From: Jörg Rhiemeier
Message: 70552
Date: 2012-12-10
On Monday 10 December 2012 01:22:10 Bhrihskwobhloukstroy wrote:
> First peopling. Of course, there's no proof either - otherwise we
> wouldn't discuss on this topic - and there are many other
> possibilities, but our first task is to fix the extreme extensions of
> what is reasonable. Such extremes are by definition scarcely
> attractive, but they are nevertheless necessary.
Surely, what is possible must be considered. But what is impossible
*must not* be considered. And Paleolithic continuity *is* impossible
- see below.
> One of these extremes
> is Drew's theory (Non-Anatolian PIE shortly before the earliest
> Non-Anatolian evidence; I don't like Indo-Hittite theory, but this is
> nevertheless a necessary extreme; S. Kalyanaraman puts himself beyond
> this extreme); the other one (on the remote side) is (Europe's) First
> Peopling. Why is it necessary? Because nothing can (still) exclude it.
What excludes it is the fact that words pertaining to farming,
wheeled vehicles and metals can be reconstructed for PIE.
*All* of these things were utterly unknown 40,000 years ago,
so you get an egregious anachronism. What did *h2arh3trom,
*kWekWlos and *h2ayes mean in the Paleolithic? These words
yield a _terminus post quem_ at about 4,000 BC, when the wheel
was invented and metalworking began in Europe (farming was
earlier, though, but not earlier in Europe than 6,500 BC).
Also, it is hardly plausible that the rate of linguistic change
rises by a factor of about 10 in the very moment in history
when the relevant languages are first put to writing. Just
consider how similar Sanskrit and Latin were about 2,000 years
ago, and how different Hindi and French are now, only a puny
2,000 years later. Sanskrit and Latin cannot be separated by
40,000 years of independent development!
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