Oops! My brain melted for a second there. Obviously he was Corsican.
Oops! My brain melted for a second there. Obviously he was Corsican.
@Morticia: The Kozsyce example, I read the paper which sumskilz posted and there is nothing in there that I didn't already know. Much like I had said earlier they really do suggest it was part of the Corded Ware expansion. We also have no reason to doubt the genocidal segregationist tendencies of Indo-Aryans because we have plenty of examples of them doing exactly that in other places. Besides if it isn't true then how did steppe migrations cause such a dent in every population group, even the Basques which are some of the few surviving Neolithic cultures. So obviously at some point they adapted from "kill everything in sight" to "kill the men and kidnap the women". Every culture they ever created was also extremely militant, I mean you don't need chariots if your society is peaceful.
@Roma: We could go into semantics, Napoleon actually only had 2 out of 8 Corsican great grandparents. The other 6 were from Tuscany, Genoa and Lombardy. However his Y-DNA is neither R1b, J2, or G, it is actually E1b1 (specifically E-M34).
I'm sorry but there is just no way that the Sea People were members of the Nuragic culture. If there is no evidence at Kozsyce to say that it was part of the Corded Ware expansion, there is even less evidence that the Sea People were Nuragic. All evidence and clues point to the Sea People being Aegean and specifically Luwian in origin.
Actually I looked up how that research team came to the conclusion that the Sea People were Nuragic. Their supporting evidence was that the Sea People had horned helmets. Also that they found Sardinian wares in a Bronze Age site in Greece.
@Cyclops: Nice meme! But there is no reason to doubt the Aryan invasion of the Indian sub-continent at this point. It isn't just a matter of cultural or linguistic transmission to India. The Vedic Civilization which shows up during the Late Bronze has characteristics consistent with the Indo-Aryans, and are probably the descendants of the Andronovo Culture. I mean linguists have been showing this since at least the early 1800's. But not only do we have the material remains to prove this, more recently we also have genetic studies.
If the Luwians were the Sea Peoples, and the Luwians built Troy, and the Homeric figure Aeneas of Troy fled to Italy to help in the founding of Rome as the legendary ancestor of Romulus and Remus, that means the Romans were Sea Peoples!
Thanks for explaining that, Oda. I had read a number of theories about the Sea Peoples and I thought that the Sardinian theory was still considered at least somewhat credible. Apparently I am not up to speed with the latest research on that, but then again the Bronze Age is not my forte. I am, however, at least well informed enough to know that Troy was not located in the Baltic Sea, and that the mythical Trojan War was most likely just a series of conflicts that got conflated into one giant naval landing by Mycenaean Greeks under the banner of Agamemnon. I've seen others here in this sub-forum also argue that the nebulous "Sea Peoples" were just an amalgamation of different marauders attacking at different times, although you'd probably be right to say the bulk of them were Luwians. Damn Luwians! They were just jealous of the Hittites.
Last edited by Roma_Victrix; July 16, 2020 at 05:56 PM.
It probably is considered credible. But it is just a dumb theory with pretty much no evidence to back it up.
In Turkey at least their Bronze Age departments in academia all accept that the Sea People were Luwian. The issue is that people are assuming that the migrations need to have originated outside of the known scope of civilization. For whatever reason people keep having the need to reach all the way to Sardinia, or Central Europe or whatever. But even then a lot of the names of these tribes can be identified as known Anatolian tribes.
I think this might be an interesting case of the political narratives of the ultra-nationalist and the ultra-progressive (the "far right" and "far left", as it were) converging: one side because "my ancestors can do no wrong" (given the current poltical climate in Poland etc.), the other because they want to uphold the dogma that mass migrations are beneficial to the native populace. In either case, it's bad practice.
I wonder which political leanings are to be found among scholars who put forth such theories
Thx mate. I was agreeing with you entirely, (there' n doubt there was a movement of IE speakers into the Punjab and North India in Vedic era) just offering a simplistic caveat that language does not equal blood.
