Subclades of R1b in Wales

Brennus said:

Where were these areas?

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I will have to dig that up later tonight. I have a source with a map somewhere. You are definitely right to question it, though, since almost every source that I have ever read about movements of proto-Celts will include both cultures and they seem to be very intertwined in the accounts. Looking back at the too-brief way that I wrote it, I would probably have questioned it also. I think that I can recall some isolated parts of the Iberian Peninsula, Scotland, Ireland, etc. Whatever the regions were, it was very little. I think that I should also better define it by clarifying that it meant IE people as far as initial settlements. After a period of time, all of these areas wound up with appreciable IE admixture as peoples/groups moved around. I am not sure even if the final word on whether or not origin of the Picts of Scotland got sorted out.

Thanks for the check.

Regulus said:

I will have to dig that up later tonight. I have a source with a map somewhere. You are definitely right to question it, though, since almost every source that I have ever read about movements of proto-Celts will include both cultures and they seem to be very intertwined in the accounts. Looking back at the too-brief way that I wrote it, I would probably have questioned it also. I think that I can recall some isolated parts of the Iberian Peninsula, Scotland, Ireland, etc. Whatever the regions were, it was very little. I think that I should also better define it by clarifying that it meant IE people as far as initial settlements. After a period of time, all of these areas wound up with appreciable IE admixture as peoples/groups moved around. I am not sure even if the final word on whether or not origin of the Picts of Scotland got sorted out.

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Well, the only non-Indo-European languages in the former Beaker-Bell area are these (for the sake of completeness, Pictish was probably a P-Celtic language, related with Brythonic and Gaulish, or just a dialect of Brythonic):
- Aquitanian, which probably was spoken in the area between the Garonne and the Pyrenees, and which may have been the same as Old Basque (or a related dialect).
- The Vascones, who were the ancestors of the Basques.
- Iberian, spoken from the Roussillon in the north (as well as throughout the largest part of the Pyrenees) to western Iberia in the south. May possibly have been related with Basque/Aquitanian, but this is disputed.
- The undeciphered language from the inscriptions from southwest of the Iberian penninsula (Algarve and western Andalusia), ostensibly called "Tartessian", even though a connection with the actual Tartessians is spurious.
- The Etruscans in Italy, which according to some evidence, may have arrived from Anatolia.
- The Raetians in the Alps, who spoke a language which was probably related with Etruscan.

Taranis said:

Well, the only non-Indo-European languages in the former Beaker-Bell area are these (for the sake of completeness, Pictish was probably a P-Celtic language, related with Brythonic and Gaulish, or just a dialect of Brythonic):
- Aquitanian, which probably was spoken in the area between the Garonne and the Pyrenees, and which may have been the same as Old Basque (or a related dialect).
- The Vascones, who were the ancestors of the Basques.
- Iberian, spoken from the Roussillon in the north (as well as throughout the largest part of the Pyrenees) to western Iberia in the south. May possibly have been related with Basque/Aquitanian, but this is disputed.
- The undeciphered language from the inscriptions from southwest of the Iberian penninsula (Algarve and western Andalusia), ostensibly called "Tartessian", even though a connection with the actual Tartessians is spurious.
- The Etruscans in Italy, which according to some evidence, may have arrived from Anatolia.
- The Raetians in the Alps, who spoke a language which was probably related with Etruscan.

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Two quick questions -

Did all of the areas that you mentioned become settled by Bell Beakers? I was speaking particularly about areas in which there had been evidence of Bell Beakers and later either settled directly by IE peoples or not. You may have a newer map or source that has more areas of settlement.

Are you referring to the P and Q Celtic as non-Indo-European? Forgive me if I misunderstood that part.


I have to find my map on the Bell Beakers or I am going to go crazy looking for another one.
Not to go off-topic, but I personally find the Etruscans to quite interesting. I once got to see a great exhibit about 20 years ago when it toured here.

Regulus said:

Two quick questions -

Did all of the areas that you mentioned become settled by Bell Beakers? I was speaking particularly about areas in which there had been evidence of Bell Beakers and later either settled directly by IE peoples or not. You may have a newer map or source that has more areas of settlement.

Are you referring to the P and Q Celtic as non-Indo-European? Forgive me if I misunderstood that part.


I have to find my map on the Bell Beakers or I am going to go crazy looking for another one.
Not to go off-topic, but I personally find the Etruscans to quite interesting. I once got to see a great exhibit about 20 years ago when it toured here.

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All languages I mentioned are found within an area that was formerly part of the Bell-Beaker culture.

I explicitly excluded any Indo-European language from the list above.

Taranis said:

All languages I mentioned are found within an area that was formerly part of the Bell-Beaker culture.

I explicitly excluded any Indo-European language from the list above.

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OK, I had understood that Bell Beaker finds, although widespread, were not in all of those areas. I would be willing to defer in this case. You may have more updated evidence.

