The Sound That Changed Ancient Rome
How can a single sound shift the course of a civilization? This article explores Latin rhotacism, the fascinating process where an 's' sound between vowels transformed into an 'r'. Discover…
Tag: sound change
Proving Languages Are Related
How can linguists be so certain that English and ancient Sanskrit are cousins, while neighboring Finnish is a total stranger? It's not guesswork—it's a rigorous scientific process called the comparative…
The Grammar of Nicknames
Ever wonder why William becomes Bill, but not Willam? Or how a Russian Aleksandr affectionately becomes Sashenka? Nicknames follow a fascinating, unwritten grammar, a secret set of rules that transform…
The Ultimate Ancestor: How Linguists Reconstructed the Proto-Indo-European Language
Imagine a language that vanished over 5,000 years ago, leaving behind no written records. This is Proto-Indo-European (PIE), the mysterious ancestor of English, Russian, Hindi, and hundreds of other tongues.…
The Great Vowel Shift: How it Transformed the English Language
The Great Vowel Shift, a term coined by the Danish linguist Otto Jespersen, is a pivotal moment in the annals of English language history. This...