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Internal Reconstruction/Evidence
Method evidence record

Internal Reconstruction

Internal Reconstruction is a historical linguistic method that reconstructs earlier stages of a single language by identifying internal inconsistencies, morphological irregularities, and distributional patterns within the language itself. Unlike the Comparative Method, which relies on comparing related languages, Internal Reconstruction uses evidence from within one language—such as suppletive forms, analogy-induced irregularities, and phonological asymmetries—to infer its historical structure and sound changes. This method is particularly valuable when only one written form of a language survives or when related languages are unavailable.

Sources recorded, not reviewed

Source record

Citations copied verbatim from the method’s source record. No claim-level verification is inferred from them.

Internal Reconstruction Method
Taxonomic method record · process-pipeline / linguistics
  • Hock, H. H. (1991). Principles of Historical Linguistics (2nd ed.). Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter. · DOI 10.1515/9783110219135
  • Hoenigswald, H. M. (1960). Language Change and Linguistic Reconstruction. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. · URL
  • Anttila, R. (1972). An Introduction to Historical and Comparative Linguistics. New York: Macmillan. · URL
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Related methods

Generated from the method graph and shown as machine-suggested relations — no evidence claim is inferred.

Taxonomic bucketComparative Methodmachine-suggested · Relational suggestion, not evidence.Same method familyGlottochronologymachine-suggested · Relational suggestion, not evidence.Same method familyMorphological Analysismachine-suggested · Relational suggestion, not evidence.

Evidence status

Sources recorded, not reviewed

Bibliographic sources are present. Claim-level evidence review has not been performed.

Sources

3 recorded citations, copied from the method source record.

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