Germanic substrate hypothesis

The Germanic substrate hypothesis is an attempt to explain the distinctive nature of the Germanic languages within the context of the Indo-European language family. It postulates that the elements of the common Germanic vocabulary and syntactical forms that do not seem to have an Indo-European origin show Proto-Germanic to be a creole language: a contact language synthesis between Indo-European speakers and a non-Indo-European substrate language used by the ancestors of the speakers of the Proto-Germanic language. The theory was first proposed by Sigmund Feist in 1932, who estimated that roughly a third of Proto-Germanic lexical items came from a non-Indo-European substrate and that the supposed reduction of the Proto-Germanic inflectional system was the result of pidginization with that substrate.^[1] The culture and tribes from which the substrate material originated continues to be a subject of academic debate and study. Notable candidates for possible substrate culture(s) are the Ertebølle culture, Funnelbeaker culture, Pitted Ware culture and the Corded Ware culture.

Distinct language group

Grimm's law was a profound sound change that affected all of the stops inherited from Indo-European. The Germanic languages also share common innovations in grammar as well as in phonology, Half of the noun cases featured in what are commonly regarded as the more conservative languages such as Sanskrit, Lithuanian or Slavic languages are missing from Germanic.^[2] (However, other Indo-European languages attested much earlier than the Germanic languages, such as Hittite, also have a reduced inventory of noun cases. It is not certain whether Germanic and Hittite have lost them, or whether they never shared in their acquisition.^[3]) The Germanic verb has also been extensively remodelled, showing fewer grammatical moods, and markedly fewer inflections for the passive voice.

Hybridisation as conjectured cause

It has been suggested^{[citation needed]} that Proto-Germanic arose as a hybrid of two Indo-European dialects, one each of Centum and Satem types, although they would have been mutually intelligible at the time of hybridisation. This hypothesis may help to explain the difficulty of finding the right place for Germanic within the Indo-European family (though the Germanic languages are commonly classified as Centum languages, because of the sound correspondences exemplified in the words *hund, not !sund ("hundred", ~ centum with a guttural fricative according to Grimm's law) and *hwis, not !his ("who", ~ Latin quis)).

Germanic has some words which seem to ignore Grimm's law: *ūp = "up": compare Sanskrit upa- and (Vedic) upári; "help" and Vedic kḷp- = "be adapted". Where Proto-Germanic shows a "p" the typical PIE reflex is "b", however Sanskrit also shows a "p", seemingly indicating that the PIE form also included a "p". However, if this is true, then the Germanic reflex should be ūf instead of *ūp (Note, German auf contains "f" as a result of the much later High German consonant shift in which High German p became f under certain conditions. Thus, both auf and *ūp go back to a previous form containing p).

Non-Indo-European influence

The Germanic substrate hypothesis attempts to explain these features as a result of creolization between an Indo-European and a non-Indo-European language. Writing an introductory article to the Germanic languages in The Major Languages of Western Europe, Germanicist John A. Hawkins sets forth the arguments for a Germanic substrate. Hawkins argues that the proto-Germans encountered a non-Indo-European speaking people and borrowed many features from their language. He hypothesizes that the first sound shift of Grimm's Law was the result of non-native speakers attempting to pronounce Indo-European sounds, and that they resorted to the closest sounds in their own language in their attempt to pronounce them. The Battle-axe people is an ancient culture identified by archaeology who have been proposed as candidates for the people who influenced Germanic with their non-Indo-European speech. Alternatively, in the framework of the Kurgan hypothesis, the Battle-axe people may be seen as an already "kurganized" culture built on the substrate of the earlier Funnelbeaker culture.

