Pre-Greek languages

[Sean Crist]

On Thu, 7 Oct 1999, Stanley Friesen wrote:

> I question the assumption that the Anatolian languages necessarily split
> off earlier than the others.  Given the linguistic and archaeological
> facts, I suspect that the northern European languages, and probably
> Proto-Tocharian, split off at least as early as Anatolian.  Thus I see an
> original three or four-way split, not a simple bidding off of Anatolian

> [The northern group would be ancestral to Germanic, Celtic, and Italic, at
> least, and perhaps Balto-Slavis as well],

You must be new on this list; during August and September, the question of
the phylogeny of the IE languages was hashed over in great detail.  I'm
curious as to what linguistic and archaeological evidence you have in
mind; your claim is at odds with the work of Ringe, Warnow, and Taylor
which I have been discussing.  If you like, I can forward you some of the
emails which I sent out as a part of this dialog.

> And given that, again pace Renfrew, Anatolian almost certainly had to move
> through the Balkans prior to Greek arrival *there*, let alone their arrival
> in Greece proper, and that there is some evidence for a non-Greek IE
> language in Greece in place names, the time scale is further constrained.

If the speakers of prehistoric Anatolian travelled south along the west
coast of the Black Sea to the Bosporus, they need not have entered any
part of what is now Greece on their way into Anatolia.

  \/ __ __    _\_     --Sean Crist  (kurisuto at unagi.cis.upenn.edu)
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