Comments on: The phylogeography of the trans-Caucasus

By: Justin Giancola

Justin Giancola — Sat, 21 Jan 2012 21:42:17 +0000

thanks, everything I’ve been able to find cites lots of examples of counterpoint but no examples of true harmony of melodies before colonialization – which is sortof the defacto for other places in the world. Where the caucasus stuff seems like it could be the origin of western harmony via early church chants in Armenia, Geogia etc.

Whenever I hear “African” style harmonies in popular music I feel like I’m often hearing an extended 2nd in the high voice with a 5th in the middle voice..maybe? that’d fit well with pentatonic stuff.

By: Victor Grauer

Victor Grauer — Sat, 21 Jan 2012 16:32:49 +0000

Justin, African music has been intensively studied over the last 50 years or so, and musicologists now agree that singing in harmony and, in certain cases, counterpoint, is an indigenous practice of considerable antiquity, completely independent of Western influence. Chapter One of my book offers some theories regarding the possible origins of these traditions along with several links to musical examples that might interest you. http://soundingthedepths.blogspot.com/2011/02/chapter-one-pygmy-bushmen-nexus.html

By: Justin Giancola

Justin Giancola — Sat, 21 Jan 2012 05:44:35 +0000

Interesting that you make the exception “outside Africa” as whenever I’ve asked people about “African Harmony” who study music no one can tell me any rules and some even think it may have to do with Christian missionaries or one guy brought up them often using the phrygian mode which could be a link to the Shiraz Empire or Islam spreaders…and how would we know how long they used harmony?

I do know of some groups making beats vocally and having polyrhythms with different tones.

By: Victor Grauer

Victor Grauer — Sat, 21 Jan 2012 03:41:26 +0000

Musically, this is an extremely interesting region, with the richest array of polyphonic vocal traditions in the world, outside of Africa. For further discussion of these remarkable oral traditions and what they might mean, with links to some very beautiful and interesting audio clips, see Chapters Twelve and Thirteen of my online book, Sounding the Depths: http://soundingthedepths.blogspot.com/2011/03/chapter-twelve-passage-to-europe.html

By: alani

alani — Fri, 20 Jan 2012 15:43:03 +0000

An excellent point that the Caucasus is a repository of forgotten and ‘defeated’ people who were safe from both East and West conflicts. Through this, homogeneity was maintained through the centuries, with geography providing safety and security. Keeping in mind, the area was Islamized but still providing haven for Armenians and similar Christian groups.
Fast forward to when the area came under Russian control that Western Europe began to take interest in this ‘settled’ population to hone their theories on World New Order programmes instigated by Adolf Hitler and renforced by others to this day.

By: Paul Givargidze

Paul Givargidze — Thu, 19 Jan 2012 17:20:56 +0000

Just wish to add some possibly relevant bits to the discussion.

From the GeoCurrents article discussed by Razib: “But the plot thickens if we consider the question of where these haplogroup G2a1a Ossetian males might have come from.”

Here is an interesting bit from Ray Banks’ Haplogroup G Newsletter, from early last year, regarding data published in Haber et al., on the specific topic of G2a1a:

“There seems quite an unusual concentration of G2a1a in this country that was not observed before. This concentration is actually almost entirely seen in Christian groups, among which are the Maronites. There are Greek Orthodox Christians in Lebanon as well. So it is not clear why there are concentrations of G2a1a in both the central Caucasus and among Lebanese Christians. The Caucasus has much higher concentrations of G2a1a.”

Razib: “The main lacunae in the above analysis is that it does not cover results from autosomal studies.”

Indeed. The Dodecad “Caucasus” component for Near East minority groups hover around 50%. This includes even the most extreme southwestern population, the Samaritans. Interestingly, the Caucasian populations have very little of the Dodecad “Southwest Asian” component. A component often associated with Semitic languages, and the Arabian Peninsula.

Also, in the GeoCurrents article, they referred to the Balanovsky et al. study. Here is a bit from the Balanovsky et al. conclusion: “The data suggested a direct origin of Caucasus male lineages from the Near East, followed by high levels of isolation, differentiation and genetic drift in situ.”

If I had to hazard a guess, I would say the most recent significant gene exchange between the Caucasus and the Semitic-speaking parts of the Near East occurred in the 3rd and 2nd millennia BCE, with the southern expansions of groups such as the Hurrians. I believe this is why groups such as Armenians, Assyrians, and peoples of Dagestan (e.g. Lezgins), may share some paternal lines, such as J1*.

By: Karl Zimmerman

Karl Zimmerman — Thu, 19 Jan 2012 14:29:57 +0000

Although I’m not saying it best fits the data in this case, I wonder if we’ve under-estimated the number of cultures with a “men’s language” and a “woman’s language” in the past. Such a system is known to happen in various parts of the world (Sumeria, Australia, etc), but has inherent instabilities, as any time a major event happened which disrupted the male population too much (say a devastating war which killed off much of the adult male population), the system would tend to drift towards making the women’s, instead of the men’s, the predominant and eventually sole language. I am wondering if this is how many Austronesian peoples seem to be mostly descended from Austronesians only on the mitochondrial side, while the YDNA points to a Melanesian/Papuan background.