Indo-European origins: Neolithic Anatolia still the best hypothesis

[Loki]

Indo-European origins: Neolithic Anatolia still the best hypothesis (http://dienekes.blogspot.com/2011/04/indo-european-origins-neolithic.html)

Dienekes has an interesting article here on the origins of IE.

Language split chart:

http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-UK6uv6RZBlw/TZr4U1kHkKI/AAAAAAAADbY/jvqITDejMG0/s1600/nature.jpg

[Agrippa]

It is relatively certain, that the Neolithic component from Anatolia played a major role, but to see Anatolia as the main centre is still doubtful and I think the real crucial Proto-Indo-European period was happening in Europe, primarily in South Eastern and Eastern Europe.

Whether the LBK people were already Indo-European speakers or not, is a crucial question in this respect.

Interesting is also, from a genetic point of view, that if looking at what Dienekes offered us, with the admixture analysis, that there are two components in practically all Indo-Europeans: Northern European and West Asian.

This becomes particularly evident at the fringes: Basques and other relatively "pure" Atlantic inhabitants: Very low level to non-existence of the West Asian component. But all populations which have known Indo-European influences of significance have it.

Now going in the East, the Southern European component too is extremely low, even in upper caste Indians which have a significant (still small though) portion of Northern European (!).

So if we want to overstretch the results of not just Dienekes, but also other authors, like the study of Behar et al., Indo-Europeans must have had this two components and probably mixed them up early on - depending on exact group in different proportions.

This would be on-line rather with an Eastern European origin in my opinion, if thinking about those two elements from the racial typological point of view and what we know about that, again, Eastern Europe would fit the bill.

Especially the areas directly North of the Caucasus.

So I imagine Mesolithic and then Neolithic groups from the Anatolian-Caucasus area penetrating into Eastern Europe North of the Black Sea, where they came into contact and mixed up with local Mesolithic elements.

The result of this process were the Indo-Europeans, regardless of where exactly this happened. I don't think Anatolian as the primary source makes too much sense honestly, because, among other reasosn, it seems that especially Eastward the primary mode of expansion was along the steppe belt. There was practically no Eastward expansion directly from Anatolia.

Looking at the Indo-Europeans as such, they were herder-warriors, with a quite specialised culture already, again something I would see as a possibly European adaptation.

But that says little about who spoke the Indo-European tongue first or whether the language too was the result of a mixture, the Neolithic newcomers or the locals?

I still think that the crucial formation happened in South Eastern, Central or Eastern Europe, with an important input from the Anatolian-Caucasian Neolithic people, but the final stage happening somewhere in Europe.

But I find it hard to prove, clear is just, that the two elements must have met, at least for the Indo-Europeans which became later known outside of Anatolia.

[EnlightenedHumanist]

I still hold the belief that the origin of the Indo-Europeans (also known as Aryans) originated somewhere in southern Russia close to modern day Stalingrad. However I admit there is no way of identifying certainly. The Annotolia, SE Europe, Central Asia and Ural mtns area are all good candidates.

At any rate, this a study done a couple years ago at several Japanese universities which might be of interest.

Frost’s theory is also backed up by a separate scientific analysis of north European genes carried out at three Japanese universities, which has isolated the date of the genetic mutation that resulted in blond hair to about 11,000 years ago.

rest of article http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/uk/article735078.ece

One of things we need to consider in defining an origin has to do with when the Indo-Europeans arrived at various places in history. Since I am a world study major (I study all history) I can identify when Indo-Europeans arrived and where.

We know that Indo-Europeans arrived in China (as Yuezhi, Tochari, Scythians) around 2000 B.C. around the time of the legendary Xia dynasty. They arrived in India about the same time and either overan the Indus Valley flooding into India. They arrived in Iran in the later half of the 2nd millenium B.C. They arrived in middle-east and Greece in various forms during the Bronze Age collapse (and maybe in some cases before). Slavs and Balts arrived in Eastern Europe during the same period. The Celts arrived Western Europe in the 1st millenium B.C. finally invading Britain about 500 B.C. reaching Ireland not much longer after that. Germans likely developed distinct culture from the Celts in Southern Scandinavia overunning Celtic central Europe around the time the Romans began to rise.

Based on this, hard to imagine IE peoples invading India and China coming from Annatolia had this happened Greece would've been likely effected much earlier on.

There are problems though, Finns carry Nordics traits but they are not IE speakers. Sumerians also had blue eyes but this was before the IE invasion.

[Osweo]

Anatolia is full of non-IE languages of more than three families, in the very earliest known period. IE is a superstratum there. It puzzles the hell out of me why people STILL cite Anatolia as the Urheimat. :tsk:

The adoption and spread of farming into Europe, and in other directions from the Fertile Crescent too, involved many stages of acculturationn of non-farming populations, and many intermediate stages of mixed subsistence. Linking it with the spread of IE is disgustingly simplistic. (With blondeness and light eyes even more so, indeed ;) )

As for Ciscaucasia, that's another region I'd characterise as 'linguistically full', already 'occupied', so to speak. It's dry grassland, for the most part, and I see the successful adaptation to steppe life as an eastern IE innovation, occurring after the dispersal from the Urheimat. Conquering the Great Steppe was the work of the Arya (perhaps simultaneously with the linguistic ancestors of the Tocharians), and there's little to indicate that the other western branches of IE had anything to do with it.

