From: Anne Lambert
Message: 14076
Date: 2002-07-19
>From: "richardwordingham" <richard.wordingham@...>Stupid question: was Etruscan related to IE, and if so how?
>Reply-To: cybalist@yahoogroups.com
>To: cybalist@yahoogroups.com
>Subject: [tied] Re: Europeans descend from Basques
>Date: Mon, 17 Jun 2002 13:54:58 -0000
>
>Dear John,
> Have you read
>http://www.stats.ox.ac.uk/~macaulay/papers/richards_2000.pdf? It
>talks of refuge areas both in S. W. France and Spain and in Italy, so
>that after the Last Glacial Maximum (LGM) Europe would have been
>recolonised from both the South West and the Near East. I don't know
>whether 'South West' includes Italy or not; I don't see why not.
>This spread is dated to c. 14.5kYBP. This scenario in itself
>suggests that there would have been several language families
>present, let alone several languages. I don't think any of us
>believe there was a single, widespread langauge just before the
>spread of IE. (In this context, 'Europe' excludes, at the very
>least, Russia and the Caucasus.)
>
>Under this scenario the Basque country might well be the Basque
>urheimat (if earlier history is ignored), though I don't know if
>Italy is excluded! In so far as one can trust populations to keep
>their own languages (Glen doesn't!), an examination of the mtDNA
>might exclude Italy. (The paper above gives a working hyperlink to
>the data. Tread with care! An examination might be totally
>inconclusive! Has any member of the group looked at this raw data?
>I've only got as far as down-loading it.) It is not impossible that
>Vasconic entered from the Near East after the LGM; the earliest
>Europeans are best represented in Scandinavia, not the Basque country!
>
>Spain has furnished written materials from classical times for at
>least two languages (one is Iberian) unrelated to Indo-European,
>Semitic or Basque and I think unrelated to one another! Adding
>Aquitanian (reckoned as a relative, possibly ancestor) of Basque we
>get three indigenous European languages unrelated to larger groups.
>Some would add Pictish (though others will say that Pictish is
>several languages, and some that it is Indo-European), and some will
>reckon that Etruscan is indigenous.
>
>One can envisage many different possible linguistic patterns prior to
>the Neolithic. It is quite possible that languages related to IE
>were already widely spread in Europe - some would cite Etruscan as an
>example, though there is a strong tradition that it arrived from Asia
>Minor relatively recently. (Is this tradition related to Aeneas's
>flight from Troy to Latium?)
>
>I suspect the Neanderthal and Vasconic lingerings-on have both
>depended on peripherality. (There may be other parallels, e.g.
>valley versus hill.) However, it is always possible that Vasconic
>had a late expansion before the Roman conquests secured the
>Mediterranean lands for Indo-European.
>
> Regards,
> Richard.
>-----Original Message-----
>From: jpisc98357@... [mailto:jpisc98357@...]
>Sent: Saturday, June 15, 2002 6:17 PM
>To: cybalist@yahoogroups.com
>Subject: Re: [tied] Re: Europeans descend from Basques...
>
>
>Dear Friends,
>
> The Basques have been giving this group a lot of food for
>thought.
>
> Does anyone consider it possible that Europe was once populated
>by many tribes using similar languages and that their survival
>pattern followed that of the Neanderthals who once inhabited all of
>Europe and the Near East?
>
> The last pockets of Neanderthals are also speculated to have
>lived in the Pyrennes Mountains and perhaps other parts of the
>Iberian penninsula.
>
> My personal belief is that the Basque territory was not the
>Urheimat of the Basque people, only their last refuge in Europe where
>a pocket managed to survive.
>
> Here is a case where mtDNA studies might help.
>
>Best Regards, John
>
>
>
>
>
>
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