Who were the first settlers on the Balkans?

Originally posted by etnosoul ILIAD The Illyrian variants of the Trojan War have been lost. The Homeric saga is a mere translation of an early oral heritage created immediately after the war.

Illyrian variants? Who says they existed? Evidence?

a) The Illyrians didn't write at that time.
b) At the time of the war the Illyrians were still moving from the Danube region down to Illyricum.
c) Recently Linear B tablets of the two Epos were found in Greece and are dated just 80 years after the war.

In any case ther whole issue has been discussed elsewhere... I have nice material from cultures that lived in the area around 6000 BC but i guess i will have to make a separate thread to avoid this mess.

Originally posted by chicagogeorge I challenge anyone to find an ancient source claiming Pelasgians are connected to Illyrians or Albanians

Because there isn't source of the period, you cannot claim them as greece.
The only source or connection is through the language.

Review the posts.



Edited by EagleAl - 12-Sep-2007 at 18:33

The mythology of greek it isn't greeks but is Yllirian - Albanian, all the names and words have sense only in Albanian dialectic language! Informed your self take an Albanian dictionary and the Iliad in original language like Homer write it, comparate the worlds by your self!When Homer was born, the Greeks had just recently learned how to use the alphabet from the Phoenicians. Homer lived around 700 BC, in the Archaic period in Greece. No one knows where in Greece he lived exactly, and Homer didn't make up these stories, or even the words, himself. The Greeks lived in a lot of little city-states they do not have a nation and in the Bronze Age each one had in its own city a king.Before the Trojan war there is no indication of helens.Greeks were invited by pelasgians in their cities .

Additional Details

"Zeus" survives as "Zot" in the Albanian language and it's mean "VOICE". The invocation of his name is the common form of oath among the modern Albanians. "Athena" ( the Latin Minerva), the goddess of wisdom as expressed in speech, would evidently owe its derivation to the Albanian "E Thena," which simply means "speech." "Thetis," the goddess of waters and seas, would seem to be but Albanian "Deti" which means "sea."
- The word "Ulysses,"whether in its Latin or Greek form "Odysseus," means "traveler" in the Albanian language, according as the word "udhe,"(udhetues) which stands for "route" and "traveler," is written with "d" or "l," both forms being in use in Albanian.

Even the name GREEK isn�t greek! Romans added their latin suffix -ci making it Graeci. Well, in Pelasgian mythology �Graia� or �Graes� were three old ladies sisters of the monsters called Gorgon and u can grab any mythology book and read their story. In Albanian language "Gra" means exactly that, �Old Ladies�. Singular "Grua/Gruaja" and plural "Gra".

According to mythology Illyrios was the child of Cadmus & Harmonia. And Cadmus was the son of Agenor who was a greek hero! So all old greeks were pelasgians. So the old helen only by languge different from other pellasgians(illyrians, epiriots, macedonians). They rapresent only a partial culture of a big nation. The question is:"what are the new greeks"?

The Y-Chromosome Haplogroup Frequency- The Today Greek CHART Population hg1 hg2 hg3 hg4 hg7 hg8 hg9 hg10 hg12 hg13 hg16 hg21 hg22 hg26 hg28 Greek 11 22 8 0 0 0 28 0 0 0 0 28 0 3 0 POPULATION DNA DISTANCE FROM Greeks: 1 Cypriot 8 -2 Turkish 21- 3 Ashkenazi Jews 23-4 Sephardic Jews 24-5 Romanian 26 -6 Muslim Kurds 26-7 Bulgarian 29-8 Armenian 30 -9 Kurdish Jews 32
- today greek blood and DNA: The genotype and allele frequencies of the 9.1-kb polymorphism in 1,844 unrelated healthy donors from Mediterranean populations living in 26 different geographic locations. The frequency of the 9.1 kb + allele is remarkably uniform and less than 0.50 across the different populations living in North Africa and Greece and ranges from 0.44 (Casablanca) to 0.49 (Athens)!!

more important element in the population of Greece is formed by the Albanians (ca.240 000), called Arvanitae (Arnaouts) by the Greeks, while they name themselves Skyptars'
Karl Baedeker Greece: 'Handbook for Travelers' in 1909
in Homer's Iliad, and Odyssey, whilst the aristocrats such as Achilles and Menelaus have blond hair, the slaves Eurybates and Thersites are brunet. Indeed, the Greek orator Dio of Prusa noted that the Greek ideal of beauty was a Nordic one. The Greeks, he said, admired the blond Achilles, but thought that the barbarian Trojan Hector, was black-haired. [G�nther (1956).]
The poet Bacchylides said that the women of Sparta were blonde, and Dicaearchus said much the same thing about the women of Thebes. [G�nther (1956).] For the Greeks, the most beautiful woman who ever lived, Helen, was a blonde, as were those mythical men such as Adonis, who were famed for their handsomeness. [Sieglin (1935).]

