From: george knysh
Message: 16250
Date: 2002-10-14
>necessary for a
> ***GK: I suppose that it took some time for the
> -->Proto-Slavic lineage to acquire sufficiently
> distinct characteristics. What would be your
> informed guess as to the earliest possible time for
> the emergence of "Proto-Slavic" on linguistic
> grounds? On
> archaeological grounds it would be very difficult to
> argue for a period earlier than the Zarubynets'ka
> culture (200 BC-200 AD). The historical evidence
> seems to indicate that in Herodotus' time pre-Balts
> and pre-Slavs were still lumped together under the
> designation of "Neuri", although the Balto-Slav
> territory where the "most ancient" Slavic toponyms
> and hydronyms can be found (thoroughly mixed with
> Baltisms BTW), viz., the area south of the Pripet r.
> were under Scythian control. I wonder if that is the
> time frame for the differentiation of the "god" name
> as used by "Balts" and "Slavs". The southernmost
> "Balto-Slavic" territory continued to maintain
> strong links with post-Scythian political formations
> in the south.*****
>
> (Piotr)It's difficult to determine the time
> separate lineage to emerge, since******GK: Yes, I think this linguistic scenario fits
> "glottochronological" metrics cannot be trusted.
> However, the Slavic group is very coherent in terms
> of linguistic features; there are numerous common
> innovations not shared with Baltic, and of course
> there are Iranian influences and East Germanic loans
> that aren't shared either. A language ancestral to
> Slavic must have been relatively distinct from the
> rest of Balto-Slavic already before the arrival of
> the Goths in its vicinity, and my impression based
> on the degree of coherence we find in Slavic is that
> one ought to extend its prehistory much further
> back. I'd estimate, cautiously, that
> (pre-)Proto-Slavic acquired some of its unique
> characteristics during the latter half of the first
> millennium BC and at the very beginning of the
> common era, perhaps at the same time as
> Proto-Germanic. Proto-Slavic proper (the latest
> common ancestor of the known Slavic languages)
> developed still more common innovations (e.g. vowel
> changes, the second palatalisation) between AD 200
> and 500. This squares quite well with archaeological
> data, I think, and gives Proto-Slavic a sufficiently
> long period of separate development.
>
>
> Piotr
>__________________________________________________