Eli5: When the first languages were being developed, how did everyone possibly learn and even agree on the set sounds for words?

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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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15 Answers

Anonymous 0 Comments

Short answer, they *didn’t* agree on the same words for the same thing, and especially not on the same pronunciation.

This is how you get a dialect. Regional dialects were incredibly common up until the mid 1900s. The only reason they aren’t more common now is the advent of mass media. If everyone on the continent can watch the same TV show and see the same word pronounced the same way, well that becomes the standard pronunciation.

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