>I don't get it. If there was no settlement boom, then the boom of
>new -eÅti names would have spread in existing settlements.
Imagine a gradual "growth": after the first mentioning of
such place names, a *gradual* increase in number in a long
period of time: several centuries. Do not imagine a boom as
if a massive immigration had taken place (in 1-2-3 years)
(as if many people had run thither upon hearing one had
found... gold! :))
All written material (from a long period of time = centuries)
show that the place names with this ending are a quite late
occurrence. (Usually, such options are... whimsical. Look at
the map: where do you find most of Germanic place names ending
in -ham? Practically only in England and Bavaria+Austria;
although in all Germanic countries -ham (< heim) has been
known. Or -weiler: chiefly in the areas that happen to be
interesting to you because of Ariovist. Although all over
the territory with German-speaking populations use the
word/notion Weiler, in other German-speaking areas such
place names are scarce or better said: non-extant.)
Such peculiarities might be a marker for the presence of
some ethnic groups, but they are not a... *must*. (BTW,
as far as the Dacian and Thracians are concerned: a similar
situation, the area of place names ending in -dava, -dova
and in -para have prompted some researchers to conclude
-dava means the presence of Dacians and -para the presence
of Thracians, but who can tell that this really was so
2,000 years ago? In the case of English and Bavarians
everyone knows the same -ham doesn't mean the same
population, but in 2,000 years scholars will also be
tempted to say "those living near London, Munich and
Vienna must have been the same ethnos". The'll be
partially right: they live in the same "country" - the
European Union. :)
>What's the origin of Slavic toponym suffix -iÅ¡Äe, BTW?
I don't know. Maybe you can tell me. (I only know that
in Romanian the rendering -iÅ¡te for -iÅ¡Äe is considered
to be a marker for the influence by Bulgarian Slavic.
And I also know that -ište is a different suffix with a
different semantic & role in the usage than -ešti; they
are by no means interchangeable.)
>It wouldn't really have to as such, if old naming habits
>for anthroponyms and toponyms survived (ie. the suffixes).
Of course. But it's a far way between a sudden "what if?"
and an advanced phase where there is a sufficient gathering
of "Merkmale".
>Dutch is officially a Low German dialect (but don't tell the Dutch
>or Flemings).
I know (and I already did in an NG on Usenet :)).
>I know. High German became important because all the important
>institutions were in the High German area. That's circular.
Above all: the Church. And where the Frankish kings, marshalls
and seneshals had their "Pfalzen" & other important places.
They were more in the south; although Oche (Aachen/Aix la
Chapelle) and Fulda are not quite southern places, when seen
from Switzerland, Austria, Bavaria and Bohemia. :)
>Sounds German alright ;-)
Es ist nicht zu fassen: you again quoted the whole stuff!
Why did you do that? Were you afraid that the original post
could get lost and the honorable cybalist readers wouldn't
be able to read the cited paragraphs from the Atlas der
deutschen Sprache? :) (Torsten, puhleeze, learn to quote.)
>That Ariovistus came from the east? Here:
>http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Poland_in_Antiquity#Early_Roman_wars_and_movement_of_tribes
>and check the archives.
This is no explanation, no illustration, no demonstration.
This is only a molecular info saying that A. traveled from
"sunrise" to "sunset". This is as if I'd say Willem van
Rubruk traveled from "sunset" to "sunrise", where he met
Batu's underlings, greeted "merhaba" and asked for a cup
of kumis.
>>Until then, I'll
>>tend to accept the mainstream finds, namely that, at such an
>>early stage of the language transformations it did not matter
>>whether Elbe Germanic groups or Rhine-Weser-North Sea groups
>>had the "upper hand" 500-600 years prior to the colonization
>>of the South.
>
>??? What??
What "what"? Show me the significant pre-German population
in the South before the real pre-Germans came in. Show me
that the pre-existent pre-German population had that kind of
Germanic language that deserves being called "high German".
These are the two chapters of your... task.
>Under Ariovistus or in the decades after him under other
>leaders. The Helvetian lands on the upper Danube had become
>deserted.
But, until the massive Germanic colonization of the territory
in question there is a chronologic gap consisting in *centuries*
not in mere decades! A missing link 4-6 centuries long.
>>Linguistically they were rather Suebians.
>
>After they moved south.
What sources tell you Langobards hadn't been before that?
>Poland had been cleared of Germanic-speakers (except Jews,
>I think, and a few splinter groups) by that time.
At that time no Jew spoke German(ic) (except for a few
translators :)). And in those times, Khazars were not yet
converted to Judaism.
>I mention them when they are relevant, or when I'm asked.
Now you've seen they aren't relevant in the Ariovist-Bastarnae-
Hochdeutsch-Schöffe context, so give them a break, coz they
didn't have Easter holidays.
>The Bastarnae spoke Bastanian. If the Bastarnae are the ancestors
of those social and geographical groups in Germany which speak
>High German, then Bastarnian is the ancestor of High German.
