Re: [tied] Re: Interpreting some Scythian names

--- Piotr Gasiorowski <gpiotr@...> wrote:

> --- In cybalist@..., george knysh <gknysh@...>
> wrote:
>
>PG: Talking of experts and amateurs, I may be an

amateur

> in history and
> archaeology. Call me what you like and correct my
> errors -- I'll
> swallow the former and will be grateful for the
> latter.

****GK: I'm sorry if I offended you. I didn't mean to.
I like what you write and the way you write it even if
I don't always agree. I've learned a great deal from
you Piotr, and hope to learn more. As for Petrov
(1894-1969). I confess that I don't know a great deal
about him as a linguist beyond the two books that I
read ("Skify. Mova i Etnos." "Etnogeneza Slovjan".)
They both came out in 1972, and quickly became a
bibliographical rarity. I understand that these items
were published by Kyiv's "Naukova Dumka" just weeks
before the "big Shcherbytskyj crackdown" on "original"
Ukrainian creativity. Petrov seems to have become a
linguist rather late (sometime in the 1950's.) Petrov
had other interests also. He was the Ukrainian
literary critic Domontovych. (Same fellow different
names). And he had quite a career as a double agent in
his youth and middle age.******

PG:What I know

> has been gleaned from my reading, since the kind of
> research I do
> research requires a little interdisciplinary
> orientation. But I'm
> paid for doing linguistics and have been properly
> trained to do it
> well. I don't care what sort of reputation Petrov
> used to enjoy or
> maybe still enjoys. The fragments you showed us look
> amateurish,
> that's all.

*****GK: Possibly this was the work of Petrov's
editor, to make the thing more "popular"-oriented.
There are multiple other passages which seem much more
technically apt. But in any case, if you ever get the
chance do read the stuff. You won't waste your time,
if only because of the very interesting
interpretations of Scythian society (many of which
have since percolated into mainstream historical
science [like Petrov's view on the famous Scythian
"enclosed settlements"].******

>
> ****GK: So if API goes back to what you call common
> IE, or Proto-Indo-
> Iranian why the urgent need to understand it by
> reference to Iranic
> dialects only?****
>
> PG:Nobody does that on the basis of a single word,
> especially an
> inherited one. It doesn't prove much either way.
> There's better
> evidence elsewhere.

*****GK: Precisely Petrov's point against the
Iranists.****

>
> PG: Anyway, *ap- is an impeccable
> > Proto-Iranian word (and Proto-Indo-Iranian too,
> > given the Sanskrit cognates), even if it is
> missing
> > from Ossetic in underived form. The reason for
> that
> > is a trivial semantic shift particular to Ossetic:
> > don < *danu < *dHa:nu 'river' came to mean
> 'water',
> > ousting the older term. However, the development
> > *ap-ra- > *afra- > arf- is regular (even the
> Ossetic
> > metathesis *-fr- > -rf-), and I see no obstacles
> to
> > accepting this derivation.
>
> *****GK: Petrov did not deny it either. But the idea
> was to show that
> it was easier to rely (here and in many cases) on
> Baltic analogies
> rather than to automatically search for Iranic
> cognates. He looked at
> Baltic, Iranic, and Thracian material because of the
> territorial contiguity factor.*****
>
> PG: What "Baltic analogies?" Did the Balts have a

Mother

> River goddess
> called Api, or something? He doesn't show at all
> that the connection
> is "easier", or more convincing, or superior in any
> sense. Closer
> connections can be demonstrated using shared
> innovations, but not
> shared archaisms. That's the ABC of historical
> linguistics.

*****GK: I understand (?). So that the Slavic "Bog(h)"
rather than the D word in Baltic akin to "Deus"
indicates that their ancestor population had closer
contacts to Iranians than the ancestor population of
the Balts. Unless I'm confusing borrowing and
innovation...But then when the "shared archaisms" are
exceedingly numerous (and exclusive) that tells you
something too doesn't it? They could also have been
in Thracian of course but there's only about 180
extant words of that...(nearly 60% shared with Baltic,
10% with Iranic, 10% with Indo-Aryan).*****

> PG: Territorial contiguity? There are many Iranian

loans

> in Slavic, but
> very few in Baltic; that tells you something about
> the early
> geographical configuration of the three groups.

*****GK: And here ancient hydronyms can be very useful
indeed. The basin of the Sejm r. is a well-known
ancient contact zone between Baltic and Iranic. But
given your loan words statement perhaps one should say
"BaltoSlavicScythian" and Iranic. The "loan words"
indubitably acquired there didn't make it into the
hinterland. The fact is though that linguists have
reconstituted these hydronyms thanks to Baltic terms.
There was territorial contiguity between non-Royal
"Scythians" and the areas known to be then occupied by
populations which evolved into Balts, and the areas
which were then Thracian (if one includes Geto-Dacian)
and the areas where Iranic could be postulated (still,
even if the "Royals" were acculturating).******

>PG: "Thracian material"
> is scarce and should be used with utmost care.

****GK: I agree. There is no guarantee that the
so-called "Thracian" material on the right bank of the
Dnipro is not in fact "Scythian".*****

>
> Piotr
>
>

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