The Albanian population structure is analyzed based on the allele frequencies of six classic genetic markers: ACP, GC, PGM1, AK, ADA, and 6PGD. The results show a significant heterogeneity between the Albanian population: the frequencies of some alleles, particularly those of the PGM*1W31 variant, and the analysis of the R matrix still show the actual peculiar genetic structure of the Albanians!
Albania = 75% Dinaric, 10% West Mediterranean, 10% Alpine, 5% Noric = 5% periphery Nordish.
Rif: http://www.racialcompact.com/n ordishrace.html

An oft-quoted passage from the 4th c. AD Jewish writer Adamantius Judaeus is used to prove that the original Greeks were tall, pale, blond and light-eyed, not dark like they are today!

Argonautica, the Greek poet Apollonius Rhodius, describes the hero Jason, and all fifty of the Argonauts, as blond-haired. [Sieglin (1935).] When the heroine Electra, in Euripides' play of that name, finds a lock of her brother Orestes' hair, on the grave of their father Agamemnon, she can tell that it is his hair, because of its distinctive blond colour. It would appear that the nobility of ancient Greece was distinguished from the dark masses, by its many blond members. [Ridgeway (1909).

Pelasgians" is the name generally given by ancient writers to the peoples before the Hellenes. According to both Herodotus and Thucyclides, Pelasgians formed the largest element of the early population of Greece and the Aegean, and most of them were gradually assimilated by the Hellenes. Herodotus saw this transformation as following the invasion by Danaos (the Egyptian). The idea that the Pelasgians were the native population, converted to something more "Greek" by the invading Egyptians, also occurs in the plays of Aischylos and Euripides, written around the same time as Herodotus' Histories .

All over the world nationalist system changed textbooks and rewrote history which is of course reflected and then defended by the former students of the given system. This is how most of human history operates!

The semi-annual movements up and down the mountains in the western Balkans have never been a small or isolated matter since the absolute majority of the population have always been semi-nomadic pastoralists. The Spring migration relatively depopulated the lowland areas and their arrival back in the fall swelled these areas with people again. Since the summer was the season of war and invasions and, armies normally travelled along natural passages such as rivers and valleys, there were usually sparce targets for plunder for any ouside raiders in the rural areas of the western Balkans.

The migrations in the Spring, in ancient times, were marked by celebrations and festivals honoring the rebirth of things from the dead. Cerimonial bonfires were lit and there were parades of people decorated in green leaves to honor the god Dionysos who symbolized this season of rebirth and fertility. Later, in Christian times, the great spring movements were preceded by the feast of St. George, the warrior saint and "rider of the green horse", every April 23. In the Fall, at the time of the return from the mountains, there were similar festivals centered on the ancient deity of Demeter, goddess of the dead and later, as the feast of St. Demeterus every October 8.

Our deepest roots are likely centered in the Dinaric range, in the area of today's northern Albania and the southern half of the former Yugoslavia. This is the area where the Greeks first recorded the existence of a people whom they called the Illyrians.
Legends say Illyrios, the son of Cadus and Harmonia was the person from whom all Illyrians were descended. Cadus was told by the oracle to go northwards from Boeotia and live with a people known as the Encheleians and become their king. After their son Illyrios was born a snake came and wound itself around the baby's body and imparted mystical powers to him. Later, his mother and father were both turned into serpents and cast out to live in the fields.
The Greek word: "Ilir" meaning "to turn" or "to wind", is thought to be the origin of the name Illyrios, and thus also, Illyrian. In historical times Encheleians were one of the southernmost Illyrian tribes, one of the first encountered by the Greeks. Their lands were centered near Lake Ohrid (on today's border of Albania and Macedonia), after a southward migration in earlier times. The tribal name "Encheleae" stems from the Greek word for "eel" (which was actually more akin to "serpent" in those times), and means "eel-people". The Encheleae are known to have worshiped snakes and decorated their shields with images of serpents.


The content of this legend strongly suggests to some scholars that the Greeks coined the term "Illyrian" based only on their early knowledge of the Encheleae tribe. The term was likely applied it to all similar tribes in the Dinarics they encountered later. It is doubtful the Illyrians ever used this term to actually identify themselves, prior to late Roman times. This is because the Illyrians were not a unified civilization or culture and rarely more than a loose political entity as a people. Rather, they were autonomous tribes and sometimes tribal confederations. Even though they were known to have shared many common cultural traits, which identified them to outsiders as Illyrians, it appears the cultural differences from tribe to tribe were extreme enough for them see themselves as each being distinct tribal-nations or kingdoms. It also appears inter-tribal warfare was more common than inter-tribal confederations.

There were over seventy major "Illyrian" tribes and several minor ones. Surviving records indicate how some of these tribes were organized. Each tribe contained usually three or four "brotherhoods" of about twelve or thirteen clans each. Each clan numbered about 150-200 warriors and their associated families. The leaders of each brotherhood also formed the membership a tribal council. The brotherhoods seemed to control certain geographic areas and the authority to re-apportion the land and other properties within it to their own clans. One of these brotherhoods is said to have redistributed property on a regular basis, every eighth year. However, it is believed there were probably wide variations in tribal organization and sizes thoughout the Illyrian lands.


