Aquan languages: Difference between revisions

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''This article is about a hypothetical ancient natlang family. For the languages of water elementals in fantasy settings, see [[Elemental languages]].''  
''This article is about a hypothetical ancient natlang family. For the languages of water elementals in fantasy settings, see [[Elemental languages]].''  


The '''Aquan languages''' are a hypothetical [[Paleo-European languages|European]] [[language family]] proposed by [[User:WeepingElf|Jörg Rhiemeier]]. The languages are all extinct and unattested, leaving only traces in other languages, mainly in form of the [[Old European hydronymy]] and [[Wikipedia:Substratum (linguistics)|substratum]] loanwords in the [[Indo-European languages|Indo-European]] languages of Central and Western Europe. The name "Aquan" is derived from Latin ''aqua'' 'water', a word that is limited to the westernmost branches of Indo-European (Italic, Celtic and Germanic) and also occurs in the Old European hydronymy, and may have been the Aquan common term for a watercourse.
'''Aquan''' is a term coined by [[User:WeepingElf|Jörg Rhiemeier]] for the hypothetical language of the [[Old European Hydronymy]]. He conjectures that this language may have been an [[Indo-European languages|Indo-European language]] related to the [[Wikipedia:Anatolian languages|Anatolian]] branch of that family, spoken by the [[Wikipedia:Bell Beaker culture|Bell Beaker culture]], on the grounds that both probably originated in the southwestern outlier of the [[Wikipedia:Yamnaya culture|Yamnaya culture]] on the Lower Danube. It may have been a ''kentum'' language with an *o > *a merger, thus ''not'' the ancestor of the [[Wikipedia:Caltic languages|Celtic languages]] in whose history the latter change did not happen (nor in the [[Wikipedia:Italic languages|Italic languages]]).


According to Rhiemeier, the Aquan languages were spoken in Copper Age Central and Western Europe and form a branch of the Indo-European family that separated from the rest of the family at an early date, together with the [[Wikipedia:Anatolian languages|Anatolian]] languages or slightly earlier. He '''formerly''' assumed that Proto-Aquan may have been spoken around 5500 BC by the people whose archaeological remains are known as the [[Wikipedia:Linear Pottery culture|Linear Pottery culture]]; see [[Europic]] for this obsolete hypothesis. These people, however, were genetically not very close to the [[Wikipedia:Yamna culture|Yamnaya]] people of Copper Age Ukraine and southern Russia who are widely identified with [[Proto-Indo-European]]; hence, he now considers this connection doubtful, instead proposing that Proto-Aquan resulted from the first wave of Indo-European expansions which would have brought the language to Central Europe ca. 4500 BC; Proto-Aquan would thus be a result of the same expansion movement that also resulted in the formation of the [[Wikipedia:Anatolian languages|Anatolian]] branch. From there, the languages were carried north, south and west by various daughter cultures. The last holdout of Aquan languages may have been in the British Isles, where these languages may have been the substratum responsible for the "un-Indo-European" appearance of the [[Wikipedia:Insular Celtic languages|Insular Celtic]] languages.
Aquan languages would have been spoken in most parts of Western Europe during much of the Bronze Age, before they were eclipsed by Italic, Celtic and Germanic languages either in the late Bronze Age ([[Wikipedia:Urnfield culture|Urnfield culture]]) or in the early Iron Age ([[Wikipedia:Hallstatt culture|Hallstatt culture]]). There are no surviving Aquan languages, nor are any attested in written form. [[Wikipedia:Basque language|Basque]], [[Wikipedia:Iberian language|Iberian]] and [[Wikipedia:Etruscan language|Etruscan]] are ''not'' Aquan languages; they are not Indo-European at all. These languages thus either represent even earlier linguistic strata, or arrived from elsewhere later.


The Aquan languages seem to preserve some archaic features of an early stage of Proto-Indo-European, such as a three-vowel system (*/a i u/) without ablaut (though this may be due to levelling of ablaut by a change which collapsed *e, *a and *o into single vowel), and perhaps a more agglutinating morphology (again, perhaps the result of analogical changes). Substratal evidence from the Insular Celtic languages may indicate that the insular branch, at least, may have been head-initial and active/stative, with a tendency to phonologically run together syntactically closely associated words (such as noun and adjective within a noun phrase).
Rhiemeier admits, though, that this hypothesis is highly speculative and so far insufficiently confirmed by linguistic data. It is not even certain that the Old European Hydronymy is the reflex of a distinct stratum of lost languages and not merely a meaningless pattern falling out of the sheer amount of data points comparable to [[Wikipedia:Ley line|ley lines]], and that the Bell Beaker culture corresponds to a linguistic entity.


Lately, Rhiemeier has developed doubt against this idea. The [[Old European hydronymy]] may be the onomastic equivalent of constellations or ley lines - an imaginary pattern emerging from the sheer mass of data which actually means nothing. He now thinks that this idea is at best useful as an inspiration for conlangs - see next section.
Jörg Rhiemeier's [[Hesperic]] conlang family is a re-creation (''not'' a scholarly reconstruction) of this hypothetical branch of the Indo-European family.


==Aquan conlangs==
[[Category:Indo-European languages]]
 
Jörg Rhiemeier explores the lost world of the Aquan languages speculatively in his [[Hesperic]] conlang family within the framework of the [[League of Lost Languages]].
 
==See also==
 
* [[Macro-Indo-European]]
 
[[Category:LLL]]
[[Category:Paleo-European languages]]
[[Category:Paleo-European languages]]
[[Category:Historical linguistics]]
[[Category:Historical linguistics]]

Latest revision as of 00:02, 6 June 2025

This article is about a hypothetical ancient natlang family. For the languages of water elementals in fantasy settings, see Elemental languages.

Aquan is a term coined by Jörg Rhiemeier for the hypothetical language of the Old European Hydronymy. He conjectures that this language may have been an Indo-European language related to the Anatolian branch of that family, spoken by the Bell Beaker culture, on the grounds that both probably originated in the southwestern outlier of the Yamnaya culture on the Lower Danube. It may have been a kentum language with an *o > *a merger, thus not the ancestor of the Celtic languages in whose history the latter change did not happen (nor in the Italic languages).

Aquan languages would have been spoken in most parts of Western Europe during much of the Bronze Age, before they were eclipsed by Italic, Celtic and Germanic languages either in the late Bronze Age (Urnfield culture) or in the early Iron Age (Hallstatt culture). There are no surviving Aquan languages, nor are any attested in written form. Basque, Iberian and Etruscan are not Aquan languages; they are not Indo-European at all. These languages thus either represent even earlier linguistic strata, or arrived from elsewhere later.

Rhiemeier admits, though, that this hypothesis is highly speculative and so far insufficiently confirmed by linguistic data. It is not even certain that the Old European Hydronymy is the reflex of a distinct stratum of lost languages and not merely a meaningless pattern falling out of the sheer amount of data points comparable to ley lines, and that the Bell Beaker culture corresponds to a linguistic entity.

Jörg Rhiemeier's Hesperic conlang family is a re-creation (not a scholarly reconstruction) of this hypothetical branch of the Indo-European family.

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