European languages before Indo-European

[Bristel]

Then should we gather our resources and minds together for a collaborative Nostratic reconstruction?

I do think that as a team, this site in general would be more conservative in its reconstruction effort, and possibly more judicious.

If my thoughts about how linguists live and work are somewhat correct, then those reconstructionists seem to be solitary and only acknowledge what they want to see, for the most part... A self serving type of linguist... because the fame of being the "first" to reconstruct a language family like Nostratic can't be easily challenged by others, who also work in solitude on their swadesh lists and comparative linguistics books... And therefore you either disbelieve it at first glance, or you don't have time to do it alone... Reconstruction must take man hours that many linguists are unwilling to take to task... (besides some of us, maybe... teehee)

This sounded awfully like a rant, and I suppose it is a grouping of questions: how do these linguists really live, at least the ones into reconstruction? Do they get together in large groups to share their work? Do they tend to disregard others work in favor of their own? Does this work have a middle group or compilation? (Thinking of a middle ground between Sihler and Beekes, does that exist?)

[Octavià]

I do think Nostratic sans-Afro-Asiatic existed, and is reconstructable as of now to a vague extent, but all the reconstructions out there are BS, way too many phonemes based on wishful thinking.

I'm also not comfortable with the inclusion of Afrasian/Afro-Asiatic into Nostratic. IMHO, many of the purported cognates are actually Wanderwörter, including many borrowings from Semitic or related languages into IE in the Neolithic. And when I pointed this to Bomhard, he got furious.

Take for example Eurasiatic *kanpV 'lip, soft excrescence' > IE *gemb^(h)-/*ghemb- 'swelling; cheek, buttocks', Altaic *k`ómp[e] 'fungus' and Uralic *kómpV 'mushroom'. This is linked by Starostin to Afrasian *kanpVr-/*ganpVr- 'lip, muzzle' (Semitic, Berber, Cushitic), but Militarev-Stolbova points to Berber and Cushitic forms being possibly borrowings from respectively Arabic and Ethiopic.

IMHO, the genuine cognate is Semitic *ɬa(n)p-(at-) 'lip'. This is found as a substrate loanword (that is, not inherited from PIE) in Latin labrum (vulgar labium), Germanic *lip-. Also as a loanword but from a diffrent source (most Semitic language have a sibilant), we've got *swomb^(h)- > Greek somphós 'spongy', Germanic *swamp-/*sumpu- 'sponge, tree-fungus'. I then suppose the velar stop evolved from a former lateral affricate.

Speculating a little more, it's also possible this lateral had evolved in turn from a former dental stop. In NEC languages there's a root *dompe 'edge, bank' borrowed into pseudo-IE *d^h_ºmb^h- > Greek táphos (native) and túmbos (borrowed from Pelasgian) 'burial mound, tomb'.

[AnTeallach]

For example, the French Indo-Europeanist André Martinet, in his book Des steppes aux océans. L'indo-européen et les "Indo-Européens", quotes an European substrate root *kan(t)-/*gan(d)- 'stone' (e.g. Spanish canto 'pebble', hence canto rodado 'rolling stone'). This word can be linked to PNC *tɬ’anχχwV ‘ruins; cobble-stone(s)’, with the affricate lateral giving a velar stop (this correspondence is found in some NEC languages) and the uvular fricative giving a dental stop (probably through a velar intermediate). By contrast, Basque has legar 'gravel, pebblestone' (there're also the creek Leganitos and the town Leganés in Madrid) from the same root but with different sound correspondences.

With such "correspondences" (alveolar lateral affricate vs. velar stop, uvular fricative vs. dental stop) you can "relate" anything to anything, but you won't convince anyone unless you have a sufficient number of cognate sets to back it up, which I doubt you have. Especially if you invoke another "extinct branch" of "Vasco-Caucasian" whenever you hit upon a form that fails to comply with your "sound correspondences".

As I said, the correspondence between lateral affricates and velar stops can be found for example inside the NEC family. If I'm not mistaken, the Russian linguist Trubetzkoy already discovered them in the '30s. So please don't judge me so badly

This particular word must date back to the last glaciation, as it's linked to moraines.

