Neolithic Europe: Encyclopedia II - Neolithic Europe - Competing theories

Neolithic Europe - Competing theories

Few details of these cultures are widely agreed upon, and even the date of the Indo-European arrival in Old Europe is questioned, whether in a Late Neolithic or a Bronze Age context. One major reappraisal of the evidence by the archaeologist Colin Renfrew proposes that the Indo-European 'invasion' is instead linked to the relatively rapid spread of farming from Anatolia into Europe from about 6500 BC, an idea he has supported using some purely lexico-statistical studies.

Renfrew's views are rejected by a majority of linguists, however, who hold that the common Proto-Indo-European language is unlikely to date before 4000 BCE to 5000 BCE. For instance, the prominent linguist J.P. Mallory has not only carefully assembled the evidence for an origin north of the Black Sea, but has also assembled a compelling collection of evidence showing that Indo-European linguistic influences first appeared in Anatolia around the Bosporus, with the earliest Indo-European traces spreading steadily thence southward and eastward through Anatolia over the centuries, thousands of years after the region had adopted agriculture.

Another theory, the Paleolithic Continuity Theory, assumes formation of Indo-European in Europe, although this idea enjoys even less support.

Adapted from the Wikipedia article "Competing theories", under the G.N U Free Docmentation License. Please also see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki