Re: Renfrew vs Mallory (Was "New Member)

Your comparison of the Mallory/Renfrew "origins of language" is most
enlightening. You claim that Renfrew sees language spreading based
on the development of agriculture. You also state that Mallory bases
his "spread of IE" on the monopoly of the horse.

What we actually are dealing with is the same time period with BOTH
farm populations vs. nomadic tribes. Both were instrumental in the
development and acquisition of linguistic elements. Both heralded a
rich culture and exciting folk lore. Did one group or the other
produce a richer "culture"? My guess is that the nomadic tribes,
because of their constant exposure to different cultural elements,
artistically as well as technologically far surpassed the sedentary
farmers.

Cordially,

Gerry

> Some points and an opinion.
>
> First, Renfrew's stated purpose was to free archaeology from the

dating

> imposed by linguistics.
>
> Renfrew's book was revolutionary, though it was already off on some

of the

> archaeology of the day and imprecise or non-chalant about the

linguistics.

> Renfrew basically connected the spread of IE languages with the

spread of

> agriculture (which included animal and plant domestication.)
>
> Mallory's book represented a calculated answer in defense of an

updated

> version of the long established viewpoint that the IE languages

represent an

> "IE culture", that it spread through the aggressive use of the "IE"

monopoly

> of the horse and that both the time and the history of the spread

can be

> reconstructed through linguistics. It should be said that Renfrews
> breakthroughs as an archaeologist had a lot to do

with "demolishing" the

> earlier dating of PIE to 2500BC and such -- dates Mallory himself

was quick

> to abandon.
>
> Both Renfrew's and Mallory's books are now more than a decade old.

A lot of

> new archaeology has come since then. The genetic studies that were

brand new

> when Renfrew wrote are now severely dated. The understanding of

the spread

> of the neolithic in Eurasia has significantly advanced. The

willingness to

> identify a culture as "IE" archaeologically has severely shrunk.
>
> If anything archaeological dates have steadily moved the key

elements of

> Mallory's liguistic links back towards the coming of the

neolithic. For

> example, I recently posted a news story about dairy production

being

> discovered in Britain dating back to 4500BC. The apparent late

arrival of

> dairying (c 3000BC) was one of Mallory's anchor points for dating

the last

> unity of PIE. It appears dairy farming now arrived in the midst of

the

> neolithic revolution -- consistent with Renfrew's theory. The same

has

> essentially happened with metallurgy, while the connection between

the horse

> and the spread of IE has had no real archaeological confirmation.
>
> Mallory's dating and definition of IE claims to be linguistic but

is actually

> mostly dependent on the dating and interpretation of archaeology.

Mallory's

> book is often cited as being against the proposition that languages

can be

> dated archaeologically, which is far from its actual position.
>
> And often the position of the book is supported by unsupportable

claims about

> both fields. Mallory's book often states key assertions about

archaeology as

> if they were fact (e.g., that the wheel came to the Pontic area by

way of the

> Caucasus). Conversely he states certain propositions in

ridiculously

> absolute terms based he says on linguistics. (e.g., that it is
> linguistically certain that Hittite could not have come into Asia

Minor by

> way of the Caucasus.) It is a big disappointment to me that such

puffery has

> not been soundly countered by linguists themselves.
>
> A proper linguitically based refutation of Mallory's book needs to

be

> written, but for various reasons that time has not come. In the

meantime, it

> continues to misinform many about the real archaeology of this vast

time

> period and what the actual, unbiased implications are for language

history.

>
> In the meantime, the supposed ethnically-inspiring heritage of head-

bashing

> golden-haired horsemen imposing their will and language on a

groveling

> underclass will overshadow the more likely scenario of modest but

persistent

> dirt farmers, sheep herders and cowpokes spreading out across a

continent and

> a half. If there is anything consistent in the IE (and human

tradition) it

> is the imaginary glorious ancestors Mallory offers us.
>
> Steve Long