Uralic homeland and genetics and their implications for PIE

[Coldmountains]

What is your view on PIIr and archaeology now? That its in Abashevo or surrounds?
Is the best guess that Sintashta-Srubanaya=Iranian and some earlier dispersal from Abashevo=Indo-Aryan?
Gonna ask that question here too because PUr must meet PIIr sometime just after its initial split, as Holopainen (2019) Aikio (2020) and Nichols (2020) all state--there must be some place where Kra001 type populations met Steppe_MLBA.

This is a very interesting question and i would like to write about more about it. If it is too much off-topic, i will move the discussion to another thread. Don’t want to distract too much from the also very interesting discussion about Proto-FInno-Ugrians here.

The first appearance of Indo-Iranians in history is around the middle of the 2nd millennium B.C. in the Hurrian-speaking state of Mittani, so it can be excluded that PII formed around or after this date. Also PII forming before 3000 B.C can be excluded because only around 3000 B.C the admixture event with GAC-like groups took place and Proto-CWC diverged into several major subcultures like Fatyanovo, Single Grave,Baltic CWC,.. So Proto-Indo-Iranian logically must form inbetween 1500-3000 B.C. Considering that Indo-Iranians shared a number of exclusive innovations seperating it from the other IE. Languages (see Quote) and need the same kind of Steppe_MLBA source rich in both basal R1a-Z93+ and derived R1a-Z94+ there must be a significant time of PII unity or at least very close contact. One interesting linguistic exception i recently only became aware of thanks to Pegasus is the absense of the Ruki law in Nuristani languages, what really points to an early divergence of Nuristani languages and being probably spoken on the most eastern area of the Proto-Indo-Iranian zone (Abashevo). Ruki law seems to effect Balto-Slavic, Armenian and maybe Albanian, what points to a feature spreading inbetween the Balkan, Ukraine and Volga-Ural region around 2000-2500 B.C (Catacomb-Late Middle Dnieper-Abashevo contacts?)

(1) the merger of IE. *a, e, o and *ā, ē, ō into Indo-Ir. *a and *ā respectively (also in the diphthongs), (2) the development of IE. *ə into Indo-Ir. *i, (3) the change of IE. *s after *i, u, r, k into Indo-Ir. *š (Ir. *š, OInd. ṣ), (4) the gen. plur. ending *-nām in the vocalic stem classes, etc. In addition there are important correspondences in the vocabulary, especially in the field of religion and mythology, including morphological elements, such as suffixes and stem-formations, and phraseology. (See Chr. Bartholomae, “Vorgeschichte der iranischen Sprachen,” in Geiger and Kuhn, Grundr. Ir. Phil. I/1, 1895-1901, pp. 1-151. A. Erhart, Struktura indoíránských jazykûʷ [The structure of the Indo-Ir. languages], Brno, 1980.)
https://iranicaonline.org/articles/aryans

Based on this it is on one side unlikely that PII was already fully formed in early CWC, Middle Dnjepr or early Fatyanovo around 2800-3000 B.C (diverging from late PIEs probably already started there) and on the otherside that it only formed around 2000 B.C or even later. PII based on Vedic and Avestan literature/hymns seem to share a common Steppe cultural package with horse sacrificies/horse cults, horse-drawn chariots, sophisticated metallurgy, mobile agro-pastoralist economies,.. Especially chariots are so central for early Indo-Iranian mythology (most popular image and attribute of gods in early Rig Veda, that it is at the first view hard to imagine chariots or some kind of prototype being absent among PIIs. Early Iranics and Indo-Aryans also share the same term for chariot ( Vedic rátha , Avestan. raθa), which ultimately is derived from PIE *Hrót-h₂-os, from *Hret- (roll). From the same root many other IE terms for wheel are derived (Lithuanian ratas, Proto-Germanic raþą, Proto-Celtic rotos,..). Based on this it is very likely that the Proto-Indo-Iranian term was at first used for wheels and only later for horse-drawn chariots. So i would be careful about equating the first appereance of horse-drawn chariots with the first appereance of Proto-Indo-Iranians, because there are at least 500 if not 1000 years between the early appereance of Indo-Iranians with chariots in the Near East and South Asia and the first Proto-Indo-Iranians of East Europe. We can definetly say that chariots played a central role among already formed Iranics and Indo-Aryans and already late Proto-Indo-Iranians but i am not sure if the first PII communities already had horse-drawn chariots similar to later Sintashta and Steppe_MLBA. So far most date the earliest appereance of chariots to Sintashta around the 18-21th century, but there seems to be evidence fot the use of chariots or at least some kind of protypes in earlier Abashevo and Catacomb.

