Re: PIE homeland in northwest India?

From: Richard Wordingham Message: 17393
Date: 2003-01-04

'Out of India' is discussed in
Messages 8784 to 9211, 9585 to 9597
and 14798. Related matters are
discussed in 9394, 9436, 14695,
14745, 14758 and 16640 to 16690. -
Richard.
--- In cybalist@yahoogroups.com,
"anthonyappleyard <MCLSSAA2@...>"
<MCLSSAA2@...> wrote:
> Anthony Appleyard wrote:-
> > What support is there for a
theory that I have come across, that
> > the Indo-Europeans came from
northwest India? The immediate
> > scenario is that a bad drought
in northwest India caused
> > migrations, and invasion and
immigration pressure on the
remaining
> > fertile land in
>
> --- In cybalist@yahoogroups.com,
"P&G" <petegray@...> wrote:
> > This has been widely discussed,
and by far the consensus is that
> > such a scenarios does not
explain the linguistic evidence. For
> > example, there would have had to
be several waves of emigration,
> > not just one, because of links
that Indo-Iranian has to some IE
> > languages and not others. Indian
scholars link the theory, and wish
> > it to be true, but it does fly -
in my opinion absurdly - against
> > the evidence. Peter
>
> About what dates, or range of
archived message serial numbers, was
> this theory discusssed?
>
> --- "matt6219 <matt62@...>"
<matt62@...> wrote:
> > I have always thought that the
idea of a single migration from
> > India to be absurd, and that a
number of migrations to be much more
> > likely. Why would this scenario
be a problem ?
>
> Likely in the beginning, northwest
India was wetter than now, and
> could support a dense population,
not only from the River Sarasvati,
> but also from rain. As
deforestation and overgrazing
gradually
> destroyed the forests in the Indus
/ Sarasvati plain, the land dried
> up, and recurrent droughts drove
successive waves of emigrants from
> the area, who were likely also
encouraged to leave and get right
away
> by the army of the king of the
remaining fertile area who got tired
> of being invaded and raided by
people from the drought-affected
areas.
>
> I have the book "Vedic Aryans and
the Origins of Civilization" by
> Navaratna S.Rajaram and David
Frawley, ISBN 81-85990-36-0, publ.
by
> Voice of India.
>
> This book says that Natwar Jha has
decipered the Indus valley script
> and that it turned out to be
Sanskrit written in a syllabary that
> largely ignored vowels. What
support is there for this
decipherment?
>
> If this is correct, then when the
Indus Valley script started to be
> used, I suspect that its language
was likely more like PIE than
> Sanskrit, and in early
inscriptions linguists should look
for forms
> with these features:-
> (1) Second palatalization not yet
happened: e.g. *[kakara] instead of
> [cakara] = "I have made".
> (2) First (satem) palatalization
not yet happened.
> (3) Laryngeals represented by
consonant signs.