A number of root words for modern European words seem to limit the geographical origin of these Germanic influences, such as the root word for ash (the tree) and other environmental references suggest a limited root stream subset which can be localized to northern Europe^[4]

Kalevi Wiik, a phonologist, has put forward a controversial hypothesis that the pre-Germanic substrate was of a non-Indo-European Finnic origin. Wiik claimed that there are similarities between mistakes in English pronunciation typical of Finnish speakers and the historical sound changes from Proto-Indo-European to proto-Germanic.^[5][6] Wiik's argument is based on the assumption that only three language groups existed in pre-Indo-European Europe, namely Uralic, Indo-European and Basque, corresponding to three ice age refugia. Then, Uralic speakers would have been the first to settle most of Europe, and the language of the Indo-European invaders was influenced by the native Uralic population, producing the Germanic protolanguage.^[5][6]

Venemann made a hypothesis of a Basque substrate and a Semitic Superstrate.

Existing evidence of languages outside the three refugia that he proposes, (e.g. the Tyrrhenian Language Family) create a complication to Wiik's theory, meaning it relies upon an undemonstrated link between each of these languages and one of the three proto-languages he proposes.

Words derived from non-Indo-European languages

Hawkins moreover asserts that more than one third of the native Germanic lexicon is of non-Indo-European origin, and again points to the hypothetical substrate language as the cause. Certain lexical fields are dominated by non-Indo-European words according to Hawkins. Seafaring terms, agricultural terms, engineering terms (construction/architecture), words about war and weapons, animal and fish names, and the names of communal and social institutions are centers of non-Indo-European words according to Hawkins. Some English language examples given by Hawkins include:

Seafaring
English	German	Dutch	Swedish	Latin	Greek	Russian
sea	See	zee	sjö	mare	θάλασσα (thalassa)	море (more)
ship	Schiff	schip	skepp	navis	πλοίο (ploio)	плот (судно, корабль) (plot (sudno, korabl))
strand (beach)	Strand	strand	strand	litus, acta	παραλία (paralia)	берег (bereg)
ebb	Ebbe	eb	ebb	decessus, recessus	άμπωτις (ampotis)	отлив (otliv)
steer	steuern	besturen	styra	guberno	κυβερνώ (kuberno)	управлять (upravlyat)
sail	segeln	zeilen	segla	navigo	πλέω (pleo)	плавать (plavat)
keel	Kiel	kiel	köl	carina	καρίνα (karina)	киль (kil)
north	Norden	noorden	nord	septentriones	βορράς (borras)	север (sever)
south	Süden	zuiden	syd	australis, meridies	νότος (notos)	юг (yug)
east	Osten	oosten	öst	oriens	ανατολή (anatoli)	восток (vostok)
west	Westen	westen	väst	occidens	δύση (dysi)	запад (zapad)

Warfare/weapons
English	German	Dutch	Swedish	Latin	Greek	Russian
sword	Schwert	zwaard	svärd	gladius	σπαθί (spathi)	меч (mech)
shield	Schild	schild	sköld	scutum	ασπίδα (aspida)	щит (shchit)
helmet	Helm	helm	hjälm	galea	κράνος (kranos)	шлем (shlem)
bow	Bogen	boog	båge	arcus	τόξο (toxo)	лук (luk)

Animal/Fish
English	German	Dutch	Swedish	Latin	Greek	Russian
carp	Karpfen	karper	karp	cyprinus	κυπρίνος (kyprinos)	карп (karp)
eel	Aal	aal	ål	anguilla	χέλι (cheli)	угорь (ugor)
calf	Kalb	kalf	kalv	vitulus	μοσχάρι (moschari)	телёнок (telyonok)
lamb	Lamm	lam	lamm	agnus	αμνός (amnos)	ягнёнок (yagnonok)
bear	Bär	beer	björn	ursus	άρκτος (arktos)	медведь (medved)
stork	Storch	ooievaar*	stork	ciconia	πελαργός, λελέκι (pelargos, leleki)	аист (aist)

Communal
English	German	Dutch	Swedish	Latin	Greek	Russian
king	König	koning	kung	rex	βασιλεύϛ (basileus)	король (korol)
knight*	Knecht	knecht	knekt	servitus	υπηρέτης (ypiretis)	слуга (sluga)
thing	Ding	ding	ting	res	πράγμα (pragma)	вещь (veshch)

