Is there any linguistic evidence to prove Goths came from Scandinavia?

Cyrus,


I have some difficulty in following the reasoning.
At what chronological height Jordanes placed the migration of the Goths to the continent will we never know. He would have to ask himself if he was still alive.


Let's go back to the starting question: do you ask if there is any linguistic evidence that testifies incontrovertibly to the origin of the Goths from Scandinavia, right?

No, strictly speaking, no: we have no "smoking gun" that can be taken as a sure and objective proof of all this. We have only a few indirect indications that could make a Scandinavian origin or a closeness to the Scandinavian context plausible: some phonetic phenomena common to eastern Germanic and Norse / Northern Germanic, and the lexicon of some Scandinavian dialects, now extinct.


Jordanes information remains, so to speak, isolated, and you are right when you say that he himself passes on somewhat confused historical-geographical notions, being an epitomator working on lost previous works by non-Goth authors (including Cassiodorus), who drew on their turn to other traditions and with other purposes.
It would however remain to understand why he feels compelled to report this topos of Scandinavian origin in his writing. The same thing would have happened later in the Lombard context with the anonymous Origo Gentis Langobardorum and with Paolus Diaconus with his Historia Langobardorum (which perhaps in their turn took on a Jordanes model?). Although the news may not be true or not entirely trustworthy, it's clear that it was important for them to pass on this memory, but before abandoning what is now only a hypothesis - despite the fact that today's leading scholars of the Goth may think otherwise, like Wolfram and Pohl- something else is needed that defeats it openly: lack of evidence is not evidence of absence. Just as we admit that Scandinavia may have been reached by continental Indo-European groups two millennia or so BC. it doesn't even seem so out of the ordinary that around the beginning of our era there was a partial counter-migration towards the continent.


We need to agree on what we want to save from what Jordanes wrote. If we do not want to give credit to literary testimony, we must make do with what else is available, based only on material elements and archaeological evidence that makes us suppose that the first possible Goths are formed on the continent, with a first Germanic / Baltic nucleus, within the cultures of Oksywie and Wielbark, in Pomerania (however not far from Scandinavia) and from there they radiated southeast into the continent, ascending the Vistula. It is in the steppes of central and eastern Europe, north of the Black Sea, and partly in the eastern Balkans that the Goths are so called that they will flow back into Iberia and Italy, with the cultures of Černjachov and Sîntana de Mureș. That is to say when the Goths assimilate sarmatic, protoslavic and eastern Balkan elements including, in all probability, ancient Dacian and Thracian substrates. Notwithstanding the fact that the Goths = Geats equation has always seemed to me an operation of historical erudition advocated by elites, rulers and writers (not therefore a collective phenomenon present in the common imaginary), if I were to hypothesize when the Goths began to imagine themselves as Geats, I would pause more than anything else on this phase of the late antique, not before.


After which I absolutely agree that Germanic, ethnic and / or linguistic elements were present and infiltrated in Central Europe even before the Goths, according to trajectories that are not yet well clarified. The first attestation of Germanic language (or better of a Germanic name) is that one in the Etruscan alphabet, affixed around the II sec. a.C. on the helmet of Negau, an older artifact dating back to around the fifth century. BC, found in present-day Slovenia.

https://balkancelts.wordpress.com/tag/negau-helmets/

Almost all Germanic loanwords are from the south, Germanic script (Runes) is from the south, Germanic sources themselves say that they emigrated from the south (Scythia Magna), ... I see nothing except modern nationalism about Germanic origin in the Germanic lands, Iranian nationalists also love to say that Iran is the original land of Iranian culture, Indian nationalists say the similar thing about India, ... they just don't want to believe that their ancestors migrated from another land and it doesn't matter for them what we read about them in Avesta and Rigveda.
 
You're opening doors already open: you can say: Germanic, Celtic, Italic, Lusitanian, Ligurian, Illyrian, Greek, Iranian, Slavic a.s.o. are brother languages! Sure Germanic is a part of IE languages and found its oldest sources in PIE. But too, Germanic is a late evolution, with specific mutations. We are maybe shouting in the wind? And it seems these last evolutions which made it "germanic" occurred in Northern Europe, not elsewhere. And the male haplo's we find as dominant among them are Y-R1b-U106 and Y-I1 (I think R1a was acquired on the margins), and their lands of demographic expansion are in North too. And even if we take as basis Germanic is a far cognate of Daecian or Gaetian or whatever else, it remains these Balkans languages have an evolution very far from the Germanic one. Concerning Bastarnae, their ethnic and linguistic affiliations seems very dubious, for now.

