Baltic languages: a short question.

[anglesqueville]

I just read this on a blog, which nearly made me fall off my chair: "The Baltic languages ​​are not ancient, they arose no sooner than they separated from the Balto-Slavic continuum. There is nothing particularly ancient in it, the verb system is so simply completely innovative, essentially Finno-Ugric, in contrast to the completely archaic Indo-European Slavic". I always believed that the Baltic conjugation (without speaking of the nominal morphology and the phonology, which are imo completely explainable on an IE ground) is precisely very archaic, and furthermore that they share some of their innovations with other IE groups (like the -s- future, with Greek and Sanskrit). I'm absolutely unable to find the least feature in Baltic conjugation that could be due to a Uralic influence. I'm really perplexed, as I cannot imagine how anyone could write something so affirmative without at least some strong argument. What do I miss, where is the flaw in my knowledge?

[George]

Sounds like khutspah-talk to me as stated (:=)) I always thought Slavic was a late offshoot from Balto-Slavic.

[anglesqueville]

Sounds like khutspah-talk to me as stated (:=)) I always thought Slavic was a late offshoot from Balto-Slavic.

"Late", I'm not sure. You know that the relationship between Slavic, East-Baltic and West-Baltic is a difficult question, in fact much too difficult for me. But, yes, the more I think about it, the more the affirmation of this guy seems ... khutspah, as you said.

[JoeyP37]

That sounds like Carlos' crazy talk! I always thought Proto-Slavic was a South Baltic dialect, spoken by a people in close contact with Scythian tribes and also with contacts with Germanic groups. Probably in northwestern Ukraine, southwest Belarus, southeast Poland.

[anglesqueville]

That sounds like Carlos' crazy talk! I always thought Proto-Slavic was a South Baltic dialect, spoken by a people in close contact with Scythian tribes and also with contacts with Germanic groups. Probably in northwestern Ukraine, southwest Belarus, southeast Poland.

That is exactly Kortlandt's thesis, in a recent study (2018 if I remember correctly). I don't feel authorized to have an opinion about the chronology of the split (my level is elementary in Russian, less than elementary in Lithuanian, and btw hardly better in Finnish), it's the reason why I'm never confident in what I know (or believe I know). I suspect some old theories in the claim of the blogger I quoted. For example, some linguists of the past century (I can't remember their names) attributed to Balto-Finnic the lack of distinction of singular vs plural in the 3d person in Lithuanian and Latvian, but I'm pretty sure that this attribution is now dismissed, and anyway, this would be far from being enough for qualifying Baltic conjugation of "Finno-Ugric". Furthermore, Matasovic has completely destroyed the fable of a Uralic lexical substrate in proto-Balto-Slavic.
I don't read Quiles anymore, it was a useless expenditure of time. I believe I'm going to do the same for the comments on the blog where the quotation comes from. There are definitely too many clowns expressing there their fantasms.

[teftelis]

That is exactly Kortlandt's thesis, in a recent study (2018 if I remember correctly). I don't feel authorized to have an opinion about the chronology of the split (my level is elementary in Russian, less than elementary in Lithuanian, and btw hardly better in Finnish), it's the reason why I'm never confident in what I know (or believe I know). I suspect some old theories in the claim of the blogger I quoted. For example, some linguists of the past century (I can't remember their names) attributed to Balto-Finnic the lack of distinction of singular vs plural in the 3d person in Lithuanian and Latvian, but I'm pretty sure that this attribution is now dismissed, and anyway, this would be far from being enough for qualifying Baltic conjugation of "Finno-Ugric". Furthermore, Matasovic has completely destroyed the fable of a Uralic lexical substrate in proto-Balto-Slavic.
I don't read Quiles anymore, it was a useless expenditure of time. I believe I'm going to do the same for the comments on the blog where the quotation comes from. There are definitely too many clowns expressing there their fantasms.

That poster who made that quote is not reasonable and it's no use to try to debate him or try to talk any sense in to him, since he has strong opinion on all topics and if your opinion differs in the slightest he'll call you stupid, I don't understand why he's tolerated in there, but anyway getting a bit off topic here.

[anglesqueville]

^ My goal in this thread was basically to check the reliability of my own beliefs on this topic. Of course, I don't want to debate. The guy believes what he believes, I don't care. Unless something unexpected comes up, my topic is closed.

[DgidguBidgu]

^ My goal in this thread was basically to check the reliability of my own beliefs on this topic. Of course, I don't want to debate. The guy believes what he believes, I don't care. Unless something unexpected comes up, my topic is closed.

Beliefs have nothing to do with realities and facts.
The Balts are Slavicized by the southern Slavs.
The structure of the language alone is sufficient to determine which is more ancient. Well, it can't be the Baltic.
From the Slavic languages,
only one has been characterized by analyticism since the 13th century according to studied inscriptions from the epoch of course.
We are talking about a much older language related to even older IE languages ​​from the Balkans.
It is very clear that the Old Slavonic books and the alphabet come again from the southern Slavs. There is no historical contradiction here to argue and look for some new and convenient for someone specific truth.
I think DNA is a sufficient category in itself to also illustrate the above, already proven by linguistics.

[Onur Dincer]

Beliefs have nothing to do with realities and facts.
The Balts are Slavicized by the southern Slavs.
The structure of the language alone is sufficient to determine which is more ancient. Well, it can't be the Baltic.
From the Slavic languages,
only one has been characterized by analyticism since the 13th century according to studied inscriptions from the epoch of course.
We are talking about a much older language related to even older IE languages ​​from the Balkans.
It is very clear that the Old Slavonic books and the alphabet come again from the southern Slavs. There is no historical contradiction here to argue and look for some new and convenient for someone specific truth.
I think DNA is a sufficient category in itself to also illustrate the above, already proven by linguistics.

What does alphabet have to do with this discussion? The oldest written IE language is Hittite, should we assume based on this that IE originated and spread from Anatolia? Also, what migration wave of Southern Slavs to the Baltics are you talking about? What is the archaeological and genetic evidence for that migration? If you mean the Slavic ancestors of Southern Slavs before their invasion of the Balkans, then it is more appropriate to talk about Proto-Slavs or early Slavs.

[DgidguBidgu]

What does alphabet have to do with this discussion? The oldest written IE language is Hittite, should we assume based on this that IE originated and spread from Anatolia? Also, what migration wave of Southern Slavs to the Baltics are you talking about? What is the archaeological and genetic evidence for that migration? If you mean the Slavic ancestors of Southern Slavs before their invasion of the Balkans, then it is more appropriate to talk about Proto-Slavs or early Slavs.

I'm talking about Thracians and Pelasgians too.
Their language ​​is directly related to Slavic by linguists.
As I see it, a timid hypothesis about this influence is creeping into Wikipedia too.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Baltic_languages
I am talking about influence, culturally, linguistically, religiously, such as is observed in India and Sanskrit, which not coincidentally have the most parallels with the Slavic language.
Do you have the slightest idea where these influences come from? Well, the Balts don't speak German, do they ?! It is clear where the influence comes from. The story is concrete and clear here.
I am talking about a much older story than the fictional coming of the Slavs, which was rejected by historians as early as the 19th century.