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Originally posted by Vanitas
reply to post by punkinworks
Please, tell me you're joking...
Austria? Italy?
Austrians? Italians...?
First of all, Europe can only be divided - more or less accurately, that is - into regions, not countries.
(The political boundaries are, and have been throughout history, FAR too arbitrary to really mean anything.)
And that's exactly what contemporary European policies are geared towards, with a very good reason.
The people who live in the region called Tyrol - in very recent times divided into Tirol (Austria) and the Alto Adige (Italy) - can only be called Tyroleans. Ethnically, the population is very mixed (except for a few valleys), but the predominant family language is German, with the according cultural self-identification.
(It's the truth, as anyone who is familiar with the reality "on the ground" - I am - could attest. I am certainly not going to discuss this any further - it's off-topic, thank God. )
But at the time, not even the term "Tyrolean" could apply, except as a joke.
We're talking about the Europe of thousands of years ago, when even the continent didn't have its present name!
Anyway, his DNA seems to indicate a Ladino origin, according to this study, which has the added bonus of confirming the plausibility of the "outcast" theory.
To anyone interested in this subject I would recommend Mallory's book In Search of the Indo-Europeans.
[edit on 26-6-2008 by Vanitas]
Are you joking? He was using the modern place names to allow laymen like myself to know exactly what areas of the world we are talking about here.
I would have had no idea what names scholars use to refer to pre-writing peoples as far back as this, so him using modern names for areas really helped.
Originally posted by Vanitas
Are you joking? He was using the modern place names to allow laymen like myself to know exactly what areas of the world we are talking about here.
I would have had no idea what names scholars use to refer to pre-writing peoples as far back as this, so him using modern names for areas really helped.
Please, reread the post in question: there was talk of "Austrians" and "Italians".
Besides, I would have thought anyone remotely interested in Oetzi already knew the contemporary - and basically irrelevant - political appellation of the region in question.
Is the name of the region - Tyrol (not "Austria" and not "Italy") - too much for any "layman" to take in?
I shouldn't think so.
Even - or especially - the "lay" public is bound by accuracy.
It's healthy, it prevents misunderstandings or any kind of abuse; and it's not a heavy burden to carry.