When you say "Germanic is a late evolution", do you mean Germanic sound shifts from the Proto-Indo-European language occurred in 5th millennium BC, not 6th millennium BC or earlier?! What does it change? We actually see a very regular chain shift in proto-Germanic, so there couldn't be any intermediate language between proto-IE which became extinct before 6th millennium BC and proto-Germanic.

There is nothing with the name of "Balkans languages", through the ages, different people with different languages lived in Balkan and there could be no relation or distant relations between these languages.
 
=Ygorcs]Well, I think you're forgetting that the Roman Empire was the main source of civilized stuff and knowledge to the Germanic tribes in Antiquity, and it was tremendously influential, and during the Roman Empire a very large number of Germanic tribesmen served the Roman Empire as mercenaries and even came to live within its borders. Many Germanic tribes became officially foederati of the Romans. And in fact Roman did conquer lands that were either Germanic or directly neighboring Germanic peoples in present-day Germany and Belgium. There were very close relationships between Germans and Romans, they don't need to have been directly conquered by them for that, particularly when Romans projected a very powerful culture and brought lots of sociocultural and economic novelties to the Germanic tribes almost all on their own (except for some contact with Hellenic people), whereas people in West Asia, in Persia for instance, had been living amidst diverse civilized ways of life for millennia.

Also, it seems to me you need to decide what you really think. If Germanic was a West Asian language spoken somewhere in Iran or Iraq, then it couldn't have been that influenced by Latin, because Latin was never spoken by large masses of people nor managed to become a lingua franca in the East Mediterranean region, actually in any land to the west of Epirus and south of Moesia, where Greek and further east Aramaic and Persian still reigned uncontested. No wonder the Latin influence on Persian is minimal: Latin was never a major native language in West Asia and never managed to become a true lingua franca of trade, civilization and high culture, the Romans themselves learned Greek and soon started to speak Greek natively (Eastern Roman Empire).

On the other hand, the Germanic tribes' location in North-Central Europe (their origin in Scandinavia doesn't preclude the fact that when we're talking of early Germanic peoples, and not its earliest PGM roots, they already occupied parts of Germany, Netherlands, Poland) makes perfect sense considering the heavy Latin influence, because Latin was indeed the main language of civilization and political power and the lingua franca of Europe in the lands neighboring those territories (Gallia, Britannia, Noricum, Pannonia, Moesia Superior). They were in direct contact with lands where Latin had indeed become a major native language or at least an important lingua franca. Even much earlier, Proto-Italic and Proto-Celtic being probably Central European languages, Pre-Proto-Germanic would've been in much closer contact with the ancestral forms of Latin if it were an originally North-Central European language (nobody is certain whether PGM was first spoken north or south of the North Sea coast in Scandianvia) than in the Iranian Plateau or Mesopotamia.

One thing is certain:Uralic languages of Northeastern Europe are full of PGM and even arguably pre-PGM loanwords, indicating that that language was spoken in their vicinity since very early on if it had come from elsewhere. That becomes even more likely when you add to that the overwhelming genetic evidences (an increasing number of ancient DNA records) pointing to a high degreee of continuity between ancient and modern populations in core Germanic-speaking, territories with an almost completely "Central+North European" background (mainly CWC + Bell Beaker + occasionally some additional Euro HG i.e. WHG and EHG), and virtually nonexistant signs of West Asian input typical ofall the ancient DNA records recovered from the areas between the Levant and Central Asia, and the Iranian Plateau in particular, all of which had a very high pre-steppe ancestry that is not found in Germanic-speaking North Europe (Iranian_Chalcolithic + extra Levant_Neo and Anatolian_Neo input due to ongoing admixture that homogeneized the Near East gradually after the Neolithic). That would make PGM a language that was brought to Northern Europe by a supposedly very influential and more civilized people, but strangely with minimal genetic impact.

You mentioned some important points which actually show that the path of Germanic migration was from the south to the north, not vice versa. You said there are many Germanic words in Uralic languages but we don't see almsot any Uralic word in Germanic, there are also many Germanic words in Latin, some of them show the superiority of Germanic culture over Roman culture, like sapo "soap", burgus "castle", furca "fork", glaesum "amber", ... You said there were contacts between Romans and Germanic tribes, not proto-Germanic people, there were also contacts between Romans and Iranian tribes, such as Sarmatians, Alans, Iazyges, ... and there are loanwords from Latin in these languages but it doesn't mean these words should exist in other Iranian languages.

