Might Hurro-Urartian and North-Caucasian Languages Be Derived from (or Related to) Indo-European?

It seems that the Hurrians, also known as the Aryans, who stayed in the Levant, were connected with haplogroup J2, that seems to be strong in the Nakh part of the Nakh-Dagestanians, while the other part, the Dagestanians, is connected with haplogroup J1, and that the Hurrians were at the very start of our civilization and took part in the development of agriculture, domestication and the development of metalurgi.

The haplogroup J2 connected Hurrians spread to all directions, intermingled with haplogroup R1b, that spread the Indo-European languages from the north of Caucasus, haplogroup G, that is connected with the North East Caucasians and witch both spread alongs the Mediterrean as Cardium Pottery culture, towards Central europe as early neolithic cultures, the Old Europe, including LBK, and to South Asia, haplogroup E, that spread up north into Europe from Balkan, and J1, that spread the Semitic languages.

Overall, the most frequent haplogroups in the Caucasus were G2a3b1-P303 (12%), G2a1a-P18 (8%), J1*-M267(xP58) (34%), and J2a4b*-M67(xM92) (21%), which together encompassed 73% of the Y chromosomes, while the other 24 haplogroups comprise the remaining 27%.

Haplogroup G2a3b1-P303 comprised at least 21% (and up to 86%) of the Y chromosomes in the Shapsug, Abkhaz and Circassians. Haplogroup G2a1a-P18 comprised at least 56% (and up to 73%) of the Digorians and Ironians (both from the Central Caucasus Iranic linguistic group), while not being found at more than 12% (average 3%) in other populations.

Haplogroup J2a4b*-M67(xM92) comprised 51-79% of the Y chromosomes in the Ingush and three Chechen populations (North-East Caucasus, Nakh linguistic group), while, in the rest of the Caucasus, its frequency was not higher than 9% (average 3%).

Haplogroup J1*-M267(xP58) comprised 44-99% of the Avar, Dargins, Kaitak, Kubachi, and Lezghins (South-East Caucasus, Dagestan linguistic group) but was less than 25% in Nakh populations and less than 5% in the rest of Caucasus.

The prevalence of J1*-M267(xP58) in Dagestan is well known (or suspected) from previous studies. Haplogroup J-P58, if we use the genealogical rate, has an age of ~5.4ky in Semitic groups, and this is in concordance with the 5,750 years ago origin of Semitic languages based on Bayesian phylogenetics.

So, it is clear that part of haplogroup J1 was prevalent in ancient Semitic groups, another, disjoint part in ancient Dagestani groups.

To make things more interesting, the Nakh groups (Ingush and Chechens) have J2a4b*-M67(xM92) as their modal haplogroup. Nakh is also a Northeast Caucasian language subfamily, like Dagestani, and indeed NE Caucasian is also called Nakho-Daghestanian.

It would be tempting to think that Proto-Nakho-Dagestanians were J1-dominated, as J1 exists in both Nakh (16-25%) and Dagestani (58-99%) groups, whereas J2a4b-M67 (the Nakh modal haplogroup) is nearly completely absent in Dagestanians.

The Northeast Caucasian or Dagestanian (Daghestanian) languages constitute a language family spoken in the Russian republics of Dagestan, Chechnya, Ingushetia, in northern Azerbaijan and northeastern Georgia, as well as in diaspora populations in Russia, Turkey, and the Middle East.

They were formerly called Nakho-Dagestanian (Nakh-Dagestanian) and sometimes Caspian, the latter together with Pontic for the Northwest Caucasian languages.

Some linguists such as Sergei Starosin think that the Northeast and Northwest Caucasian languages should be joined into a putative North Caucasian family, citing shared vocabulary and typological features as evidence. This proposed family does not usually include the neighboring Kartvelian languages. This hypothesis is not well demonstrated.

Some linguists – notably I. M. Diakonoff and S. Starostin – also see similarities between the Northeast Caucasian family and the extinct languages Hurrian and Urartian. Hurrian was spoken in various parts of the Fertile Crescent in the 3rd and 2nd millennia BC. Urartian was the language of Urartu, a powerful state that existed between 1000 BC or earlier and 585 BC in the area centered on Lake Van in current Turkey.

The two extinct languages have been grouped into the Hurro-Urartian family. Diakonoff proposed the name Alarodian for the union of Hurro-Urartian and Northeast Caucasian.

The Proto-Northeast Caucasian language had many terms for agriculture, and Johanna Nichols has suggested that its speakers may have been involved in the development of agriculture in the Fertile Crescent. They had words for concepts such as yoke, as well as fruit trees such as apple and pear that suggest agriculture was already well developed when the proto-language broke up.

Several basic-lexicon etymologies, with regular sound correspondences, suggest Hurro-Urartian (HU) might be a sub-family of Proto-Indo-European (PIE). Preliminary evidence suggests North-Caucasian (NC) languages might also be related to PIE – in particular,to Iranian languages and Armenian.

NEC and NWC are non-controversial families; their sub-families are even evident by inspection (possiblywith the exception of Archi within Lezghian). Starostin and Nikolayev (among others) consider NEC and NWC related.

Haplogroup E1b1b (formerly E3b) represents the last major direct migration from Africa into Europe. It is believed to have first appeared in the Horn of Africa approximately 26,000 years ago and dispersed to North Africa and the Near East during the late Paleolithic and Mesolithic periods. E1b1b lineages are closely linked to the diffusion of Afroasiatic languages.