If! Sharing some artefacts doesn't automatically mean *"must"*.
I also possess computers & al. electronical hardware made by
American and South-Korean companies, but I ain't neither
American nor Korean; and have several baseball caps, but I
don't play and don't like baseball.
>In order to show that the Bastarnae spoke Proto High German I
>thus have to show that the ancestors of the social and
>geographical groups in Germany which speak High German
>were the Bastarnae.
Hehe, at laaast!
>That I will have to do with archaeological and historical
>evidence alone.
Archeological evidenc will help you only if someone one day
will unearth some fragments of a text written in Hochdeutsch
saying "Liebe Lait, des, wos ets lest, des is gwiss
Bastarnisch!" Until then, the recently discovered metal plates
have a bigger chance to be seen as older than the Qumran
scripts.
>But their old territory was in the Low German speaking area,
>so we need an explanation why the Frankish upper layer spoke
>a High German language then. That won't fly.
What if the differentiation betw. low and high German really
started much later and what if during Bastarnae's time this
differentiation wasn't there?
>According to Kuhn, the area was being Germanized at the
>time, which means the Cherusci and Arminius weren't even
>German.
What were they then? Maybe Illyrians?
>>I'm even ready to accept a thesis of yours stating "there were
>>no Franks actually, the so-called Franks were Bastarnians".
>
>I never said that.
I know. But this could be a scenario. Or that they appear later
on under another "disguise". For, if they really were so
important, and a superior social stratum at that, acknowledged
by the others, and if they were supposed to further play a
leading & ruling role, they must have been one of the populations
we know (and this would also satisfy the objection that they
had another name for themselves, an endonym, and not that
derogatory name given to them by Romans).
>As I said, in later times, the language of the upper layer in later
>times is High German, also in nominally Low German areas. The people
>of the suddenly appearing Fürstengräber in old Germania were the
>upper layer of that society.
Thus, the Frankish ones too (actually, especially them!).
>Provided there was no linguistic upheaval in the meantime, the
>latter are the ancestors of the former and would have spoken a
>language which was the ancestor of High German.
Yes, but why only the Bastarnians? Why not some neighbor? E.g.
Burgundians, Alamanians, Suebians, Langobards. The ancestors
of the Bavarians also showed up as though "out of the blue"
around AD 500: they also might be candidates (how do you know
that Bavarians aren't the real Bastarnae survivors? They went
to Bavaria and Austria coming from Bohemia, which is closer
to Bastarnaes territory and on the same NE-SW line).
>Furthermore, the upper layer with their Fürstengräber appears
>in Germania exactly at a time when the Bastarnian 'state'
>collapses, and are archaeologically similar.
Oh, now I see: you're basing the whole thing only on this.
>The Vangiones, Triboci and Nemetes were part of Ariovistus'
>army, according to Caesar. Get your facts straight.
These are indeed important. (I mentioned myself in one
previous post.) So: what happened to them between the 1st c. BCE
and AD 600? Did they become a major Germanic > German population
of South Germany? And the next significant question: if so,
were they Bastarnae known under other ethnic names?
>>Yes, but Hochdeutsch is a German dialects group chiefly
>>extant south of the Limes.
>
>No.
>http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High_german
That what has been North-East of the Limes is to chiefly be
seen as the result of later medieval Ostsiedlung (i.e. the
re-Germanization of territories that were emtied of Germanic
populations during the Great Migrations and repopulated by
Slavs). Those German dialects are actually sub-dialects
(at least in my opinion), since they can't compare with
the other dialects as far as the differentiations are concerned.
(And no wonder that the common language which evolved as
the standard written Hochdeutsch after Luther developed
around Weimar.)
It would have been the other way around if the Völker-
wanderungszeit would have left there a compact massive
population with nonstop continuity, that would have
influenced the rest in the 7th-15th centuries, and if
the center of the Frankish royal and imperial power
would have been in Thuringia, Saxony, Silezia etc.
>>(Show me that chieftains of South-Germans had Bastarnian
>>origins.)
>
>I can't.
If your assumption is correct, namely that Bastarnae, as a
respected social class continued its "career" in the
Germanic world, then they must have perpetuated under an
other name or been assimilated, in high or highest positions,
within one Germanic population or another. IMHO, the best
candidate would have been the Frankish nation. I for one
would examine the plausibility of such a hypothesis.
>>It is the main point of *your* topic!
>
>I decide what is the main part of my topic.
From the moment on in which you stay face to face with
the jury, you don't make any decision: the monopoly of
making decisions is in the claws of the jury (peer view :)).
Otherwise you'd despise the court and you'd be in to
support the consequences (including getting a piece of
ostrakon ;)).
>>(roughly
>>between Frankfurt and South-Tyrol).
>
> Yes.
Which roughly means "south of the Limes".
>This is where Ariovistus' troops came from
>http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Poland_in_Antiquity#Early_Roman_wars_and_movement_of_tribes
>That's probably how much you can get out of archaeology wrt that
>queation.