The problem with the lateral affricate/velar stop correspondence isn't that it's completely ridiculous, but that you've only shown us one cognate set. If you can find lots of examples of apparent Western European substrate words with /k/ with plausible Caucasian cognates with lateral affricates (and so on with your other correspondences), people might start to take more notice.

I'd also point out that North Caucasian is itself controversial; mightn't you have a better chance of getting people to look at your ideas if you worked with the accepted NE and NW Caucasian families?

[WeepingElf]

The problem with the lateral affricate/velar stop correspondence isn't that it's completely ridiculous, but that you've only shown us one cognate set. If you can find lots of examples of apparent Western European substrate words with /k/ with plausible Caucasian cognates with lateral affricates (and so on with your other correspondences), people might start to take more notice.

I'd also point out that North Caucasian is itself controversial; mightn't you have a better chance of getting people to look at your ideas if you worked with the accepted NE and NW Caucasian families?

You have said just what I'd have to say about this.

[jal]

I've always wondered how people can get so caught up in their own convictions, that they can just filter out everything that seems to support their theories, but are completely blind for the very obvious shortcomings and all the evidence that points to the contrary. Creationists, global warming denialists, conspiracy theorists, anti-vaxers and so on and so forth.


JAL

[Octavià]

The problem with the lateral affricate/velar stop correspondence isn't that it's completely ridiculous, but that you've only shown us one cognate set. If you can find lots of examples of apparent Western European substrate words with /k/ with plausible Caucasian cognates with lateral affricates (and so on with your other correspondences), people might start to take more notice.

With a voiceless (geminate) lateral affricate:
PNC *bHe:mtɬɬɨ (˜ -u, -i) 'deer, mountain goat'
*bukk- 'he-goat, buck' (Celtic, Germanic)
*bekko > Italian becco 'he-goat', Basque behi 'cow'
This corresponds to native IE (Pontic) *b^hug´- 'he-goat, ram' and Altaic *pógV (˜ -u-) 'deer (male)'.

And with a voiced lateral affricate:
PNC *tɕ’a:dɮwV 'blood; life'
*sang^w- (with a -n- infix) > Latin sanguīs 'blood'
This corresponds to Pontic *yak(k)- 'healthy; to cure' and Altaic *sè:gù 'healthy; blood'

I'd also point out that North Caucasian is itself controversial; mightn't you have a better chance of getting people to look at your ideas if you worked with the accepted NE and NW Caucasian families?

AFAIK, Starostin's PNC is mostly based on NEC, so the bulk of these etymologies correspond to that family. Unlike Starostin thought, IMHO the purported relationship between NEC and NWC can be understood in the framework of a wider Vasco-Caucasian macro-family which also includes Burushaski. That's to say, PNC would be actually an older entity closer to the actual Proto-Vasco-Caucasian.

[WeepingElf]

The problem with the lateral affricate/velar stop correspondence isn't that it's completely ridiculous, but that you've only shown us one cognate set. If you can find lots of examples of apparent Western European substrate words with /k/ with plausible Caucasian cognates with lateral affricates (and so on with your other correspondences), people might start to take more notice.

With a voiceless (geminate) lateral affricate:
PNC *bHe:mtɬɬɨ (˜ -u, -i) 'deer, mountain goat'
*bukk- 'he-goat, buck' (Celtic, Germanic)
*bekko > Italian becco 'he-goat', Basque behi 'cow'
This corresponds to native IE (Pontic) *b^hug´- 'he-goat, ram' and Altaic *pógV (˜ -u-) 'deer (male)'.

Hmmm - where does the /m/ go, and the /H/ after the /b/? And what is "Pontic"?

And with a voiced lateral affricate:
PNC *tɕ’a:dɮwV 'blood; life'
*sang^w- (with a -n- infix) > Latin sanguīs 'blood'
This corresponds to Pontic *yak(k)- 'healthy; to cure' and Altaic *sè:gù 'healthy; blood'

So that makes three tokens for this kind of correspondence. That's not many, but perhaps as many as one can hope for with such a distant relationship, if the relationship exists. This is a general problem with language relationships of such enormous time depths - the data get so scarce that it becomes very difficult to establish that the resemblances are not coincidental.

Also, it doesn't help if one phoneme matches seemingly regularly - the whole words have to match. Do they in this case?

I'd also point out that North Caucasian is itself controversial; mightn't you have a better chance of getting people to look at your ideas if you worked with the accepted NE and NW Caucasian families?

