The Germanic, Iranian, Thracian Languages

8/4/2019 The Germanic, Iranian, Thracian Languages

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Valentyn Stetsyuk, Lviv; Ukraine

Introduction to the Study of Prehistoric Ethnogenic Processes in

Eastern Europe and Asia

The Germanic, Iranian, Thracian languages.

The areas, where the Tocharian, Hittite, Albanian, Thracian, Phrygian languages were formed, can bedetermined with the data of many scholars who investigated mutual relationships of the Indo-Europeanlanguages, supplemented by the data about habitats of the Indo-Europeans and the Finno-Ugrers. Let’s startwith Tocharian. Many scholars believe that the first site of the Tocharian habitat should be somewhere closeto the Greek, Baltic, Germanic settlements.1 They consider the Tocharian area to be in the region of the riversflowing in the Baltic Sea also because of the “salmon argument.” This fish spawns in the basin of the riversof the Baltic Sea. The word related to the Germanic, Baltic and Slavic words which means “salmon” is

present Tocharian but it is absent in the other Indo-European languages. There is a vacant area between therivers Berezina and Dnepr close to the rivers of the Baltic basin that matches to all the requirements on themap. The Tocharian habitat can be placed only here. According to the calculation, the number of mutualwords in Tocharian and Greek is 146, and in Tocharian and Germanic - 145, in Tocharian and Baltic - 121, inTocharian and Indic - 118. The number of mutual words in Tocharian and other Indo-European languages isconsiderably less. These results confirm the location of the Tocharian area between Baltic, Greek and Indicareas and near to the Germanic area.

And now − about the Albanian. Authorities have different opinions about its origin. According toDesnytskaja, many scholars consider Albanian as the successor of the Thracian or Illyrian.2 The analysis of lexical-statistical data and phonetic peculiarities allows us to speak about the evolution of Albanian from theThracian and that the Urheimat of the Thracians was between the rivers Desna, Seym and Oka. 3 In that case,the Albanian language should have common vocabulary material with Mordvin, which area was adjacent tothe Thracian area. The purposeful search of such vocabulary presents convincing results. Here are someexamples of Albanian-Mordvin correspondences: Alb. enё “vessel” – Mord. en’a “scoop”; Alb. kapё rdij “toswallow” – Mord. kapordams “to swallow”; Alb. kofshё “thigh”– Mord. kacho “thigh”; Alb. keqe “evil” – Mord. k’azh “evil”; Alb. bizele “peas” – Mord. pizel “berries of mountain ash”; Alb. rroj “to live” – Mord.erjams “to live”. Some Albanian-Mordvin connections have parallels in other languages too: Alb. tani “today” – Mord. tjani “now” (Mari tenij “today”, Estonian täna “today”); Alb. dobё t “quiet” – Mord.topafks “sated” (Mari typ “quiet”); Alb. turi “muzzle” – Mord. trva “lip” (Mari tjarvö “lip” ); Alb. bretkosё “frog” – Mord. vatraksh “frog”(Greek βατραχοσ “frog”) etc.

Very little lexical data is available for the localization of the Urheimat of the Illyrians, but, accordingto the other language facts, Walter Porzig found arguments to claim that Illyrian and Celtic areas wereadjacent in early history.4 He also indicated that “Illyrian and Greek have remarkably little mutual

1 KRAUSE V. (1959): Tokharskiy yazyk: Tokharskiye yazyki. - ( In Russian) – Tocharian: The TocharianLanguages. Moscow: 157; GAMKRELIDZE T.V., IVANOV V.V. (1984): Indoevropeyskiy yazyk i indoevropeytsy.Indo-European language and Indo-Europeans. Tbilisi: 424; PORZIG W., (1964): 315-316.2 DESNITSKAYA A.V. (1966): Rekonstruktsiya elementov drevnebalkanskogo yazyka i obshchebalkanskielingvisticheskie problemy. (Pervyy kongress balkanskikh issledovaniy. Sofia. 26 avgusta – 1 sentyabrya 1966 g.). M. – ( In Russian) – Reconstruction of Elements of the Old-Albanian Language and Common-Balkan LinguisticProblems. (The First Congress of Balkan Studies. Sofia. 26 August – 1 September 1966). M. 4.

3 STETSYUK VALENTYN. (1998): Doslidzhennya peredistorichnikh etnogenetichnikh procesiv u SkhidniyYevropi. Persha knyga. L’viv–K. – ( In Ukrainian) – The Research of Prehistoric Ethnogenetic Processes in EasternEurope. Volume 1. Lviv–K.: 60-61, 67-68.

4 PORZIG W. (1964): Chlenenije Indo-Europeyskoy yazykovoy obshchnosti. – ( In Russian) – The Split of Indo-European Language Community. The translation from German. M. : 159.



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connections though the both peoples lived in permanent proximity since the time of Illyrian migration.”5 If we conjecture that Illyrian area was near the Celtic and far from the Greek, we can find some additional datato prove the location of the Illyrian area somewhere in the West of the Indo-European territory. Toponymicfacts can very helpful in this case. The Illyrian toponymy was studied by the linguist Oleg Trubachev and thearchaeologist Dmitriy Telegin. Pointing out at the relative vicinity of the Celtic and Illyrian onomastics ingeneral, Trubachev writes: “…hydronyms with West-Balkan connections are concentrated on the Dnestr

narrow space and are sporadic to the north in the Goryn’ river's basin and to the north-east in the catchmentof the Teterev river.”6 Telegin confirms this idea and specifies that the Illyrian (Celtic-Illyrian) hydronymsmake three concentrations in the Ukraine: the Kiev, Zhytomir and Upper Dnestr accumulations. When thefirst two of them have only ten names, the last one has almost 30 names. 7 Thus we have the reason to believethat Illyrian people resided in the Upper Dnestr river's basin and populated the territory to the north at certain

period. Their Urheimat was most likely in the region between the rivers Sluch, West Bug and Pripyat’.The Urheimat of the Phrygians was to be close to the Greek and Armenian areas because the vicinity

of the Phrygian to the Greek and the Armenian is confirmed by numerous linguistic data. For example,Gamkrelidze and Ivanov wrote: “Phrygian language... has structural features that bring it close to the dialectsof Greek-Armenian area.”8 Armenian scholar Kapantsyan indicated that Greek annalists (Herodotus,Eudoksus and other) were writing about the vicinity of Phrygians and Armenians. ”Phrygians and Armenianswere together under the same banners in the army of Xerxes and they were dressed and armed identically.”9

