The ''Atlas Linguarum Europae'' (literally ''Atlas of the Languages of Europe'', ALE in acronym) is a linguistic atlas project launched in 1970 with the help of
UNESCO
The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO ) is a List of specialized agencies of the United Nations, specialized agency of the United Nations (UN) with the aim of promoting world peace and International secur ...
, and published from 1975 to 2007. The ALE used its own phonetic transcription system, based on the International Phonetic Alphabet with some modifications. It covers six language families present on the European continent:
Altaic,
Basque
Basque may refer to:
* Basques, an ethnic group of Spain and France
* Basque language, their language
Places
* Basque Country (greater region), the homeland of the Basque people with parts in both Spain and France
* Basque Country (autonomous co ...
,
Indo-European
The Indo-European languages are a language family native to the northern Indian subcontinent, most of Europe, and the Iranian plateau with additional native branches found in regions such as Sri Lanka, the Maldives, parts of Central Asia (e. ...
,
Caucasian,
Semitic and
Uralic; these families are divided into 22 linguistic groups comprising 90 languages and dialects. The data were collected in 2631 localities. The members of the ALE project are organized into 47 national committees and 4 committees for minority languages.
Roman Jakobson
Roman Osipovich Jakobson (, ; 18 July 1982) was a Russian linguist and literary theorist. A pioneer of structural linguistics, Jakobson was one of the most celebrated and influential linguists of the twentieth century. With Nikolai Trubetzk ...
proposed a
linguistic atlas for Europe in the late 1930s, but
World War II
World War II or the Second World War (1 September 1939 – 2 September 1945) was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War II, Allies and the Axis powers. World War II by country, Nearly all of the wo ...
disrupted this plan. The idea was revived by
Mario Alinei at the Second International Congress of Dialectologists in 1965, and Alinei was still President of the ALE as late as 1997. Wolfgang Viereck took over as president between 1999 and 2005, and was then followed by
Nicolae Saramandu. Alinei developed a theory that much of language is based on "
magico-religious motivations", which he believed pre-dated the spread of
Christianity
Christianity is an Abrahamic monotheistic religion, which states that Jesus in Christianity, Jesus is the Son of God (Christianity), Son of God and Resurrection of Jesus, rose from the dead after his Crucifixion of Jesus, crucifixion, whose ...
and
Islam
Islam is an Abrahamic religions, Abrahamic monotheistic religion based on the Quran, and the teachings of Muhammad. Adherents of Islam are called Muslims, who are estimated to number Islam by country, 2 billion worldwide and are the world ...
to Europe. Viereck later wrote on the influence of religion on language.
It was the first computerised linguistic atlas. In
England
England is a Countries of the United Kingdom, country that is part of the United Kingdom. It is located on the island of Great Britain, of which it covers about 62%, and List of islands of England, more than 100 smaller adjacent islands. It ...
, the 66 sites had all been part of the earlier
Survey of English Dialects. Viereck noted that the 1970s fieldwork of the ALE demonstrated widespread
lexical erosion in English dialects since the SED (e.g. the word "icicle" had become universal in England and displaced other dialect words). Work in
Ireland
Ireland (, ; ; Ulster Scots dialect, Ulster-Scots: ) is an island in the North Atlantic Ocean, in Northwestern Europe. Geopolitically, the island is divided between the Republic of Ireland (officially Names of the Irish state, named Irelan ...
,
Scotland
Scotland is a Countries of the United Kingdom, country that is part of the United Kingdom. It contains nearly one-third of the United Kingdom's land area, consisting of the northern part of the island of Great Britain and more than 790 adjac ...
and
Wales
Wales ( ) is a Countries of the United Kingdom, country that is part of the United Kingdom. It is bordered by the Irish Sea to the north and west, England to the England–Wales border, east, the Bristol Channel to the south, and the Celtic ...
covered both
Celtic and
Germanic dialects. The Germanic dialects of Scotland were classified as
Scots, whereas those of Ireland and Wales were classified as English. Work in the
Channel Islands
The Channel Islands are an archipelago in the English Channel, off the French coast of Normandy. They are divided into two Crown Dependencies: the Jersey, Bailiwick of Jersey, which is the largest of the islands; and the Bailiwick of Guernsey, ...
only investigated Romance dialects.
An article by the
Yorkshire Dialect Society noted the troubled history of the survey in England and Wales.
J. D. A. Widdowson had initially said that there were not the resources to do the survey domestically, but he was persuaded to take part after the persistence of
Toon Weijnen. The results for Britain and Ireland have hardly been analysed. As of 2023, the ALE committee still has representation for Gaelic, Irish, Manx, Scots and Welsh but not for English. A publication by
Clive Upton and J.D.A. Widdowson noted widespread lexical erosion between the Survey of English Dialects and the ALE.
Some of the fieldwork notes for England and Wales have been uploaded to the Internet Archive's collection for dialects of English and Scots.
Publications
* Atlas Linguarum Europae: Introduction, Assen: Van Gorcum, 1975.
* Atlas Linguarum Europae: First Questionnaire, Assen: Van Gorcum, 1976.
* Atlas Linguarum Europae: Second Questionnaire, Assen: Van Gorcum, 1979.
* Atlas Linguarum Europae, volume I: first fascicle, maps and comments, Assen: Van Gorcum, 1983.
* Atlas Linguarum Europae, volume I: second fascicle, maps and commentaries, Assen / Maastricht: Van Gorcum, 1986.
* Atlas Linguarum Europae, volume I: third fascicle, maps and comments, Assen: Van Gorcum, 1988.
* Atlas Linguarum Europae, volume I: fourth fascicle, maps and comments. Assen / Maastricht: Van Gorcum, 1990.
* Atlas Linguarum Europae, volume I: fifth fascicle, maps and commentaries, Roma: Poligrafico, 1997.
* Atlas Linguarum Europae New Perspectives in Geolinguistics, Roma: Poligrafico, 1997.
* Atlas Linguarum Europae, volume I: sixth fascicle, maps and commentaries, Roma: Poligrafico, 2002.
* Atlas Linguarum Europae, volume I: seventh fascicle, maps and commentaries, Roma: Poligrafico, 2007.
* Atlas Linguarum Europae, volume I: eighth fascicle, comments, Bucharest: Editura Universității din București, 2014
* Atlas Linguarum Europae, volume I: eighth fascicle, European linguistic maps, Bucharest: Editura Universității din București, 2014
* Atlas Linguarum Europae, volume I: ninth fascicle, comments, Bucharest: Editura Universității din București, 2015
* Atlas Linguarum Europae, volume I: ninth fascicle, European linguistic maps, Bucharest: Editura Universității din București, 2015
References
Bibliography
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External links
Atlas Linguarum Europae, fascicules Internet Archive.
List of sites in the Atlas Linguarum Europae taken from Eder (2003), Internet Archive.
{{Eurasian languages
Linguistic atlases