Linguistics vs. archeology and (physical) anthropology
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Subtitle: "A cautionary note on the application of limited linguistics studies to whole populations"
A prefatory note on "anthropology". In the early 90s, I was deeply involved in the first ancient DNA studies on the Tarim mummies* with Paolo Francalacci, an anthropologist at the University of Sassari. Sardinia. Paolo was deputed to work with me by the eminent population geneticist, Luigi Luca Cavalli-Sforza of the Stanford medical school genetics department, who was unable to endure the rigors of the expedition to Eastern Central Asia.
[*Wikipedia article now strangely distorted for political reasons. Be skeptical of its claims, especially those based on recent DNA studies.]
After we had collected the tissue samples in the field, Paolo took them back to Sassari to extract and analyze the attenuated DNA. This involved amplification through PCR (polymerase chain reaction), a process that later gained great fame during the years of the coronavirus pandemic, inasmuch as it is an essential step in the detection and quantification of messenger RNA (mRNA). Indeed, two Penn scientists, Drew Weissman and Katalin Karikó, were awarded the 2023 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine for their work on mRNA technology, which was crucial in the development of COVID-19 injections.
Paolo's analysis extended over several years. About halfway through, I flew to Sardinia and visited Paolo in his "anthropology" lab. That was a revelation, because his whole department seemed more like it belonged to the hard sciences than to the social sciences, as I had become accustomed to for anthropology departments in the United States. Indeed, Paolo's own specialty, evolutionary biology, was full of zoological and botanical specimens, chemical reagents and apparatus, but showed little evidence of the cultural and social investigations I was familiar with in American departments of anthropology.
I told Paolo how surprised I was by the difference between the anthropology I knew of in America and what I was seeing in Sardinia. He smiled at me benignly and said, "We do physical anthropology," with a tone of voice and attitude that led me to believe that he considered physical anthropology to be real anthropology.
Enough by way of methodological preface.
Last week I posted "A cautionary note on the application of limited genetics studies to whole populations" (6/21/25) in which I decried overemphasis on genetics at the expense of archeology, linguistics, and many other disciplines that could be applied to the study of ancient populations. In this post, I will come at the juxtaposition between genetics and linguistics from the opposite angle, with history, archeology, art history, climate studies, and other relevant disciplines looking on as interested bystanders.
Once again, a claim has been made that the Xiōngnú and the Huns spoke a Paleo-Siberian Language:
Svenja Bonmann and Simon Fries, "Linguistic Evidence Suggests That Xiōng-nú and Huns Spoke the Same Paleo-Siberian Language", Transactions of the Philological Society (June 16, 2025).
Abstract
The Xiōng-nú were a tribal confederation who dominated Inner Asia from the third century BC to the second century AD. Xiōng-nú descendants later constituted the ethnic core of the European Huns. It has been argued that the Xiōng-nú spoke an Iranian, Turkic, Mongolic or Yeniseian language, but the linguistic affiliation of the Xiōng-nú and the Huns is still debated. Here, we show that linguistic evidence from four independent domains does indeed suggest that the Xiōng-nú and the Huns spoke the same Paleo-Siberian language and that this was an early form of Arin, a member of the Yeniseian language family. This identification augments and confirms genetic and archaeological studies and inspires new interdisciplinary research on Eurasian population history.
Here are the sections of the Bonmann and Fries paper:
1 Introduction
2 Earlier hypotheses on the linguistic origins of the Xiōng-nú and the Huns
3 Loanwords in Turkic and Mongolic (and how to detect them)
4 The Jié couplet and Xiōng-nú glosses
5 Hunnish anthroponymy
6 Toponymic and hydronymic evidence
In general, the appearance of the new Bonmann and Fries paper has been met with enthusiasm. Wolfgang Behr, who posted notices about the paper on X and Bluesky, has this to say about it:
There is an exciting new paper on the language of the Xiongnu out in TPS (attached), arguing,
with fresh evidence, that it was indeed Yeniseian, as first surmised by Lájos Ligeti (1902-1987) in 1950, more specifically a variety related to the Proto-Arin branch.
In passing, it also contains good arguments against the dubious ārya-,'Aryan' *[ɢ,g]ˤraʔ > xià 夏 equation proposed by Beckwith via hypothetical,"East Scythian" (for internal etymologies of the name, cf. Behr, Asiatische Studien, LXI.3, 2008, 727–754), and plausible ideas about a Yeniseian background of the notorious Eurasian Wanderwort for 'silver' (on which cf. Anton Antonov & Guillaume Jacques, "Turkic kümüš ’silver’ and the lambdaism vs sigmatism debate", Turkic languages, 2011, 15 (2), pp. 151-170. halshs-00655014).
For, among others, the reasons alluded to above, I have reservations about the findings of this paper. The tentativeness of the enterprise is evident in the hypothetical language in which it is couched: "probable / probably", "seem(s)", "(un)likely" "suggest(s) / suggestive", and so forth.
