> What's the overall consensus on an original Italo-Celtic
> (possibly including Venetic and maybe Illyrian?) ? Could Italic, Celtic,
> Lusitanian, Venetic, Illyrian, and maybe Balto-Slavic-Germanic have been
> an original West Indo-European genetic grouping?
As far as I know, the overall consensus is that Italo-Celtic unity is out.
It was "in" about the 1960's, but the arguments against it are too strong.
Likewise any link with Germanic. On the other hand, there are sufficient
links for us to talk of areal links, and shared vocabulary, and shared
influence one upon another. These three also stand distinct from the
Greek-Armenian-Indo-Iranian lot; although there are some ways in which
Italic and Greek share innovations (eg pronoun plurals used on nouns). As
for the others, is our evidence sufficient to tell?
Peter