I am always pulled back to Pannonia and the Carpathians of the Ruthenian/Galician/Volynian area.

[Agrippa]

Anatolia is full of non-IE languages of more than three families, in the very earliest known period. IE is a superstratum there. It puzzles the hell out of me why people STILL cite Anatolia as the Urheimat. :tsk:

The adoption and spread of farming into Europe, and in other directions from the Fertile Crescent too, involved many stages of acculturationn of non-farming populations, and many intermediate stages of mixed subsistence. Linking it with the spread of IE is disgustingly simplistic. (With blondeness and light eyes even more so, indeed ;) )

As for Ciscaucasia, that's another region I'd characterise as 'linguistically full', already 'occupied', so to speak. It's dry grassland, for the most part, and I see the successful adaptation to steppe life as an eastern IE innovation, occurring after the dispersal from the Urheimat. Conquering the Great Steppe was the work of the Arya (perhaps simultaneously with the linguistic ancestors of the Tocharians), and there's little to indicate that the other western branches of IE had anything to do with it.

I am always pulled back to Pannonia and the Carpathians of the Ruthenian/Galician/Volynian area.

Yet we know that there was a constant East-West pressure in the Eastern steppe region, after all, the Scythians were not the first potentially Indo-European steppe-warriors, but we know of the Cimmerians:


Based on ancient Greek historical sources, a Thracian[12][13] or a Celtic[14] association is sometimes assumed. According to Ferdinand Friedrich Carl Lehmann-Haupt, the language of the Cimmerians could have been a "missing link" between Thracian and Iranian.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cimmerians#Language

And the Thracians seem to be also a "Western pushed" or simply migrated offshot of this steppe people.

So what we can see, definitely, are different waves coming from the East, well into historical periods, with hints for prehistorical movements as well.

I too think that probably earlier Neolithic groups of Central-Eastern and South Eastern Europe might have been crucial for the formation of Indo-Europeans, but I don't see how we can rule out the steppe-Kurgan hypothesis.

@Osweo: What is your idea about the Maikop culture?


There are problems though, Finns carry Nordics traits but they are not IE speakers. Sumerians also had blue eyes but this was before the IE invasion.

This has nothing to do with the question of Indo-European origins, because even if most Indo-Europeans would have been Nordoid, there is no reason to assume that other people shouldn't have had at least certain Nordoid traits like light eyes, why not?

There is no contradiction in this statements.

And modern Finns are even something completely different, with all what happened in between, so they are hardly a contradiction to anything (nor a proof) neither. This is rather about the prehistory and history of Finns, but not related to the Urheimat-hypothesis of Indo-Europeans.

[d3cimat3d]

IMO what we know as Proto-Indo-European was another language spoken in some Caucasus river valley that later came to dominate the Pontic-Caspian steppe following the introduction of livestock to that area, which led to a huge population boom.

[Loki]

IMO what we know as Proto-Indo-European was another language spoken in some Caucasus river valley that later came to dominate the Pontic-Caspian steppe following the introduction of livestock to that area, which led to a huge population boom.

Yes. And therefore this ...




Anatolia is full of non-IE languages of more than three families, in the very earliest known period.


... shouldn't be a problem. I really do think Anatolia is a better bet than inside Europe somewhere for an ur-heimat of IE.

[Agrippa]

As I said in earlier discussions about that subject, even if the important aspect came from Anatolia, it was altered in Europe to produce what we see as Indo-European I'd say. Because I don't think Indo-Europeans "got mature" in Anatolia, even if some sort of Proto-language was spoken there, which was transformed by European influences into what saw later.

What this theories about the Anatolian Urheimat suggest, is often that the real Indo-Europeans, the full package so to say, evolved there and just spread into the West and Esat from Anatolia directly.

Now while I see the great impact of the Anatolian-Caucasian Neolithic, I highly doubt THAT.

Probably some sort of Proto-Proto language was spoken in Anatolia or the Caucasus area, which became the great and successful Proto-Indo-European in Europe, while dying out in Anatolia-Near East.

That seems to be an option to me, with very important influences being added IN EUROPE.

But how "the full package" we see with people like the Kurgan and Corded people, could have evolved in Anatolia, is a mystery to me, because the early Neolithic cultures were still quite different in certain respects, from what I would expect from the Proto-Indo-Europeans WITH the full package, which were essentially herder-warriors, strongly patriarchal, well organised, with a specific religious and belief system and so on.

[Loki]

Anatolia and SE Europe are not that far away from each other, though. I don't see why the one is so different from the other. Could be either, on almost every argument - but for antiquity one must look more east than west in my opinion.

[Sturmgewehr]

Loki you should also note that Dienekes in many cases is full of crap, many of his articles are made to fit his Nationalistic Propaganda.

