-
2000 BCE
The Babylonian Tradition
- Written in cuneiform and in clay tablets.
- The earliest linguistic texts were lists of nouns in Sumerian.
- The Sumerian was replaced by Akkadian, a different language.
-
1000 BCE
Hindu Traditions
- Based on Vedas which was written in Sanskrit (the sacred language of religious texts).
- The best known grammarian is Panini.
-
500 BCE
Greek Traditions
- It includes the origins of the languages, parts of the speech sistems, the relationship between the languages and thoughts.
- In greek tradition, syntax was not described directly.
-
100 BCE
Roman Traditions
- This tradition continued with Greek Themes
- Syntax was ignored
- The grammars of Donatus and Priscan were high influential in the Middle Ages.
-
700
Arabic Traditions
- In this one, the greek grammar had a strong influence.
- Grammarians considered Arabic language as sacred.
- Focussed on morphology and accurate phonetic descriptions
-
700
Hebrew Traditions
- The linguists of this language were interested in establishing the correct text of the Old Testament.
- With methods of the Arabic tradition they developed a system of analysis for morphology.
-
1000
European Traditions
- Interested in the vernacular languages increased among students.
- Christian writers used again the philosophical themes of Aristotle.
-
Period: to
Development of linguistics
- Sir William Jones insisted that the Greek, Celtic, Latin and Germanic must have originated from one common source because all of them have similarities.
- Some time after the discovery of Sir William Jones, linguistics began to take much more importance in research.
-
Modern Linguistics
- Focused on the idea that a language can be viewed as a self-contained and structured system situated at a particular point in time.
