Origins of European Peoples: Part One: Ancient History

By Mario Mosetto

\This series explores the history of European peoples, with the first book focusing on ancient history.

To understand the evolution of Europeans, we must go back to the end of the Paleolithic Age. In all probability, from 40,000 BC onward, there was a slow migration from the South across the Middle East, which continued during the Paleolithic Age, and all human languages stem from three principal branches: African, Indo-European, and Chinese.

The author shares a detailed account on the origins of Europeans and shares interesting facts that anyone who enjoys history will find valuable.

He also examines the twelve tribes of Israel from the very beginning of their history, the causes of various migrations, the affect sailing technology had on the world, and the role that religion played in the development of leagues, tribes, and cities.

Delve into the fascinating history of the origins of the European peoples and explore the development of various nations, including their linguistic and physical characteristics, with this well-researched book.

• Language: English
• Publisher: AuthorHouse UK
• Release date: Mar 20, 2018
• ISBN: 9781546284253

Mario Mosetto

Mario Mosetto graduated cum laude with a law degree from the University of Turin in Italy. He worked in law at two different companies in Italy before retiring to devote himself to archaeology and linguistics. He studied several languages in writing this book. Mosetto currently lives in Turin, Piedmont, Italy.

Book preview

© 2018 Mario Mosetto. All rights reserved.

No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted by any means without the written permission of the author.

Published by AuthorHouse 03/19/2018

ISBN: 978-1-5462-8426-0 (sc)

ISBN: 978-1-5462-8430-7 (hc)

ISBN: 978-1-5462-8425-3 (e)

Any people depicted in stock imagery provided by Getty Images are models,

and such images are being used for illustrative purposes only.

Certain stock imagery © Getty Images.

Because of the dynamic nature of the Internet, any web addresses or links contained in this book may have changed since publication and may no longer be valid. The views expressed in this work are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the publisher, and the publisher hereby disclaims any responsibility for them.

Contents

First Part

Ancient History

Chapter 1     The Method of Historical-Linguistic Study

Chapter 2     Mediterranean Geography from the Third Millennium to the Eighteenth Century BC

Chapter 3     Geography: Mediterranean Sea in the centuries XII-XI

Chapter 4     Remarks about the migrations in the XI century B.C. and about the Hittite language

Chapter 5     The Anatolians move towards the West

Chapter 6     The name Europe, the name of the cultivable land and of the water

Chapter 7     The allies of the Trojans

Chapter 8     Pan and Pen

Chapter 9     Israel’s Prophets and Phoenician merchants

Chapter 10   Umbrians, Dardanians and Pelasgians

Chapter 11   Aaron, Madyan and the Pagans

Chapter 12   Lud and Nebo

Chapter 13   Hammurabi’s dynasty

Chapter 14   Proper nouns and populations

Chapter 15   Underworld and big rivers

Chapter 16   Turks and Indo-Europeans

Chapter 17   Israel’s language

Chapter 18   Common elements to all the languages

Chapter 19   The elementary numbers

Chapter 20   Pre-Hellenic words in ancient Greek

Chapter 21   Theories about the origin of the European populations

Second Part

First Section

Origin Of Germans, Poles, Scandinavians And Latins

Chapter 1     The populations south of the Baltic Sea and those of the Volga

Chapter 2     The ovod and the egg

Chapter 3     The origin of the Latin Dardanians

Chapter 4     The Lithuanians, ancestors of the Latins

Appendix A

The various Germanic populations

Chapter 1     Lusatians, Celts, Ubii, Hermanduri, Cimbri, Teutons, Ambrones

Chapter 2     The origin of the Boj, Quadi, Marcomanni

Chapter 3     Nemetes, Silingi, Asdingi, Treri, Bessi, Rugii and Odrysians

Chapter 4     Frisians, Suebians and Saxons, Scandinavian people

Appendix B

Scandinavian languages

Appendix C

Populations of Gaul

Chapter 5     Abraham, Aaron, Lot, Moses

Second Part

Second section

ORIGIN OF ITALICS AND PROVENÇALES

Chapter 1     The Neolithic in Asia Minor

Chapter 2     The Neolithic in Italy

Chapter 3     Pre-roman languages in Italy

Chapter 4     Neolithization of France

Chapter 5     The story of Thorrebo and of the Tyrras pirates

Chapter 6     Uria from Liguria and Carians from Corsica

Chapter 7     Rome

Chapter 8     Wine and bier: Romans and Serbians

Chapter 9     Hausones and Osci; Venetians and Mandaeans

Chapter 10   Manthya and Mantua, the Picentes

Chapter 11   Snakes and pirates

Chapter 12   Diana, Tiv, Mona luna (moon)

Chapter 13   Abbacchio (spring lamb), Baccalà (dried salted cod) and Bacchus

Chapter 14   Pylos and the Pisates

Chapter 15   Agricultural tools – Tools of the metalworkers

Chapter 16   On the trail of Minos and of the Thebans

Chapter 17   Mysians, Rumelians and Thracians of Bulgaria

Third Part

Origin of the Iberian People

Chapter 1     The Origin of the Tartessians

Chapter 2     Jason and Aaron’s Expeditions

Chapter 3     King Castillas and Spain

Chapter 4     Origin of British Peoples

Fourth Part

Eastern Europe Between Turks, Slavs and Scythians

Chapter 1     Avars, Goths and Uhlans

Chapter 2     Swabians and Scythians

Fifth Part

Origin of Magyars

Six Part

Origin of the Etruscans

Chapter 1     Etruscan Mysteries

Chapter 2     The Etruscan alphabet and rune

Chapter 3     Gaul geography and origin of the Gauls

Endnotes

About the Author

FIRST PART

Ancient History

CHAPTER 1

The Method of Historical-Linguistic Study

1.1. The history of Europe from the thirteenth to the tenth century BC is marked by a scarcity of sources and a lack of points of reference. Such is not the case for the Middle East, concerning, which, instead, there are numerous historical documents. The biblical text of Genesis has been proven to date back to this period, and we must assume that the Exodus and the story of Jacob also refer to peoples and events with at least some degree of truth. These texts can be compared to those of Egypt of the same period and, in particular, to Rameses III. This is not to mention the catalogue of ships provided by the Iliad and the traditions remaining of other poems on the return of heroes from the Trojan War (Nostoi). Other points of comparison can also be found in the names appearing in the Hittite letters of King Tudhalias IV and those of the Ugarits and the Elean Pisans, as well as in the Assyrian texts from that period or from the two centuries which followed. The myths of Jason and the Golden Fleece, of Pyrrha and Deucalion and of Leda, together with others from the archaic Hellenic tradition, can be considered as belonging to this period, while others are even older, such as the myths of Dionysius and of the Carian pirates and various ancient Georgian stories and Hittite, Hurrian and Babylonian myths.