Another important point is that we don't see any Germanic loanword from Italic, Celtic and other European languages with proto-Germanic sound shifts, like those ones that I mentioned about Akkadian in another thread, this thing shows that the process of Germanic sound shifts didn't happen in Europe, in fact Germanic phonology was developed in Europe and there was no reason for spirantization and other sound changes, for example we don't see k>x in English octopus and German oktopus from ancient Greek oktṓpous, compare it to Iranian and Semitic loanwords, like Persian oxtapus or Arabic uxtubut but the proto-Germanic cognate of Greek okto "eight" is *axto.
 
Ygorcs said:
That's an extremely speculative statement based on mere sound similarity, and you'd know that fully well if you were not very obviously personally invested in rejecting any evidence contradicting your hypothesis and instead accepting anything whatsoever that fits the conclusion you want to be true (Germanic being West Asian and, by sheer "coincidence" with your being Iranian, closely related to Iran and Iranians). I have met this kind of behavior before in this forum, and it's just intriguing that, surprisingly, all these people have hypothesis that invariably link some ancient people/civilization/culture to their own modern ethnicity or country.

I am a historian and my main research is on the history of western Iran in the 3rd and 2nd millennium BC, I just search for historical facts and it doesn't matter for me what other ones think about me, in Iran most of people prefer to hear that Gutians and other people who lived in this region in the ancient times were Iranian and for this reason Iranian civilization is as old as Mesopotamian, Egyptian and other ancient civilizations but when I say to them for numerous reasons they were a Germanic people, they call me a westernized traitor and try to deny these historical facts. Of course Germanic people also prefer to hear that Germanic culture originated in the Germanic lands, not Iran. Nationalism has been always a big problem in these issues.
 
You mentioned some important points which actually show that the path of Germanic migration was from the south to the north, not vice versa. You said there are many Germanic words in Uralic languages but we don't see almsot any Uralic word in Germanic, there are also many Germanic words in Latin, some of them show the superiority of Germanic culture over Roman culture, like sapo "soap", burgus "castle", furca "fork", glaesum "amber", ... You said there were contacts between Romans and Germanic tribes, not proto-Germanic people, there were also contacts between Romans and Iranian tribes, such as Sarmatians, Alans, Iazyges, ... and there are loanwords from Latin in these languages but it doesn't mean these words should exist in other Iranian languages.

Another important point is that we don't see any Germanic loanword from Italic, Celtic and other European languages with proto-Germanic sound shifts, like those ones that I mentioned about Akkadian in another thread, this thing shows that the process of Germanic sound shifts didn't happen in Europe, in fact Germanic phonology was developed in Europe and there was no reason for spirantization and other sound changes, for example we don't see k>x in English octopus and German oktopus from ancient Greek oktṓpous, compare it to Iranian and Semitic loanwords, like Persian oxtapus or Arabic uxtubut but the proto-Germanic cognate of Greek okto "eight" is *axto.

Sorry to say, but the examples you give don't prove much. The words and sounds you mention were all over Europe (as IE cognates) in proto-historic times.

SOAP : Old English sape "soap, salve" (originally a reddish hair dye used by Germanic warriors to give a frightening appearance), from Proto-Germanic *saipon "dripping thing, resin", from PIE *soi-bon-, from root *seib- "to pour out, drip, trickle" (source also of Latin sebum "tallow, suet, grease").

BURG : Old English burg, burh "a dwelling or dwellings within a fortified enclosure," from Proto-Germanic *burgs "hill fort, fortress", from PIE root *bhergh- "high," with derivatives referring to hills, hill forts, and fortified elevations. Cp. : Sanskrit b'rhant "high," brmhati "strengthens, elevates;" Avestan brzant- "high," Old Persian bard- "be high;" Greek Pergamos, name of the citadel of Troy; Old Church Slavonic bregu "mountain, height;" Old Irish brigh "mountain;" Welsh bera "stack, pyramid;" Old Gaulish brigas "hill".

FORK : Old English forca, force "pitchfork, forked instrument, forked weapon," from a Germanic borrowing of Latin furca "two-pronged fork; pitchfork; fork used in cooking,".

The velar sound in German "acht" was not specific to Germanic in pre-Roman days. See, eg, Old Gaulish ordinal numbers:
- 6th suexos (modern Welsh chweched, Breton c'hwec'hved)
- 7th sextametos (Old Irish sechtmad)
- 8th oxtumetos (OIr ochtmad)
 
hrvclv said:
Sorry to say, but the examples you give don't prove much. The words and sounds you mention were all over Europe (as IE cognates) in proto-historic times.

