Re: Were There any Cultural Continuity Between Goths/Vandals and Vikings?
Yusuf B Gursey
> On Nov 30, 10:28 am, Weland <gi...@poetic.com> wrote:
>
>
>
>
>
> > Weland wrote:
> > > Larry Caldwell wrote:
> > >> In article <0c16fb8e-ec6a-4e1d-9c05-ef2349fc66e3
> > >> @g31g2000vbr.googlegroups.com>, tangent1...@gmail.com
> > >> (2.7182818284590...) says...
> > >>> Around the 4th and 5th Century AD, the Goths and Vandals and many
> > >>> other Germanic tribes migrated all over to South, Central, Eastern,
> > >>> Western, Europe, and even to Northern Africa and Turkey. The Goths
> > >>> were from Northern Germany area, probably close to today's Denmark.
> > >>> The Vandals were from that area as well, and the surname "Wendel" is
> > >>> still found in Sweden. This migration had the effect of supplanting
> > >>> Celtic language in England (then known as Albania), as well as,
> > >>> perhaps, change the demographics of huge swaths of Europe.
>
> > >>> During the 10th and 11th Century AD, Vikings from Norway, Denmark,
> > >>> and Sweden all migrated and influenced the English language via
> > >>> French. They raided a lot of churches and monasteries, and in
> > >>> general, they caused havoc to the locals of England.
>
> > >>> However, it seems that the Vikings and Goths were very different
> > >>> culturally. I don't think that the two had similar boats. The
> > >>> Vikings had their own distinct boats with oars, but I don't think that
> > >>> the Goths/Vandals did. Moreover, the Goths/Vandals/Angles/Saxons
> > >>> spread and suplanted other languages, but the Vikings didn't do this
> > >>> as much.
>
> > >>> Did the Vikings feel that they were a continuity of the Goths/Vandals
> > >>> or did it occur to them that they are the descendents of Goths/Vandals/
> > >>> etc?
>
> > >>> What were their similiarities, besides their languages?
>
> > >> There was a vast difference between the two events. In the 4th and
> > >> 5th centuries, Germanic tribes were displaced by a cooling climate,
> > >> which forced them to move south or die. They moved piecemeal, joining
> > >> up with related groups as they settled in southern areas. It was a
> > >> migration, not an invasion. The only thing they could return to was
> > >> starvation and death.
> > >> The Viking invasion happened in response to population pressures
> > >> during the medieval warm period. Going viking was a way for young men
> > >> to get a start in life, or for chieftains to gain wealth and
> > >> influence. Life in the north was good, with good crops and good
> > >> fishing. Some of the population bled off to colonies in Greenland and
> > >> Iceland, and some, like Rollo, set up shop in Europe, but their home
> > >> base remained intact and prosperous.
>
> > > Overall, I agree that climate is an often overlooked explanation and I
> > > agree that there are significant differences between the Viking
> > > invasions and the earlier Volkwanderung, the problem I see here is that
> > > climate can not be the only reason for either sequence of events. In
> > > the earlier period, there was also the movement of other peoples,
> > > opportunity for wealth and greater security as well as food caused by
> > > the better climate south. In the latter, the first Viking raids occur
> > > before any significant results from the gradual warming would be felt;
> > > in fact one of the usual reasons given for the beginning of the Viking
> > > raids is that life in Scandinavia was not good and there was not plenty
> > > of good crops and good fishing etc. Their prosperity was due in part to
> > > getting rid of excess population through migration south, east, and west.
>
> > I meant to add that there are cultural similarities: organization of
> > leadership, shared cultural traditions (Theodric the Goth appears in
> > later Norse stories, the Hildebrandslied and the Waltharius/Waldere poem
> > etc show shared contacts and cultural traditions at least at some level.
>
> It seems difficult to me to separate the two movements of Germanic
> speakers southward even if we acknowledge that there was a lull of
> sorts between about 500 and 800. The lull may well have been due
at least the linguistic evdience points to distinct peoples, and the
historical evidence points to different motives
> strictly to the fact that so many people had left that the pressure
> was reduced. Even in the middle of the lull we have incidents like
> Hygelac's attack on the Frisians which feels like a pure Viking
> operation. It is even possible that the Viking renewal of attacks
> southward was the result of Harald Fairhairs nation-building
> operations and the parallel operations in Denmark.
>
> It could be argued that the first wave of attackers were invaders
> looking for a home and the second wave were looters who intended to
> return home. But a large number of Vikings did not in fact return
> home but settled in where they gained control.
sounds plausible to me.
>
> A much more speculative theory would be based on outlaw "secret"
> societies like the Jomsvikings and. perhaps, the Berserkers. Such
> societies appear to have existed in both Africa and South America at
> various times and cannot be excluded out of hand in northern Europe.
> The connection between these societies and the Christian monastic
> movement remains unexplored and there are even possible Islamic
> models.
Yusuf B Gursey
> On Nov 30, 6:39 am, Larry Caldwell <firstnamelastinit...@peaksky.com>
> wrote:
>
> > The Viking invasion happened in response to population pressures during
> > the medieval warm period. Going viking was a way for young men to get a
> > start in life, or for chieftains to gain wealth and influence. Life in
> > the north was good, with good crops and good fishing. Some of the
> > population bled off to colonies in Greenland and Iceland, and some, like
> > Rollo, set up shop in Europe, but their home base remained intact and
> > prosperous.
>
> of Viking terror was a relatively warm one, but this has little to do
IIRC that's why they were able to colonize Greenland and left it when
the climate cooled again.
> with the onset of the Viking raids. There was a whole host of
> reasons. In the first place, western European societies became
> wealthy enough to be worth plundering. Whenever settled societies
> become wealthy, somehow plunderers always appear. The fact that the
> western European countries did not have the capability of repelling or
> restricting the raiders, made raiding profitable and attracted more
> plunderers. And so on and so forth. There is little mystery here.
> In fact, prosperous settled groups and states have attracted raiders
> since the beginning of recorded history!
Yusuf B Gursey
> On Nov 25, 8:52 pm, igor <inbellt...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
>
>
>
>
> > On Nov 25, 8:18 pm, ADR <aretz...@yahoo.com> wrote:
>
> > > On Nov 23, 10:59 am, "2.7182818284590..." <tangent1...@gmail.com>
> > > wrote:
>
> > > > Around the 4th and 5th Century AD, the Goths and Vandals and many
> > > > other Germanic tribes migrated all over to South, Central, Eastern,
> > > > Western, Europe, and even to Northern Africa and Turkey. The Goths
> > > > were from Northern Germany area, probably close to today's Denmark.
> > > > The Vandals were from that area as well, and the surname "Wendel" is
> > > > still found in Sweden. This migration had the effect of supplanting
> > > > Celtic language in England (then known as Albania), as well as,
> > > > perhaps, change the demographics of huge swaths of Europe.
>
> > > East Germany (the Elbe) to the West and Ukraine (as far as the
> > > Dnieper) to the East.The Goths appeared mostly in the southern
> > > European borders of the Empire, in the lower Danubian limes prior to
> > > be admitted to the empire. I do not believe that there is any serious
> > > archaeological evidence of their migration to Sweden although it was a
> > > cause celebre for 19th century Swedes.
>
> > Looks like ADR started selebrating the holiday season a day too
> > early!! Goths did not migrate back to Sweden, AFAIK.
>
> When did I state that they did??? I said that 19th century Swedish
> nationalists made a connection to the Goths despite scant information
> of any presence of them there.
nevertheless there were early traditions locating the Goths there.
Yusuf B Gursey
> On Nov 23, 3:35 pm, "Peter T. Daniels" <gramma...@verizon.net> wrote:
>
>
>
>
>
> > On Nov 23, 2:41 pm, igor <inbellt...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> > > On Nov 23, 10:59 am, "2.7182818284590..." <tangent1...@gmail.com>
> > > wrote:
>
> > > > Around the 4th and 5th Century AD, the Goths and Vandals and many
> > > > other Germanic tribes migrated all over to South, Central, Eastern,
> > > > Western, Europe, and even to Northern Africa and Turkey. The Goths
> > > > were from Northern Germany area, probably close to today's Denmark.
> > > > The Vandals were from that area as well, and the surname "Wendel" is
> > > > still found in Sweden. This migration had the effect of supplanting
> > > > Celtic language in England (then known as Albania), as well as,
> > > > perhaps, change the demographics of huge swaths of Europe.
>
> > > > and Sweden all migrated and influenced the English language via
> > > > French. They raided a lot of churches and monasteries, and in
> > > > general, they caused havoc to the locals of England.
>
> > > > However, it seems that the Vikings and Goths were very different
> > > > culturally. I don't think that the two had similar boats. The
> > > > Vikings had their own distinct boats with oars, but I don't think that
> > > > the Goths/Vandals did. Moreover, the Goths/Vandals/Angles/Saxons
> > > > spread and suplanted other languages, but the Vikings didn't do this
> > > > as much.
>
> > > > Did the Vikings feel that they were a continuity of the Goths/Vandals
> > > > or did it occur to them that they are the descendents of Goths/Vandals/
> > > > etc?
>
> > > > What were their similiarities, besides their languages?
>
> > > hundreds of years before reaching borders of Roman empire, they were
> > > the amalgamation of various ethnicities including slavs, celts,
> > > sarmations and etc.-
>
> > Bishop Wulfila and the Gothic language/script are from around present-
> > day Moldova.
>
> a group of Goths survived in the Crimea.
>
> see:
>
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crimean_Goths
>
> <<
>
> In the 16th century, Ogier Ghiselin de Busbecq reported having had a
> conversation with two Goths in Constantinople. He also left the Gothic-
> Latin dictionary with few words that are similar to ancient Gothic
> language. There are no further sources concerning the Crimean Goths
> and the survival of their language.
>
> >>
http://www.jstor.org/stable/25188176
The Ethnogenesis of the Crimean Tatars. An Historical.
Reinterpretation
Brian Glyn Williams
Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society, Third Series, Vol. 11, No. 3
(Nov., 2001), pp. 329-348
<<
The thirteenth-century traveller to the Crimea, Friar William of
Rubruck wrote of this area "There are lofty promontories along the sea
coast from Kherson (Western Crimea) as far as the mouth of the Tanais
(Sea of Azov), and between Kerson and Soldaia (Sudak) lie the Forty
Settlements, of which nearly every one has its own dialect: the
population includes many Goths, whose language is Germanic".4 While
this source may have been referring to the mountain fortress known in
Tatar as Kirk Yer (Forty Places), his description of the linguistic
diversity of this region was certainly intentional.
>>
>
> probably they were the Tats (tat means "foreigner, foriegn subject" in
> turkic) mentioned by the Khans of Crimea. IIRC the two Goths in
> question were representatives of the Khan of Crimea in Istanbul. IIRC
> later the Tats are said to have adopted Crimean Turkish (Ottoman
> Turkish with Tatar influence - BTW "Tatar" is also probably from the
> same turkic word).
Yusuf B Gursey
> On Nov 25, 5:17 pm, Yusuf B Gursey <y...@theworld.com> wrote:
>
>
>
>
>
> > On Nov 25, 3:07 pm, igor <inbellt...@gmail.com> wrote:
> > > > turkic) mentioned by the Khans of Crimea. IIRC the two Goths in
> > > > question were representatives of the Khan of Crimea in Istanbul. IIRC
> > > > later the Tats are said to have adopted Crimean Turkish (Ottoman
> > > > Turkish with Tatar influence - BTW "Tatar" is also probably from the
> > > > same turkic word).
>
> > > Azerbaijan, super wealthy, they run in the same circles as Putin and
>
> > Tat has been applied by Turkic peoples to various different peoples
> > under their rule. in the case of Azerbaijan, the population that
> > remained Iranian speaking, more narrowly the Iranian Jewish
> > population. The Crimean Tats were altogethr different and unrelated.
