Glen Gordon (>) responds to Sabine (>>):
> >His main point is his following Kretschmer (1925) who saw three
>different
> >layers of languages in the Mediterranean area: "a) pre->Indoeuropean
> >(Mediterranean), b) Proto-IE, c) Indo-European strictu >sensu.
> My opinion: the pre-IE should be divided into Etrusco-Lemnian and Semitic
> dialects with a Caucasic substratum prior to agriculture.
(Don't know Kretschmer's stuff..but I think I like it!)
Prior to agriculture would put your Caucasic substratum pre-8th millennium
BC.
I have to suggest a lot happened between the presence of Semitic* in
Anatolia
and westward, and the Etrusco-Lemnian emergence; and between the beginning
of ag in Anatolia and the Etruscan intrusion into Italy. Etruscan is weakly
dated
at Italian intrusion c 700 BC. (If it was Tryyhenian linguistically or
culturally..it would not be intrusive.) Acknowledging that the evidence in
both Italy and Lemnos is weak: the proposed is too simplistic, and presumes
too much. The Etruscan-Lemnian link I support, but suggest it is only the
chalky late visible edges of something much bigger. I can not support
Etrusco-Lemnian arising out of Semitic (or Semitic+Tyrrenian) with only a
10K year old cauc substratum around; and if it is only a small island
variance over a major Anatolian area linguistic "layer" (even if you limit
that to Pontic)..then it is misnamed, and misgrouped.
*(Excusing later complications from the east, such as the known middle to
late bronze age Assyrian trade enclaves in Anatolia, and med wide sea
trade.)
> EtruscoLemnian is closer to Anatolian....than anything..
Concur..but that would tend to complicate Anatolian over your pre ag Cauc
influenced Semitic. Then why isn't your Etruscan-Lemnian or Indo-Etruscan
just a late subordinate of IE Anatolian..(however alternately influenced)?
> By viewing IndoEtruscan as originating from the
> Pontic-Caspian, EtruscoLemnian therefore must have travelled (before the
> Anatolians did) to the Balkans in order for Etruscan to end up in Italy
> further west.
I have no problem with the first half, just suggesting there was a broader
Anatolian "stage" this omits, and that the name of the group is a little
misleading if so.
The second half..No. If we just limit this linguistic "emergence" to Lemnos
(which in my view is absurd) after arising from Anatolian contact, it did
not get there (Lemnos), nor leave (to Italy), by walking or swimming. Boats
and colonies, many of each..skipping the Balkans. If it was "Pelasgia"
coastal wide (my definition)..they left their coastal cities and
ships?..walked around?..to establish new coastal cities in Italy? Doesn't
seem to fit the context of the Aegean.
> The EtruscoLemnians are the immediate substratum having been
> laid over a bed of virtually erased Semitic substratum.
Why not slim residual evidence of (two) very late manifestations of an area
wide influence? You can't be suggesting Etrusco-Lemnian emerged in Lemnos
with mixed Semitic influences c 8000 BC, surviving with only some peripheral
IE influence from Anatolia, to maintain its distinctness and then
solely..seed Etruria after 700 BC? Can you? The concept of Villanovan as a
proto-Etruscan culture has been largely abandoned..but it is still possible
that the Villanovan linguisticlly influenced the Etruscan, as many Etruscan
sites overlay or adjoin earlier Villanovan. (All Villanovan sites however,
did not "evolve" into Etruscan) Either Etruscan is an Italian "intrusive
isolate" of unknown origin..OR..it is linked to Lemnian..which means both
represent variants (how ever wide that variance) of a wider Aegean
linguistic layer (whether IE, proto or pre): (Pelasgian?).
> Etruscan words like
> semph clearly show this Semitic influence that is independant from IE (cf.
> *septm is modelled on the _masculine_ number not the feminine as in
> Etruscan).
Not clear where you are going here..I don't think anyone would deny Semitic
residual influences..or new ones from sea trade...IF we address an Anatolian
origin of Etruscan. The question is how does this phenomenom of: (little
bitty Lemnian with Anatolian influence) "laid over a bed of nearly erased
Semitic" rise to dominate a period in Italy, without some degree of Aegean
(Anatolian+Greek+Islands) commonality and support? If that was there, then
"Etrusco-Lemnian" is a mislabel, and Indo-Etruscan is a late Italy only
sub-variant of an Aegean wide IE (or proto or pre IE) linguistic layer. If
we have an Aegean wide sea trade culture extending well into the med; how
do we retain a near isolate at the center of this activity (Lemnos), and how
does it dominate a wider culture in Italy?
> End of story.
But I have just begun to read. :-)