1.2. All of these documentary sources are nothing more than a starting point. To reconstruct European history, what is needed is a comprehensive theory on the interpretation of languages and of their pronunciation: herein lies the keystone for any identification of the peoples who inhabited the land of Japheth. Such an analysis is possible if we accept an analysis of the vocabulary of the languages of the known languages of the present and the past as a basis for research into the people’s to whom they belonged in ancient times. This method is, in fact, rather debatable, and its use should be limited to just a few words, so as to shield ourselves from the risks that stem from the alteration of vocabulary which, with the passage of centuries, afflicts the majority of words in all languages. This risk of error is, in part, connected to the variations which the passage of time imposes on the words of the various languages, whereby they gradually become more and more removed from ancient models from century to century.

Nonetheless, various scholars have noted that each language also has a tendency to remain unaltered in at least some of its parts across millennia – a fact which would permit us to hypothesise a certain permanence in current languages and dialects of the most ancient vocabulary. This is demonstrable in the continued, unaltered existence of words which are historically ancient, being traceable to the Bronze or the Copper Age. This observation cannot be generalised into a denial of linguistic change, which is clearly apparent to all of us. Yet there are those who have taken it a step further, reconstructing lexical and linguistic structures which are undeniably linked to the stone age and tracing the most ancient of connections between the structures of the various originary languages of the earth and the three different ways of working stone in antiquity.

1.3. A logical corollary to this and other studies which bridge the gap between linguistics and archaeology is that, just as languages remain unaltered (at least in part) so too should those linguistic areas which come into being when a given territory becomes populated remain constant in the distribution of the various races, until such a time as truly groundbreaking developments lead to the settlement of new peoples. Such developments took place, according to archaeological data, only in about 2200 BC in Eastern Europe with the beginning of the use of horses and the development of metalwork and after 1200 BC with the Iron Age. To corroborate this theory of innatism in evolution it is necessary, moreover, to frequently underline the enduring presence of peoples speaking a certain (dialectal) language, even whilst under the leadership of a minority speaking a different language without the resulting linguistic contamination impeding a subsequent return to the original dialectal language when the leading class has fallen. Something more or less analogous happened in Italy after the fall of the Roman Empire and it is for this reason that certain Italian dialects are more ancient than Rome and than written Latin itself and would have the potential to become national languages as the ruling classes of the country changed.

1.4. In my own modest opinion, it is not necessary true that a continuity can be traced either for all the parts or for all the identifiable structures of the various languages. The historical continuity of certain words throughout history, which have undeniable roots in the ancient pass and have remained similar across the millennia, is certainly striking. However, this can be explained through the fact that these words are highly symbolic key terms, which have remained unaltered because of their symbolic strength. It would therefore follow that the tendency towards immanence does not belong to language in general, but rather to these words which assume a particularly high value within each language. Examples may be found in the names given to the hydrographic or mountainous substrate which, as a rule, remain unchanged throughout the millennia, since they only serve as a point of reference if they remain immutable, or those attributed to peoples or to their Gods or other terms referring to particularly striking innovations such as fire, agriculture, the metals and weapons.

The pronunciation of these terms by diverse people can be considered as part and parcel of these immutable characteristics. Since there is no scientific procedure for transforming them, these common terms are frequently absorbed into the languages of new peoples with their own pronunciation and spelling. Their grammatical structure changes very little and is indicative of belonging to the language of a certain group.

1.5. In the present study, which straddles the gap between ancient history and linguistics, particular emphasis will also be given to the observation of other characteristics, such as the race of the various peoples and their hair colour (the extent to which blond hair is prevalent) or to those other somatic characteristics which intuitively suggest that they originate in a certain hotter or colder region (e.g. in Germany and England there are many people who are not blond and have the somatic characteristics of the Mediterranean, whereas in Sicily, and the Piedmont and Veneto regions blonds abound, as is also the case in Romagna and in the area of Massa). These characteristics only change over a very long period of time, and it is for this reason that we can find blonds in Sicily and Tuscany and people with a darker complexion in areas such as the North of Germany. We need to ask ourselves where these people come from and where their origins lie. Historians such as Herodotus provide data about the physical characteristics of certain peoples (e.g. the Odrysians of Thrace were fair-haired while the other people in that area had brown hair) and the Iliad tells us that Achilles was blonde with blue eyes, traits which confirm a Nordic origin for the heads of the peoples involved – information which can help our general understanding of the invasions of that period.

1.6. Since, therefore, we can neither simply affirm that today’s languages are the unaltered transposition of ancient tongues nor deny the validity to the repeated coincidences and unaltered permanence of certain terms in the various languages, I would suggest that we should study above all those terms which I will refer to as key words: to the names of mountains, regions, divinities and mythological figures, to the names of peoples and cities and of fundamental products, and also to certain exclamations and insults. I will do so without seeking to formulate unitary, generalised evolutionary rules for language in general.

We need to be aware that, for each individual and community, if grammatical and pronunciation structures remain unaltered across millennia, words may be classified into different categories according to their importance, and there are words which are accepted as new, words which become distorted with use, and words which, instead, remain unchanged because of their importance.

These are the nouns which we can refer to as strong, since, for various reasons, they come to be so forcibly imprinted on the human mind that they do not change over time. A strong noun has much in common with a strong brand. A strong brand is a brand which acquires a distinct significance which imprints itself in the mind of the consumer. If we extend this theory from consumer products to vocabulary, strong words are those which, by nature, hardly ever change, since they are imprinted in the mind and the traditions of a people due to their powerful symbolic meaning. There are multiple causes for this phenomenon, but the strength of a word depends not so much on the nature and the incisiveness of the word itself as on its meaning.

The name of a people remains unchanged, among both the people to whom it refers and their neighbours, as if it were the brand of that particular tribe. These names indicate the originary settlement of each tribe, even if they have subsequently disappeared or migrated. Sometimes the name assigned to a given nation by its neighbours refers to a characteristic product or ethnicity. Hence the Hungarian word for Italy is Olasz, which is also the word for oil. The Finnish word for German is Saksat, referring to the Saxons and the name for Russian is Venäjä, referring to the Wendes. These peoples were settled to the South of what is now St. Petersburg until 1300 BC, although they subsequently migrated. Saksat and Venäjä are therefore very ancient terms, which pre-date that Graeco-Roman era and have never fallen out of use.