>
> Enc.of Islam II disputes the identificationofthe Crimean Tats with the
> Crimean Goths, in spite of some suggestive statements and the
> opinionof some scholars. IRCC I had read of the identification in the
> "InternationalJournalof Middle East Studies" (IJMES).
>
> from Enc.of Islam II
>
> <<
>
> TAT (t.), a term used in earliest Turkish with the general meaning of
> "alien, non-Turk", but speedily coming to be applied par excellence to
> the Persians as opposed to the Turks, in any case with a somewhat
> contemptuous nuance of meaning, as likewise with the term ta:dji:k
> [q.v.].
>
> ...
>
> Other usages cited by Minorsky, loc. cit., of tat = other peoples in
> addition to the Persians, are much more doubtful. Schaeder discussed
> passages which Minorsky adduced from the travel account of the Ottoman
> captive Hans Schiltberger (early 15th century), and he showed that the
> reading of some mss. of the Reisebuch, the language Kuthia "called by
> the heathens That", should really be Churin = the people of the
> northeastern Caucasus, in what is now southern Da:ghista:n [q.v.], the
> Kürin or Lezgin [see lezgh], who would at that time have been near
> neighbours of the still-subsisting Iranian Tats of the Baku and
> Apsheron peninsula region [see below, 2. Language]. The correct
> reading Churin can thus have no connection with the remnants of the
> Goths (the putative Kuthia) in the Crimea, as asserted originally by
> W. Tomaschek. On the other hand, Schiltberger correctly located a
> group of Tats in the Crimea, the inhabitants of Karkery/Karkeri (= K.)
> rk.yer, the name in later times for the "Jewish settlement"
> Čufutk.al`e near Ba:ghče Saray) and Sutti/Suti (= the ancient Alan
> settlement on the southeastern coast of the Crimea, Grk. Sougdaia,
> Ital. Soldaia, Sodaia, etc., in Islamic rendering Sughda:k.[q.v.],
> modern
> Sudak). Schiltberger's Thatts could not, however, have been Crimean
> Goths but were probably Greek-speaking Christians; tat was used over
> three centuries later by the Crimean Tatars for Greek Christians who
> migrated between 1775 and 1778 from the southeastern coast of the
> Crimea to Mariupol (modern Zhdanov) on the northern shore of the Sea
> of Azov and who spoke both a Neo-Greek dialect and Turkish (which they
> wrote in Greek characters).
>
> ...
>
> (C.E. Bosworth)
> (Eva JeremiKhs)
>
> Extract from the Encyclopaedia of Islam CD-ROM Edition v. 1.0
> © 1999 Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden, The Netherlands
>
> >>
>
OTOH
http://www.jstor.org/stable/25188176
The Ethnogenesis of the Crimean Tatars. An Historical.
Reinterpretation
Brian Glyn Williams
Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society, Third Series, Vol. 11, No. 3
(Nov., 2001), pp. 329-348
<<
The "Tats" of the Crimea
During the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, German
historians and nationalists (among them Adolf Hitler) rediscovered the
lost history of their Gothic ancestors in the Crimean peninsula and
there was much speculation concerning the fate of this "lost Aryan
tribe". There is of course no mystery concerning the fate of this
eastern branch of the great medieval Gothic migrations. Nineteenth-
century Russian and German visitors to the Tatar villages in the
shadow of Gothic mountain fortress of Mangup Kale (Tatar, "Mangup
Castle"), found their descendants living there among the Tatars. A
German source from 1806 points out that the Crimean Tatars of this
mountainous region were aware of their Christian origins.24 A
nineteenth-century Russian visitor to the Gothic region in the south-
western mountains was convinced that, "In aU probability their (the
Goths) descendants are the Tatars of a series of villages in the
Crimea who are sharply delineated from the inhabitants of neighbouring
villages by their tall height and other features characteristic of the
Scandinavians."25 More recent works, such as Michel Kazanski's history
of the Goths point out that "In all probabillty the remnants of the
Crimean Goths remain in the 'Turkic' base of the Tatar population."26
Interestingly enough, the contemporary Crimean Tatars see themselves
as the descendants of "the Circassians, Goths, ancient Greeks, ItaUans
and Armenians" and do not identify with the Mongols.27 There seems to
be little doubt that the mountain Goths did in fact convert to Islam
and become "Tatars", although they were only gradualiy accepted by the
Kipçak-Tatar nomadic population of the steppe as fellow MusUms. Hans
Schiltberger, a Bavarian slave who visited this region in 1396,
claimed that the neighbouring Tatars of the plains used the derisive
term "Tat" (Thatt) to describe their Islamized Goth and coastal
neighbours.28 According to P. Brunn, the term Tat signified a reUgious
"renegade" or "a conquered race" in the local Turkic dialect and "the
Crimean Tatars appUed the contemptuous term of Tadd to the Tatars of
the south coast because they did not consider them of pure descent, in
consequence of the intercourse of their ancestors with the Greeks and
Genoese".29 This term has the same root as the pejorative ethnonym
"Tat" used by the Turks of the Caucasus to describe earUer non-Turkic
populations of this region such as the Jewish Mountain Tats. This term
also appeared in Central Asia and was used by nomadic Turks to refer
to the sedentary Iranian peoples of this region (i.e. the Tajiks). In
his analysis of the Crimean Tats' ancestry, Edmond Schutz writes, "The
anthro pological differences between the Tatars and Tats is
conspicuous. The Tatars (proper) are usuaUy round faced, short and
dark, among the Tats prevail two types: the most characteristic
feature of many of them is their high stature, fair hair and blue
eyes".30 This source points out that the presence of these Caucasoid
features among these Tatars, who are erroneously stereotyped as
Mongoloid, lay in this Tatar sub-group's history: The facts behind
their specific anthropological character which sharply distinguishes
them from the Tatar people should be looked for in their earlier
history in the Crimea. ...
24 V. E. Vozgirin, Istoricheskie Sud'by Krymskikh Tatar (Moscow,
1992), p. 93.
25 Ibid., p. 94.
26 Michel Kazinski, Les Goths 1er-Vile Apres J.-C. (Paris, 1991), p.
124.
27 Etham Feyzi Gozaydin, Kirim. Kirim. Turklerinin Yerlesme ve
Gocmeleri (Istanbul, 1948), p. 30.
28 J. Buchan Tefler, The Bondage and Travels of Johann Schiltberger
(London, 1879), pp. 50, 176.
29 Ibid., p. 176.
30 Edmond Schutz, "The Tat People in the Crimea", Acta Orientalia,
Academiae Scientiarum Hungaricae, XXXI (1977),P- 96.
>>
>
>
>
>
> > > Medvedev.
> > > I researched this people (to the extent of traveling to Azerbaijan and
> > > visiting Kuba, Derbent areas), they consider them selfs true
> > > Israelites who migrated to Caucasus hundreds of years ago from Iran
> > > and speak Iranian dialect, most of them fluent in Turkic and Russian
> > > also.
> > > To me, the most striking attribute of this people is the variation of
> > > their appearance, they go from blond Nordic type (my great grandmother
> > > looked nordic) to dark Arab like complexion.- Hide quoted text -
>
igor
>
> read more »
Fascinating. There is also a substantial contribution to the
ethnogenesis of this population by Hazars and Alans who were displaced
by Rus and later by Huns all over the area, many clans were known for
their Caucasoid appearance (tall, fair hair and eyes).
Yusuf B Gursey
the Alans or their ancestors were the first wave of migration. the
Huns displaced them. the Khazars, who were more of a dynasty than an
ethnic group (they spoke a language deriving from Hunnic) came after.
the Rus, slavified Scandinavians, displaced the Khazar Empire. the
underlying native substratum had fair hair and eyes.
igor
You're right Rus came after Huns.
Yusuf B Gursey
they sure did!
Trond Engen
> On Dec 2, 12:28 am, igor <inbellt...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
>> On Dec 1, 7:38 am, Yusuf B Gursey <y...@theworld.com> wrote:
>>
>>> The "Tats" of the Crimea
>>> eastern branch of the great medieval Gothic migrations. Nineteenth-
>>> century Russian and German visitors to the Tatar villages in the
>>> shadow of Gothic mountain fortress of Mangup Kale (Tatar, "Mangup
>>> Castle"), found their descendants living there among the Tatars. A
>>> German source from 1806 points out that the Crimean Tatars of this
>>> mountainous region were aware of their Christian origins.24 A
>>> nineteenth-century Russian visitor to the Gothic region in the south-
>>> western mountains was convinced that, "In aU probability their (the
>>> Goths) descendants are the Tatars of a series of villages in the
>>> Crimea who are sharply delineated from the inhabitants of neighbouring
>>> villages by their tall height and other features characteristic of the
>>> Scandinavians."25 More recent works, such as Michel Kazanski's history
>>> of the Goths point out that "In all probabillty the remnants of the
>>> Crimean Goths remain in the 'Turkic' base of the Tatar population."26
>>> Interestingly enough, the contemporary Crimean Tatars see themselves
>>> as the descendants of "the Circassians, Goths, ancient Greeks, ItaUans
>>> and Armenians" and do not identify with the Mongols.27 There seems to
>>> be little doubt that the mountain Goths did in fact convert to Islam
>>> and become "Tatars", although they were only gradualiy accepted by the
>>> Schiltberger, a Bavarian slave who visited this region in 1396,
>>> claimed that the neighbouring Tatars of the plains used the derisive
>>> term "Tat" (Thatt) to describe their Islamized Goth and coastal
>>
>> Fascinating. There is also a substantial contribution to the
>> ethnogenesis of this population by Hazars and Alans who were displaced
>> by Rus and later by Huns all over the area, many clans were known for
>> their Caucasoid appearance (tall, fair hair and eyes).
>
> the Alans or their ancestors were the first wave of migration. the
> Huns displaced them. the Khazars, who were more of a dynasty than an
> ethnic group (they spoke a language deriving from Hunnic) came after.
> the Rus, slavified Scandinavians, displaced the Khazar Empire. the
> underlying native substratum had fair hair and eyes.
From the few words that are known, the Crimean Gothic language looks
surprisingly modern and also similar to Low Franconian or Low Saxon, as
if there'd been contact with Germania proper all along. I remember
speculating that these Goths were really Rus, settled there by the
emperor of Constantinople, or a mixed Goth/Rus population, but then
there should have been recognizable North Germanic features. Gr�nvik and
others favour a Medieval influx of West Germanic settlers. Is there
other evidence for this? How would it have come come about? Relocation
of German speaking settlers from Transilvania or Galicia soon after the
Ottoman or Crimean Khanate conquests?
--
Trond Engen
Yusuf B Gursey
> >>> Schiltberger, a Bavarian slave who visited this region in 1396,
> >>> claimed that the neighbouring Tatars of the plains used the derisive
> >>> term "Tat" (Thatt) to describe their Islamized Goth and coastal
> >>> neighbours.28 [...]
>
> >> Fascinating. There is also a substantial contribution to the
> >> ethnogenesis of this population by Hazars and Alans who were displaced
> >> by Rus and later by Huns all over the area, many clans were known for
> >> their Caucasoid appearance (tall, fair hair and eyes).
>
> > the Alans or their ancestors were the first wave of migration. the
> > Huns displaced them. the Khazars, who were more of a dynasty than an
> > ethnic group (they spoke a language deriving from Hunnic) came after.
> > the Rus, slavified Scandinavians, displaced the Khazar Empire. the
> > underlying native substratum had fair hair and eyes.
>
> From the few words that are known, the Crimean Gothic language looks
> surprisingly modern and also similar to Low Franconian or Low Saxon, as
> if there'd been contact with Germania proper all along. I remember
> speculating that these Goths were really Rus, settled there by the
> emperor of Constantinople, or a mixed Goth/Rus population, but then
> others favour a Medieval influx of West Germanic settlers. Is there
> other evidence for this? How would it have come come about? Relocation
> of German speaking settlers from Transilvania or Galicia soon after the
> Ottoman or Crimean Khanate conquests?