ILLYRIANS

Between 8000-6000 B.C. was the Mesolithic (Middle Stone Age) in the Balkans. People survived by hunting, fishing and food gathering. From 6000 and 4000 B.C., during the Neolithic ("New Stone Age") agriculture spread northwards to the banks of the Danube river. This Mediterranean agricultural people raised cereals duch as wheat, beans and barley, and bred livestock, cattle, sheep, pigs and goats. Tools and weapons were still made of stone and the tribes were almost totally matriarchial in social structure and the worship was of female mother-earth goddesses, and the mystery of birth growth and fertility.

About 4000- 3500 B.C. new people began to make intrusions into the Balkans from somewhere north of the Black Sea, in central Asia. They were fast moving Indo-European nomads and they brought radical changes such as . new technology, in the form of bronze metal working for tools and weapons, the wheel and the domesticated horse for transporation. Their social structure was patriarchal and their religion focused on male-warrior sky gods and warrior cults of the wolf and horse. They assimulated or were assimulated by the existing settled Mediterranean agricultural propulations of the Balkans (Pelasgians?) and began to emerge as separate and identifiable cultural groups for the first time in this new era called the Bronze Age.
Archealogists have identifed the Illyrians of the Dinaric mountains as one of the original Bronze Age cultures to emerge in the Balkans, along with their neighbors the Thracians, Moesians and Dacians. Scholars feel the cultural development of the Illyrians was extremely slow, fragmented and uneven, because of their isolation, which apparently resulted in the great diversity and independence of the tribes who finally emerged from the Bronze-age.

About a thousand years after the formation of these original Balkan cultures another new people, the ancestors of the Greeks, arrived in the Balkans. These Greek-speakers moved in from the east and pushed southwards, through Thrace and Moesia, bypassing the Dinarics. These Greek-speakers mixed with the rural agricultural peoples (Pelasgians?) in the north and interior areas and then with some Aegen coastal peoples in the more southern areas. In the north and interior agricultural regions the Greek-�Pelasgian' combination is thought to have produced later the "Dorian" and other northern Greek cultural groups. In the south, the Greek-Aegean Coastal mixture produced a powerful maritime trading civilization called the Mycean (centered in the Peloponnese of southern Greece). The Aegean peoples, found by the Greeks, in the south are thought to have been heavily influenced by earlier Persian/Egyptian and Phonecian civilizations and their social organizations (which also probably produced the nearby Mionian civilization on the island of Crete, which the Myceans soon absorbed).

About 1200 B.C. the Myceans along with many other advanced and dominate Mediterranean civilizations were devastated by an apparent general and concurrent uprising by "rural peoples" who had gained enough new iron technology and military techniques to be able to throw off the domination of more advanced city-state civilizations. Shortly after this time, there were large general population movements and disruptions throughout Europe which brought another wave of new cultures, this time from the north, into the area of the Balkans which may have, in turn, pushing the Hellenes or "northern Greeks" southwards. Many of the former Myceans fled into Attica to the protection of Athens, and later to Anitolia (modern Turkey) and Syria as well as the islands of the eastern Aegean.

legends of some of the Illyrian tribes being descended in some way from the Trojans, in both Greek and Illyrian mythology. The Dardanian tribe of the Kosovo plain, just northeast of Albania and the northern Illyrian Veniti (later, the founders of Venice, in Italy) both, for example, had this tradition of Trojan ancestory. This is strange, considering that archealogical evidence shows an opposite movement of peoples, from the Balkans eastward into Anitolia (today's Turkey and Armenia), not too long before the sack of Troy. In fact, the tribes of the Phrygians and Armenians, who displaced the Hittites from that area, are now thought to have originally been either Thracians, Moesians or Illyrians, or a combination of some or all of these peoples.

The Illyrians have been a great mystery to most scholars for centuries, probably because only a few detailed scientific facts were known about them until recently and, the existing historical records concerning them were vague or incomplete. This lack of knowledge put them at the heart of many fantastic theories and speculations, many of which have been recently discarded because of new archealogical evidence combined with better and more objective historical analysis. However, even some of the new and more objective proposals about them seem no less interesting or fantastic. For example, some Balkan and Italian archealogists have now both proposed that "an Illyrian migration" into Apulia, on the �heel' of Italy, between 1300-1200 B.C. resulted in the Messapic culture there, and that later these same people also migrated to Sicily. They have gone as far as to classify the �native' Sicans and Sicels, who lent their name to the island, as being of actual "Illyrian" origin. Some Russian scholars also, for example, have proposed that an Illyian tribe called the Neuri, who migrated northwards in the 6th century B.C. past the Gaete River, as being the ancestors of a certain people, later to be called the Slavs, who originated in that same area. Of course, the critical question is how precisely can they define what is actully "Illyrian" in light of all the diversity that has been found of the people grouped under that label?

The Greeks claimed the Illyrians occupied all the lands beyond Epirus and Thrace, up to the Danube-Drava river line. This was a huge area and, although the majority of it was mountainous and pastoral, it also contained significant agricultural and coastal areas as well on its northern and western peremiters, respectively. In actual fact, it appears there were many Illyrian sub-cultures within this defined area, with many being much less Illyrian than more.

