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Which two main regions have been proposed as the homeland of Proto-Indo-European speakers?
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Anatolian languages
Distribution of the Anatolian languages.
In the 21st century, scholars have primarily converged on two regions as the proposed homeland for the speakers of Proto-Indo-European:1
- Neolithic Anatolia: Some researchers, most notably Colin Renfrew, have argued that the language originated in Anatolia during the 7th millennium BCE, spreading into Europe alongside the adoption of agriculture.1
- Pontic-Caspian Steppes: This is the more widely accepted hypothesis, which suggests that Proto-Indo-European was spoken approximately 6,000 years ago in the steppe region north of the Black Sea and Caspian Sea, encompassing parts of modern-day Ukraine, Russia, and Kazakhstan.1
While these two theories dominate current academic discussion, determining the precise origin remains a complex challenge that requires correlating linguistic findings with archaeological evidence.21