I would assume that an Ottoman transfer would have been recorded and
known to historians. I don't think the Crimean Khanate did any
relocating. any possible relation to the Volga Germans?
>
> --
> Trond Engen
Yusuf B Gursey
in favor of the Crimean Goths being independent of all the mentioned
populations is that they were Muslims, like the Tatar population, not
Christians.
>
>
>
>
> > --
> > Trond Engen
Yusuf B Gursey
sorry, can't be any relation, as it turns out that the Volga Germans
came during Catherine the Great.
>
>
>
>
> > --
> > Trond Engen
igor
> >>> Schiltberger, a Bavarian slave who visited this region in 1396,
> >>> claimed that the neighbouring Tatars of the plains used the derisive
> >>> term "Tat" (Thatt) to describe their Islamized Goth and coastal
> >>> neighbours.28 [...]
>
> >> Fascinating. There is also a substantial contribution to the
> >> ethnogenesis of this population by Hazars and Alans who were displaced
> >> by Rus and later by Huns all over the area, many clans were known for
> >> their Caucasoid appearance (tall, fair hair and eyes).
>
> > the Alans or their ancestors were the first wave of migration. the
> > Huns displaced them. the Khazars, who were more of a dynasty than an
> > ethnic group (they spoke a language deriving from Hunnic) came after.
> > the Rus, slavified Scandinavians, displaced the Khazar Empire. the
> > underlying native substratum had fair hair and eyes.
>
> From the few words that are known, the Crimean Gothic language looks
> surprisingly modern and also similar to Low Franconian or Low Saxon, as
> if there'd been contact with Germania proper all along. I remember
> speculating that these Goths were really Rus, settled there by the
> emperor of Constantinople, or a mixed Goth/Rus population, but then
> others favour a Medieval influx of West Germanic settlers. Is there
> other evidence for this? How would it have come come about? Relocation
> of German speaking settlers from Transilvania or Galicia soon after the
> Ottoman or Crimean Khanate conquests?
>
> --
> Trond Engen
Zosimus consistently refers to the Gothic migrants as "Scythians",
AFAIK, they were never in Germany proper.
It is surprising for them to retain intelligible German given the fact
that they left Scandinavia hundreds of years prior, never spoke German
in the first place (maybe proto-German), assimilating with many none
Germanic speakers not even counting the fact that languages change
drastically over time. For example me being a native Russian speaker,
I can barely understand Primary Chronicle written in 12th century ce.
igor
Actually they did speak Germanic, I changed my mind:)))))
ADR
Gothic is one of the germanic languages that we have some information
on since extensive fragments of the Gospels translated into Gothic
remain. It is not really peculiar for languages to morph very quickly
when disparate populations with divergent dialects merge. It did
happen in English in the beginning of the 2nd millenium as Danes,
Angles and Saxons merged into a single unit.
am...@hotmail.com
> On Nov 26, 12:49 am, Yusuf B Gursey <y...@theworld.com> wrote:
> Interestingly enough, the contemporary Crimean Tatars see themselves
> as the descendants of "the Circassians, Goths, ancient Greeks, ItaUans
> and Armenians" and do not identify with the Mongols.
What is interesting or unexpected in this? The numbers of the "true"
Mongols who settled in various parts of the modern European Russia/
Ukarine was extremely limited: Batu had something around 4K (families)
with those "borrowed" from his brother Urdu (founder of the Siberian
Horde) and Nogai inherited approximately the same number. None of them
settled in the Crimea so there was simply no source for any
significant Mongolian presense in the area. Crimean Khanate had been
founded only in mid-XV century and by this time whatever could pass
for the "Mongolian blood" in the former Golden Horde was extrtemely
thin outside the ruling family. Even at its foundation, the Mongolian
population of the Golden Horde itself was so insignificant that it was
routinely referenced as the "Kipchak Horde" (Vernadsky argued that the
name "Golden Horde" is totally anachronistic and that the right names
were "Kipchack" or "Blue" Horde). Even as far as the ...er...
"true" (steppe) Tatars are involved, why would they be interested in
settling in the areas as unsuitable for the nomadic life style as the
mountain or urban areas of the Crimea when there was plenty of steppe
space inside and outside the peninsula?
BTW, the Tatars of Kazan - Astrakhan area (at least those I saw
myself) do not look Mongolian either.
am...@hotmail.com
XIX. :-)
Yusuf B Gursey
> On Dec 1, 10:38 am, Yusuf B Gursey <y...@theworld.com> wrote:
>
> > On Nov 26, 12:49 am, Yusuf B Gursey <y...@theworld.com> wrote:
> > Interestingly enough, the contemporary Crimean Tatars see themselves
> > as the descendants of "the Circassians, Goths, ancient Greeks, ItaUans
> > and Armenians" and do not identify with the Mongols.
>
> What is interesting or unexpected in this? The numbers of the "true"
it's not my words or opinion, but what that of hte source I quoted.
Yusuf B Gursey
bu the germanic speakers encountered by European sources are from much
earlier.
am...@hotmail.com
>
I know, this was a joke (didn't you notice ":-)")?
am...@hotmail.com
> On Dec 3, 9:11 am, a...@hotmail.com wrote:
>
> > On Dec 1, 10:38 am, Yusuf B Gursey <y...@theworld.com> wrote:
>
> > > On Nov 26, 12:49 am, Yusuf B Gursey <y...@theworld.com> wrote:
> > > Interestingly enough, the contemporary Crimean Tatars see themselves
> > > as the descendants of "the Circassians, Goths, ancient Greeks, ItaUans
> > > and Armenians" and do not identify with the Mongols.
>
> > What is interesting or unexpected in this? The numbers of the "true"
>
> it's not my words or opinion, but what that of hte source I quoted.
>
Obviously. I was just commenting on the siurce "discovering" (among
other things) something that shoulod be quite obvious.
>
>
> > Mongols who settled in various parts of the modern European Russia/
> > Ukarine was extremely limited: Batu had something around 4K (families)
> > with those "borrowed" from his brother Urdu (founder of the Siberian
> > Horde) and Nogai inherited approximately the same number. None of them
> > settled in the Crimea so there was simply no source for any
> > significant Mongolian presense in the area. Crimean Khanate had been
> > founded only in mid-XV century and by this time whatever could pass
> > for the "Mongolian blood" in the former Golden Horde was extrtemely
> > thin outside the ruling family. Even at its foundation, the Mongolian
> > population of the Golden Horde itself was so insignificant that it was
> > routinely referenced as the "Kipchak Horde" (Vernadsky argued that the
> > name "Golden Horde" is totally anachronistic and that the right names
> > were "Kipchack" or "Blue" Horde). Even as far as the ...er...
> > "true" (steppe) Tatars are involved, why would they be interested in
> > settling in the areas as unsuitable for the nomadic life style as the
> > mountain or urban areas of the Crimea when there was plenty of steppe
> > space inside and outside the peninsula?
>
> > BTW, the Tatars of Kazan - Astrakhan area (at least those I saw
> > myself) do not look Mongolian either.- Hide quoted text -
>
> - Show quoted text -
igor
Correct. Got confused with the time frames. We have the Gospels.
I was comparing them to Varangians who completely lost every trace of
their language.
erilar
<1de04407-e4fa-4e15...@g22g2000prf.googlegroups.com>,
igor <inbel...@gmail.com> wrote:
> I was comparing them to Varangians who completely lost every trace of
> their language.
Implying that ALL Varangians came from the same area?
--
Erilar, biblioholic medievalist
Yusuf B Gursey
>
> > On Nov 26, 12:49 am, Yusuf B Gursey <y...@theworld.com> wrote:
> > Interestingly enough, the contemporary Crimean Tatars see themselves
> > as the descendants of "the Circassians, Goths, ancient Greeks, ItaUans
OTOH this may reflect an official soviet or Russian position.
> > and Armenians" and do not identify with the Mongols.
the diaspora also identifies with the Turks.
>
> What is interesting or unexpected in this? The numbers of the "true"
> Mongols who settled in various parts of the modern European Russia/
> Ukarine was extremely limited: Batu had something around 4K (families)
> with those "borrowed" from his brother Urdu (founder of the Siberian
> Horde) and Nogai inherited approximately the same number. None of them
> settled in the Crimea so there was simply no source for any
> significant Mongolian presense in the area. Crimean Khanate had been
> founded only in mid-XV century and by this time whatever could pass
> for the "Mongolian blood" in the former Golden Horde was extrtemely
> thin outside the ruling family. Even at its foundation, the Mongolian
> population of the Golden Horde itself was so insignificant that it was
> routinely referenced as the "Kipchak Horde" (Vernadsky argued that the
> name "Golden Horde" is totally anachronistic and that the right names
> were "Kipchack" or "Blue" Horde). Even as far as the ...er...
the official Turkic name was Ulu*gh* Orda "Great Horde". Golden Horde
is what the Russians used.
Yusuf B Gursey
I didn't!
ADR
The Varangians? Those were the members of an Imperial Guard battalion
in Constantinople who were mostly Norse up to the 11th century and
were recruited not only from Kiev but from Scandinavia as well.
Harold Hadrada was a celebrated member of the Guard prior to launching
his claims to the Norwegian and Engish crowns. Later, the Varangian
Guard was opened to a variety of other western and northern Europeans,
especially when the enemy of the Byzantines were the Normans of Sicily.
Trond Engen
> On Dec 2, 9:09 am, Yusuf B Gursey <y...@theworld.com> wrote:
>
>> On Dec 2, 5:57 am, Trond Engen <trond...@engen.priv.no> wrote:
>>
>>> From the few words that are known, the Crimean Gothic language
>>> looks surprisingly modern and also similar to Low Franconian or Low
>>> Saxon, as if there'd been contact with Germania proper all along. I
>>> remember speculating that these Goths were really Rus, settled
>>> there by the emperor of Constantinople, or a mixed Goth/Rus
>>> population, but then there should have been recognizable North
>>> Germanic features. Gr�nvik and others favour a Medieval influx of
>>> West Germanic settlers. Is there other evidence for this? How would
>>> it have come come about? Relocation of German speaking settlers
>>> from Transilvania or Galicia soon after the Ottoman or Crimean
>>> Khanate conquests?
>>
>> I would assume that an Ottoman transfer would have been recorded and
>> known to historians. I don't think the Crimean Khanate did any
>> relocating. any possible relation to the Volga Germans?
>
> in favor of the Crimean Goths being independent of all the mentioned
> populations is that they were Muslims, like the Tatar population, not
> Christians.
Your quote from Brian Glynn Williams says they were late converts from
Christianity to Islam.
--
Trond Engen
igor
Slavs called Varangians Varyags, according to Primary Chronicle slavs
along with finns invited Rurick and his kin from Sweden to rule over
them and they were the founders of Kievan Rus.
Over time Varyags (Varangians) completely slavisized and completely
abandoned their native language in favor of slavic (Russian) with no
traces of any germanic language whatsoever.
Yusuf B Gursey
AFAIK there are many Norse loanwords in Russian. in the Haghia Sophia
(Constantinople / Istanbul) there is a graffito in Runic script in Old
Norse (saw it). also IIRC there are Runic Norse inscriptions in Russia
or the Ukraine.
Yusuf B Gursey
> Yusuf B Gursey:
>
>
>
>
>
> > On Dec 2, 9:09 am, Yusuf B Gursey <y...@theworld.com> wrote:
>
> >> On Dec 2, 5:57 am, Trond Engen <trond...@engen.priv.no> wrote:
>
> >>> From the few words that are known, the Crimean Gothic language
> >>> looks surprisingly modern and also similar to Low Franconian or Low
> >>> Saxon, as if there'd been contact with Germania proper all along. I
> >>> remember speculating that these Goths were really Rus, settled
> >>> there by the emperor of Constantinople, or a mixed Goth/Rus
> >>> population, but then there should have been recognizable North
> >>> West Germanic settlers. Is there other evidence for this? How would
> >>> it have come come about? Relocation of German speaking settlers
> >>> from Transilvania or Galicia soon after the Ottoman or Crimean
> >>> Khanate conquests?
