Growing weary of archaeogenetics

[Richard W]

As I'm sure Witzel is aware, Skt. ch is a palatal stop, not a velar fricative, so we're dealing with just two similar consonants.

But when did it palatalise? The claimed Para-Munda loans suggest that that the palatalisation was incomplete or not yet started at the time of the early Para-Munda interaction with Sanskrit. Moreover, the development of the Indic geminate cch is a little reminiscent of the development of Dutch <sch> /sx/ .

[hwhatting]

I'm not an Indologist and so don't know the status of the question right now, but:
1) It's not Witzel's idea (or at least, not his alone). He's quoting papers from several other scholars on the theory that Dravidian is intrusive to Southern India.
2)

The usual story is that the Dravidians occupied most of India-- which is why a Dravidian language, Brahui, is still found west of the Indus-- and were displaced by the Arya.)

That's the story you find in the usual accounts of Indian history, yes, but I'm not sure that it's actually the common opinion among indologists anymore. Concerning Brahui, there seems to be evidence that it's the result of a relatively recent internal migration (centuries ago, not millennia) from the South.
3) On the parallel migrations: The idea is specifically that the Aryans entered India in the North of the Indus valley (Gandhara / Punjab), while the Dravidians entered the Indus valley in the South (Sindh), via Southern Iran, and I assume then were pushed further South when the Aryans expanded from the Gandhara / Punjab region. Parallel migrations happen - one example would be the Finno-Ugric Hungarians being swept along with the Turkic steppe migrations (and ending up farther west than most Turkic speakers before modern industrial migration); another, more speculative, would be the theory currently raised by archaeogeneticists that Basque also originates in the steppe and was swept into its current location (pretty far West) together with the migrations that brought Indo-European into Europe.
In any case, on the evidence of the layers of loanwords discussed by Witzel, it seems that the Dravidian loans show up only in later layers and who the Aryans encountered in the North of the Indus valley were speakers of Munda or Para-Munda, not Dravidians.
As I said, I'm not a specialist, but I'd not dismiss Witzel easily just because what he writes is not what we know from the history textbooks - those often contain old and simplified accounts that are being revised in the specific fields they originated from, like archaeology or historical linguistics.

[Travis B.]

I'm not an Indologist and so don't know the status of the question right now, but:
1) It's not Witzel's idea (or at least, not his alone). He's quoting papers from several other scholars on the theory that Dravidian is intrusive to Southern India.
2)

The usual story is that the Dravidians occupied most of India-- which is why a Dravidian language, Brahui, is still found west of the Indus-- and were displaced by the Arya.)

That's the story you find in the usual accounts of Indian history, yes, but I'm not sure that it's actually the common opinion among indologists anymore. Concerning Brahui, there seems to be evidence that it's the result of a relatively recent internal migration (centuries ago, not millennia) from the South.
3) On the parallel migrations: The idea is specifically that the Aryans entered India in the North of the Indus valley (Gandhara / Punjab), while the Dravidians entered the Indus valley in the South (Sindh), via Southern Iran, and I assume then were pushed further South when the Aryans expanded from the Gandhara / Punjab region. Parallel migrations happen - one example would be the Finno-Ugric Hungarians being swept along with the Turkic steppe migrations (and ending up farther west than most Turkic speakers before modern industrial migration); another, more speculative, would be the theory currently raised by archaeogeneticists that Basque also originates in the steppe and was swept into its current location (pretty far West) together with the migrations that brought Indo-European into Europe.
In any case, on the evidence of the layers of loanwords discussed by Witzel, it seems that the Dravidian loans show up only in later layers and who the Aryans encountered in the North of the Indus valley were speakers of Munda or Para-Munda, not Dravidians.
As I said, I'm not a specialist, but I'd not dismiss Witzel easily just because what he writes is not what we know from the history textbooks - those often contain old and simplified accounts that are being revised in the specific fields they originated from, like archaeology or historical linguistics.

The big question then is were there two invasions of India, one first by the Dravidians (presumably from Iran), and a second one by the Arya, which completely erased the indigenous languages of most of India? About Brahui, I too have heard that it most likely reflects a recent migration from southern India.

[hwhatting]

The big question then is were there two invasions of India, one first by the Dravidians (presumably from Iran), and a second one by the Arya, which completely erased the indigenous languages of most of India?