I wonder at the way languages take hold. Aramaic was not the language of any major conqueror but it spread widely in the Near East as the administrative lingua franca of Assyrians and Persians. For some reason a West Germanic language took hold in Britannia (I think because foederati were settled there) displacing Latin and the indigenous languages until it bonded with a North Germanic dialect to make English (also bizarre because usually the Norse dropped their language at the border and became French or Slavic or whatnot). I suspect a relatively small elite or sub-elite can infect a population with a language especially if it brings a tech or social gain: i believe there are more English speakers in India now than under the Raj, as an example-thats because the tech gain is greater, even though the political impetus has gone. Likewise French was the lingua franca of Europe post 1640's when they achieved near hegemony under Luis XIV but remained long after their star waned post 1815.
Maybe horse domestication/charioteering was a tech/social complex that carried with it the Aryan language?
Jatte lambastes Calico Rat
"Blessed is he who learns how to engage in inquiry, with no impulse to hurt his countrymen or to pursue wrongful actions, but perceives the order of the immortal and ageless nature, how it is structured."
Euripides
"This is the disease of curiosity. It is this which drives to try and discover the secrets of nature, those secrets which are beyond our understanding, which avails us nothing and which man should not wish to learn."
Augustine
Were the Hyksos specifically Amorite? I guess by the 1600s BC when they established the 15th Dynasty, this seems likely.
That is basically what the Indo-Aryan peoples did. It is debated as to who Labarna is, but many suggest that Labarna is actually a title of Hattusili I. Later on many Hittite rulers take the title "Tabarna" which is likely the same term but this shows that it probably was a title. Prior to the establishment of the Hittite kingdom it is probable that the Hittites had split off into various kingdoms in Hatti and that the Labarna had unified these into one kingdom. The Hittites didn't so much just walk into Hatti and take over since their exposure to Hattian culture and language shows a long time presence. The accepted narrative is that the Hittites migrated into the Hattian states and served as mercenaries, until eventually they overthrew the Hattian states and decided to "civilize" themselves. But in all likelihood they had already been influenced by the local culture and were only "quasi-barbarous". For instance the terms "Hatti" and "Kingdom of Hatti" continued to be used by the Hittites.
The Hittites were also heavily influenced by the Hurrian culture and Hurrian religion. The Hurrian language was used for ceremonial and religious purposes. Hurrian names were also used interchangeably with Hittite names by prominent individuals and Hurrian people also flourished in areas under Hittite control. The Hittites would have entered Hatti from the Caucasus region and Eastern Anatolia. That whole area of Eastern Anatolia, Armenia, and Upper Mesopotamia had been inhabited by the Hurrians since roughly the time of Hammurabi. Although it is interesting that the Hurrians do not coalesce into the Mitanni Kingdom until around the early to mid 1500's BC (under Kirta). A process which must have been very similar to the unification of the Hittites by the Labarna.
Hattusili I was actually succeeded by his grandson Mursili I. For whatever reason Hattusili named his grandson as his successor rather than any sons he might have had. Mursili I inherited the throne while still a minor however when he came of age he conquered Aleppo (a powerful kingdom in those days, but which had been declining since the time of Hammurabi), and possibly conquered Carchemish. He marched down Mesopotamia and sacked Babylon, then marched back to Hatti with all of his spoils. This destabilized the ruling Amorite dynasty and led to the kingdom being conquered by the Kassite barbarians from the east. But there isn't much mention as to what was happening in Upper Mesopotamia, so presumably the Hurrian and Amorite cities had not unified into the Mitanni Empire just yet. But it is interesting that Mursili did not attempt to establish any sort of control over those cities in Upper Mesopotamia. Perhaps he bought their compliance because there is no mention of him having to fight his way across the Euphrates or Khabur rivers, and no mentions of threats to his line of retreat on his way to Babylon.
I can't really say how large the Indo-Aryan invasion was. But it was definitely one of the later invasion waves within Europe. To my knowledge the earlier waves completely bypassed Greece and went right through Eastern and Central Europe.