>
> >> I would assume that an Ottoman transfer would have been recorded and
> >> known to historians. I don't think the Crimean Khanate did any
> >> relocating. any possible relation to the Volga Germans?
>
> > in favor of the Crimean Goths being independent of all the mentioned
> > populations is that they were Muslims, like the Tatar population, not
> > Christians.
>
> Your quote from Brian Glynn Williams says they were late converts from
> Christianity to Islam.
I wrote:
>>> A
>>> German source from 1806 points out that the Crimean Tatars of
this
>>> mountainous region were aware of their Christian origins
OK.
>
> --
> Trond Engen
Christopher Culver
> AFAIK there are many Norse loanwords in Russian.
Are there? The only Germanic loanwords I can think of in Russian are
either Gothic loanwords that came so early that they underwent
Proto-Slavonic era sound changes ("church", "prince" and the like), or
very recent German loanwords (штраф, шлагбаум). The only Norse loan
I've come across are the names Oleg and Olga, being from Helge and
Helga.
am...@hotmail.com
> On Dec 3, 9:11 am, a...@hotmail.com wrote:
>
>>
> > What is interesting or unexpected in this? The numbers of the "true"
> > Mongols who settled in various parts of the modern European Russia/
> > Ukarine was extremely limited: Batu had something around 4K (families)
> > with those "borrowed" from his brother Urdu (founder of the Siberian
> > Horde) and Nogai inherited approximately the same number. None of them
> > settled in the Crimea so there was simply no source for any
> > significant Mongolian presense in the area. Crimean Khanate had been
> > founded only in mid-XV century and by this time whatever could pass
> > for the "Mongolian blood" in the former Golden Horde was extrtemely
> > thin outside the ruling family. Even at its foundation, the Mongolian
> > population of the Golden Horde itself was so insignificant that it was
> > routinely referenced as the "Kipchak Horde" (Vernadsky argued that the
> > name "Golden Horde" is totally anachronistic and that the right names
> > were "Kipchack" or "Blue" Horde). Even as far as the ...er...
>
> the official Turkic name was Ulu*gh* Orda "Great Horde". Golden Horde
> is what the Russians used.
AFAIK, "Great Horde" had been used by the Russians as well but the
important point is that both these names are applicable to "post-
imperial" Mongolian period: as long as there was universally
acknowledged Great Khan, his (Mongolian) Horde was Great and Golden.
After Empire disintegrated, "Great" and "Golden" started being applied
to the main regional horde (Blue/Kipchack).
Yusuf B Gursey
wrote:
I might have remembered wrong. I accept your point.
Yusuf B Gursey
I know from documents that the Crimean Tatars at least used Ulu*gh*
Orda (Great Horde). I think during the Mongol period it was known as
the Qipchaq Ulus (ulus roughly being "nation").
am...@hotmail.com
Yes, but they emerged as an independent entity in the early XV (IIRC)
so their references were to the "post-imperial" times and terminology.
> I think during the Mongol period it was known as
> the Qipchaq Ulus (ulus roughly being "nation").
"Ulus", AFAIK, is not a nation but rather an administrative (or
heritage) entity, the territories that Genghis bequitted to his sons
were referencing as "Ulus" (Ulus Jagatai, Ulus Juchi, etc.) even if
their population did not represent anything that would qualify as a
nation (in the case of Juchi's sons, big part of their uluses was to
be conquered). Later, when the dust settled and some kind of the
national entities emerged on the conquered territories, the meaning of
the term changed.
Yusuf B Gursey
it comes from Turkic ulu*sh* originally IIRC refering to territories,
later the Mongols starting to think in terms of the people attached to
those territories and the meaning changed more towards "people". in
modern Khalkha Mongolian (uls) it translates bot "country" and
"nation" see Enc. of Islam II "Ulus"
<<
Ulus , a word in Turkic languages and Mongolian with several related
meanings.
Written ulush in ancient (pre-Mongolian empire) Turkic, it originally
had a geographic connotation, meaning “country” (and later even
“district”, “town” or “village”) as opposed to the term el “people”.
When the term came into Mongolian, changing its phonetics to ulus in
the process, it acquired the latter meaning. As such, it is found in
The secret history of the Mongols , referring to both the Mongol
peoples themselves (§ 272) and neighbouring nations who were absorbed
by them (§§ 110, 196). Essentially, a more exact translation would be
“the people subject to a certain ruler” (E. Haenisch, Wörterbuch zu
Mangholun Niuca Tobach’an..., Leipzig 1939, 163). A more comprehensive
and imperial variant is the later expression yeke mongghol ulus , “the
great Mongol nation”, found first on the seal of Güyük in 1246 ( ulus
here has been translated as “empire” by some scholars, but see I. de
Rachelwitz, Qan, qa’an and the seal of Güyüg, in Documenta Barbarorum,
ed. K. Sagaster and M. Weiers, Wiesbaden 1983, 274-5). A Turkish
variant of this formula exists on a coin minted at Tiflīs in 622/1244,
during the regency of Töregene Khātūn [q.v.], within the following
phrase: ulugh monkol ulūsh bek “commander of the great Mongol
nation” (D.M. Lang, Studies in the numismatics of Georgia in
Transcaucasia, ANS Numismatic Notes and Monographs no. 130, New York
1955, 35-7; but cf. his translation). It was also applied to the
various appanages given to the sons of Čingiz Khān [q.v.], but the
intended reference again was not to geographic entities per se but to
the nomads controlled by each house. These uluses became increasingly
autonomous of the Great Khān, and expressions such as ulus-i Djočī and
ulus-i Čaghatay became the way that these essentially independent
states were known by the Mongols (and their historians) (e.g. Ras̲h̲īd
Dīn, Djami el-Tévarikh, ed. E. Blochet, Leiden and London 1911, 111,
184). Thus the term ulus can often be translated henceforth as “state”
and this meaning remains in modern Mongolian, along with “people”,
“empire”, “country” and “dynasty” (F. Lessing, Mongolian-English
dictionary, Berkeley 1960, 873). The word returned to some of the
Turkic languages in the post-Mongol imperial period with the Mongolian
spelling and usage.
>>
(R. Amitai)
lorad
So says the highly nationalistic minded Old Chronicle (much
annotated)..
Unfortunately, 'varangi' makes best sense if Latvian root words 'var'
and 'varans' are considered.
'Var' means 'power (war)' and 'Varans' means '(war) hero' and
'nobleman'.
'To conquer' is 'uzvaret'.
I reject the false etymology of Greek Várangos and Old East Slavic
varęgŭ as being derived from Old Norse væringi, originally a compound
of vár "pledge" and gengi "companion", i.e.... in favor of a more
straightforward name related to Latvian 'varangis'.(nom sing)
The first capital of the Varangians was Novogorod where the so-called
'rhos' were invited by the council of elders in 862.
The name of the city council of elders was 'The 'Vetch'. And here
again 'vetch' only makes sense by using Latvian, where it translates
to 'the old men'.
It is irritating to see obvious Baltic correspondences being
overlooked in favor of parochial politics (now institutionalized - if
not entirely ossified).
Brian M. Scott
<lora...@cs.com> wrote in
<news:4a5bf403-1e93-4a1a...@n35g2000yqm.googlegroups.com>
in
soc.history.ancient,soc.history,sci.lang,soc.history.medieval:
[...]
> Unfortunately, 'varangi' makes best sense if Latvian root words 'var'
> and 'varans' are considered.
> 'Var' means 'power (war)' and 'Varans' means '(war) hero' and
> 'nobleman'.
> 'To conquer' is 'uzvaret'.
> I reject the false etymology of Greek Várangos and Old East Slavic
> varęgŭ as being derived from Old Norse væringi, originally a compound
> of vár "pledge" and gengi "companion", i.e.... in favor of a more
> straightforward name related to Latvian 'varangis'.(nom sing)
Thereby displaying your carefully maintained ignorance and
parochial bias, both of which are all too familiar here. ON
<væringi> has cognates in OE <wærgenga> 'one seeking
protection, a stranger', Langobard. <waregang>, and OFrank.
<wargengus>.
> The first capital of the Varangians was Novogorod where the so-called
> 'rhos' were invited by the council of elders in 862.
> The name of the city council of elders was 'The 'Vetch'. And here
> again 'vetch' only makes sense by using Latvian, where it translates
> to 'the old men'.
The word is <veče>), Ukr. <vjiče>, Old Russian <věče>, OCS
<věšte> 'council', derived from PSlav. *větjati 'to say'
(OCS <věštati> 'say', Russ. <veščat'> 'broadcast, (obs.)
prophesy, (coll.) pontificate', akin to Old Prussian
<waitiāt> 'to say'. OPruss. <wayte> 'pronunciation' also
belongs here.
By the way, the first use of the term in the Primary
Chronicle seems to be at 127, 19 in the annal for the year
6505 (997) in connection with Bělagorod (Bilhorod Kyivsky).
> It is irritating to see obvious Baltic correspondences being
> overlooked in favor of parochial politics (now institutionalized - if
> not entirely ossified).
<splork!!>
Yusuf B Gursey
there is epigraphic evidence that they spoke Old Norse, fo rexample
the garphito in the Haghia Sophia
am...@hotmail.com
> On Thu, 10 Dec 2009 06:33:00 -0800 (PST), lorad
> <news:4a5bf403-1e93-4a1a...@n35g2000yqm.googlegroups.com>
> in
> soc.history.ancient,soc.history,sci.lang,soc.history.medieval:
>
> [...]
>
> > Unfortunately, 'varangi' makes best sense if Latvian root words 'var'
> > and 'varans' are considered.
> > 'Var' means 'power (war)' and 'Varans' means '(war) hero' and
> > 'nobleman'.
Or "Varan (バラン, Baran?) is a kaiju that first appeared in Varan the
Unbelievable (1958). Physically, Varan resembles a giant reptile with
skin membranes between his arms and legs, allowing him to glide much
like a flying squirrel, and a horned head." It's being of Japanese
extraction is much more fun than Latvian option and even the "horned
head" can be accounted for.
Or one may settle for Varanus komodoensis (http://en.wikipedia.org/
wiki/File:Komodo_dragon_Varanus_komodoensis_Ragunan_Zoo_2.JPG)
:-)
> > 'To conquer' is 'uzvaret'.
> > I reject the false etymology of Greek Várangos and Old East Slavic
> > varęgŭ as being derived from Old Norse væringi, originally a compound
> > of vár "pledge" and gengi "companion", i.e.... in favor of a more
> > straightforward name related to Latvian 'varangis'.(nom sing)
>
> Thereby displaying your carefully maintained ignorance and
> parochial bias, both of which are all too familiar here. ON
> <væringi> has cognates in OE <wærgenga> 'one seeking
> protection, a stranger', Langobard. <waregang>, and OFrank.
> <wargengus>.
>
> > The first capital of the Varangians was Novogorod where the so-called
> > 'rhos' were invited by the council of elders in 862.
> > The name of the city council of elders was 'The 'Vetch'. And here
> > again 'vetch' only makes sense by using Latvian, where it translates
> > to 'the old men'.
>
> The word is <veče>), Ukr. <vjiče>, Old Russian <věče>, OCS
> <věšte> 'council', derived from PSlav. *větjati 'to say'
> (OCS <věštati> 'say', Russ. <veščat'> 'broadcast, (obs.)
> prophesy, (coll.) pontificate', akin to Old Prussian
> <waitiāt> 'to say'. OPruss. <wayte> 'pronunciation' also
> belongs here.