As you probably know, Munda languages are stil spoken in refuge areas of India. I don't envisage immediate erasure upon invasion, but conversion of (Para-)Munda speakers to Aryan / Dravidian in the main agricultural areas of the Indus valley first and then spreading of Aryan & Dravidian with the agricultural societies over centuries.

[Travis B.]

The big question then is were there two invasions of India, one first by the Dravidians (presumably from Iran), and a second one by the Arya, which completely erased the indigenous languages of most of India?

As you probably know, Munda languages are stil spoken in refuge areas of India. I don't envisage immediate erasure upon invasion, but conversion of (Para-)Munda speakers to Aryan / Dravidian in the main agricultural areas of the Indus valley first and then spreading of Aryan & Dravidian with the agricultural societies over centuries.

The only issue with that is that the Urheimat of Proto-Austroasiatic is usually posited to be the Mekong river valley or southern China...

[hwhatting]

The only issue with that is that the Urheimat of Proto-Austroasiatic is usually posited to be the Mekong river valley or southern China...

1) How secure is that? I mean, we're still debating the Urheimat of PIE or Afro-Asiatic, debates into which a lot of linguistic, archaelogical, and genetic evidence has flown, without them being solved finally - is there conclusive evidence or is this more like some Austro-Asianists looking at the map and finding that theory reasonable? After all, IIRC Austro-Asiatic has been established as a group much more recently than IE or Afrasian and I assume much less evidence for the Urheimat has been amassed?
2) And even if the Urheimat is located corrrectly, immigration from the East is also possible; my understanding is that that's what happened with Tibetan a bit further to the North. What are the assumed time lines for the spread of Austro-Asiatic? (After all, Munda is spoken in many areas of India right now and thus must have come from the East if the Mekong / South China Urheimat is correct, so there would only be a problem for Witzel's theory if the time lines don't match.)

[zompist]

I'm not an Indologist and so don't know the status of the question right now, but:
1) It's not Witzel's idea (or at least, not his alone). He's quoting papers from several other scholars on the theory that Dravidian is intrusive to Southern India.

2)

The usual story is that the Dravidians occupied most of India-- which is why a Dravidian language, Brahui, is still found west of the Indus-- and were displaced by the Arya.)

That's the story you find in the usual accounts of Indian history, yes, but I'm not sure that it's actually the common opinion among indologists anymore.

I'm not rejecting the idea, and my sources may be too old. Still, the idea seems to be based on a chain of speculations, and the more suppositions one piles up, the more unlikely the hypothesis.

As I noted, the location of Meluḫḫa is disputed in Assyriology— many do identify it with the Harappans, but it's also been identified with eastern Iran, or with Ethiopia. The latter is not that far-fetched: in the Amarna letters, the term is applied to Nubia. Note that one Akkadian king claims to have conquered Meluḫḫa, in the context of war with Elam.

Of course we would really like it to be a term for the Harappans, but we don't know that it's actually a self-designation, any more than (say) Elam. (In fact that isn't the Elamite word for Elam.)

Conclusions based on onomastics have a way of changing around. E.g. many scholars tried to find a substrate for Sumerian and declared that the Sumerians invaded from elsewhere. But the most recent scholars of Sumerian find this unconvincing. (My impression in Middle East studies, in fact, is the early 20th century loved an invasion story based on scant evidence, and modern scholars are much more skeptical. And in India, the Arya "invasion" has been downgraded to more of a long-scale infiltration.)

In any case, on the evidence of the layers of loanwords discussed by Witzel, it seems that the Dravidian loans show up only in later layers and who the Aryans encountered in the North of the Indus valley were speakers of Munda or Para-Munda, not Dravidians.

To my knowledge the Rigveda locates the Arya in the Punjab (which I think is what you're saying), and the Mahabharata pushes them no further than the Doab, the region of Delhi. It may well be that there are no Dravidian loans in that period, but note that these sources are not a window into who was occupying the Ganges, much less south India.

(Also, if Witzel's claim is that the Dravidians were in Sindh, and thus neighbors of the Arya, why wouldn't there be borrowed terms? After all, he has the Sumerians borrowing terms from 2000 km away!)

Plus, I'd note again that 3000 years ago is really late— well into Vedic times, just 500 years before the Pali scriptures, just 700 before the first Tamil inscriptions (already in the southern tip of India).

