Re: [tied] Fwd: Aryanism and Journal of Indo-European Studies

--- In cybalist@yahoogroups.com, "Richard Wordingham
<richard.wordingham@...>" <richard.wordingham@...> wrote:> RW: For
what they're worth, my observations on the reviews are as > follows:

>
> 1. Observations on Agrawal
>
> I don't understand why he stresses the inheritance from the IVC.

Is > he trying to say that the RV does show it?

>
> 2. Observations on Bryant's Review
>
> His review seems rather favourable.
>
> 3. Observations on Martin Huld's Review
>
> These observations can all be described as nit-picking.
>
> 3.1. Language Diversity:
>
> Are we sure that Scots is not a separate language? (It once had

an > army and a navy.)

>
> Can we count Dutch, Frisian, Low German, High German and Danish as
> _five_ languages?
>
> The London Borough of Ealing (not a large area) finds it necessary

to > print leaflets in at least four Indic languages: Urdu, Hindi,

> Gujerati and Bengali. Are we sure it isn't the dispersal centre

for > Indo-Aryan? (I raise this issue because the Chinese dialects
of Los > Angeles were listed as evidence for the language diversity
argument.)

>
> 3.2 Dispersals:
>
> Anatolia is not a central location, and pace Piotr is not fully
> analogous to 'Formosan' via-à-vis Austronesian; as I see the
> Anatolian homeland hypothesis, Indo-Hittite splits into Anatolian

and > 19th Century Indo-European, and the latter then radiates as
Piotr > describes in his Danubian homeland theory.

>
> 4. Observations on Kuz'mina's Review:
>
> I'm afraid I don't see the _necessity_ of the relationships

between > technology and linguistic separations - wheel & IE;
chariot & IIr. > The case for technological spread (West to East)
looks good, though.

>
> 5. Observations on Mallory's Review:
>
> His critique of the continuity argument leads straight to

Renfrew's > theory with 'Hypothesis A' (i.e. that first farmers
brought IE from > Near East to India)!

>
> Model 3 might be partially rescued by élite dominance spreading IE
> across the steps from East to West. However, 2200 BC is still too
> late.
>
> 6. Observations on Meadow's Review:
>
> A lot hinges on whether the horses in the RV need to be E.

Caballus!

>
> 7. Observations on Parpola's Review:
>
> I didn't see anything contentious here!
>
> 8. Observations on Zimmer's Review:
>
> He clearly has no time for Kazanas. It's a shame his abuse wasn't
> edited out, but perhaps it had to be left in so Kazanas could

comment > on the comments within the time scale.

>
> The section on 'archaeoastronomy' is best ignored!
>
> I was puzzled as to how developing the retroflex series (perhaps a
> fifth articulation place, rather than a reversion to having four
> places) ruled out India as the homeland. (Section 6.2). It took

me > a long time to realise that this was an application of

> the 'preservation principle'!
>
> I hope Kazanas doesn't mean what he writes in his Footnote 15!
>
> I presume the Kazanas's point about settlers moving to Iceland by
> ship was that they did not mix with others en route. Given the
> number of Irish wives they had, I don't think that that is
> particularly relevant! I have seen Icelandic conservatism

explained > by a lack of village-to-village contact - contacts were
within a > village or in a meeting of many, many villages.

>
> <End of RW's comments on reviews>

Thanks, Richard for taking on the issues. I am sad that even Piotr
does not comment on the substantive new insights of Kazanas' in his
60-page piece. Piotr's Danubian home-land theory is fine, maybe,
there are views which should also be heard and debated.

In the original posting of Vishal Agarwal, there was an URL which
leads us on to 12 pdf files.

I feel that members of the list may find something worthwhile in
these 12 files to comment upon, offer their views on an issue which,
in my view, will not go away, primarily because not enough work has
been done on the nature of and substrates of Indo-Aryan.

Why should the multiple migrations out of Bharat (that is India)
hypothesis be ruled out of hand? Maybe, reality is not as simplistic
as one would want to theorise. Simplicity in explanation is not
necessary the true explanation for the spread of languages in Europe
after the glaciation period, circa 18000 C-14 years ago. If not a
blade of grass grew, how could people (and cattle) have lived in
most parts of Europe?

Why does Richard Meadow assume that the R.gvedic horse has to be the
equus caballus? It could as well have been the Indian pony still
used on ekka-s and jat.ka-s all over India.

Do we know enough about Dravidian spread?

Do we know for sure that Munda was spoken in Iran or Afghanistan?

Are Mekong and ma_ ganga_ (Mother Ganga) cognate river names, since
both are Himalayan glacier rivers?