Tiryns and Mycenae remained a shadow of their former selves after the Bronze Age Collapse. These two cities were in ruins and their populations probably struggled to feed themselves. A lot of the main buildings from the Bronze Age had already been destroyed. When Argos conquered these cities during the Classical Era they probably did not struggle to overcome these enemies. If the Argives destroyed the remains there probably was not a lot to finish off.
Although the question really is why this change in terminology. The thing is that the kings who ruled later in Greek history didn't simply stop calling themselves "Anax", they did not rule as an Anax would. A Basileios was significantly reduced in authority from an Anax and this is true even in Makedonia, where a monarchy was the norm (well feudalism was the norm but you get my point).
Presumably the ruler of Mycenae was titled "Anax". But it would be interesting to know what the rulers of Athens and Thebes called themselves at their peak. Both strong cities, which were likely outside of the Mycenaean grasp (although Homer states that the Athenians took up Agamemnon's call to arms, Thebes did not). Thebes was powerful enough that it defeated Gla and Orchomenos, and drained Lake Kopais.
That seems very possible.
Perhaps the Pelasgians were another Indo-European group that did not migrate into Greece. They could be related to the Greek Indo-Europeans but since they remained on the peripheries they were not assimilated.
Anyway that is some good information you posted.
I don't think that there is a book that covers the Hittite-Ahhiyawan Wars. I know of it because I read the correspondence between Muwatallis II and the "Great King of Ahhiyawa" (and his brother Tawagalawa). I posted what remains of that tablet about a page or so back. Also did some analysis on this letter and put into the broader context. But this conflict undoubtedly coincides with a Luwian uprising against the Hittites, as well as the Alaksandu of Wilusa treaty. In another letter about Wilusa, we can see that generally Wilusa had good relations with the Hittites. Then in the 1290s BC the ruler of Wilusa finally opted to seek Hittite protection and made the alliance with the Hittites. So we can infer that Wilusa had always been on the receiving end of other Luwian states and probably raiders from the Aegean. But this particular conflict was so bad that they decided to finally throw their lot in with the Hittites. There is also the statement that Alaksandu of Wilusa was not a relative of the previous king. Quite likely Alaksandu was trying to acquire recognition by the Hittite overlords. However the Ahhiyawans did not go to war over any reason involving Wilusa. They mention disputed islands in the Aegean which were seized by the Hittites, the requested extradition of the notorious pirate Piyama-Radu to the Hittites, and their support for the Luwian rulers that rebelled against their Hittite overlords.
I will take a look at Drews and Chadwick. Generally I just say to read Trevor Bryce's books. Bryce doesn't have any revolutionary or wild theories or anything, but it is a decent read for understanding the Hittites and the Anatolians. I can't think of any better place to start.
Probably not in the way you’re thinking.
The term Amorite gets used differently (and rather loosely) by different sources, both ancient and modern. For a lot of Mesopotamian sources, Amorites are any Northwest Semitic people and Amurru is anywhere west of the Euphrates. The biblical texts seem to use Amorite interchangeably with Canaanite. Although, maybe more so for people from northern modern Israel and Jordan. Not that this is much help, when they also use Canaanite as an exonym despite Hebrew being a Canaanite language or dialect (depending on your perspective).
Linguistically, Amorite is a designation for a specific Northwestern Semitic language, which is very closely related to Canaanite. Although some consider it a dialect of Canaanite. In any case, it’s not well attested except at Ugarit. So Ugaritic is considered a dialect of Amorite, except for by those that consider Ugaritic to be a regional variation of the Amorite dialect of Canaanite. The Hyksos names don't show more or less affinity with any of these languages/dialects.
There was also the Amorite Kingdom of course, which was in northern modern Lebanon and northwestern modern Syria. However, the closest parallels to Hyksos material culture were in southern modern Lebanon and northern modern Israel.