In Finnish, again, the adjective Swedish translates into Ruksas, which shows that the first Russians took their name from the Swedes who reigned over Russia and Sweden before and during the Varangian period. Instead, the Danish word for Germanic, Tysk probably derives from the Etruscan peoples of Tuscia (on whom more later). Each new tribe who settled accepted the pre-existent geography, simply pronouncing it in their own way: we might cite Hamburg, originally home to the Ambrones, or the forest of Teutoburg, home to the Teutonians; similarly, Nuremberg takes its name from the area of Noricum, home to the Norici who had their capital in Noreia; again, Bavaria, also known as Bayern, takes its name from the Pannonian Avars and the Gallic Boii.

1.7. This kind of reading may also be highly fruitful when applied to religious texts, such as the Bible, wherein it is possible to trace ancient names of the Balcan peoples dating back to 1000 BC. Epic narratives such as the Iliad and the Odyssey similarly contain this kind of information, which is not even so hard to find. Neither do the gods chance. They may go into retirement or be thrust into hell, but their names remain unaltered. The names of pagan divinities remain in our vocabulary, though they have often been transformed into insults. Mythical figures (such as Hercules, called Melquart by the Phoenicians) tend always to be recognised with their most ancient names by all the peoples (the Pillars of Hercules are not called the Pillars of Melkquart, presumably because the Phrygians named them before the Phoenicians did). Some knowledge of the most ancient divinities is of great help in constructing the most ancient parts of the various languages, since these names are by definition strong nouns and often persist across time. An awareness of this mental mechanism is also important for any understanding of the validity of the interpretations put forward in this book. Indeed, the vast majority of insults derive from the most ancient people and gods, which had subsequently fallen into disgrace. The same mechanism can be traced in art and in medieval Christianity, where the attributes of angels and of the devil derive from antique, pre-roman traditions and belong to pagan divinities. Insults are, by definition, words which do not change, as to insult somebody with an invented word would be to risk failing to offend. The origin of insults lies in an ignominy which is frequently very ancient and in the names of peoples who have been shamed or condemned as treacherous or of ancient gods whose names have been demoted to obscenity (not without good reason: cf. the modern tendency to use the names fascist or nazi as an insult, due to the enduring symbolic force of historical events 50 years on; significantly, in Germany only the term fascist is so used, since Nazism did no immediate damage to the German people). The offensiveness of a term endures for millennia, even if it loses its incisiveness over the centuries. These cases are so numerous that they cannot be dismissed as mere coincidence. Indeed, the historical events or the divinities from which insults derive can be reconstructed with a certain accuracy.

It is curious to note that, although the name of the Pythia of Mycenae (the oracle of Delphi) was transformed into an insult in dialect, the name pyx is still given to the chalice in church and this name is also the root for the English adjective episcopal or the Italian episcopo and for the English Bishop and the German Bischof). A similar irony can be traced in the fate of the Hittite name Khatti, divinity of the rocks, which gives its name to the Italian cazzuola (plasterer’s trowel or float) but also to the more obscene cazzo (dick). Again, the God Pen / Pan lends his name to the serpent, but also to the penis.

1.8. I have extended my attempts at the historical reclassification of words as far as possible, in order to include the maximum possible number of terms and references to historical and mythological figures and peoples that continue to be cited, perhaps without any detailed context, in the present day. In so doing, I have run the risk of falling into direction or getting lost in the pursuit of false trails. For safety’s sake, I have had to abandon many hypotheses which appeared isolated and unconfirmed.

1.9. In the course of my research, I noticed that the names of certain elementary objects are strong because they belong to a series of words which have evolved from the name of a divinity or a people. Thus we have whole series of names given to objects or actions which derive from the same ancient name that is traceable to a specific people. For example, the Roman, Dinaric and Italian Alps are linked to the first westward migration of the Italic people, while the Cottian Alps (or the Alps of Cottius) have connections with the ice axe (piccozze in Italian) and with mussels (cozze in Italian). From this I came to understand that, in the various languages, not only the mountain ranges but also the typical agricultural and craft products of the area were identified through these references to a people or a god. Again, in Great Britain and in Italy the cult of Pen / Pan probably lent its name not only to the Pennines, Ben Nevis and the Appennines but also to cooking pans, penne pasta, etc. A particularly emblematic case of this is the Lithuanian god Per(k)un(as) who lends his name to the prune or plum and the pear, since he is identified with their plants, but also generated the Latin quercus or quercia. The purcuna or pig was the animal sacred to this divinity, because it eats acorns, and Lithuanians (like the Italians) still use the word porcu as an imprecation today. Among the Baltic peoples, he lent his name to parks and to the Parcae (the Fates). In Italian he gave us the word forcone (pitchfork), in reference to the fact that he was the god of lightening. When the ancient peoples invented a new object, they baptised it as sacred to a god. On other occasions, names were given by merchants, who imported new products and identified them with their place of origin. Something similar still happens today, but in the past words lasted longer since new products emerged less frequently and their names became more indelibly fixed in our vocabulary. This habit of baptising mountains, rivers, produce, etc. is typical of the most ancient peoples, since their successors limited themselves to adopting the names which they found – something which makes it possible to look a long way back quite easily. If anything, there is a risk of looking back ad infinitum, retro-dating divinities and collocations with peoples more than we should. This is why we need to be careful when considering events before 1300 BC, for which there are no European sources except for those from Greece. Nonetheless, even for this period, it is, at times, possible to identify the characteristics of an ancient people or god on the basis of similar names, thereby tracing the defining characteristics of figures going back to the totemic religions of Neolithic and Mesolithic times. For the better-known figures, on whom extensive research has already been done, we can go back even further, to the very first European settlements. The apparently strange fact is that, provided we apply the safeguards which I have already described, the present method of enquiry provides almost certain results, banal though they may appear at first sight.

