From: fournet.arnaud
Message: 49687
Date: 2007-08-29
----- Original Message -----From: george knyshSent: Monday, August 27, 2007 11:29 PMSubject: Re: RE : [tied] Re: North of the Somme
> ============ ========= ========= ========= =
>
> A.F :
> This statement you write about the originally
> Celtic status
> of the two parts : "Belgica" and "Gallia" proper
> does not seem to be meeting everybody's opinion
> (on your side).
****GK: There is no "your side". We converge on some
isues and diverge on others. Take this as individually
stated. My opinion is as above.****========================
A.F : I wrote this sentence this way because I had (wrongly) perceived you had the same core idea : So there are in fact three groups of hypotheses :
A : the 1+ 1 = 1, which I represent (All Celtic people)
B : the 1 + 1 = 1,25, which you represent (Most Celtic but with "Germanic" invaders in the northernmost area)
C : the 1 + 1 = 2, which Torsten was advocating with the sub-group C.2 that believe the "Belgian" area is not only non Celtic but may represent a separate branch of PIE to be defined.
================================
> My point of view from the start was that there is
> no known
> criterion to distinguish these two parts.
****GK: There is Caesar's opinion, an excellent one,
based on information passed on by many local Gauls,
esp. Iccius and Antebrogius of the Remi (DBG 2:3).
This is much more reliable than speculative
reinterpretations two thousand years removed.****
==========================================A.F :
I don't know who is reinterpretating speculatively. So far, I made it clear that I deem DBG as not trustworthy.
What you are describing in an "act of faith" : one has no reason to express doubts about words (unrecorded) transmitted by a man, Caesar, (notoriously untrustworthy enough to get murdered by his own familly), transmitted by a chain of people (we know about none at 99% rate). That kind of "act of faith" could also apply to Jesus, for example. It is probably easier to list of the chain of popes and apostles from Jesus to present-day, than to list the chain of people from Iccius down to us. How can we be sure that Iccius even existed ? We might also believe everything Herodotes wrote with such an "act of faith". And Heraklês resisting Sirens' singing, tied to his mast.
So far, my approach is based on historical phonology : I consider that we have enough data kept in sufficiently precise state to be able to make documented statements about what is what, what is clear, what is unclear. And From this lexical and phonological basis, duly ascribed to known (or supposed) languages, we can try to figure out a scenario, without forgetting Occam's razor : undocumented languages do not exist.
I will not move from this way of dealing with this Gallia / Belgica dichotomy, the nature of which is to be determined and is not to be postulated ex nihilo (or because dixit Caesar). Caesar's DBG is just (a bit of) data : not an untouchable principle upon which everything has to rotate like the Earth around the Sun.
As a starting point, I consider this dichotomy as totally unproved. Otherwise, I suppose it would be easy to provide the necessary data. I have sensed that the blunt and blithe conviction that this dichotomy is valid is starting to melt. And I believe the debate has reached a new stage when we can seriously exchange data to be examined and weighed in order to arrive at a sensical shared point of view, which remains to be defined.
===========================================
> These two parts hence being basically
> one and only Gaulish country and undividable,
> the alleged dichotomy having no whatsoever
> ethnolinguistic relevance.
****GK: Willful rejection of reliable data is not very
laudable even if wrapped in French Jacobin slogans
(:=))****A.F :
I accept the justified criticism for having deliberately and knowingly used (provocative) wording. My real intimate conviction is that "Gaulish" is a catch-all concept that has to be refined.
Which "reliable data" are you talking about ?
================================> I believed some (or maybe most) of you were
> contending
> that "Belgica" was a non-Gaulish and a not even
> Celtic area.
****GK: That is my preferred view for the northern
half of what was "Belgica" in Caesar's DBG****
A.F :You are free to like or prefer any opinion. (And so am I). But I will be more easily convinced by facts and data that this hypothesis makes sense. My naive point of view is that science deals with facts, concepts and data. Feelings are something else, even though they interfere.
> ============ ========= ========= ======
> > A.F
>
> the linguistic precise nature of these "Belgians"
> is definitely what is at stake.
> "Germanic" is too fuzzy.
