alternatehistory.com

First of all, I'm not a linguist, so I apologise in advance for any stupid assumptions I make.

starting from a PoD of middle antiquity or so, what would it take for a single language - spread out over large territories (like vulgar latin or arabic) but not unified under any single state - to fracture into visibly different languages? in addition, how much time must pass until these languages become completely non mutually-intelligible (like different branches of indo-european)? what part do political circumstances play here - would a language even fracture if the people speaking it remain unmolested?
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