ABSTRACT
Over the past three decades historical-comparative linguistics has witnessed the transgression of what was previously considered to be the ultimate time limit in the applicability of the traditional method. The main driving force for this has been the Nostratic hypothesis which first postulated the feasibility of a macrophylum consisting of six language phyla (Indo-European, Afroasiatic, Kartvelian, Uralic, Altaic, Dravidian).1 This major breakthrough, however, has been met with antagonism due to the misunderstanding that the Nostratic theory violates the rules and methods of traditional historical-comparative linguistics. This chapter clarifies some of the principles followed in linguistic reconstruction at ‘greater-than-usual’ time-depth and tries to analyse the recent ambiguities concerning the time-depth of Nostratic.