>
Actually, "veche" was not "council of elders" but a public assembly
where ALL citizens had a right to participate. Of course, some
personages had been more equal than others.
> By the way, the first use of the term in the Primary
> Chronicle seems to be at 127, 19 in the annal for the year
> 6505 (997) in connection with Bělagorod (Bilhorod Kyivsky).
And Novgorod only 1016
igor
Logical, why would Slavs travel to far away Sweden to ask for rulers
when Latvia was right door, there is much more in common between
Baltic and Slavic languages and culture in general. No traces of Old
Norse in Russian apart from a few names.
Yusuf B Gursey
> On Dec 10, 2:36 pm, "Brian M. Scott" <b.sc...@csuohio.edu> wrote:
>
> > On Thu, 10 Dec 2009 06:33:00 -0800 (PST), lorad
> > <lorad...@cs.com> wrote in
> > <news:4a5bf403-1e93-4a1a...@n35g2000yqm.googlegroups.com>
> > in
> > soc.history.ancient,soc.history,sci.lang,soc.history.medieval:
>
> > [...]
>
> > > Unfortunately, 'varangi' makes best sense if Latvian root words 'var'
> > > and 'varans' are considered.
> > > 'Var' means 'power (war)' and 'Varans' means '(war) hero' and
> > > 'nobleman'.
>
> Or "Varan (バラン, Baran?) is a kaiju that first appeared in Varan the
> Unbelievable (1958). Physically, Varan resembles a giant reptile with
> skin membranes between his arms and legs, allowing him to glide much
> like a flying squirrel, and a horned head." It's being of Japanese
> extraction is much more fun than Latvian option and even the "horned
> head" can be accounted for.
>
> Or one may settle for Varanus komodoensis (http://en.wikipedia.org/
> wiki/File:Komodo_dragon_Varanus_komodoensis_Ragunan_Zoo_2.JPG)
>
> :-)
>
>
that's from arabic waral (probably from a dialect pronounciation as
waran_
Brian M. Scott
<inbel...@gmail.com> wrote in
<news:c09a6c3c-cba5-49a3...@u16g2000pru.googlegroups.com>
in
soc.history.ancient,soc.history,sci.lang,soc.history.medieval:
[...]
> Logical, why would Slavs travel to far away Sweden to ask
> for rulers when Latvia was right door, there is much more
> in common between Baltic and Slavic languages and culture
> in general.
There were Scandinavians right next door, too: for example,
archaeology shows a major Swedish presence in Grobin,
Latvia, in the 8th century.
> No traces of Old Norse in Russian apart from a few names.
Not quite true: there are also a few words, including knut <
kn�tr 'a knot', krjuk < kr�kr 'a hook', grid' < gri�i 'a
servant'.
Brian
igor
> On Thu, 10 Dec 2009 13:03:16 -0800 (PST), igor
> <news:c09a6c3c-cba5-49a3...@u16g2000pru.googlegroups.com>
> in
> soc.history.ancient,soc.history,sci.lang,soc.history.medieval:
>
> [...]
>
> > Logical, why would Slavs travel to far away Sweden to ask
> > for rulers when Latvia was right door, there is much more
> > in common between Baltic and Slavic languages and culture
> > in general.
>
> There were Scandinavians right next door, too: for example,
> archaeology shows a major Swedish presence in Grobin,
> Latvia, in the 8th century.
>
> > No traces of Old Norse in Russian apart from a few names.
>
> Not quite true: there are also a few words, including knut <
> servant'.
>
> Brian
Interestg, I am a little biased, spent summers in Latvia for many
years in my childhood.
IMO Latvian and Russian people genetically and culturally much closer
then either of them to Scandinavians.
ADR
The term "Varangioi" is not a Greek word at all and I certainly did
not imply that it was. Obviously, the imperial bureaucracy utilized a
name for this guard that was related to what these people called
themselves. Of course, men of other ethnic groups served in that
Guard over the centuries, but until the mid 11th century it was
recruited heavily from the Norse.
> The first capital of the Varangians was Novogorod where the so-called
> 'rhos' were invited by the council of elders in 862.
> The name of the city council of elders was 'The 'Vetch'. And here
> again 'vetch' only makes sense by using Latvian, where it translates
> to 'the old men'.
>
> It is irritating to see obvious Baltic correspondences being
> overlooked in favor of parochial politics (now institutionalized - if
> not entirely ossified).
I do not know what political motives you are referring to here, but
the Nordic infiltration of the Baltic and the Russian river system was
a substantial effort and the presence of Norse in Novogorod hardly
negates their presence anywhere else in this large geographical area.
Yusuf B Gursey
> On Thu, 10 Dec 2009 13:03:16 -0800 (PST), igor
> <news:c09a6c3c-cba5-49a3...@u16g2000pru.googlegroups.com>
> in
> soc.history.ancient,soc.history,sci.lang,soc.history.medieval:
>
> [...]
>
> > Logical, why would Slavs travel to far away Sweden to ask
> > for rulers when Latvia was right door, there is much more
> > in common between Baltic and Slavic languages and culture
> > in general.
>
> There were Scandinavians right next door, too: for example,
> archaeology shows a major Swedish presence in Grobin,
> Latvia, in the 8th century.
>
> > No traces of Old Norse in Russian apart from a few names.
>
> Not quite true: there are also a few words, including knut <
> servant'.
>
> Brian
actually what I remembered was from Stalin's (yes, you are not
misreading) "Marxism and Language" IIRC where he mentions some common
russian words that are taken as germanic in origin and sort of derides
linguists as implying that the slavs were not civilised enough to hve
those things. forgot the exact passage and what those words were.
am...@hotmail.com
Yusuf, sometimes I wonder if a sense of humor is something totally
alien to you (no offense).
am...@hotmail.com
Stalin's exercises in linguistics were part of the broader "Russian
Priority in Everything" campaign. His qualifications as scientist were
limited to the ability to do whatever he wants to the opponents.
On a broader historical perspective, this was just a continuation of
the XVIII century fight between the "varyangian" and "slavic" theory
of the roots of the Russian state. Stalin, by the obvious reasons,
adopted Lomonosov's position that the Slavs had their own statehood
and that Scandinavian influence was negligible. Lomonosov (and
Stalin's propaganda as well) extended this theory to the fighting
against the "evil Geman influence" in the Russian science (and, as far
as was politicaslly safe) in general. In the case of Lomonosov, this
was somewhat ironic because he studied in Germany, had German friends
and had been married to a German woman. Eventually, he found a strong
(even if not unreserved) supporter in the .... "truly Russian"
Catherine II.
am...@hotmail.com
Well, Latvia was a part of Russia since early XVIII (with a big
Russian population even now) so there was more cultural mixup than
between Russia and Sweden. Not sure if the same goes for the earlier
times. Not that <whatever closeness exists> resulted in the mutual
good feelings (I did not follow the recent development so perhaps some
miracle happened in this area).
Can't comment on genetical relations except as far as the Russian/
Soviet Empires are concerned.
António Marques
He's not taking it seriously, he just took the opportunity to mention where
'varanus' may come from.
Joachim Pense
> On a broader historical perspective, this was just a continuation of
> the XVIII century fight between the "varyangian" and "slavic" theory
> of the roots of the Russian state. Stalin, by the obvious reasons,
> adopted Lomonosov's position that the Slavs had their own statehood
> and that Scandinavian influence was negligible. Lomonosov (and
> Stalin's propaganda as well) extended this theory to the fighting
> against the "evil Geman influence" in the Russian science (and, as far
> as was politicaslly safe) in general. In the case of Lomonosov, this
> was somewhat ironic because he studied in Germany, had German friends
> and had been married to a German woman. Eventually, he found a strong
> (even if not unreserved) supporter in the .... "truly Russian"
> Catherine II.
What about Marx and Engels?
Joachim
am...@hotmail.com
ADR
Well, irrespective of the appearance of Nordic rule in Kiev and other
parts of today's Russia, it does not mean that there were not
organized groupings of Slavs in the area. In fact, the Sclaviniae
settlements in the Balkans of the 6th to the 8th century CE provide a
good idea of what slavic "states" would have resembled. There was a
hierarchical structure in these Sclaviniae and a rudimentary core
function of an organized group. There is no reason as to why Slavic
groups by the Dnieper or the Volga would not have had the same
structure. But the Norse offered substantially more and were capable
of greater levels of organization thus engineering a more modern
state, very much in the way that the Bulgarian kingdom in Balkans
absorbed and organized the Sclaviniae there.
Peter T. Daniels
> On Dec 10, 9:40 pm, Yusuf B Gursey <y...@theworld.com> wrote:
> > actually what I remembered was from Stalin's (yes, you are not
> > misreading) "Marxism and Language" IIRC where he mentions some common
> > russian words that are taken as germanic in origin and sort of derides
> > linguists as implying that the slavs were not civilised enough to hve
> > those things. forgot the exact passage and what those words were.- Hide quoted text -
>
> Stalin's exercises in linguistics were part of the broader "Russian
> Priority in Everything" campaign. His qualifications as scientist were
> limited to the ability to do whatever he wants to the opponents.
It was claimed here recently that Stalin actually did know something
about linguistics, and actually did write *Marxism and Problems in
Linguistics*, rather than simply put his name on an orthodox Soviet
exercise.
António Marques
The fact is that the piece is quite authoritavely written - would Stalin
commit his name to something he didn't have the ability to judge? It's not
like Ielena Ceaushescu looking for scientific prestige.
igor
The Baltic languages show closest relationship with the Slavic
languages, and are commonly reconstructed to have passed through
common Proto-Balto-Slavic stage, during which numerous Common Balto-
Slavic lexical, phonological, morphological and accentological
isoglosses developed.
am...@hotmail.com
AFAIK, this was not denied by the proponents of the "nordic" theory.
Their point, IIRC, was that it took <whoever> to organized these
"groupings" into a national state. BTW, the very legend/story/
<whatever> about invitation of Rurik and his brothers assumes
existence of a pretty big "groupong": city of Novgorod.
To give a balanced picture, Lomonosov's polemic with Muller (sp)
included the following argument: if the Slavic state of Russia was
created by the Norsemen, this means that it did not exist at the times
of Christ, which means that Apostol Andrew could not travel to the
Russian lands to preach Christianity, which means that he can't be a
saint-protector of Russia, which means that the Order of St. Andrew
(Russian highest order established by Peter I) is an absurdity, which
means criticism of Peter the Great, which means that this is something
requiring special attention of the Secret Chancellry.
Yusuf B Gursey
>
> Stalin's exercises in linguistics were part of the broader "Russian
> Priority in Everything" campaign. His qualifications as scientist were
> limited to the ability to do whatever he wants to the opponents.
I am not praising Stalin's qualifications (but he was interested in
languages and particularly of course, language policy, a field in
which by virtue of his position he was qualified to speak! :) , but
presumeably he got his information of Germanic words from scholarly
people (and this of course, didn't prevent him from criticiszing
them). I 'll look up hi spamphlet in the library tomorrow, to see what
those words were, if I remembered the passage well enough.
Yusuf B Gursey
> On Dec 11, 9:48 am, a...@hotmail.com wrote:
>
>
>
>
>
> > On Dec 10, 9:40 pm, Yusuf B Gursey <y...@theworld.com> wrote:
>
> > > On Dec 10, 4:54 pm, "Brian M. Scott" <b.sc...@csuohio.edu> wrote:
>
> > > > On Thu, 10 Dec 2009 13:03:16 -0800 (PST), igor
> > > > <inbellt...@gmail.com> wrote in
> > > > <news:c09a6c3c-cba5-49a3...@u16g2000pru.googlegroups.com>
> > > > in
> > > > soc.history.ancient,soc.history,sci.lang,soc.history.medieval:
>
>
> > > > > No traces of Old Norse in Russian apart from a few names.