AFAIK, Starostin's PNC is mostly based on NEC, so the bulk of these etymologies correspond to that family. Unlike Starostin thought, IMHO the purported relationship between NEC and NWC can be understood in the framework of a wider Vasco-Caucasian macro-family which also includes Burushaski. That's to say, PNC would be actually an older entity closer to the actual Proto-Vasco-Caucasian.

If a relationship is weakly founded, such as that between NWC and NEC, it is not really helpful to add even more stocks to the mix. Of course, it becomes easier to find similar-looking words that way, but you still have to demonstrate that the resemblances are not by chance.

[Octavià]

IMHO, what's commonly labelled as "PIE" is actually a mix of several layers/languages, the more "innovative" or "recent" being Pontic, which is more or less the direct ancestor of Greek-Armenian, Indo-Iranian, Albanian and possibly also Celtic. For example, the 'wheel' lexicon you mention so often is essentialy from Pontic. I've also borrowed the term "Hesperic" to name another of these layers.

If you remember from the old thread, Pontic is somewhat similar to Adrados' IE III A, but with the addition of Albanian (a close relative of Indo-Iranian) and Celtic. This is a novelty introduced by K.H. Schmidt, quoted by Villar in his old book "Los indoeuropeos y los orígenes de Europa".

In this way, the lexicon relative to wheeled vehicles, copper, etc. would be Pontic. This is congruent with the classical Kurgan (Gimbutas-Mallory's) theory. The big mistake of these archaeologists and most Indo-Europeanists was to equate PIE and Pontic, and so they tried to derive all the historically attested IE languages from it, an utterly impossible task. Even Adrados, who recognizes Anatolian represents a different language model and thus postulated IE II (=Sturtevant's Indo-Hittite), still sticks to the Kurgan scenario.

This is where an alternative multi-layer model fits in. Even Adrados himself recognizes there're still some remnants of IE II in non-Anatolian languages.

[Rik]

I've always wondered how people can get so caught up in their own convictions, that they can just filter out everything that seems to support their theories, but are completely blind for the very obvious shortcomings and all the evidence that points to the contrary. Creationists, global warming denialists, conspiracy theorists, anti-vaxers and so on and so forth.

and poets ...

[WeepingElf]

IMHO, what's commonly labelled as "PIE" is actually a mix of several layers/languages, the more "innovative" or "recent" being Pontic, which is more or less the direct ancestor of Greek-Armenian, Indo-Iranian, Albanian and possibly also Celtic. For example, the 'wheel' lexicon you mention so often is essentialy from Pontic. I've also borrowed the term "Hesperic" to name another of these layers.

If you remember from the old thread, Pontic is somewhat similar to Adrados' IE III A, but with the addition of Albanian (a close relative of Indo-Iranian) and Celtic. This is a novelty introduced by K.H. Schmidt, quoted by Villar in his old book "Los indoeuropeos y los orígenes de Europa".

In this way, the lexicon relative to wheeled vehicles, copper, etc. would be Pontic. This is congruent with the classical Kurgan (Gimbutas-Mallory's) theory. The big mistake of these archaeologists and most Indo-Europeanists was to equate PIE and Pontic, and so they tried to derive all the historically attested IE languages from it, an utterly impossible task. Even Adrados, who recognizes Anatolian represents a different language model and thus postulated IE II (=Sturtevant's Indo-Hittite), still sticks to the Kurgan scenario.

This is where an alternative multi-layer model fits in. Even Adrados himself recognizes there're still some remnants of IE II in non-Anatolian languages.

My thinking about PIE is that there was an Early PIE, spoken in what is now Ukraine around 4000 BC (Sredny Stog culture), which split into Proto-Anatolian and Late PIE, which was spoken in the same area around 3200 BC (Yamnaya culture), and was the latest common ancestor of all non-Anatolian IE languages. The "standard model" of PIE found in most handbooks describes Late PIE; Early PIE looked somewhat different, with only two genders and different nominal and verbal paradigms, preserved in Hittite. The "wheel and wagon" terminology can be securely reconstructed for Late PIE (they are even present in Tocharian, which appears to have been the first branch to break off from Late PIE, to be followed by Italo-Celtic); of these words, Hittite only has 'thill' and 'yoke', both things older than the wheel, and used with sleighs and ploughs before the wagon was invented.

