[gothic-l] Re: ZDF Program on the Goths

[george knysh]

--- faltin2001 <dirk at smra.co.uk> wrote:
> --- In gothic-l at y..., george knysh <gknysh at y...>
> wrote:

>
>
>
>
> > The overwhelmibg majority of the carriers of the
> > Wielbark culture were undoubtedly descendants of
> > "local" populations.
>
>
> (DF)Yes, there is no doubt about that.
>
>
>
>
> There is no credible evidence
> > (esp. toponymic or hydronymic) that these
> populations
> > were primarily "Germanic", save to the extent that
> > they later had a Yastorf-Przeworsk element (along
> with
> > many others). They were not proto-Slavic either.
>
>
>
>(DF) Well, they were East Germanic speaker; just as
their
> culture their
> language was most closely related to that of the
> Przeworsk people
> (like the Wandals).

*****GK: We must be very careful here. There is no
doubt that as time went on Wielbark acquired
substantial numbers of Germanic speakers. There is no
doubt that the only "Gothic" language known to us is
an East Germanic dialect. But there is also little
doubt that the Oksywie culture carriers and the
original Wielbark culture carriers (they occupied the
same space; this was before Wielbark began to
expand)did not speak a Germanic language. Oksywie is
an offshoot of the Pomeranian culture (itself a
development of the Lusatian culture). We don't know
what languages these people spoke. Certainly
Indo-European, judging by ancient topo- and
hydronymics, but not proto-Germanic. Early Przeworsk
was a fusion of Pomeranian and Yastorf, and
historically came to be identified with the Vandals.
But these Germanic speakers were not the whole of the
Przeworsk culture. It also had that Pomeranian origin
element, very numerous, which cannot be assumed to
have been instantly germanized. It had at some point
Celtic speaking elements too, and historically
attested (more on that in a later post). I don't doubt
that as time went on, the Goths, Vandals etc. no
matter what the origin of their constituents, became
more and more obviously Germanic in speech, esp. as
their wanderings and reshufflings continued. But I
would not say that this was obvious at the beginning.
I have to rush off to class, but I'll get back on this
very interesting topic later today. See you. And for
God's sake stop wasting your time with B.H.
(:=)))*****
>
>
>


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