'Ershver tooni monhrr!'The ice age 'superlanguage' Europeans spoke 15,000 years ago

[wvwvw]

'Ershver tooni monhrr!' In other words, hey, can you give me a hand! The ice age 'superlanguage' Europeans spoke 15,000 years ago - and we can still understand today

Researchers uncovered language Ice Age people used to communicate - with many of the words still in use today
Believe 'superlanguage' may have existed so different groups could communicate
Experts say we could 'hold a simple conversation' using the language.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencete...#ixzz2Sj2v4qUy

[Comte Arnau]

Cool. Yet something tells me that, as soon as they reveal the methodology, the theory will collapse. Doesn't look really solid at first sight.

Why did the journalists choose Inuit-Yupik as "the superlanguage" for the title? Lol.

[Arbërori]

Is that Finnish?

[Vesuvian Sky]

Professor Pagel's previous research on the evolution of human languages has built up a picture of how our 7,000 living human languages have evolved - with the 'proto-Eurasiatic' language that was the common ancestor to about 700 contemporary languages that are the native tongues of more than half the world’s people.
Professor Pagel and his research team have documented the shared patterns in the way we use language and researched why some words succeed and others have become obsolete over time.
This is done by using statistical estimates of rates of lexical replacement for a range of vocabulary items in the Indo-European languages.

It seems like this theory would aim to be a contender to Jospeh Greenberg's Proto-Nostratic language to a degree. Although, Greenberg's methodology was a little more clear cut/straight forward.

[Comte Arnau]

First two mistakes I see: one can't rely in such words as mama or to spit, because the m in the first and the exploited t in the second are a common thing in most languages all over the world, an onomatopoeic feature rather than genetic.

I see that Basque is missing on the chart. Let's see.

thou = hi - Hmm, not bad, could work.

to give = eman (<*-ban-) - Doesn't work.

hand = esku - Again, doesn't work at all.

bark = azal - Again, nah.

to spit = tu - Yeah, could work, but as I said, it could be a common onomatopoeic sound.

[Vesuvian Sky]

First two mistakes I see: one can't rely in such words as mama or to spit, because the m in the first and the exploited t in the second are a common thing in most languages all over the world, an onomatopoeic feature rather than genetic.

I see that Basque is missing on the chart. Let's see.

thou = hi - Hmm, not bad, could work.

to give = eman (<*-ban-) - Doesn't work.

hand = esku - Again, doesn't work at all.

bark = azal - Again, nah.

to spit = tu - Yeah, could work, but as I said, it could be a common onomatopoeic sound.

IMO, major mistake there. If one wanted to work back to any type of proto-Upper Paleolithic for Europe's region alone, then Basque requires serious attention.

[Comte Arnau]

IMO, major mistake there. If one wanted to work back to any type of proto-Upper Paleolithic for Europe's region alone, then Basque requires serious attention.

Basque, even Proto-Basque (Basco-Aquitanian), or who knows if Basco-Iberian, might not go as far back as the Upper Paleolithic, according to some theories. Perhaps it was simply previous to Indo-European but already in the Neolithic. Yet, it definitely should have been a language to take into account for this. Specially when some have typically related it to Kartvelian too.

[Vesuvian Sky]

Basque, even Proto-Basque (Basco-Aquitanian), or who knows if Basco-Iberian, might not go as far back as the Upper Paleolithic, according to some theories. Perhaps it was simply previous to Indo-European but already in the Neolithic. Yet, it definitely should have been a language to take into account for this. Specially when some have typically related it to Kartvelian too.

There's definitely contention to the notion that Basque = Paleolithic survivor and its certainly debatable on several different levels. Theo Veneman's version of Basque represent such I know is not popular. Interesting that it has similarities to Kartvelian as that would indeed shift it more towards the notion that it was a "Neolithic invader" language given what we know what the aDNA Y-chromosome haplogroups of Cardial Ware and LBK horizons were.

What linguistic similarities are there though to Kartevelian?

[Comte Arnau]

There's definitely contention to the notion that Basque = Paleolithic survivor and its certainly debatable on several different levels. Theo Veneman's version of Basque represent such I know is not popular. Interesting that it has similarities to Kartvelian as that would indeed shift it more towards the notion that it was a "Neolithic invader" language given what we know what the aDNA Y-chromosome haplogroups of Cardial Ware and LBK horizons were.

What linguistic similarities are there though to Kartevelian?

That's it. I've even read that Basques and Ancient Aquitanians could be the final stage of ancient Iberians being pushed by the Romans to that final corner, and that ancient Iberians and others like, perhaps, Nuragics and ancient Ligurians, might have spoken a same proto-language, which could be associated to the Cardial Ware culture, coming from the East. While it seems risky, one has to take into account that Basque dialects are relatively close and that Celtic substrate in the modern territory and language indicates a likely movement westwards from Pyrenean ancient Basques. And that while Iberian hasn't been fully deciphered, the similarities are too striking to be just loanwords.

The connection to Kartvelian has been a theory both adopted and criticized many times because it's a rather slight one. It has more to do with a few similarities in structure, the use of the ergative case and dubious attempts at some words.

[Vesuvian Sky]

That's it. I've even read that Basques and Ancient Aquitanians could be the final stage of ancient Iberians being pushed by the Romans to that final corner, and that ancient Iberians and others like, perhaps, Nuragics and ancient Ligurians, might have spoken a same proto-language, which could be associated to the Cardial Ware culture, coming from the East. While it seems risky, one has to take into account that Basque dialects are relatively close and that Celtic substrate in the modern territory and language indicates a likely movement westwards from Pyrenean ancient Basques. And that while Iberian hasn't been fully deciphered, the similarities are too striking to be just loanwords.

The connection to Kartvelian has been a theory both adopted and criticized many times because it's a rather slight one. It has more to do with a few similarities in structure, the use of the ergative case and dubious attempts at some words.

Ah I see. Sounds like the phonological aspects aren't there but some grammatical. Yeah that is rather dubious. Usually, the best evidence for close genetic relationships is determined when both the grammatical and phonological are there.

I kinda feel these days a stronger case for Etruscan can be made for a Neolithic invader languages from e. Anatolia/Caucuses based on phonological aspects of some kinship terms but also given what we know regarding genetics of Tuscany.

Here's something interesting I just caught:

Etruscan
apa: father
apana: paternal
ati, ativu: mother

Hurrian
attardi: ancestor
attai:father
ašti: woman

Euskara
ama: mother