I don’t know if Drews meant Amorite in the more general sense or the more specific sense, but I do know that book was published before the results of the excavations of the Hyksos capitol were published.
So the Hyksos were Canaanites or something? Or... a group which migrated into Canaan and then moved into Egypt?
With the Indo-European migrations into Greece, we just don't know if this happened via the Aegean or if they come down from the Danube. But since what we have recorded from Mycenaean Greek is so similar to Luwian, it is really hard not to draw a connection. Similarities in culture and religion are further evidence.
What we do know is that the earlier migration of peoples to the Aegean isles, Crete and the Greek peninsula occurred from Anatolia by non-Indo-European peoples in the 2000s BC. Proto-Greek peoples are hypothesized as having migrated southwards from the Balkans-Danube area. It is quite possible that at the start of the Late Helladic period, there was an influx of two Indo-European groups, those from the north and those that crossed the Aegean. But supposedly Proto-Greek speakers were present in the Balkans around the Early Helladic Period.
http://www.centrostudilaruna.it/home...c-summary.html
Related to the historical background of the Trojan War.. I'm not sure whether this should be posted here or in the Arts (since the Iliad is in fact an epic poem), but the theories from Felice Vinci (sorry but I can't provide any page in English about the author) are related to the supposed historical collocation of the events that later gave birth to the epic poem from Homer, so I guess it might well stay here in the VV.
However, an intriguing theory, here is an abstract from an AD to the book "The Baltic Origins Of Homer's Epic Tales: The Iliad, The Odyssey, And The Migration Of Myth":
As a young Italian who had to study the Iliad and the Odyssey at the high school, I was always intrigued by the fact that teachers used to almost completely ignore the historical background of both and only focused on the moral teachings around which those poems where supposedly based and developed .. honestly I always found them to be an attempt to tell a story and not to teach lessons.. I suppose it was the same for Prof. VinciFor years scholars have debated the incongruities in Homer’s Iliad and Odyssey, finding the author’s descriptions at odds with the geography he purportedly describes. Inspired by Plutarch’s remark that Calypso’s island home was only five days’ sail from Britain, Felice Vinci convincingly argues that Homer’s epic tales originated not in the Mediterranean, but in northern Europe’s Baltic Sea.
Using meticulous geographical analysis, Vinci shows that many Homeric places, such as Troy and Ithaca, can be identified in the geographic landscape of the Baltic. He explains how the cool, foggy weather described by Ulysses matches that of northern climes rather than the sunny, warm Mediterranean and Aegean, and how battles lasting through the night would easily have been possible in the long days of the Baltic summer. Vinci’s meteorological analysis reveals how the “climatic optimum”--a long period of weather that resulted in a much milder northern Europe--declined and thus caused the blond seafarers of the Baltic to migrate south to warmer climates, where they rebuilt their original world in the Mediterranean. Through many generations the memory of the heroic age and the feats performed by their ancestors in their lost homeland was preserved and handed down, ultimately to be codified by Homer as the Iliad and the Odyssey.
In The Baltic Origins of Homer’s Epic Tales, Felice Vinci offers a key to open many doors, allowing us to consider from a new perspective the age-old question of the Indo-European diaspora and the origin not only of Greek civilization, but of Western civilization as a whole.
Enjoy the reading, IMO it's an intriguing theory that's worth 15 minutes of your time
Under the patronage of Finlander, patron of Lugotorix & Lifthrasir & joerock22 & Socrates1984 & Kilo11 & Vladyvid & Dick Cheney & phazer & Jake Armitage & webba 84 of the Imperial House of Hader
First problem. Homer or the collective set of poets that resulted in the two epics were not professional students of Geography, nor navigators nor Bematists (professional step counters). It also almost certain they never referenced any such professionals in making their stories. So there is no particular reason to suppose there is any difficulty in a geographic description. You can be puzzled by an apparent discrepancy in Arrien. You can note a gaff in Thucydides like say the fact he was clearly mislead by his Spartan sources about the geography of Sphacteria and had not visited it himself. But they were professional soldiers and writing history.