[Octavià]

IMHO these dates are too early. I'm also not sure whether Tocharian really shares all these lexicon. For example, the 'wheel' word is from the same root than Anatolian.

I think one can't date a language famili on the basis of a rather small spart of the lexicon. Take for example, *mori- 'sea'. This word is altogether absent from Pontic languages, but it's found in Anatolian. Or *ak^wā- 'water', which apart from Anatolian found only in Latin, Germanic and the OEH.

IMHO, the IE family is the result of the interaction of several (at least 3) related languages which probably were already differentiated in the Mesolithic/Early Neolithic. These group of languages equates more or less your "Europic".

[Morrígan]

[quote="Talskubilos"]IMHO these dates are too early. I'm also not sure whether Tocharian really shares all these lexicon. For example, the 'wheel' word is from the same root than Anatolian.
quote]

Why are they too early? And why would Tocharian not really have the words that are in its lexicon? Are you suggesting that the Toch. "wheel" is a loan from Anatolian? Are you talking about Toch.B yerkwanto or cākkär? I'd assume the former, since it is not the typical form found elsewhere.

And for the love of the gods, stop saying "IMHO"; your opinion is anything but humble.

[jal]

And for the love of the gods, stop saying "IMHO"

I read "imho" as "this is my opinion" / "I think that", and I think it's fine to introduce some unsubstantiated theory :).


JAL

[Morrígan]

And for the love of the gods, stop saying "IMHO"

I read "imho" as "this is my opinion" / "I think that", and I think it's fine to introduce some unsubstantiated theory .

We have "IMO" for that.

[jal]

We have "IMO" for that.

Details, details... If a single "H" can annoy you, you've got some priorities to straighten out :).


JAL

[WeepingElf]

IMHO these dates are too early. I'm also not sure whether Tocharian really shares all these lexicon. For example, the 'wheel' word is from the same root than Anatolian.

Why are my dates to early? Anyway, they are termini post quem, i.e. the languages could have been later - we just can say that the break-up of Late PIE did not predate the invention of the wheel. On the other hand, the degree of resemblance between the earliest IE languages tells us that Late PIE probably broke up not long after 3000 BC, and Early PIE not long after 3500 BC.

I think one can't date a language famili on the basis of a rather small spart of the lexicon. Take for example, *mori- 'sea'. This word is altogether absent from Pontic languages, but it's found in Anatolian. Or *ak^wā- 'water', which apart from Anatolian found only in Latin, Germanic and the OEH.

I don't date stages of PIE on the wheel-and-wagon terminology alone.

IMHO, the IE family is the result of the interaction of several (at least 3) related languages which probably were already differentiated in the Mesolithic/Early Neolithic. These group of languages equates more or less your "Europic".

I'm sorry, but that's gobbledigook. There is no evidence that the IE family is "the result of the interaction of several related languages which probably were already differentiated in the Mesolithic/Early Neolithic". It is well-established to descend from a single language spoken in the Late Neolithic, according to the sort of vocabulary reconstructed for it. Also, you told me that my dates were "too early", but now you invoke the "Mesolithic/Early Neolithic", which is earlier. You are contradicting yourself.

[Octavià]

IMHO, the IE family is the result of the interaction of several (at least 3) related languages which probably were already differentiated in the Mesolithic/Early Neolithic. These group of languages equates more or less your "Europic".

I'm sorry, but that's gobbledigook. There is no evidence that the IE family is "the result of the interaction of several related languages which probably were already differentiated in the Mesolithic/Early Neolithic". It is well-established to descend from a single language spoken in the Late Neolithic, according to the sort of vocabulary reconstructed for it.

I'm affraid you're appealing to dogmatism here. First remember that PIE is nothing more than a conlang made upon the existing IE languages, not a real language spoken by some people at time X and place Y.

The traditional PIE model has drawbacks like: words (including morphological items) being attested in some languages but not in others (irregular geographical distribution), words seemingly related but irreductible to a single protoform according to standard sound laws (phonetic misrepresentation), etc. These defects became more apparent when Anatolian was discovered, and in more recent times with the advent of Nostratic theories.

