Responding to Dennis Poulter in:"Pelasgians, Tyrrenians and now Trojans"
>It appears that Troy was never the name of the city,
Trying to sort Troy names out will lead to insanity :-). The area of
Troy was inside an area (The Troad) with strategic and marketing value to
all interested in Black Sea trade (Mark Odegard can provide more there, I've
seen his thinking on the point on ane list.) Tyrrhen
(noi/ia/ians) has been more obstacle to my thinking than anything else. For
the moment, I am relying on Strabo (three layers..all of Greece, AND many
parts of Italy: 1) Oscan..2) Tyrrhenian 3)Pelasgian. Strabo and many
others also assert that Tyrrhenians held parts of Greece, till the
Pelasgians dominated. It is deductive assumption that Tyrrhenoi center was
Italy, and that Pelasgi got to Itlay after consolidation in Greece. John's
last input was helpful with separating the Lydians of a city named
"Tyrra"..from Italian Tyrrenia, where Tyrrans and Lemnans sent colonists to
become Etruscans.
Mysia, in my view is intrusive Northern (Danubian?) after the Pelasgic
wave had been established in Anatolia, and entered Greece. Is Tyrran
resilient in Anatolia from pre-Pelasgic Tyrrhenians? My vote now is a very
tentative "no"..but I am not taking a solid position on the point yet. ( I
am avoiding also tossing in Tiranna; and Tyrrhenoi impact on later
Illyruns and Albanians,{Did Illyrians take the Balkans from the Tyrrhenoi?}
because it gets beyond the point of my position..Macro Pelasgia.) I am
accepting Strabo and the others that Tyrrhenoi were a region wide influence
before the Pelasgi..and much older...granting substrata to proto Greek.
Mysia never was a state, but a culturally defined area among those I cite as
Intrusive from the north into North Anatolia: and inside that area grew Troy
by any name, and the Troad..which may have been a state at one or several
times.
>Ilias was founded around 3000BCE,
If I am right, that would correspond to the Pelasgic arrival and domination
at the Aegean point..as well as EBA in Poliochni (Lemnos). All I have
maintained so far is "from the north"..which was deliberately to avoid
selecting from: West of the Black sea and East of the Black sea: as a single
route (or a double one)..don't have enough arch data to make those
determinations yet.
>>By the time of Ilias' destruction around 2250BCE, there were large
>amounts of gold, silver, bronze and copper and enormous >monumental
buildings and gateways through the massive walls etc. >etc. The question
that comes now is, where did all this gold, >silver, copper and tin come
from? I think, given the orientation of >Ilias at this time (characterised
at Troia Maritima), that it is more >likely to be the Balkans than the
interior of
>Anatolia or the >Caucasus.
That could correspond to a northern intrusion..deleting Pelasgic control of
northern trade from the Troad advantage point.
Of course: trade with the north via the Black Sea.
>Do you have any idea of who were the people of the Danubian >Bronze
cultures of this period? Could they have been Trojans?
This can get in to the layered "Name Game" again. Could they have been
Trojans? yes. Could they have also moved into an already existing Troad by
name? yes. Moesia (South bank Danubian) could have been the source of the
name Mysia..and could have contributed to the Eastern "Muski". Danubians
certainly came: can't sort out chronologies from here: Bithynia was defined
by warlike Danubians well before mid 2nd Millennium. Phyrges...and the
groups who would create "Hittite' over next to (or on top of) Pala and
Hattics. I think in the Troad you have a northern new domination of an older
established area..in My View: Danubian taking from Pelasgic. East Danubian
major (Thracian) groups include the Moesi, Getae, Daci, Costoboc, and
KarpiDaci. Do all of them extend back to 3,300 BCE; the current date of IE
and BA dominance of the eastern Danube? I don't know. Daci are known to have
traded with Myceneans..via arch evidence in the form of distinct Mycenean
swords. I think the proto-group for all these tribal groups came from the
initial IE intrusion of the Eastern Danube. Largest impact on NW Anatolia
since EBA: Moesi. Moesi alone? No.
>Following the destruction of 2250BCE, possibly by incoming >Anatolians, the
site was reduced to relative poverty. Houses are >smaller and communal,
metal becomes very scarce, and there is an >increase in animal bones
(hunting for food perhaps), deer at first, >later pigs and cows. This phase
(Troy III, IV and V) lasted until about >1900BCE, and although there seems
to be a slight improvement in >living standards, it remains relatively poor,
especially in metals. >This phase also has been characterised as
"Anatolian".
All Pelasgi were not rich sea traders..those in the interior were poor
farmers. Pre-Pelasgians were also getting displaced in some regions, and
still around in many. Nor have I ever claimed all people in the geo area
were all Pelasgi.
>About 1900BCE Troy V was demolished and Troy VI was built. This >seems to
coincide with a general wave of destruction right across >Anatolia. James
Mellaart has ascribed the cultural change in Troy VI >and the introduction
of horses and grey "Minyan" ware with the >arrival of the Luwians, who also
took their ceramic style on into >Greece. These Luwians are seen as the
precursors of the Greeks >into Greece, mainly on the grounds of place-name
elements. From >this point, we come to my earlier posting on Hyksos etc.