In early times the northern areas seem to have been Italo-Illyrian; Celto-Illyrian; and Daco-Illyian. To the east, Thraco-Illyian. To the south, Epriot-Illyrian or, perhaps even Pelasgian-Illyrian. In the late Bronze-age there may have been a pressure from the north or an expansion out of the mountains which pushed some Illyrians further east into Thrace or, even into Anitolia; also southwards for a ways into both northern Eprius and Thessaly and, westwards across the Adritiac to Italy.

About 500 years later, as Greece emerged from the dark ages, the Greek influence began to spread northwards along the Adriatic coast and the eastern mainland through Thessaly and into Epirus. Around this same time the Macedoneans, orignally a �Doric' tribe also apparently emerged as a separate identifiable people in the gap between the Pindus and Dinaric ranges (in central Albania) and moved eastwards to displace some existing Thracian and Illyrian tribes living along the Thermaic Gulf. The Macedoneans soon developed into a stong poltical power who often faced-off against their Illyrian neighbors.

The first Greek settlement in Illyrian lands took place when the Corinthins established a trading post on the island of Corfu in 733 B.C. off the coast of today's southern Albania. A second Corinthian trading post was established a hundred years later, about 630 B.C. farther north and on the coast of the mainland, in an area called Dyrrhachium. It was known first as Epidamnus and is today's modern Albanian port city of Durres. In 588 B.C. a third post, called Glyaceia, was established on the Illyrian-Epriot frontier to the south, it was later renamed Apollonia, in honor of the Greek god Apollo. During the following centuries, these outposts would grow into flourishing cities facilitating trade between Greece and Italy by sea and, also overland with the Balkans and Danube basin. Very little is recorded about the relationships between the Greeks and Illyians and Epriots at these trading posts during their early years however, it does appear that the Greek post in Epidamnus took on a distinct "Illyrian character" over time, rather than the other way around.

The first detailed record of Greek contact with Illyrians was in 421 B.C., as recorded by Thucydides in his History of the Peloponnesian War. He tells of a Spartan army who encountered a group of Illyrian mercenaries and were so unnerved by their first sight of these people, "by their warlike nature" and loud battle cries, that they quickly retreated. Thucydides then goes on to relate the often quoted speech given by Spartan commander to help calm his troops and rebuild their courage.

In 393 B.C. the Illyrians invaded and plundered Macedonia, then ruled by Amyntas III, grandfather of Alexander the Great. They raided Macedonia again in 384 B.C. and in the following year also attacked the Molossian tribes in Epirus. This was the start of an era of continuious warfare in the area involving the Illyrians against various foes, especially the Macedonians.

Why must you copy and paste nonsense.

Originally posted by etnosoul The mythology of greek it isn't greeks but is Yllirian - Albanian, all the names and words have sense only in Albanian dialectic language! Informed your self take an Albanian dictionary and the Iliad in original language like Homer write it, comparate the worlds by your self!When Homer was born, the Greeks had just recently learned how to use the alphabet from the Phoenicians. Homer lived around 700 BC, in the Archaic period in Greece. No one knows where in Greece he lived exactly, and Homer didn't make up these stories, or even the words, himself. The Greeks lived in a lot of little city-states they do not have a nation and in the Bronze Age each one had in its own city a king.Before the Trojan war there is no indication of helens.Greeks were invited by pelasgians in their cities .

Complete and utter bullsh*t. I will not even respond to this.



Actually, if you can translate this portion of the Illiad in your language than I will stop



If you can read Greek notice the first word, third line from the bottom, and the second to last word in the passage, it's Dios=Zeus, NOT ZOT.

Originally posted by etnosoul Additional Details "Zeus" survives as "Zot" in the Albanian language and it's mean "VOICE". The invocation of his name is the common form of oath among the modern Albanians.

How ignorant. Zeus, was known as Dias, and even in Mycenaean Linear B tablets which date back to 1400 BC, he was known as DI-U-JA (month-name DIWIOIOS). A far cry from Zot or what ever the hell you call it.

Originally posted by etnosoul "Athena" ( the Latin Minerva), the goddess of wisdom as expressed in speech, would evidently owe its derivation to the Albanian "E Thena," which simply means "speech." "Thetis," the goddess of waters and seas, would seem to be but Albanian "Deti" which means "sea."

More b.s. Athena......Linear B tablets 1400 bc. was known to the Greeks as
A-TA-NA PO-TI-NI-JA (Potnia). What is thena deti crap?

Originally posted by etnosoul - The word "Ulysses,"whether in its Latin or Greek form "Odysseus," means "traveler" in the Albanian language, according as the word "udhe,"(udhetues) which stands for "route" and "traveler," is written with "d" or "l," both forms being in use in Albanian.

You don't read do you? Previous page......I proved that Odysseus from Greek οδυσσομαι (odyssomai) "to hate". In Greek legend Odysseus was one of the Greek heroes who fought in the Trojan War. In the 'Odyssey' Homer relates Odysseus's misadventures on his way back to his kingdom and his wife Penelope. Udhe has no connection to this name.....