> We know how to recognize Norse, Flemish, Saxon, Frankish, etc.====================================
****GK: A methodological issue. How many of the
"Celtic" place names of ancient Gaul (including
Belgica) have survived in their pristine Gallic form
rather than as reconstructed from later Latin and
French revoicings ?Next: how many of the identifiable
Norse, Flemish, Saxon, Frankish terms could be viewed
as N. Fl. S. or Fr. reinterpretations of ancient
(pristine) Germanic labels?****A.F :
You say you disagree with speculations. So, insofar as a word is clearly ascribable to a known language and there is no hint that this requires a better idea, the most documented ascription is to be held as the only legitimate interpretation.
The rest belongs to God, to the extend he (or she ! or they) exists.
========================
POSTSCRIPT:
I happen to be in agreement with those scholars who
view DBG as having been "serially" produced. Thus Book
I would have been likely penned at Modena in the late
fall of 58 BC. This, of course, is where Caesar makes
his famous comment about the trilingual status of
Gaul. You don't object about Aquitania only about
Belgica. But here is what I think (only me not "my
side" (:=)))--- When Caesar wrote this he identified
the Belgae with their leading, sovereign, tribe (which
at that time happened to be the Nervians (we know this
when we compare the "Belgan" characteristics of DBG
1:1 with the Nervian ones of DBG 2:4 and 2:15.) Here I
quite agree with you: Caesar was wrong to identify
Belgica with the Nervii. He corrected himself in DBG
2.****==========================================
A.F
So far we have not discussed about Aquitania. I probably would not be able to get involved in such a discussion.
Nevertheless, I will not accept this trilingual status in whatever way.
My working hypotheses about the ethnolinguistic status of """""Gaul"""" are :
1. Greek people settled early (-700 ?) and they have left traceable lexical items within a distance of about 200 km from Mediterranean sea-cost (Cf. Wartenburg)
This fact is not in Caesar's work.
2. Proto-Bask people were necessarily "somewhere". Let us accept Aquitania in order to make it simple and short.
3. P-celt Gauls (you may have failed to notice that I use this lengthy wording) are obviously in many places.
Quite strangely, these P-celt Gauls seem to be more obviously present in the Western part of France, even though they are supposed to come from Central Europe. This fact inevitably will require some explanation in one way or another.
4. I have never read anything on possible kw-celt Gauls in France. But this cannot be discarded altogether. There may be some.
5. Some of these alleged "Gauls" are obviously not "Celtic". I consider that "Gaulish" is a fuzzy catch-all word. It only makes description obscure and mixed-up.
The "Gallice diciuntur" Alp mountain is obviously not a Celtic word : Arduenna is the right Celtic word. Alp is from some other language (whether indo-european or not). Roman allegations about what is "gaulish" is obviously about as (not) trustworthy as the French when they speak about "English" people being the only people in the British Isles. A catch-all word that usually provokes angry reactions from Scot, Welsh and Irish people. (I hope I forgot nobody)
The ascription of "Alp" to P-celt Gaulish is wrong. Non P-Celt Gallice diciuntur.
5. My point of view about Aedui and some people allied with Aedui against Arvenes confederation is that these people most probably are non Indo-European people resisting Celtic invasion. This eastern part of France, in Saone river and Alps mountains, is quite strangely occupied by tribes and hydronyms that are often not even Indo-European.
the explanation of Aedui as "fire" is unconvincing.
the river Saone < saucona has kept its un-indo-european name Arar for 1000 years !
6. There are a certain number of odd words derivable from PIE thru non Celtic non Latin phonetic laws that are in favour of a possible Indo-European people being pushed forward by the Celts in front of them and preceding P-Celt Gauls invasion.
I have a certain number of cases to be debated.
7. The Alps area is a place where non Celtic and maybe non-Indo-European presence is most obviously documented.
8. I agree that some people like Atuataki """Belgians !?""" don't look like P-Celt Gauls. But is their name better understood as a "Germanic" name ? and then, which German language ? Do we have to hold these people as pre-Indo-European, P-Celt GAuls, Germans, something else ? I don't know. This is a point to be determined.
==============
So in a word :
Caesar's description is not only unreliable : it is not even a starting point.
======================
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