>
> > > > Not quite true: there are also a few words, including knut <
> > > > knútr 'a knot', krjuk < krókr 'a hook', grid' < griði 'a
> > > > servant'.
>
> > > > Brian
>
> > > actually what I remembered was from Stalin's (yes, you are not
> > > misreading) "Marxism and Language" IIRC where he mentions some common
> > > russian words that are taken as germanic in origin and sort of derides
> > > linguists as implying that the slavs were not civilised enough to hve
> > > those things. forgot the exact passage and what those words were.
>
> > Stalin's exercises in linguistics were part of the broader "Russian
> > Priority in Everything" campaign. His qualifications as scientist were
> > limited to the ability to do whatever he wants to the opponents.
>
> I am not praising Stalin's qualifications (but he was interested in
> languages and particularly of course, language policy, a field in
> which by virtue of his position he was qualified to speak! :) , but
> presumeably he got his information of Germanic words from scholarly
> people (and this of course, didn't prevent him from criticiszing
> them). I 'll look up hi spamphlet in the library tomorrow, to see what
> those words were, if I remembered the passage well enough.
memory must have played tricks as I couldn't find it in the
"canonical" anthology in pamphlet form. perhaps it was in a different
version or a political tract based on it.
Peter T. Daniels
Howie Aronson probably kept the Red Chinese bookshop on 53rd St. in
business by buying copies of *Marxism and Problems in Linguistics* to
hand out to everyone -- as class readings, as prizes in linguistics
contests -- they cost about 25c. The only place in the world that kept
Stalin's writings in print was Beijing. (I'm not sure I ever saw it in
Russian.)
Yusuf B Gursey
also I think in Albania (one of my library copies is from Tirana 1981)
the library also has it in Russian.
am...@hotmail.com
Yusuf B Gursey
googling I found only these dry statements concerning Norse loanwords
in Russian:
http://www.experiencefestival.com/a/Old_Norse_language_-_Modern_descendants/id/1815986
Russian and Finnish also have a number of Norse loanwords;
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rus'_(people)
It has been suggested that the Vikings had some enduring influence in
Rus, as testified by loan words, such as yabeda "complaining
person" (from aembaetti "office"), skot "cattle" (from skattr "tax")
and knout (from knutr, "a knotty wood").[citation needed]
http://vikings.wikia.com/wiki/Old_Norse
Russian, Finnish and Estonian also have a number of Norse loanwords;
this does not seem to count, as it is a Germanic loan in Proto-Slavic
and not specifically Russian:
http://www.billcasselman.com/wording_room/lord_lady.htm
Modern Russian xлeб ‘bread, loaf ‘ pronounced ‘chlyeb’ and probably
borrowed into Old Slavic from Proto-Germanic
Old Norse (language of the Vikings) hleifr ‘loaf of bread’
igor
Good link, did not find any statements deprecating Slavs.
Yusuf B Gursey
of course Stalin did not depreciate Slavs, what I remembered, perhaps
wrongly, was a statement accusing others of doing so. the issued
pamphlets contain secondary material, like Stalin's answers to
questions posed by other party members.
Surreyman
>
> Russian and Finnish also have a number of Norse loanwords;
>
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rus'_(people)
>
> It has been suggested that the Vikings had some enduring influence in
> Rus, as testified by loan words, such as yabeda "complaining
> person" (from aembaetti "office"), skot "cattle" (from skattr "tax")
> and knout (from knutr, "a knotty wood").[citation needed]
>
> http://vikings.wikia.com/wiki/Old_Norse
>
> Russian, Finnish and Estonian also have a number of Norse loanwords;
>
> this does not seem to count, as it is a Germanic loan in Proto-Slavic
> and not specifically Russian:
>
> http://www.billcasselman.com/wording_room/lord_lady.htm
>
> Modern Russian xлeб ‘bread, loaf ‘ pronounced ‘chlyeb’ and probably
> borrowed into Old Slavic from Proto-Germanic
>
>
> - Show quoted text -
That seems to prove that the Slavs occupied England for some time
too .................... :-))
Surreyman
Yusuf B Gursey
wrote:
that doesn't follow, the word isn't slavic in origin but germanic.
>
> Surreyman
Dušan Vukotić
The same in English
http://www.4shared.com/file/172172359/8b5c99e5/J_Stalin.html
am...@hotmail.com
But I'm not sure if he knew why the medieval English aristocracy had
been speaking French. Anyway, his analogy with the French-speaking
Russian nobility is hardly applicable.
am...@hotmail.com
This specific article is written as a series of answers to the
presumably asked questions.
The main (as I understend after browsing through this crap) subject is
a standard marxist controversy regarding "nadstroyka" and "basis" with
Stalin inissting that the language is not "nadstroyka".
Most of the rest is criticism of the Marr's school of linguistics for
their "vulgar marxism".Cant't tell about it in linguistics but when
applied to the history (by Pokrovsky) it produced results almost
absolutely unacceptable for the establishment by excluding Russian
patriotism, Slavic brotherhood and numerous other things adopted by
the Soviet commies under Stalin's guidance. Things had to be taken
"dialectically". :-)
am...@hotmail.com
Not a problem: 1st, they had been occupied by the Germans and later
they occupied England. :-)
igor
He could not be that ignorant??? We have to admit, becoming the new
"czar" or Russia is not a task for the ordinary..
am...@hotmail.com
Surely, he could. There was no "minimal cultural level" test for the
members of Politburo. :-)
>We have to admit, becoming the new
> "czar" or Russia is not a task for the ordinary..
You are confusing intelligence with erudition and culture.
igor
Have to agree, surely a ruthless sob he was, a Russian "emperor" with
a heavy Georgian accent.
Yusuf B Gursey
yes. and French continued to be used in Law for a considerable time.
Yusuf B Gursey
"superstructure".
> Stalin inissting that the language is not "nadstroyka".
"supersturcture"
>
> Most of the rest is criticism of the Marr's school of linguistics for
> their "vulgar marxism".Cant't tell about it in linguistics but when
well he has a point that the basic language doesn't change by social
revolutions just as the railroads don't change.
am...@hotmail.com
Probably. Hopefully, you don't expect me to read this crap in English
(not that I read it too closely in Russian)..
> > Stalin inissting that the language is not "nadstroyka".
>
> "supersturcture"
>
>
>
> > Most of the rest is criticism of the Marr's school of linguistics for
> > their "vulgar marxism".Cant't tell about it in linguistics but when
>
> well he has a point that the basic language doesn't change by social
> revolutions just as the railroads don't change.
>
Indeed. The point was (as I explained in the previous post) that
almost any attempt to apply Marxism literally result in an obvious
stupidity and embarrassment. As a result, there was a need in the
'dialectic' interpretation which could easily result in something
totally opposite to what "source" had been saying. The trick was that,
unless you were entitled to such an interpretation, you would be
accused in deviation from Marxism.
am...@hotmail.com
The French in England had been used because certain group of people
were French or descendants of the French and it took quite a while for
them to merge (plus, all that time the Kings of England had big
possessions in France). The French in Russia had been used exclusively
because it was fashionable.
Yusuf B Gursey
I agree with that.
some detail for the medieval period is provided in:
and
http://www.chass.utoronto.ca/~cpercy/courses/6361Heys.htm
French as a Mother-Tongue in Medieval England
Jacquie Heys
Copyright 2001
> possessions in France). The French in Russia had been used exclusively
> because it was fashionable.
my point was that at least formally, French remained the offical
language of Law until 1731 (way after Norman ancestry remained
important, and when England had no possesions in France), although
this was merely formal:
quoting the Jacquie Heys article:
<<
A statute written in 1362 saying that all governmental and legal
affairs must be conducted in English tells us a couple of things.
Firstly, that the language of the government was not the language of
the people, and ergo, that French, even as a second language, had
fallen out of fashion and remained the language of only a few.
Secondly, since this statute (and, subsequently, many more) was
written in French, obviously French remained the language of the law.
However, 14th century Oxford students in legal and business studies
were required to take a supplementary French course which Kibbee takes
to mean that even lawyers were not native speakers of Law French or
even knew French as a second language. In fact, French was
(officially) the language of English courts until 1731, which proves
that officiality does not always reflect practice.
>>
Yusuf B Gursey
n this case, I think Stalin was right in interpreting Marx as not
emphasizing language after a social revolutuon. language change and
changing the language was the stuff of the German Romantics, starting
with Herder and vulgarized by Fichte, Arndt etc. and imitated by later
nationalist ideologues of different nations, such as Hungarians, Turks
and Arabs, and seemingly (IMO, though some disagreed) by pan-Slavists.
ken...@cix.compulink.co.uk
<4cc02ae7-8252-4492...@a21g2000yqc.googlegroups.com>,
am...@hotmail.com () wrote:
> Surely, he could. There was no "minimal cultural level" test for the
> members of Politburo. :-)
IIRC he was well enough educated to get into a seminary before he
developed his political views. So I would have thought he had at least
some knowledge of Russian history.
Ken Young
am...@hotmail.com
> In article
> <4cc02ae7-8252-4492-8c70-9b0f1ed7e...@a21g2000yqc.googlegroups.com>,
>
> a...@hotmail.com () wrote:
> > Surely, he could. There was no "minimal cultural level" test for the
> > members of Politburo. :-)
>
> IIRC he was well enough educated to get into a seminary before he
> developed his political views. So I would have thought he had at least
> some knowledge of Russian history.
But we were talking about knowledge of English history. BTW, I'm not
sure how educated person had to be to get _into_ seminary (even less
sure if curriculum included extensive course of any history) and,
IIRC, he did not even graduated from a seminary.
Years ago I read an article on Stalin's cultural level. Quotation from
his and Zdanov's speeches and articles on the "cultural issues" had
been intermixed with the quotes from Zoschenko novels. One would never
guess correctly who wrote what: the level and opinions were those of
semi-educated 'proletariat'. In behavioral model, he was a typical
"vor v zakone" (professional criminal with the high standing among his
brethren). As for his knowledge of the Russian history, probably
everybody would benefit if he had even less than he did because he
ended up with the glorification of Ivan the Terrible and Peter I and
had a firmly set opinion that Maluta Skuratov (Ivan's most infamous
henchman) was 'an outstanding general'.
lorad
> On Thu, 10 Dec 2009 06:33:00 -0800 (PST), lorad
> <lorad...@cs.com> wrote in
> <news:4a5bf403-1e93-4a1a...@n35g2000yqm.googlegroups.com>
> in
> soc.history.ancient,soc.history,sci.lang,soc.history.medieval:
>
> [...]
>
> > Unfortunately, 'varangi' makes best sense if Latvian root words 'var'
> > and 'varans' are considered.
> > 'Var' means 'power (war)' and 'Varans' means '(war) hero' and
> > 'nobleman'.
> > 'To conquer' is 'uzvaret'.
> > I reject the false etymology of Greek Várangos and Old East Slavic
> > varęgŭ as being derived from Old Norse væringi, originally a compound
> > of vár "pledge" and gengi "companion", i.e.... in favor of a more
> > straightforward name related to Latvian 'varangis'.(nom sing)
>
> Thereby displaying your carefully maintained ignorance and
> parochial bias, both of which are all too familiar here. ON
> <væringi> has cognates in OE <wærgenga> 'one seeking
> protection, a stranger', Langobard. <waregang>, and OFrank.
> <wargengus>.
You are a prime example of ossfied parochial mentality.
You are unable to accept the Latvian equivalents offered - but choose
instead to regurgitate uber nationalistic achronistic indogermanisch
fantasies ( geographically displaced) as your preferred choice.
> > The first capital of the Varangians was Novogorod where the so-called
> > 'rhos' were invited by the council of elders in 862.
> > The name of the city council of elders was 'The 'Vetch'. And here
> > again 'vetch' only makes sense by using Latvian, where it translates
> > to 'the old men'.
