---
lsroute66@... wrote:
>
> And where does that leave us? How did IE spread?
*****GK: I think it leaves us with the realization
that a great deal of additional work is needed before
this issue can even begin to be settled one way or
another. It's glaringly obvious that both the Gimbutas
and the Renfrew models are defective beyond repair in
their original conception. But a lot has been invested
in the attitudes of both sides (cf. for instance
D.Anthony's scathing review of Marsha Levine's
interpretation of Dereivka in the September 2001
ANTIQUITY). It's much easier to demonstrate why your
opponent's position is shaky than to demonstrate why
your own is necessarily correct. We need to suspend
final judgements and do additional research.******
>
> SL: First clue - IE did not spread by the migration
of
> genes. No genes
> match up with the extent of IE. Not even close.
*****GK: I agree. Gene migrations are frequently an
accompanying but not necessarily a defining
characteristic of language use and spread. The Cavalli
etc. results prove nothing definitively either re
Gimbutas et al. or re Renfrew et al.*****
>
> S.L.:Second clue - Mesolithic cultures across Europe
were
> isolated from
> most of one another for thousands of years.
*****GK: I believe this is incorrect. Mesolithic
populations were in fact extremely mobile.
Craniological studies do not of course provide 100%
certainty as to these matters, but here is the
conclusion drawn by the Institute of Archaeology of
Ukraine in a recent publication concerning the
Dnipro-Donetz culture cemeteries (those which were
partially redated by Oxford RC laboratories): "the
process of formation of the anthropological elements
of the mesolithic population of the Middle and Lower
Dnipro lasted for millennia: MIGRATIONAL WAVES (my
emphasis GK) accumulated constantly from the north,
from the south, from the east, and from the west,
until the North Europeid-Proto-Europeid type became
dominant in this region of Ukraine." (THE ETHNIC
HISTORY OF ANCIENT UKRAINE, ed. P. Tolochko, Institute
of Archaeology of the Ukrainian Academy of Sciences,
Kyiv 2000, p. 249 [in Ukr.] ISBN 966-02-1758-7). NB:
The "N.E-P.E.type" is that of the Ertebolle people
(ibid., p. 251).== What would be useful at this
juncture is the application of strontium isotope ratio
study technology to these crania (as has been done by
T.Douglas Price et al. re LBK (cf. ANTIQUITY Sept.
2001 and ANTIQUITY 1998 re Bell Beaker) so as to
determine their migration patterns and
intensities.*****
S.L.:If they
> all spoke IE, it
> should have been in 100 different languages,
> following the New
> Guinea/Australian model. If they had a lingua
> franca, they didn't use
> it much. No real cross-continental contacts are
> evident.
>
> S.L:Third clue - In Denmark, along the Danubian Iron
> Gates and in
> Dereivka One, there is recurring evidence of porotic
> hyperostosis
> attributed to parasitic infestation by fish
> tapeworms among the
> mesolithic populations. So, even in lox paradise,
> there was a price
> of admission. Especially if you didn't cook your
> fish.
>
> S.L.: Fourth clue - No significant European
population,
> except in the far
> north, did not convert to agro-pastoral culture.
> Most took some time
> to get around to it, but were always dependent in
> the mean time on
> agri-pastoral marketeers for all of their finery and
> most of their
> wares.
****GK: Most of their "wares" were in fact their own
microlithics, and there wasn't much "finery". Even the
pottery was overwhelmingly "local" (at least in the
East European area) once its early instances arrived
(from the east) and were "adopted and adapted". So
this point is essentially meaningless.******
>
> S.L.:Fifth clue - Andrew Sheratt - the archaeologist
who
> identified the
> secondary products revolution (ie, mesolithics show
> no signs of ever
> having a surplus of food or materials, neolithic
> types developed
> surpluses, enter "rich guys") maintains that the
> best evidence now is
> that the giant vats of LBK were malt vats. Cooked
> fish bones show up
> in northern neolithic middens. Bring me salmon,
> I'll give you beer.
