Re: That old Ariovistus scenario.

--- On Fri, 6/26/09, tgpedersen <tgpedersen@...> wrote:

> How would you account for the movement of Croats from Tanais to

> Southern Slavland?

****GK: In the first place one cannot even prove that there was any such movement. The Bosporan inscription refers to an individual with a hellenized Iranic name. We have no other evidence of "Croats" in that area at that time (3rd c. AD). ****

>

> GK: My view is that defensive set-ups ("croatias")

****GK: I don't have my notes on hand, but remember that that there is a Slovak verb where "croat" (something like "khorovaty se" if memory serves) means "to defend" one's self****

were

> organized by th Avars along their northern borders (in the

> Carpathians and beyond) against the looming Turkic threat.

****GK: Sometime in the 570's.****

The

> leading elements were imported from the east and settled among

> Slavs. Their ethnicity is open to debate: you can try etymologizing

> the names of the rulers' ancestors from the account in Constantine

> Porphyrogenitus.

****GK: (from memory) There were five names (3 "brothers" and two "sisters) None seemed particularly Slavic.****


After the crisis of the 630's some of these

> "Croats" moved south. Many however remained north and subsequently

> fused with Czechs, Poles, and Ukrainians.

>

> When? The communis opinio of Slavic infiltration in the 6th-7th

> centuries has no archaelogical match-up.

>

> GK: I haven't studied the archaeology except for Bulgaria and

> Greece, which is ample.

Aha. Does the ample archeology of Bulgaria and Greece support your scenario?

> But the historical documentation seems sufficient.

So screw the lack of relevant archaeological data? Remind me now, what is it that makes you think your scenario is more tenable than mine?

****GK: My scenario of what? Slavic arrival in the Balkans? AFAIK then "archaeological problem" in Croatia is the absence of evidence for the "Croats" arriving at the time postulated by Constantine P. But there is ample evidence for a Slavic presence in the northern "croatias" and for Slavic movement into the Balkans in the 6th century. I doubt these early arrivals were called "Croats" (just as the early Slavs of Bulgaria weren't called "Bulgars"). But a small contingent of "croats" from northern Avaria need not have left archaeological traces (the 3 brothers and two sisters). In any case there is a good deal of evidence for Croats as of the 7th c. onwards, and the logic of their name and presence is infinitely preferable to your "Harudes" scenario, which makes no sense whatever in Slavic history terms.*****