I've got no problem to equate (roughly) your "Late PIE" to my "Pontic", provided you understand I consider it to be only the ancestor of some but not all IE languages, namely Greek-Phyrgian-Armenian, Albanian, Indo-Iranian and possibly also Celtic. Of course, they had also different substrates/adstrates (both IE and non-IE).

Balto-Slavic was part of a larger group (like your "Danubian") which possibly included Thracian and other languages such as Italoid/Sorotaptic with none or little direct attestation. This group, acting as adstrate/substrate of Indo-Iranian and Albanian, caused them to be "satemized". Of course, these and other non-Pontic languages like Germanic and Italic became "Ponticized" to a variable degree by an aculturation process, including the adoption of the 'horse/wheel' lexicon.

If you stand by the traditional definition of PIE as the latest common ancestor of ALL the languages considered as IE, then it would be roughly similar to your "Proto-Europic". I no longer regard your Europic/Hesperic theory as a crackpot one (I've also removed your name from my blog's list), but it still needs some non-trivial adjustments.

Also, you told me that my dates were "too early", but now you invoke the "Mesolithic/Early Neolithic", which is earlier. You are contradicting yourself.

I really meant to say "late" instead of "early", but unfortunately my mind slipped on those night hours.

[WeepingElf]

IMHO, the IE family is the result of the interaction of several (at least 3) related languages which probably were already differentiated in the Mesolithic/Early Neolithic. These group of languages equates more or less your "Europic".

I'm sorry, but that's gobbledigook. There is no evidence that the IE family is "the result of the interaction of several related languages which probably were already differentiated in the Mesolithic/Early Neolithic". It is well-established to descend from a single language spoken in the Late Neolithic, according to the sort of vocabulary reconstructed for it.

I'm affraid you're appealing to dogmatism here. First remember that PIE is nothing more than a conlang made upon the existing IE languages, not a real language spoken by some people at time X and place Y.

Sure, PIE as it is found in the handbooks is only a model of the real thing, but the general consensus among Indo-Europeanists is that a Proto-Indo-European language community existed at some time in some location, even if the model is only a simplified approximation of a language which, like all human languages, had dialects and changed over time. It is very well possible that the standard model combines features that existed at different times. Yet, this model is not sheer fantasy as, for instance, Quenya or Klingon are; it is an attempt, though imperfect, to sum up our knowledge of the real Proto-Indo-Euroopean language.

The traditional PIE model has drawbacks like: words (including morphological items) being present in some languages but not in others (irregular geographical distribution), words with similar meaning but different phonetics, etc. These defects became more apparent when Anatolian and Tocharian were discovered in the 20th century, and in more recent times, with the emerging of Nostratic theories.

It is a truism that not every word and every grammatical category of PIE survived in every attested branch of Indo-European; there may have been words and categories that survived in no attested branch, and therefore cannot be reconstructed!

Anatolian and Tocharian are indeed challenges, especially Anatolian, which is the reason to posit distinct "Early" and "Late" stages of PIE. But that does not invalidate two hundred years of scholarly endeavour! You should really be more respectful towards the academic mainstream. Those people do that professionally; they should know very well what they are doing.

I've got no problem to equate (roughly) your "Late PIE" to my "Pontic", provided you understand I consider it to be only the ancestor of some IE languages, namely Greek-Phyrgian-Armenian, Albanian, Indo-Iranian and possibly also Celtic. Of course, they had also different substrates/adstrates (both IE and non-IE).

Balto-Slavic was part of a larger group (like your "Danubian") which possibly included Thracian and other languages such as Italoid/Sorotaptic with none or little direct attestation. This group, acting as adstrate/substrate of Indo-Iranian and Albanian, caused them to be "satemized". Of course, these and other non-Pontic languages like Germanic and Italic became "Ponticized" to a variable degree by an aculturation process, including the adoption of the 'horse/wheel' lexicon.

If you stand by the traditional definition of PIE as the latest common ancestor of ALL the languages considered as IE, then it would be roughly similar to your "Proto-Europic".

I'm sorry, but your chronology strikes me as eccentric. I accept that Greek-Phrygian-Armenian and Indo-Iranian have some innovations (such as the augment) in common - you may call that "Pontic" if you want to. That's my opinion, too. But Celtic goes IMHO together with Italic; Germanic occupies some kind of middle position between Italo-Celtic and Balto-Slavic.

