Re: Check out Origin of Ancient Languages

--- In cybalist@..., x99lynx@... wrote:

> Torsten wrote:
> <<This is what I still believe: Germania, ie. Germanic-speaking
> what-is-now-Germany (not Scandinavia) is the product of some

invasion from

> the east, which imposed some uniform Bastanian creole on the local

Celts,

> abolishing the druids (the intellectuals) as a class, opening up

for social

> climbing in a militarized society. There's your later France and

Germany

> already.>>
>
> A couple of things that may or may not be relevant to this, to

consider as

> you choose.
> - Christiansen (i'll get you the cite if you like) describes the

archaeology

> in mid Central Europe at about 500BC in a very interesting way. At

that

> time, the settlements of the western oriented Halstatt culture

fundamentally

> disappear from north of the Danube all the way west to the Tisza

River. What

> are found there at the same time are not settlements or pottery,

but Scythian

> arrowheads -- apparently in great abundance across a wide

geographical range.
Or Cimmerian?

> Now, it is known to be difficult to trace the "settlements" of

people who

> live in wagons. But Chistiansen feels that the Scythians were

essentially

> raiders who left the land from somewhere north of the Carpathians

to the

> Danube and into modern Hungary essentially a no-man's land -- at

least for a

> time. But at the same time he notes contact between Scythians and

modern

> Denmark.

Hungary was the last peace of prairie for a raider people comig from
the east. Ideal for a base. Cf. the later raids of the Hungarians (in
case anyone has seen "Lohengrin")

> - About this same exact time, Jastorf -- traditionally the

archetypical early

> "Germanic" material culture -- begins to emerge and spread into

Central

> Europe from the directiom of Denmark. It enters what John Collis

ALSO calls

> a no-man's land in the Central European Plain -- he describes it in

terms of

> being bereft of settlement, and improverished of technology and

material

> advances that was already well established in the south. But this

expansion

> by Jastorf also pushs Halstatt culture further south and west.
> - What happened to the Halstatt trade system at this time is less

clear, but

> there is evidence that it lost access to OR control of the northern

and

> eastern trade routes. And suddenly the Scandinavian iron age

begins.
According to Albrectsen and several others the initial (Celtic) Iron
Age is just that - an iron age. Finds are greatly reduced.

There

> is clear evidence of Scythian contact and maybe even settlement in

areas of

> modern Poland where Halstatt-related material cultures used to be

dominant.

> And the "Celts" who appear on the Danube centuries later appear to

have been

> part of a western contingent rather than any kind of a remnant.
> - One might conjecture on this basis, some kind of common action

between

> Scandinavia and the Scythians may have been involved, perhaps even

a formal

> alliance.

Or perhaps a Scythian invasion. Or Cimmerian?

I've mentioned the incredibly impressive Scythian gold necklace

> that was found in the Danish bogs from this time. Exchange of

royal

> daughters and such, a grand old tradition.
> And perhaps a key time establishing the language distribution which

emerges

> historically. And once that "Scythian - Scandinavian" highway was
> established, it could provide the on-going cultural interchange you

suggest

> occurred later on. The other thing I think it did was set the

stage for

> establishing another factor in all this -- the Germanic mercenary --

a class

> that became attached to the trade routes and centers and

marketplaces for its

> wherewithal -- and which may have had a lot to do with spreading

the language

> eastward. This vocation is already evident in Livy's and Plautus'
> description of the apparently German-speaking Bastarnae.
> - The connection of Baltic-Slavic to Germanic is difficult to

figure in this,

> but if this scenario is correct, it would mean that the "early"

connection

> with Germanic supposedly found in the UPenn study is either very

early or

> rather late. Piotr doubts it on phonological grounds and that

might means

> that the connection Rule found on lexical and morphological grounds

is

> coincidence or later areal. In any case, when Slavic comes, it

really comes,

> spreading over a good piece of Europe in practically no time with a

large

> population to back it up. Where it was hiding and why it exploded

when it

> did is both an interesting linguistic and, more broadly, historical

question.

>
> Regards,
> Steve Long

Thanx for the interesting information!

Torsten