Calibrated weighted permutation test detects ancient language connections in the Circumpolar area (Chukotian-Nivkh and Yukaghir-Samoyedic)

Journal of Historical Linguistics. 2025. Vol. 15. No. 3. P. 463–481.

Kassian A., Starostin G., Zhivlov M., Sergey A. Spirin

Relationships between universally recognized language families represent a hotly debated topic in historical linguistics, and the same is true for correlation between signals of genetic and linguistic relatedness. We developed a weighted permutation test which represents the classical permutation tests with weights introduced for individual Swadesh concepts according to their typological stability. Further, the obtained values were calibrated on a negative control group to override non-uniform distribution of phonemes within the Swadesh wordlist. We applied the calibrated permutation test to the basic vocabularies of nine languages and reconstructed proto-languages to show that three groups of circumpolar language families in the Northern Hemisphere show evidence of relationship through common descent or borrowing in the basic vocabulary: [Chukotko-Kamchatkan, Nivkh]; [Yukaghir, Samoyedic]; and [Yeniseian, Na-Dene, Burushaski]. The former two pairs showed the most significant signals of language relationship. Our findings further support some hypotheses on long-distance language relationships previously put forward based on linguistic methods but lacking universal acceptance.

Keywords: дальнее родство языков, Nivkh, permutation test, Chukotian-Itelmen, Burushaski, Circumpolar languages, Dene-Yeniseian, Samoyedic-Yukaghir, циркумполярные языки