Re: [tied] Baltic-Slavic disintegration

George Knysh:

> *****GK: The usual view is that Zrubna in the West
> goes through three phases: Early, Sabatynivka,
> Bilozerska. The Early phase is almost exclusively
> "pastoral" and "nomadic", with classic "zrub" burial
> rite. The Sabatynivka phase involves massive "land
> settlement" and "agriculturalization". The classic
> "zrub" rite disappears, though elements thereof
> remain. It is assumed that the preceding population
> ("Bahatovalykovoji keramiky" =your KMK=)provides the
> assimilated substrate. This phase is one of very close
> contacts with the Noa culture, which the usual view
> holds to be an independent "Thracian" culture with
> roots in Romania and Moldavia.

The _Iron Age_ Thracian culture has its roots in Romania indeed, but at the
moment (or rather during the process) of the Satemic disintegration all the
Satemic languages - Aryan, Balto-Slavic, Thracian, Proto-Armenian and some
other - must be neighbours. Thus we have either to take Aryans out the west
steppes and lead them to east, or to take Tracians out the east steppes (or
forest-steppes) and lead them to west. The latter variant seems to me more
realistic.

There are archaeological arguments for the westwards movements in the Middle
Bronze Age steppes
- the direction of distribution of round psalia from the Ural region
(Sintashta) to the west (to Romania and then further to Micenian Greece);
and in the Late Bronze Age steppes
- the direction of distribution of the tin bronze metallurgy from east (West
Siberia and Ural) to west.
BTW, the Iron Age also demonstrates only westward general movements in the
steppes.

Of course, these considerations can not prove that Sabatinovka is the
ancestor for Noua and historical Thracians, but they suggest that one should
look for them somewhere in the eastern steppe/forest-steppe regions.

> Actually this Noa
> culture is quite interesting, since it affected the
> nearby Komariv c. and is deemed responsible for the
> northward spread of the Thrakoid culture (and
> presumably speech) which persisted on the Right bank
> through the classical Scythian period. If Gershkovich
> is right, and Sabatynivka does not belong to the
> Zrubna complex, but is part of a Noa/Sabatynivka
> continuum then the "Thracization" of the Right bank
> acquires additional elements. But what does G. say
> about Bilozerska? The usual view sees this late Zrubna
> culture as a direct continuation of Sabatynivka,
> lasting until Cimmerian times.

He doesn't write about the Belozerskaya c. directly, but I think that it
should have the same roots as Sabatinovka. At least I didn't meet arguments
against it.

=== BTW when you say

> "Aryan variant" do you mean "Pontic Aryan"?

The Srubnaya culture is attributed either as an early Iranian or as
Indo-Aryan (and sometimes even as Indo-Iranian). Anyway it is an Aryan
culture, therefore this variant can be called "Aryan" for Sabatinobka.

The Indo-Aryan attribution of the Srubnaya c. seems to me more preferable
than the Iranian one. There is a number of reasons for it. One of them is
the presence of Pontic Aryan traces.