ABSTRACT
As classifications of race based on phenotypical differences developed during the nineteenth century, evidence in support of such theories was sought from the study of language. Scholars sought to reconstruct language “families” on the basis of linguistic evidence. The European languages and the languages of India were classified together into the Indo-European group of languages. At the same time, the myth was established of a long-lost Indo-European or “Aryan” race who had spoken a proto-language from which Indo-European descended and who were the ancestors of the Slavs, Romans, Germans, and other European races. The proposition that race, culture and language are isomorphic is patently false, but has frequently had a strong appeal to the politicians and populations of many nations. Hitler’s Ein Volk, Ein Reich, Eine Sprache is an example.