Russian scholar Moisejeva also wrote about closeness of Phrygian to Greek and Armenian.10

Hirt and Lehr-Splavinski had similar opinion on this problem even earlier 11.12. According to this state of affairs, the area

between the rivers Desna and Iput’ suits the best as the ethnogenic area of the Phrygian.The volume of mutual words in Hittite-Luwian and other Indo-European languages suggests that the

area of the formation of this language can be located near Greek, Italic and Armenian areas. 13 There are 80Hittite correspondences in Greek, 78 - in Armenian and 58 - in Italic. Thus, Hittite area was to be in thetriangle-shaped region among the rivers Dnepr, Teterev and Ros’.

The localised territories of habitats for ancient ethnical groups can be associated with the certainarchaeological cultures well-known to the specialists of the Eastern Europe. For example, the Dnepr-DonetsCulture can be associated with the Indo-Europeans. This culture emerged on the Dnepr's left bank parts andin the Donets valleys in the 5 th mill BC. The region of this culture “covers the Dnepr valley (from themodern town of Rogachiv up to the banks of Kakhovka Reservoir), East Volyn, the Middle and Low Pripyat’,

the Sozh, the Desna, the Vorskla, the Psel, the Sula and also the Middle Donets.”14

As we can see, thisterritory is almost identical with the Indo-European territory, if we point out that migration of bearer of thisculture can be indicated from the Southeast to the Northwest.

A numerous group of Pit-Comb Ware cultures existed simultaneously with the Dnepr-Donets Culturein the basin of the Volga and the Oka. Some clans of these cultures entered the valleys of the rivers Seym,Desna, Psel, Sula and Donets and reached the region that nowadays is the suburbs of Voronezh and Tambov

5 ib. 224.6 TRUBACHEV O.N. (1968): Nazvaniya rek Pravoberezhnoy Ukrainy. - ( In Russian) - River Names of Right-Bank Ukraine. M.: 279.7 TELEGIN D.Y.(1990): Illirijskiye i frakiyskiye gidronimy Pravoberezhnoy Ukrainy v svetie arkheologichskikhissledovaniy: Voprosy yazykoznaniya. - ( In Russian) - Illyrian and Thracian Hydronyms in the light of Archaeological Data: Problems of Linguistics, Moscow: 4.8 GAMKRELIDZE T.V., IVANOV V.V.: 910.9 KAPANTSYAN G. (1956): Istoriko-lingvisticheskiye raboty: K nachalnoy istorii armian (in Russian). - Historical-linguistics works. To the primary history of Armenians. Erevan: 164.10 MOISSEYEVA T.A. (1986): K voprosu o kharaktere Frigiyskogo gosudarstva v VII st. do n.e: Vestnik drevneyistorii. Nr.3. ( In Russian) - To the Problem of the Character of Phrygian state in VIIth century BC. Bulletin of Ancient History, 3. Moscow: 13.11 HIRT H. (1905): Die Indogermanen. Ihre Verbreituhg, ihre Urheimat und ihre Kultur. Strassburg.12 LEHR-SPłAWINSKI T. (1946): O pochodzeniu i praojczyźnie Słowian. ( In Polish) – About the Origin and theUrheimat of Slavs. Poznań.13 STETSYUK, (1998): 62.14 TELEGIN D.Y. (1968): Dnipro-donetska kultura ( In Ukrainian). - The Dnepr-Donets culture. Kiev: 9.



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cities.15 This territory is almost the same as the localised territory for the ancient Finno-Ugrians. The Pit-Comb Ware Cultures were the descendants of local Mesolithic cultures but pottery manufacture was broughtthere from the outside, probably from the South. So we can presume that these cultures can be associated withFinno-Ugric tribes.

When the Turks left their territory, the migration of the Indo-Europeans followed. As the first,speakers of Hittite-Luwian moved in the direction of Anatolia and entered there around or after 2000 BC.Later the Celts, the Illyrians, the Italics advanced westward, and the Greeks migrated towards the BalkanPeninsula following the way of the Hittite-Luwians. The Indo-Aryans went to the southeast, but the Slavic,Baltic, Germanic, and Iranian tribes remained in Eastern Europe for a long time. Such presumption can be

plausible as the Slavic, Baltic, Iranian, and Germanic languages share some mutual characteristic features.One of them in contrast to the other Indo-European languages is transforming the ancient Indo-European bhto b. These two sounds were fallen together in the Slavic, Baltic, Iranian languages but in Germanic b wasevolved to p. The voiced aspirated stop bh either has kept or evolved to different sounds in the other Indo-European languages.

