From: Trond Engen
Message: 68796
Date: 2012-03-06
> At 10:00:49 AM on Sunday, March 4, 2012, Trond Engen wrote:I know. I just thought I'd add it for the record.
>
>> Brian M. Scott:
>
>>> At 6:35:55 AM on Friday, March 2, 2012, Tavi wrote:
>
>>>> But you can't ignore IE languages have been and are
>>>> still (see e.g. Anthony's book subtitle: "How Bronze-Age
>>>> riders from the Eurasian Steppes shaped the Modern
>>>> World") too often represented as being spoken by warfare
>>>> aristocracies who imposed their language to non-IE
>>>> speaking people by military conquest.
>
>>> I frankly don't much care: I'm interested in the
>>> linguistics first and the archaeology second. Moreover,
>>> not having read Anthony's book, I have no idea whether it
>>> actually presents the early spread of IE languages in the
>>> way that you suggest on the basis of the subtitle; I
>>> certainly don't trust your judgement on that score after
>>> what you've written here.
>
>> He isn't that different from Mallory before him. The
>> spread to the Balkans and Bactria came as
>> (archaeologically well documented) disruptive intrusions
>> of pastoral nomads into the realms of already strained
>> city cultures, while the spread to northern and western
>> Europe mainly was a "franchise" -- a gradual adoption of
>> the cultural package by indigenus populations after their
>> leaders joined the IE client system.
>
> Thanks; that's pretty much what I'd understood, but I still
> haven't actually seen the book.