Anyways I would also agree that Anatolia is a very good and strong Candidate for the Origin of Indo European Languages.

His chart with Indo European Languages tree is funny, he has put Albanian to be with the same origin with Baluchi and Persian which pretty much doesn't really have a base, I think that map is just not accurate.

I find this ones more useful:

http://apt.aforementionedproductions.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/03/Indo-European-Family-of-Languages.jpg
http://www.tutorpal.com/Our_English/images/ltree.jpg
http://www.intersolinc.com/newsletters/images/Language%20Tree.gif

[Agrippa]

Anatolia and SE Europe are not that far away from each other, though. I don't see why the one is so different from the other. Could be either, on almost every argument - but for antiquity one must look more east than west in my opinion.

Well, if Anatolians were involved, there is primarily one option, namely the people we might associate with sites like Çatalhöyük:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/%C3%87atalh%C3%B6y%C3%BCk

That would fit into the racial profile as well, as they were mostly, rather progressive even, Mediterranoids (with Alpinoid and other elements too).

Now they settled typically very closely together and represent the early and Near Eastern stage of the Neolithic culture. On a high level, but quite typically of the Near Eastern model, characterised, among other things, by villages and almost towns which consisted of close knit houses of the Near Eastern style and very often so called Tels/Tells.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tell

Going back to Çatalhöyük:


A striking feature of Çatalhöyük are its female figurines. Mellaart, the original excavator, argued that these well-formed, carefully made figurines, carved and molded from marble, blue and brown limestone, schist, calcite, basalt, alabaster, and clay, represented a female deity of the Great Goddess type. Although a male deity existed as well, “…statues of a female deity far outnumber those of the male deity, who moreover, does not appear to be represented at all after Level VI

This is consistent with what I would call "the Old Mediterranean culture", we see later in Crete, other Mediterranean islands and even as far as Iberia.

There was, in comparison to Indo-Europeans, a much stronger concentration on grain and agriculture, beside the possible ideological and religious differences.

Looking at the Indo-Europeans and their cultures, virtually everywhere, in the later period of time, I see just a possible connection on the one hand, but also a very strong difference on the other.

So a really huge transition must be considered if comparing what we see in f.e. Çatalhöyük and the Caucasus area and Indo-European cultures proper, like that of the Kurgan people and Corded Ware group.

Now this could have been a change happening from inside, but even if the Anatolians-Caucasians would have introduced the language and dominated genetically, even if, when they came they didn't have the full package and were - in my opinion - at best Proto-Proto-Indo-Europeans so to say.

The crucial changes in settlement, customs, way of life and worldview happened outside of Anatolia, before that, whatever they spoke, they were not real Indo-Europeans.

And it is to me totally out of question, that f.e. the Indo-Aryans and Iranians could have expanded DIRECTLY from Anatolia Eastward. But even that being proposed by some proponents of the Anatolian theory.

If having Corded Ware, Kurgan Culture, Indo-Aryans and Iranians on the one hand and sites like Çatalhöyük on the other, I just see the possible connection, yes, but also a HUGE gap!

This gap must be filled with developments in the areas described, I don't see this happening, archaeologically wise, in Anatolia, not at all.

And the gap is so big, the difference still so huge, that I have to assume a strong influence of other people and changes happening, rather in Europe, than in Anatolia before we can really speak of Proto-Indo-Europeans, yet alone Indo-Europeans "with the full package".

While the language is important, the success of this language group being based on the full package I mentioned and the "mature status" the whole group gained - in Europe. Even for the Anatolian branches of IE we can make up perfect models of how they came (back?) to Anatolia from further North.

The Hittites being not really an example of an Anatolian persistence of the Indo-Europeans neither.

[Osweo]

Yet we know that there was a constant East-West pressure in the Eastern steppe region, after all, the Scythians were not the first potentially Indo-European steppe-warriors, but we know of the Cimmerians:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cimmerians#Language
Eee... People STILL talking about 'Celtic' here! :eek: :tsk:

Cimmerians, Scythians, Sarmatians, Alans - all part of the same thing, just like the Arya, Medes, Persians, Parthians, etc.

Seems to me that the Iranics, and a few other fellow travellers, were the first to conquer the steppe, and held onto their advantage for a very long while until the Turkics inherited their position.

They were not of an intermediate physical type between east and west, but an offshoot of the west that penetrated the east. That's a fair comment, yes, Agrippa? Or am I wrong to expect an older intermediate type in Inner Asia?

And the Thracians seem to be also a "Western pushed" or simply migrated offshot of this steppe people.
Why not see the Thracians more as 'southward pushed', and the Steppe folks as 'eastward'?

So what we can see, definitely, are different waves coming from the East, well into historical periods, with hints for prehistorical movements as well.
Migrations from the east were only possible once the required technology and mode of subsistence were developed. I don't see this as predating the Arya.


I too think that probably earlier Neolithic groups of Central-Eastern and South Eastern Europe might have been crucial for the formation of Indo-Europeans,
Absolutely. Everything points to this.

but I don't see how we can rule out the steppe-Kurgan hypothesis.
Only as an intra-IE thing, in my book. I simply don't think it was early enough, and think the Dnepr area too far from the Etruscan/Lemnian area (clear relatives of PIE).