Originally posted by etnosoul Even the name GREEK isn�t greek! Romans added their latin suffix -ci making it Graeci. Well, in Pelasgian mythology �Graia� or �Graes� were three old ladies sisters of the monsters called Gorgon and u can grab any mythology book and read their story. In Albanian language "Gra" means exactly that, �Old Ladies�. Singular "Grua/Gruaja" and plural "Gra".

Why you are void of any knowledge of ancient history. You have never read Aristotle who tells us exactly where the name Graeci come from.

Originally posted by etnosoul According to mythology Illyrios was the child of Cadmus & Harmonia. And Cadmus was the son of Agenor who was a greek hero! If you are even remotely interested in the myth of Cadmus and Harmonia read here. http://www.timelessmyths.com/classical/thebes.html [QUOTE=etnosoul]  So all old greeks were pelasgians. So the old helen only by languge different from other pellasgians(illyrians, epiriots, macedonians). They rapresent only a partial culture of a big nation. The question is:"what are the new greeks"?

Epirotes and Macedonians

Livy wrote, � The Aetolians, the Acarnanians, the Macedonians, men of the same speech, are united or disunited by trivial causes that arise from time to time ��
(Livy, History of Rome, b. XXXI par. XXIX).

The Acarnanians, and the �tolians, like many other nations, are at present worn out, and exhausted by continual wars. The �tolians however, in conjunction with the Acarnanians, during a long period withstood the Macedonians and the other Greeks.

Strabo, Geographia, Book 10, Chapter 2, 23.

"The Molotti also were Epirot�, and were subjects of Pyrrhus Neoptolemus, the son of Achilles, and of his descendants, who were Thessalians. The rest were governed by native princes. Some tribes were continually endeavouring to obtain the mastery over the others, but all were finally subdued by the Macedonians, except a few situated above the Ionian Gulf."

Strabo, 7.7.1

"Pyrrhus, the king of Epirus, had a particularly high opinion of his powers because he was deemed by foreign nations a match for the Romans; and he believed that it would be opportune to assist the fugitives who had taken refuge with him, especially as they were Greeks, and at the same time so forestall the Romans with some plausible excuse before he should suffer injury at their hands. For so careful was he about his good reputation that though he had long had his eye on Sicily and had been considering how he could overthrow the power of the Romans, he shrank from taking the initiative in hostilities against them, when no wrong had been done him."


Cassius Dio, Book 9.4

---

"Zeus Archon, Dodonean, Pelasgian, who dwells afar, ruling on rough wintered Dodona, surrounded by the Selloi, the interpreters of your divine will, whose feet are unwashed and sleep on the ground".

Homer, Iliad 16:127 (Achilles prayer)

XI. "War was at the same time proclaimed against the Tarentines (who are still a people at the extremity of Italy), because they had offered violence to some Roman ambassadors. These people asked aid against the Romans of Pyrrhus, king of Epirus, who derived his origin from the family of Achilles...

XIII. "...Thus the ambassador of Pyrrhus returned; and, when Pyrrhus asked him "what kind of a place he had found Rome to be," Cineas replied, that "he had seen a country of kings, for that all there were such, as Pyrrhus alone was thought to be in Epirus and the rest of Greece."

Eutropius (Abridgment of Roman History) Historiae Romanae Breviarium


"Arha Ellas apo Oricias kai arhegonos Ellas Epiros"

"Greece starts at Oricus and the most ancient part of Greece is Epirus."

Claudius Ptolemy, The Geographer


�Peleus is the forefather of the kings of Epiros�

Pausanias, II (Corinth).

Peleus being the son of King Aeacus (the dynasty's name) and the father of Achilles.

�but we know of no Greek before Pyrros who fought against Rome.�

Pausanias, 1.11

�So Pyrros was the first to cross over against Rome from mainland Greece, and even so he went over only because he was called in by Tarentum�

Pausanias, 1.12


"Alexander, the Epirote, when waging war against the Illyrians, first placed a force in ambush, and then dressed up some of his own men in Illyrian garb, ordering them to lay waste his own, that is to say, Epirote territory. When the Illyrians saw that this was being done, they themselves began to pillage right and left � the more confidently since they thought that those who led the way were scouts. But when they had been designedly brought by the latter into a disadvantageous position, they were routed and killed."

Frontinus, Strategemata, On Ambushes, 10

"When Harrybas, king of the Molossians, was attacked in war by Bardylis, the Illyrian, who commanded a considerably larger army, he dispatched the non-combatant portion of his subjects to the neighbouring district of Aetolia, and spread the report that he was yielding up his towns and possessions to the Aetolians. He himself, with those who could bear arms, placed ambuscades here and there on the mountains and in other inaccessible places. The Illyrians, fearful lest the possessions of the Molossians should be seized by the Aetolians, began to race along in disorder, in their eagerness for plunder. As soon as they became scattered, Harrybas, emerging from his concealment and taking them unawares, routed them and put them to flight."

Frontinus, Strategemata, 13

Seems clear that the Epirotes were NOT Illyrians...






I could continue to quote ancient sources, but I have a feeling that you wont even bother to read them. Historical truth is not on your side my friend.


I wont even bother responding to your genetic DNA claims....


