Table 1.

Chronological identification of language communities. Rows represent language families, while columns represent time periods. Language community is in bold, archaeological culture in italics, and geographic location underlined. Fields in green are supported by multiple distinct lines of evidence, fields in yellow debated or a priori assumed from green fields, while fields in red are unknown (see references in the text).

Before 3500 BC	3000–2000 BC	2000–1000 BC	After 1000 BC
Proto-Indo-European Western Steppe	> Language of Afanasievo Afanasievo	? > Pre-Proto- Tocharian	> Proto-Tocharian (ca. 500 BC)
	> Proto-Indo-Iranic Sintashta	> Proto-Iranic Andronovo	> Old Iranic
Pre-Proto-Uralic	> Proto-Uralic North Central Asia Okunevo?	> Western Uralic Seima–Turbino	> Western branches
		> Pre-Proto- Samoyedic	> Proto-Samoyedic
Transeurasian Xinglongwa	> Pre-Proto-Turkic I Altai	> Pre-Proto-Turkic II	> Proto-Turkic Altai
Proto-Sino-Tibetan Yangshao	> Proto-Sinitic	> Old Chinese (from 1300 BC)	> Old Chinese