Study of Human and Languages in Nineteenth Century

Throughout the nineteenth century, as physical anthropologists were puzzling over the differences among humans. Evidence of earlier and somewhat different human forms poured in from around the world. Fossil forms of humanlike animals.

Some with thicker skulls or larger teeth of slightly different facial shapes, forced scholars to rethink their theories of human evolution or creation. But even more important, in many cases the bones of ancient people were found in association with tools and other material possessions, often indicating not only that they must have looked different from modern human beings but that they lived by different means as well: that is, they had a different culture.

As archeologists provided more information about ancient peoples around the world, their work became more valuable to physical anthropology. At the same time, knowledge of past civilizations contributed to other areas of interest and formed the link that tied them to the growing field of anthropology. One such area was linguistics, the study of human language and languages.

Much of the work in linguistics in the nineteenth century and even earlier was devoted to detailed descriptions or peculiarities in the speech of various groups of people, or to tracing the history of related languages in an attempt to find some common form from which they had developed.

Increased interest in language was a result of the expansion of European economic and political interest throughout the world, but for a long time it remained more of an art form than a science. People who, for one reason or another, had an opportunity to learn another language might do so, but often without any attempt at developing a scientific approach to the study of language as a whole.
Study of Human and Languages in Nineteenth Century