1.10. Feminine names in particular carry the names of the most ancient of peoples, since the bride was identified with her people of origin: thus in Europe we find Masha for the Masha (Mesii) of Mesia, Masovia and Masuria, Tanja for the Tanai or Danai of the Don Katja for the Chatti, Katrin and Katarina for the Chazars (or Cathars), Ketty for the Chetti or Chittin, Galina for the Gauls of Galicia, Frida and Brigida for the Phrygians (who referred to themselves as Bryges), Elena or Helen for the Helenics, Lydia for the Lydians, Rita and Ruth for the Ruteni, Elizabeth or Bessy for the Bessi, Audrey for the Odrysians, Elisa for Elis, Edwige for the Aedui, Vanessa for the inhabitants of Vannes (Gallic Venetians) and Elvis for the Helvii. Moving on to masculine names, Hermann recalls the Hermanduri, Rurik the Ruhr, Marco the Marrucini or the Marcomanni, Ennio and Egnazio Aeneas and the Aeneans, Boris the Prussians, Boemondo, the Bohemians, Vanja the Vans or the Wends, etc. etc. The Bible in particular always indicates the name of a tribe with the name of a woman, who is usually the wife of its leader; thus, the wife of Israel is Lia, probably the Cretan lion, the slave-girl Bila, who is Pila, and the slave-girl Zilpa, who is Ziper, or Cyprus. In such cases, there is also an indication of the corresponding peoples, as Licia refers to Lycia and the Lycians, Luca to Lukka and the Lucans. Israel’s daughter Dina is probably associated with the Dinaric Alps (and to A-thena – Athens, which had been reduced to a rustic condition since the city had been captured by the Myceneans), just as the name Jacob is linked to Zakopane in the Carpathian mountains. There is, of course, some doubt as to whether these names came to Europe from Asia or vice versa. However, the history which is known to us recounts sea invasion datable to a period contemporary with that in which Genesis was written, so the prevalent interpretation of these names is that they are Balkan in origin. If anything, one might hypothesise on the arrival of names originating in Asia Minor in the Balkan area before 3000 BC, when the land masses were still united and peoples could migrate on foot from one continent to another. For the same reason it is, instead, also possible to hypothesise on the presence in Europe of Caucasian peoples from the densely populated areas along the Don and Volga rivers in the period between 2500 and 1300 BC.

1.11. The name which a specific people gives to itself often derives from an object, frequently the tribe’s favourite weapon: the name of the Saxons (Sachsen) may derive from the axe (Achse), that of the Serbs from the curved sword, Serp, in Serbian and Bulgarian the straight sword or Machete is connected to the Macedonians; in Russian the broadsword Palasch is connected to the Palestinians; the lance, Safni is associated with the Samnites and the Sabines; the Lithuanian lance, Jetta, is still connected with the verb for throwing or jettatura in the Neapolitan dialect, but there was also a tribe called the Gepids to the North of the Danube. On other occasions peoples lend their names to versions of Heaven and Hell. Eden takes its name from the Edoni, who were rich in gold, the Elysian fields from the Elis, Erebus from Thorebbia, Acheron from the Achaeans, Lethe from the Lydians at the mouth of the Danube, Hades from Odessa and Anubis from the Danube. Tribes often borrowed the names of their neighbours when naming qualities with which they associated them (e.g. the Latins took the name of the Samnites for tusks - Sanne / Zanne - and for health –sanità; the word for servant, instead, derived from the name of the Serbs). This confusing attribution of meaning in another language occurred for reasons which can be identified intuitively: the Samnites wore two tusks on the front of their helmets and were the first to develop medicine, coming from the Thrace and the Mysia of Asclepius and Orpheus; the Serbs, instead, were sold as slaves. This kind of contamination is one of the errors which we should identify and avoid, through a comprehensive and coherent study of each originary people itself.

The names of some peoples derived from divinities (e.g. the Gepids and the Iapigians from Iapetus, the Dorans from Tyr, the Phrygians and the Frisians from the goddess Frida, the Ostrogoths from Oester, the goddess Isthar, the morning star which indicates the East). The same is true of some individual given names (Bruno from Prunas, Percival from Perku-Baal [Baal is found not only in the Balkans but also in Holland (Baas). He is equivalent to the Phoenician god Bes or Bel], Julo / Julio was Jui the sun for the Germans and Celts, Aeneas derived from Ignis, Giana or Jane from Diana and Cajo from the titan Ceo). These associations are not always easy to identify, but they are significant in identifying the origins of a given people (e.g. the Latin Aeneas is connected to the Enians of Epirus, as is the river Aniene.

1.12 The overall picture which arises from this research (which I would define as analogical because, as in the case of research into trademarks, it is based on the mental mechanisms of memory and analogy) is certainly more complex than that which we have inherited from the previous centuries of historical and archaeological study. It obliges us to reconsider our convictions. Having said this, it also fills in many gaps in the most complex and antique areas of our knowledge (providing, for example, a new interpretation of archaic Roman names) and enriches our perceptions of many real-life events that these ancient peoples to life for us. As we progress, we will realise that, despite an apparent tendency to approximation, this method offers us a more complete and coherent knowledge than that to be obtained from the usual logic of historical texts and enables us to take numerous steps forward. The analysis of evidence which bring together the various pieces of the puzzle, acquiring a systematic potency at which we could never have arrived with logic alone. Our final deduction, the fruit of our analogical enquiry, will be the distilled essence of our observations on hundreds of strong nouns from the various periods.

CHAPTER 2

Mediterranean Geography from the Third Millennium to the Eighteenth Century BC

2.1 To understand the evolution of the European peoples we need to go back to the end of the Paleolithic Age. In all probability from 40000 BC onwards there was a slow migration from the South across the Middle East, which continued during the Paleolithic Age, and all human languages stem from three principal branches: African, Indo-European and Chinese. Recent research has revealed that these three branches coincide from three different ways of working stone during the Paleolithic Age. In 10,000 BC, when the Baltic and North Seas were covered with ice, the scanty hunting population was spread from the Lower Volga to Spain. In the Mesolithic Age, it extended northwards, reaching the Samartian uplands and the Urals going back up the Volga. England and Scandinavia also became populated at this time, but agriculture only took off along the rivers that flow into the Mediterranean and the Black Sea, probably as a result of the climate and the increased opportunities available. The Colchis and the Southern Caspian were agricultural areas, as was the Greek coast of the Aegean sea and Southern Italy. Agriculture was also to be found across broad areas of Asia Minor, on the coast across from Cyprus and in the Land of Canaan. We may therefore imagine, at this point, that the agricultural and fishing peoples were able, thanks to their available reserves of food, to proliferate and multiply in the river valleys and along the coast, generating forms of social and political life as they went. The first known city, dating back to 7000 BC, is in Southern Anatolia. To contextualize this, the Egyptian civilization was born in the same period, whilst the Sumerian arose almost 4000 years later. These agricultural centres and the people who populated them should be our starting point if we wish to understand the dynamics of the peaceful Neolithic infiltrations. In this period, the Danubian and Greek civilizations were one with the Italic and Catalan, not to mention the Western Anatolian, while along the Atlantic Coast and on the Rhone there lay an area notable for its megalithic (fishing) settlements, the influence of which was also felt along the German and Dutch coast. Across the Black Sea, an Eastern Anatolian and Caspian (Kura-Araxes) came face to face with a Northern one (Dnjepr-Donez and Bug Dnjestr). On the Eastern Baltic Sea were the settlements which would become Lithuanian, a culture of stroke decorated pottery, while inland linear pottery distinguished a culture whose only sea outlet lay North of the mouth of the Danube. If we shift our gaze to Siberia, we may observe that in this period the population had already occupied large areas of the Urals, and that the peoples who began to migrate in this period were doubtless Mongols and in part Indo-European. There is, naturally, a degree of controversy around the identification of the linguistic heritage of the aforementioned peoples. If the Balkan languages can be clearly identified with three lines – the Greek, the Italic and the Slavic, the geographically distinguishable Eastern Baltic group might have been constituted before 3000 BC by Ural-Hungarian peoples, the same Ural culture being present in Estonia, Livonia and Finland as in Volhynia (although in Hungary there was a culture of linear pottery).

