Hello John,
I wrote:
> > I agree that ultimately one of the early farmers groups produced
> > the NEC people. However I'd expect a wider scale of its early
> > branching. The idea of J.Bengtson's Macro-Caucasian superfamily
> > (including NEC, NWC, Basque and Burushaski) would fit here
> > perfectly.
>
> Yes, I have seen some versions of this. The Encyclopedia of Language
> suggests a deep level structure (approx 12000 BP, i.e. PPNA times)
> between NE and NW Caucasian, and Oppenheimer recently suggested a
> trans-Mediterranean post-neolithic connection between Basque and
> Caucasian, based upon human genetics, that would support 1/2 of
> Bengtson's thesis.
Among the arguments pro the Macro-Caucasian concept there is the "wheat"
word (M. Witzel mentions it in his "Early Loan Words in Western Central
Asia"):
- Burushaski <gur>
- Basque <gari>
- NEC *Go:l'e
Besides, the following forms could be borrowings:
- Kartvelian *ghomu
- Drav. *go:di
John wrote:
> I have often wondered about Maikop, bit I thought
> it too far West into the NW Caucasian area, and given the connections
> between Maikop and Alaka Huyuk, that certainly lends itself to
> Hattic.
We consider Hattic as a NWC language, don't we?
Hatti (or the group they belong to) are unique due to inventing the iron
metallurgy which remained a secret for foreigners until the downfall of the
Hittite empire. Ethnographical evidences show that iron making belongs to
the sacral sphere and takes a very special place in Abkhazian and Adyghian
rites. According to S.Starostin, the names of the smith-gods in Abkhazian
(Shashwa) and in Adyghian (Lepsh) go back to the Proto-Ab-Ad form *Xapshwe,
which can be cognate to the Hattic name Hashmil (with the name suffix -il-)
and, BTW, to Greek Hephaistos.
Thus, in all probability, Proto-Ab-Ad left Asia Minor for the NW Caucasus
only in the Iron Age, in 2,500 years after the Maikop c. appeared there.
Similarity with tribal names of the territiry to north from the Hittite empi
re coud be an additional argument:
Kasog - Kashka
Abkhaz, Abazin - Amazones (have you seen the national costume of Abazin
women:
http://abazapress.chat.ru/14.jpg - actually a military uniform)
I guess, Amazones were an East-Iranian tribe who mixed up with (or gave the
name to) the local NWC-speaking substrate.
> The Beldibi culture was strongly influenced by the Natufian.
Microliths? Or?
> Were the Central Saharan "catfish" people Afro-
> Asiatics? Afro-Asiatic has a common cognate for bowl or pot.
I don't think so.
From the R.Winshall's abstract (
http://www.h-net.org/~africa/biblio/Winshall.html):
"Christopher Ehret's work touched on Sutton's language hypothesis--that
these early fishers were NiloSaharan speakers. In the process of generating
protolanguages for these speakers, he created an initial vocabulary for both
NiloSaharan, proto-Saharan and proto-Sahelian. The words that he developed
do not include fish or fishing terms (line, net, hook, harpoon). This early
vocabulary does have herding terms and words for 'goat', 'young goat',
'cow', 'corral' and such."
I'd expect that the wavy-line pottery people were the ancestors for both
Nilo-Saharan and Niger-Congo.
Regards,
Alexander