Re: Kentum/satem (was: The future of Sturnan)

From: Jan van Steenbergen [mailto:ijzeren_jan@YAHOO.CO.UK]

>  --- Keith wrote:
>
> > PIE sister languages? Huh? I didn't think there was
> > anything like that?
>
> There is such a theory, that links some big language families
> with each other. IIRC: Indo-European, Uralic, Altaic, Semitic,
> Caucasian, Etruscan, and perhaps a few others. They call it
> "Nostratic".
> I don't know how widely this theory is accepted among
> scientists; I know too little about it to give my own
> opinion. But if it were true, it would mean that
> Proto-Indo-European actually did have sister
> languages.
Ah, that makes much more sense. I've heard about Nostratic,
but I the 'sister languages' thing in relation to Celtic
languages sort of threw me. All that popped into my head then
was some of the unfounded ramblings about Basque and the
Celtic languages being related that pop up from time to time.

K.