Edited by chicagogeorge - 13-Sep-2007 at 12:12

XXXIII. 27. The ancient popular form of the name �Pelasgi�.



I.

The Pelasgii, writes Dionysius of Halikarnassus, had received their name from Pelasg, the son of Jove and Niobe (lib. I. 11, 17).

We find the same tradition with the poet Eschyl, who presents Pelasg speaking the following words: �I am Pelasg, the son of Palaechton, born from Terra (Gaea), the ruler of this country, and from my name, its king, has been called the nation of the Pelasgii, which masters this earth� (Supplices, v.250-251).

Here Pelasg is, as we see, the national name of an illustrious king, who had put the foundation of the first powerful state, with a moral purpose, in Europe.

Before trying though to find out about the ancient form of the name Pelasgi (ans), we must know in which part of the ancient world had been the country of this great civilizing king of the Pelasgian people.

In ancient Greek literature, the country or nationality of the more famous persons of the mythical times was often indicated in a simple genealogical form. The countries, lands, mountains, rivers, caves, were personified, and it was said, for example, that the ancestor of a tribe, a king, or a hero, had been the son of Thrace, of Libya, of Atlas mountain, or of the river Oceanos, Scamandros, Alpheos, etc.

Such a geographical genealogy had also Pelasg, the first traditional king of the Pelasgian people.



According to one of these traditions, Pelasg had been a great grandson of Oceanos potamos (istru), and its great affluent Tetys (Tisa), both these rivers personifying the regions from the Carpathians and the lower Danube.



We find another allegorical genealogy with the poet Asius of Samos, who had lived 700 years before the Christian era. According to this tradition, Pelasg, �the one like the gods�, had been born �in the black country�, on the mountains with the high ridges� (Pausanias, frag. lib. VIII. 1). Here, the mother of Pelasg is the country, or the �black� land, a very ancient name in itself.

The blessed region situated in the northern parts of the river Oceanos, where the earth blossomed and bore fruit three times a year, is called by Hesiodus gaia melaina (Theog. v. 69; Dies et Opera, v. 171)[1].



[1. The name gaia melaina does not derive from the physical type, or the color of the inhabitants, but from the geological quality of the particular zone of black, rich and extraordinarily productive soil (Neumann, Die Hellenen im Skythenlande, p. 14, 20). We have to admit though that the geological and ethnographic meaning of this expression had been misinterpreted since the most remote antiquity, even by Homer].



For some parts of ancient Dacia, the same name has been preserved in a traditional form, even during the course of the Middle Ages.

At the time when king Stefan, called �the Saint�, ruled over Hungary (997-1038), Transilvania appears under the name Ungria Nigra (Ademar Chabaniensis, Historiar. III. 33; Hunfalvy, Ethnographie von Ungarn, p. 217, 417).

The epithet Nigra has a great significance for history here, and �Ungria�, if not somehow a simple corrupt form of �Nigra�, appears only as a political name given by the author, because Transilvania had never been called with the particular geographical name of �Ungria�.



From the country, the epithet of �negri� (TN � blacks) passes on to its people, the Romanians.

In the chronicle of Fazel-ullach-Rashid from around 1303, the Romanians from the southern parts of the Carpathians are called Kara-Ulaghi, meaning the �Black Valachii� (D�Ohsson, Histoire des Mongols. La Haye, 1834, t.II, 627-628; Hasdeu, Ist. Critica, p. 68).

The Turks call the Romanian Country (Tera Romanesca) Kara-Iflak, and Moldova Kara-Bogdan (Cantemir, Cronicul vechimii Romano-Moldo-Vlahilor, ed. 1901, p. 307; Hasdeu, Ist. Crit. p. 107).

In the epic poems of the southern Slavs, the Romanian Country is zemlja karablaska (Miladinovitzi, 203; Hasdeu, Ist. Crit. 107, 110).

In the documents of the Constantinopolitan Patriarchate between the years 1390-1400, Moldova figures as Mauroblachia (II. nr. 404, 435, 444, 454, 461, 465, etc; Codinus, De officiis magnae eccl. Paris, 1625, p. 130), and as Melana Pogdania with Chacocondylas (lib. IX. p. 514).



Finally, we find with Eschyl a third tradition about the country of Pelasg.

In his poem Supplices (v. 250), Eschyl tells us that Pelasg had been the son of Palaechton (the ancient earthling, born on the earth), born of Gaia or Terra.

In ancient Greek literature, the epithet �Palaechton� was hold only by the god Mars (Eschyl, Sept. c. Th. v. 105), also called Geticus by the Latin poets (Statius, Silv. I. 2. 53), and protector of the Getic plains (Virgil, Aen. X. 542).



We are presented here with the question, why was the god Mars, the protector of the Getic plains called �the ancient born on the earth�, or in other words, why it was said that Mars was originally from the ancient country (TN - Tera cea vechia)?

Under the name �Terra antiqua� appears in the geography of the Pelasgian times a certain region, famous for its martial people and for its richness (Homer, Hymn. XXX. 2).

Virgil also speaks about this �Ancient Terra�, and tells us at the same time that the Greeks named it also Hesperia, or �the country from the sundown� (Aen. I. v. 530; III. v. 163 seqq) [2].



