First use

Posted by R. Berg on August 31, 2003

In Reply to: First use of a word meaning love in any language? posted by Jonas on August 31, 2003

: First use of a word meaning love in any languages?

That would be impossible to know. There are no written records for the most ancient languages. The earliest I can get, without the resources of a historical linguist, is the hypothesized Proto-Indo-European root "leubh-," defined as "To care, desire; love" (American Heritage Dictionary). The Proto-Indo-European language, which has been partly reconstructed, is thought to have been spoken well before 2500 B.C., perhaps in an area that later became part of Russia. I have no information on how languages of East Asia and other parts of the world developed at around that time.