SOAP : Old English sape "soap, salve" (originally a reddish hair dye used by Germanic warriors to give a frightening appearance), from Proto-Germanic *saipon "dripping thing, resin", from PIE *soi-bon-, from root *seib- "to pour out, drip, trickle" (source also of Latin sebum "tallow, suet, grease").

BURG : Old English burg, burh "a dwelling or dwellings within a fortified enclosure," from Proto-Germanic *burgs "hill fort, fortress", from PIE root *bhergh- "high," with derivatives referring to hills, hill forts, and fortified elevations. Cp. : Sanskrit b'rhant "high," brmhati "strengthens, elevates;" Avestan brzant- "high," Old Persian bard- "be high;" Greek Pergamos, name of the citadel of Troy; Old Church Slavonic bregu "mountain, height;" Old Irish brigh "mountain;" Welsh bera "stack, pyramid;" Old Gaulish brigas "hill".

FORK : Old English forca, force "pitchfork, forked instrument, forked weapon," from a Germanic borrowing of Latin furca "two-pronged fork; pitchfork; fork used in cooking,".

The velar sound in German "acht" was not specific to Germanic in pre-Roman days. See, eg, Old Gaulish ordinal numbers:
- 6th suexos (modern Welsh chweched, Breton c'hwec'hved)
- 7th sextametos (Old Irish sechtmad)
- 8th oxtumetos (OIr ochtmad)


When we talk about Germanic words, it is certainly clear that these words have Indo-European origin and we can find cognates in other IE languages.

Soap was invented in the West Asia about 5,000 years ago, the first concrete evidence we have of soap-like substance is dated around 2800 BC in Mesopotamia. The word sapu with the similar meaning of "to bath" and "dyer" exists in Akkadian too and for this reason some linguists believe that the Latin word has an Akkadian origin: https://books.google.com/books?id=z...hAhWOJ1AKHf1VC-4Q6AEIJzAA#v=onepage&q&f=false

mya0_soap.jpg



But the semantic development of the Germanic word shows that this word has a Germanic origin and Akkadian, Arabic, Hebrew and other Semitic words have been borrowed from Germanic.

We see similar thing about Arabic burj "fortress, tower": https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/برج Borrowed from Classical Syriac ܒܘܪܓܐ‎ (burgāʾ), from burg in Middle Persian, or from Ancient Greek πύργος (púrgos).
About the Greek word: https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/πύργος#Ancient_Greek The word is first attested in Homer, Iliad 7.206. Believed to be a borrowed word, probably from Urartian (burgana, “palace, fortress”), Kretschmer suggested a borrowing from Proto-Germanic *burgz (“fortified town, hill-fort”).

This word has certainly a Germanic origin, the ancient Urartian word is also a loanword from Germanic.
 
@hrvclv
just to split hairs or to joke:
concerning latin forms for 'soap', the "traditional" explanations were based on Celtic (Gaulish), and seemingly it was Celts who dyed their hair (not giving a red colour but rather a dirty blondish one). I was not aware of the same habit among Germanics, but who knows? ATW I'm not opening here a competition concerning the "paternity" fo some words or findings. We have better to do.
But this is on the margin of this thread and I agree with your post #25
 
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When we talk about Germanic words, it is certainly clear that these words have Indo-European origin and we can find cognates in other IE languages.

Soap was invented in the West Asia about 5,000 years ago, the first concrete evidence we have of soap-like substance is dated around 2800 BC in Mesopotamia. The word sapu with the similar meaning of "to bath" and "dyer" exists in Akkadian too and for this reason some linguists believe that the Latin word has an Akkadian origin: https://books.google.com/books?id=z...hAhWOJ1AKHf1VC-4Q6AEIJzAA#v=onepage&q&f=false

mya0_soap.jpg



But the semantic development of the Germanic word shows that this word has a Germanic origin and Akkadian, Arabic, Hebrew and other Semitic words have been borrowed from Germanic.

We see similar thing about Arabic burj "fortress, tower": https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/برج Borrowed from Classical Syriac ܒܘܪܓܐ‎ (burgāʾ), from burg in Middle Persian, or from Ancient Greek πύργος (púrgos).
About the Greek word: https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/πύργος#Ancient_Greek The word is first attested in Homer, Iliad 7.206. Believed to be a borrowed word, probably from Urartian (burgana, “palace, fortress”), Kretschmer suggested a borrowing from Proto-Germanic *burgz (“fortified town, hill-fort”).

This word has certainly a Germanic origin, the ancient Urartian word is also a loanword from Germanic.