We know that the original unitary Iranian language had split on many languages of higher level withcomplicated relationships. At present such Iranian languages exist: the Ossetic, Yaghnobi, Pashto, Parachi,Ormuri, Yazgulami, Ishkashimi, Wakhi, Persian, Tajik, Kurdish, Baluchi, Talishi, Gilaki, Mazandarani,Kumzari, the dialects of Phars, small languages of Central Iran, the Luri and Bachtiar dialects, the dialects of Shughni-Roshani language group.16 The Yaghnobi language is a successor of the extinct Sogdian languagetherefore these two languages can be united into one language. The Iranian tribes of Sackes and Massageteswere in existence in the 1st mill BC. But it is still unknown what languages they were speaking. Thus it isvery difficult to investigate the relationships of Iranian languages. However, comparative analysis of Iranianvocabulary was performed using Historic-etymological dictionary of Ossetic17and bilingual dictionaries of thefollowing languages: Ossetic, Kurdish, Talishi, Gilaki, Persian, Pashto, Tadjik, Dari, Yazgulami, Shughnani,Roshani (with Khufi), Bartangi, Yaghnobi, Sarikoli (Tashkorgani). The artificial Dari language was createdon the basis of Persian and Tadzhik, and the latter evolved from Persian therefore all these three languagescan be considered as the unity. Also Shughnani, Roshani and Bartangi had the common parent language.They were united into one group of the Pamir languages. In total 1660 phono-semantic sets were includedinto the study. 263 of them were considered as common Iranian words. Then the table-dictionary wascomposed and the number of mutual words in the language pairs was calculated. The result of the calculationis given in table 6.

Table 6. Quantity of mutual words in pairs of the Iranian languages

Lang. Osset. Yagh. Kurd. Pasht Talish Pers. Pamir Gilak Yazg. Sarik. Baluch

Osset. 437

Yaghn. 208 499

Kurd. 212 201 587

Pashto 173 231 272 595

Talishi 114 157 243 194 430

Pers. 208 288 364 441 266 755

Pamir 115 225 192 245 131 298 554Gilaki 90 154 224 222 198 329 173 425

Yazg. 111 168 146 187 94 206 287 113 418

15 ib,178.16 EDELMAN D.I. (1968): Osnovnyje voprosy lingvisticheskoy geografii. Na materiale indoiranskikh yazykov ( In Russian) - Basic Problems of Geographical Linguistics. On the Material of Indo-Iranian Languages. Moscow.17 ABAEV V.I. (1958-1989): Istoriko-etimologicheskiy slovar’ osetinskogo yazyka ( In Russian) - Historical-Etymological Dictionary of the Ossetic. Moscow.



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Sarik. 63 124 101 126 72 149 225 91 147 319

Baluchi 20 24 25 19 15 24 18 16 12 10 39

These data let us to build the model of Iranian relationships presented on figure 7.

Figure 7. Graphic model of Iranian languages relationships.

Since the Ossetes were the last who left their Urheimat, this model of relationships was placed so thatthe Ossetic area overlapped Indian area in the Sozh river's basin in the region between the rivers Dnepr andIput’ i.e. on the remotest areas from other (see map 5). The Yaghnobi area was placed in the region amongthe rivers Iput’, Dnepr and Desna, the Kurdish area found its place between the rivers Desna, Seym andUpper Oka. The Pashto language had its area among the Dniepr, Sula and Desna as the other Iranianlanguages were placed among the tributaries of the rivers Dnepr and Don. Most likely the Ancient Iranians

populated the whole territory between the Dnepr and Don and had created Catacomb Culture which wasextended in that region. But many “vacant” areas stay in the region between the Dnepr and Don. The

ethnogenic areas of not analyzed Iranian languages should be located there. So, e. g. the Baluchi or Mazendaranian area, belonging for the same language group as Kurdish, Talishi and Gilaki, can be locatednorth of the Kurdish area near-by to the Veps. The plausibility of this conjecture should be supported by

possible mutual words in Veps and one of these Iranian languages. Unfortunately, the analysis of neither Beluchi nor Mazendaranian vocabulary could be performed. Instead, the Veps vocabulary was analyzed incomparison with the other Iranian languages. It turned out, that Kurdish had the biggest number of mutualwords with Veps - 76, the runner-ups are Ossetic - 65 mutual words, Talishi - 61 words, Gilaki - 56 etc. Asone can see, Kurdish and Ossetic area is situated the nearest to the Veps area and therefore there should have

been the closest language contacts among the population of these regions.



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Here are some examples of Kurdish-Veps lexical connections: Kurd çerk “drop” – Veps. č irk š tada – “to drop”, Kurd. hebhebok “spider”– Veps. hämähouk – “spider”, Kurd. xumari “darkness” – Veps. hämär “twilight”, Kurd. kusm “fear” – Veps. h’ämastoitta “to fear”, Kurd. henase “breathing” – Veps. henktä “to

breathe”, Kurd. hîrîn “neigh” – Veps. hirnaita “to neigh”, Kurd. e’ys “joy” – Veps. ijastus “joy”, Kurd. cirnî “trough” – Veps. kurn “gutter”.

The Kurdish and Talishi areas were adjacent to the Mordvin area. According to this, these languages

have the biggest number of mutual words with Mordvin really18.The Ancient Germans remained near the Urheimat though considerably expanded their territory.

