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gorseddphungus 185 posts |
Mar 12, 2006, 14:58
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"I find it interesting that there are examples that are EXACTLY the sme as British RA . Despite similarities between RA in British regions there are no examples of an exact copy of motifs" "It is the very ubiquity of very similar motifs world wide that destroys the diffusion /invasion argument that is often heard in RA studies .That is not to say that there were no exchange or invasions , just that it is not the full explanation ." that's exactly what i believe and i am saying elsewhere. rock art is universal but then the code used is applied following cultural reasons. one more example, Galician rock art (=Northumbrian rock art) is used in a certain area of Galicia and only on specific places of the countryside (as a 'gateway' to the highlands and always high above the valleys, often just off ancient cattle trackways) and what's more, it is completely different from megalithic art (the painted slabs that decorate Galician dolmens), which in itself has more of a Brittany/Eire connection, although in this case it is far more indigenous than the similarities in rock art between Galicia and Britain. AND dates are beginning to prove that cup and rings (rock art) began to be created in the late neolithic, therefore contemporary with megalithic art (the one used in graves). As for migrations, you know the way that archaeology is seen by the public as one-dimensional sometimes even by archaeologists. Usually the public consider places as Celtic supposing that huge populations moved and replaced earlier ones. Let's take celtic art for instance. you find it all over europe and yet even the irish are genetically NOT celtic (if we follow one side of the studies). As you say, migrations ARE possible. I would add that WHOLE replacements of population are virtually impossible - affirmations you tend to hear everywhere like, say, the irish or the welsh are not related to the basques because the basques are not IE (and they stand alone in europe genetically speaking) would imply that the whole of ireland was replaced by incoming IE migrations. Thus, all of Europe retains a Paleolithic (=Basque) sub-stratum in some places it has been definitely more altered than others. The more isolated places like the Basque lands, the Welsh mountains or Western Ireland must have definitely retained that pre-IE stock, which is STILL the one that EVERYONE in Europe still possess. Most likely a few warriors arrived and imposed themselves and their language on the vast majority like they did later on in the dark ages (goths in iberia or normans in britain) but the peasant can still be traced back to paleolithic times.
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gorseddphungus 185 posts |
Mar 12, 2006, 15:00
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by the way, could you perhaps post details of Baku rock art if possible? I have been there and I was not aware of it, it is definitely very interesting for me.
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gorseddphungus 185 posts |
Mar 12, 2006, 15:09
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After a while you will agree with me that it leads nowhere. This is the eternal discussion between IE vs non-IE / Basque which has raged on in Iberian circles for centuries. It is similar to the Celtic debate, but this one is even worse as it is spread out over such a vast territory (ie all of Europe). But it is still fun to see the word 'celtic' overused in Galician brochures (or Irish and welsh brochures for that matter). People who see links like the Galician bagpipes, the wet and green landscape or large numbers of Brig- placenames as evidence of a Celtic uber-nation get too carried away, especially when you think that Celtic *culture* was almost as strong almost everywhere in Iberia, France or Germany, just faded away faster later on. I have seen this debate for decades and it definitely arises passions and never leads anywhere. But it is great fun sometimes, isn't it?
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tiompan 5758 posts |
Mar 12, 2006, 15:20
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| As I can't post it here I can send a pic if you give me an address . btw there are quite a few RA panels in the area . | |||
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tiompan 5758 posts |
Mar 12, 2006, 15:35
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Placement of RA differs from region to region often in Britain it is on terraces above river systems but then again there is Dumfries and Galloway where it is predomantly low lying and coastal . Then in Valcamonica it is snow covered for half the year due to the altitude. An area like Dartmoor is exactly where you would expect to find RA except it is an RA desert , until now anyway. Sometimes it is just a case of some areas being unexplored . Might there not be a possibility that RA is to be found further inland like Gargamala ?