@Osweo: What is your idea about the Maikop culture?
I honestly don't know. But here are suggestions; A zone of contact of Eastern IE with the ancestors of the Cherkess. Or a para-Indo-Iranian group, later assimilated into the main Iranian stock. Or an eastern cousin of IE.


As I said in earlier discussions about that subject, even if the important aspect came from Anatolia, it was altered in Europe to produce what we see as Indo-European I'd say. Because I don't think Indo-Europeans "got mature" in Anatolia, even if some sort of Proto-language was spoken there, which was transformed by European influences into what saw later.
Whatever the neolithic Zagros/Anatolian pioneers brought to the PIE speakers, it wasn't enough to determine the structure of the language, which grammatically is quite distinct from those in early historical Anatolia. It brought a few cultural things as icing on the cake (see the word 'seven' and 'star', and several other lexical items), but not the fundaments of the language.


What this theories about the Anatolian Urheimat suggest, is often that the real Indo-Europeans, the full package so to say, evolved there and just spread into the West and Esat from Anatolia directly.

Now while I see the great impact of the Anatolian-Caucasian Neolithic, I highly doubt THAT.
Exactly. :thumb001:


Probably some sort of Proto-Proto language was spoken in Anatolia or the Caucasus area, which became the great and successful Proto-Indo-European in Europe, while dying out in Anatolia-Near East.

That seems to be an option to me, with very important influences being added IN EUROPE.
You seem too ready to assume that the incoming cultivators formed the base, upon which the mesolithic natives added a few finishing touches of their own, rather than exploring how the natives might rather have adopted what they liked from the incomers and built a cultural tradition of their own. I see the birth of the LBK as just such a native response to the Balkan neolithic.


But how "the full package" we see with people like the Kurgan and Corded people, could have evolved in Anatolia, is a mystery to me, because the early Neolithic cultures were still quite different in certain respects, from what I would expect from the Proto-Indo-Europeans WITH the full package, which were essentially herder-warriors, strongly patriarchal, well organised, with a specific religious and belief system and so on.
Exactly. The PIE reconstructed package fits best with partially acculturated native Central Europeans.

There was, in comparison to Indo-Europeans, a much stronger concentration on grain and agriculture, beside the possible ideological and religious differences.

Looking at the Indo-Europeans and their cultures, virtually everywhere, in the later period of time, I see just a possible connection on the one hand, but also a very strong difference on the other.
These differences are far too strong for me to see all but the most indirect connections.

And it is to me totally out of question, that f.e. the Indo-Aryans and Iranians could have expanded DIRECTLY from Anatolia Eastward. But even that being proposed by some proponents of the Anatolian theory.
Cringe-worthy, indeed. :eek:

Even for the Anatolian branches of IE we can make up perfect models of how they came (back?) to Anatolia from further North.

The Hittites being not really an example of an Anatolian persistence of the Indo-Europeans neither.
Definitely. They themselves were fully aware and honest about being incomers on top of a native population (of Caucasian linguistic affiliation, which stretched all the way into Greece).

Unfortunately, Loki is just excited about his weird paternal haplogroup, and anxious to see its bearers as great culture bringers to our humble continent. ;):p

[Agrippa]

They were not of an intermediate physical type between east and west, but an offshoot of the west that penetrated the east. That's a fair comment, yes, Agrippa? Or am I wrong to expect an older intermediate type in Inner Asia?

Interestingly, the Cimmerians, as far as we can see them, were more on-line with the Western branches, so were the later Scythians, but there were always subpopulations and groups which had a stronger deviation, like some of the Sarmatians which were actually more Dinaro-Borreby like so to say, possibly even with small Mongoloid influences - while the Alans again were just like other IE.

I just know the record for some areas and one can see a constant pressure on the Western populations coming from the East.

As for the Celtic connection, well, the interesting thing about the Hallstatt culture is the predominance of certain aspects of the steppe warrior there and the art of the Celts too might show such influences.

One of my ideas, I just played through, wouldn't bet on it, was, that a rather steppe-warrior elite (Cimmerians?) conquered the Western groups and established a society on their own, exemplified by various typical Hallstatt remains.

In the La Tene period there seem to have been almost a revolution against this smaller elite and a free warrior society emerging, which was somewhat different in various respects from the chieftain-system before.

So while I see no definitive proofs, it just appears to be an option that early Celts/Hallstatt was strongly influenced by a later wave of steppe-warriors, which could be identified as Cimmerians.

[Loki]

Unfortunately, Loki is just excited about his weird paternal haplogroup, and anxious to see its bearers as great culture bringers to our humble continent. ;):p

Well, they most certainly were ... where would Europe be without ancient Greek civilization? ;)

[Osweo]

Well, they most certainly were ... where would Europe be without ancient Greek civilization? ;)

Somewhere like this;

http://www.topstrange.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/08/Village-In-Ukraine1.jpg
http://www.bertsgeschiedenissite.nl/ijzertijd/eeuw1ac/terp2.jpg
http://www.scotlandforvisitors.co.uk/crannog.jpg
http://www.llangorselake.co.uk/Photos/Crannog%202.jpg
http://www.topstrange.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/08/Village-In-Ukraine21.jpg

Damn Greeks... :tsk:



:cry2

[Agrippa]

Well, the Bronze Age had many higher cultural developments, the Greeks were just the pinnacle of it.