The classification of cheek-pieces and the establishment of their evolution permits us to establish the origin of the disc-shaped cheek-pieces and their chronology. The most archaic disc-shaped cheek-piece was amorphous and undecorated of Type I and derived from contexts of the Catacomb-Multi-roller Ware and Abashevo cultures from the Ukraine to the Urals. This permits us to attribute the first controlling of chariots with cheek-pieces to tribes of the Abashevo and Multi-roller Ware cultures (KMK=Kul’tura Mnogovalikovoy Keramiki).

Much of archaelogy and literature is here still outdated and focused with Catacomb, Yamnaya or Poltavka being Proto-Indo-Iranian and Fatyanovo and even Abashevo being Baltic or “Western Indo-European“, what we thanks to genetic evidence can surely exclude now. Unfornuately this caused rearchers untill recently to not look deeper at the connections between Fatyanovo-Blanovo, Abashevo and Steppe_MLBA, This reminds me on the situation with Steppe Bell Beakers, which were untill recently mostly not associated with CWC and obvious links to Corded Ware were often ignored. But researchers were netherless very right about the archaeological and cultural links between Sintashta/Steppe_MLBA/early historical Indo-Iranians and Steppe culures of the Catacomb-Poltavka type. Even when genetic inflow fron Steppe_EBA seems to be rather limited at least in the earliest phases and before 2000 B.C there was a huge cultural impact for sure. Cultures like Potapovka and Sintashta seem to be basically Abashevo tribes imposing themselves on earlier Poltavka regions , so we find earlier Poltavka pottery there and older graves are reused (Potapovka). Much of the classical steppe cultural package of Steppe_MLBA like horse sacrificies, possibly chariots, sophisticated metallurgy and even pottery is either derived from Catacomb/Poltavka-type of cultures or was strongly influenced by them.

Sintashta being Proto-Indo-Iranian is also not likely in my eyes because despite many samples from several different sites much of it shows some very bottlenecked set of Y-DNA and i would expect Proto-Indo-Iranians to show more diverse basal R1a-Z93+ and Z94+ clades. Also it is too late, because than we just had several centuries between formed Mitanni Indo-Aryans distinct from even Vedic Aryans and Proto-Indo-Iranians, what would be really fast in my amateurish eyes. Rather Sintashta seems to be a Abashevo-derived Post-PII culture already closer to Iranics. But definetly an Indo-Iranian culture and of course important for understanding Proto-Indo-Iranians. So a slightly earlier culture ancestral to Sintashta is the most logical candidate for Proto-Indo-Iranians.

This ancestral culture is very likely Abashevo, which had prototypes/technologies for chariots, similar potttery, socketed spearheads, same type of cattle like Sintashta, anthropological /genetical similarities (especially GAC-like admix), militaristic orientation and overlapping sites. Also it seems to share recent drift with Sintashta based on Ukraine_MBA I6561 and Poltavka_O (likely belonging to Potapovka culture) sharing drift with Sintashta. Both samples were probably misdated and are related to Abashevo ultimately. Abashevo in turn shows close links to Fatyanovo-Balanovo and especially eastern Balanovo based on anthropological /genetical similarities, socketed spearheads (found earliest in Fatyanovo), similar pottery, carrying R1a-Z93, similar axes, overlapping sites/periods.

So i would date the earliest split of Proto-Indo-Iranians to around 2500 B.C (with Proto-Nuristani maybe diverging a bit earlier but staying closer to Proto-Indo-Aryan) in disintegrating eastern Fatyanovo-Balanovo and early Abashevo around the Middle Volga with close contacts between Proto-Iranics, Proto-Indo-Aryans, Proto-Nuristani and other extinct branches in Abashevo for the next 500 years before the migration into Central Asia and South Eurasia really started. Seemingly the intense inter-tribal warfare in Abashevo is a sign for the zone fracturing into different and distinct clans/dialects/tribal identies. Indo-Aryans likely departed slightly earlier from Abashevo into Andronovo than the Sintashta-Iranic wave and actually i have found sources mentioning Sintashta burning down older other Abashevo sites close to/in Andronovo. So there likely were earlier Abashevo migrations forming earliest Andronovo, which likely are either mostly overlooked, misinterpreted as coming from Sintashta or not deeper researched/found yet.