I would concede that, just as Southeast and South Sinitic languages may embody substratal Austronesian and Austroasiatic elements, Paleo-Siberian / Yeniseian / Arin may constitute a substratal component of the languages of the Xiōngnú / Huns, nevertheless we should be wary of jumping to the conclusion that Southeast and South Sinitic languages were ipso facto Austronesian and Austroasiatic and that Xiōngnú / Hunnic were Paleo-Siberian / Yeniseian / Arin languages.
When all is said and done, the base line of our researches on ancient civilizations should be their physical remains: textiles, metals, pottery, basketry, structures, associated animals and plants, middens, pits, bones, coprolites, usw.
Specifically, with regard to the identity of the Xiōngnú / Huns, we cannot ignore the Iranian inputs in the confederation, as the late Elling Eide, who worked on this problem for decades, had assembled mountains of supporting evidence. I believe that his records may still exist at his magnificent research library in Sarasota, Florida.
Finally, as Étienne de la Vaissière has demonstrated in his authoritative article on "Xiongnu" in Encyclopædia Iranica, the Xiōngnú were basically mounted warriors and nomads with steppe affinities to the west.
XIONGNU (Hsiung-nu), the great nomadic empire to the north of China in the 2nd and 1st centuries BCE, which extended to Iranian-speaking Central Asia and perhaps gave rise to the Huns of the Central Asian Iranian sources.
Origins. The Xiongnu are known mainly from archaeological data and from chapter 110 of the Shiji (Historical Records) of Sima Qian, written around 100 BCE, which is devoted to them. Comparison of the textual and archaeological data makes it possible to show that the Xiongnu were part of a wider phenomenon—the appearance in the 4th century BCE of elite mounted soldiers, the Hu (Di Cosmo, 2002), on the frontiers of the Chinese states which were expanding to the north. The first mention of the Xiongnu in Chinese sources dates to 318 BCE. Archaeologically, these Hu cavalrymen seem to be the heirs of a long development (the Early Nomadic period, from the end of the 7th to the middle of the 4th century BCE), during which the passage from an agro-pastoral economy to one dominated at times exclusively by equestrian pastoralism had taken place. Among these peoples, in the 4th and 3rd centuries BCE the Xiongnu occupied the steppe region of the northern Ordos as well as the regions to the northwest of the great bend of the Yellow River. Numerous archaeological finds in Inner Mongolia and in Ningxia demonstrate the existence of a nomadic culture that was socially differentiated and very rich, in which both iron and gold were in common use and which was in constant contact, militarily as well as diplomatically and commercially, with the Chinese states (in particular Zhao to the southeast).
The Xiōngnú were not hunter-gatherers and fishermen of the Yenisei Valley. I am amazed and dismayed that the linguists who propose that the origins of Xiōngnú language are to be found in Ket, Yeniseian, or other Paleo-Siberian language are oblivious to this basic reality of existence and ecology.
Selected readings
- Chau Wu, "An early fourth century AD historical puzzle involving a Caucasian people in North China" (1/25/19)
- "Sogdians and Xiongnu / Huns" (2/21/22)
- "Xiongnu (Hunnic) Shanyu" (7/16/21)
- "The complexities of a basic word for "barbarian" in Sinitic and neighboring languages" (6/28/20)
- "Xiongnu Official Title Danghu and Jurchen Tanggu ‘Hundred’" (1/13/25
- "Heavy Velar vs Meager Bilabial Articulations in Xiongnu Language" (4/15/22)
- [Thanks to Ted McClure]
Chris Button said,
June 24, 2025 @ 11:10 pm
One very quick comment for now regarding 夏. Personally, I still like Pulleyblank's suggestion that it is related to 華.
Yves Rehbein said,
June 25, 2025 @ 1:39 pm
Callback to The basis of coming and going: the top part of Western Zhou 華 as a form of 花 resembles 禾 'grain' and 來 'come' /*mə.rˤək/ (Baxter and Sagart).
The connection between flowering and growing grain is obvious, but it may be argued (cf. Wiktionary) that 來 represented rice and that it was borrowed to spell "come" (rebus principle) – I notice too late in my argument. I won't spear you the details.
David Marjanović said,
June 25, 2025 @ 4:36 pm
I'm stunned. What do you expect from a scientific paper?
There are things to criticize about the paper (sadly I don't have time to go into details – maybe in two weeks), but not this.
Do lifestyles never change? Can languages never survive a change in subsistence economy?
Again I'm stunned; and again there are things to criticize about the paper, but not this.
I will mention that there's lots of toponymic/hydronymic evidence that Yeniseian is actually intrusive where it survives now and came from farther south in historical times, just as the paper assumes its readers know.
