Sprachmaschinen und automatische Textgenerierung. Programmierversuche aus dem 17. Jahrhundert

In seventeenth-century reflections on language, combinatorics played a central role. Rooted in the medieval ars combinatoria, it stood at the intersection of two conceptual frameworks: a logical-philosophical one and a pedagogical-religious one. Scholars firmly believed in the existence of a «natural language» that provided the universal basis of communication, rested on logical-mathematical principles, and was therefore reproducible. By applying specific rules of combination (for instance to syntax or morphology), they sought to uncover the divine order underlying language and to foster rational thinking. Within this context, numerous language machines and projects were created, which may be regarded as the true precursors of machine-generated text and automatic translation. This article presents the projects of Georg Philipp Harsdörffer (1636) and Johann Joachim Becher (1661).