Re: Ancient Veneti Warrios

[Domen]

Here I answer some questions that I was asked on another forum regarding those two posts above:

How is it possible to tell from a 2000-year-old skull what language was spoken by its owner when alive?

It is not about language it is about ancestry.

It says that majority of Slavs who lived in this area in Medieval were descendants of people who lived in this area in the Roman era.

It doesn't necessarily mean that those people spoke Slavic languages already in the Roman era.

It doesn't say what language they spoke in the Roman era. But Anthropological data suggests that it is untrue that the bulk of population of this area moved somewhere else (to the West and to the South), and then was replaced by new population coming from the East.

If such a massive population replacement took place, Western Slavs would have different skulls than Roman era population of the same land.

On the other hand, the results of anthropological research show that most of Medieval population in Vistula and Oder basins were descendants of Roman era population from the same territory - not of people who came from the East after local population moved on to the West and South.

It also shows that people from Scandinavia (i.e. migrating Goths) were not a significant portion of population in Vistula and Oder basins. Not only Scandinavians, but also populations from lands of modern Germany had different anthropological features than Vistula-Oder population.

The similarity of skulls of the medieval population of a particular area to the skulls of a much older population living in the same region simply shows that there was no physical replacement of population in the intervening period, ie the medieval population was physically descended from the older one.

However, such similarity does not exclude the possibility of changes in the culture and language of that population between the two periods examined. That is to say, the fact that a particular language was spoken in the area where the medieval skulls were found does not mean that the same language was spoken by the physically similar population that lived in the same area in much earlier times, say Roman times.

An example is provided by the extensive germanisation of large Slavic populations in medieval times in the territory east of the Elbe. Presumably a Slav-speaker who learned to speak German and adopted a German culture would not thereby undergo a change of skull-shape.

Thus, the German-speaking population of a particular area might be substantially descended from a population that was Slavic-speaking in previous centuries, and therefore would have the same skull-shape as its physical ancestors, despite the change in language and culture.

In similar vein, a medieval Slavic-speaking population might be substantially descended from a population that spoke a Germanic language in Roman times.

Exactly! All of your points are correct. But it shows that the story about great migration of entire population, who left only deserted land behind them, and then was replaced by new (Slavic-speaking) population who came from the East - is wrong. Moreover, it shows that majority of Medieval Slavic-speaking population had ancestors in the same territory in the Roman era (which of course doesn't mean that those ancestors were also Slavic-speaking, but it denies the old theory of complete switch of population, with a period of totally deserted land in between).

By the way - genetic (haplogroups) research shows the same conclusion, and we already had a discussion about this on another forum.

Those are the sort of factors that make it very difficult to draw conclusions from the comparison of alleged "Slavic" skulls with alleged "German" skulls. If skulls from two different areas show marked differences in form, that shows a degree of genetic distance between the populations of those two areas, but those physical differences say nothing about the cultural and linguistic relationship of the two populations.

Yes, the research doesn't say that those were Slavic skulls. But it says that those were skulls of descendants of Medieval Slavic population of the same territory, rather than of descendants of Medieval Germanic population of diffferent parts of Europe (where Goths and other Germanic tribes, who allegedly lived in large numbers in the area of modern Poland during the Roman era, migrated). In other words - when you want to look for Medieval descendants of people who lived at the Vistula during the reign of Emperor Augustus, you will find majority of them living in the same place (also at the Vistula) during the reign of Charlemagne - rather than somewhere else (for example in Italy and Spain, where the Goths migrated).

Thus, the German-speaking population of a particular area might be substantially descended from a population that was Slavic-speaking in previous centuries, and therefore would have the same skull-shape as its physical ancestors, despite the change in language and culture.

Yes, when you change language, the shape of your skull is not changing because of this. So there are many modern Germans who descend from Medieval Slavs of Vistula and Oder basins, who in turn descend from Ancient population of the same area (Vistula and Oder basins).

This research is not completely denying that some migrations of various ethno-linguistic groups took place.

But this research is showing that majority of population of Vistula and Oder basins was stationary between Ancient and Medieval times. This contradicts the old theory that entire population moved away to Western and Souther Europe, being replaced by new population from the East.

skulls measuring and all this is like the nazi research before 1945 or Virchow -style.

Nazi measuring was claiming that one skull (and its owner) is inherently better than another skull (and its owner). And they claimed this basing on differences in skull shapes, which are completely immaterial except for purely comparative and parentage researching purposes.

It would be like claiming that people with fair hair are better because of hair colour (actually that's what the Nazis also claimed).

These 19th century research thought to classify people by skull features. Thas was already shown as nonsense decades ago.

Anthropology was shown as nonsense decades ago? Then why is this science still existing?

The 19th century research was thought to prove that owners of some skulls are superior to owners of other skulls because of their skulls (and such). But it is a matter of fact that various populations have - statistically - different shapes of nose, face, mouth, eyes, skull, etc.

Another thing is that shapes of skull, nose, eyes, etc., have no impact on mental abilities of its owner.

Not Anthropology is nonsense, but to make conclusion for ethnic groups on the base of skull features or genetic research.

If you define ethnic groups as language groups (like me) then it is not making any conclusions.

It makes conclusions when it comes to parentage, descent.

It concludes that descendants of Medieval Slavic population did not come from the East, but lived where they were.

It is possible that their Roman era descendants did not speak Slavic languages, of course.

But this research also proves, that there were no significant and / or long-lasting populations of Goths from Scandinavia in Vistula and Oder basins. Either there were relatively small groups of Goths from Scandinavia, or there could be large groups who quickly moved forward without staying in this area (Vistula-Oder) for a long time, and without interbreeding much with local populations.

If there were significant Gothic populations for long time, more skulls with Scandinavian shapes would be found.

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Here the discussion quoted above took place:

http://historum.com/european-history/609...ost1558535