CONTENTS
Preface = xiii
Conventions, abbreviations and symbols = xxi
General prologue ： time travel and signal processing = 1
1 The past, the present and the historian = 4
1.1 The historian as mythmaker = 4
1.2 Messages from the past ： historical understanding and the problem of 'synchrony' = 9
1.3 Making history ： witnesses and interpretation = 16
1.4 Making history ： reconstruction = 21
1.5 Making history ： the role of uniformity constraints = 24
1.6 Metaphor and access = 32
1.7 Metaphor and metalanguage = 41
1.8 Summary = 42
2 Written records ： evidence and argument = 44
2.1 Prologue = 44
2.2 Hearing the inaudible = 45
2.2.1 Graph interpretation ： generalities = 45
2.2.2 What does writing represent? = 47
2.2.3 'Defective' alphabetic representation and the shape of reconstructive argument = 50
2.2.4 Allophonic spelling = 57
2.2.5 Orthographic conservatism ： good and bad news = 58
2.3 What do texts represent? Variation and e ´ tat de langue = 61
2.3.1 Spelling variation = 61
2.3.2 The import of variation ： a test case = 63
2.3.3 Morphological variation = 66
2.4 Literary evidence ： rhyme and metre = 68
2.5 Metalinguistic evidence = 78
2.5.1 Premodern phoneticians = 78
2.5.2 Glosses and translations = 83
2.6 What is a 'word' anyhow? Or a sentence, or text? = 93
2.7 Desperate remedies ： interpreting vs. disappearing = 96
3 Relatedness, ancestry and comparison = 104
3.1 'Family resemblances' = 104
3.2 Historicity ： how are families possible? = 109
3.3 Replication and shared errors = 111
3.4 Cladistic concepts in language filiation = 113
3.5 Homoplasy = 118
3.6 'Sound laws', cognateness and families = 123
3.6.1 Diagnostic characters and regular correspondences = 123
3.6.2 'Regular sound change' = 132
3.6.3 Comparative method ： apomorphies, ancestors and etymologies = 135
3.7 Problems and pseudo-problems = 139
3.7.1 Variation, diffusion and competition = 139
3.7.2 Subgrouping ： non-arboriform genealogies and character-weighting = 143
3.7.3 Multiple descent and 'hybridization = 158
3.8 Etymologies and 'etymologies' ： the hypertaxon problem = 159
3.9 Non-phonological evidence for relationship = 169
4 Convergence and contact = 172
4.1 Preliminaries = 172
4.2 Homoplasy vs. plesiomorphy = 173
4.2.1 A test case ： Afrikaans diphthongization = 173
4.2.2 Excursus ： motivated and unmotivated naturalness = 177
4.2.3 The north-European diphthongization area = 179
4.3 Contact = 184
4.3.1 The constraints problem = 184
4.3.2 Sorting, 1 ： 'synchronic foreignness' = 190
4.3.3 Sorting, 2 ： asymmetrical correspondences = 195
4.3.4 Sorting, 3 ： non-substantial ('structural') loans = 197
4.3.5 Contact agendas and etymology = 201
4.4 Endogeny vs. contact as a methodological issue = 207
4.5 Etymologyia ex silentio ： contact with lost languages = 209
5 The nature of reconstruction = 215
5.1 Beyond filiation = 215
5.2 Projection vs. mapping = 216
5.2.1 Principles = 216
5.2.2 'Quanta' and phonetic gradualism ： a few suggestions = 221
5.2.3 Morphoclines, quanta and borrowing = 225
5.2.4 Projection again ： conventions and justifications = 228
5.3 Internal reconstruction = 232
5.3.1 Tautolinguistic cognates and reconstruction = 232
5.3.2 Internal reconstruction and 'abstract' morphophonemics = 234
5.3.3 The limits of internal reconstruction = 237
5.4 Chronology and sequence = 241
5.5 Morphosyntactic reconstruction = 246
5.5.1 Preliminaries = 246
5.5.2 Reconstructing morphology ： a non-example = 251
5.5.3 Simplification and cyclicity = 252
5.5.4 Morphological portmanteaus = 257
5.5.5 Plesiomorphous residue = 263
5.5.6 Directionality and morphoclines = 267
5.6 Postscript ： realism in reconstruction = 270
5.6.1 Phonetic realism ： the art of coarse transcription = 270
5.6.2 What is a protolanguage? = 272
6 Time and change ： the shape(s) of history = 277
6.1 The nature of 'change' = 277
6.2 Language in time ： when is a change? = 281
6.3 Linguistic time = 290
6.3.1 Arrows and cycles = 290
6.3.2 Epigenetic landscapes = 293
6.3.3 Point attractors ： grammaticalization and other sinks = 295
6.3.4 Cyclical attractors = 297
6.3.5 Chreods ： conspiracy and drift = 300
6.3.6 Stasis and punctuation = 303
6.4 The emergence of novelty = 305
6.4.1 Ex nihilo nihil fit? Setting the boundaries = 305
6.4.2 The joys of junk ： decomposition and bricolage = 309
6.4.3 Exaptation = 316
6.4.4 Non-junk exaptation ： inventing new systems = 318
7 Explanation and ontology = 325
7.1 The issues = 325
7.1.1 Conceptual preliminaries = 325
7.1.2 The logical structure of explanations = 328
7.2 In which the author revisits an earlier self, and is not entirely satisfied by what he sees, but not entirely repentant = 332
7.3 Hermeneutic explication = 336
7.3.1 The 'hermeneutic challenge' = 336
7.3.2 Does the mind 'shun purposeless variety'? = 340
7.4 Function ： hermeneutics and the individualist error = 352
7.4.1 Is change 'functional', 'dysfunctional' or neutral? = 352
7.4.2 Functional explanation ： an example = 355
7.4.3 Prophylaxis and therapy = 359
7.4.4 Whose function? Individuals vs. collectives = 361
7.5 'Agents' ： structure, pragmatics and invisible hands = 366
7.6 A modest ontological proposal = 370
7.6.1 The locus of change ： societies vs. populations = 370
7.6.2 A medium-neutral evolutionary model = 376
7.6.3 Consequences of the population model ： bottlenecks, universals and 'mind' = 382
7.7 Envoi = 384
References = 391
Index of names = 416
Subject index = 420
