Right, I've read and studied all
the excellent archaeological/anthropological info you have posted, John, and
have done a great deal of reading of whatever I can find on the subject on the
web.
However, first, I must take
issue with you on your linguistic analysis. I've been looking specifically at
the language families involved, and what you say makes no sense.
Your subgrouping of
AfroAsiatic into Chadic/Cushitic/Omotic and Berber/Egyptian/Semitic has no
linguistic basis, and can only be supported by the Saharan hypothesis.
It must be stressed that the
AfroAsiatic superfamily is on a par with Eurasian, in that all the coordinate
families show great divergence, and that the common features between them are
based on mainly typological correspondences in morphology and phonology.
Interestingly, the postulated proto-phonological system is very similar to that
proposed for Nostratic. None of the languages have preserved all the
elements; Chadic and Berber have preserved the least, and Semitic has
preserved the most.
There are two schools of thought
on the original location and date of the break-up.
One gives a Saharan origin
and date of 8000-6000BCE for the split, which corresponds with the onset of the
desiccation of the Sahara.
The other gives an East
Africa/Ethiopian origin, with a much earlier date of 12000BCE for the original
split, based on the fundamental differences between Egyptian and Akkadian, the
oldest attested languages of this group.
So, I have come up with a
synthesis of all this, which, I believe, does not do (too much) violence to
John's cultural sequence, which accounts reasonably well for the linguistic
evidence, and which may even provide a historical basis for Glen's
Semitish.
Neat trick, eh? So , here goes
:
1. Post 18000BCE,
proto-Afro-Asiatic speaking nomadic hunters moved into the Sahara. They must
have come from the southerly or easterly equatorial regions.
2. Capsian technology
probably originated in the Sahara , and was in part based on earlier North
African techniques. But it would have spread quickly through what was still a
fairly homegenous Saharan population, back to East Africa.
3. Around 12000BCE occurred the
first split in AfroAsiatic. Peoples inhabiting the Red Sea coastal regions may
have already crossed over to the Arabian savannahs to exploit the resources
there. It would seem, on the linguistic evidence, that while the speech of the
Sahara evolved, the speech of the Arabian/Red Sea coastal people remained more
archaic. This then would be the split between Semitic and, let's call it
Hamitic.
4. With the onset of
desiccation, ca. 8000BCE, probably from the interior outwards, of the Saharan
region, the peoples there became isolated from one another and retreated : the
proto-Berbers to the north-west and Atlas mountains, the proto-Chadics to the
south and west to the Sahel and equatorial regions, the proto-Cushites (followed
by proto-Omotic) to the south-east and the mountains of Ethiopia, the
proto-Egyptians eastwards into the Nile valley.
5. Desiccation also affected
Arabia, forcing movements of Semites in all directions: back to Africa, to Oman
and the Gulf watered by the edge of the monsoons, into Mesopotamia, and
westwards towards the Nile valley. It could well be that the Semitic hunters and
gatherers had already penetrated into Anatolia and beyond, into
Europe.
I believe this scenario best
accounts for the linguistic facts :
1. that while betraying signs of
a common ancestry, Semitic and Egyptian are profoundly different in phonology
and morphology. This has been obscured by the long and intimate relationship of
Egyptians and Semites (but not a la Norman/English relations, John) which has
resulted in a certain amount of convergence between West Semitic and Lower
Egyptian, and the fact that classical hieroglyphic Egyptian, from the Old
Kingdom on, was based on the Lower Egyptian dialect of Memphis.
2. that the African branches of
AfroAsiatic show a common development in phonology and morphology, such as the
loss of laryngeals and emphatics (ejectives), loss of noun cases, loss of
root/theme word derivation processes, development of auxiliary+verbal noun in
the verb system. These changes are graduated, with greater preservation of
original forms in the east (Egyptian) less in the south east (Omotic and
Cushitic) and least in the south and west (Berber and Chadic).
It also has advantages from the
cultural point of view :
1. it preserves John's
north-to-south flow of Capsian technical advances, with possible sources in
Ibero-Maurusian and Aterian;
2. it removes the need to
postulate a movement of Semitic speech across the Nile valley from west to east,
which neither stopped there not left any trace of its passage;
3. it preserves the
fundamentally African character of Egypt, while allowing for the very early and
important Semitic contributions to come from the east (but no dynastic
race);
4. it gives ample time for the
Semites to establish themselves in the Middle East, and forge the necessary
technology and networks to be able to influence Egypt at such an early
date;
5. it gives ample time for the
Semites to penetrate into Anatolia and Europe at any early enough date to
account for the ancient Semitic loans into proto-Indo-Tyrrhenian and
Kartvelian;
6. it provides a very real
possibility that the first farmers were Semitic speaking. A recent paper given
by Harvard Univ. anthropologist Ofer Bar-Yosef claims recent findings show that
the first farmers were located in the western half of the Fertile Crescent
at around 10,000BCE (onset of the Younger Dryas). This would account for the
Semitic argricultural vocabulary Glen keeps turning up, and gets rid of the need
for unknown or hypothetical substrate languages.
As a postscript, archaeologists
from Chicago's Oriental Institute announced on 23/5 the discovery of a city in
northern Syria (Tell Harmoukar) dating to 4000BCE. This makes it contemporaneous
or perhaps earlier than the earliest Sumerian cities. Perhaps the unknown
substrate to Sumerian is Semitic. (see my post on Eridu from Semitic - Arabic
3ariiD(un)). Perhaps the Ubaid pottery makers were also fundamentally Semitic
speaking.
BTW, for John. according to
Peter A. Piccione of North-Western University, African agriculture originated
around 8000BCE in southern Libya, west of lower Nubia.
Cheers
Dennis
This also allows ample time for
the Semitic speaking people to have penetrated into Anatolia and Europe, and to
have intermixed with speakers of PIE (or IT) and Kartvelian, to account for
Glen's ancient Semitic loans into these languages. This would also seem likely
given the physical appearance of Middle Easterners. Interestingly, an
anthropologist at Harvard University, Ofer Bar-Yosef, claims that his latest
findings narrow the location of the first farmers to the western half of the
Fertile Crescent and dates it to the onset the Younger Dryas, ca.
10,000BCE. Given the earlier date for Semitic (12,000BCE), this could be
the source of Glen's Semitish argriculturalists spreading their agricultural
Semitic terminology far and wide. BTW, John, it seems the earliest true
agricultural sites in Africa are to be found in southern Libya, to the west of
lower Nubia, and are dated to 8000BCE.
While on the subject of the
Semites, on 23/5 a discovery was announced of a 6000-year-old city in northern
Syria (Tell Harmoukar), which would thus appear to pre-date or be
contemporaneous with the earliest sites of Sumer. New stuff comes out of the
woodwork every day, doesn't it?
According to your Excel file,
John, this would make at the Natufians Semitic-speaking. Do you have a problem
with that?