Nowadays there are almost ten Germanic languages divided into three groups. Danish, Swedish, Norwegian,Icelandic and Faroese belong to the northern group. English, German, Dutch and Frisian compose the westerngroup. The extinct languages −Gothic, and that spoken by the Burgundians, Vandals, Gepids, and Ruguans

belong to the eastern group. But according to F. Maurer, the Germanic tribes were initially separated into fivegroups: the Northern Germans (ancestry of the present-day Danes, Swedes, Norwegians, Icelanders); theEastern Germans (Goths, Vandals, etc); the Elbe Germas (forebears of modern the Germans, i.e. Semnons,Suebs, Quads, Markomans, Hermundurs, Longobards etc); the Rhine-Weser Germans (ancestors of modernDutches and Flemish); the North Sea Germans (Anglo-Saxons and Frisians)19. It is supposed that commonlanguage for all Germanic tribes existed till the 3rd c. AD and it was split after the migration of Germans intothe Central and North Europe20. But the analysis of Germanic languages by the graphic-analytical method

brings us to absolutely different conclusions.According to the primary split of the Germanic languages, such languages were taken to the research

- English, German, Netherlandish (Dutch-Flemish), North Germanic group and Gothic. Frisian language wasadded to the study later, but as it appeared, it cannot be inserted into a common model of Germanic languagerelation. Obviously, the Frisian was formed at some later time. The table-dictionary of Germanic languageswas composed by using the data from the etymological dictionaries of German,21Gothic22, Old English23,

North Germanic24, and Dutch25, and also bilingual dictionaries. In total 2628 phono-semantic sets wereanalyzed. 1424 of them were admitted as common Germanic words. The number of mutual words in thelanguage pairs is presented in table 7.

Table 7. Quantity of mutual words in pairs of Germanic languages

Languages German English Netherl. Northern Gothic FrisianGerman 884

English 601 858

Netherlandic 503 357 632

Northern 412 468 226 651

Gothic 228 205 132 166 305

Frisian 248 237 245 128 82 329

18 STETSYUK VALENTYN. (1998): Doslidzhennia peredistorychnykh etnogenetychnykh procesiv u SkhidniyEvropi (in Ukrainian) – The Research of Prehistoryc Ethnogenetic Processes in Eastern Europe: 74-76.19 SCHMIDT WILHELM (unter Leitung) (1976): Geschichte der deutschen Sprache. Volkseigener Verlag: 45.20 ib.44.21 KLUGE FRIEDRICH. (1989): Etymologisches Wörterbuch der deutschen Sprache. 22 Auflage. Berlin-NewYork.22 HOLTHAUSEN F. (1934): Gotisches etymologisches Wörterbuch. Heidelberg.23 HOLTHAUSEN F. (1974): Altenglisches etymologisches Wörterbuch. Heidelberg.24 KÖBLER H. (2003): Altnordisches Wörterbuch.25 van VEEN P.A.E. en van der SIJS NICOLINE. (1989): Etymologisch woordenboek. Van Dale Lexicografie.Utrecht/ Antwerpen.



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Using these data, the model of the relation of the Germanic languages except Frisian was built quiteeasily (see figure 8)

Dutch

English

Gothic

German

NorthGermanic

Figure 8. Graphic model of Germanic languages relationships. but the location of the area for the Gothic is uncertain, because of small volume of Gothic words indictionaries. The shown place of Gothic on the figure place is objected by the small number of mutual Dutch-Gothic items. However perhaps separate Dutch-Gothic language correspondences are not studied by linguiststhoroughly. Merely one such parallel was given by F. Holthausen in his dictionary: Gothic plinsjan “todance” – Middle Duth plansen but only purposeful search can give a definitive answer about possible Dutch-Gothic connection.

Since we have only four reliable nodes of graph, it is very difficult to find a proper location for themodel on the map. A found position will be veritable if it will be confirmed by other facts. Let us admit suchlocation of the model that the area of Anglo-Saxons lie upon the Urheimat of Italics between the Teterev,Pripyat’ and Sluch rivers. In that case, the area of the ancestry of modern Germans (let us name them for convenience Teutons) can be located on the former area of the Illyrians on the Sluch, West Bug and Pripyat’

bassins. The former area of the Celts on the both sides of the West Bug is due to the ancestors of modernDutch and Flemings. Accordingly, North Germanic speakers had their area on the left side of the LowPripyat’ and the Goths had their Urheimat on the left side of the Upper Pripyat’ (see map 5).

There is historical evidence of the presence of the Germans on the territory of the Ukraine, referringto the time when they have not to be presen there, but their name was transferred to the Slavs, who settled onthe old German Länder. In 970 the Byzantine Emperor John I Tzimisces (969 -976) reported the Kiev princeSvyatoslav (964 - 972) through the Ambassadors message, which consisted of the following words:

" I believe that you have not forgotten about the defeat of your father Ingor, who despised the oath sailed to the capital of a huge army of 10 thousand ships, but to the Cimmerian Bosporus arrived barely a

dozen boats, beeng himself a messenger of his troubles. I do not mention nothing about his [further]

miserable fate, when, having gone on a campaign against the Germans, he was taken captive, tied to a treetrunk and broken in half " 26 ( Leo the Deacon, 1988, VI, 10).

It is clear that we are talking about Prince Igor, martyred at the hands of the Drevlyan inhabiting theAnglo-Saxon area at that time. As we shall see later, there is evidence that the Anglo-Saxons remained on the

26 LEO the DEAKON. 1988. Istoriya. M. Nauka. – ( In Russian) – History. M. Nauka: VI, 10.



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Ukrainian territory until the "Great Migration." In this regard, the origin of the ethnonym Drevlyan "can beoutput from the name of a well-known Germanic tribe Turvin (Yaylenko VP , 1990, 116). Tthe tribe Drevlyan

belonged to the ancient Rus’ state long time. They were not included in it at leat in the10 century, asrepeatedly stressed in his work, A.N. Nasonov ( Nasonov A.N , 1951, 29, 41, 55-56). The fact that the Vikingscould not include in the "Russian land" adjacent to the Polans the Drevlyans can say that these were theremains of their relatives Anglo-Saxons, mixed with the alien Slavic population. The chronicle notes that the

custom of the Polans was "meek and quiet", whereas Drevlyans "lived bestial way", ie they were more belligerent or unruly.

Map 5. The Map of the Germanic and Iranian habitats

Legend:Afg – Afghani, Gil - Gilanian, Pamir - Pers - Persian, Yagn - Yaghnobi, Yazg - Yazgulami.

