[tied] Re: Why did Proto-Germanic break up?

>
> > Now the question is: before the breakup, was Proto-Germanic

spoken in

> > all of Northern Germany and Southern Scandinavia (option 1) or

was it

> > spoken in a much smaller area from where they expanded into NGer

and

> > SScand?
>
> Proto-Germmanic a group of related dialects? It may have been

spoken all

> over the area in question, but how can we know for sure?
>

Let my try another angle:

With the two other big European IE branches, Romance and Slavic, we
know they expanded into their present area just before their breakup
(and they probably broke up because their area was now bigger than
one man was likely to travel through in his lifetime). Why is that
not the case with Germanic?

Torsten