Bayesian phylogenetic analysis supports an agricultural origin of Japonic languages

Abstract

Languages, like genes, evolve by a process of descent with modification. This striking similarity between biological and linguistic evolution allows us to apply phylogenetic methods to explore how languages, as well as the people who speak them, are related to one another through evolutionary history. Language phylogenies constructed with lexical data have so far revealed population expansions of Austronesian, Indo-European and Bantu speakers. However, how robustly a phylogenetic approach can chart the history of language evolution and what language phylogenies reveal about human prehistory must be investigated more thoroughly on a global scale. Here we report a phylogeny of 59 Japonic languages and dialects. We used this phylogeny to estimate time depth of its root and compared it with the time suggested by an agricultural expansion scenario for Japanese origin. In agreement with the scenario, our results indicate that Japonic languages descended from a common ancestor approximately 2182 years ago. Together with archaeological and biological evidence, our results suggest that the first farmers of Japan had a profound impact on the origins of both people and languages. On a broader level, our results are consistent with a theory that agricultural expansion is the principal factor for shaping global linguistic diversity.

28 Japan: archaeology

“…In chapter 24 of this volume, linguist Alexander Vovin states that: "There is almost universal consensus that Japonic languages entered the Japanese islands via the Korean peninsula during the Yayoi period." This conclusion is further supported by a recent phylogenetic analysis of 59 Japonic languages and dialects which concluded that these languages derived from a common ancestor about 2,182 years ago (Lee & Hasegawa 2011).…”

Northeast Asian Linguistic Ecology and the Advent of Rice Agriculture in Korea and Japan

“…Neither the phonological evidence nor the statistical evidence (in the case of Japanese) is consistent with a date of protolanguage divergence older than the dates for the beginning of wet rice agriculture, as pointed out by Hudson (1999) and Lee and Hasegawa (2011). This fact alone does not rule out the possibility that proto-Japanese descends from a preYayoi Jōmon language, or proto-Korean from a pre-Mumun Chulmun language.…”

“…In a recent paper, Lee and Hasegawa (2011) attempt to overcome 10 Lee and Ramsey acknowledge that the four numerals attested in the Koguryŏ phonogrammatic tradition "all look remarkably like Japanese" (2011: 43). They then state "At the same time, however, the vocabulary found in the Koguryŏ place names includes even more elements that relate solidly to Middle Korean and thus to the mainstream development of the Korean language" (ibid).…”

Folktale transmission in the Arctic provides evidence for high bandwidth social learning among hunter–gatherer groups

“…The relative influence of these three processes varies across aspects of culture. Language frequently exhibits highly tree-like patterns of vertical transmission (Bouckaert et al, 2012;Gray et al, 2009;Lee & Hasegawa, 2011), as do a variety of social practices (Currie et al, 2010;F. M. Jordan et al, 2009;Opie et al, 2014), and aspects of material culture (P. Jordan & Shennan, 2009;Larsen, 2011;Tehrani & Collard, 2002).…”