For the Brythonic, Goidelic, etc., I would have to strongly take the opposite position. I can't see how very slight changes put them out of the IE range. To continue with that pattern, we would have to throw out others such as German. It too had much non-IE influence. Indeed I would say that it had more. I have never seen any source that puts P and Q outside of an IE classification

Regulus said:

OK, I had understood that Bell Beaker finds, although widespread, were not in all of those areas. I would be willing to defer in this case. You may have more updated evidence.

For the Brythonic, Goidelic, etc., I would have to strongly take the opposite position. I can't see how very slight changes put them out of the IE range. To continue with that pattern, we would have to throw out others such as German. It too had much non-IE influence. Indeed I would say that it had more. I have never seen any source that puts P and Q outside of an IE classification

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Tell me where exactly I claimed that Brythonic and Goidelic were not Indo-European languages?!?! Because I am pretty sure I never claimed that.

Taranis said:

Tell me where exactly I claimed that Brythonic and Goidelic were not Indo-European languages?!?! Because I am pretty sure I never claimed that.

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Please, forgive me. I had asked for a clarification and misunderstood the one you provided. Sincere apologies.

Regulus said:

Please, forgive me. I had asked for a clarification and misunderstood the one you provided. Sincere apologies.

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As I said, the list I gave are known non-Indo-European languages that are found inside the former Bell-Beaker area. Of those, obviously only Basque is still alive today. Basically, all the others probably became extinct during the Roman period.

Taranis said:

As I said, the list I gave are known non-Indo-European languages that are found inside the former Bell-Beaker area. Of those, obviously only Basque is still alive today. Basically, all the others probably became extinct during the Roman period.

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Agreed. I don't believe that any of the others survived past that period.

Basque, of course, remains mysterious, along with the other documented non-IE languages in Western Europe. I am curious to see a show of hands regarding which hypothesis people favor:

(1) Basque is descended from a Beaker language, and although Beaker people were largely Haplogroup I, the Basque people had their Y-DNA replaced to be primarily R1b over the years
(2) Basque is descended from a Beaker language, and the Beaker people (at least the ones that spoke proto-Basque) were already primarily R1b
(3) Basque is not a Beaker language, but came with the R1b people

The same question could also go for the other non-IE languages. I personally favor (1) or (3), but (2) could be an unexpected result if it turns out that R1b people became dominant in Western Europe earlier than seems likely. It's too bad that the answer to the question is not obvious, because there are other questions that it could help answer, like: Who did the IE languages originate with, R1b or R1a? And, do we know of any languages that would have been spoken by primarily Haplogroup I peoples?

sparkey said:

Basque, of course, remains mysterious, along with the other documented non-IE languages in Western Europe. I am curious to see a show of hands regarding which hypothesis people favor:

(1) Basque is descended from a Beaker language, and although Beaker people were largely Haplogroup I, the Basque people had their Y-DNA replaced to be primarily R1b over the years
(2) Basque is descended from a Beaker language, and the Beaker people (at least the ones that spoke proto-Basque) were already primarily R1b
(3) Basque is not a Beaker language, but came with the R1b people

The same question could also go for the other non-IE languages. I personally favor (1) or (3), but (2) could be an unexpected result if it turns out that R1b people became dominant in Western Europe earlier than seems likely. It's too bad that the answer to the question is not obvious, because there are other questions that it could help answer, like: Who did the IE languages originate with, R1b or R1a? And, do we know of any languages that would have been spoken by primarily Haplogroup I peoples?

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Regarding (1) you probably mean that Basque is supposed to be descended from a Pre-Beaker language. The problem is, there's little evidence that Basque was ever spoken outside of the current areas or the area where Aquitanian was spoken in Antiquity (which roughly corresponds to the area sandwiched between the Garonne and the Pyrenees). I agree however that the Basques (as well as the Iberians) are definitely a major problem with the question of R1b.

As for where the Indo-European languages originated, R1a or R1b, is impossible to tell. At first glance, it appears that there were two early branches (one predominantly R1a, the other predominantly R1b) of Indo-European, with Germanic, Baltic, Slavic, Indo-Iranic and Tocharian predominantly R1a, whereas Italo-Celtic, Greek and Anatolian belonged to R1b.

Regarding Haplogroup I, it is said that Germanic has a number of words of non-IE origin which are unique to it. So, it's possible that these are loanwords from a Non-Indo-European language in Scandinavia, which was spoken by people who probably were predominantly I1.

I had my Y DNA analysed by Oxford Ancestors and was designated me to the Oisin:can anyone tell me what subclade i could be a member of e.g.R1b-L21,R1b-u106?

Brennus

Brennus said:

I had my Y DNA analysed by Oxford Ancestors and was designated me to the Oisin:can anyone tell me what subclade i could be a member of e.g.R1b-L21,R1b-u106?

Brennus

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That doesn't tell us enough. "Oisin" is just Sykes' nickname for R1b. In the absence of additional SNP testing, we might be able to predict your subclade with your STR values.