When speaking of loans it's of some worth to compare not only phonetic roots but also closeness of meanings, I agree with you.
But every word taken in account has to be well studied. the first example, 'sapo', doesn't prove contacts with Germanics; the 'sapu' of akkadian could be an hazard of not too close meanings from different origines: our 'sapo' could very well be issued from a Celtic 'sap' meaning (pine tree)"sap" (the same in english!) and the passage of significations from 'soap' to 'to bathe' (Akkadian) only a coincidence of hazards: we need to know what kind of "soap" used Akkadians to bathe. ATW other IE dialects could have had a common °sap- root too, without being proto-Celtic or proto-Germanic. I don't know.

Concerning 'burg', as already said a *bh-r-gh root is common to all IE tongues, giving the most of the time a °b-r-g- cognate (Latin would give a °f-r-g- I think and Greek a °ph-r-g- . So the Greek 'pùrgos' is surely a loan of the same root through another language - ATW again, this very common IE root with close enough meanings could have existed long before Germanic and even proto-Germanic genesis occurred, and does not mark specific and tight links between well evolved Germanic and Iranian dialects; CWC came surely not far from the proto-Indo-Iranian dialects, and they could have left shared roots among proto-Germanic, proto-Balt and proto-Slav too,not speaking of other languages. I do'nt know the direction of borrowing between IE and Urartian, but it doesn't change the story, I think.
What would be good would be to list some more words showing typical Germanic phonetic evolution and close enough meanings, on the ground of family, body, close environment, basic adjectives and verbs and so on, woth eastern IE languages. We know already that Germanic shows some closeness to Indo-Iranian, but it's also the case of Baltic and Slavic. Nothing too specific. But I could change opinion if I have some new evidences.
 
@hrvclv
just to split hairs or to joke:
concerning latin forms for 'soap', the "traditional" explanations were based on Celtic (Gaulish), and seemingly it was Celts who dyed their hair (not giving a red colour but rather a dirty blondish one). I was not aware of the same habit among Germanics, but who knows? ATW I'm not opening here a competition concerning the "paternity" fo some words or findings. We have better to do.
But this is on the margin of this thread and I agree with your post #25

Yes, "soap" also appears as "sapo" in Gaulish glossaries. "Sapo" is said (here and there) to be the original word from which the Latin and Germanic words were both derived. Pliny himself testified that soap was a Gaulish invention. But he also mentioned Germans using it. In my previous post, I chose to refer to what I thought was the most reliable academic source for the etymology of "soap". Considering Celts and Germanics rubbed shoulders for centuries in Central Europe, it's hard to tell which option to prefer, and who borrowed what from whom.

I too have often read about Gauls "bleaching" their hair. Germans may well have done it as well. One fact is not exclusive of the other. And again, they were neighbors...

Now that said, it is also true that the ancient Sumerians and Babylonians made a soap of their own. So did the ancient Egyptians and Phenicians (who sold and exported it). Whether the word travelled with the thing, I have no idea.
 
When speaking of loans it's of some worth to compare not only phonetic roots but also closeness of meanings, I agree with you.
But every word taken in account has to be well studied. the first example, 'sapo', doesn't prove contacts with Germanics; the 'sapu' of akkadian could be an hazard of not too close meanings from different origines: our 'sapo' could very well be issued from a Celtic 'sap' meaning (pine tree)"sap" (the same in english!) and the passage of significations from 'soap' to 'to bathe' (Akkadian) only a coincidence of hazards: we need to know what kind of "soap" used Akkadians to bathe. ATW other IE dialects could have had a common °sap- root too, without being proto-Celtic or proto-Germanic. I don't know.
Concerning 'burg', as already said a *bh-r-gh root is common to all IE tongues, giving the most of the time a °b-r-g- cognate (Latin would give a °f-r-g- I think and Greek a °ph-r-g- . So the Greek 'pùrgos' is surely a loan of the same root through another language - ATW again, this very common IE root with close enough meanings could have existed long before Germanic and even proto-Germanic genesis occurred, and does not mark specific and tight links between well evolved Germanic and Iranian dialects; CWC came surely not far from the proto-Indo-Iranian dialects, and they could have left shared roots among proto-Germanic, proto-Balt and proto-Slav too,not speaking of other languages. I do'nt know the direction of borrowing between IE and Urartian, but it doesn't change the story, I think.
What would be good would be to list some more words showing typical Germanic phonetic evolution and close enough meanings, on the ground of family, body, close environment, basic adjectives and verbs and so on, woth eastern IE languages. We know already that Germanic shows some closeness to Indo-Iranian, but it's also the case of Baltic and Slavic. Nothing too specific. But I could change opinion if I have some new evidences.
The most important thing is the process of semantic development of words, of course both soap and burg have Indo-European origin but the meanings of these words have been developed in the Germanic language and they differ from their cognates in other IE languages, this process in the Germanic language can be enough reason that we consider both soap and burg as Germanic inventions. For example sugar is from Sanskrit and the Sanskrit word is from a proto-IE word with the meaning of gravel, this semantic development in Sanskrit can be a good reason to consider sugar as an Indian invention.
 
