historical linguists and archaeologists, researchers who have traditionally been suspicious of one another’s methods. Though parts of the book will be penetrable only by scholars, it lays out in intricate detail the complicated genealogy of history’s most successful language.
Dati dalle informazioni generali inglesi.Modifica per tradurlo nella tua lingua.
When you look in the mirror you see not just your face but a museum.
Citazioni
Ultime parole
Dati dalle informazioni generali inglesi.Modifica per tradurlo nella tua lingua.
But there is another irony rarely appreciated: that in the invisible and fleeting sounds of our speech we preserve for a future generation of linguists many details of our present world.
Roughly half the world's population speaks languages derived from a shared linguistic source known as Proto-Indo-European. But who were the early speakers of this ancient mother tongue, and how did they manage to spread it around the globe? Until now their identity has remained a tantalizing mystery to linguists, archaeologists, and even Nazis seeking the roots of the Aryan race. The Horse, the Wheel, and Language lifts the veil that has long shrouded these original Indo-European speakers, and reveals how their domestication of horses and use of the wheel spread language and transformed civilization. Linking prehistoric archaeological remains with the development of language, David Anthony identifies the prehistoric peoples of central Eurasia's steppe grasslands as the original speakers of Proto-Indo-European, and shows how their innovative use of the ox wagon, horseback riding, and the warrior's chariot turned the Eurasian steppes into a thriving transcontinental corridor of communication, commerce, and cultural exchange. He explains how they spread their traditions and gave rise to important advances in copper mining, warfare, and patron-client political institutions, thereby ushering in an era of vibrant social change. Anthony also describes his fascinating discovery of how the wear from bits on ancient horse teeth reveals the origins of horseback riding. The Horse, the Wheel, and Language solves a puzzle that has vexed scholars for two centuries--the source of the Indo-European languages and English--and recovers a magnificent and influential civilization from the past.
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6
This book is full of examples of scientific work and discovery that give the layman a true appreciation for all the tedious, impossibly incremental work that builds a theoretical structure on which to hang such a ludicrous-sounding idea. The author discusses dozens or perhaps hundreds of different cultures and societies spread across continents and continental expanses of time. These cultures are known from artifacts that have first been discovered, then dug up, then catalogued and radiocarbon dated (a technique which i know understand to be incredibly complicated thanks to this book), then fit into the grand scheme of archeological data that only in the aggregate gives us a picture of some tiny shard of a life from thousands of years ago. Equally if not more impressive is the process by which linguists have triangulated similarities in far-flung languages in order to cast a ghostly apparition of what the Proto-Indo-European language might have sounded like. It makes your head spin to consider the huge amount of brain and man power spent to make even the smallest bit of progress.
The thing about archeology and linguistics in particular that has always drawn me to them over other sciences is they are really the study of what makes us essentially human. Learning more about deep space or quantum physics is cool and all, but the questions taken up in this book affect millions of peoples lives every day, but at such a deep level that its almost unnoticeable. Writing this review right now puts me in debt to the very nomadic people who are described in this book. The author mentions in the beginning of the book the short time frame that even very well known people have persisted in historical records. For the vast majority of humanity, no one will remember your name or who you were one hundred years after you die. The fact that the world we inhabit today will continue to evolve and change into what may seem like an alien planet, just as the people of the prehistoric Eurasian steppe would surely see us. It takes ingenuity and holy curiosity to excavate the ties that bind us to what happened thousands of years ago. This kind of work isn’t merely egghead research on esoteric topics, its a search for knowledge that has the capacity to revolutionize the way we see death, history, the passage of time, and especially, the meaning we attach to our language and identity. One of the great repeated shocks of life is both a cliché and a rarely heeded piece of wisdom: everything is always changing, nothing stays the same. This truism is especially true in anything human beings do. Too many lives are stunted (not to mention wars started and atrocities committed) by a poor understanding of time in its vast expanse. Maybe work like that described in this book can help make some people more aware.
The first quarter of this book is 5 stars. Like the urban civilizations that rimmed the vast Eurasian steppe, once you pass a certain point, you enter what might seem like a desolate, undifferentiated landscape to the untrained eye. Most of this book is about hardcore archeology, and I came for the language stuff. Trudging through hundreds of pages describing the pottery and burial rituals of sundry tribes and chiefdoms was definitely a slog, and made me wonder if this book we intended for a more specialized audience. When it enters into existential questions about human nature, society, and language, the writing is beautiful and clearly comes from a place of deep passion. Every once in a while i came across and little factoid or idea that, like a river or patch of forest on the steppe broke up the monotony. But it was soon back to the litany of sites and findings and cultural horizons that I’m just not educated enough to care about. (