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Linguistics

Deep relationships between languages

Tracing a common ancestry between languages becomes harder as the connection goes further back in time. A new test has revealed a surprisingly ancient relationship between a central Siberian and a North American language family.

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Figure 1: Circumpolar map of the Arctic showing the locations of Yeniseian and Na-Dene languages.

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Correspondence to Jared Diamond.

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Diamond, J. Deep relationships between languages. Nature 476, 291–292 (2011). https://doi.org/10.1038/476291a

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