'sapo' is not specific to Germanic, even with this specific meaning - 'burga' is troubling in some way, it's true-
proto-Germanic came from an oder form of IE, at evidence - some central European dialects could have had a form very close with a close meaning too (look at Slavic, Celtic, close for meaning and but a bit less close for vowels) - some of these central dialects could be the IE provider in proto-Germanic. But the cristalization of Germanic took place later and elsewhere, and also their Identity Card.
 
'sapo' is not specific to Germanic, even with this specific meaning - 'burga' is troubling in some way, it's true-
proto-Germanic came from an oder form of IE, at evidence - some central European dialects could have had a form very close with a close meaning too (look at Slavic, Celtic, close for meaning and but a bit less close for vowels) - some of these central dialects could be the IE provider in proto-Germanic. But the cristalization of Germanic took place later and elsewhere, and also their Identity Card.

Different words with different meanings from the same proto-IE origin in other IE languages couldn't be certainly the source of ancient Greek, Urartian or Akkadian words, for example Irish bri means "hill" or Russian breg means "coast". It is not impossible that an ancient extinct language with almost the same sound shifts of proto-Germanic existed in the Middle East but how you can explain the existence of many Germanic loanwords from Middle Eastern languages? like silver from Akkadian or hemp from Sumerian (with Germanic sound shifts) or path from Old Persian, some linguists have tried to say that these words entered proto-Germanic through Scythian language but by comparing to Ossetian and other language which related to ancient Scythian, we already know that they were wrong, for example cognate of Old Persian path "way" in Ossetian is fændag "road", in fact p>f is one of the principal sound changes in Scythian.
 
The similarity between the names of Guti (modern Gotvand) and Goth can be a coincidence but what about the names of almost all other people who lived in the centeral and western Iran before the arrival of Iranian tribes in the 1st millennium BC? Such as Suedin (modern Suteh), Alman (modern Uraman), Asgard (modern Asgerd), Germani (modern Kerman), Semnonen (modern Semnan), Saksen (modern Saqqez), Danes (modern Danian), ...

Search these words in Google Books.

rrlh_suedin.jpg


zjeu_almanguti.jpg
 
I believe the original land of Germanic people was Asgard (Asagarta in Old Persian and Sagartia in ancient Greek sources), as you read about Asgard: https://pagan.wikia.org/wiki/Asgard In the Prologue Snorri offers his own de-paganized interpretation of Asgard. As-gard, he conjectures, is the home of the Aesir (singular Ás) in As-ia, making an etymological connection between the three "As-"; that is, the Aesir were "men of Asia", not gods, but the speakers of the original Germanic language, who moved from Asia to the north and intermarried with the peoples already there. This interpretation of the 13th century foreshadows 20th century views of Indo-European migration from the east.
 
I believe the original land of Germanic people was Asgard (Asagarta in Old Persian and Sagartia in ancient Greek sources), as you read about Asgard: https://pagan.wikia.org/wiki/Asgard In the Prologue Snorri offers his own de-paganized interpretation of Asgard. As-gard, he conjectures, is the home of the Aesir (singular Ás) in As-ia, making an etymological connection between the three "As-"; that is, the Aesir were "men of Asia", not gods, but the speakers of the original Germanic language, who moved from Asia to the north and intermarried with the peoples already there. This interpretation of the 13th century foreshadows 20th century views of Indo-European migration from the east.

Sounds like totally speculative and creative folk etymology to me, typical of ancient authors before the development of modern science (and linguistics in particular)... especially with all this fanciful but unexplained etymology that would make men of Asia (and how precisely as- meant "men of Asia"? A mere similarity of sounds is no explanation, what's this morphological device to derive such a noun?) become aesir/áss meaning "deity", a quite unlikely semantic shift, but also one that does not make sense when you consider that áss is the Norse form, but not the Proto-Germanic one, which is best reconstructed as *ansuz and has obviously nothing to do with Asia, just as much as the other Germanic forms of the same word do not have anything Asia about it, such as Old English oos, Old Dutch ans, Old High German ans/ansi. There's a lot of fancy imagination in the conjectures of even modern linguists, let alone ancient authors.
 