The determined territory coincides to a great extent with the region of Tř ynec culture of uncertain

origin which existed from the second quarter till the end of the 1st

mill BC. Thus, this culture can be plausibleconsidered as of Germanic origin. Such assumption may be confirmed by connections of discrete Germaniclanguages with the Iranians, since the Iranian areas were located near-by on the Dnepr's left banks. The madecomparative analysis of table-dictionaries of Germanic and Iranian languages discovered 253 Germanic-Iranian lexical correspondences. The North Germanic languages have at most mutual Germanic-Iranianwords, namely 193 ones. The English has a bit less, 173 correspondences, but German has considerablelesser, only 95. The Ossetic language has mostly Germanic lexical correspondences, to wit 143 ones. Pashtoand Kurdish have 93 correspondences, Yaghnobi has 67 etc.



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These data can confirm that the North Germanic and Ossetic areas were once adjacent. Theavailability of numerous Germanisms in Ossetic has been known long ago27, but linguists neglect the fact thatOssetic has the biggest volume of correspondences namely with the North Germanic languages. The area of initial formation of Proto-English was near-by to the Yaghnobi and Pashto areas, therefore English shouldalso have many common language connections with Pashto and Yaghnobi, but connections of Germaniclanguages with these Iranian languages are perhaps yet to be investigated. Detailed study of these connections

can provide linguists with rich material for the further research. The Yaghnobi vocabulary is scantyrepresented in the table-dictionary because the lexical material of this language was taken from an availablesmall dictionary. Nevertheless, interesting examples of the separate correspondences this language with the

North Germanic languages and English one were discovered:Eng. bug – Yagn. bugalak “gadfly”;Eng. cog – Yagn. ozax “tooth”;Eng. jump – Yagn. jumb “to move”;Eng. moth, Swed. mott, Ger. Motte – Yagn. mоtta “bread moth”;Swed. digna “to fall”, dingla “to hang over”– Yagn. dangal “fell”;Swed. mögel “mould” – Yagn. magor “mould”;Swed. sarg “edge” – Yagn. sarak “edge”.The Pashto area was located as nearest to the English one and this was resulted in such English-

Pashto lexical correspondences:Eng. bark “any small ship” (Latin origin?) – Pashto barga “O.E. beam “a tree’, Eng beam – Pashto bəna “a tree”;Eng dapper – Pashto debər “stout, fat”;O.E. fright , Eng right – Pashto rixtija “truth, verity”;O.E. g æ t “opening, passage”, Eng gate – Pashto get. “gate” (modern loan-word?);O.E. lyft “weak, foolish”, Eng left – Pashto lavt “weak”;Anglo-Saxon minnia “love” – Pashto mina “love”;Eng. mitt “hand” – Pashto met “hand”(modern?) ;Eng. paten “small disk” (Latin origin?) – Pashto patan “spinning-wheel ” (Greek origin?);Eng. to rate “to scold” – Pashto rat əl “to scold”;O.E. scī r , Got skiers and others Germanic “clean”- Pashto x.k āra “clear”;

Eng. to search – Pashto surag’ “to search”, Pers. sorag’ “to search”;O.E. spearca, Eng spark – Pashto speregej “spark”;O.E. sprot , sprota, Eng sprout – Pashto – spartak “twig, vine”;O.E. wadan “to go forward”, Eng wade – Pashto wāte “going put”;O.E. weddian “to pledge, marry”, Eng to wed , wedding – Pashto wāde “wedding”;O.E. wherry (boat) – Pashto berej “raft”.

However Pashto has many English loan-words of modern days, such as Pashto bench (Eng bench),Pashto str ābari (Eng strawberry) etc, therefore it is very difficult to separate common ancient lexicalheritage from nowadays borrowings. Some lexical coincidences can have common origin from Greek or Latin. One must say that English-Iaranian connections are not yet studied sufficiently. For example, Eng.hog is supposed to be of Celtic origin but it has many correspondences in the Iranian languages, which areunknown (Yagn, Afg xug , Shung xū g, Gil xuk , Pers. xūk , Yazg. xə g etc) for scholars. Many Germanic

words have Iranian correspondences (Ger Damm, Sw damm “dam”, Ger Fa ß ‘barrel”, Haus “house”,Hammel “lamb”, Rain “border”, Reif “rope”, waten, “to wade”, Zagel, Sw tagel “tail”) but it is vainly tolook for them in the Etymological Dictionary of German Languge28

Besides, there are such Germanic-Iranian parallels which connection is not clear. For example, Ger Bast , Eng, Dutch, Ic bast corresponds with the word bast “to join” which is present in many Iranian

27 ABAEV V.I., (1956-1989); ABAEV V.I. (1965): Skifo-evropeyskiye isoglossy. ( In Russian) - Skifo- EuropeanIsoglosses. Moscow28 KLUGE Friedrich , (1989). Etymologisches Wörterbuch der deutschen Sprache. Walter de Gruyter. Berlin.

New York.



