Ante Aikio:
>But it seems to me (correct me if I'm wrong!) that
>among many IE-ists, there's a tradition of uninterest in diachronic
>linguistics done outside the IE language family.
Much of what Ante Aikio seems to be saying is what I have already stated. I
would add that the "tradition of disinterest" that Ante is refering too
stems more from stuffy ultra-conservatism and bias, perhaps, dare I say,
tying in with the muddled past of "Aryan" stereotyping of IE-speakers and
such that sometimes resurface even today in researchers' attitudes. It must
be accepted that IE had a past and so we must as researchers discover it,
not ignore it - that's still a hurdle it seems for many IEists.
As to Ante's conclusions, I must say that I agree with view that Uralic
helps to piece together IE's past by showing at the very least there was
more going on than just IndoIranian-FinnoUgric borrowing.
The similarities in grammar and vocabulary can only be accounted by
accepting that some sort of connection existed between the two language
groups. This also implies that IE's and Uralic's pre-history are ultimately
bound within the same geographical region.
The IE "Anatolian Hypothesis" is flawed for this very real reason and we
cannot entertain outlandish ideas such as placing Uralic's origins in
Anatolia too in order to hide the errors. There is absolutely no Uralic
connection to Anatolia in the slightest sense (nor is there hardly with IE,
for that matter). The only conclusion to obtain from all this is that IE
originates from the northern regions above the Black Sea.
Ultimately, we must also consider with seriousness, genetic ties between IE
and Uralic for the reasons I will explain ahead based on the data that Ante
supplies as well as the grammatical correspondances with both interrogative
and personal pronouns, conjugation, declension and verbal suffixes that
follow clear sound correspondances and strict rules governing stress accent.
Here, Ante has supplied the following etyma which I have split into seperate
categories:
1. IndoIranian-FinnoUgric loans (my IIr reconstruction is approximate
due to ignorance of the precise forms, beg pardon)
*koki- 'see, find' IIr *hok- < *hwekw- (*Hokw- 'see')
*kulki- 'move, flow, walk' IIr *kelh- < *kwelH-
*mos�ki- 'wash' IIr *mozg- < *mozg(-eye)-
*s�alkaw- 'pole, rod' IIr *ghalgho-
These forms are clearly of IIr origin and not from some mystical
pre-IndoAnatolian branch that just happens to have reflexes like
IndoIranian. There is also the matter of Finnish sata "hundred",
etc which are known to be IIr loans for the same characteristic
Satem twang and the fact that these terms do not show up
in the ancient Samoyedic branch of Uralic.
2. Other possible loans
Uralic *j�Ni 'ice' Germanic-Celtic *yeg-
Samoyedic *pura- 'burn' IE *pehwr- (*pur- 'fire')
The *yeg- item might or might not be a loan. It could just
as well be an inherited word since it does not violate
proper IE-Uralic sound correspondances. Evidently the
Samoyedic *pura- had to have been borrowed after the laryngeal
had disappeared in IE, unless Samoyedic had lost this Uralic *x
phoneme. Another possibility is that the term is inherited just
like *j�Ni.
3. Inherited terms from a common IE-Uralic mother tongue
*pel(x)i- 'fear' *pelh- 'grau, fahl; schreckig'
*toxi- 'bring, give, sell' *dehW- (*doH- 'give')
*weti- 'water' *wed- id.
*kala 'fish' *(s)kwalo- '?whale, ?fish species'
The last item is difficult in my view to claim as a loan since
we must explain the *s- that occasionally shows up in the IE
variant. We also have similar words that can't be blaimed
easily on borrowing either, found exclusively within Nostratic lgs
like Sumerian (kua), EskimoAleut (Inuktitut qaq), Altaic
(Mong. qalim "whale") and Dravidian (*kalk-). It's a pretty
big little word in the Nostratic family.
>One thing worth noting is that dates have gone back conciderably. The
>Uralic expansion (for whatever reason it happened) may have been >earlier
>than the IE one. Some descendant of proto-U (which would >later evolve into
>Finnic and Saamic) was spoken in the Baltic Sea / >Scandinavia area already
>3200 bc, when the Indo-European battle axe >culture arrived in southwestern
>Finland.
Erh, this is one of those problems that I've been talking about -
archaeological proof that is used to override the linguistic proof.
Question: How are we to be sure that these aren't anything other than
IndoIranian-FinnoUgric loans?? The FinnoUgric *s'uki- correspondance shows
the tattle-tale IIr Satem change of IE *k' to *s'. Whoops! Somebody made a
booboo.
>Furthermore, there is internal evidence in Uralic supporting the loan
>origin of p-U *weti 'water'. This item does not have cognates in >Saamic
>and Khanty.
What about Nenets /jid/? Nenets is part of the Samoyedic branch (just like
IE's Anatolian branch), the oldest branch to split from common Uralic.
Again, I think someone made a booboo.
>As for common origin, it is not possible to
>discredit semantically and phonologically natural loan etymologies by
>replacing them with Nostratic speculations. There have been multiple
>attempts to relate IE and U genetically, and all of them have failed.
Failed by whose standards. In the end, it is truely up to the skeptics to
_overtly_ define the criteria they need filled in order to accept or deny
the IE-Uralic Hypothesis unbiasedly. So far, I have seen no such criteria
presented, leading me to the conclusion that bias will continue into this
new century unabated because these skeptics aren't willing to accept the
errors of their ways.
- gLeN
______________________________________________________