Indo-European
Indo-European is a collective name for cultures speaking related
languages, being of related traditional
religions and sharing a similar geographical origin. A
patriarchal system and
patrilineal inheritance, along with other cultural similarities, appear to be fundamental to the general scope. Hypothetically, these cultures arose from the expansion of an ancient people, the
Proto-Indo-Europeans, c. 4000 B.C., somewhere around the
Black Sea region. (See
Indo-European religion and
Indo-European languages)
The existence of the Indo-Europeans has been inferred by\ncomparative
linguistics. The discovery of the genetic relationship of the various Indo-European languages goes back to
William Jones, a british judge in
India, who in
1782 observed, that,\n
"The Sanskrit language, whatever be its antiquity, is of a wonderful structure; more perfect than the Greek, more copious than the Latin, and more exquisitely refined than either, yet bearing to both of them a stronger affinity, both in the roots of verbs and the forms of grammar, than could possibly have been produced by accident; so strong indeed, that no philologer could examine them all three, without believing them to have sprung from some common source, which, perhaps, no longer exists."
At first, the related languages were simply compared, with no attempt at reconstruction.
August Schleicher was the first scholar to compose a tentative text in the extinct
common source Jones had predicted. The reconstructed
Proto-Indo-European language (PIE) represents, by definition, the common language of the Proto-Indo-Europeans. In the
20th century, great progress was made due to the discovery of more language material belonging to the Indo-European family, and by advances in comparative linguistics, by scholars such as
Ferdinand de Saussure. Purely linguistic research was assisted by attempts to reconstruct the culture and religion of the Proto-Indo-Europeans by scholars such as
Georges Dumézil.
There have been many attempts to claim that particular prehistorical cultures can be identified with the PIE-speaking peoples, but all have been speculative. This is because there are no written records of PIE, so the only way to identify an actual people with the language is to match the archeological remains of non-literate peoples to the supposed prehistory of known languages. This depends on reconstructing the early language, and identifying concepts in it that may be associated with particular cultures (such as the use of metals, agriculture or pastoralism, geographically distinctive plants and animals, etc).
The search for Indo European origins
The ideas of nineteenth century scholars of linguistics who first postulated the existence of the Proto-Indo-Europeans were made during a time dominated by a imperialist and racist mind set. It was naturally assumed that the spread of the language was due to invasion by a superior Aryan race into Europe. These discredited ideas still have a wide popular following. They tied this European invasion into speculations about the Aryan invasion of India, which would have occurred around 1500 BC. The question of where exactly was the Proto-Indo-European homeland from which they invaded Europe and India resulted in much speculation.
In the twentieth century Marija Gimbutas created a modern variation on the traditional invasion theory (the Kurgan hypothesis, see Kurgan) in which the Indo-Europeans were a nomadic tribe in southern Russia and expanded on horseback sometime around 2000 BC. Their expansion coincided with the taming of the horse. Leaving archaelogical signs of their presence (see battle-axe people), they crushed the peaceful European Neolithic farmers of Gimbutas's Old Europe. This theory in the form modified by James Mallory who dated it earlier to around 4000 BC is still widely held. Colin Renfrew is the main propagator for a newer theory dating from 1987 in which the Indo-Europeans were farmers in Asia Minor who expanded peacefully in South east europe from around 7000 BC.
However recent developments in archaeology have caused problems for both these theories. Modern archaeological evidence and improved dating techniques, indicates very strong cultural continuity in Europe since the Neolithic, which undermines claims of any outside invasion. The rise of Archaeogenetic evidence which uses genetic analysis to trace migration patterns also added new elements to the puzzle. Luigi Luca Cavalli-Sforza, one of the first in this field, recently used genetic evidence to in some ways combine Gimbatus and Colin Renfrew theory together. Here Renfrew's agricultural settlers moving north and west, partially split off to eventually became Gimbatus' Kurgan culture which moves into Europe.
However even more recently Brian Sykes extensive data shows the vast majority, that is 80%, of the genetic stock of Europeans goes back to the Paleolithic, tying in with the archeological data showing European continuity. Yet another controversial recent study combing genetics and language locates Indo European origins in Anatolia supporting Renfrew.
One new attempt to explain this new evidence is the Paleolithic Continuity Theory (PCT) which suggests the Indo European languages actually originated in Europe and have existed there since the Paleolithic.\n \nEven more recently, a glottochronological study on Bayesian principles (Gray and Atkinson, 2003) suggests that the origin of Indo-European goes back over 9000 years, the first split being of Hittite from the rest around 8700 years ago. The implication seems to be that the original Indo-European speakers inhabited the plains now submerged under the northeastern and eastern region of the Black Sea, while a splinter group who became the early Hittite speakers moved into northeastern Anatolia around 7000 B.C.E. At the time of the Black Sea Flood (ca. 5600 B.C.E.) the main body would have gone northward, becoming the Kurgans, while others escaped far to the northeast (Tocharians) and the southeast (Indo-Iranian), leaving in Anatolia the people who became Hittite. If this is correct, Renfrew is correct in that the oldest branch of Indo-European was in Anatolia, but the "Kurgan" hypothesis is also correct, in that the European branch would have originally come from north of the Black Sea.
The concept of the Proto-Indo-Europeans was exploited for political means by the Nazi Party (see Aryan race). Their very existence is also questioned by scholars who maintain that their own culture and language have always been present in the area (see Indus valley civilisation, Vedic civilization, Aryan, and Aryan invasion theory) (cf. the controversy about the Rus' (people)).
See also:
External link
\n*http://www.iras.ucalgary.ca/~volk/sylvia/Kurgans.htm\n* HREF="http://www.continuitas.com/" class="external">[1] Paleolithic continuity Theory\n*[1] Indo-European Origins in Southeast Europe\n*[1] Language tree rooted in Turkey – Another new genetic analysis supports Renfrew’s version]
further reading
\n* C. Renfrew, Archaeology and language, the puzzle of Indo-European origins (London, Penguin 1987).\n*Luigi Luca Cavalli-Sforza, Genes, Peoples, and Languages (translated by Mark Seielstad) (New York, Penguin 2000).\n*J. P Mallory, In Search of Indo-Europeans (London 1989).\n* Brian Sykes, The seven daughters of Eve (London, Corgi Books 2001)\n* Russell D. Gray and Quentin D. Atkinson, Language-tree divergence times support the Anatolian theory of Indo-European origin, Nature 426 (27 Nov 2003) 435-439
Category:Ancient Peoples
