From: Urban Lindqvist
Message: 2112
Date: 2000-04-13
> From: John Croft <jdcroft@...>Yes, we mustn't forget that the languages of the Homeric poems and the Rigvedic hymns are both highly formulaic and traditional (as is Avestan). Any attempt to establish a terminus ante quem is therefore highly dangerous.
>
> As for the Vedic language, I know that the River Saraswati is
> mentioned in the early Vedas, and on geological evidence that is
> supposed to have dried up about 1,500 BCE. On this ground, Sanscrit
> is a lot earlier than Avestan, although of course such evidence needs
> to be taken carefully.
>
> Homer for instance, knew of a late Mycenaean seige of Troy, but the
> language he wrote in was Ionian Greek, far removed from the
> Paleo-Arcadian dialect the Mycenaeans are supposed to have spoken.
> A similar set of events may have also occurred with Sanscrit.