Anthropology.net passes along a study by the Max Planck Institute on the origins of Proto-Indo-European. This controversy has been a big deal at least as long as I have studied historical linguistics since the early70s, and from what I read, far longer than that. The competing theories have been the Steppe, that is Northern Caucasus origin, and the Anatolian or Southern Caucasus origin. I have favored the Steppe hypothesis myself, but even though this result calls itself a hybrid between the two, it looks a good deal closer to the Anatolian to me.
The results of this study do not align entirely with either the Steppe or farming hypotheses. Recent ancient DNA data suggests that the Anatolian branch of Indo-European did not emerge from the Steppe, but rather from an area near the northern arc of the Fertile Crescent. This challenges traditional assumptions and suggests that other early branches of Indo-European may have also spread directly from this region, rather than through the Steppe.
Building on the insights derived from both genetics and linguistics, the authors propose a new hybrid hypothesis for the origin of the Indo-European languages. This hypothesis posits an ultimate homeland south of the Caucasus with subsequent migration northwards onto the Steppe. It suggests that some branches of Indo-European entered Europe through later expansions associated with the Yamnaya and Corded Ware cultures. The combination of ancient DNA and language phylogenetics indicates that the resolution to the Indo-European language enigma lies in this hybrid of the farming and Steppe hypotheses.
2 comments:
Well, Europe's previous round of conquerors, of whose cultural and linguistic progeny only the Basque people remain, seems to have come from the Levant as well.
There is some genetic evidence, and linguistic evidence that may not be entirely wishful thinking, that extinct languages in upland Sardinia might be in that group as well.
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