[Travis B.]

The only issue with that is that the Urheimat of Proto-Austroasiatic is usually posited to be the Mekong river valley or southern China...

1) How secure is that? I mean, we're still debating the Urheimat of PIE or Afro-Asiatic, debates into which a lot of linguistic, archaelogical, and genetic evidence has flown, without them being solved finally - is there conclusive evidence or is this more like some Austro-Asianists looking at the map and finding that theory reasonable? After all, IIRC Austro-Asiatic has been established as a group much more recently than IE or Afrasian and I assume much less evidence for the Urheimat has been amassed?
2) And even if the Urheimat is located corrrectly, immigration from the East is also possible; my understanding is that that's what happened with Tibetan a bit further to the North. What are the assumed time lines for the spread of Austro-Asiatic? (After all, Munda is spoken in many areas of India right now and thus must have come from the East if the Mekong / South China Urheimat is correct, so there would only be a problem for Witzel's theory if the time lines don't match.)

Apparently Proto-Austroasiatic is typically dated to 5000-4000 BP, so if the Munda languages were the aboriginal languages of a good chunk of India, they'd have to get there in the time between Proto-Austroasiatic and the spread of Aryan and Dravidian languages, or the Austroasiatic-ists have to be wrong and the Urheimat of Proto-Austroasiatic is actually much closer to the present-day Munda languages geographically.

[hwhatting]

Apparently Proto-Austroasiatic is typically dated to 5000-4000 BP, so if the Munda languages were the aboriginal languages of a good chunk of India, they'd have to get there in the time between Proto-Austroasiatic and the spread of Aryan and Dravidian languages, or the Austroasiatic-ists have to be wrong and the Urheimat of Proto-Austroasiatic is actually much closer to the present-day Munda languages geographically.

Well, dating proto-laguages is an imprecise art, and if Witzel is correct to identify (Para-)Munda loans in Vedic, Munda-speakers must have been present in Gandhara / Punjab or the neighbourhood thereof in Vedic times, so about minimum 3000 years ago. That would be a data point for the existence of a branch of AA with recognisable Munda Features. When is Munda supposed to have split off? In any case, for this (Para-)Munda needs only to be present in North India, and if Munda is supposed to have branched off immediately after the split of AA, the Munda.speakers would have had one or two millennia to get to India from the Mekong area or South China.
This is more of a problem for the Australian immigration scenario, but NB that Witzel only claims that.South India wasn't originally Dravidian, not that it was (Para-)Munda. It would be possible that the Dravidians displaced speakers of some other language (maybe even the ancestor of the current Australian languages)? But I am in no way endorsing the theory of Indian Immigration to Australia 4500 years ago; my only point was that if it happened, the immigrants needn't necessarily have been Dravidians.
@zompist - in my recollection, the Meluhha argument is not central to Witzel's argumentation, and IIRC, he assumes loaning, just in the other direction (Aryan -> Dravidian). I need to re-read the article; I read it over 10 years ago and just skimmed §1.11 before linking it here. I think his conclusions about loan layers are tenable also without the assumption that Dravidian is intrusive to South India; all it needs is that Northwest India wasn't Dravidian, but (Para-)Munda, and if Munda comes from the East, that would make it probable that the rest of North India wasn't as well. But again, the idea of the intrusivenes of Dravidian isn't his alone, so it might make sense to look at the papers he cites for that view (if I only had more time to look into this…)

[Travis B.]

Of course, this implies a substratum in India before (Para-)Munda, since (Para-)Munda itself is most likely not indigenous to India either...

[bradrn]

Personally, I think that Australian languages are more likely to be related to Papuan languages than anything Indian. Trans-New Guinea in particular looks extremely similar to northern Australian languages (few fricatives, ergativity, verbs composed of auxiliary+coverb). Remember that Australia and New Guinea were one continent up until 8000 years ago — around the postulated date for Proto-Sino-Tibetan — so it would be surprising if their languages were completely unrelated. We just don’t have any firm data for a connection: Pama-Nyungan is probably valid and related to Tangkic, but we have no other high-level families yet.

EDIT: A different part of Wikipedia references a different age for genetic separation of Australians and Papuans, as 37000 BP. This would make a linguistic relationship much more difficult, but one is still possible — that age is only twice as old as Proto-Afroasiatic.

