LANGUAGE PARTICULARITIES IN THE INDO-EUROPEAN AREA. ROLE OF THE SOUTH-EASTERN EUROPEAN CULTURAL CONTEXT
LANGUAGE PARTICULARITIES IN THE INDO-EUROPEAN AREA. ROLE OF THE SOUTH-EASTERN EUROPEAN CULTURAL CONTEXT

Summary/Abstract: This paper contradicts the centum-satem linguistic hypothesis that appeared in the intention of reconstructing the Proto-Indo-European language based on the evolution of dorsal consonant classes. Considering the peculiarities of the linguistic and cultural South-Eastern European context, we found that the centum-satem isogloss is unsatisfactory for our intention of explaining this context. In this respect, we designed a mixed research, in order to identify features of the Indo-European languages, based on an analysis of some morphological units from lexical fund of words of the languages under scrutiny. We included 123 Indo-European languages in the research corpus, analyzing the distribution of linguistic branches and groups in relation to words from the main lexical fund: water, to be and brother. Furthermore, we traced isophones and isoglosses and compared them with the centum-satem isogloss. We found that archaeological and anthropological data sustain the hypothesis of the Indo-European languages classification based on proposed isophones/isoglosses and not on the centum-satem isogloss. The present paper is important because it casts a different analytical light upon the Indo-European languages distribution, starting from the area where the two families of isoglosses intersect, specifically the South- Eastern European area.

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