tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8304928500646903522.post4473743438874193904..comments2024-03-28T18:32:05.933-04:00Comments on bensozia: The Appeal of Indo-European CultureJohnhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01037215533094998996noreply@blogger.comBlogger5125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8304928500646903522.post-19292277668889713152019-11-04T10:49:59.584-05:002019-11-04T10:49:59.584-05:00A good book to read about the influence of pestile...A good book to read about the influence of pestilence in human civilizations is McNeill's Plagues and Peoples. He covers China, Europe, and the Steppes in depth. <br /><br />https://www.amazon.com/Plagues-Peoples-William-McNeill-ebook/dp/B0047747QK/ref=sr_1_2?Adv-Srch-Books-Submit.x=0&Adv-Srch-Books-Submit.y=0&qid=1572882474&refinements=p_28%3Aplagues+and+people&s=books&sr=1-2&unfiltered=1Shadowhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05353532874773316117noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8304928500646903522.post-8094603533764809262019-11-04T08:28:52.811-05:002019-11-04T08:28:52.811-05:00Yersina pestis is native to the Steppes, where it ...Yersina pestis is native to the Steppes, where it lives most of the time in ground-dwelling rodents and their fleas. Its explosions into Europe, the Middle East and China may have something to do with changes on the Steppes, either climate or politics; there is a theory that the 1348 epidemic followed the Mongol Empire unifying vast regions and increasing trade and movement across central Asia.<br /><br />Several Bronze Age Yamnaya skeletons from Ukraine have produced plague DNA, which almost certainly means they died of it. If the Yamnaya people lived with it all the time, they presumably had evolved some degree of resistance. So people have theorized that they brought the plague with them to Europe and that their conquest was made easier because a lot of their enemies were dying of plague.<br /><br />At present this is all speculation because 1) no plague DNA has yet been found in the bones of Bronze Age Europeans, 2) there is no clear evidence of a big fall in the population of Europe at the time, and 3) Bronze Age Yersinia pestis seems to lack a couple of mutations that made the medieval variant so deadly.<br /><br />I think the best evidence for the plague theory is the 90% replacement of the people of Britain by invaders, which is what the paleogenetics seems to be telling us right now. How could that have happened unless something killed off most of the natives? So you might theorize that the people of Neolithic Britain were uniquely susceptible to the disease.<br /><br />But, again, all speculation at this point.Johnhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01037215533094998996noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8304928500646903522.post-32541538206027407912019-11-03T14:00:31.873-05:002019-11-03T14:00:31.873-05:00The Black Death? Was there an epidemic in Bronze ...The Black Death? Was there an epidemic in Bronze Age Europe? Was it Yersinia Pestis? Tell us more.Davidhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14456987412710878404noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8304928500646903522.post-29862068153431145732019-11-03T12:43:33.832-05:002019-11-03T12:43:33.832-05:00Yes, we know very little about how Indo-Europeans ...Yes, we know very little about how Indo-Europeans treated the conquered, except what the genetics tells us: that there was a lot of inter-breeding, even at the most elite levels. There is also the question of the Black Death, which may have accompanied or preceded the invaders. The example of European diseases in the Americas shows that a mass die-off from disease can destroy elite cultures, and maybe something like this happened in Europe, although nobody I know thinks the plague killed 90 percent of Bronze Age Europeans. (There isn't much sign of a major fall in population, for one thing.)<br /><br />I had the Islamic comparison in mind: that's an example where the religion, language, and culture seem to have great appeal across a vast area. And the best reverse example is the Chinese, who absorb invader after invader with very little change. (Hardly any Mongol or Manchu words in Han Chinese.)<br /><br />I think that maybe the appeal of the cultures involved matters. Mongol culture just didn't have much to offer people living in China. That's why I think Indo-European culture must have had something to offer Europeans.Johnhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01037215533094998996noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8304928500646903522.post-8075705151848826142019-11-03T08:45:09.569-05:002019-11-03T08:45:09.569-05:00An interesting post that opens up a lot of broader...An interesting post that opens up a lot of broader questions. For example, what are the parameters determining differences in language change in terms of adoption/non-adoption, timeline, and degree of mixing? For example, Islamic conquest entails Arabization in Egypt, Syria, and Iraq, but only partially in Persia and North Africa westward from Tunisia (vocabulary mixing, alphabet adoption). Anglicization of the Normans in England entails plentiful vocabulary mixing, as does the Spanish-Christian conquest of Muslim Spain, but I don't think we see nearly as much in Spanish America. How much, if any, pre-Indo-European finds its way into the Indo-European languages of the Bronze Age conquerors? My impression is virtually none (the case may be different in India).<br /><br />One can cite examples where a conqueror can be in place for centuries with only marginal or partial language change, and then a mass adoption takes place in one or two generations. Ireland after the Famine would be (as I understand it) a clear example of this. Arabization in the Middle East may be another one (this is, in any case, my understanding of current thinking about Islamization in the Middle East). My impression of the Latinization/Romanization of Gaul is that it was, contrariwise, quite rapid.<br /><br />It might be pointed out that both Islam (as a way of life as well as a religion) and classical Chinese civilization have proved immensely attractive to neighbors and to the conquered, while not exercising remotely the same appeal for western intellectuals as Indo-European heroic epic.<br /><br />Finally, one needs to consider the position into which the conquerors put the conquered. Cultural shame as well as crude oppression can form a sort of negative pole that can push people into adopting the ways of their conquerors. The virtual absence of non-Indo-Europeans in some epic, and their *possible* reduction to the status of monsters or curiosities in others (eg, as divs in Persian epic) may be significant in this regard.Davidhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14456987412710878404noreply@blogger.com