Nineteenth-century philologists saw language study as a science able to rebuild dead societies
Evidence
Like his teacher, Quatremère was a passionate philologist in an age when philology was thought of as one of the cutting-edge sciences. Nietzsche described philology as ‘slow reading’. Nineteenth-century philologists believed that by correct application of their techniques they could not only discover lost languages but also reconstitute the ancient societies that had used those languages. — Robert Irwin, For Lust of Knowing, 267
Categorization
- DEFINE: Defines 19th-century philology’s ambition: not just grammar but the reconstruction of whole ancient civilizations through linguistic technique.
- CANDY: ‘Philology is slow reading’ (Nietzsche) is a great conversational one-liner.