A Genealogy of Freudenthal's Lincos

This article traces the intellectual history leading to Hans Freudenthal's Lingua Cosmica (Lincos), beginning with 17th-century attempts to create a universal philosophical language. Driven by practical needs in trade, colonialism, and diplomacy, European intellectuals like Francis Bacon and John Amos Comenius sought to overcome the limitations of Latin and the dominance of French by developing artificial languages that could facilitate communication across linguistic and national boundaries. These early projects laid the conceptual groundwork for the mathematical and logical approaches to universal language that would emerge in the 20th century.