leibniz

Leibniz's Linguistic Research

"Linguistics" in the sense of research carried out on the basis of systematic collection of materials following strict rules and organized by objects of consideration (phonetics, morphology, syntax, lexicology, etc.) first emerged in the early nineteenth century. It is true that in Leibniz's time, and in the circle of the learned scholars who were directly or indirectly in contact with him, works of fundamental importance were produced, particularly in the area of lexicography and of the opening up of sources which, by virtue of the material thus uncovered, have to an extent retained their importance to the present day (cf. H. LUDOLF, Grammatica linguae Amharicae, 1698; J.G. SPARWENFELD, Lexicon Slavonicum, edited 1987-1992). In addition to their actual research objects however, these works had to identify fundamental questions of methodology; the spectrum of the aspects taken into consideration would accordingly remain limited and the results obtained were often to lack verification.

Against this background Leibniz's investigations of language are to be seen; they differ in one major respect from those of contemporaries primarily interested in linguistics. Beyond a mere general philosophy-rooted interest in language, linguistics is for Leibniz first and foremost an expedient for historical research. The objective is the reconstruction of the migration of peoples, the identification of ethnic groups and accordingly the elucidation of history prior to the emergence of the written tradition. The way ahead lay in the study of words and - on this basis - the establishment of affinities in language, all based of course on the assumption that from the language of a people its origin may be deduced. Leibniz's interest is therefore predominantly rooted in a single discipline viz. etymology.

On the other hand he casts his net much wider than the majority of his contemporaries, inasmuch as he takes into consideration in his collections and considerations lexical material of any and every origin, from words of German dialect to Manchurian glosses. Herein lies simultaneously the weakness and strength of his linguistic-historical efforts: against the universal perspectives thus uncovered stands the fact that the processing of such heterogeneous material must of necessity surpass the powers of a single individual. Even in the attempt to approach a comparability of languages through the establishment of a universal alphabet, Leibniz's efforts floundered under his specialist peers.

Often he never advanced beyond mere collections. Although the materials assembled by his correspondents, from available literature and his own observations are of considerably varying quality, they have, independently of Leibniz's work, remained of great value down to the present day. Thus the major part of the extant textual evidence of Dravenopolabish has only survived due to Leibniz's initiative. In addition there are numerous versions of the Lord's prayer, particularly in languages from the central Asiatic region, just as they were collected by Leibniz (along with lists of everyday words) tracing an older tradition. The sources of the material collection include, in addition to the Chinese missionaries, representatives of the Dutch East India Company. This material was to a large extent assembled by Leibniz himself in his Collectanea etymologica. In the case of words found in texts of the classics and in those of the more common European languages, Leibniz attempted the discovery of connections; here his approach is basically associative: etymology = phonetic similarity + semantic proximity. For the indispensable verification of the results obtained the prerequisites were wanting. The material basis was not only too narrow and not seldom unreliable; except for a first approach phonetic rules, whose possible existence is not a subject of investigation for Leibniz, are likewise wanting. In the traditions of the ancients, he based his considerations on phonetic-symbolic ideas (e.g. [k] represents flexure) and he liked to arrange series of words, that appeared to him to confirm this thesis, in the same way that he postulated the etymological relationship of words of different languages and periods (e.g. vir, erus, baro, Herr) having approximately the same meaning. The speculative character of such constructions is occasionally emphasized by Leibniz himself.

Ideally series of relationships thus established allow not only rough divisions of peoples according to language (e.g. "Scythian" versus the Celto-Germanic languages), but also the classification of scattered peoples, in much the same way as Leibniz attempted in the case of Dravenopolabish through comparison with Slavic and Baltic materials; in this way a prehistoric, if not original, condition was to be established, albeit with the reservation of the Genesis account of the tribal wanderings following the deluge, with which Leibniz constantly sought to harmonize his own results.

Thus Leibniz's investigations of language stand as a rule in the service of the further advancement of knowledge. As far as they concern his mother tongue, they could indeed become an end in themselves. Leibniz was certainly well disposed to the efforts of the linguistic societies of the 17th century; cultivation of German in word and script, elaboration of its beauty, complete knowledge of its hidden treasures in specialist vocabularies and dialects - each of them even for its own sake - were matters of concern to him. On the other hand he is removed from the "Fruchtbringende Gesellschaften" by virtue of his rejection of the capricious and unscholarly, which in the fight against real or alleged borrowed or "foreign" words had assumed a slight fanatical trait and had remained restricted to a narrow sphere of life. While here too Leibniz had at heart primarily vocabulary, which is to be investigated etymologically and extended in every conceivable fashion, nevertheless all the people regardless of station, and not least the fair sex, were supposed to profit from it. As a form of organization appropriate to efforts to put German on a par with the other contemporary and more thoroughly investigated languages of the courts, he conceived the founding of a "Teutschgesinnter Orden". Much of this thinking subsequently went into the planning of the later Prussian Academy of Sciences; this nothing short of revolutionary idea of having the whole of the people share in the undertaking would however find no place in the scheme of things.

Further reading:   S. von der SCHULENBURG, Leibniz als Sprachforscher. Frankfurt am Main, 1973.

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