On Language Diversity and Relationship from Bibliander to Adelung

From the Renaissance onwards, European scholars began to collect and study the various languages of the Old and the New Worlds. The recognition of language diversity encouraged them to explain how differences between languages emerged, why languages kept changing, and in what language families they could be classified. The present volume brings together the papers of the late George J. Metcalf (1908 1994) that discuss the search for possible genetic language relationships, and the...
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From the Renaissance onwards, European scholars began to collect and study the various languages of the Old and the New Worlds. The recognition of language diversity encouraged them to explain how differences between languages emerged, why languages kept changing, and in what language families they could be classified. The present volume brings together the papers of the late George J. Metcalf (1908 1994) that discuss the search for possible genetic language relationships, and the study of language developments and origins, in Early Modern Europe. Two general chapters, surveying the period between the 16th and 18th century, are followed by detailed case studies of the contributions of Swiss, Dutch, and German scholars such as Theodor Bibliander (1504 1564), Konrad Gesner (1516 1565), Philippus Cluverius (1580 1623), Hugo Grotius (1583 1645), and Justus Georg Schottelius (1612 1676). This collection of important studies, a number of which have become very hard to find, has been framed by a detailed Editors Introduction, a biographical sketch of the author, a master list of references, and indexes of biographical names and of subjects, terms, and languages."