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languages, Ger Hirse, OS hersija “millet” can be connected with Kurd herzin, Tal arzyn, Pers ärzan “millet”. Bur the most interesting example is such Germanic-Ossetic parallel: Ger Farbe, Dutch verv “paint”, Sw färg “colour”, Got farwa “deportment, carriage”. One cannot at once to find a correspondencein English fallow. All these words can be united by Os färw “alder-tree” which has no Iranian parallels. Itis known that the bark of this tree can be used for painting and gives red-yellow or brown-yellow colour.Maybe Ger Falbe “a dun, light-bay horse” belongs to this word group. V.I. Abaev considered the Ossetic

word as a loan-word from O.U.G f еlawa “willow-tree”. In such case, Slav. vьrba, Lit virbas “vine”, Lat verbena have to be joined here too. Ger Falbe is connected by Kluge with Gmc * falwa “light-yellow”

parent Slav. * polvь, Lit palwas.As we can see on the map 5, the forefathers of Albanians, the Thracians were the nearest neighbours

of Germanic tribes on the southeast. The Pashto Urheimat was located over the Dnepr. All these languagescan have common lexical heritage. However the Germanic-Thracian language connections are researchedinsufficient, to say nothing about Pashto-Albanian ones. Brief survey of the vocabularies of theselanguages shows that such connections exist. There are some examples;

Eng beam – Pashto bêna - Alb pemе “a tree”;Eng blay, Ger Blei – Alb – bli “sturgeon”;OE borgian, Ger Borg – Alb barga “debt”;Eng raft, Ger Drift – Alb trap “a raft”;

Eng deer – Alb dr ё “deer”;Eng trunk – Alb trung “a stump” (though both can be from Lat truncus);Pashto bus “chaff” – Alb byk “id ”;Pashto g аh “time” – Alb kohе “id ”;Pashto lêg’êr “naked” – Alb lakurig “id ”;Pashto peca “a part” – Alb pjesе “id ”;Pashto tar.ê l “to bind” – Alb thur “id”;Pashto xwar “a wound” – Alb varr ё “id”;Pashto cira “a saw” – Alb sharr ё “id” (though both can be from Lat cěrra).Some Albanian-Yagnobian correspondences were found too: Alb hing еllin “to neigh” - Yang

hinj'irast «id», Alb anё “bank, shore” - Yagn «id», Alb kurriz “back, spine” - Yang g ûrk “id”.

The location of the Urheimats of particular Germanic tribes on the territory of the ancient Ukrainecan be confirmed by the many place names. We shall begin our survey with Volhynia (modern-dayVolins’ka oblast’ or Volin Region), an area between the Western Buh and Horyn’ rivers located south of the upper Pripjat’. One may recall that the ancient Illyrian ethnos formed in this area. This countrysubsequently was occupied by the ancient Germans. After the great bulk of Germans went westward,some Slavic tribe settled in the area, speaking a dialect that subsequently developed into the Czechlanguage. When the majority of the Czech ancestors left the area for Central Europe, it was occupied bynew Slavic tribe wich is known as either Dulebs or Dudlebs. The name of this tribe is preserved in severaltoponyms of Western Ukraine and the Czech Republic, and in the opinion of some scholars this ethnonymderives from W.G. Deudo and laifs 29. The first part of the word derived to Teutons and Deutsch whatmeans the Germans. The second partial word means “the rest” (Got. laiba, O.Eng. làf ). Thus the word

Dulebs may be ecplained as “the remnants of the Teutons.” As the local inhabitants have took the name as

their own since long, one can affirm that some part of the Germans (Teotons) remained in Volhynia. The place names the ancestors of the Germans and Czeches brought to new their settlement The place names“Wollin” or “Volin” were brought by the ancestors of Germans and Czechs to new their settlements andthey can be found in Germany and Czechia now.

As is true of the Ukraine as a whole, the most part of place names in Volynia has naturally Slavicorigin; nevertheless, one can find the traces of more ancient settlers in the region. Since the Illyrian

29 VASMER MAX. (1964): Etimologicheskij slovar’ russkogo jazyka ( In Russian. the translation

from German) – Russian etymological dictionary. Volume 1. Moscow: 551.



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language is practically unknown to us, we may try to find place names of Germanic origin, i.e. Teutonicorigin, to be precise. The great bulk of the Germanic place names appeared in the area of the Shatski lakesin the basin of the upper Pripiat’. This area lies far from intensive transport routes, the local population isstable and archaic. The name of these lakes can originate from OUG scaz , “money, cattle,” or Ger. Schatz ,"treasures.” One can speak more confidently about the Teutonic origin of the names of the village Pulemets

and Lake Pulemetske. We can explicate them as “a full measure of grain” (Ger. volle Metze, OUG fulle

mezza – EWDS). The enigmatic for Ukrainians name of another lake, Lutsymer, can be explained as “thesmall sea” (Ger. lütt , lütz , OUG luzzil "small;” OUG mer ; Ger. Meer , "sea"). In this case the attention has to

be drawn to the fact that while similar words exist in other Germanic languages, here and henceforth weshall deal with the typical German features – in particular, with the transition t > z , which is unique inGerman among other Germanic language. The names of Lake Svitjaz’ and the village Pulmo, located on its

banks, can have as well Germanic, as Slavic origin.However, the most persuasive evidence of Teutonic settlements in Volyn is given by the name of

the village Velbovno in Rivne Region, located adjacent to the town of Ostroh on the right bank of the river Horyn’. The name consists of two ancient Germanic words: OUG welb-en, “to arch,” and ovan, "furnace.”An arched furnace having been made of stone is a rather natural thing, but nevertheless it can serve for special purpose. There are along the right bank of the Horyn’ impassable bogs stretched for manykilometers. Therefore the special furnace could be used for smelting iron from marsh ore. The name of the

town of Neteshin which is located adjacent to the village Velbovno can also have Germanic origin. Thesecond part of the word could have the same origin as Ger. Asche "ashes” as each furnace gives ashes butno word with the logical connection to the first partial word has been found in German. More than anything,this place name can be explicated as “a fish net”. The word net means “fishing network” in all Germaniclanguages and the second partial word can have the same origin as Ger Äsche (O.U.G asco) “grayling” (thekind of river fish Thymallus thymallus L.).