[Richard W]

Well, dating proto-laguages is an imprecise art, and if Witzel is correct to identify (Para-)Munda loans in Vedic, Munda-speakers must have been present in Gandhara / Punjab or the neighbourhood thereof in Vedic times, so about minimum 3000 years ago.

Para-Munda is probably not Austroasiatic. The unindic loans reminded Witzel of Munda, but the connections don't hold up (according to Witzel), and Witzel now regrets his choice of name.

[hwhatting]

Para-Munda is probably not Austroasiatic. The unindic loans reminded Witzel of Munda, but the connections don't hold up (according to Witzel), and Witzel now regrets his choice of name.

Oh, that's interesting. Do you have any links where I could read more on that?

[Richard W]

Para-Munda is probably not Austroasiatic. The unindic loans reminded Witzel of Munda, but the connections don't hold up (according to Witzel), and Witzel now regrets his choice of name.

Oh, that's interesting. Do you have any links where I could read more on that?

That comment was based on a smidgeon at p11 in Witzel, Michael. 2009. "The linguistic history of some Indian domestic plants", Journal of BioSciences 34(6): 829-833 (https://dash.harvard.edu/bitstream/hand ... sequence=1). Oddly enough, the later 2012 EJVS article "Substrate Languages in Old Indo-Aryan (Rgvedic, Middle and Late Vedic)" is much more bullish about the Austroasiatic connection. I don't know what's become of the Electronic Journal of Vedic Studies; it no longer seems to have a live site.

[Richard W]

Of course, this implies a substratum in India before (Para-)Munda, since (Para-)Munda itself is most likely not indigenous to India either...

Well, we've already got Burushaski, Kusunda, and the substrates of Nihali and the Vedda language of Sri Lanka.

[hwhatting]

That comment was based on a smidgeon at p11 in Witzel, Michael. 2009. "The linguistic history of some Indian domestic plants", Journal of BioSciences 34(6): 829-833 (https://dash.harvard.edu/bitstream/hand ... sequence=1). Oddly enough, the later 2012 EJVS article "Substrate Languages in Old Indo-Aryan (Rgvedic, Middle and Late Vedic)" is much more bullish about the Austroasiatic connection. I don't know what's become of the Electronic Journal of Vedic Studies; it no longer seems to have a live site.

Thanks!
The 2012 article may be the same as the one to which I linked (the title is identical), I think I remember Witzel republishing it?

[Richard W]

The 2012 article may be the same as the one to which I linked (the title is identical), I think I remember Witzel republishing it?

I must have misinterpreted some of the tagging. They are the same, 1999 article, which explains why the 2009 misgivings appeared to have gone.

[Moose-tache]

On topic, something that has always annoyed me about archaeogenetic papers is when they assume the proportions of various genes indicate populations and not genes. The classic example is when it is revealed that Y-chromosomal DNA from steppe nomads is far more common in Countryland than the mitochondrial DNA from steppe nomads, so obviously a bunch of unattached steppe Chads showed up without a proportional number of steppe Stacies. Is all genetic research done by people who have never been to a high school dance? Human reproduction is wildly, comically assymetrical. If one hundred dudes and one hundred ladies conquer an area of nine hundred natives, the next generation will be 10% conqueror mitochondria, but way more than 10% conqueror Y-chromosome. Are people just... afraid to talk about this in an academic paper? Or are they really just idiots?

[Travis B.]

On topic, something that has always annoyed me about archaeogenetic papers is when they assume the proportions of various genes indicate populations and not genes. The classic example is when it is revealed that Y-chromosomal DNA from steppe nomads is far more common in Countryland than the mitochondrial DNA from steppe nomads, so obviously a bunch of unattached steppe Chads showed up without a proportional number of steppe Stacies. Is all genetic research done by people who have never been to a high school dance? Human reproduction is wildly, comically assymetrical. If one hundred dudes and one hundred ladies conquer an area of nine hundred natives, the next generation will be 10% conqueror mitochondria, but way more than 10% conqueror Y-chromosome. Are people just... afraid to talk about this in an academic paper? Or are they really just idiots?

Somehow academics overlook what the "spoils" of conquest really mean...

[Richard W]

Somehow academics overlook what the "spoils" of conquest really mean...

And it may not be you're thinking of. Think of the half a million male-line descendants of Somerled, or the estimated 16 million male line descendants of Genghis Khan.