Re: Bow and arrow

--- In cybalist@yahoogroups.com, "tgpedersen" <tgpedersen@...>
wrote:

> > I also think that it is silly to think that the "Anglo-Saxons"

(the modern ones) are the result of only 2 or 3 well defined groups
of people.

> I totally condemn the unscientific pseudo-scientist who said that.

If you are saying that you agree with me then perhaps we are wasting
time. This was my main point.

[snip]

> >That's no a "moral
> > imperative". That's an imperative of reason.
> >
> Erh, what? My brain is too small to follow your line of reasoning.

It is "against reason" to "draw more conclusions than the evidence
allows", and more than just "a professional hazard". Your imperative
to draw conclusions which are not justified is not just taking a
risk, but aiming to fail.

> > In any case, the Belgae lived in the right time and the right
> place
> > to have been the successors of the Nordwestblok speakers. Which
> > other tribal groups can we say that about?
> >
>
> No they didn't. They lived to the south of them, and at the same
> time. Kuhn thinks they were a group that was temporarily

successful,

> and had conquered the land down to the Seine just prior to

Caesar's

> arrival. The name of the Parisi (of Lutetia Parisium) would be an
> example, since it's from *par-isi- "on the Oise", the confluence

of

> the Seine and Oise being a few tens of km's upstream from Paris.
> Note the Un-Celtic preserved p- (cf. the proper Celtic tribal name
> Are-morica "on the sea"). Another example is the name of the Seine

<

> Sequana, with preserved -kW- although Gaulish is p-Celtic.
> And another thing, Kuhn distinguishes between pre-IE Nordwestblock
> (also called the ar-/ur- language) and IE Nordwestblock; two
> obviously very different languages spoken in sequence in the
> Nordwestblock area.

I understand that this is just one view of the period. For example q
Celtic and p Celtic are now thought to be terms more appropriate to
later languages - indeed the terms mainly distinguish Irish and the
British languages, which I understand are these days grouped
together in distinction to continental Celtic as "insular Celtic".
It is reasonably clear that both p and q pronunciations also existed
on the continent. And even in insular Celtic, there seems to have
been a level of mutual understanding, for example Patrick sometimes
being called Cadraig. Consider the first ch in name of the
Luxemburgish town of Echternach. It seems to have be recorded as a p
by classical writers?

> > > >But by
> > > > Caesar's time it seems likely that the Nordwestblok

language,

> if
> > > > there was one, was on the way out.
> > > >
> > > > > I would think
> > > > > the most likely period for the NWBlock people to enter
> Britain
> > > > would
> > > > > be after their societies were overrun and Germanicised by
> > their
> > > > > Eastern ex-Jastorf neighbors.
> > > > >
> > > >
> > > > Ah. You mean earlier than Caesar?
> > >
> > > Around the time of Caesar and later. Ariovist and his army

would

> > have
> > > been Germanic, but Arminius and his uprising was at least

partly

> > > still Nordwestblock.
> > >
> >
> > How do you judge that? What is the evidence for that?
> >
>
> Caesar and later Tacitus describes a situation where the tribes
> close to the are constantly harassed by tribes from the interior

of

> Germania, which are described as belonging to the Suebian
> confederaton. Archaeology shows that the Celt-like civilisation on
> the right bank of the Rhine (until then archaeologically
> indistinguishable from that on the left bank) and the civilisation
> of western North Germany (ie. the Nordwestblock civilisation) at
> that time is overrun by a culture to the east the upper class of
> which is indistingushable from Poland to Thuringia.
>

Interesting speculation. But you seem to admit that you
connect "cultures", "languages" and political groupings in a rather
speculative way? And then you write as if your conclusions were more
than just speculations.

Best Regards
Andrew