Miscellaneous
English	German	Dutch	Swedish	Latin	Greek	Russian
drink	trinken	drinken	dricka	bibo	πίνω (pino)	пить (pit)
leap (run)	laufen	lopen	löpa	curro	τρέχω (trecho)	бегать (begat)
bone	Bein	been	ben	os	οστούν (ostoun)	кость (kost)
wife (woman)	Weib	wijf	viv	uxor	γυνή (gyni)	жена (zhena)
bride	Braut	bruid	brud	nupta	νύφη (nyfi)	невеста (nevesta)
(bride)groom	(Bräuti)gam	(bruide)gom	(brud)gum	maritus	γαμπρός (gampros)	жених (zhenix)

Controversy

Many of Hawkins's purported non-etymologies are controversial. One obvious way to refute the Germanic substrate hypothesis is to find Indo-European etymologies for the words on Hawkins's list. This process continues, but several cited as examples by Hawkins can likely be eliminated. For example, it is generally agreed that helmet represents IE *kel-, "a concealing covering" (cf. Thracian zelmis - "skin", Old Prussian salmis - "helm"). East relates to IE *h₂eus-ro-, "dawn". Some of the words may have Indo-European derivations that are simply not well preserved in other Indo-European languages. For example, it has been suggested that wife is related to Tocharian B kwipe, "pubes; vulva", from a reconstructed root *gʷíh₂bʰo-. Other possible etymologies include:

• ebb: from *h₂epo "off, away"
• north: from *nr̥tro- which is in turn from *ner- "under, on the left," north being to one's left when facing the rising sun.
• south: from *sunto- which is in turn from *sun-, a variant of *säwel- "the sun"
• west: from *westo- which is in turn from *wes-, reduced form of *wespero "evening"
• shield: from *skel- "to cut"
• stork: from *str̥go- which is the zero-grade form of *ster- "stiff"
• bear: "the brown one" (a taboo avoidance term, or taboo deformation) from *bʰer- "bright, brown"
• drink: from *dʰreng-, presentive of *dʰreg- "to draw, glide"
• groom: (as in bridegroom) from *(dh)ghm̥on which is the zero-grade suffixed form of *dʰgʰom- "earth". The word bridegroom derives from Middle English bridegome and Old English brȳdguma, a compound of brȳd 'bride' and guma 'man'. The intrusive r in Modern English bridegroom is due to contamination with the word groom (of different meaning), the origin of which is unknown.
• ship: from *skei-, a root originally meaning "to cut", or compare Greek σκάπτω = "I dig", referring to a dugout boat.
• strand: from *ster-, meaning "wide, flat".
• king: from Old English cyning. The cyn- part is possibly cognate with Modern English "kin" and related to Latin genus, etc.

Similarly, the word "bear" may not be unique to Germanic languages. In Russian, a bear's lair is berloga, sometimes etymologized as "the lair of ber". Others hold that berloga could be derived from a proto-Slavic word for 'swamp' that also influenced the originally West Slavic origin of the city name Berlin as a "town built on swampy grounds". A number of Slavic languages have cognates of medved for "bear", which meant "honey-eater" < *medʰu + *ed- (though was later taken to mean "honey-knower" by folk etymology). This suggests that a possible ancient Slavic word ber may have been replaced by a euphemism (although the older Slavic word predating ber for a bear was "oster" as in the Oster River in Ukraine^{[citation needed]}). However, supporters of the Germanic substrate hypothesis such as Max Vasmer explain the obvious relation between berloga and the Germanic word for 'bear' by the fact that early Old Norse influences on East Slavic languages cannot be disregarded — see the prevalent Normanist theory regarding the Varangian origin of the Rus people from Scandinavia, from whom also the name of Russia is derived.

