Indo-European languages, also known as Indo-Germanic languages, are a widespread language family, ranging across Europe, the Middle East, and India. They are the most-widely spoken languages in the world, with well over 2 billion speakers, especially of English. It is believed by some creationists that the Indo-European people are descended from Japeth, the son of Noah.
It is the world's largest language group encompassing many languages, including most of those spoken in the greater Eurasian continent from Iceland to the Xinjiang province, China. It includes English and most of the major European languages.
Although there is debate about its origin, the most commonly accepted hypothesis among secular linguists is that Indo-European dates from about 4000 BC, and originated in the Caspian steppe. Creationists believe that major language groups, perhaps including Proto-Indo-European, were created by God in about 2200 BC following the destruction of the Tower of Babel. A few have proposed that Indo-European languages are an offshoot of the original Hebrew language, while most see Indo-European, Semitic and Hamitic language groups stemming from the dispersion following the Tower of Babel.
Indo-European is divided into several language branches both extinct (Anatolian and Tocharian) and living as with several proposed languages and peoples. A few are merely language isolates (Greek, Armenian) with evidence only pertaining to one language with no living or extinct ancestors, yet which can be traced to the Indo-European family. These current living language families are:
Categories: [Linguistics] [Language]