Re: Finnic substrate in Slavic?!

--- On Thu, 3/4/10, Torsten <tgpedersen@...> wrote:





--- In cybalist@... s.com, johnvertical@ ... wrote:
>
> > > > > What leads you to choose a Finnic substrate in Slavic over
> > > > > a Balto-Slavic substrate in Finnic?
> > > >
> > > > Because historically the Finnics were the losers.
> > >
> > > Seriously now.
> >
> > I am serious. The Finnic speakers have historically been
> > retreating before Balto-Slavic speakers.

****GK: This is true as of the partly documented period beginning with the first centuries BCE, esp. in the area of "classic" central Russia. It wasn't true earlier, as far as we can tell from archaeology. It's hard to say whether the carriers of the Fatyanovo culture might already be viewed as proto-BaltoSlavs, but the advance of the Finno-Ugrians westward undoubtedly pushed back and assimilated these IE groupings. Some of this was lost in the period 200-600 CE when Balts pushed eastward again at the expense of the FU, reaching once more into the area of the Moscow river. We thus have a geographical configuration between (roughly) Latvia/Lithuania and the Middle Volga where it seems rather difficult to determine what (and when) is "substrate" and what isn't...*****