The Contact Area=I2+R1a+R1b >> PIE & the Urheimat: The Contact Area is where I2/Cucuteni people met first with R1a than with R1b. I quote from the Eupedia page reffering to R1b, to the origin of indo-europeans: It is not yet entirely clear when R1b crossed over from eastern Anatolia to the Pontic-Caspian steppe. This might have happened with the appearance of the Dnieper-Donets culture (c. 5100-4300 BCE). This was the first truly Neolithic society in the Pontic-Caspian Steppe. The first clearly Proto-Indo-European culture was Sredny Stog (4600-3900 BCE) ... There is evidence of population blending from the variety of skull shapes. Towards the end of the 5th millennium, an elite starts to develop with cattle, horses and copper used as status symbols. Archeology also shows a clear diffusion of bronze working and kurgan-type burials from the Maykop culture to the Pontic Steppe, where the Yamma culture developed soon afterwards (from 3500 BCE)... The Yamna period (3500-2500 BCE) is the most important one in the creation of Indo-European culture and society. Middle Eastern R1b people had been living and blending to some extent with the local R1a foragers and herders for over a millennium, perhaps even two or three. The close cultural contact and interactions between , R1a and R1b people all over the Pontic-Caspian Steppe resulted in the creation of a common vernacular, a new lingua franca, which linguists have called Proto-Indo-European (PIE). It is pointless to try to assign another region of origin to the PIE language. end of quote, I have inserted the parts. Maybe when we talk about blending peoples, technologies & cultures in this Contact Area to produce the PIE people and culture we should consider that in this blending I2 Cucuteni culture/people had the following contributions: 1] farming came to the PIE area from Cucuteni people/culture 2] first metal products, gold and copper came from I2/Cucuteni imports 3] pottery came from Cucuteni people which worked with fire at such high temperatures that today it is difficult to reproduce the way they used to burn their houses. Look to the maps refering to the Burning House Horizon!! The Burning House Horizon covers all the PIE homeland!! 4] and very important SALT came from Moldova, Carpathian mountains. Salt was important to people, to herding AND to food conservation. Food conservation helped people to travel on longer distances and for sure helped in herds and population increase. First salt went down the rivers from the mountains, there are some very nice studies regarding the relation between first neolithic sites and salt mines. Then salt was carried further with wagons and cattle. Cucuteni people for a long time made trade with the kurgan people and mixed with them, Cucuteni culture and farming spread east, there is evidence that very large quantities of salt were transported east to the pontic steppes from the Carpathians. Life is not possible without salt, salt mines were essential for first Thracian large settlements also, see the rich Varna Culture. 5] Also consider that the area between Cucuteni and Vinca, ie Transilvania, was later 5.1]the turntable from where Urn culture spread to W Europe, 5.2]the area, turntable from where proto-celts conquered all W Europe and also 5.3] maybe the area from where indo-europeans invaded for the first time Greece - see the relation between Wietenberg culture / bronze objects / technology and Micenian swords / bronze technoogy. Wietenberg culture used tin from Bohemia and probably preceded Unetice and western bronze technology. 6] we could consider that the lower Danube next to the Cucuteni area was the entrance of Indo-Europeans in Europe. 7] Coming back to the way people from Cucuteni used fire at high temperatures, when they made pottery or when they burned the houses. These high temperatures are essential for copper technology - over 1100 degrees Celsius. The Cucuteni people were the first to use cremation, after Cucuteni people the Wietenberg culture after 2000BC were the predecessors of Urn Culture, using the first cremation in Transylvania. From Transylvania, Urn culture spread W, later Dacians used also cremation. There seem to be a continuity in using a lot the fire: fine pottery / Cucuteni, the best bronze technology in their time / Wietenberg culture, Iron / the Dacians and all of them cremation of the dead. So all in all when we talk about blending of haplogroups, technologies and cultures to produce the proto indo europeans we should not forget the I2 HP, the HP that dominated Europe for so many thousands of years after the last Ice Age, the Continuity theory of Alinei, the first human civilizations of the world from Old Europe. Cucuteni was there right in the eye of the storm, part of the Contact Area. Populations in Cucuteni and Vinca area were, were so strong that R1b and R1a were not able to displace them. R1b spread to W Europe which was less populated, easier to be conquered, while R1a spread to N& Central Europe for same reason. On their way up the Danube, the new haplos avoided the W of former Yugoslavia where today I2 has highest percentages. Gimbutas said that kurgan people destroyed Old Europe. But for a long time, Cucuteni culture co-existed with kurgan people, traded with them, even expanded to E. When Cucuteni culture vanished the blending was over,A new mixtures took the place of the Old Europeans, stronger populations with better technology and more competitive social behaviour. Stroger mixtures that had everything, just replace the older culture, maybe better adapted also to climate changes. The new mixture had all the new technologies, farming, herding, horses/chariots, metallurgy and also the more competitive social organization - they were fierce warriors but in the same time they were not using slavery they had elites but no crushing state/aristocracy. eupedia/europe/Haplogroup_R1b_Y-DNA.shtml
Posted on: Tue, 06 Jan 2015 20:11:53 +0000
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