2.2 The linear potter group occupied Pannonia, Romania and the Slavic areas to the North of the Danube (the Varna civilization). After 2500 BC, however, they retreated back to Germany alone, with a small outpost in Alsace. For this reason it can credibly be identified with the Western Germanic peoples of the Reno and the Danube, who went on to influence the Hungarian peoples. These Western Germanic peoples developed the culture of copper chalices in about 2500 BC, together with the fishing tribes of the Western Baltic. In the same period, the Danubian civilization expanded its civilizing influence into Austria and Hungary, while the Romanian area fell to civilizations from the Eastern Black Sea.

2.3 No signs of conflict between the various European peoples become evident until 2500 BC. Until that point we can only trace expansions and cultural influences. While the improvement in climate and agricultural and fishing techniques allowed the population to expand, there was no shortage of space and the growing population did not lead to the destruction of existing settlements. The Megalithic culture of the Atlantic fishing peoples, in particular, expanded along the coast as far as the Oder, but never spread as far as Italy, remaining confined to Sardinia, Corsica and Puglia. This is the period and the area to which some scholars trace the origins of Celtic civilization, a typically Italic linguistic area, to my mind (a long time before the Anglo-Saxon invasion of England). The culture of copper pots arose from the point of contact between the four civilizations: Atlantic, Germanic, Eastern Balkan and Balkan, and this would suggest that it is the fruit of their combined knowledge of metallurgy.

2.4 Geographical reconstructions of Europe in the third millennium BC have brought to light various modifications to the coasts, dating back to the last part of the Ice Age and the formation of the present boundaries of Europe. In particular, the coasts of Anatolia and the Balcans only separated at the beginning of the millennium and the definitive separation of the British Isles from the continent dates to 6500 BC. The phenomena to which we are referring only took place in about 3500 BC or a few centuries before and led, between 6000 and 3000 BC, to the partial submersion of an area of land on the Atlantic and the North Sea whih had previously been populated by Neolithic peoples. Between 6000 and 4000 BC, large areas of land around England, Ireland and France was submerged under the North Sea and the Atlantic, as was an area on the Northern Adriatic coast. These changes, and especially the disappearance of land-links between Asia Minor and the Balkans, played a key role in bringing about the cessation of linguistic contacts between bordering lands. Indeed, while until the Neolithic period Britain was part of the continent and the Balkans were a highly evolved outpost of Asia Minor, the situation subsequently underwent a radical change and these areas broke away and undertook their own autonomous downhill cultural journeys. In the third millennium, then, the Marmara Sea went from being a swamp to being navigable. Its very name Marmarica can be explained with reference to how it must have appeared to its first inhabitants (cf. mare marcio – or boggy sea in Italian).

2.5 Here follows the series of movements which emerge from the analysis of the linguistic variations of the Indo-European peoples and of their coincidence with conflicts in accordance with migrationist theories. Some would argue that the common fatherland of the migrant Indo-Europeans before and after 3500 BC was in Kazakhistan; others would place it in Caucasus. Whichever is the case, these peoples certainly harked from somewhere around the Caspian Sea and the Volga and the Don rivers, areas rich in pasture and suitable for animal husbandry. The migrationist theory does not look back before 3500 BC, although logic would suggest that these settlements resulted from an earlier migration from the South. From here Kazakh migrations headed South into Anatolia and Armenia before 2500 BC, where the Carians, Luwians and Armenians settled. The shepherd Hittites passed through to the Dardanelles, heading North to found the Lithuanian pastoral culture. The Turks already flanked the Armenians on the Caspian Sea. These peoples already used carts for transportant but not for combat. Other peoples to the North-West had created the Lusatian civilization along the Oder river. Yet others (evidently from Anatolia) settled in the Northern Balkans, where they would remain undisturbed for over 1500 years. Others still had reached the Rhine, the Atlantic and Italy from the West, generating the languages of the Ligurians, Umbrians, Volsci, Ambrones and Arminians, reaching Great Britain on foot in ancient times (Northumbria and Cumbria). The migrationist theory would not consider the nature of the languages of these peoples in any depth, but would limit itself to gathering from the hydronymy and toponymy roots such as Arg-, -ava or Kar- which belonged thereto. At most, we might arrive at a recognition of these earlier languages as Indo-European, but we would go no further in our deductions.

In about 2000 BC a second Indo-European settlement (probably of Celts and their Slavisc subjects) was located between the Carpathian mountains and the Danube valley. These people were known as the Zaker, Teuker or Czeker. These peoples had learned how to work in bronze, were skilled archers and drove light-wheeled carts into battle. One group of them pushed towards the South.

The Kassites, with their Caucasian language (known as the Kasspi, since in the Caucasian languages PI marked the plural)came from the Caspian sea and reached Babylon and Egypt (Hyksos) in about 1800 BC. Other peoples also headed North from the Carpathian mountains and the Western Balkans. These tribes used carts in battle and were able to surprise and supplant their enemies. Others still came from Afghanistan and India and spoke Sanskrit. As far as Balkan settlement is concerned, the migrationist theory would consider that this lasted at least 2000 years. Before these violent invasions, then, the Indo-European peoples of the Balkans must have reached Europe in at least 4000 BC, given the strong assimilation which exists between the various Balkan languages.

