Kurds and Georgians [and Basques]

[Eduard Selleslagh]

At 14:36 7/12/00 +0200, you wrote:

>    Just a brief question/comment here. Of course, I aggree any
>Basque-Caucasian, or specifically Basque-Georgian connection is complete
>nonsense,but shouldn't we add on the list of co-incidental similarities, the
>one concerning "Ivir","Iviria", a name used by foreigners to designate the
>country known to its natives as "Sakartvelo" (=Georgia) and  "Iberian (s)"?
>I believe this coincidence was also used by the followers of this theory.
>                                             Regards,
>                                              Cristian

[Ed Selleslagh]

Actually, things are more subtle than has been told by several members of
this list. I don't want to elaborate too much because all this is largely
outside its scope. Let me just point out a few things:

-There are at least two periods in Basque-Caucasianism.

-During the first  period, not only lexical coincidences were considered
(and here most, except Bouda and a few others, agree that most similarities
are accidental or invalid; Dumézil is rather careful in this respect), but
also grammatical ones, in the first place the presence of ergativism and
multipersonal verbs. The latter aspect is not a laughing matter, although
alternative explanations may be found. The most confusing fact is that the
grammatical aspects point to NE Caucasian, while other aspects point rather
to other Caucasian groups.

-During the second period, or the renaissance of Basque-Caucasianism, which
is still going on, one of the theories with some foundation is that Basque,
a Pyrenean language possibly going back to the local, isolated, late
Palaeolithic or early Neolithic population, was actually more or less
heavily influenced by the more prestigious and influential Iberian (even
Strabo seemed to admire them), the latter being possibly a language of a
migrant group with links of some kind to the Caucasus. Most authors are
very careful in their wording and about which data are conjectural, backed
up by serious indications or proven. They often 'suggest' rather than
'pretend'.
A serious hint of that can be found e.g. in H. Haarmann's article "Basque
ethnogenesis...." in Fontes Linguae Vasconum.

-In Antiquity both Georgia and Mediterranean SE Spain were already called
Iberia, puzzling the writers of the time. In Spain the name seems to be
related to 'ibar', Basque (Iberian?) for 'river (valley)'(cf. the river
Ebro, Lat. Hiberus, another example of a river 'River'?). Note that ancient
Georgia also consisted essentially of two major river valleys parallel to
the Caucasus, so it could have been called 'ibar' by non-Kartvelians.

-It is very notable that Iberian (not really understood) and Basque have
quite a bit in common, especially toponyms and their structure and
elements, but also their general aspect, phonetics etc.. Both are (insofar
Iberian can be analyzed, that is) agglutinating SOV languages. Nonetheless,
most agree that they are probably not 'genetically' related, otherwise
Iberian would not remain so relatively opaque.

-Another remarkable thing: the presence of a number of E. Mediterranean
cultural words in Basque (and in Iberian when available), like 'ili/iri'
for (fortified) city (cf. 'ur(i)', Hebr. 'ir' , Ilion, etc). Of course,
many explanations are possible.

-There is a trail of cultural remnants (e.g. underground 'temples' or
sacred sites, decorative motifs, beliefs, ...) from the Dodecanesos via the
Mediterranean islands to Spain and the Basque country and up to the
Scottish islands, pointing to a maritime migration path. The Etruscans came
from Anatolia to Italy (Tuscany) by sea via Lemnos. Why can't the Iberians
have come to SE Spain from the Black Sea (via e.g. Crete, Malta, the
Balearic Islands...)?

-There is also a 'school' of Armenian-Basque comparitivists who pretend to
have found numerous, mainly lexical, coincidences. Since the two lgs.
belong to vastly different phylla, this can only be through loans, if
actually true. But it could point to a remote Caucasian link, albeit
probably a very indirect one, e.g. direct influence on Armenian, and
indirect influence on Basque via direct influence on those who would become
later the Iberian migrants.

So, a relationship of some sort cannot be excluded, but it is likely to be
a very complex indirect one. And clarifying it will probably require a much
better understanding of the Iberian language, although genetic
investigation into the migrations from the neighborhood of the Caucasus and
further study of the propagation mechanisms of the Cycladic culture  will
also play a major role.

Ed.