But do you realize that those tribes could have had relevance
only if they would have built a Germanic population/nation
in South Germany in those centuries (4-6 centuries) before
the real great Germanic colonization set in? I put his
question some paragraphs before. This is the central issue!
I've never heard, read, I've never been taught in school of
such a pre-existing German/ic population in what's called
South Germany (or the South of the former Holy Roman Empire
of German nation). The Germanization of the south started
with the victories of Alamanians, Franks, Suebians and with
the retreat of the Roman Empire (3rd-4th-5th centuries).
And the real, in-depth colonization ("Besiedelung") occurred
in the 7th-8th centuries, when the Anglo-Saxon and Irish
Christian missions were also on their peaks. Only the Rhine
valley had earlier Germanization.
Are you able to make a synthesis between the wanna-be
continuators of Ariovist's Germanic tribes and the massive
immigration of Germanic populations (the future Germans
speaking lingua teodisca) 400-500 years later?
This is your topic and task! Otherwise, the "jury" will show
thumbs downwards.
>I'm not talking about Franks being Bastarnians, actually I think
>their upper layer has another provenance, namely from Pannonia
>(according to their own chroniclers). As for how I can show that >Bastarnae were the Verhochdeutschers, see above.
This is of no help. The Pannonian link might be better.
It would open a gate for speculating on movements to and fro
of those three Germanic population in the West (after Ariovist)
who might have combined forces with others and came back.
>It is standard, AFAIK. If anyone else knows different, please tell.
But at least they could have contacts with Germans along the
Rhine border (from the upper to the middle and lower Rhine).
At the beginning of the 1st century BCE Rome already had a...
"Wacht am Rhein", right?
>No, it didn't.
Maps available on the Net show that Rome was West of the Rhine
in the last decades of the res publica. So, even if that presence
wasn't as massive as 100-200 years later on, there was the
possibility for them to great Germanic fellas across the water
"buon giorno, come stai?" :)
>Into all groups. The were the nobility everywhere in Germany. A >conquering people became a class.
Oh, this is something new, and interesting. Why don't you
talk of this in the 1st place? So, the idea would be then
that they were sort of an elite or even a "noble" or "royal"
class, as were in the Scythian-Turkic world, in the same
period of time, the "blue Turks" and the Dulo clan or dynasty
(to which seemingly belonged Attila and his family as well).
Or much later as royal clans such as of the Merowingians,
Carolingians, Guelfi, Hohenstaufen, Babenberger, Hohenzollern,
Hapsburg etc.
But then you should also think of the Gothic Amalii and other
highnesses, incl. Geiserich the Vandal, & al. lineages: they
all might have had some ancestors from among such elite groups
with Bastarnian ancestry. So, much the more in the case of
the Merowingian-Carolingian Franks.
>All of them. Archaeology tells us the new upper class spread
>out as a homogenous layer over heterogenous populations.
OK, I agree, it is tempting. But does archeology really show
such a development? (Anyway, if your hypothesis were justified,
then the Gothic and the Frankish nations/states could be seen
as the epitome of Bastarnae's endeavor. Only that the timegap
is enormous in the lack of a certain cohesive ideology and
religious+customary program... Because something like this
requires the idea of a "mission", of some kind of "mesianism",
as it is called.)
>Ariovistus was Germanic. Burebista attacked the Germani.
It would be not singulary for ancient and medieval scribblers
to mix up legendary characters & heroes. (E.g. scientists say
that many features of Siegfried are those of a Rhineland
Frankish king of the 5th or 6th century, Siegbert, and
Kriemhild of Siegbert's wife.)
>Because the Romans were active south of the Danube.
Where they could have recruited Dacians without having to
pay for them. (Again: Dacia wasn't only the septentrional
Dacia. South of the Danube there were further Dacias, and
these were engulfed in the Roman empire earlier.)
>That's not what those sources say. They say that Dacia was
>an especially heavily exploited area of slave procurement
>in the 70's BCE.
Awright if you prefer the term "heavily exploited", I don't mind.
But what's important: the main mass of slaves coming from
among Dacian tribes must have been Dacian and not... Germanic.
And even if in some years Dacians would have managed to
supply x thousand Germanic slaves it looks like a bit weird
to me that out of that Germanic slaves contingent those
three Germanic tribes pop up in Alsace and Baden-Württemberg
and the same tribes multiplied in so far as to build a
compact Germanic population near the Alps in order to
pass on Hochdeutsch to the bulk of Germanic "late-comers"
of the 5th-6th-7th centuries. What respect could have had
the newcomers (more numerous and militarily a superpower)
in order to let themselves be subdued by those semi-Romanized
"cousins"? (And I've never heard of such a significant
Germanic population there preceding the great invasions
that occurred after the Roman army and administration
had gone home.)
>So what are you objecting to?
I was only referring to those theatrical comic characters
as source of inspiration.
>Nettozahler. We got oil.
You too? I thought that privilege was Norwegian and British.
George