And for a higher culture you need people being freed from the daily simple labour for subsistence, so specialisation, diversification, stratification etc. of the society. Which however, reduced many peasants just to a ressource in a way.

Now looking at the Hallstatt period again, there were huge tumuli for the chieftains, really very rich ones, an extreme social stratification. Those single rulers and clans were really a people apart.

What we can see at sites like the Heuneburg is a very well organised, high standing fortified town and chieftains domicile, but then, interestingly, with the beginning of La Tene, this settlement was BURNED DOWN.

Whether foreigners came, probably even another ethnic group, is hard to tell, but that sort of social revolution must have taken place at least in some areas, namely from where this new development of a lower but broader culture of free warriors emerged. I think it might even have had an ethnic as well as religious back up. We don't know for sure whether all Hallstatt people were Celts, but it seems to be likely that the majority of the population was, at least related.

Here the Heuneburg (chieftain's town/domicile of the Hallstatt time, burned down then) as a classic example of what I described, just look how well organised it was, here is the model:

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/d/da/Heuneburg_%28Diorama_im_Heuneburg-Museum%2C_Hundersingen%29.jpg

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/5/5f/Heuneburg_%28Diorama_-_Ausschnitt_im_Heuneburg-Museum%2C_Hundersingen%29.JPG

http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heuneburg

The Hallstatt period was characterised by a very, very strong Southern influence, actualyl the upper class lived "like Greeks", just with some of their old, often much more brutal, customs. This aristocracy imported Southern goods and customs at a very high level.

So probably, if they were not foreign from the start, they might have alienated themselves from the rest of the population. To describe it somewhat dramatically, they were sitting up in their hill fortresses and towns, people apart, living a different way of life, largely at the expense of the largely ignorant larger population, as horse warriors, like they described themselves.

They even tried to use the chariot and Hoplit tactics, the latter might have changed something, since more of the average people got warrior experience. However, all of that just shows how great the influence from Greeks and Etruscans actually was at that time.

Even after death, the elite was a people apart, following ancient Indo-European customs with their hill graves.

Rich grave from inside:
http://www.unc.edu/celtic/topics/burial/crypt.gif

Tumulus in Austria:
http://www.weinviertel.at/magazin/00/datenmanager/objekte/34309/302/tumulusgrossmugl.jpg

[Motörhead Remember Me]

There are problems though, Finns carry Nordics traits but they are not IE speakers. Sumerians also had blue eyes but this was before the IE invasion.

Nordic traits are not reserved for IE speakers only. Finns/Estonians do not only "carry Nordic traits", we are fully Nordic and far more Nordic than 90% of the worlds IE speakers.
Ever heard about language shift? Or language diffusion?:wink

[Curtis24]

Well, the Bronze Age had many higher cultural developments, the Greeks were just the pinnacle of it.

And for a higher culture you need people being freed from the daily simple labour for subsistence, so specialisation, diversification, stratification etc. of the society. Which however, reduced many peasants just to a ressource in a way.

Now looking at the Hallstatt period again, there were huge tumuli for the chieftains, really very rich ones, an extreme social stratification. Those single rulers and clans were really a people apart.

What we can see at sites like the Heuneburg is a very well organised, high standing fortified town and chieftains domicile, but then, interestingly, with the beginning of La Tene, this settlement was BURNED DOWN.

Whether foreigners came, probably even another ethnic group, is hard to tell, but that sort of social revolution must have taken place at least in some areas, namely from where this new development of a lower but broader culture of free warriors emerged. I think it might even have had an ethnic as well as religious back up. We don't know for sure whether all Hallstatt people were Celts, but it seems to be likely that the majority of the population was, at least related.

Here the Heuneburg (chieftain's town/domicile of the Hallstatt time, burned down then) as a classic example of what I described, just look how well organised it was, here is the model:

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/d/da/Heuneburg_%28Diorama_im_Heuneburg-Museum%2C_Hundersingen%29.jpg

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/5/5f/Heuneburg_%28Diorama_-_Ausschnitt_im_Heuneburg-Museum%2C_Hundersingen%29.JPG

http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heuneburg

The Hallstatt period was characterised by a very, very strong Southern influence, actualyl the upper class lived "like Greeks", just with some of their old, often much more brutal, customs. This aristocracy imported Southern goods and customs at a very high level.

So probably, if they were not foreign from the start, they might have alienated themselves from the rest of the population. To describe it somewhat dramatically, they were sitting up in their hill fortresses and towns, people apart, living a different way of life, largely at the expense of the largely ignorant larger population, as horse warriors, like they described themselves.

They even tried to use the chariot and Hoplit tactics, the latter might have changed something, since more of the average people got warrior experience. However, all of that just shows how great the influence from Greeks and Etruscans actually was at that time.

