The idea of a universal language that could transcend national language barriers was first entertained by the ancient Greeks. During the Middle Ages and the Renaissance, Latin was considered the international language, and in the eighteenth century French was known as the language of diplomacy. Despite attempts by scholars to devise a universal language beginning in the early seventeenth century, it was not until the late nineteenth century that intellectuals--heady from a generation of advances in the physical sciences and optimistic that science could be applied with the same success to humanity's social and political barriers--began to fully formulate and widely embrace such language systems. The most successful of them were invented by European scholars, and, despite their claims to universality, each was derived in some manner from existing European languages for ease of understanding by Westerners.

The first of these languages, Volapük, was...