[2. Diodorus Siculus writes (IV. 27) about the origin of the name Hesperia, that Atlas � the ancient king of the Hyperboreans (Apollod. II. 5. 11) � had divided the parental inheritance with his brother Hesperus, and that the part over which ruled the latter had been called Hesperia.

It results therefore that, according to the traditions of more ancient times, Hesperia had been situated in close neighborhood with the kingdom of Atlas from the Atlas mountains (of Olt), in the northern parts of Istru. From a geographical point of view, the name Hesperia refers in any case to the lands situated beyond the Carpathians mountains, which formed the separation line between the eastern and the western regions of ancient Dacia (Rufus Avienus, Descr. Orb. v. 738-739).



In Romanian heroic songs, which are of a very remote age, we still find today some mentions about the country from the sundown (TN � tera de la scapatat), identical with Ardel.

In the epic cycle about Old Novac it is said that his porch was at the sundown (Catana, Balade pop. 108). In another versions though, his sons are called �brave men from Ardel� (Sezatoarea, I. 44). Iovan Iorgovan is called in some versions �an emperor�s son, from the sundown�. The same is said about the maiden from the mountains of Cerna, that she was �an emperor�s daughter, from the sundown� (Catana, ibid. 56)].



The name �Terra antiqua� is the antithesis of the new countries; or in other words, �Tera vechia� is the mother country of the Pelasgian pastoral tribes, which, migrating in the course of a long series of centuries, towards south and west, still remembered an ancient country, or the places from where their parents had come, as the same meaning still has in our times the name �the old village� as opposed to �the new village�.

From this �Tera vechia� therefore, once unbeaten in wars and blessed with the richness of its soil (potens armis atque ubere glebae), had been originally Mars, called Palaechton, the father of king Pelasg.



Thus, we have here the following genealogies regarding the country of Pelasg, the first monarch who had ruled over the great people of the Pelasgii:






It results therefore that, according to Greek traditions, Pelasg, the ancient representative of the Pelasgian people, was originally from the northern parts of Istru.

II.



We now know which was �Tera vechia� (Terra antiqua) of the Pelasgian people, situated on the northern parts of Istru.

We have to address now the question of the form of the name Pelasgoi, as it appears in the ancient Greek literature. But before all else, we must state here the following:

In the ancient topical nomenclature we do not find any trace of the form of the name Pelasgoi as presented by the Greek authors, either on the territory of Hellada, of Asia Minor, or in the Italic peninsula, where as we know, so many Pelasgian tribes had once settled.



This is evident proof that the name Pelasgoi, as used by Homer, does not correspond to a true popular form; that we have here only a term, corrupted by the mode of pronunciation and writing of the Greek authors.

The Greek geographer Strabo, originally from Asia Minor, wishing to indicate an etymology of the name Pelasgoi - but in an entirely frivolous way - tells us that in older times the inhabitants of Attica called these people Pelasgoi (ciconiae, meaning storks), because they migrated from one place to another (Geogr. Lib. V. 2. 4).

We find the same idea expressed by the Diodorus Siculus (I. V. 80), who uses for the Pelasgians the epithet planomenoi, �nomads�, from planao, to wander.

All the ancient and new attempts of finding the origin of this name, from its Greek form of Pelasgoi, could not reach any serious result.



In reality, the original form of the name �Pelasgi� had been completely different.

The Greeks had borrowed this term from the barbarian populations of the Hem peninsula; had borrowed and had distorted; and if we took into account the Greek phonetic changes, then it is easy to understand that the correct, usual form of this name, in the speech of the southern populations, had been without doubt Balasci, or Belasci, where the Greeks, by the nature of their language, had replaced, as in many other cases, B with P, and from the suffix ascus, asci, had formed a more harsh, guttural one, asgos, asgoi.



In prehistoric antiquity had existed, as we know, only two big groups of the Pelasgii.

The first group were the Arimii, a name which appears in various regions under the various forms: Rami (Ramnes), Remi, Romi, Rumi, Aramaei, Arimi, Arimani, Remores, Aremorici, Ormini, Orchomeni, etc.



The second group were the Abii, or the White Arimii (Abii, Abarimones), to which belonged the inhabitants of Latium (Albani, Bolani, Abolani), and various other Pelasgian tribes, scattered from east to west through the three continents, under the name of: Balaci, Belaci, Bolaci, Bellovaci, Belloaci, Blasci, Blaci, Placi, Palaci, Blaceni, Belcae, Volcae, Volsci, Vloqui, etc.

That the form �Balasci� or �Belasci� as ethnic name had once been used in the Balkan peninsula is proved by the term Balascae, as were called the Thracii of the first half of the Middle Ages (Tomaschek, Die alten Thraker, II. 4).

The Romanian Country (Tera Romanesca) is called even today Vlaska zemlia in the language of the southern Slavs. A district of the Romanian Country is called Vlasca. We also find here the villages Balaci, and the family names Balaciu and Balascu (Hasdeu, Etym. Magn. III. 2992, 2943). Finally, the part of Moravia, where in ancient times was settled a significant group of Romanians, is still called Valaska.