Calvert Watkins's 1969 appendix of Indo-European roots in the American Heritage Dictionary listed several roots that were believed to be unique to Germanic at that time. More recent editions have substantially reduced the number of roots claimed to be uniquely Germanic.

More recent treatments of Proto-Germanic tend to reject or simply omit discussion of the Germanic substrate hypothesis. Joseph B. Voyles's Early Germanic Grammar makes no mention of the hypothesis, nor do most other recent publications on the Germanic language family.

Nonetheless, the hypothesis remains popular in some circles, such as the Leiden school of historical linguistics. The first etymological dictionary of any language to systematically take the hypothesis into its discussions is the new Dutch dictionary influenced by the thinking of the Leiden group, which is currently under production: Marlies Philippa et al. (ed), Etymologisch woordenboek van het Nederlands, Amsterdam University press, in 4 volumes, 2003-2009.

References

Footnotes

1. ^ Feist, Sigmund (1932). "The Origin of the Germanic Languages and the Europeanization of North Europe". Language (Linguistic Society of America) 8 (4): pages 245–254. doi:10.2307/408831. JSTOR 408831. 
2. ^ Not all consider languages such as Sanskrit to be conservative in terms of case. Prokosch (1939) wrote: "the common Indo-European element seems to predominate more definitely in the Germanic group than anywhere else."
3. ^ In regards to this issue, Polomé (1990) wrote: "Assuming 'pidginization' in Proto-Germanic on account of the alleged 'loss' of a number of features reconstructed by the Neogrammarians as part of the verbal system of Proto-Indo-European (...) is a rather specious argument. ... The fairly striking structural resemblance between the verbal system of Germanic and that of Hittite rather makes one wonder whether these languages do not actually represent a more archaic structural model than the further elaborated inflectional patterns of Old Icelandic and Hellenic."
4. ^ Cf. Vennemann (2003).
5. ^ ^{a b} Kalevi Wiik, Eurooppalaisten juuret (Finnish) ("Roots of Europeans"), 2002
6. ^ ^{a b} Kalevi Wiik, Suomalaisten juuret (Finnish) ("Roots of Finns"), 2004

Notations

• Eduard Prokosch (1939), A Comparative Germanic Grammar (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania, Linguistic Society of America). ISBN 9-991-03485-4
• John A. Hawkins (1990), Germanic Languages, in The Major Languages of Western Europe, Bernard Comrie, ed. (Routledge). ISBN 0-415-04738-2
• Edgar C. Polomé (1990), Types of Linguistic Evidence for Early Contact: Indo-Europeans and Non-Indo-Europeans. In: Markey-Greppin (eds.) When Worlds Collide 267-89.
• Joseph B. Voyles (1992), Early Germanic Grammar (Academic Press). ISBN 0-12-728270-X
• Robert S. P. Beekes (1995), Comparative Indo-European Linguistics: An Introduction (John Benjamins). ISBN 1-55619-505-2
• Calvert Watkins. ed. (1985), The American Heritage Dictionary of Indo-European Roots (Houghton Mifflin) ISBN 0-395-36070-6
• Calvert Watkins, ed. (2000), The American Heritage Dictionary of Indo-European Roots, second edition (Houghton Mifflin). ISBN 0-618-08250-6
• Orrin W. Robinson (1992), Old English and its Closest Relatives: A Study of the Earliest Germanic Languages (Stanford). ISBN 0-8047-2221-8
• Theo Vennemann (2003), "Languages in prehistoric Europe north of the Alps," Languages in Prehistoric Europe, eds Alfred Bammesberger & Theo Vennemann (Heidelberg: C. Winter), 319-332.
• Kalevi Wiik (2002), Eurooppalaisten juuret (in Finnish; "Roots of Europeans".
• Kalevi Wiik (2004), Suomalaisten juuret (in Finnish; "Roots of Finns").

See also

• Pre-Germanic
• Old European hydronymy
• Language shift
• Neolithic Europe
• Theo Vennemann