Victor Mair said,
June 25, 2025 @ 7:01 pm
"I'm stunned. What do you expect from a scientific paper?"
rigor, logic, precision, evidence
"Do lifestyles never change? Can languages never survive a change in subsistence economy?"
Your questions are so far off base for 4th c. BC that they don't make sense.
Richard Hershberger said,
June 26, 2025 @ 4:33 am
Regarding the note about Wikipedia, I have two fundamental rules about it: (1) Wikipedia is useless for any subject that is controversial; and (2) An outsider to the subject cannot know whether it is controversial.
Chris Button said,
June 26, 2025 @ 6:21 pm
There's a lateral component to 秀支 that seems to be being swept under the rug.
For that reason, i still think the best sound correspondence comes from Gaulish *slugi.
David Marjanović said,
July 11, 2025 @ 11:07 am
Clear statements about, ideally quantifications of, uncertainty are what I expect. These statements, in turn, I expect to be backed by rigor, logic, precision and evidence – as they are here.
Why do you think so?
Couldn't at least the Pre-Arin-speaking people split in two, one group wandering north and retaining the attested hunting-gathering lifestyle, another learning to ride from local Iranian-speaking pastoralists and ending up with an empire?
MusaeumScythia said,
July 12, 2025 @ 9:20 am
Hi Victor,
I share your complaints. I would like to add, as someone quite well-versed in steppe nomadic genetics – that there is absolutely not one bit of genetic evidence that can support these conclusions.
The Xiongnu period samples are diverse, but certainly contain a primarily Turkic component with some samples representing migrants from the Altai, Xinjiang, Central Asia, Eastern Mongolia/Manchuria and China, and some samples containing ancestry from these populations. The European Hun samples look like the Turkic populations from the early common era, by then containing genetic input from Iranic nomads. Medieval Bulgars and Khazars are genetically of the same sub-population ad the European Huns. Not just broadly similar, but very closely-related groups of peoples.
In neither populations do we have genetic evidence of a Yenisei-Baikal type population which practiced steppe nomadism and genetically contributed to either the Xiongnu and Huns.
Beyond this, you can actually find traces of this in modern day China too. I discovered that Chinese individuals with the last name "Shi", when carrying "foreign" paternal origin, carry lineages which are also found in the Xiongnu, European Huns and medieval Turks. You can read about that here:
https://substack.com/@musaeumscythia/note/c-90740382
I have some old blog entries which relate to this, but I will be writing a new one soon. I also got invited to talk about this on a podcast. Would you like it if I shared that here when it is published?
David Marjanović said,
July 12, 2025 @ 2:15 pm
Now it gets interesting!
I do wonder, however, when the Turkic languages became associated with "Turkic ancestry" and when the Yeniseian languages became associated with "a Yenisei-Baikal-type population". Have they "always" been, or did these things change at some point? After all, river names show that the Yeniseian languages used to be spoken in a very large area pretty far south of where the last few languages became attested from the 18th century onwards.
MusaeumScythia said,
July 12, 2025 @ 4:29 pm
@David
I don't think the toponymic evidence goes much further south than northern Mongolia, unless if one would identify -kul as a Yeniseian toponym which is not the consensus I believe (complete layman here). This is the region where the Tsaatan live, whose ancestors linguistically would have been Southern Samoyedic reindeer herders. These Samoyedic-> Turkic reindeer herders do all seem to have a Yenisei-Baikal genetic substrate. Perhaps this is reflected linguistically as well? I unfortunately do not know if this is the case.
I do know that Yeniseian has far more Turkic loans than the reverse, which would be strange if they were the older, more widespread population on the Mongolian steppes. Unless you suppose that "steppe Yeniseian" was parallel to Northern and Southern Yeniseian but this is not a proposal I have seen.
Based on some ancient samples in the Siberian region, I'd say that the association between Yeniseian languages and their genomic profile is at the very least certain in the early common era – very close to when Proto-Yeniseian diverged.
For Turkic language, the ancestry best fitting for their "Proto-Turkic" component is an ancestry component which has recent genetic ties to Mongolic and slightly deeper ties to Tungusic, while also having a genetic tie to Uralic. My own opinion is that this would suggest a (deep) genetic connection to either Uralic or Mongolic-Tungusic languages, I personally think the Mongol-Tungusic connection makes the most sense. Either way it seems from the moment that Turkic people appear in history, they are associated with "Turkic ancestry".
David Marjanović said,
July 20, 2025 @ 11:25 am
Thank you!
If Turkic has Yeniseian loans related to the steppe lifestyle, they may be hard to detect – they could be extinct in Yeniseian, so there's nothing to compare them with.
I bet the issue is underresearched, too. Here… was a proposal for a set of four Yeniseian loans in Turkic (possibly through Mongolic) that are about social organization on the steppe: none less than qan, qaghan, qatun, qaghatun. The file seems to be gone. The paper is cited here, and further developments of the idea are mentioned there, too.