The origin and chronological correlation of early Andronovo sites are based on stratigraphy. On the Kuysak settlement ceramics with Pit-grave/Poltavka and Abashevo features were recovered from the earliest levels of the ditch. It indicates that these cultures participated in the formation of the Sintashta type of site (Smirnov and Kuz’mina 1976; 1977; Gening 1977). The early settlement built by the Pit-grave/Poltavka and Abashevo tribes was burnt, then it was rebuilt in the Sintashta period only to be fired again. All of this reflects the extremely tense atmosphere in inter-ethnic relations (Malyutina and Zdanovich 1995: 104- 105).

[Ryukendo]

"The earlier, Pre-Indo-Iranian loanwords usually show a wider distribution and regular sound correspondences. Although the number of these earliest loans is quite small, based on their distribution and regular correspondences it can be assumed that the Pre-Indo-Iranian stage (after RUKI, *l > *r and the merger of velars and labiovelars but before the merger of non-high vowels) was concurrent with Proto-Uralic, with the changes leading to Proto-Indo-Iranian happening after the dispersal of Proto-Uralic", p. 343, here:

https://helda.helsinki.fi/bitstream/...=1&isAllowed=y

Yes, but right before that Holopainen says

However, some observations can be made. It thus seems that there are Proto-Iranian
loanwords which were borrowed simultaneously into several early branches of Uralic,
making it likely that Uralic had split into several branches by the time of these contacts.
Also the fact that many of the Proto-Indo-Iranian loanwords either show a restricted
distribution (such as West Uralic *waćara, *woraći) or irregular correspondences
(*asVra, *śasra, *śi̮ta) can point to the conclusion that Proto-Uralic was fragmenting by
the time when contacts with Proto-Indo-Iranian took place.

I'm not discounting the fact that Proto-Ur probably had some contact with pre-IIr, just that Holopainen points to the majority of the contact (the very heavy part of the contact which can push the numbers up to 70s of IIr loanwords in specific branches, which Holopainen points out and Grunthal & Nichols will show in their upcoming manuscript tends to vary across Ur branches in proportion to the fraction of PUr roots they retain) probably took place right after PUr.

[Ryukendo]

So i would date the earliest split of Proto-Indo-Iranians to around 2500 B.C (with Proto-Nuristani maybe diverging a bit earlier but staying closer to Proto-Indo-Aryan) in disintegrating eastern Fatyanovo-Balanovo and early Abashevo around the Middle Volga with close contacts between Proto-Iranics, Proto-Indo-Aryans, Proto-Nuristani and other extinct branches in Abashevo for the next 500 years before the migration into Central Asia and South Eurasia really started. Seemingly the intense inter-tribal warfare in Abashevo is a sign for the zone fracturing into different and distinct clans/dialects/tribal identies. Indo-Aryans likely departed slightly earlier from Abashevo into Andronovo than the Sintashta-Iranic wave and actually i have found sources mentioning Sintashta burning down older other Abashevo sites close to/in Andronovo. So there likely were earlier Abashevo migrations forming earliest Andronovo, which likely are either mostly overlooked, misinterpreted as coming from Sintashta or not deeper researched/found yet.

Where are some of these "earliest Andronovo" sites? Since you are familiar with Russian, do you know?

I get that you think the stratigraphy is wrong and so the sites are probably hiding as misclassifications which push them to later dates, but do you know of any published sites (even in Russian) which look suspiciously like they may be wrongly dated? Is there an archaeological trail from these "earliest Andronovo" sites to Mitanni or India?

[Huck Finn]

I'm not discounting the fact that Proto-Ur probably had some contact with pre-IIr...

Yes, at least some kind of a contact also with Pre IIr, in Krasnoyarsk Krai and after the dispersal of Proto Uralic the Uralic daughter languages, except Samoyedic, moved into Ural area, where most of the Uralic linguistic heterogeneity was after that found? Something does not add up now.

[CopperAxe]

The two ideas of (Pre-)proto-Indo-Iranian and Proto-Uralic/Early Uralic having linguistic contacts and PIIr separating into Iranic, Indo-Aryan and Nuristani around 2500 bc are two positions which are at odds of one another.

[Ryukendo]

Yes, at least some kind of a contact also with Pre IIr, in Krasnoyarsk Krai and after the dispersal of Proto Uralic the Uralic daughter languages, except Samoyedic, moved into Ural area, where most of the Uralic linguistic heterogeneity was after that found? Something does not add up now.

This is true... Hmmmmmm.

