User:Neitrāls vārds/Pre-Indo-European Baltic

The nature of Neolithic European cultures, ethnic groups or languages (also referred to as the "Old Europe") prior to Indo-European and Finno-Ugric proliferation remains a highly speculative topic.

The territory comprising modern day Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania during the Neolithic was characterized by the Narva culture comprising roughly modern day Estonia and Latvia and Neman culture comprising roughly modern day Lithuania and adjacent territories.

It is only possible to speculate on the ethnicity of the peoples that were part of the Narva culture/Neman culture.

Endre Bojtár comments on the possibility of certain "Veneds" being a pre-Indo-European/pre-Finno-Ugric ethnic group being squeezed out by IDE Balts from south and FU Baltic Finns from the north. However this question raises serious issues. Bojtár devotes an entire chapter to what he calls "The Venet(d) question" in his book Foreword to the past: a cultural history of the Baltic people.

Some of his observations are:


 * At this time only the name of certain "North Veneds" and "South Venets" mentioned in historical texts remains the only sign of their existence, furthermore instances of this name being used are scattered all over the European continent. Author notes that versions with -t and -d have been used interchangeably. The author decides to refer to the Baltic (North) Veneds with a -d and the Adriatic (South) Venets with a -t.[p 85]


 * Pliny calls north Veneds either Venets or sometimes Veneds, while Tacitus Venets.



Pre-Indo-European hydronymy
Bojtár argues against the possibility of a pre-Indo-European substratum in hydronyms (see Theo Vennemann's theories: Old European hydronymy and Vasconic substratum theory) among other examples citing that "'many, if not most, Latgalian water features were renamed during the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, following the devastation war, plague and famine.' (Zeps-Rosenschield 1995, 345)"[p 53]

Eric P. Hamp, The pre-Indo-European language of northern (central) Europe

In Baltic Finns

 * http://tech.groups.yahoo.com/group/cybalist/message/50271 - Saarkivi's suggestion that Baltic sala, Finn. (arch.) salo, Saami suolu ('island') could potentially derive from an extinct pre-IDE, pre-FU Neolithic language, since it doesn't have cognates in other FU languages, nor other IDE languages. According to Ernout/Meillet, Dictionnaire Étymolgique de la Langue Latine etymology of Latin insula is unclear.

Latvian pottery
Latvian pottery (Latvijas keramika or Latvijas podniecība), one of the country's oldest art forms, dates back to the Neolithic. Latgale pottery (Latgales keramika) is the most well-known subset of Latvian pottery. The eastern region of Latgale is the most prolific producer of wares.

As a rule, Latvian pottery is characterized by an absence of any painted-on patterns or designs, instead solid colors and gradients are used. Traditionally subdued, earthen hues (greens, browns, etc.) are used; however, artisans can be seen using brighter colors in their unique pieces. Mottled glaze and random artifacts (somewhat reminiscent of the Japanese Shino-yaki) are characteristic of Latvian pottery.

Prehistoric period
The Neolithic Pit–Comb Ware culture ( Comb Ceramic culture) that spanned the entire territory of modern-day Latvia derives its name from the pottery characteristic of the time – wares decorated with impressions of a comb-like object. Narva culture spanning the entire territory of modern day Estonia and Latvia, as well as parts of Lithuania and Western Russia, is a subset of the larger Pit–Comb Ware culture.

Pit–Comb Ware culture is usually thought to have used an early form of what are today known as the Uralic languages, a competing view is that they may have been speakers of a Paleo-European language.

Latgale pottery
Some of the types of wares characteristic to Latgale pottery are vāraunieks (a pot for cooking), medaunieks (a pot for honey storage), sloinīks (a pot for storing fruit preserves), ķērne (a pot for storing sour cream), ļaks (a vessel for storage of oil), piena pods (a pot for storing cow's milk), kazelnieks (a pot for goat milk storage), pārosis (lit. "over-handle", a vessel for bringing food to the field), bļoda (bowl), krūze (a jug or a mug, most often for beer or milk).

Some Latgale pottery wares are not food-related, these include the svilpaunieks (a bird-shaped whistle toy), svečturis (candlestick) and decorative plates and possibly other items meeting more contemporary demands, for example, ashtrays.