The "wheel-and-wagon" words were not borrowed into Italic and Germanic from "Pontic"; they were inherited from Late PIE. How to tell? They show perfectly regular sound developments, which is not to be expected from borrowings. And that means that Late PIE was spoken after the invention of the wheel.

And what are "Italoid" and "Sorotaptic"?

Also, you told me that my dates were "too early", but now you invoke the "Mesolithic/Early Neolithic", which is earlier. You are contradicting yourself.

I really meant to say "late" instead of "early", but unfortunately my mind slipped on those night hours.

Oh, I see. Then you did not contradict yourself. But you project PIE too far into the past.

[Octavià]

The traditional PIE model has drawbacks like: words (including morphological items) being present in some languages but not in others (irregular geographical distribution), words with similar meaning but different phonetics, etc. These defects became more apparent when Anatolian and Tocharian were discovered in the 20th century, and in more recent times, with the emerging of Nostratic theories.

It is a truism that not every word and every grammatical category of PIE survived in every attested branch of Indo-European; there may have been words and categories that survived in no attested branch, and therefore cannot be reconstructed!

The problem is that traditional PIE might be actually the "sum" of several systems/languages, and not a single one. This is my point.

Anatolian and Tocharian are indeed challenges, especially Anatolian, which is the reason to posit distinct "Early" and "Late" stages of PIE. But that does not invalidate two hundred years of scholarly endeavour! You should really be more respectful towards the academic mainstream. Those people do that professionally; they should know very well what they are doing.

You should be also aware of how the academic world works. This is why changes of paradigm like this one are very slow.

If you stand by the traditional definition of PIE as the latest common ancestor of ALL the languages considered as IE, then it would be roughly similar to your "Proto-Europic".

I'm sorry, but your chronology strikes me as eccentric. I accept that Greek-Phrygian-Armenian and Indo-Iranian have some innovations (such as the augment) in common - you may call that "Pontic" if you want to. That's my opinion, too. But Celtic goes IMHO together with Italic; Germanic occupies some kind of middle position between Italo-Celtic and Balto-Slavic.

As pointed by K.H. Schmidt (quoted by Villar), Celtic shares some "innovations" with these languages, namely the relative pronoun *yo- and specific lexicon (I'll dwell on this later). The coincidences with Italic seem to be due to a common "Danubian" or "Hesperic" substrate (me) or to contact influence (Schmidt).

The "wheel-and-wagon" words were not borrowed into Italic and Germanic from "Pontic"; they were inherited from Late PIE. How to tell? They show perfectly regular sound developments, which is not to be expected from borrowings. And that means that Late PIE was spoken after the invention of the wheel.

They certainly inherited these words from Pontic, but large parts of their respective lexicons did NOT. In my model, Germanic and Italic are the result of the aculturation of the existing "Danubian" (using your own terminology) languages by Pontic speakers.

And what are "Italoid" and "Sorotaptic"?

I think I told you before, but in case you don't remember, they're two different names for a substrate IE language/family whose traces can be found in parts of the Italian and the Iberian Peninsula before Celtic and Italic. Possibly Lusitanian evolved from some Italoid dialect spoken in West Iberia.

Oh, I see. Then you did not contradict yourself. But you project PIE too far into the past.

I don't think so. The problem is what you label as "PIE" is only a part of IE/Europic family.

As an experiment, I'd propose you equate PIE and Proto-Europic and we'll see what happen. For example (taken from Frathwiki):

The main feature that distinguishes Europic from the other branches of Eurasiatic is its vowel system, which included only three vowels: *a, *i and *u, of which *a was much more frequent than the others. [...] This three-vowel system is attested in the Old European hydronymy and can be reconstructed for pre-ablaut Indo-European. In PIE, *a became *e/*o/Ø, *i became *ei/*oi/*i and *u became *eu/*ou/*u.

I'd say that in a such 3-vowel system there would be the diftongs *ai,*au. The first one would evolve into *ei/*oi/*i: and the second one into *eu/*ou/*u:.

[Morrígan]

The coincidences with Italic seem to be due to a common "Danubian" or "Hesperic" substrate (me) or to contact influence (Schmidt).

So why exactly do you think this is better than thinking that there was an Italo-Celtic subfamily? And I remind you that a number of statistical phylogeny studies, which make no assumptions about the structure of the Indo-European family, group Italic and Celtic together.