Even after death, the elite was a people apart, following ancient Indo-European customs with their hill graves.

Rich grave from inside:
http://www.unc.edu/celtic/topics/burial/crypt.gif

Tumulus in Austria:
http://www.weinviertel.at/magazin/00/datenmanager/objekte/34309/302/tumulusgrossmugl.jpg

so you're saying the early Celts successfully overthrew their own plutocracy?

[Agrippa]

so you're saying the early Celts successfully overthrew their own plutocracy?

That was a warrior-class rather, but you can say they overthrew, probably, at least some hints go that, their more foreign-oriented Aristocracy and Oligarchy.

Oligarchy, yes, Plutocracy? No.

They were richer, but their power didn't came from their wealth and for sure not the issuing of money.

That was an aristocratic warrior class of "knights" or "horse warriors" rather, the wealth was the result of their social, military, probably even religious dominance, rather than the opposite.

This is a crucial difference, because even then there were people which were rich, but not rulers, only influential. It is more difficult to say for the Hallstatt-period, but the Romans might serve as an example.

For quite some time a rich Near Easterner would have been only able to corrupt people of the ruling elite, because he himself was not allowed to participate, since he was no nobleman and of lower blood, which didn't distinguish himself, his family neither, in those fields which mean glory for an Indo-European.

So he had to buy people, which had this background, to get through to what he wants. Once such a corrupting influence becomes dominant over other mechanisms of rule and politics, we might speak of a Plutocracy.

If a man who distinguished himself, as a great hero or high priest of the group, organiser of his people in a direct way - he surely will be wealthier than others, but this is not necessarily a Plutocracy.

Once money or wealth means AUTOMATICALLY the highest status and greatest influence in a group, regardless OF OTHER CONSIDERATIONS, this is the clearest case of a Plutocracy.

But to, to make it clear, some kind of social revolution might have happened, against the old and probably at that time already decadent Oligarchy/Aristocracy. I guess a religious component was involved, since so many patterns changed then, which were of such a great importance to people of that time and they wouldn't have changed them for nothing.

A new belief-system must have emerged, probably one denying a certain class of people "god given rights" or something like that.

[Curtis24]

Can any lessons be applied from this example, to the modern-day?

[Agrippa]

Can any lessons be applied from this example, to the modern-day?

Well, in my opinion the biggest lesson you can learn from it is, if you want to overthrow such a system, you must change many things more completely and have a more complete alternative than just saying: "I don't like that guy up on the hill who says us what we have to do, let's kill him and then we will live a happy life..."

Because if it would have been that way, just another guy would have sittin' there, probably a better one, but still the threat of the same thing happening again, would have been there.

Also, if such rules of a society, which cement a social stratification, legitimate the rule of the few, you must change that rules and give those which want to change things another, different legitimation for their actions.

Again, I don't know for sure how often that was actually some sort of invasion, but the end result is everywhere largely similar: Less extreme social stratification, the older ruling class disempowered - things changed forever and in social respects at least for generations.

[Osweo]

A new belief-system must have emerged, probably one denying a certain class of people "god given rights" or something like that.

I'm tempted to see in this event the appearance of (or one instance of the wider general tendency towards greater prominence of) that advanced Druidic institution which Caesar recorded several centuries later. :chin:

Some clever buggers organised a coup, and their intellectual and/or physical descendants were then able to enjoy the fruits of that victory until the Romans slaughtered them... :strokebeard:

[Agrippa]

A version could be, that the druids were there for a long time already, but were strongly involved in that sort of "change". Similar to some Islamic preachers, which are probably the people most difficult to "touch" by those otherwise in charge.

If the priests preach against you, and the people believing them, you definitely have a problem, whether that is your fault or not. After such an event, those priests would have gained even more power than they had before, I'd say.

And I'm very much inclined to see it that way, since the ruling class had some sort of decadence, was used to foreign customs and luxury, probably ignored "the old ways" in certain respects and overstretched the exploitation and control of the common people.

This would have been an IDEAL culture medium for some sort of "religious regeneration" - one could also say REFORMATION or unification of formerly separated customs, people, ideas and beliefs. This would fit into a scheme of various immigration waves, and people probably living not just as a community, but still largely side by side.

[Curtis24]

Dudes, we could totally do the same thing. People nowadays are so confused as to fall for any kind of belief system promising meaning.. We should start a cult, and then empower ourselves and our descendants for the next few centuries. Not to mention all the groupies we'd get! :thumb001:

[LC22]

I still hold the belief that the origin of the Indo-Europeans (also known as Aryans) originated somewhere in southern Russia close to modern day Stalingrad.

The Kurgan theory? yes I also favor it. I think it is the best supported by data.

Archeology and genetics (and also linguistics) rather support it.



Frost’s theory is also backed up by a separate scientific analysis of north European genes carried out at three Japanese universities, which has isolated the date of the genetic mutation that resulted in blond hair to about 11,000 years ago.

There is nothing certain about it and some data could indicate that the rate of mutation could be actually much slower (and so the date of the apparition of these characteristics would be more ancient).


