Hermann Möller

Hermann Möller (1850-1923) was a Danish linguist noted for his work in favor of a genetic relationship between the Indo-European and Semitic language families.

Möller grew up in North Frisia after its conquest by Germany in the German-Danish War of 1864 and attended German universities (Pulsiano and Treharne 2001:447). He began teaching Germanic philology at the University of Copenhagen in 1883 and continued to do so for over thirty-five years (ib.).

Also in 1883, he published "Das altenglische Volksepos in der ursprünglichen strophischen Form", 'The Old English Folk Epic in the Original Strophic Form', in which he argued, among other things, that "Beowulf" had been composed in a fixed meter which was corrupted by later poets (ib.).

Möller's magnum opus was the "Vergleichendes indogermanisch-semitisches Wörterbuch", 'Dictionary of Comparative Indo-European-Semitic', published in 1911.

Although Möller's association of Semitic and Indo-European reflected a high level of linguistic expertise and was the fruit of many years of labor, it did not receive general acceptance from the linguistic community and is rarely mentioned today (2008).

It was, however, accepted as valid by a number of leading linguists of the time, such as Holger Pedersen (1924) and Louis Hjelmslev.

According to Hjelmslev (1970:79), "a genetic relationship between Indo-European and Hamito-Semitic was demonstrated in detail by the Danish linguist Hermann Möller, using the method of element functions".

Möller's work was continued by Albert Cuny (1924, 1943, 1946) in France and more recently by the American scholar Saul Levin (1971, 1995, 2002).

It was doubtless thanks to Möller's work that Holger Pedersen included Hamito-Semitic in his proposed Nostratic language family, a classification maintained by subsequent Nostraticists (e.g. Vladislav Illich-Svitych and Allan Bomhard). The Hamitic family was shown to be invalid by Joseph Greenberg (1963), who consequently rejected the name Hamito-Semitic, replacing it with Afroasiatic, under which Semitic is classed today.

Möller is also well known for his version of the laryngeal theory, set forth in "Die semitisch-vorindogermanischen laryngalen Konsonanten", 'The Semitic-Pre-Indo-European Laryngeal Consonants' (1917).

References

*Cuny, Albert. 1924. "Etudes prégrammaticales sur le domaine des langues indo-européennes et chamito-sémitiques." Paris: Champion.

*Cuny, Albert. 1943. "Recherches sur le vocalisme, le consonantisme et la formation des racines en « nostratique », ancêtre de l'indo-européen et du chamito-sémitique." Paris: Adrien Maisonneuve.

*Cuny, Albert. 1946. "Invitation à l'étude comparative des langues indo-européennes et des langues chamito-sémitiques." Bordeaux: Brière.

*Greenberg, Joseph H. 1963. "The Languages of Africa." Bloomington: Indiana University Press. (From the same publisher: second revised edition, 1966; third edition, 1970. All three editions simultaneously published at The Hague by Mouton &. Co.)

*Hjelmslev, Louis. 1970. "Language: An Introduction." Madison: University of Wisconsin Press.

*Levin, Saul. 1971. "The Indo-European and Semitic Languages: An Exploration of Structural Similarities Related to Accent, Chiefly in Greek, Sanskrit, and Hebrew." State University of New York Press. ISBN 9780873950558.

*Levin, Saul. 1995. "Semitic and Indo-European, Volume 1: The Principal Etymologies, With Observations on Afro-Asiatic." John Benjamins Publishing Company. ISBN 1556195834.

*Levin, Saul. 2002. "Semitic and Indo-European, Volume 2: Comparative Morphology, Syntax and Phonetics." John Benjamins Publishing Company. ISBN 1588112225.

*Möller, Hermann. 1883. "Das altenglische Volksepos in der ursprünglichen strophischen Form." Kiel: Lipsius & Tischer.

*Möller, Hermann. 1906. "Semitisch und Indogermanisch. Teil l. Konsonanten." (Only volume to appear of a projected longer work.) Kopenhagen: H. Hagerup, 1906. (Reprint: 1978. Hildesheim – New York: Georg Olms. ISBN 3487066696.)

*Möller, Hermann. 1911. "Vergleichendes indogermanisch-semitisches Wörterbuch." Kopenhagen. (Reprint: 1970, reissued 1997. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck and Ruprecht. ISBN 3525261152.)

*Möller, Hermann. 1917. "Die semitisch-vorindogermanischen laryngalen Konsonanten." København: Andr. Fred. Høst.

*Pedersen, Holger. 1924. "Sprogvidenskaben i det Nittende Aarhundrede. Metoder og Resulteter." København: Gyldendalske Boghandel.

*Pedersen, Holger. 1931. "Linguistic Science in the Nineteenth Century: Methods and Results", translated from the Danish by John Webster Spargo. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press. (English translation of the previous.)

*Pulsiano, Philip and Elaine M. Treharne. 2001. "A Companion to Anglo-Saxon Literature." Oxford: Blackwell Publishers.

External links

* [http://www.jstor.org/pss/268883 Review of Levin (1971)] by Gordon M. Messing