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gorseddphungus 185 posts |
Mar 12, 2006, 15:37
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I would if I had the time, I find it hard to post in these forums due to a busy life, although I often enjoy one or two discussions by such knowledgeable people as everyone here, including yourself. Comparative mythography between Galicia and other 'Celtic' areas is also a highly speculative matter and some of the best papers on it are in Galician (or in Spanish if lucky). And far better researchers are doing this all over Iberia. It would be crazy to even attempt here to write about the Galician three Anas (connected to the Irish triple goddess), the devotion to Epona in Galicia (which still has whole festivals devoted to horses) or how the 'Keltic' tribes all over northern Spain who resisted the Romans for so long had plenty of enough written evidence of sacrifices to Lugh (there's even a town called Lugo). I recently even found that women on a beach let the waves touch their lower parts NINE times for fertility. It is coincidences like these that are curious. A certain cultural stream must have entered these lands with some settlers during the earliest waves of Iindoeuropean migrations then remained isolated (the same in Ireland), that's why they are not strictly Celtic (in a La Tene / Hallstatt way) but pre-Keltic Bronze Age tribes and there the ancient similarities. And in other cases, highly forested areas (with little population) like (north)-western Iberia were occupied initially by foreigners, like the case of the Lusitanians, without necessarily fighting the natives and getting involved in trade etc It varies from region to region obviously. Regarding rock art, I am sure you know this excelent book: Rock Art and the Prehistory of Atlantic Europe; Signing the Land (RBradley) - where galician and british rock art are conscienciously compared in a scientific manner Facing the Ocean : The Atlantic and Its Peoples 8000 BC-AD 1500 by Cunliffe is also supposedly fairly all right and it is related to the topic of Atlantic connections, though I havent read it yet Cheers GP
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gorseddphungus 185 posts |
Mar 12, 2006, 15:37
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fantastic! cheers [email protected] |
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gorseddphungus 185 posts |
Mar 12, 2006, 15:50
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Oh yeah, I am sure that many discoveries lie there to prove us all partly wrong one day. I know of the contrasts with Galloway in rock art, Bradley makes that quite clear in his comparative studies. I still trust the generalizations though and the way his studies follow 'tendencies'. If 90% follow a certain trend then there must be something there. Still, I am convinced that each area must have had, like with the building of megalithic graves in Britain, their own regionalisms. Yes, even in a country like Galicia there is always a tiny area that breaks the general rule. After all, they were human and competition and dissent has always been pretty common. Valcamonica is also a fascinating place isn't it but I cannot comment much about it except say that I love it. I also love the way that Hoskin's magnificent work of passage grave orientations (you know the SE/E generalizations) were shattered when he came across the great passage graves of Pastora (near Seville), one with the longest corridor ever - nearly 50 metres - the other one 40 metres. After months of intensive study and finding that nearly all had winter solstice sunrise orientations, the biggest one was orientated west! And of course we shouldn't forget that rock art was created over a period of 1000-2000 years and longer in some areas, and meanings and intentions faded to be replaced by new ones. Thus it is also possible that deviations from the norm could also date to 500 years later. And you know that rock art is extremely difficult to date.
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tiompan 5758 posts |
Mar 12, 2006, 16:49
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| I don't know the Hoskins connection to Pastora could you give me the title , it looks good .Similar shifts in attitudes may happen in RA studies too. There are lots of ingrained ways of thinking in the study of RA that are not necessarily backed up by the evidence . Personally I have big doubts about , pathways & intervisibility , complex motifs being on the higher ground , complexity itself being considered from the purely visual i.e. numbers of rings and uncommon motifs highlight certain sites when the vast majority of cases are quite simple and rarely get considered in the equation , the importance attached to drawings (which I almost prefer to pics ) which priveleges a certain viewpoint and doesn't consider the immediate texture , colour and gradations of the surface and wider landsape (difficult to do ) but the end result is concentrated on the motifs . | |||
PeterH 1180 posts |
Mar 12, 2006, 18:57
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"but the peasant can still be traced back to paleolithic times." Yes and that has been shown throughout Britain by genetic mapping. It seems so obvious when considered objectively. The more tangible indications can be understood better if more recent invasions are considered. We know that the Norman invasion happened and laws, culture and even language changed (for a while), but the population didn't. Yes it did at the upper land-owning end and Domesday Book shows who owned what land before and after. There is real anguish in Anglo-Saxon circles when the argument is put forward that the mass AS migration was much less than supposed. Then the language, law, customs and building techniques really did change. But the population stayed put, merged with the newcomers and adopted their ways. High status clan leaders lost out and may have moved westwards, but genetic mapping again has shown that even people in the east of England are predominantly descended from a stable, original population. There was no mass exodus or ethnic cleansing. Similarly with the the Roman occupation - very few "Italian" Romans settled here, a fair number of auxiliaries especially German probably did. But the bulk of the population just continued. Genetic mapping and such techiques as dna sampling from teeth and the ability to establish where people lived as children, will sweep away the preconceptions and mythologies. The answer must lie between the extremes that have both been "orthodox" in their time. The old idea of successive waves of mass folk movements has been abandoned. As a reaction, the pendulum has swung too far the other way with the new orthodoxy being one of zero movement and diffusionism. Surely the answer is likely to be that a finite number of people did sometimes move for economic and social reasons. Sometimes, that movement was peaceful through trade while at other times it was only acheived by conflict. That which is most likely, seems to be that which most probably did happen. Occam's razor again!
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