Re: Hercynian (again)

From: Trond Engen
Message: 68750
Date: 2012-03-04

Brian M. Scott:

> At 6:35:55 AM on Friday, March 2, 2012, Tavi wrote:
>
>> --- In cybalist@yahoogroups.com, "Brian M. Scott"
>> <bm.brian@...> wrote:
>
>>>> There's a strong tendence to forget about minority
>>>> languages in atlases and text books. Too often the
>>>> winners make active efforts to erase the traces of
>>>> "loser" language, for example, by translating
>>>> alloglottic toponyms to their own language and even
>>>> people names.
>
>>> This can happen, yes. The degree to which it happens
>>> varies greatly, however, and the winning language isn't
>>> always that of the winning people.
>
>> But you can't ignore IE languages have been and are still
>> (see e.g. Anthony's book subtitle: "How Bronze-Age riders
>> from the Eurasian Steppes shaped the Modern World") too
>> often represented as being spoken by warfare aristocracies
>> who imposed their language to non-IE speaking people by
>> military conquest.
>
> I frankly don't much care: I'm interested in the linguistics
> first and the archaeology second. Moreover, not having read
> Anthony's book, I have no idea whether it actually presents
> the early spread of IE languages in the way that you suggest
> on the basis of the subtitle; I certainly don't trust your
> judgement on that score after what you've written here.

He isn't that different from Mallory before him. The spread to the
Balkans and Bactria came as (archaeologically well documented)
disruptive intrusions of pastoral nomads into the realms of already
strained city cultures, while the spread to northern and western Europe
mainly was a "franchise" -- a gradual adoption of the cultural package
by indigenus populations after their leaders joined the IE client system.

--
Trond Engen