>
> The word is <veče>), Ukr. <vjiče>, Old Russian <věče>, OCS
> <věšte> 'council', derived from PSlav. *větjati 'to say'
> (OCS <věštati> 'say', Russ. <veščat'> 'broadcast, (obs.)
> prophesy, (coll.) pontificate', akin to Old Prussian
> <waitiāt> 'to say'. OPruss. <wayte> 'pronunciation' also
> belongs here.
I'll have to remember that; 'wayte' belongs with 'vetch' - while
'vetch' does NOT belong with 'vetch'..so said BM Scott..
All of your disjointed and displaced crap substitutions are
offered?... but not the cuurent day Latvian EQUIVALENT?
What is wrong with your psychotic self? You are an example of those
dishonest irritating fools that I mentioned.
> By the way, the first use of the term in the Primary
> Chronicle seems to be at 127, 19 in the annal for the year
> 6505 (997) in connection with Bělagorod (Bilhorod Kyivsky).
>
> > It is irritating to see obvious Baltic correspondences being
> > overlooked in favor of parochial politics (now institutionalized - if
> > not entirely ossified).
>
> <splork!!>
Splork in your own face, foolish regurgitator of 19th century
indogermanisch.
lorad
> On Dec 10, 9:33 am, lorad <lorad...@cs.com> wrote:
>
>
>
>
>
> > On Dec 3, 5:25 pm, igor <inbellt...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> > > On Dec 3, 12:52 pm, ADR <aretz...@yahoo.com> wrote:
>
> > > > On Dec 3, 7:38 am, igor <inbellt...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> > > > > On Dec 2, 9:37 pm, ADR <aretz...@yahoo.com> wrote:
>
> > > > > > On Dec 2, 4:03 pm, igor <inbellt...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> > > > > > > On Dec 2, 2:57 am, Trond Engen <trond...@engen.priv.no> wrote:
>
> > > > > > > > Yusuf B Gursey skrev:
>
> > > > > > > > > On Dec 2, 12:28 am, igor <inbellt...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> > > > > > > > >> On Dec 1, 7:38 am, Yusuf B Gursey <y...@theworld.com> wrote:
>
> > > > > > > > >>> The "Tats" of the Crimea
> > > > > > > > >>> [...] There is of course no mystery concerning the fate of this
> > > > > > > > >>> eastern branch of the great medieval Gothic migrations. Nineteenth-
> > > > > > > > >>> century Russian and German visitors to the Tatar villages in the
> > > > > > > > >>> shadow of Gothic mountain fortress of Mangup Kale (Tatar, "Mangup
> > > > > > > > >>> Castle"), found their descendants living there among the Tatars. A
> > > > > > > > >>> German source from 1806 points out that the Crimean Tatars of this
> > > > > > > > >>> mountainous region were aware of their Christian origins.24 A
> > > > > > > > >>> nineteenth-century Russian visitor to the Gothic region in the south-
> > > > > > > > >>> western mountains was convinced that, "In aU probability their (the
> > > > > > > > >>> Goths) descendants are the Tatars of a series of villages in the
> > > > > > > > >>> Crimea who are sharply delineated from the inhabitants of neighbouring
> > > > > > > > >>> villages by their tall height and other features characteristic of the
> > > > > > > > >>> Scandinavians."25 More recent works, such as Michel Kazanski's history
> > > > > > > > >>> of the Goths point out that "In all probabillty the remnants of the
> > > > > > > > >>> Crimean Goths remain in the 'Turkic' base of the Tatar population."26
> > > > > > > > >>> Interestingly enough, the contemporary Crimean Tatars see themselves
> > > > > > > > >>> as the descendants of "the Circassians, Goths, ancient Greeks, ItaUans
> > > > > > > > >>> and Armenians" and do not identify with the Mongols.27 There seems to
> > > > > > > > >>> be little doubt that the mountain Goths did in fact convert to Islam
> > > > > > > > >>> and become "Tatars", although they were only gradualiy accepted by the
> > > > > > > > >>> Kipçak-Tatar nomadic population of the steppe as fellow MusUms. Hans
> > > > > > > > >>> Schiltberger, a Bavarian slave who visited this region in 1396,
> > > > > > > > >>> claimed that the neighbouring Tatars of the plains used the derisive
> > > > > > > > >>> term "Tat" (Thatt) to describe their Islamized Goth and coastal
> > > > > > > > >>> neighbours.28 [...]
>
> > > > > > > > >> Fascinating. There is also a substantial contribution to the
> > > > > > > > >> ethnogenesis of this population by Hazars and Alans who were displaced
> > > > > > > > >> by Rus and later by Huns all over the area, many clans were known for
> > > > > > > > >> their Caucasoid appearance (tall, fair hair and eyes).
>
> > > > > > > > > the Alans or their ancestors were the first wave of migration. the
> > > > > > > > > Huns displaced them. the Khazars, who were more of a dynasty than an
> > > > > > > > > ethnic group (they spoke a language deriving from Hunnic) came after.
> > > > > > > > > the Rus, slavified Scandinavians, displaced the Khazar Empire. the
> > > > > > > > > underlying native substratum had fair hair and eyes.
>
> > > > > > > > From the few words that are known, the Crimean Gothic language looks
> > > > > > > > surprisingly modern and also similar to Low Franconian or Low Saxon, as
> > > > > > > > if there'd been contact with Germania proper all along. I remember
> > > > > > > > speculating that these Goths were really Rus, settled there by the
> > > > > > > > emperor of Constantinople, or a mixed Goth/Rus population, but then
> > > > > > > > there should have been recognizable North Germanic features. Grønvik and
> > > > > > > > others favour a Medieval influx of West Germanic settlers. Is there
> > > > > > > > other evidence for this? How would it have come come about? Relocation
> > > > > > > > of German speaking settlers from Transilvania or Galicia soon after the
> > > > > > > > Ottoman or Crimean Khanate conquests?
>
> > > > > > > > --
> > > > > > > > Trond Engen
>
> > > > > > > Zosimus consistently refers to the Gothic migrants as "Scythians",
> > > > > > > AFAIK, they were never in Germany proper.
> > > > > > > It is surprising for them to retain intelligible German given the fact
> > > > > > > that they left Scandinavia hundreds of years prior, never spoke German
> > > > > > > in the first place (maybe proto-German), assimilating with many none
> > > > > > > Germanic speakers not even counting the fact that languages change
> > > > > > > drastically over time. For example me being a native Russian speaker,
> > > > > > > I can barely understand Primary Chronicle written in 12th century ce.
>
> > > > > > Gothic is one of the germanic languages that we have some information
> > > > > > on since extensive fragments of the Gospels translated into Gothic
> > > > > > remain. It is not really peculiar for languages to morph very quickly
> > > > > > when disparate populations with divergent dialects merge. It did
> > > > > > happen in English in the beginning of the 2nd millenium as Danes,
> > > > > > Angles and Saxons merged into a single unit.
>
> > > > > Correct. Got confused with the time frames. We have the Gospels.
> > > > > I was comparing them to Varangians who completely lost every trace of
> > > > > their language.
>
> > > > The Varangians? Those were the members of an Imperial Guard battalion
> > > > in Constantinople who were mostly Norse up to the 11th century and
> > > > were recruited not only from Kiev but from Scandinavia as well.
> > > > Harold Hadrada was a celebrated member of the Guard prior to launching
> > > > his claims to the Norwegian and Engish crowns. Later, the Varangian
> > > > Guard was opened to a variety of other western and northern Europeans,
> > > > especially when the enemy of the Byzantines were the Normans of Sicily.
>
> > > Slavs called Varangians Varyags, according to Primary Chronicle slavs
> > > along with finns invited Rurick and his kin from Sweden to rule over
> > > them and they were the founders of Kievan Rus.
> > > Over time Varyags (Varangians) completely slavisized and completely
> > > abandoned their native language in favor of slavic (Russian) with no
> > > traces of any germanic language whatsoever.
>
> > So says the highly nationalistic minded Old Chronicle (much
> > annotated)..
>
> > Unfortunately, 'varangi' makes best sense if Latvian root words 'var'
> > and 'varans' are considered.
> > 'Var' means 'power (war)' and 'Varans' means '(war) hero' and
> > 'nobleman'.
> > 'To conquer' is 'uzvaret'.
>
> > I reject the false etymology of Greek Várangos and Old East Slavic
> > varęgŭ as being derived from Old Norse væringi, originally a compound
> > of vár "pledge" and gengi "companion", i.e.... in favor of a more
> > straightforward name related to Latvian 'varangis'.(nom sing)
>
> the garphito in the Haghia Sophia
Some certainly were ON speakers, and yet we find grafitti that appears
to be IE but is as yet untranslatable.
(Eventually even OE speakers journeyed there.)
All I am stating is that the word 'varangian' appears to be derived
from Baltic.
> > The first capital of the Varangians was Novogorod where the so-called
> > 'rhos' were invited by the council of elders in 862.
> > The name of the city council of elders was 'The 'Vetch'. And here
> > again 'vetch' only makes sense by using Latvian, where it translates
> > to 'the old men'.
>
lorad
> > 'rhos' were invited by the council of elders in 862.
> > The name of the city council of elders was 'The 'Vetch'. And here
> > again 'vetch' only makes sense by using Latvian, where it translates
> > to 'the old men'.
>
> > It is irritating to see obvious Baltic correspondences being
> > overlooked in favor of parochial politics (now institutionalized - if
>
> Logical, why would Slavs travel to far away Sweden to ask for rulers
> when Latvia was right door, there is much more in common between
> Baltic and Slavic languages and culture in general. No traces of Old
> Norse in Russian apart from a few names
Thanks.
The only thing that gives me pause is the account that the 'rulers'
came 'from over the waters'.
Even though this can be conceivable explained by its being a port city
that relied upon water transport for almost all travel.
"Novgorod Republic Novgorod is the most ancient Slavic city recorded
in Russia. The chronicle first mentions it in 859, when it was already
a major station on the trade route from the Baltics to Byzantium".
lorad
> On Thu, 10 Dec 2009 13:03:16 -0800 (PST), igor
> <inbellt...@gmail.com> wrote in
> <news:c09a6c3c-cba5-49a3...@u16g2000pru.googlegroups.com>
> in
> soc.history.ancient,soc.history,sci.lang,soc.history.medieval:
>
>
> > Logical, why would Slavs travel to far away Sweden to ask
> > for rulers when Latvia was right door, there is much more
> > in common between Baltic and Slavic languages and culture
> > in general.
>
> archaeology shows a major Swedish presence in Grobin,
> Latvia, in the 8th century.
Grobin was one of two serious attempts by the scandanavians to
colonize the Kurland peninsula.
Danes and Swedes seized Grobin (already an ancient and prosperous
trading town) ca 650.
Their suzerainty lasted until ca 800 when they were militarily
defeated and expelled (unlike in England and France).
Unfortunately for your guess, Grobina had already been re-established
as Baltic Kuronian property over one hundred years before any
'varangians' arrived in Constantinople in 911
> > No traces of Old Norse in Russian apart from a few names.
>
> Not quite true: there are also a few words, including knut <
> knútr 'a knot', krjuk < krókr 'a hook', grid' < griði 'a
> servant'.
> Brian
So give the corresponding Russian proper names. please.
lorad
> not imply that it was. Obviously, the imperial bureaucracy utilized a
> name for this guard that was related to what these people called
> themselves. Of course, men of other ethnic groups served in that
> Guard over the centuries, but until the mid 11th century it was
> recruited heavily from the Norse.
>
> > The first capital of the Varangians was Novogorod where the so-called
> > 'rhos' were invited by the council of elders in 862.
> > The name of the city council of elders was 'The 'Vetch'. And here
> > again 'vetch' only makes sense by using Latvian, where it translates
> > to 'the old men'.
