Karl Brugmann (1849–1919) was professor of comparative language sciences at Freiburg im Breisgau when he began publishing his monumental, multi-volume comparative grammar of the Indo-European languages, synthesising the first 70 years of research in a rapidly developing academic subject, and identifying areas for future investigation. Volume 1, on phonology, begins with an introduction to Indo-European philology and provides a bibliographic orientation which is itself a fascinating snapshot of the field. The main part of the book focuses in turn on each Proto-Indo-European sound and its reflexes in the earliest attested languages of each language family (Sanskrit, Avestan, Armenian, Greek, Italic, Germanic, Old Irish, Balto-Slavic). Comparisons are also made within families, for example between Gothic and Old English. Brugmann also discusses Ablaut and sound changes including elision, contraction and lengthening as well as intonation and stress.
The monumental, multi-volume comparative grammar of the Indo-European languages by Karl Brugmann (1849–1919) provided a synthesis of the first 70 years of research in a rapidly-developing academic subject, and identified areas for future investigation. Volume 2, split into three parts, covers morphology, roots and inflection, beginning with nouns and continuing with pronouns and verbs. It begins with a substantial introduction that includes bibliographic information, and then focuses in turn on each Proto-Indo-European feature and its reflexes in the earliest attested languages of each language family (Sanskrit, Avestan, Armenian, Greek, Italic, Germanic, Old Irish, Balto-Slavic). Comparisons are also made within families, for example between Gothic and Old English. Owing to its length, the original publisher bound this volume in two parts, paginated as a single sequence; in this reissue, it is divided into three parts, maintaining the same pagination.
This is the index volume to the monumental comparative grammar of the Indo-European languages published by Karl Brugmann (1849–1919) in the late-nineteenth century. It contains three indexes. The first, an index of words, is subdivided by language and organised so as to be useable as a comparative lexicon even by those unfamiliar with particular languages. It shows the huge variety of languages referred to in the book, from Pali and Venetic to Frisian and Old Cornish. The index of topics excludes categories such as individual sound changes that are easily located via the extensive tables of contents, but includes languages and dialects, grammatical and phonetic categories, and concepts such as place names and music. Finally, there is an index of names which will be of particular value to historians of the field and bibliographers.
The monumental, multi-volume comparative grammar of the Indo-European languages by Karl Brugmann (1849–1919) provided a synthesis of the first 70 years of research in a rapidly-developing academic subject, and identified areas for future investigation. Volume 2, split into three parts, covers morphology, roots and inflection, beginning with nouns and continuing with pronouns and verbs. It begins with a substantial introduction that includes bibliographic information, and then focuses in turn on each Proto-Indo-European feature and its reflexes in the earliest attested languages of each language family (Sanskrit, Avestan, Armenian, Greek, Italic, Germanic, Old Irish, Balto-Slavic). Comparisons are also made within families, for example between Gothic and Old English. Owing to its length, the original publisher bound this volume in two parts, paginated as a single sequence; in this reissue, it is divided into three parts, maintaining the same pagination.
The monumental, multi-volume comparative grammar of the Indo-European languages by Karl Brugmann (1849–1919) provided a synthesis of the first 70 years of research in a rapidly-developing academic subject, and identified areas for future investigation. Volume 2, split into three parts, covers morphology, roots and inflection, beginning with nouns and continuing with pronouns and verbs. It begins with a substantial introduction that includes bibliographic information, and then focuses in turn on each Proto-Indo-European feature and its reflexes in the earliest attested languages of each language family (Sanskrit, Avestan, Armenian, Greek, Italic, Germanic, Old Irish, Balto-Slavic). Comparisons are also made within families, for example between Gothic and Old English. Owing to its length, the original publisher bound this volume in two parts, paginated as a single sequence; in this reissue, it is divided into three parts, maintaining the same pagination.
Karl Brugmann (1849–1919) was one of the central figures in the circle of Neogrammarians who rejected a prescriptive approach to the study of language in favour of diachronic study. This short overview of the development of comparative Indo-European linguistics and philology in the second part of the nineteenth century was first published in 1885, the year before Brugmann's celebrated multi-volume comparative grammar of Indo-European began to appear. To Brugmann, language is not an autonomous organism that develops according to inherent laws. It exists only in the individual speaker, and every change in a language takes place because of the speaker, though speakers share similar psychological and physical processes. Traditional philologists, including Brugmann's former university teacher Georg Curtius (1820–1885), were extremely hostile to the Neogrammarians' approach. Here, Brugmann responds to Curtius' criticism and defends his research methodology and theories.
Karl Brugmann (1849–1919) had recently taken up a newly-established chair in comparative philology at Freiburg im Breisgau when he began to publish his monumental, multi-volume comparative grammar of the Indo-European languages. In his foreword he argued that a new overview was needed for scholars and students of this rapidly developing 'young' subject (only 70 years old at the time). His book provides a fascinating snapshot of the field, the scholars active in it, and the debates they engaged in. The first volume is devoted to phonology; the second volume, on morphology, had to be divided by the original publisher, and it is bound in three parts in this reissue. There is also a volume containing indexes of words, topics and names. Berthold Delbrück's three-volume book on Indo-European syntax, which complements Brugmann's work, is also available in this series.