[TaylorS]

Oh great, I see Octavio is back, spouting nonsense about PIE and ripping of WE's and my terminology to boot.

As for Europic vowels, I reconstruct a 4-vowel system, /a i u @/, in agreement with Glen Gordon on Paleoglot. In pre-PIE /@/ merges with /a/, resulting in the development of a Velar-Uvular distinction (the traditional Palatovelars and Velars). a new /@/ forms from the merging of /i/ and /u/. /a/ becomes traditional /a/ and /o/ while /@/ becomes traditional /e/.

[Octavià]

The coincidences with Italic seem to be due to a common "Danubian" or "Hesperic" substrate (me) or to contact influence (Schmidt).

So why exactly do you think this is better than thinking that there was an Italo-Celtic subfamily? And I remind you that a number of statistical phylogeny studies, which make no assumptions about the structure of the Indo-European family, group Italic and Celtic together.

Surely not the one by Gray & Atkinson (2003), which groups Italic and Germanic into a single node.

As I said earlier, Celtic shares a significant part of its lexicon with Pontic languages, specially Greek. For example, *gdonjo- 'man' is modelled after the same root than Greek khthó:n 'earth', khthónios 'underground'. Other words like *yekkā 'cure, treatment' or *yorko- 'roebuck' are also distinctively Pontic.

In my model, Germanic and Italic are the result of the aculturation of the existing "Danubian" (using your own terminology) languages by Pontic speakers.

A possible Danubian word would be *saχ-n- 'healthy' (Latin sānus), which in reduced grade and a different suffix (and also a prefix) becomes *ʔi-sχ-r- 'blood', which interestingly is the origin of Celtic *īsarno- 'iron' (notice I'm using the equivalences H₁ = ʔ and H₂ = χ in these reconstructions).

This root is found (with reduplication) in Kartvelian *zisx-l/r- 'blood' and it's cognate to the already mentioned *yak(k)- 'healthy; to cure' in Pontic. Although Gamkrelidze & Ivanov (1995) think this is am IE borrowing into Kartvelian, this kind of *-(V)r- suffixes are also found in words like *paχ-ur- 'fire' ~ Georgian za-px-ul 'summer' < Kartvelian *px 'warm'.

I'd say that in a such 3-vowel system there would be the diftongs *ai,*au. The first one would evolve into *ei/*oi/*i: and the second one into *eu/*ou/*u:.

Another Danubian word I've recently reconstructed is *d^haun- ~ *d^hūn- 'hill, mound', found in Germanic *dūn-ō 'hill, dune' (English down, Dutch duine > English dune), Latin fūnus 'funeral' (< *'burial mound') and Etruscan thaura 'tomb', with n > r.

Although phonetic developments aren't clear, I connect this word with PNC *dompe 'edge, bank', which is the source of Greek táphos (native), túmbos (borrowed from "Pelasgian") 'tomb' and Sabine tēba, Samnitic tīfā- 'hill' in Italic.

[WeepingElf]

The coincidences with Italic seem to be due to a common "Danubian" or "Hesperic" substrate (me) or to contact influence (Schmidt).

So why exactly do you think this is better than thinking that there was an Italo-Celtic subfamily? And I remind you that a number of statistical phylogeny studies, which make no assumptions about the structure of the Indo-European family, group Italic and Celtic together.

Surely not the one by Gray & Atkinson (2003), which groups Italic and Germanic into a single node.

Which is based on glottochronology, a technique now considered unreliable. Gray and Atkinson aren't Indo-Europeanists. They are mathematicians who dabble in historical linguistics without understanding that field. That they managed to get the thing published in a peer-reviewed journal means nothing more than that the peer reviewers were natural science Fachidioten who were too impressed by the formulae to realize how phony the thing was. (EDIT: That the structure of the tree is doubtful is obvious from some errors in the branches, such as Polish being classified as East rather than West Slavic. If something like that could happen, it could also happen deeper in the tree.)

As I said earlier, Celtic shares a significant part of its lexicon with Pontic languages, specially Greek. For example, *gdonjo- 'man' is modelled after the same root than Greek khthó:n 'earth', khthónios 'underground'. Other words like *yekkā 'cure, treatment' or *yorko- 'roebuck' are also distinctively Pontic.