2.6 In 1750 BC, the Western Balkan peoples took over Greece, moving in from Epirus (Mycaenae) and pushing towards the sea, displacing the autochtonous peoples and the Carians; the Eastern Balkan peoples, instead, did not wage war for about 2000 years, developing agriculture instead and gradually spreading along the coast of the Black Sea and inland.

2.7 The Iron Age began in about 1300 BC, coinciding with a new Ice Age, with Northern peoples descending on the Carpathian lands and the coasts of the Black Sea. The harsh climate probably catalyzed a new wave of migrations (Antians, Dardanians and Phrygians) in the Balkans and westwards. Clashing with the Hittite empire, these led to the migration of the sea peoples who, equipped with high-board ships, occupied Southern Anatolia and destroyed the Hittite empire in around 1190 BC, together with the Egyptian settlements on the Canaan. Taking over the Canaan, these sea peoples founded the Phoenician nation, Philistine and perhaps also Israel, whilst the Hellenic and Dorian peoples established new settlements in Greece and along the Anatolic coast. From then on, the Phrygians and Karians had a clear sea passage and were able to reach the Southern coasts of Italy, Spain and France, settling and developing East-West commerce (the Phrygian thalassocracy). During the same period, the Phoenicians developed trade routes along the African coast, which stretched to Cadiz and beyond (Tartessos and Utica).

2.8 In around 750 BC, a great surge of Celtic peoples migrated from the East towards Gaul, colonizing the whole coast of the channel right up to Ireland . At the same time, there was a large movement of Indo-European peoples to Iran (the Medes and the Persians) and the Assyrians destroyed the kingdom of Urartu, leading to the dispersion of its inhabitants, some of whom headed West.

2.9 In about 600 BC an invasion of Scythian peoples forced the Phrygians and the Dacian and Slavic peoples of the Eastern Balkans to migrate North and settle on the Baltic. Initially they joined with the Wends. When internecine fighting erupted, they dispersed into Scandinavia and Denmark.

We thus arrive at a picture of the geographical locations of the peoples at the time of the Trojan War (1260-50BC), resulting in part of the earlier, originary settlements.

• The Shardjan lived in the West before 1300 BC. Their name probably derived from S’Arzawa (the region of the Sardinians) or Sarzana and they are farmers, like the Achaeans (Arzi or Argi referring to land for cultivation). They can probably be associated with the Mycenaean frequenting of the Bay of Naples and the lower Tiber as well as the Lunigiana, an area which was rich in copper. It would appear that the Shardjan used the Sardinian copper mines and introduced the nuraghe, imitating Mycenaean constructions. In ancient Sardinian statues the S’arzana wear a horned helmet and this was what led the Middle Eastern and Egyptian peoples to distort their name into Sherdan, from the Persian "sher" which means horn and the Caspian term Dan / Djan for people. Their depictions in the Sardinian statues and Egyptian bas reliefs of the period confirms the S’arzana’s use of horned helmets. The S’arzana were certainly related to the inhabitants of Sardis in Lydia, and of the Lydians themselves. Lydia already existed in around 1200 BC and had close ties with Egypt. Indeed, in that period, when the Sea Peoples invaded, Egypt sent corn to the Lydia to prevent famine. As a consequence of this, the Lydians (or Shardana) fought for Egypt even then, although the kingdom of Lydia is only recorded historically after 750 BC. Sardis in Anatolia was near Lake Karalis, which gave its name to the city of Cagliari in Sardinia. Also from Anatolia was King Sarduri II, who ruled over the Lycians in around 764BC and whose name can be seen to derive from that of the city of Sardis. The Shardjan were professional mercenaries and pirates. Indeed in Sardinia, as in ancient Epirus, the name Piras (connected to Pirate in all the neo-Latin languages) is common. Puddu is a Sardinian name which may derive from Arzawa (cf. Queen Pudu-Khepa). The ongoing influence cof the Shardjan stretched as far as Catalonia, with the popular dance of the Shardana, which is still practiced today, and in the Sordi tribe, who settled in Gerona on the Mediterranean coast. The Italian surname Sartoris derives from the name of King Sarduris as does the Italian name for the profession of tailor: sarto or Sartur in the Piedmontese dialect and the names of nautical items: sartie, sartiame (stays). Indeed, the Sardinians were professional sailors and the first inhabitants of the western islands were great pioneers in seafaring.

• Perhaps in this very period to the West, in the Bay of Biscay, there was a settlement of Caucasian iron-workers, who lived side-by-side with the people who would later be termed Iberian (with an Armenian and Caucasian term which recalls the Greek hyper and the Latin Superi), who lived in the mountains and to the North of the peninsula. There is every reason to associate this settlement of iron-workers with the Iron Age, which was restricted, driven by economic motivations and cloaked in secrecy. The entrepeneurs who pushed these people to settle in that area had probably discovered iron and intended to profit from it. Although it may seem incredible to us today, at that time the exploitation of resources was organized over long distances for precious materials such as iron. We need only consider the reign of David, during which there was commerce with Tartessos (Andalucia) in around 1000BC. The kingdom used iron weapons but, as there was no iron in the Middle East at that time, sent ships to Ukraine, Elba or Gascony for supplies. The term Baski should have read Guaski. The origin of the Guaski (Viesgos in Spanish and Euskadi in Basque, with an Ew/We metathesis typical of the Armenian region, as is the plural ending in –ki) is probably to be found in the name of the Gasgas, who we also know as the Gaskas, a people of the Caucasian mountains. These ancient smiths used their iron weapons to defeat the Hittites. The Gaskas took their name from Caucasus (Kafkas in Russian). How did they reach Spain? It would appear that they migrated over sea, travelling up the Ebro and the Aragon valley to Irunea. Their land of origin existed as early as the twelfth century BC on the Eastern Caucasus, and a dynasty ruled over the so-called Iberian peoples up in the mountains. Incredibly, this dynasty survived right up the the Tzarist occupation at the end of the nineteenth century AD. The East Caucasia region was known as Iberia for centuries and the mountain peoples as Iberians. The fact that we find the same name in Northern Spain is therefore, probably, as consdquence of the Basque people. Indeed, the Viesga or Euskar language, which is significantly different from all the other known languages, resembles only the language of certain North-Eastern Caucasian tribes. Indeed, about 2000 corresponding terms have been identified (and about 20% of the vocabulary as a whole corresponds to the ancient Armenian language). Moreover, it has been ascertained that the composition of the blood of the Basques and of the Caucasian tribes differs from that of all the other European peoples, since it contains 50% of Rh positive, whereas in Europe in general Rh does not exceed 17%. Whatever the reason for this genetic alteration, the Basques and Iberians of Caucasus are peoples unlike any other. It could be that the Euskandi were subsequently also present in Corica, at Bastià (the Corsican dialect word for dog is giacaru, which corresponds to the Basque Tzakur and the Caucasian Dzagli).