The suffix ascu is neither Greek, nor Slav.

This suffix had also existed in the ancient language of the Pelasgian population, having the same meaning as escu has in the Romanian language of today.

On a Roman inscription discovered at Genova, on the territory of the ancient Ligurii, we find mentioned the rivers Neviasca, Tulelasca, Veraglasca, Vinelasca, certainly reflecting the names of some ancient Ligurian localities (C. I. L. vol. V. nr. 7749. I. 9. 10. 19. 21).

The food tabula of Veleia also mentions two names of localities ended in ascus: fundus Areliascus and fundus Caudalascus (C. I. L. vol. XI. p. 215, nr. 1147, p. 5. 1. 21).

Finally, we find even today in the upper parts of Italy a significant number of localities with the name ending in the suffixes asca and asco:

In the provinces Genova and Porto Maurizio: Caiasca, Marinasco, Morasca, Bagnasco;

In the province Alexandria: Fabiasco, Martinasco;

In Novara and Emilia of Lombardy: Rimasco, Romagnasco, Barbarasco, Sarmadasco, Romasco, etc (De Jubainville, Les premiers habitants. Tome II. 46-59).

The same suffixes also appear in the topical nomenclature of Switzerland, Tyrol, upper Bavaria, Alsace, Loraine, France, Corsica, Spain and Portugal (Ibid. II. p. 68. 86. 99).



We resume: the ancient popular form of the name Pelasgi had been Belasci and Balasci; and the ancient country, the power center from which this people had expanded, had been in Europe, at the Carpathians and the lower Danube.

The peregrine language.



The barbarian language was completely different from the language so-called peregrine (peregrinitas).

According to the ideas of Roman authors, the barbarian language was a language which was not grammatical, a rustic language spoken by the native populations of the other provinces of Europe, Africa and Asia, which had the same national origin as the Romans.

The peregrine language though was the language of a people foreign of Roman nationality.

Cicero characterizes these two types of language with the words: �rustica asperitas� and �peregrina insolentia� (De orat. III. 12).

The Greeks were not counted among the Barbarians. They and their language were �peregrine�.

So, Quintilianus makes a distinction between the rustic language and the peregrine language. He attributes the first to the Barbarians, and the second to the Greeks (Inst. I. 5; XI. 3. 30).

Ovid (Trist. V. 10. 27) makes the same separation between the Greeks (Graii) and the Barbarians (Barbara turba).

The same writes Plato: the Greeks are all from the same family and related among themselves, but they are foreigners relative to the barbarians, not being of the same people, genos othneion chai allotrion (Civitas. Lib. V. p. 97)

It is to be noted that, according to Herodotus, the Pelasgians were not part of the same ethnic family of the Greeks, and he considered the language of the Pelasgians entirely different from that of the Greeks (lib. I. c. 58).

Originally posted by etnosoul It is to be noted that, according to Herodotus, the Pelasgians were not part of the same ethnic family of the Greeks, and he considered the language of the Pelasgians entirely different from that of the Greeks (lib. I. c. 58).

Really?

I will repost what Herodotus said for the third time now.

Herodotus 1.58


Τὸ δὲ Ἑλληνικὸν γλώσσῃ μέν, ἐπείτε ἐγένετο, αἰεί κοτε τῇ
αὐτῇ διαχρᾶται, ὡς ἐμοὶ καταφαίνεται εἶναι. Ἀποσχισθὲν
μέντοι ἀπὸ τοῦ Πελασγικοῦ

translation:

"But the Hellenic stock, it seems clear to me, has always
had the same language since its beginning; yet being, when
separated from the Pelasgians"

In Herodotus
Book I, 56 (page 53) it is mentioned "These races, Ionian and
Dorian, were the foremost in ancient time, the first a Pelasgian
and the second an Hellenic people. The Pelasgian stock has never
yet left its habitation, the Hellenic has wandered often and
afar. For in the days of king Deucalion it inhabited the land
of Phthia, then in the time of Dorus son of Hellen the country
called Histiaean, under Ossa and Olympus; driven by the Cadmeans
from this Histiaean country it settled about Pindus in the parts
called Macednian; thence again it migrated to Dryopia, and at
last came from Dryopia to Peloponnesos, where it took the name of
Dorian".


and......


Dionysus of Halikarnassos "Roman Antiquities" 1.17.2.1

καὶ τὸ τῶν Πελασγῶν γένος Ἑλληνικὸν ἐκ Πελοποννήσου

translation:

for the Pelasgians too, were a Hellenic race originally from the Peloponnesus


Can you please read the nonsense before you copy and paste hundreds of sentences that have no relevance to the discussion.

However, etnosoul is right when he says Herodotus believes the Pelasgians were not Hellenes (at least initially). From Herodotus (Godley edition):

1.57 What language the Pelasgians spoke I cannot say definitely. [...] one may judge by these, the Pelasgians spoke a language which was not Greek. If, then, all the Pelasgian stock spoke so, then the Attic nation, being of Pelasgian blood, must have changed its language too at the time when it became part of the Hellenes. [...]

Edited by Chilbudios - 13-Sep-2007 at 12:06