These place names can also have German origin:the village of Khobultova, east of the city of Volodymyr Volyns’kyj – Ger . Kobold , “a demonic

being”; the town of Kovel – Ger. Kabel , “destiny, lot,” MLG kavel-en – “to draw lots”;the town of Kiverci – Ger. Kiefer , MUG kiver , "jaw, chin”;the village of Mosyr, northwest of the town of Volodymyr Volyns’kyj, New Mosyr

and Old Mosyr, southwest of Rožyšča in Volin Region – OUG masar to NG møsurr "maple”;the village of Nevel, southwest of the Belarusian city Pinsk – Ger. Nebel , "fog”;the lake Nobel and the village Nobel, located west of the town of Zarične in Rivno

Region on a peninsula of the lake, like to a navel – Ger . Nabel , OUG nabalo, “navel”;the village of Pare on the Prastyr Strait – Ger. Fähre “ferry”;the village of Rastiv, to west of the town of Turijs’k – OUG rasta, "a rest stand,

camp”;the river Styr, the right tributary of the Pripjat’ – Ger . Stör , OUG stür(e), "sturgeon”;The river Tsyr, the right tributary of the Pripiat’ and the village of Tsyr on the bank of

the low Tsyr – Ger. Zier , "ornament,” and OUG zieri, "good, beautiful”.The place names of English origin can be found on the Urheimat of Anglo-Saxons. The ancient city

of Korosten is located on the bank of the river Uša which meanders along granite banks. The name of the

city could have the same origin as Cornish care “rocky ash,” and OE stàn, “stone, rock”. The root care canalso be found in the name of the city of Korostishiv, located on the Teteriv’s rocky left bank. If the second part of the word derives from OE sticca, “stick, staff,” the place name can be explicated as “an ashen stick.”The name of another city is connected to rocks as well: this is the city of Ovruch, located in the Slovechan-Ovruch Hills on the high left bank of the river Norin’. Its name is corresponded to OE of rocc “of rock”.The name of the city of Zhitomyr can lead us to far conclusions. It can be composed from two logicalconnected words OE scyttan "to shut, to hasp" and OE mer æ , “border” which can have the same origin as

Lat mùrus, "wall" (AEW). But the first partial word is similar to Greek Σκυθασ ”a Scythian” (Σκυθια „Scythia") therefore the name of the city can be explicated as “Scythian border”. Indeed, to the south of Žitomyr lied the Scythian land. However we will turn back to this question further. Another defensive



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border could go along the river Už (Uša) where the town of Ushomyr is located. The root mer æ , “border”can be present in the name of this town too but the second partial word is unclear. Maybe it can have Italicorigin as the word mer æ has because this area was settled by Italic tribes before the Germanic people camehere. In that case we can consider Lat. usio, ùsus, "custom," "use" and then Eng use can be loan-word of Italic but not to be borrowed from French.

Some other examples of place names having possible English origin are listed below:the village of Bukcha in Belarus, west of the town of Lelchyci – OE bucca, "a male

goat”;the river Hresla, left tributary of the Uzh – OE hr ī sel , OIcl hrisla "bush”;the villages of Khodory, Khodorkiv and Khodurkiv in Žitomyr Region – OE hā dor ,

“vigorous, brisk”;the village of Klivyny near the town of Chornobyl’ (Chernobyl) – OE cliewen,

“heap”;the village of Kyrdany near the town of Ovruč – OE cyrten, "beautiful”;the river Latovnia, right tributary of the Ten’ka, right tributary of the Tnja, right

tributary of the Sluč – OE latteow , "a leader;”the town of Mozyr’ in Belarus – OE Maser-feld , AS masur to NG møsurr "maple”;the river Morsivka, right tributary of the Riznja, left tributary of the Ir ša, left tributary

of the Teteriv – OE mō r , plural mors, “swamp, moor”;the town of Narovlja on the right bank of the Pripjat’ – OE nearu, “narrow” and w æ l

“pool, source;”the village of Olmany in Belarus, southeast of Stolin – OE oll , “insult, abuse” man,

“fault, sin”;the river Pripjat’ – OE frio, "free", pytt , “water hole, pit”;the river Rikhta, left tributary of the Trostjanycja, right tributary of the Ir ša – OE riht ,

ryht , “good, right, straight”;the village of Syzany on the south of Homel’ Region in Belarus – OE sessian, “to

grow quiet”;the river Zherev, left tributary of the Už, and the river Zhereva, left tributary of the

Teteriv, right tributary of the Dnieper – OE gierwan "to decorate, dress”;the river Zerce, west of Olevs’k – OE sierc "shirt”.

As it was mentioned in the Part 4 of this work (see:http://www.geocities.com/valentyn_ua/AO22b.doc ) some Turkic tribes from the basin of the Dnestr moved to Central Europe, but the great deal of them established their settlements in the Western Ukraineto the south of Indo-European habitats. This vicinity is evidenced by language contacts of the Proto-Bulgars with the Italics and Greeks. When the Italics moved westward, Proto-Bulgars stayed in their settlements longer and get in language contacts with the Germanic peoples. During many centuries their neighbors were the ancestors of modern-day Germans which we will call Teutons. The border between thehabitats of the Proto-Bulgars and the Teutons lay across the watersheds of the Pripjat’ and Dniester. Asthis boundary was indistinct, linguistic contacts between Teutons and Proto-Bulgars were rather close, asit follows from numerous lexical correspondences between the modern German and Chuvash languages.

This phenomenon was been already noted by the Russian scholar Kornilov which gave some examples of German-Chuvash lexical paralleles though did not explaine this fact convincingly30 and his notes fell outattention of scholars.

That the Chuvash language was not taken into consideration in Indo-European studies shows suchexample: Chuv armuti “wormwood” good corresponds to German Wermut , Engl. wormwood . Nosimilarity was found in other Indo-European languages, perhaps Lat artemisia “wormood” can beconsidered here too. F. Kluge assumed the German word could be derived from Western Germanic

30 KORNILOV G.E. (1973): Evraziyskiye leksicheskiye paralleli. ( In Russian). - Eurasian lexical parallels. Chupashkar 88-101.



