Re: Fate of Conventional PIE's Relatives

--- In cybalist@yahoogroups.com, "Richard Wordingham" <richard.wordingham@...> wrote:

>
> I'm used to superstrate and substrate being what is left of the other language in the surviving language, so such a symmetry makes no sense long after the period of co-existence. However, I now see that some do use the terms as you do, though I must say the concept of modern English having an Old English *substrate* feels bizarre to me.
>

But Old English can't be a "substrate" of modern English because the latter is a direct descendent of the former. However, English has Danish and French (Norman) superstrates. The first one is particularly interesting because of the close relationship between Danish and OE.

> It would appear that what you wrote and I quoted above is compatible with two quite different propositions:
>
> (A) And finally, one of these paleo-dialects underwent a rapid expansion in the Chalcolithic and the Bronze Age, and replaced the other varieties.
>
> (B) And finally, one of these paleo-dialects underwent a rapid expansion in the Chalcolithic and the Bronze Age, and left words in the other varieties.
>
> Proposition (A) is not an outrageous claim, though the date is challenged.
>
> However, my understanding from your various attacks on 'conventional PIE' is that you support Proposition (B).
>

Properly speaking, the paleo-dialect of the Steppes (which I colloquially call "Pontic") would be a superstrate only to a part of the IE family, because languages such as Greek-Armenian and Indo-Iranian would be their direct descendents. The net outcome is that the most part of the IE lexicon doesn't actually come from "PIE" (i.e. Pontic) but from other IE paleo-varieties. This "substrate" lexicon has features such as irregular sound correspondences and/or lack of ablaut e/o and is often restricted to a particular geographical area.

> Incidentally, this appears to conflict with your claim of a widespread Vasco-Caucasian substrate in Europe.
>

IMHO the Neolithic farmers who came to Europe from the Near East spoke Vasco-Caucasian languages, which spread à la Renfrew along the Mediterranean and the Low Danube area. And with the exception of Basque all these languages were ultimately replaced, leaving substrate loanwords behind them.

By contrast, the Central Europe Neolithic beyond the Carpathian Mountains (LBK culture) appears to be the result of the acculturation of the autochthonous hunter-gatherers, presumably speakers of some IE paleo-variety. In this case, we should speak of a Vasco-Caucasian adstrate.

> The notion of a North Caucasian adstrate in PIE while it was spoken North or South of the Black Sea is fairly > respectable - the part of low repute is the lumping together of NE and NW Caucasian.
>

IMHO we should substitute Starostin's "North Caucasian" by Vasco-Caucasian. This way, NEC and NWC would be part of a macro-family which also would include other families such as Burushaski, Hurro-Urartian, Hattic, Etruscan and so on.

To me it's clear that "Pontic" had Vasco-Caucasian loanwords (probably from more than one source), some of which, e.g. *h1ek^w-o- 'horse' and *pork^-o- 'young pig, piglet' have been already studied by Starostin.