Second Occamas Razor. There is so much special pleading in that link that I am sorry its fun, and a lot effort was put into it. But sorry again, its nonsense or at least to be kind its as fanciful as Homer's world is in the first place.
IN PATROCINIVM SVB Dromikaites
'One day when I fly with my hands - up down the sky, like a bird'
But if the cause be not good, the king himself hath a heavy reckoning to make, when all those legs and arms and heads, chopped off in battle, shall join together at the latter day and cry all 'We died at such a place; some swearing, some crying for surgeon, some upon their wives left poor behind them, some upon the debts they owe, some upon their children rawly left.
Hyperides of Athens: We know, replied he, that Antipater is good, but we (the Demos of Athens) have no need of a master at present, even a good one.
I've read Illiad and Odyssey ages ago and I don't actually remember much of it, least of all the geography, so most of my knowledge about it is from secondary sources like Wikipedia. Yet the claims that the geography fits so precisely made me instantly suspicious. Geography in those times was far from exact. It couldn't be otherwise, with their level of technology. Even Strabo, who could travel extensively and had reliable written sources to use, all thanks to the extent of Roman Republic at the time, ended up with significant distortion and outright fabrications in his work. And yet, we're expected to believe that the geography itself and few select passages were transmitted orally with perfect fidelity over 800 years while the rest of the epos, as penned down by Homer, is obvious patchwork of mythology, traces of legends and anachronisms from various time periods and outright fabrication, while author admits that the origin of those passages was lost in time even before Homer.
What most obviously show how much of this theory is wishful thinking and grasping for straws is this passage:
I've bolded the two cases that really jumped on me. Poles are Slavic people, who lived in semi-nomadic lifestyle and obscurity around lower Dniepr and Dniestr until the Migration period when they were displaced and radiated to the central Europe and Balkans. Similar, Livonians are Finno-Ugric people who migrated into the area around 1000CE from their home in Siberia. And as I found during a little research, Lapps is an exonym for Sámi people, another Finno-Ugric group. Equating any of these with people from Homeric epos, whether it's supposed to take place in the Mediterranean or Baltic, is absolute nonsense and shows just how much research the author really did.We should note that many Homeric peoples, as the Danaans, Pelasgians, Dorians, Curetes, Lybians and Lapithae, whose traces are not found in the Mediterranean, probably still exist in the Baltic world: they find their present counterparts in the Danes, Poles, Thuringians, Kurlandians, Livonians and Lapps (this identification is supported by their respective geographic locations).
Edit: okay, the migration of Sámi and Livonians is a bit more complicated and some theories put it as far back as ~1000 BCE or earlier, but it's still off...and Lapps as term for Sámi is no more than 1000 years old anyway.
Overall, it looks like the author here just tried to make a splash with a grand, revolutionary theory and grasped at straws and ignored basic logic in order to make it appear to fit the evidence. But whenever there's talk of any historicity of the Homeric epos, one should remember that Homer, and all those who transmitted the story before him, were storytellers, and thus prone to exaggeration and outright fabrication in order to captivate the the public. If there is any historic background to it at all, it's most likely been distorted beyond recognition even before Homer penned it down.
Last edited by Sar1n; September 30, 2020 at 11:21 AM.
Y-chromosome lineages of ancient samples from Estonia:
Data source.
That N3a3 is common in speakers of Uralic languages and first arrived along with some Siberian autosomal ancestry. Note the oldest is archeologically dated to 770 BCE at the very earliest. Not that it matters much to the thread, for reasons you've already mentioned.
https://www.twcenter.net/forums/show...-weird-theory)
The various permutations of these silly theories aren't really interesting or worth 15 minutes of anyone's time.
Jatte lambastes Calico Rat
Under the patronage of Finlander, patron of Lugotorix & Lifthrasir & joerock22 & Socrates1984 & Kilo11 & Vladyvid & Dick Cheney & phazer & Jake Armitage & webba 84 of the Imperial House of Hader