Proto-Turkic homeland

This post is part of a draft on South Siberian language homelands and Sprachbünde.

The following text contains a description of Proto-Turkic and its main dialectal split. Contacts with Samoyed, Ob-Ugric, Iranian, Yeniseian, Tocharian, Chinese and Mongolic, as well as palaeolinguistics, hydronymy, and ethnonymy are taken into account to pinpoint the succeeding homelands and expansion territories. The archaeological-archaeogenetic discussion is focused on the Middle and Late Bronze Age Altai Mönkhkhairkhan and Deer Stone-Khirigsuur Complex and related groups, as well as on Ulaanzukh; Early Iron Age “Scytho-Siberian” Pazyryk & Uyuk and Slab Grave cultures; and on the Late … Read the rest “Proto-Turkic homeland”

Proto-Samoyed homeland

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This post is part of a draft on South Siberian language homelands and Sprachbünde.

The following text contains a description of Pre- and Proto-Samoyedic stages and its dialectal diversification. Contacts with Indo-Iranian, Yeniseian, Tocharian, Yukaghir, and Turkic, as well as onomastics and palaeolinguistics are taken into account to pinpoint the succeeding homelands and expansion territories. The archaeological-archaeogenetic discussion is focused on the Middle Bronze Age Cherkaskul materials of the Andronovo period, on the Late Bronze Age Karasuk culture, and on the evolution and expansion of the Iron Age Tagar culture within the framework of “Scytho-Siberian” … Read the rest “Proto-Samoyed homeland”

Proto-Uralic Homeland (IX): West Caucasian

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This post is a continuation of a draft on palaeolinguistics and the Proto-Uralic homeland. Or, rather, a preliminary approach to the most likely key to understand the ultimate origin of Proto-Uralic.

Despite the multiple far-fetched proposals of long-range connections between Asian languages and Uralic – e.g. Ural-Altaic, Uralo-Siberian, Eskimo-Uralic, or Uralo-Dravidian – its closest language family is evidently Indo-European, whether by inheritance or by long-lasting intertwined language developments. This supports that Pre-Proto-Uralic and Proto-Uralic developed in Eastern Europe, always close to the Proto-Indo-European homeland. Therefore, it can be assumed that they were subject … Read the rest “Proto-Uralic Homeland (IX): West Caucasian”

Ob-Ugric Homeland

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This post is part of a draft on South Siberian language homelands and Sprachbünde.

The following text contains a description of Ob-Ugric languages and their connection within an Ugric Sprachbund. Special emphasis is placed on their evolution among surrounding ethnolinguistic groups before they were first documented, and on their most likely connection with archaeological cultures succeeding the Seima-Turbino phenomenon in the Southern Urals and the Trans-Urals. The archaeological-archaeogenetic discussion is therefore focused on the Middle Bronze Age Cherkaskul and Late Bronze Age Andronovo-like cultures, as well as on the formation of the “Scythian” Sargat … Read the rest “Ob-Ugric Homeland”

Proto-Yeniseian Homeland

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This post is part of a draft on South Siberian language homelands and Sprachbünde.

The following text contains a description of Yeniseian languages, their dialectal groupings and likely evolution among surrounding ethnolinguistic groups before they were first documented. Special emphasis is placed on ancient Yeniseic formants for water bodies, widely distributed through Western, Southern, and Central Siberia. Finally, the archaeological-archaeogenetic discussion is focused on Early Bronze Age Glazkovo-related and Okunevo-like cultures, due to their patrilineal connection to sampled Yeniseian and ancient Na-Dene populations.

Yeniseian languages

Evolution and Contacts
Hydronymy

Archaeology and population genomics

Glazkovo culture

… Read the rest

South Siberian Urheimaten and Sprachbünde

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The long-lasting intertwined ethnolinguistic developments of East Uralic speakers with Palaeo-Siberian populations makes it impossible to split up a post about the evolution of the former without discussing the fate of the latter.

External contacts with other indigenous East Asian languages close to the Altai-Sayan region and Circum-Baikal area are also relevant, but would no doubt turn this post series into an unending task. Therefore, I will focus on the western part of the Baikal Neolithic and Neo-Siberian-related ancestry clines, which seem more relevant for the ancient stages of Ob-Ugric and Samoyed developments.

For an easier read of … Read the rest “South Siberian Urheimaten and Sprachbünde”

IBD sharing between Corded Ware and Yamnaya-related populations

Oral communication Ancient DNA and the New Science of the Human Past by David Reich (March 3, 2021).

I noticed this interesting slide called “Caught red-handed”, at approximately 45m 17s, where David Reich asserts that sampled Corded Ware populations had many “close cousins” with Yamnaya-related populations “within generations”. The method could also be used, always according to Reich, to identify “who the Yamnaya mixed with to form groups like Corded Ware”.

NOTE. Notice also the the number of new sampled individuals from Khvalynsk, Ekaterinovka, and new Yamnaya groups from Chelyabinsk, Urals, Volga, Don, Moldova, and Romania.

This represents the … Read the rest “IBD sharing between Corded Ware and Yamnaya-related populations”

Proto-Indo-European Self-Study Course Book

Today is International Mother Language Day, a day as good as any other to start or continue learning Proto-Indo-European.

Fernando López-Menchero has just published the 3^rd version of his Proto-Indo-European self-study book, A Practical Guidebook for Modern Indo-European Explorers, updating the previously published 1^st version (2018). It includes:

Multiple corrections to the already published lessons 1-30, based on many comments from readers, received by email and through the Modern Indo-European Group.
The addition of previously announced Part II of the Guidebook, now published as lessons 31-42 and Appendices.
Corrections and updates to the supplementary materials,

… Read the rest

Germanic runes in the Prague-Type Pottery culture

Recent paper (~~behind paywall~~) Runes from Lány (Czech Republic) – The oldest inscription among Slavs. A new standard for multidisciplinary analysis of runic bones by Macháček et al. J. Archaeol Sci (2021).

Interesting excerpts (emphasis mine):

To date no archaeological find is generally accepted as evidence for a direct contact between Germanic tribes and Early Slavs in Central Europe (Brather, 2004). Here we report a novel archaeological find in support of a direct contact: a rune-inscribed fragment of a bone from the late 6^th century found in a Slavic settlement. Runes are an alphabetic script, called fuþark,

… Read the rest