--- Sergejus Tarasovas <
S.Tarasovas@...>
wrote:
> >
>
Despite
> the fact the hydronymy in question _can't_ be
> explained through the
> Slavic lexis but _can_ through the Baltic one, the
> two scholars (one
> of them indeed being a professional linguist,
> though, IMHO, too often
> buying his (sometimes romantic) ideas at the expense
> of scrupulous
> analysis) nothing doubting state the people to whom
> the hydronymy
> belongs were the Proto-Slavs (or what?) and not the
> Balts. That's the
> logic I can't understand. Can you?
*****GK: Well I don't know about Toporov since I
haven't read his things. But as I understand Petrov,
he is arguing that the population which left these
"Baltic" sounding hydronymics subsequently evolved
into "Slavs". He actually has a fairly good case here
archaeologically. We have evidence of some population
movements in the area of the oldest Slavic hydronymics
(where they are so "interestingly" interspersed with
Baltic ones) but these movements are minor compared to
the continuation of the older cultures. So the
conclusion that the population of the Prague epoch
(6th century) in that area is basically descended from
that of the Scythian epoch is on target. They have
also dabbled in "cranial analysis" which supports this
view. All that is needed is DNA work (when they get
the $$). According to Petrov then the "Baltic"
hydronymics (Baltic because their closest affinities
are to words extant in contemporary Baltic languages)
were the work of these pre-proto-Slavs or whatever
who were part of the Scythian polity (I call them the
"inner Neuri" in other contexts)and who then spoke a
dialect close to that of their northern neighbours,
one which was later substantially changed (the
scenario for that linguists are still debating).
Perhaps he doesn't call them "Balts" because he feels
that they also had linkages to the Thracians and Royal
Scythians which their northern neighbours did
not.******
> Sergei
>
>
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