I see no reason to assume borrowing here, nor does any Indo-Europeanist worth his stripes.

In my model, Germanic and Italic are the result of the aculturation of the existing "Danubian" (using your own terminology) languages by Pontic speakers.

A possible Danubian word would be *saχ-n- 'healthy' (Latin sānus), which in reduced grade and a different suffix (and also a prefix) becomes *ʔi-sχ-r- 'blood', which interestingly is the origin of Celtic *īsarno- 'iron' (notice I'm using the equivalences H₁ = ʔ and H₂ = χ in these reconstructions).

WHAT? Also, please don't abuse other people's terminology that way. You speak of "Europic", "Hesperic" and "Danubian" all the time, but refer to things that have nothing to do with what TaylorS and I mean when we use these words.

This root is found (with reduplication) in Kartvelian *zisx-l/r- 'blood' and it's cognate to the already mentioned *yak(k)- 'healthy; to cure' in Pontic. Although Gamkrelidze & Ivanov (1995) think this is am IE borrowing into Kartvelian, this kind of *-(V)r- suffixes are also found in words like *paχ-ur- 'fire' ~ Georgian za-px-ul 'summer' < Kartvelian *px 'warm'.

WHAT? There is too little evidence for an IE-Kartvelian relationship. Just a handful of similar-looking words - which are probably borrowings. You should compare languages and not just dictionaries.

I'd say that in a such 3-vowel system there would be the diftongs *ai,*au. The first one would evolve into *ei/*oi/*i: and the second one into *eu/*ou/*u:.

Another Danubian word I've recently reconstructed is *d^haun- ~ *d^hūn- 'hill, mound', found in Germanic *dūn-ō 'hill, dune' (English down, Dutch duine > English dune), Latin fūnus 'funeral' (< *'burial mound') and Etruscan thaura 'tomb', with n > r.

Although phonetic developments aren't clear, I connect this word with PNC *dompe 'edge, bank', which is the source of Greek táphos (native), túmbos (borrowed from "Pelasgian") 'tomb' and Sabine tēba, Samnitic tīfā- 'hill' in Italic.

What an entangled mess of dubious etymologies!

[WeepingElf]

Oh great, I see Octavio is back, spouting nonsense about PIE and ripping of WE's and my terminology to boot.

As for Europic vowels, I reconstruct a 4-vowel system, /a i u @/, in agreement with Glen Gordon on Paleoglot. In pre-PIE /@/ merges with /a/, resulting in the development of a Velar-Uvular distinction (the traditional Palatovelars and Velars). a new /@/ forms from the merging of /i/ and /u/. /a/ becomes traditional /a/ and /o/ while /@/ becomes traditional /e/.

My personal viewpoint is different, though that of course does not prove that you are wrong. In my opinion, the evidence for an IE-Etruscan relationship is so meagre (one pronoun and one case marker, and a handful of similar-sounding words which do not show regular sound correspondences, and are thus more likely borrowings or mere coincidence) that I see no reason to assume such a relationship. There is just as much evidence for an IE-Kartvelian or, for that matter, an Etruscan-Kartvelian relationship, but I am doubtful of both.

I reconstruct just three vowels */a i u/ for Proto-Europic. The distinctions between the three types of velars were already there; they stem from a yet earlier stage when there was a fuller vowel system (*/a e i o u/ at least), of which all but */i/ and */u/ collapsed into */a/ in Proto-Europic. This */a/ later split into */e/, */o/ and zero in Early PIE; */i/ and */u/ likewise split into */ei/, */oi/, */i/ and */eu/, */ou/, */u/, respectively. In the Hesperic branch of Europic, the 3-vowel system survived longer, and can still be seen in the Old European hydronymy (as reconstructed by Krahe in his 1963 paper Die Struktur der alteuropäischen Hydronymie).

[Izambri]

I could open a new thread, but since we are talking about old languages and Europe...

Well, I'm interested in the old languages of Europe, before and after IE, and I want to find a good book with grammars for all those tongues. An encyclopedia, that is, with comprehensive and concise grammars (not fully developed, since that would result in a whole collection with many volumes).

Google Books has Encyclopedia of the languages of Europe and The ancient languages of Europe and I wonder if they're good resources. Anyone knows them or has any suggestions?