Re: Mapping the Origins and Expansion of the Indo-European Language

--- In cybalist@yahoogroups.com, "shivkhokra" <shivkhokra@...> wrote:

> > ps: The main result is the phylogeography: First branch, Anatolian; second branch, Tocharo-Armenian; third branch, Indo-Iranian + Greco-Albanian; 4th branch, Balto-Slavic, and last branches, Germanic, Italic and Celtic. I'd like to see you comments..

> What were the Germanic and Italic speakers speaking before their language became a branch?

Call it 'Proto-Western-IE' if you need a specific name. However, language boundaries can only be perceived very dimly at this depth. A huge dialect continuum containing Indo-Iranian, Balto-Slavic, Germanic, Italic and Celtic is probably a better model than a branching tree. Albanian probably belongs there, while Greek and Armenian may well be peripheral members.

Tocharo-Armenian is probably a result of trying to take geography into account and not having any IE spread north of the Caspian.

Richard.