Indo-Germanic

English

AI In plain words

Writing a short explanation…

Written by a house AI from the entry below, in your language. The entry itself is the source.

Indo-Germanic

Where it comes from

Coined by Dano-French geographer Conrad Malte-Brun in 1810 (as langues indo-germaniques) and popularized in German (as indogermanisch/Indogermanisch), especially following J. Klaproth's 1823 Asia polyglotta. At the time the term was coined, the Celtic languages were not yet considered Indo-European, and the Tocharian languages were not yet discovered; even after the inclusion of Celtic, Germanic remains the northwesternmost family (thanks to Icelandic). By surface analysis, Indo- + Germanic.

proper noun

Indo European studies, dated Indo-European (a major language family)
Indo European studies, dated Proto-Indo-European (a hypothetical language)
Indo European studies Pre-Germanic Proto-Indo-European.

adjective

Indo European studies, dated, not comparable Indo-European.

Talk about this word

Cite this

MLA

"Indo-Germanic." Wiktionary, via Micwyn, micwyn.com/word/indo-germanic. Accessed 6 Nov. 2026.

APA

Indo-Germanic. (n.d.). In Wiktionary, via Micwyn. Retrieved November 6, 2026, from https://micwyn.com/word/indo-germanic

Chicago

"Indo-Germanic." Wiktionary, via Micwyn. Accessed November 6, 2026. https://micwyn.com/word/indo-germanic.

BibTeX

@misc{indo_germanic_2026,
  title = {Indo-Germanic},
  howpublished = {Wiktionary, via Micwyn},
  year = {2026},
  url = {https://micwyn.com/word/indo-germanic},
  urldate = {2026-11-06}
}