by Achae
The last article left off on the eleven branches of the root language. They are: Indian, Iranian, Armenian, Hellenic, Albanian, Italic, Balto-Slavic, Germanic, Celtic, Hittite, and Tocharian.
Indian - The Indian language group possesses the oldest literary texts to have survived in any Indo-European language. These are known as the Vedas. The earliest of these is the rig-veda, a collection of hymns. The Vedas comprise the basis of Brahman philosophy. As with other cultures, they began in the oral tradition and were eventually written down. It is thought that the oldest text dates to 1500 B.C. These are written in Sanskrit. Sanskrit was used in writings other than religious aspects. Thanks to Panini in the 4th century B.C., Sanskrit was given a literary form. This is known as "Classical" Sanskrit. However, this literary form became like Latin in that it ceased to be spoken. Numerous dialects branched off from Sanskrit, such as Romani, Bengali, Hindi, Urdu, and Punjabi.
Iranian - This comprises languages northwest of India and in Iran. There are two main branches of this language - Avesta and Old Persian. Avesta is known from the sacred book of the Zoroastrians. Old Persian is only preserved in certain cuneiform scripts which concern the rulings of Darius and Xerxes. One such example is a mountainside with trilingual inscriptions depicting Darius and his prisoners. Old Persian evolved into modern Persian, also known as Farsi. Numerous dialects exist today including Pashto and Kurdish.
Armenian - The Armenian language exists in a small region by the Caucasus Mountains. Armenian also exhibited a sound shift similar to Grimm's Law. It may also be noted that this language lacks grammatical gender. Because of its rather isolated position, there are not many commonalities between Armenian and other Indo-European languages. It is believed that the Trojans spoke of by Homer may have been Armenian. Due to lack of surviving scripts, Armenian is known thanks to a passage from the Bible.
Hellenic - The Hellenes were Greeks that gradually supplanted their way into the Aegean. A dialect of this language, Attic, is often studied today. Many great writers increased the popularity of this dialect. It soon became known as "koiné," or common Greek. There are two strains in modern day known as Romaic - one is the language of the people and the other is the "pure" strain in an effort to restore the vocabulary and inflections of ancient times.
Albanian - This is another small branch, off the East coast of the Adriatic. It is difficult to isolate this language as it has been influenced heavily by Latin, Greek, Turkish, and Slavic languages. Originally classified with Hellenic, it has become recognized as its own branch.
Italic - Ah, the Romance languages. The center of this branch was in Italy. This branch devolved into Latin, which eventually branches into numerous languages such as Portugese, Spanish, French, and Italian. The Latin they branched from is not to be confused with Classical Latin. Classical Latin was the literary language whereas Vulgar Latin was the spoken language. Vulgar Latin contains simpler grammar and a different vocabulary. Confusing, right? For example, the word for "horse" written was "equus" but the spoken word was "caballus." Because Vulgar Latin was spoken and not written down, there was no homogenization and thus numerous branches were formed from one strain.
Balto-Slavic - This branch comprises the Baltic and Slavic languages. There were three Baltic languages: Prussian, Latvian, and Lithuanian. Prussian is now extinct, but the remaining two languages are noted for their conservatism. Slavic is broken down by region. East Slavic includes Russian, Belorussian, and Ukrainian. West Slavic includes Polish, Czech, Sorbian, and Slovak. South Slavic includes Bulgarian and Serbo-Croatian. Serbo-Croatian is a blend between two languages which are nearly similar, but use different alphabets. All these languages are more homogenous than other Indo-European branches.
Germanic - Germanic can also be broken down by region. East Germanic uses Gothic. North Germanic includes the Scandinavian languages such as Swedish, Danish, and Norwegian. Oddly enough, the oldest literary language of this branch was Old Icelandic. West Germanic is of chief interest to English speakers, because this is root of their language. West Germanic branched into Old High German, Old Dutch, and Old English. Old English developed into Middle English by dropping many inflections. Middle English then gave way to Modern English, how it is spoken today.
Celtic - The Celtic language used to be the most extensive of the Indo-European languages. In areas where they were once dominant, they left little trace, being supplanted by Italic and Germanic languages. In Modern times, Celtic has survived through Irish, Scottish Gaelic, and Welsh. Yet even in present day there is a diminishment of this branch as English becomes more dominant.
Hittite - This branch was known chiefly from references in the Bible. It wasn't until 1907 that this branch was discovered through an archaeological expedition. 10,000 clay tablets were found on which royal documents were written in cuneiform.
Tocharian - This language was found in fragments in western China. Strangely enough, this language bears most resemblance to the Italic, Germanic, and Celtic languages instead of the closer regional languages such as Indic, Iranian, or Armenian.