We know that Indo-Europeans arrived in China (as Yuezhi, Tochari, Scythians) around 2000 B.C. around the time of the legendary Xia dynasty.

They arrived in Asia much sooner though apparently

http://pastmists.wordpress.com/2010/05/12/xinjiang/

also interesting :


http://pastmists.wordpress.com/2010/06/21/central-asia/ (http://pastmists.wordpress.com/2010/05/12/xinjiang/)



There are problems though, Finns carry Nordics traits but they are not IE speakers. Sumerians also had blue eyes but this was before the IE invasion.

There is no reason to believe IE were the only carriers of these characteristics. After all they probably appeared much earlier than the time of PIE (accoring to the kurgan theory, PIE could date of about 3,500 BCE which could be confirmed by Tocharian languages characteristics and south Siberian archeological findings.

[d3cimat3d]

Well, the oldest clear representation of a wheel comes from the Cucuteni-Tripolye farming culture which was apparently taken over by steppe pastoralists around 3,700 BC.

http://i55.tinypic.com/2eojj3c.png

So some nomadic Proto-Indo-Europeans stole the wheel concept from the Cucuteni farming culture then took it east where they later on developed chariots to help them conquer the east.

http://i51.tinypic.com/2i9ia84.png

[Agrippa]

Crucial was the development of chariots with crossings, full wooden wheels were known in Mesopotamia too and even used for quite slow paced kind of "chariots", sometimes even drawn by donkeys probably.

But the fast chariot with two wheels and crossings was the invention Indoeuropeans of Eastern Europe-Central Asia made.

[Motörhead Remember Me]

There is no reason to believe IE were the only carriers of these characteristics. After all they probably appeared much earlier than the time of PIE (accoring to the kurgan theory, PIE could date of about 3,500 BCE which could be confirmed by Tocharian languages characteristics and south Siberian archeological findings.

People had "Nordic traits" long before IE languages were spoken in areas where people had "Nordic traits".

[Curtis24]

A version could be, that the druids were there for a long time already, but were strongly involved in that sort of "change". Similar to some Islamic preachers, which are probably the people most difficult to "touch" by those otherwise in charge.

If the priests preach against you, and the people believing them, you definitely have a problem, whether that is your fault or not. After such an event, those priests would have gained even more power than they had before, I'd say.

And I'm very much inclined to see it that way, since the ruling class had some sort of decadence, was used to foreign customs and luxury, probably ignored "the old ways" in certain respects and overstretched the exploitation and control of the common people.

This would have been an IDEAL culture medium for some sort of "religious regeneration" - one could also say REFORMATION or unification of formerly separated customs, people, ideas and beliefs. This would fit into a scheme of various immigration waves, and people probably living not just as a community, but still largely side by side.

But in seriousness, how can we modern people do the same?

[Loki]

People had "Nordic traits" long before IE languages were spoken in areas where people had "Nordic traits".

I wonder what the first carriers of the IE language(s) looked like. We can only speculate I guess.

[Curtis24]

I think I read on Skadi, or somewhere else, they were probably dark-skinned Caucasoids and looked like Northern Indians("Indids") more than anything else. Of course, this all depends on where the proto-Indo-Europeans were from, which we don't know.

[Agrippa]

But in seriousness, how can we modern people do the same?

Consider that our current Capitalist system and "political correctness", these mixture from Liberalism, Cultural Marxism and Neo-Christianity with a lot of authoritarian state being legitimated by it ironically, is something which is close to a new religion.

And you might think about the Holocaust what you want, but fact is, that currently many politicians and public persons, as well as the population as a whole, need to bow before it. If you don't, if show just a hint of Anti-Semitism, yet alone critical tones towards Jewish people, individually or collective, you get easily in trouble. You have to accept that you have moan for them, that THEY ARE SPECIAL and DESERVE SPECIALLY GOOD TREATMENT; while you, as a common, normal, relatively healthy functioning white man, ARE NOT, but just an guilty subject, responsible for all the worst crimes of history from slavery to the oppression of women and homosexuals...

And to question individual property and civil rights, the way the system preaches it while destroying part of those right step by step: That's all a big delusion and hypocrisy.

People have to BELIEVE IN IT to ACCEPT IT!

If people don't believe some of the societal rules the Plutocracy accepted by now, they will start to question many things and if there would be an alternative, ready to start, THEN, they might grab it faster than many people think.

AND THAT is exactly the reason why the Plutocracy and their menials are so strict about certain things and try to put the truth down, or any rebelling thoughts, make people indoctrinated, conditioned on a new level with new and newer idiocies, because they themselves know too:
Thinks might tip fast and once that happens, they might lose the control completely and if the people THEN REALISE, what this system and the Plutocracy DID TO THEM, they are fucked up!

So power is always a question of belief too, it must not be a religion, it can be an ideology, it can be even that you believe in the bankers money and see no alternative or higher value in your life or for society, it can take many forms.