• In the Danube area, archeologists have identified the Celts with the Bronze Age, which spread from 2200 onwards along the Romanian coast (Galati), in the Belgrade region (Dardania) and in Galicia, before concentrating itself in the West, towards the Atlantic. There are theories that pre-date the Celtic settlement on the Atlantic coast, partly due to the dating of Celtic megaliths in Brittany and Cornwall. Nonetheless, we cannot exclude the possibility that the earlier Italic peoplesfirst gave rise to this civilization, expanding West. The word Europe, or Evropa in Russian and Greek, derives from classical mythology, where it refers to a cow who was abducted and ravished by Zeuss. The name might also come from Evro-, which would indicate the boar Epero. This is an interesting explanation, but the origin of Evro lies with the Evros (or Maritsa) river in Thrace, and we can establish that the root for this name lies in the word Evro, also to be found in the Spartan river Evrota (with the Doric pronunciation), which is characterized by –ota ending typical of the Aegaean people. This ending makes us think that Eurota might be an adjective of Evro, deriving from the river, such as might refer to a people settled there. In the West, Eurota became Eprota (and Epirota), (Epero = boar); ancient Corinth was also known as Epiri. In Spanish V becomes B, so the Ebro in Spain can be traced back to the same root, as can the Ebro in Thace and the name Epero, if given a Spanish reading, which can realistically be associated with the same Italic peoples settled in Rumelia. Ebro is a root which corresponds with the name of the Eburone and the Eburovice tribes, who inhabited Northern Gaul, a land rich in boar; in Latin Ebur indicates the ivory tusk of the boar. In other words, Evropa and Epirus were the lands of the boar, just as Russia and the Arctic were the lands of the bear(Rrus in ancient Slavic and Arktos in Greek are terms for bear). Evro became Euro in all of the western languages which read V as U, and it became linked to the Celtic people known as the Neuri. These were probably Celts and they had a language not far removed from Latin. Indeed, in Latin V was read as U and probably pronounced W. It would appear that the Neuri overcame the Germans and that they may have come from Dardania (cf. the French surname Dardagnan), that they ruled over various areas of mining or commercial interest, imposing their typically Balkan mining and commercial technologies. Gaining strength from their prowess in using carriages in battle, the Celtic warriors imposed themselves as an elite minority in farming villages all over Europe, and their burial places in all of these areas (except Ireland) evince their military occupation. Their mining technologies and their use of carriages in battle originated in the Balkans, and before that in the basin of the Don river, just as the art of archery is typically Eastern. It is significant that the areas which were once Celtic do not have a single language nowadays, but rather belong to three groups: italic, Germanic and Slavic. The Celtic language of the Gauls does not appear to have any roots in Latin, but can rather be traced back to the languages spoken along the coast of the English Channel, which would be the purest relation, whereas in Gaelic we can also find traces of pre-Celtic languages, a combination of Phrygian and Hellenic languages, which may have been absorbed with the immigration of copper smiths. Indeed, because it was an island and due to its climate, Ireland appears to have been almost deserted when the Celts decided to settle there to mine and fish, although in Dublin and Ulster there was already some copper mining and some early smiths (the Kain), who probably harked back to the Balkans, land of Vulcan. This reconstruction is coherent with the Hellenic remains to be found in Irish Gaelic and mythology, which are not present in either Gaul or in the Celtiberian language as we now know it. The Celts who reached Ireland were experts in river sailing and ferrying, skills acquired along the Danube, the Rhein and the other European rivers. The Carrach, their fleets of boats, made of stitched animal skins, braved the Atlantic, thanks to their high sides, and remained the most resistant and high-capacity vessels, consequently lending their names to the Medieval Carrack which subsequently evolved into the Caravelle.

• There is no archaeological evidence of Celtic military invasions before 2200 BC. Whether the Kurgan from the Don river, expert horsemen and metal-workers, were the Celts themselves, or whether the Celts subsequently learnt these skills from the Kurgan, it was the invasions of the Kurgan civilization which laid the foundations for the birth of an autonomous Celtic civilization. The Celts must have come to power in the West between 2200 and 1300 BC – no earlier – and were concentrated in the far West, even though they came from the East. This fact has led to some significant uncertainties among scholars, but everything would lead us to believe that certain unpopulated areas of Northern France and Ireland were peacefully occupied for the first time by Dardanians – a people who were quite late in introducing agriculture (between 2200 and 1300 BC) – banishing or assimilating the small numbers of prior inhabitants without any apparent conflict.

• The Dardanian Celts, descendents of the Brianzan Celts, probably hailed from the Briansk (cfr. Dardania, Brianza and Briançon for the itinerary followed). Their language became dominant on the Atlantic coast because they were the first to fish intensively in that area. They subsequently settled in significant numbers in the North of France, practicing Iron Age agriculture (the horse-drawn plough or Plaumoratas is a Celtic invention). Something similar happened in the Alps, where we find the purest traces of the Celtic language in the place names. The Dardanian passage through the Alps the Alps (and, in particular, through Brianza, Besançon and Briançon, from the Swiss Franconian Jura to reach the Atlantic), is fairly evident that the place names in that area, just as it seems clear that the Veneti from Veneto and Bergamo are related to the Veneti in Brittany and the Wendes from the source of the Dnepr, where, in Leopoli, we can also find the city Vinnieka. The word Veneti is related to the goddess Venus, protectress of Aeneas. Likewise, the name of the name of the Antes harks back to the name of King Anittas of Nicaea, to Byzantium, Besançon, the Atlantic or the Carthaginian Atlas, as well as to the aristocratic name Argantonius, typical of Gaul and Tartessus and to Antonius, typical of Rome. The fact that Celtic place names are still to be found in the Alps probably stems from the fact that this area was uninhabited when it was first occupied by the Dardanian Celts. In those times, many areas in the West were still occupied by isolated nomadic peoples and were scarcely populated, as a consequence either of their cold climate or of the aridity of their soils.

