Proto-Uralic homeland hypotheses

Various Proto-Uralic homeland hypotheses, concerning the origin of the Uralic languages and the location (Urheimat or homeland) and period in which the Proto-Uralic language was spoken, have been advocated over the years.

The Proto-Uralic homeland has always been located near the Ural Mountains, either on the European or the Siberian side. The main reason to suppose a Siberian homeland has been the traditional taxonomic model that sees the Samoyed branch splitting off first; because the present border between the Samoyed and the Ugric branch is located in Western Siberia, the original split was seen to have occurred there, too.

However, the Ugric languages are known to have earlier been spoken on the European side of the Urals, so a European homeland would be equally possible. In recent years it has also been argued that on the phonological basis the oldest split was not between the Samoyed and the Finno-Ugric, but between the Finno-Permic and the Ugro-Samoyedic language groups. The lexical level is argued to be less reliable, and lexical innovativeness (a small number of shared cognates) can be confused with a great age of the division. For a long time, no new arguments for a Siberian homeland have been presented.

Both European and Siberian homeland proposals have been supported by palaeolinguistic evidence, although only such cases are valid in which the semantic reconstructions are certain. A Siberian homeland has been claimed on the basis of two coniferous tree names in Proto-Uralic, although these trees (Abies sibirica and Pinus cembra) have for a long time been present also in easternmost Europe. A European homeland is supported by words for 'bee', 'honey', 'elm' etc. These can be reconstructed already in Proto-Uralic, when Samoyed is no more the first entity to split off.

More recently also the loanword evidence has been used to support a European homeland: Proto-Uralic has been seen borrowing words from Proto-Indo-European, and the Proto-Indo-European homeland has rarely been located east of the Urals. Proto-Uralic even seems to have developed in close contact with Proto-Aryan, which is seen to have been born in the Poltavka culture of the Caspian steppes before its spread to Asia.

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