The Handbook of Historical Linguistics provides a detailed account of the numerous issues, methods, and results that characterize current work in historical linguistics, the area of linguistics concerned with language change as well as past language states.

- Provides a comprehensive and current account of the numerous issues, methods, and results that characterize historical linguistics. - Contains an extensive introduction that places the study of historical linguistics in its proper context within linguistics and the historical sciences in general. - Covers the methodology of historical linguistics and presents sophisticated overviews of the principles governing phonological, morphological, syntactic, and semantic change. - Includes contributions from the leading specialists in the field.