There is the "Abashevo migrants" idea from Parpola about the Seima-Turbino phenomenon, which would make Uralics and IIrs interact, but judging by Coldmountains' estimation even Abashevo is too late for Pre-PIIr.

The PIE stuff is discounted as chance (~7 words) by Simon, and Nichols + Riiho Grunthal; there's 11 Pre-PIIr words in Holopainen's thesis, I wonder if statistically it holds up as well? But I admit that sounds like special pleading.

Honestly, it would be a great idea for the CONTACTS conference to be re-held once the new data is out, and for everyone involved to have a round-table discussion given all these new publications in aDNA and linguistics. I imagine Aikio will draw attention and evaluate Fortescue's work on contact with Eskimo, Riiho Grunthal and Nichols will point to their Eastern typological stuff and IIr loanword work, Holopainen on IIr loanword work, Kallio on dating the splits, Kummel on laryngeals etc. Would be super fun to involve people on the Indo-Iranian and Indo-Aryan side as well.

It would be super, super fun and highlight all the remaining issues. I hope one of the newer generation of linguists can go back and revisit the PUr PIE loanword issue, it seems like after the list got pared down to a core of ~7-10 words, the discussion never could go any further. Maybe this is as far as the evidence will go. The Pre-PIIr words that Holopainen identifies could become a focus of discussion there too.

[CopperAxe]

It is not so unlikely, because they both had very rich BMAC admix and moved shortly after each other via BMAC into South Eurasia. I am not aware for IE etymlogies for ustras and considering camels are not found in East Europe it is unlikely in my eyes to have an IE etymlogy in the first place and at best the term was used for another local animal in East Europe and only later associated with camels, what again would not point to PII forming in Central Asia. Also BMAC and/or Central Asian Steppe contacts are much too young and only after 2000 B.C to be present among Proto-Indo-Iranians, which definetly formed before 2000 b.C. We already see formed Indo-Aryans in 1500-1700 B.C in the Near East and South Asia, so it is in my opinion very unlikely that PII was spoken around 1500-2000 B.C in BMAC or the Central Asian Steppe and rather around 2500 B.C in Abashevo.

My point was not that Proto-Indo-Iranian developed in Central Asia. My point was that Proto-Indo-Iranian was not spoken near Moscow, but near the Ural mountains because linguistics points to the word ustra being part of the Proto-Indo-Iranian lexicon. The archaeological data also shows that its around this region we see the development of chariot technology. At least there is more evidence for the development than in Moscow.

Go beyond the Ural mountains in the bronze age, southwards or southeastwards and you run into camels. I think you had them up in northern Kazakhstan as well actually. You also run into people whose ancestors had been hunting wild camels for thousands of years, and some of these people were pastoralists herding camels amongst other animals. And like with the BMAC they had cultural interactions and genetic contributions to Indo-Iranian peoples. So logically, the Proto-language them must've been in the vicinity of camels or people who herded them.

If we are looking for a donor population of the loanword ustras in Indo-Iranian, I wouldn't look towards the BMAC to be honest, which is quite on the southern end of wild camel distribution as the source of the loanword. Even if the domestication came from the BMAC region (but predating the complex). Unless it was a magical wonderland I think whenever there is something unique about Indo-iranians it is always immediately linked to the BMAC when there were many different peoples iand cultures in Central Asia, not too mention the interactions in other areas as well (Siberia as always is overlooked).

I see no reasoning for it having to be a loanword though, the etymology if ustras is uncertain but most explanations I came across derive it from IE actually:

The Indo-Iranian word *uštra-, whence Vedic uṣṭra-, Avestan uštra- (fem. uštrā-), and Old Persian uša° (in uša-bāri “camel-borne”), is probably derived from the Indo-European root ṷes “to be wet” (Mayrhofer, Dictionary I, pp. 113f.), referring to the ejaculation of semen. For the semantic development we may compare Skt. ukṣan- “bull” (Av. uxšan-, Eng. ox, etc.) from *ukṷs- (< *ṷegṷ) “to (be)sprinkle” and Skt. vṛṣan- “male human/animal” (Av. varəšna- “male,” varšni- “ram,” Pers. gošn, Lat. verres “boar”) from *ṷers- “rain, dew” (see Mayrhofer, Dictionary, s. vv. ukṣāˊ-, úṣṭraḥ, vṛÎʷṣǡ, and Pokorny, I, pp. 80-81 aṷer-/ṷers-, 1118 ṷegṷ-/ukṷs- “damp,” 1171 ṷes- “to dampen, wet”).