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*wermóda “bitter” which has a remote semantic parallel in Celtic * swerwo “bitter”31 but this opinion ismistaken. The Chuvash word consists out two parts: er ě m “wormwood” and ut ă “grass, herb”. The first

partial word has parallels in other Turkic languages: Tat. erem, Uzbek. erman, Yakut eberhen all“wormwood”. Thus Germanic words are most likely borrowed from Bulgarish. Turkic origin must havealso Greek αρω µ α "smell, odour" and maybe Lat artemisia “wormood” was borrowed from Bularishwith the metathesis of consonants. This and some other similar coincidences between the German and

Chuvash languages gave an impulse to the purposeful search of German-Chuvash lexical parallels.As the result of this study such Chuvash-Germanic correspondences were discovered:

1. Chuv ă t ă r “otter” - OG *utra, Eng otter , Germ Otter .2. Chuv ă vă s “asp” - OG *apso, OE æps, Germ Espe “asp”.3. Chuv č ak(k) “to stick up” - Germ Zacke “tooth, jag”.4. Chuv čě tre “to tremble” - Germ zittern “to tremble”.5. Chuv yě kel “acorn” - OG *aikel , Germ Eichel “acorn”.6. Chuv k ě rt “ flock” - OG *herdo, Germ Herde, Eng herd , Sw hjord “herd, flock”.7. Chuv karta “fence” - OG * gardon, Germ Garten, Eng garden.8. Chuv l ă bă r “thistle” – OE laber, leber “rush, reed”, Old High Germ leber .9. Chuv mă k ă n’ “poppy” - Germ Mohn “poppy” (old form *mæhon).10. Chuv pě çen “sow-thistle” - Germ Vesen “siftings, bran”.

11. Chuv palt “fast, quick” - OG *bal þa, “bold, courageous”, eng. bold , Germ bald “fast, soon”.12. Chuv papak, pebek “child” (other Türkic bebi, beba, bebek ) - Eng baby.13. Chuv pult ă ran “a kind of parsley” - Germ Baldrian “valerian”. Perheps, Latin name of the plant

Valeriana, that is similar to parsley, is changed accordingly to Lat valere “be strong” and the first formof the name was other. German word is more similar to Tur baldiran “a kind of parsley” and other Türkic names of this plant (in Balkar, Tartarian and Altaian). Therefore, it is not clear, which of thelanguages, German or Latin, adopted the Türkic word first.

14. Chuv t ă r ă “top” - Eng tor “stony top”. See Lat torus too.15. Chuv tu “to do” - Germ tun, Eng to do, Dt doen “to do”.16. Chuv urpa (Turk arpa) “barley” - OG *arwa, Germ Erbse “pea”.17. Chuv. ühě “eagle-owl” - German Uhu “eagle owl”.18. Chuv vak “wake” - OG *wakwo, Germ Wake, Eng wake, Sw vak “wake”.

19. Chuv xajmatl ă x “kindred” - Germ Heimat , (Old High Germ heimoudil), Got haimo þli “homeland”.20. Chuv xaltar ă “to freeze” - OG *kalda, Germ kalt , Eng cold “cold”.21. Chuv xat ă r “cheerful” - OE hador , Germ heiter “cheerful”.22. Chuv xitren “good, fine” - OE cytren “beautiful”.23. Chuv xüte “defence” - OG *hoda, Germ Hut , Eng hood , hat, Swhatt “defence”.24. Chuv ytla “superfluous” - West Germ. *ídla “insignificant, vain”, Germ eitel , Eng idle, Dt ijdel .

The list of Chuvash-Germanic lexical correspondences is enlarged continually and reaches nowmore as forty items (see: http://www.geocities.com/valentyn_ua/TurGrLatEng2.doc). Besides lexical

parallels some other language phenomena may confirm the vicinity Proto-Bulgarish and Germanic tribes.Mayby the labialization of the German front vowels ö and ü took place under the influence of Bulgarish assuch vowels are characteristic for all Turkic languages.

At the end of the 2nd

mill BC the Germanic peoples began movement westward forcing out the Celtic peoples farther in Central Europe. The ancestors of Dutch and Flemings, the most western Germanic peopleon the ancient Germanic territory, moved to the west as far as to the Rhine. The Teutons followed them andstopped on the banks of the Middle Elbe. The way of the Goths and related tribes was determined by thecurrents of the rivers Neman and Narev. They found the place for settlement on the land between the Wistulaand the Neman. North Germanic tribes moved also using the flows of rivers, which led them to the BalticSea, and farther to Scandinavia. The time when the Anglo-Saxons moved to Central Europe is still uncertain.

31 IBID.



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The movement of the Germanic peoples westwards was obviously caused by the increasing impact of the Balts which pressed out also Iranian people from the territory to the east of the Dnepr. Some part of theIranian peoples moved in the direction to Middle Asia along the eastern shore of the Caspian Sea and came tothe territory of modern Iran at the beginning of the 1 st mill BC. Cuneiform sources of that time let know abouttwo groups of Iranians: Medes and Persians but other Iranian peoples not identified by name had to besomewhere east of them. Other Iranian tribes stayed in the Pontic parts.

The review of these events and the reconstruction of the later ethnogenic processes in Eastern Europewas made after the analysis of Slavic languages in the second book. 32

© Valentyn Stetsyuk

32 STETSYUK V.M. (2000): Doslidzhennia peredistorychnykh etnogenetychnykh protsesiv u Skhidniy Evropi. Knuhadruha. (in Ukrainian) - The Research of Prehistoric Ethnogenic Processes in Eastern Europe . Second book. L’viv – Kiev..

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The Germanic, Iranian, Thracian Languages