A long long time ago, humans went from grunts to some kind of primitive language then to an advance language.
How did a region possibly learn and agree that the sound “tree” for example meant that big thing over there?
Maybe my family would agree and say, but then our neighbours or tribe some 20km away?
Then for every word, tenses, grammar?!
I imagine it took a long time but I can’t even comprehend how you would transition from grunts to even a basic common language for a larger region like ancient China, Egypt, or aztecs.
They obviously did accomplish it, but how?
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Languages are not purposefully developed in meetings, they elvolve on their own when people try to communicate. Someone makes up a sound or a series of sounds to get a message across. If it’s a useful word, other people start to use it too and it spreads. It may experience a few changes along the way when traveling from mouth to mouth, which is only natural, and not every word sticks.
I reckon it’s the same with grammar – someone needed a way to express that this thing happened yesterday or it’s gonna happen tomorrow rather than right now, or this is a possibility to happen so be careful. Communication is important for survival and people are very creative with it. Useful ways to set up sentences will spread, more are invented, some are ditched, some gets modified. Language still constantly evolves the same way according to our needs for communication.
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