This is partly true, but note that Wolfram
himself speaks of the "Goths" (or Greutungi and Tervingi) in the narrow sense --
Gothic-speakers or "ethnic" Goths, as opposed to other peoples and linguistic
comunities inhabiting Ermanarik's kingdom (and there were surely a large number
of them, some no doubt bilingual or multilingual). Linguistic assimilation
probably often accompanied the adoption of the Gutonic mores by a non-Goth
-- a natural process in such circumstances. Anyway, when we discuss Gothic loans
in Slavic, Gothic etymologies, or Wulfila's Gothic Bible, we mean an
identifiable (and once prestigious) East Germanic language.
By the way, Getic/Dacian was quite
different from Thracian, IMO.
Piotr
----- Original Message -----
Sent: Wednesday, December 05, 2001 1:23
PM
Subject: [tied] Polyethnicity
...
Which all means, I suppose, that arguments like
"the Goths are Germanic speakers, the Getae Thracian-speakers, therefore they
are not identical" (or similarly about Alani and Alamani) do not hold. In such
a gang, or organization, the choice of language is a matter of
expediency;
if the tribe includes a sufficient number of alternatively-speaking people,
you pick your favorite lingua franca for communication.