In a recent scientific article, the origin of Indo-European languages, including Albanian, Armenian, and Greek, is studied using sophisticated methods. The published data confirms that Albanian is one of the oldest Indo-European languages still in use.

Moreover, research primarily conducted through computational linguistic studies confirm the ancient age and originality of the Albanian language.

Researchers have also conducted DNA studies and verified that the Albanian population is indigenous and very ancient in these territories.

Both studies complement and reinforce each other, providing conclusive scientific evidence that both the Albanian people and the Albanian language are at least 6000 years old and indigenous to these lands.

The language tree diagrams support a hybrid model for the origin of Indo-European languages.

In summary, based on this study, it is evident that Indo-European languages are spoken by almost half of the world’s population, but their origin and spread remain a subject of debate.

Heggarty et al. present a dataset of 109 modern and 52 time-calibrated historical Indo-European languages, which they analyzed with models of Bayesian phylogenetic inference.

Their results suggest an emergence of Indo-European languages around 8000 years before present. This is a deeper root date than previously thought, and it fits with an initial origin south of the Caucasus followed by a branch northward into the Steppe region.

These findings lead to a “hybrid hypothesis” that reconciles current linguistic and ancient DNA evidence from both the eastern Fertile Crescent (as a primary source) and the steppe (as a secondary homeland).

The “Science” article highlights that almost half the world’s population speaks a language belonging to the Indo-European language family. However, it remains unclear where the homeland of the common ancestor of this family (Proto-Indo-European) was, and when and why it spread through Eurasia.

Few ancient written languages are returned as direct ancestors of modern clades. The study finds a median root age for Indo-European of ~8120 years before present (95% highest posterior density: 6740 to 9610 years before present). Indo-European had already diverged rapidly into multiple major branches by ~7000 years before present, without a coherent non-Anatolian core. Indo-Iranic has no close relationship with Balto-Slavic, weakening the case for it having spread via the steppe.

The study results are not entirely consistent with either the Steppe hypothesis or the farming hypothesis. Recent aDNA evidence suggests that the Anatolian branch cannot be sourced to the steppe but rather to south of the Caucasus. For other branches, potential candidate expansion(s) out of the Yamnaya culture are detectable in aDNA, but some had only limited genetic impact.