In fact I can only think of David W. Anthony who attributed ustra to being a BMAC loanword but he also attributed Indra and Soma to the BMAC and I highly doubt that was actually the case. In Mallory's encyclopedia they mention an PIIr root. Some link it to *uraz > auroch as well but I don't know about that.

But to not further derail the thread let's get back to Uralic people.

How do you reconcile the date of 2500 bc with Uralic speakers having had contact with Proto-Indo-Iranians, recently diverged Indo-Iranians and perhaps pre-Indo-Iranians as well?

[Coldmountains]

Where are some of these "earliest Andronovo" sites? Since you are familiar with Russian, do you know?

I get that you think the stratigraphy is wrong and so the sites are probably hiding as misclassifications which push them to later dates, but do you know of any published sites (even in Russian) which look suspiciously like they may be wrongly dated? Is there an archaeological trail from these "earliest Andronovo" sites to Mitanni or India?

I will search about this in Russian literature. My russian is not that good despite having Russian-speaking parents (grew up in Europe), but I will read through the Russian literature I can find. The big problem here is that archaeology will probably not be able to differentiate between Proto-Iranics, Proto-Indo-Aryans, and other earliest Indo-Iranians considering that they were derived from the same cultural horizon and very similar if not almost identical in terms of material culture. Another problem is that after migrating through BMAC any material Andronovo influences are reduced to a minimum so much that this was/is a very popular argument for dissociating Proto-Indo-Iranians with Steppe_MLBA groups. So any direction material/archaeological connection between 15th century B.C Indo-Aryans and early Andronovo/Abashevo will be very hard to find especially considering that they were almost 1000 years apart from each other. This is also the reason why i so much look for more Andronovo and Abashevo Y-DNA to find direct links between Indo-Aryans and these cultures, which are from a material/archaeological point of view invisible.

[Coldmountains]

This is true... Hmmmmmm.

There is the "Abashevo migrants" idea from Parpola about the Seima-Turbino phenomenon, which would make Uralics and IIrs interact, but judging by Coldmountains' estimation even Abashevo is too late for Pre-PIIr.

The PIE stuff is discounted as chance (~7 words) by Simon, and Nichols + Riiho Grunthal; there's 11 Pre-PIIr words in Holopainen's thesis, I wonder if statistically it holds up as well? But I admit that sounds like special pleading.

Honestly, it would be a great idea for the CONTACTS conference to be re-held once the new data is out, and for everyone involved to have a round-table discussion given all these new publications in aDNA and linguistics. I imagine Aikio will draw attention and evaluate Fortescue's work on contact with Eskimo, Riiho Grunthal and Nichols will point to their Eastern typological stuff and IIr loanword work, Holopainen on IIr loanword work, Kallio on dating the splits, Kummel on laryngeals etc. Would be super fun to involve people on the Indo-Iranian and Indo-Aryan side as well.

It would be super, super fun and highlight all the remaining issues. I hope one of the newer generation of linguists can go back and revisit the PUr PIE loanword issue, it seems like after the list got pared down to a core of ~7-10 words, the discussion never could go any further. Maybe this is as far as the evidence will go. The Pre-PIIr words that Holopainen identifies could become a focus of discussion there too.

What is the current consensus about the origin and date of the earliest Indo-Iranian loanwords in Finno-Ugrian? I am not up to date about the date and type of earliest Indo-Iranian loanwords in Finno-Ugrian. I remember some wrote, that the earliest loanwords are of Proto-Indo-Aryan instead of Proto-Iranic origin, other wrote they belong to a parallel "Andronovo-Aryan" branch and other claimed that the earliest loanwords are Proto-II. I don't think Proto-Indo-Iranian was spoken east of the Urals this is much too late to have Mitanni and Vedic Indo-Aryans at 1500-1700 B.C speaking already different Indo-Aryan dialects diverged from Proto-Indo-Iranian. Maybe rather some basal or parallel extinct branch which like Nuristani not fully adopted most innovations of Proto-Indo-Iranian.

[CopperAxe]

Where are some of these "earliest Andronovo" sites? Since you are familiar with Russian, do you know?

I get that you think the stratigraphy is wrong and so the sites are probably hiding as misclassifications which push them to later dates, but do you know of any published sites (even in Russian) which look suspiciously like they may be wrongly dated? Is there an archaeological trail from these "earliest Andronovo" sites to Mitanni or India?

https://www.cambridge.org/core/journ...0FFE54BAAB130C

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