Sounds like totally speculative and creative folk etymology to me, typical of ancient authors before the development of modern science (and linguistics in particular)... especially with all this fanciful but unexplained etymology that would make men of Asia (and how precisely as- meant "men of Asia"? A mere similarity of sounds is no explanation, what's this morphological device to derive such a noun?) become aesir/áss meaning "deity", a quite unlikely semantic shift, but also one that does not make sense when you consider that áss is the Norse form, but not the Proto-Germanic one, which is best reconstructed as *ansuz and has obviously nothing to do with Asia, just as much as the other Germanic forms of the same word do not have anything Asia about it, such as Old English oos, Old Dutch ans, Old High German ans/ansi. There's a lot of fancy imagination in the conjectures of even modern linguists, let alone ancient authors.

You should read about nasal infix in Indo-European languages: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nasal_infix this 'n' has no role except changing the tense of words, I don't think that there is any linguist who denies the relation between Germanic and Indo-Iranian gods æsir and asura, the original first part of the word is As and it could be related to Asia. Scythians also called themselves As and their land Asia, the name of Ossetians, their descendents, is also from this word. As you read here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Skjöldr In the Skjöldunga saga and the Ynglinga saga, Odin came from Asia (Scythia) and conquered Northern Europe.
 
The similarity between the names of Guti (modern Gotvand) and Goth can be a coincidence but what about the names of almost all other people who lived in the centeral and western Iran before the arrival of Iranian tribes in the 1st millennium BC? Such as Suedin (modern Suteh), Alman (modern Uraman), Asgard (modern Asgerd), Germani (modern Kerman), Semnonen (modern Semnan), Saksen (modern Saqqez), Danes (modern Danian), ...


Search these words in Google Books.

rrlh_suedin.jpg


zjeu_almanguti.jpg

Striking at first sight. It deserves more attention; but we have other close tribes names in Europe with similarities which are sometimes misguiding. Have these tribes names been confirmed by diverse authors? ATW the tribes which transferred the bulk of the IE lexicon to pre-proto-Germanics - long before the Germanics could have had ancient remote contacts with South-Caucasus people at old times, wherever in details these contacts occurred and how (trade, mercenaries...). I concede you the Germanic-like phonetic evolution of some words are amazing. I keep an eye on your interesting posts. But I would prefer to have more elements in the diverse basic lexicons of the Near-East before to make a sound opinion.
That said Grigoriev thought the archeology of Celts, Germanics and Balto-Slavs show strong links with Seyma-Turbino culture, and this last metallurgic culture for him came ultimately from North Near-East. But it comes in opposition to anDNA and Y-haplo's todate. Some slight elites late elites?
I'll read the future developments the next satruday. Thanks.
&: for the fun, 'Padan' evocates Northern Italy, does it not?
 
Striking at first sight. It deserves more attention; but we have other close tribes names in Europe with similarities which are sometimes misguiding. Have these tribes names been confirmed by diverse authors? ATW the tribes which transferred the bulk of the IE lexicon to pre-proto-Germanics - long before the Germanics could have had ancient remote contacts with South-Caucasus people at old times, wherever in details these contacts occurred and how (trade, mercenaries...). I concede you the Germanic-like phonetic evolution of some words are amazing. I keep an eye on your interesting posts. But I would prefer to have more elements in the diverse basic lexicons of the Near-East before to make a sound opinion.
That said Grigoriev thought the archeology of Celts, Germanics and Balto-Slavs show strong links with Seyma-Turbino culture, and this last metallurgic culture for him came ultimately from North Near-East. But it comes in opposition to anDNA and Y-haplo's todate. Some slight elites late elites?
I'll read the future developments the next satruday. Thanks.
&: for the fun, 'Padan' evocates Northern Italy, does it not?
Padan means from padua province of Veneto
.
Venezian from Venice province
Belun from Belluno province
Trevisan from treviso province
Veronese from verona province
Rovigan from Rovigo province
Vicentin from vicenza province
 
You should read about nasal infix in Indo-European languages: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nasal_infix this 'n' has no role except changing the tense of words, I don't think that there is any linguist who denies the relation between Germanic and Indo-Iranian gods æsir and asura, the original first part of the word is As and it could be related to Asia. Scythians also called themselves As and their land Asia, the name of Ossetians, their descendents, is also from this word. As you read here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Skjöldr In the Skjöldunga saga and the Ynglinga saga, Odin came from Asia (Scythia) and conquered Northern Europe.

