--- Piotr Gasiorowski <
gpiotr@...> wrote:
the labels
> "Indic" (or "Indo-Aryan") and "Iranian" are used for
> lack of better terms also with reference to the
> remote prehistory of peoples and languages so
> called, before they reached India or Iran. "Pontic
> Indo-Aryans" sounds like a contradiction in terms,
> but it should be construed as "speakers of a
> non-Iranian language closely related to Indo-Aryan,
> living in the Pontic region". As a footnote to what
> George wrote, the name <alazones> looks very
> plausibly Iranian to me, after all: *arya-zana- or
> the like, meaning 'Aryan tribe'.
*****GK: It could also be "Ala-zona", meaning
"excellent bay horse"(s). A good "Scythian"
appellative (cf. also reconstructed "Tri-aspa";
"Callipidae" (Her. Gk.); and "wild white horses"
(Her.) The colour "red" indicative of south/southwest
is also appropriate, as is the location on the
"Hypanis" (a river with an Indian homonym). So Pontic
Indic is possible. But "Thrakoid" can't be ruled out
given the attested extant vocabulary parallels between
Thracian and Indic (acc. to Duridanov's lexicon nearly
10%), and of course Iranic can't be ruled out
either.******
__________________________________________________
Do You Yahoo!?
Yahoo! Sports - Coverage of the 2002 Olympic Games
http://sports.yahoo.com