• The toponym Alba in Piedmont, Liguria (Albenga) and Lazio probably dates back to the Ligurian Ambrones, the first Italic people. The word Alba also exists in Romanian (Alba Julia), Albanian and Urartian (Albania is a region of Caucasus). In Latin the word Alba means clear and dawn. Nonetheless, the word’s origins are Balkan and it can be linked to the Romanian and Dinaric or Italian Alps, which are white with snow, while the Appenines are full of pines, Pen. The Apuan Alps, in the middle of the Appenines, are white as a consequence of the presence of Carrara marble, as a consequence of which these are called Alps, whereas the Pre-Alps are called Pennines because they are devoid of snow and covered in pines. The place name Albalonga means a long clearness, as does the name of Alba in Piedmont. The names of areas such as Romania and Romagna derive from the name of bronze (rame in Italian, aramen in Latin). These names enable us to trace the path of the westward overland migration of the metallurgic technologies developed in the Balkans. This primordial migration coincides with the geography of the first agricultural areas and can therefore be connected with the first Mesolithic settlements of early Italic pastoral and arable farmers, although the same names can also be found in apparently non-Italic regions such as Armenia. The name Aram and the word for bronze Aeramen may provide the source for the name of these peoples in the Bronze Age, including the Arminiones from the Rhine and the Armenians from Asia Minor.

• The Ambrones and the Sicambri (or Sugambri), who shared their name with the Ligurian Ambrones, belonged to this originary people. Amber is yellow like ambrosia (clear beer), but the term belongs to the Umbrian and Hispanic language (Umbri = hombres), as well as to the Hungarian (ember = man). These peoples made up a significant part of the originary populations of the Rhine and the Mediterranean: it seems hard to believe that these Ligurian Ambrones spoke a Germanic language. The Western Germanic peoples have their most ancient roots not along the Danube, but in the Rhine valley, and along the Dutch and Danish coasts there were first and foremost to be found Italic peoples, who presumably lived in agricultural settlements along the Rhine until 5000 BC and constituted a political entity. Indeed, not only is there a Rhine river in both Germany and Romagna, but the word Reno / Rhein might recall the Umbrian pronunciation of the word Regno (kingdom) and suggest the primitive social organization that existed along the river when it no longer marked the confine between different peoples. Similarly, in Spanish rey and reina are the words for king and queen, and the Italian adjective Reggina (recalling the Italian word for queen Regina) refers to Reggio in Emilia, on the Reno river. These are probably all ancient Italic agricultural kingdoms dating back to before 5000 BC. In German Rein means pure and reinigen means to clean or wash, but it can be connected to rennen – to run (cf. the Greek rein). In German, then, the Rhine was taken on as a name which already carried the meaning of running water and the Germanic peoples, arriving on the banks of the Rhine, seemed to appreciate its pure waters for drinking and sailing. The Germanic peoples saw the Rhine and a confining river and a sailing port, not as a kingdom.

• Romagnano, Carmagnola, Scarmagno, Gozzano, Lake Gozo, Lake Sirio and Ivrea were the lands of the Taurini. A little further to the East are the Leontine Alps, where the name of the Lepontine people, who spoke a Celtish language, can apparently be raced to the name of Ponte Eusino and Lepanto. The Taurus mountains (in Armenia and Cappadocia) carry the name of the Austrian Tauro and the Germanic God Tyr, the God of the door (the mountain pass), and this would lead us to believe that his cult was widespread in all mountain passes, from Anatolia to Piedmont. This would implicate the prhesence of Balkan peoples who worshipped the God Tyr in all of these areas. We know, moreover, that Tyr was worshipped by Slavs, Lithuanians and Germanics, but it would appear that the Celts also adopted this cult. In Liguria we can also find Albenga, on the Arroscia torrent, the name of which derives from the Albingauna of the Ingauni ; Alba is a typically Italic word, but the Ingauni take their name from the Swiss German Ingen and the Rhine. From these names it appears that in ancient times there was already a certain intermingling of peoples. The first origins of the Italic people is linked to the Rhine, to Catalonia and to the South of France, to the agricultural communities of the Rhône, the Pyrenes and the Po Valley, and can be traced back to 5000 BC, or perhaps even earlier. Germanic language-speaking communities had been settling to the East of the Rhine since the most ancient times, sometimes occupying Alpine areas. It would now appear difficult to date these peaceful settlements, but peoples like the Ingauni and the Cottii are certainly related to the Germanic peoples (Ingens and Goths), who perhaps subsequently pushed further South into Italic lands or reached them by sea. The presence of the Graian Alps (from Graikoi = Greeks or, better, Phrygian Hellenics) beside the Cottian Alps would lead us to imagine that there were Phrygian disembarkations. This would mean that Phrygian-Gothic peoples had reached Albenga by sea and that these peoples were connected to the Allobroges and to the Ingen from the Danube. The word Allobroges, read as AlloBryges, might share associations with the names of the Alemmani and Alsatians, deriving from from aalen (to fish) or Aal (eel) [This would also explain the origin of the greeting Hallo in German, French and English as a derivative of the German Hals (throat) and the Czech Hlas (voice) and as being connected to the Gallic people, since Hlava means head and Hlasitu means big and strong, being equivalent to the Russian Galavà (head) and the Lithuanian Galvià (bigness)].

We can also affirm that this settlement dates to about 1000 BC, the period of the Phrygian thalassocracy. In the Alps of Cuneo, known as the Cottian Alps, we can find the relics of the King Gottian or Cottian, a name recalling that of the Goths, as does the seaside town of Varigotti. In Liguria the Goths and Armenians were both controlled by the Phrygians. In particular, the Celticised Goths (the Getae) belonged to the Dacian people, who are already chronicled in the Bible as giving their name to the race of Geter, the son of Aram. The Phrygians were evidently the inhabitants of Balkan Europe, over which of whom the spawn of Abraham, who originated from the Ebro or the Zela in Troad. We cannot, then, exclude the possibility that communities of Goths and Phrygians from the Danube and Anatolia reached the Cottian Alps, travelling up the Rhône, and that this settlement was contemporaneous with the arrival of other Mysian, Armenian, Carian and Zaker peoples who were allies of the Phrygians. It is probable that this area became populated after 1200 BC, after the arrival of the Celts on the Altaltic, and that these Goths were none other than the Cisalpine Masha cited in an ancient Celtic inscription to be found in the Pyrenes.

• The Saluvii were one of the Ligurian tribes, whose name, analogous with that of the Salian Franks, can perhaps be traced in the place name Saluses (italianised into Saluzzo) and can also be linked to