And this society is not rational in some of the most important aspects, especially if it is about the power and structures of control, it is NOT AT ALL. People must be kept ignorant and dumbed down, because otherwise, some day, they might look beyond single incidences, some things they don't like, the problems in society on the surface, they might look at those WHICH PULL THE STRINGS and then they will see, if they really get the truth, something they absolutely don't like, but will ultimately begin to hate with passion.

[Curtis24]

Yes, but what would the role of religion be in any attempt to mobilize people against the plutocracy? To what extent would utilizing spirituality, or even paranormal beliefs perhaps, be useful in this respect?

Osweo mentioned druidism possibly accompanying the Celtic revolt and transition between Halstatt and La Tene.. As we know, modern people, yearn for spirituality of some kind. You see this with the rise of psychics, tarot reading, Wiccanism, fascination with Eastern spiritual beliefs, etc. etc. Could all this be tapped into in some way? How do you convert anti-plutocratic ideals into a religious or spiritual schema? Should rebels against the plutocracy claim prophethood in some way?

[Agrippa]

Yes, but what would the role of religion be in any attempt to mobilize people against the plutocracy? To what extent would utilizing spirituality, or even paranormal beliefs perhaps, be useful in this respect?

They can simply legitimate "values" in a transcendental way and even "force" people to act, as it is morally inacceptable to stand certain "sins" if you get what I mean.

In the Christian past or Islam in general this was often the case, if people of power failed to live up to the standards, they were judged by the religious, by the priests and believing mass, as "infidels" or "sinner" - this made their opposition, even in a very radical form, much more legitimate, if god demands them to act, than if they would just have said: "That guy exploits us and I don't like it..."

GOD doesn't like it! Then you can say: "I would stand it, but I can't bear him mocking GOD's RULES, or even GOD HIMSELFS the way he acts and lives.

So people which are not the perfect "social revolutionaries", probably to stupid, but naive believers, might get that way their ass up if you know what I mean. It brings various interest groups together, with different motives, but one shared one: To get rid of the false ruler.


Osweo mentioned druidism possibly accompanying the Celtic revolt and transition between Halstatt and La Tene.. As we know, modern people, yearn for spirituality of some kind. You see this with the rise of psychics, tarot reading, Wiccanism, fascination with Eastern spiritual beliefs, etc. etc. Could all this be tapped into in some way? How do you convert anti-plutocratic ideals into a religious schema?

I don't want that necessarily, but what you see happening is that Islam tries to do it - it is always easier, like for the rule of the Plutocrats, if you can start from a good starting point.

And Islam has it, Westerners on the other hand are alienated from their old and in meantime corrupted religion and at the same time very individualised in their approaches.

In a worst case scenario their religion, like that of the Jews and some Calvinist sects, even defend and legitimate the existing Liberalcapitalist rule!

So in their case, the case of those Jews and certain Christian sects, you must rather break the bond between their spirituality-religion and this fucked up system than the opposite.

[LC22]

I think I read on Skadi, or somewhere else, they were probably dark-skinned Caucasoids and looked like Northern Indians("Indids") more than anything else. Of course, this all depends on where the proto-Indo-Europeans were from, which we don't know.

Well, in case the Kurgan hypothesis is correct (the linguistical evidences seem to support it better than the farmer/anatolian hypothesis IMO, as the proto-indo-european language had apparently a chalcolithic vocabulary (wheel, metal, etc...)), we roughly know what they looked like.
The chalcolithic/bronze age human remains in the pontic steppes, central Asia and south Siberia show them tall, robust and moderately dolichocephalic.
We also know by their DNA that they were white-skinned (no suprise there as they are described as "europoid" (their morphological type is sometimes called "proto-europoid")) and that Blue/green eyes and light hair were apparently rather frequent among them (not rare anyway).

It's in adequacy with some of the aspects of some peoples of these region, nowadays.

[d3cimat3d]

Within 5 years, maybe even earlier, we will find out for sure.

http://www.uni-mainz.de/FB/Biologie/Anthropologie/MolA/English/Research/CentralAsia.html

http://i56.tinypic.com/35nav6c.jpg

http://i54.tinypic.com/mip9bb.png


In collaboration with Prof. Wolfram Schier and Dr. Elke Kaiser (Excellence Cluster TOPOI, Freie Universität Berlin) we are studying the population structures of the Eneolithic and the Bronze Age in the steppe areas north of the Black Sea and neighbouring regions. The late Eneolithic (ca 3500-3000 BC) is strongly influenced by innovations in metallurgy, e.g. copper arsenic alloys, as well as developments and dispersal of new technologies, like the early wagons with disc wheels. The first kurgans (barrows) are constructed in this period. The Yamna culture appears in the North Pontic steppe during the transition to the Bronze Age (ca 3000-2500 BC). The Yamna culture is characterised by high mobility, and during this period a uniform burial rite in pit graves underneath kurgans is established throughout the steppe region. Their subsistence economy is based on specialised husbandry and forms of semi- / nomadism, probably supported by new means of transportation including the use of draught animals. Their extensive trade relations extend across the boundaries of the steppe and include sedentary cultures west and north of the steppe territory. It has been suggested that Yamna groups might have migrated as far as Central Europe.