The World’s First Words

Research released by the University of Adelaide has revealed new insights into the origins of some of the most widely spoken languages.

Through genetic profiling of more than 90 bodies dating back from 3000-8000 years ago, great similarities have been demonstrated between people from disparate geographical origins. Waves of several migrations explain this genetic mixing, and give way to the argument that at least some of the Indo-European languages spoken in Europe were likely to be the result of a large migration from eastern Russia.

The study goes on to trace Europe’s first farmers in Germany and Spain back to the common origin of what is now known as Turkey. While this research does not solve the problem of the origin of all languages, the study does go some way to disprove the Archaeological theory that Indo-European languages emerged from Anatolian farmers arriving in the early 1000s, and rather argues for a larger blend of nationalities and a wider dissemination of languages in the Stone Age.

Human Sciences applicants may wish to trace this phenomenon back even further and investigate evolutionary theories as to how language emerged in the physiology of primates and proto-humans.

The leader of the study, Professor David Reich of Harvard Medical School, argues that we must now look to the East, the Caucasus, Iran and India for the origins of Indo-European  Modern and Medieval Languages, in the hopes of one day soon finding where language as we know it today began.