Re: Affects of immigrant communities in language change

You seem to be arguing for 'late dates' for the breakup of
(post-Anatolic) PIE.

If we are to suggest that the IE homeland is to be found in the
Globular Amphora culture, that it was strongly challenged and greatly
changed by by steppic intrusions, but maintained its essential
linguistic unity, then you have a theory to argue.

If you have what becomes Germanic at the NW end (adjacent to what
becomes Baltic) of Globular Amphora, much removed from the center of
the action, the peculiarities of Germanic become a little easier to
explain.

Putting the post-Anatolic homeland in Globular Amphora does remove the
problem of explaining the *massive* language replacement in Europe if
IE originates on the Steppe. Rather, you just say certain dominant IE
speakers swallowed Steppe Culture whole, without really changing their
language, along the usual pattern of invading male elites (they marry
local women; while their sons may speak the father-language, the
grandsons likely don't).

The historic pattern on the Steppe is that of linguistically and
ethnically mixed confederacies. Indo-Iranian languages achieved an
early dominance in the East, as did Celtic in the West, but I-I was
largely replaced by Slavic and Turkic, as was Celtic by Romance and
Germanic. The original center would seem to have been lost to other
languages, with only the peripheries surviving.

The sphere of action could just as well have been Hungary, which has
historically gone thru quite a number of wholesale language
replacements. It could have been the homeland, or at least, one lobe
of it.

--- In cybalist@..., "Joseph S Crary" <pva@...> wrote:
> Archaeologically,
>
> there is a major shift or differentiation of material culture in
> temperate Europe during the transition from Middle to late
> Bronze age. Although there are dozens of names for local
> expressions of both the earlier and later archaeological complexes,
> collectively they've been referred to as the Tumulus and Urnfield
> cultures. This is a very complex subject, however if one is able to
> step back and view the forest from the trees, the general patterns
> are quite apparent.
>
> The Tumulus Culture represents the MB Age norm as found throughout
> more of Europe. The most pervasive feature of this culture is
> humantion burial covered by mounded structure. This is typical of
the
> MB Age. However, these patterns continued more-or-less
> intact into the Hallstatt and Latene periods. As you are well aware,
> the Hallstatt and Latene complexes define Celt culture, thus the
> development of primitive, verb first, kw-ish, q-Celt-like languages,
> likely dates to the MB Age Tumulus Culture. With this said, it
> is likely there remained large regions within the Tumulus Culture
> sphere, where the local population used non IE languages. In fact,
it
> is likely the assimilation of these large non IE population that
> distinguish the Celt language group from the more easterly IE types.
>
> There also appears to be another cultural complex situated in the
> Netherlands, Northurmbria, and Lowland Scottland where cremation was
> the dominant method of burial throughout the MB Age. This culture
has
> several major attributes that make it different from the LB Age
> Urnfield culture.
>
> The LB Age Urnfield Culture, in all its various expressions, is
> represented by cremation burial placed in urns, typically capped
with
> a cover bowl, buried in tightly clustered cemeteries. It appears
> spontaneously throughout western Poland. For about two hundred years
> it expanded to include eastern Germany, Poland, Denmark,
Netherlands,
> southern Baltic, northern Balkans, and eastern Ukrainian steppes.
> This brings us to about BC 1300. Basically, during the transition
> from MB to LB areas that were within the Tumulus Culture sphere were
> incorporated into the emerging Urnfield Culture. Several studies of
> burial populations from this period indicate this was by no means a
> peaceful process. Quite the contrary, this appears to be a period of
> intense warfare. This assemblage commonly includes the skeletal
> mutilation of adult males and mass burial of young adult females
with
> subadults.
>
> Things appear to stabilize until between BC 1200 to 900 when the
> Urnfield Culture appears to explode outwardly. Logically, this would
> be the point when many of the, so-called more advanced, IE languages
> diverged. This includes Italic, Slavic, Hellenic, Illyianic, and
> yes...Geramanic. Again the Urnfield Culture shares element of the
> Hallstatt complex and is typical of the LB Age, but its clear it
> continued relatively unchanged until replaced by post-Roman period
> Christian Culture. In fact the Hallstatt complex appears to develop
> in the eastern north-south seam between the remnant Tumulus and
> Urnfield cultures.
>
>
> As a recap, as the IE languages moved from east to west, overtime
> they began to diverge along a east-west axis. Thus, those on leading
> western edge become more Celt like and those that remained in the
> east more Thracian-Balt like. That at some point the eastern
language
> group is very different from the western group, similar to what has
> been noted as the q to p shift in Celt. Then as large-scale
> migrations occur to Greece, Balkans, Italy, Scandinavia, north
> central Russia, the major European languages emerge. This
represented
> a rapid divergence of the eastern group primarily along a
north-south
> axis.
>
> There is one more point to be made. This is about the linguistic
seam
> between the major western and eastern language groups. The way I see
> it is this linguistic seam would be centered on Germany and Denmark,
> and would represent languages that were Celt-like but included
> elements also found in the eastern language group. Culturally, the
> same should be expected; a culture that was Celt-like but included
> element found in the eastern cultural sphere. This would be, what
has
> been called p-Celt.
>
> Frankly, the archaeological evidence and classical sources appears
to
> support this conclusion. For example, the Belgae where p-Celt
speaker
> that migrated to northwest France from north central Germany around
> BC 300. They were distinguished by the Urnfield Culture, a complex
> quite different from that of the Gallic people they largely
> displaced. I would argue that until the Belgae and later Cimbric
> migrations the major languages used in Germany and Denmark were p-
> Celt, while the languages now called Germanic developed in the
> relative isolation of Scandinavia.
>
> So the answer to the question.
>
> I would associate the beginning development of Germanic Languages,
> with the expansion of the Urnfield complex in northern temperate
> Europe, during the Late Bronze Age. In the big picture this would
> represent a divergence from Celt and/or Balt, and the massive
> assimilation of an unknown non IE population in Scandinavia.
>
>
>
> JS Crary