The IE nasal infix was added to a root to form verbal actions in the present tense. That's not the case here. The lack of /n/ inSanskrit ásura has nothing to do wth Germanic having added a nasal infix to a noun. It instead comes from the regular change of syllabic /n/ into /a/ in Proto-Indo-Iranian, with the root *h2ens- reducing its vowel in the zero grade to a syllabic /n/ to form *h2nsuros and then *hásuras. That's a regular PII change found in many other words, too. The original root already had an /n/, it had nothing to do with an extra infix.

How do you know Scythians called themselves As? Do you have a reliable source about that? AFAIK Ossetians do not call themselves Ossetians, their endonym is Iron, from the *arya- root, and the ancient Alans, probably one of the groups descended from Scythians, also derived their name from *arya- (the /rj/ > /l/ change is attested in some Ossetian dialects).

And there is no reliably known common name for all Scythians, they probably identified with their diverse tribes and did not have one name for all of them. You still seem to believe a priori in this "secular/irreligious" interpretation of the old Indo-European religions, because only that could explain how you can easily accept the extremely counterintuitive and unlikely etymology linking aesir/asura ("deity") with men of Asia, when there is a much more semantically sensible explanation for those religious terms coming from *h2ens-, h2ensir-, "life force, energy".

Honestly the idea that the word for "god, deity" in many IE languages would come from Asian men strikes me as fanciful at the very least, the credibility of such an association without very strong evidences is almost null. "Could be" is just not enough, a theoretical possibility doesn't even mean plausibility, let alone probability.

These medieval sagas portraying ancient Nordic gods as human characters in epic tales should be read with many grains of salt, because they mostly date to post-Christianization times and are thus obviously "depaganized", with many characters that had once been seen as spiritual entities and deities being re-interpreted as mere heroes and important ancestors in their narratives.
 
The IE nasal infix was added to a root to form verbal actions in the present tense. That's not the case here. The lack of /n/ inSanskrit ásura has nothing to do wth Germanic having added a nasal infix to a noun. It instead comes from the regular change of syllabic /n/ into /a/ in Proto-Indo-Iranian, with the root *h2ens- reducing its vowel in the zero grade to a syllabic /n/ to form *h2nsuros and then *hásuras. That's a regular PII change found in many other words, too. The original root already had an /n/, it had nothing to do with an extra infix.

How do you know Scythians called themselves As? Do you have a reliable source about that? AFAIK Ossetians do not call themselves Ossetians, their endonym is Iron, from the *arya- root, and the ancient Alans, probably one of the groups descended from Scythians, also derived their name from *arya- (the /rj/ > /l/ change is attested in some Ossetian dialects).

And there is no reliably known common name for all Scythians, they probably identified with their diverse tribes and did not have one name for all of them. You still seem to believe a priori in this "secular/irreligious" interpretation of the old Indo-European religions, because only that could explain how you can easily accept the extremely counterintuitive and unlikely etymology linking aesir/asura ("deity") with men of Asia, when there is a much more semantically sensible explanation for those religious terms coming from *h2ens-, h2ensir-, "life force, energy".

Honestly the idea that the word for "god, deity" in many IE languages would come from Asian men strikes me as fanciful at the very least, the credibility of such an association without very strong evidences is almost null. "Could be" is just not enough, a theoretical possibility doesn't even mean plausibility, let alone probability.

These medieval sagas portraying ancient Nordic gods as human characters in epic tales should be read with many grains of salt, because they mostly date to post-Christianization times and are thus obviously "depaganized", with many characters that had once been seen as spiritual entities and deities being re-interpreted as mere heroes and important ancestors in their narratives.

I think you are right about proto-Germanic *ansuz, the original Germanic name of this land was probably Ansugarda, Old Persian Asagarta could be actually the Iranian form of this word, the interesting thing is that some people say that the Assyrian chief god Assur/Ashur doesn't relate to Indo-Iranian god Asura because the Old Akkadian name of this god is Ansur/Anshur, the name of Anshan (Persia in Sumerian and Akkadian texts) is believed to be from the name of this god and Akkadians adopted it from the eastern lands (in all probability from a Germanic people).
Except ancient Greeks, I don't think that any other ancient people called this Part of Eurasia as Asia or any thing else, in fact the word Asia is a Greek invention and it really possible that it relates to the name of a major eastern Semitic and Indo-European god in this region, it is meaninglessness to say the name of this important God relates to a young Greek word.
Anyway it seems to be clear Germanic sources just knew that Asgard was in Asia, not Europe, and they also knew that the original Germanic people who lived in Asgard, migrated from Asia to north Europe.
 

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