Marcus Zuerius van Boxhorn

Marcus Zuerius van Boxhorn at age 28.

Marcus Zuerius van Boxhorn (August 28, 1612 - October 3, 1653) was a Dutch scholar. Born in Bergen op Zoom, he was professor at the University of Leiden. He discovered the similarity among Indo-European languages, and supposed the existence of a primitive common language which he called 'Scythian'. He included in his hypothesis Dutch, Greek, Latin, Persian, and German, later adding Slavic, Celtic and Baltic languages.

References

• B. van Wayenburg (2004), "Marcus van Boxhorn: uitvinder van de Europese oertaal", in Mare di libri 32 (in Dutch)
• Biography on the site Digitale Bibliotheek voor de Nederlandse Letteren (in Dutch)

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