>
> > It is irritating to see obvious Baltic correspondences being
> > overlooked in favor of parochial politics (now institutionalized - if
> > not entirely ossified).
>
Institutionalized west-european myopia is my best characterization of
it.
As the Baltics were under-represented scholastically during the early
years of indo-european studies, (due to concurrent political
marginalization) the Baltic language group seems to have been under-
represented in critical consideration of the development of IE
languages as a whole. Mr Scott is a good contemporary example of the
type of scholastic chauvinism I refer to.
> but
> the Nordic infiltration of the Baltic and the Russian river system was
> a substantial effort and the presence of Norse in Novogorod hardly
> negates their presence anywhere else in this large geographical area
No one said that Nordic penetration of the Russian river systems did
not occur - because it did.
However, lost in the mix is the fact that *the primary* Nordic to
Byzantium trade route occurred through a Baltic river system; the
Daugava (aka 'Dvina' in Russian). Also overlooked is the fact that the
Daugava route *was never controlled* by the scandanavians.
There are no scandanavian settlments along the Daugava, no skaldic
mention of viking conquests along the Daugava, no viking archeological
finds along the river. Instead the vikings were forced to reach all
the way to Ladoga to gain access to the Volga system in order to reach
Byzantium.
Clearly Baltic polities - and not scandanavian - controlled and used
the primary route to Constantinople.
Consequently the linguistic link beween 'varangis' and 'Varangian'
seems likely.
igor
Interestingly, Novgorod means "new city".
am...@hotmail.com
IIRC, the same chronicle tells that it was founded as a conglomerate
of 5 older cities, at least 2 of which had been Finnish.
am...@hotmail.com
The most obvious question is: why would anybody start looking for the
candidates in whatever passed at this time for Latvia?
> there is much more in common between
> > Baltic and Slavic languages and culture in general. No traces of Old
> > Norse in Russian apart from a few names
>
> Thanks.
> The only thing that gives me pause is the account that the 'rulers'
> came 'from over the waters'.
> Even though this can be conceivable explained by its being a port city
> that relied upon water transport for almost all travel.
Among other things, the route of Latvia-related trade with the
Byzantian Empire totally bypassed Novgorod. OTOH, the trade route from
Scandinavia was going through Novgorod so certain number of the
Varyags would be routinely hanging in the area so "sending to the
Varyags" did not necessarily involved oversea trip (and the whole
episode with Rurik & Co can easily be just a legend).
>
> "Novgorod Republic Novgorod is the most ancient Slavic city recorded
> in Russia. The chronicle first mentions it in 859, when it was already
> a major station on the trade route from the Baltics to Byzantium.
So?
igor
Chud', one of the founding tribes were finns.
Yusuf B Gursey
Brian M. Scott
<lora...@cs.com> wrote in
<news:5de2273f-2068-4d36...@n35g2000yqm.googlegroups.com>
in
soc.history.ancient,soc.history,sci.lang,soc.history.medieval:
>> [...]
The nationalistic fantasies are all yours, dear boy.
>>> The first capital of the Varangians was Novogorod where the so-called
>>> 'rhos' were invited by the council of elders in 862.
>>> The name of the city council of elders
Public assembly of *all* citizens, as Alex has already
pointed out. Rather like the Scandinavian <þing>, actually,
though it's not clear whether that influenced the Slavic
institution. Nothing to do with elders.
>>> was 'The 'Vetch'. And here
>>> again 'vetch' only makes sense by using Latvian, where it translates
>>> to 'the old men'.
>> The word is <veče>), Ukr. <vjiče>, Old Russian <věče>, OCS
>> <věšte> 'council', derived from PSlav. *větjati 'to say'
>> (OCS <věštati> 'say', Russ. <veščat'> 'broadcast, (obs.)
>> prophesy, (coll.) pontificate', akin to Old Prussian
>> <waitiāt> 'to say'. OPruss. <wayte> 'pronunciation' also
>> belongs here.
> I'll have to remember that; 'wayte' belongs with 'vetch' - while
> 'vetch' does NOT belong with 'vetch'..so said BM Scott..
No, no, no: OPruss. <wayte> belongs with Russ. <veče> and
ORuss. <věče>; there is no <vetch> here.
> All of your disjointed and displaced crap substitutions are
> offered?... but not the cuurent day Latvian EQUIVALENT?
There apparently isn't one.
[...]
am...@hotmail.com
> On Tue, 15 Dec 2009 03:41:32 -0800 (PST), lorad
Taking into an account that "parochial" means "provincial", the only
entity in the subject under discussion to which it can be safely
applied is Latvia (was somebody's province for most of its history) so
he is a little bit confused in his terminology. Not sure how and why
your judgments can be impacted by your nationalism because Latvia
(AFAIK) is a little bit too far on the map for you to have any
nationalistic designs and/or biases on her account.
>
> >>> The first capital of the Varangians was Novogorod where the so-called
> >>> 'rhos' were invited by the council of elders in 862.
> >>> The name of the city council of elders
>
> Public assembly of *all* citizens, as Alex has already
> pointed out. Rather like the Scandinavian <þing>, actually,
> though it's not clear whether that influenced the Slavic
> institution. Nothing to do with elders.
>
> >>> was 'The 'Vetch'. And here
> >>> again 'vetch' only makes sense by using Latvian, where it translates
> >>> to 'the old men'.
A naive question is what sense does it made to use a Latvian word if
(a) it sounds differently and (b) it means different thing?
[]
> > All of your disjointed and displaced crap
Isn't he cute?
>> substitutions are
> > offered?... but not the cuurent day Latvian EQUIVALENT?
>
> There apparently isn't one.
Hmmmm, just an idle thought: what if borrowing happened in opposite
direction? Not that anybody should care...
Brian M. Scott
wrote in
<news:00661933-701a-4693...@f20g2000vbl.googlegroups.com>
in soc.history.ancient,soc.history.medieval:
>>>> [...]
It's probably not fair of us to use actual knowledge!
[...]
>>>>> The first capital of the Varangians was Novogorod where the so-called
>>>>> 'rhos' were invited by the council of elders in 862.
>>>>> The name of the city council of elders
>> Public assembly of *all* citizens, as Alex has already
>> pointed out. Rather like the Scandinavian <þing>, actually,
>> though it's not clear whether that influenced the Slavic
>> institution. Nothing to do with elders.
>>>>> was 'The 'Vetch'. And here again 'vetch' only makes
>>>>> sense by using Latvian, where it translates to 'the
>>>>> old men'.
> A naive question is what sense does it made to use a Latvian word if
> (a) it sounds differently and (b) it means different thing?
>>> All of your disjointed and displaced crap
> Isn't he cute?
:-)
>>> substitutions are
>>> offered?... but not the cuurent day Latvian EQUIVALENT?
>> There apparently isn't one.
> Hmmmm, just an idle thought: what if borrowing happened in
> opposite direction? Not that anybody should care...
I've not looked into it, but I strongly suspect that
whatever Latvian word he has in mind is related to Latin
<vetus> 'old', OCS <vetъxъ> 'old, ancient', Russ. <vetxij>
'old, ancient, decrepit', Lith. <vētušas> (obsolete) 'old,
archaic', from a different PIE root altogether.
Brian
am...@hotmail.com
> On Tue, 15 Dec 2009 19:12:52 -0800 (PST), <a...@hotmail.com>
The whole idea that the Latvian tribes could be (as claimed) a
powerful source of a cultural influence on their neighbors (as
opposite to the ocassional borrowing here and there) needs a LOT of
proof because these tribes were not exactly a shiny beacon of a
regional super-civilization. " In the 10th century AD, the ancient
Balts started to form specific tribal realms. Gradually, five
individual Baltic tribal cultures developed: Couronians, Livonians,
Latgallians, Selonians, Semigallians (Latvian: kurši, līvi, latgaļi,
sēļi, zemgaļi)." As you see, the meaningful social development came
rather late, after establishment of the Rurik Rus and under its
influence: "The largest of them was the Latgallian tribe, which was
the most advanced in its socio-political development. The main
Latgallian principality was Jersika, ruled by the Greek Orthodox
princes from Latgallian-Polatsk branch of Rurik dynasty. "
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_Latvia#Prehistory
Jersika (there are various spellings) had been one of the border
princedoms [1] of the Principality of Polotsk, also ruled by the
princes of (surprise, surprise) Rurik dynasty. In the early XIII the
last independent ruler lost most of his territories and became vassal
of the (German) Bishop of Riga. Princedom of Polotsk (in the modern
Belorus) first mentioned in IX as a part of the Novgorodian Rus, had
been ruled by the local dynasty and populated by the
"krivichi" (Slavs). At the time it was conquered in X century by (not
a saint, yet) Vladimir, it was ruled by a Varyang Rangvald. After
conquering town and killing Rongvald Vladimir married his daughter
Rogneda (or 1st raped in front of her family, then killed the family,
then married), subject popular in the Russian art and literature. So,
there were connections but there is no indication in which direction
they were going ("lorad's" automatic assumption that they were going
from Latvia outward just because Latvia was "underrepresented" thanks
to the nationalistic parochial pigs like you :-)).
Another claim is about "alternative" route from Baltics to Byzantia:
from Baltic coast by Dvina and down the Dnieper. IIRC, sometimes it is
referenced as "Amber Road" (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Rota_do_
%C3%A2mbar.jpg this map does not show the route by the Black Sea;
another issue is that the "source" area is far from being limited to
the Latvian coast: it is most of the Eastern Baltic Coastand in the
Roman times main "source" are was Prussia). Can't tell why exactly he
called it "primary" but it was surely an old one. The problem with the
statement about an absence of the Varyags is that (in the medieval
times) at part of this route had been probably controlled by the
Varyags who ruled over the Kievan Rus. As you can see from above, at
least from X century the same Varyags had been controlling at least
part of Latvia as well. And, wherever you look on the web, the 1st
thing you are finding about this route is that trade had been carried
(during the middle ages) by the <V-word>. BTW, "Latvia was originally
settled by the ancient people known as Balts. In the 9th century the
Balts came under the overlordship of the Varangians, or Vikings" is
from the site of the Latvian Embassy.
[1] "Standard" schema of the Russian princedoms was a big one
(sometimes with the title of the "Great Princedom") and numerous
smaller vassal princedoms (to accommodate ever-growing numbers of the
members of the Rurik family in a system where every male was entitled
to inherit some kind of a "princedom", however small).
igor
The Curonians or Kurs (Curonian: Kursi; German: Kuren; Latvian: Kurši;
Lithuanian: Kuršiai; Estonian: Kuralased; Polish: Kurowie) were a
people living on the Eastern shores of the Baltic who were eventually
absorbed by the expansion of the Latvian and Lithuanian nations. They
gave their name to the region of Courland (Kurzeme). They spoke the
Curonian language. The Curonians lived in what is now Latvia and parts
of Lithuania from the 5th to the 16th centuries.
The Curonians were known as fierce warriors, excellent sailors and
pirates. They were involved in several wars and alliances with
Swedish, Danish, and Icelandic Vikings. Grobin was their main center
during the Vendel Age. Chapter 46 of Egils Saga describes one Viking
expedition by the Vikings Thorolf and Egill Skallagrímsson in
Courland. They took part with the Oeselians in attacking Sweden's main
city Sigtuna in 1187. Curonians established temporary settlements in
overseas regions including eastern Sweden and the islands of Gotland
and Bornholm.
am...@hotmail.com
Exciting. Not clear however, how and why does this imply that the
Slavs had been borrowing words from their language.
igor
It does not, why would Slavs borrow any words?? They had plenty of
their own:) The fact is that linguistic borrowing from Swedes was very
limited while relation to Baltic languages is comparatively
substantial. The term Varyag could be applied to Latvians as well as
Swedes, IMO it was a blanket term for pirates, robbers (vor, voryaga -
thief, robber).