At one time, at the beginning of history, what there was of mankind then probably spoke one language. As time went on, this parent language, or perhaps there were several parent languages, spread and changed.
At first, the parent lanuages were spoken by small numbers of persons or by scattered small groups. Gradually, some groups increased in numbers and there wasn't enough food for all of them. So some people would form a band to move a new location.
When these people arrived at a new location and settled down, they would speak almost the same as the people from whom they had parted. Gradually, though, new pronunciations would creep in. The people would begin to say things a little differently and there would be changes in the sounds of words.
Some words that were needed in the old home were no longer needed in the new place and would be dropped. New experiences would require new words to describe them. Ways of making sentences would change. And suppose the people had settled in a place where others were already living? The two languages would blend, and thus both of old languages would change.
At first , when the speech of the new people had changed only slightly from the original language, it would be called "a dialect". After a longer time, when there were many changes in words, sounds, and grammar, it would be considered a new language.
In just these ways, Spanish, French, and Portuguese developed from Latin; and English, Norwegian, Swedish, Danish, and Dutch grew from an early form of the German language.
The ancestor language, together with all the languages which developed from it, is called "a family" of languages.
-: Thanks :-
No comments:
Post a Comment