Re: [TIED] Re: AfroAsiatic

From: Glen Gordon
Message: 2617
Date: 2000-06-08

John:
>Egyptian was a cognate with Semitic, the two languages split about
>5,800 BCE,

You're dillusional. References, please. I don't see the EB saying anything
close to this. In fact, it considers Egyptian very different from Semitic.
Maybe you should take note.

>How about this (not to scale.... sorry)
>
> |---Sahara------------------- Chadic
> | Kenya
> | |---------- Omotic
> | |
>Ibero- | Kenya---| |---- Cushitic
>Maurusian | |Capsian | | Family
>11,000 BCE | |7,800BCE|-----| Develops
>-----------| | Ethiopia| After
>Proto A-A | | |---- 5,000 BCE
> | |
> | |
> |Early---| |--Nth --- Berber after
> Capsian | | African 5000 BCE
> 8,500 BCE| | Cattle
> NthAfr.to| | Herders
> Khartoum |Later----|
> Capsian | |-Sinai- Semitic
> Sahara |-| post languages
> | PPNB develop
> | 5,800 BCE
> |
> |--Badarian Egyptian
> Amratian language
> Gerzian post
> 4,500BCE
>[...]
>Glen, hope this helps resolve the difficulties you are having with my
>maps.

Thanks for the clarification but I still think that some of these branches
(like the Egyptian-Semitic one) are far too late.

On a side note, I've been looking at Hacilar. Remember that place? It's in
the southwest corner of Turkey. It would seem according to my readings that
the area was first settled by an aceramic culture at around 8000 BCE with
houses of a very Jericho-like nature. Now Jericho is down south (a
Semitic-speaking population probably). One would almost get the feeling that
a people and language had spread from there into West Anatolia at around
that time, speaking a language sister to Semitic.

What's even more intriguing is that there is subsequently a period of
abandonment for approximately a millenium before a new culture takes its
place with far more sophisticated technology like pottery and agriculture.
Later, the western edges of Anatolia apparently seemed to be developing new
pottery styles with colored paint and this innovation then started spreading
east and southward...

It would almost seem to me that Hacilar is an example of the early Hattic
warfare being played out on the Semitish-speaking peoples. As the Hattic
were spreading west, as part of the Caucasic expansions (NEC to the north,
HurroUrartian to the south), they must have started to compete with the less
technologically advanced Semitish population, driving them westward to the
Mediterranean coastline, Balkans and northern Anatolia.

Over time, the western Semitish population adopted pottery techniques and
agriculture, innovating on them somewhat (colored paints). Subsequently,
they spread further into the Balkans by 6000 BCE as the Hattic were becoming
the overwhelmingly dominant language in Anatolia. The agriculture was then
learned by the IndoTyrrhenian peoples through trade with them and passed on
far into Europe, with some genetics as well :)

By 5000 BCE, Semitish was on the wane, having been completely replaced with
Hattic and other languages in Anatolia. After that, the last traces of the
language were probably in the Balkans until it was completely wiped out by
the dominant IndoTyrrhenian languages.

Problem solved, the gLeN way. I've updated my map to reflect the Hacilar
dilemma and I'm starting to consider Rhaetic as a seperate branch of
IndoTyrrhenian (I must find linguistic data on this elusive tongue). I
notice, John, that your map doesn't reflect Hacilar at all, since you
position a large homogeneous "Asianic" over much of Anatolia as if nothing
had ever happened. How do you explain Hacilar, Catal Huyuk, Cilicia, etc?

- gLeN

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