Lactose Intolerance/Renfrew

[X99Lynx at aol.com]

I wrote:
<<Well if the Anatolian IE languages arose as an "isolate"....>>

In a message dated 4/13/2001 5:35:25 AM, sarima at friesen.net writes:
<<What does this mean?  Languages do not appear out of nowhere - they develop
from other, similar languages. >>

I think I'd better stop using the word "isolate."

I also wrote:
<<Every one of those "thousands, of distinct languages covering very small
areas" would look "intrusive" compared to every other one.>>

Stanley Friesen replied:
<<Not really.  At least in New Guinea on can often determine some constraints
on the order of arrival of the various groups.  (For instance, the language
groups restricted to upland areas must be older than the one seen in valleys,
and groups with compact, more or less contiguous, areas must be relatively
recent). In any case, at most one of the language groups in such an area can
really be said to be fully indigenous.  All others have to have been
intrusive at some point in time.>>

That's not my understanding of the situation with "aboriginal" languages in
New Guinea.  I believe that most of the languages yield no comparative
relatedness to neighboring languages and that the explanation is that the
highly local isolation of these languages dates back more than 10,000 years.
Do you have better information?

I wrote:
<<Or perhaps it was just the other languages in Anatolia that were the
intruders.  Who exactly is the candidate for the aboriginal Anatolian
language - especially in western and southern Anatolia?>>

Stanley Friesen replied:
<<My first guess would be Hattic. Or the aboriginal language could have
become extinct by the time of the Hittite Empire.>>

But again why couldn't Hattic be intrusive?  And assuming an aboriginal
language begs the question, doesn't it?  Any other language you find in
Anatolia could have just as easily intruded on Anatolian.

I wrote:
<<The steppes headbanger theory simply does not show much either in
innovation in ideas or ways of living or in the needed geographical
range,...>>

Stanley Friesen replied:
<<Oh?  Horse riding, possibly wheeled vehicles (and later chariots for sure -
but that was after PIE split up) - these sound like innovation to me!>>

I've asked the following question on three different archaeology lists. I've
asked it of members of the team that did the recent gene study on horses.
I've even sent Prof Anthony an unanswered e-mail.  Here are the questions:

<< How many other instances of tooth bit-wear, bits, cheek pieces, saddles or
any other evidence of HORSE RIDING have been found in Europe between the time
of the early finds in the Ukraine and the clear appearance of the bit after
circa 2000BC.

Have any horse teeth been found in Europe after 4000BC but before say 1500BC
and what percentage show the stated indicia of bit wear?>>

The only answers I've ever received all say none that anybody knows of.
Nothing.  Zip.  Plenty of bones.  Plenty of horse skulls.  But nothing else.

What's worse is then when I cited bit-wear on teeth at Derevika I got this
back: "Actually you gotta throw the Derevika horse [bit evidence] out.
Anthony and Brown (2000) Eneolithic horse exploitation in the Eurasian
steppes, ANTIQUITY, 75-86, has C14 dates from it...  The most recent dates on
it put it up around the 1st century BC.  As they note, it looks like it was a
pit deposit that had nothing to do with the Neolithic levels of the site."

So now there's not even evidence in the Ukraine.  So, as far as I can tell,
there's no evidence of "horse-riding" in all of Europe much before around
1500BC.  If it came from the Asian steppes at that late date, it wouldn't
seem to have much to do with the initial spread of IE languages.  And though
the new genetic studies have located geographic centers of domestication for
the cow, pig and goat, the horse seems to come from all over the place.  And
now they're finding even more true horse bones at Catal Huyuk.  So there's
not a lot left to connect early European steppe culture with early
horse-related innovations in the rest of Europe.

The wheel just plain seems to go the other way.  The Near East, Poland, the
Danube, then into the Ukraine.

Regards,
Steve Long