>
> Now, if you carry on that relationship for a few
> hundred years, do
> you think you might get around to speaking a common
> language, just
> for
> convenience? Which language? Who had the beer?
> I'd go with the
> guys
> who had the beer, I think.
*****GK: The probability of multilingualism is of
course very high. But a language used for purposes of
trade (or a "beer language" if you like) would not
necessarily be the language of everyday use in the
mesolithic communities. "Barbarians" seemed quite
adept at multilingualism. As late as the time of
Attila.******
>
> > MO:Archaeologists are saying that Northern
European
> farmers seem to be
> > little (but more populous) enclaves surrounded by
> 'more primative'
> > hunter-gatherers.
>
> S.L.:Actually, populated settlements at first
surrounded
> by very small
> fragments of foragers. Followed by semi-settlements
> of
> foragers becoming farmers. Don't buy George's 11%
> claim. Most of
> that territory shows no signs of foragers - they
> could have occupied
> 11% or less.
*****GK: Nowak's first name is not George but Marek
(:=)). Steve Long's counter claim is not backed up by
evidence at least as to the areas of Poland and
Ukraine. Most of the territory shows much evidence of
"forager activity' (Nowak's "forest management". I'm
open to information as to whether settlement patterns
of LBK differred further West. Maybe we should let
Polish and Ukrainian archaeologists do some work there
(:=)))*****
>
> MO:These little [!] enclaves became isolated
linguistic
>
> > islands, while the much more wide-ranging
> hunter-gatherers spoke a
> > lingua franca. Thus: the farmers learned
> proto-Indo-European, and
> left
> > only a slight substratum.
>
> S.L:But honestly that's a fifty-fifty chance, isn't
it?
****GK: Not in Poland it isn't, if Marek Nowak is
right about the nature and genesis of Funnel Beaker
there. And as for Ukraine, here is some new
interesting material about the Late Trypilia culture
on the Dnister (op. cit., pp. 253-254). Trypilians
usually cremated their dead. But at this stage one
major TRYP group adopted the inhumation practices of
their eastern (Serednyj Stih) neighbours. They are
known as the Vykhvatyns'k group (and their descendants
became the Trypilian component of the Usatove culture
[Yamna "lords" Trypilian "subjects"]. Now the analysis
of Vykhvatyns'k cemeteries has led to extremely
interesting discoveries. A majority of the male
skeletons were of the "Old Mediterranean" type
(southern origin) while the female ones were of the
"Proto-Europeid type" (eastern and northern origin).
There is also evidence (far less extensive) of female
Trypilian "Old Mediterranean" types among the Serednyj
Stih people. It is now assumed that the spread of
"corded ware" ceramics among the Late Trypilians is to
be largely explained by their marriage practices (they
got their wives from Serednyj Stih and the reciprocal
relationship while present wasn't as intense). So it
looks as though the ladies of Serednyj Stih did their
job well: they carried their culture to the west and
assimilated their offspring to their S/S speech. The
far less numerous ladies of Trypilia who went east
were not in a position to emulate this. Their cultural
traditions dissipated in their new environment. Of
course we're now in a historical period where the
agriculture+ husbandry economy of Trypilia yields to
the husbandry+ agriculture "early pastoral" economy of
the east. Which probably explains a lot here.******
>
> SL: In trade and range, the farmers were much more
> far-ranging - we
> recognize no mesolithic culture that stretched from
> Holland to the
> Ukraine or from Yugoslavia to Southern France, the
> way that LBK and
> Cardial Ware did.
*****GK: This proves nothing at all about the adoption
of the LBK language (IE or otherwise).*****
With the agri-pastoralists,
> Polish obsidian
> suddenly shows up in the Southern Balkans. Trade
> expanded
> appreciably.
>
> Sometimes, I wish the Turks were IE speakers, so
> that they could
> flood the discussions with lots of ethno-centric
> claims about their
> Anatolian forebears and even up the bias I sometimes
> sense.
*****GK: I think your own bias occasionally peeps
through as well. No matter. The idea is to try to
mutually overcome such biases.*****
>
> Steve Long
>
>
>
> etc.,
>
>
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