Reading John's previous and my response: you will understand why I think
Luwian, as well as Lycian, Lydian, et-al..are regional sub-identities with
varying levels of Pelasgic Influence.
>Summary:
>Do you have evidence for your assertions of EBA penetrations into >the
western Mediterranean in the 3rd millennium? I haven't found >any reference
to this.
Whoa..stop!:-) Don't know where I gave you that impression. I have been
careful to limit early dating. I use c3000 BCE for the Aegean threshold of
advance of my theoretical wave. Taking that only from the Poliochni EBA
layer. Then into Greece to displace the Tyrrhenoi..then expanding
influence..very carefully undated..last phase of described influence into
colonies including Italy . The intended assertion was that the former
Tyrrhenian coast was already an established "Aegean place" well before the
post 800 BCE arrival of the Etruscans. Otherwise, I indicated a much more
ancient use of Tuscan than can be Etruscan derived..but that first reference
is Troy associated..which carries only a hint of Greek intrusion. There are
many arch sites including early greek levels in Italy..ID'd as intrusive..a
review of all should yield a good c.date. Don't have access to that data. I
am suggesting that colonization was begun..then interrupted in the Greek
decline post c1200 BCE..then resumed in the resurgence..including the
Etruscans.
>Otherwise, why would the Achaeans mount a massive expedition >against Troy,
To unblock sea trade into the Black Sea.
>1300, when their own cities must have been coming under pressure >from the
Dorians?
All data I have suggest the Dorians were a sudden event as late as 1100BCE
Hints of an already old Aegean influence in the Classics, suspicions about
the Raetii being older than the Etruscan settlement, Starbo on Pompeii and
Herculaneum,
> Pelasgians in Italy?
"Pelignians" are still Identified as in Tuscany allied with Romans as
"Native troops" by Livy..against Samnites and Etruscans and Gauls.
Strabo puts them there, certainly in Herculaneum and Troy. If they were
proto Greeks (and they were) then they came with, in fact define the Aegean
colonization of Italy.
(Princeton Encyclopedia of Classical Sites) Spina
Founded by the Pelasgians, ....... at the mouth of a branch of the Po
(Hellanicus fr. 1 apud Dion. Hal. 1.28.3, 1.18.3-4; Ps.-Scyl. 17; Just.
Epit. 20.1.1; Plin. HN 3.120), the city attained the thalassocracy of the
Adriatic and maintained at Delphi a famous thesaurus (Dion. Hal. 1.18.4;
Strab. 5.1.7, 9.3.8). It was within a road journey of three days from Pisa
and was linked to Adria by a navigable canal built by the Etruscans. The
invasion of the Gauls provoked the decline and desertion of the city (Dion.
Hal. 1.18.5), and on the site in the Roman period there was no more than a
small village (Strab. 5.1.7).
>Oscans?
Definitely neolithics, may have founded the original Pompeii settlement, and
may have been last identifiable as "Campanians", simply meaning the last
place they were still evident, and certainly speaking IE by that time
..Strabo puts them under Plasgi then Tyrrhenian layers in both Italy and
Greece.
>So, nothing in the posts or my rummaging around, has changed my >opinion
that the Pelasgians were the original proto-Greeks and >nothing more.
At least we agree they were the proto Greeks. How did they get there? As
for something more, I think John's detailed post and my additions in the
response do something there. But also consider:
(Princeton Encyclopedia of Classical Sites) buruncuk
Ruins at 28 km N of Izmir. These ruins are usually identified with Larisa
(Anatolia), a very old city, the principal place in the region before the
coming of the Aiolian Greeks. Of the various cities of the name, this is
perhaps the one referred to by Homer as fertile Larisa, home of warlike
Pelasgians....
(Princeton Encyclopedia of Classical Sites) Kyme
City in Aiolis, 40 km N of Smyrna. Founded, according to Strabo (621), by
Greek colonists after the Trojan War and after their capture of Larisa
(Anatolia) from the Pelasgians.
(Princeton Encyclopedia of Classical Sites) pityoussa
So called in ancient times because of its abundant pines, it is an island in
the Aegean separated from the W coast of Turkey by a strait 8 km wide. Its
earliest inhabitants included the Pelasgi, Lydians and Carians.
>The Lemnian and Thracian "Pelasgians" were the remnants of the
>"Troies/Tyrsenoi/Tyrrhenoi"
Sorry Dennis..don't buy that one. I have no doubt that many survivors of
many destructions contributed to many other places,
but you can't limit Pelasgians to post troy survivors, as distinct from
other Pelasgians who were proto Greeks, nor limit their Aegean and environs
definition to post Troy refugees.
La Revedere;
Rex H. McTyeire
Bucharest, Romania
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rexbo@...>