The highest genetic diversity of haplogroup E1b1b is observed in Northeast Africa, especially in Ethiopia and Somalia, which also have the monopoly of older and rarer branches like M281, V6 or V92. Ethiopians and Somalians belong mostly to the V22 and V32 (downstream of V12) subclades, but possess also a minority of M81, M123 and V42 subclades. Among the main subclades of E1b1b only V13 and V65 are absent from the Horn of Africa, and probably originated in northern Africa (V65) or the southern Levant (V13).

Haplogroup E1b1b may well have been associated with the earliest development of Neolithic lifestyle and the advent of agriculture, which is so far believed to have arisen in the Fertile Crescent, but could have developed earlier in parts of Northeast Africa now covered by the Sahara desert.

Agriculture spread from the Near East to Europe, at first mostly ovicaprid and cattle herders. E1b1b men (accompanied by G2a, J and T men) appear to have been associated at least with the diffusion of Neolithic painted pottery from the Levant to the Balkans (Thessalian Neolithic), and with the Cardium Pottery culture (5000-1500 BCE) in the Western Mediterranean.

The only concrete evidence for this at the moment is the presence of the E-V13 subclade, commonest in the southern Balkans today, at a 7000-year old Neolithic site in north-east Spain, which was tested by Lacan et al (2011). The African origin of some Neolithic cattle was confirmed by Decker et al (2013), who reported that Iberian and Italian cattle possess introgression from African taurine.

Judging from modern frequencies, E1b1b would have been a major Near Eastern haplogroup linked to the propagation of agriculture in Europe. It is the only Near Eastern haplogroup consistently found throughout Europe, even in Norway, Sweden, Finland and Baltic countries, which are conspicuous by the absence of other Neolithic haplogroups like G2a (bar the Indo-European G2a3b1), J1 and T (except in Estonia).

E1b1b lineages would have been part and parcel to virtually all Neolithic and subsequent cultures in Europe, if only as a tiny minority in Scandinavia, Northeast Europe and in the Pontic Steppe.

The ancient Greeks contributed to the diffusion of E1b1b to places such as Cyprus, Sicily, southern Italy, Liguria, Provence, and eastern Spain, while the Phoenicians and Carthaginians brought more E1b1b to Cyprus, Malta, Sicily, Sardinia, Ibiza and southern Iberia. Migrations within the Roman Empire probably played a role, although a minor one, in the redistribution of E1b1b in Europe.

E-V68, is dominated by its longer-known subclade E-M78. Three “E-V68*” individuals who are in E-V68 but not E-M78 have been reported in Sardinia, when announcing the discovery of V68. The authors noted that because E-V68* was not found in the Middle Eastern samples, this appears to be evidence of maritime migration from Africa to southwestern Europe.

E-M78 is a commonly occurring subclade, widely distributed in North Africa, the Horn of Africa, West Asia, (the Middle East and Near East) “up to Southern Asia”, and all of Europe.

The European distribution has a frequency peak centered in parts of the Balkans (up to almost 50% in some areas) and Sicily, and declining frequencies evident toward western, central, and northeastern Europe. Based on genetic STR variance data, suggests that E-M78 originated in the region of Egypt and Libya about 18,600 years ago (17,300 – 20,000 years ago).

Egypt is described as “a hub for the distribution of the various geographically localized M78-related subclades” and, based on archaeological data, they propose that the point of origin of E-M78 (as opposed to later dispersal from Egypt) may have been in a refugium which “existed on the border of present-day Sudan and Egypt, near Lake Nubia, until the onset of a humid phase around 8500 BC.

The northward-moving rainfall belts during this period could have also spurred a rapid migration of Mesolithic foragers northwards in Africa, the Levant and ultimately onward to Asia Minor and Europe, where they each eventually differentiated into their regionally distinctive branches”.

Towards the south there is evidence that some subclades of E-M78, specifically E-V12 and E-V22, “might have been brought to Sudan from North Africa after the progressive desertification of the Sahara around 6,000-8,000 years ago”. And similarly it is propose that E-M78 in Ethiopia, Somalia and surrounding areas, back-migrated to this region from the direction of Egypt after acquiring the E-M78 mutation.

Haplogroup G is believed to have originated around the Middle East during the late Paleolithic, possibly as early as 30,000 years ago. At that time humans would all have been hunter-gatherers, and in most cases living in small nomadic or semi-nomadic tribes. Members of this haplogroup appear to have been closely linked to the development of early agriculture in the Levant part of the Fertile Crescent, starting 11,500 years before present.

There has so far been ancient Y-DNA analysis from only four Neolithic cultures (LBK in Germany, Remedello in Italy and Cardium Pottery in south-west France and Spain), and all sites yielded G2a individuals, which is the strongest evidence at present that farming originated with and was disseminated by members of haplogroup G (although probably in collaboration with other haplogroups such as E1b1b, J, R1b and T).

So far, the only G2a people negative for subclades downstream of P15 or L149.1 have all been found in the South Caucasus region. The highest genetic diversity within haplogroup G is found between the Levant and the Caucasus, in the Fertile Crescent, which is another good indicator of its region of origin.

It is thought that early Neolithic farmers expanded from the Levant and Mesopotamia westwards to Anatolia and Europe, eastwards to South Asia, and southwards to the Arabian peninsula and North and East Africa. The domestication of goats and cows first took place in the mountainous region of eastern Anatolia, including the Caucasus and Zagros. This is probably where the roots of haplogroup G2a (and perhaps of all haplogroup G) are to be found.

R1b is the most common haplogroup in Western Europe, reaching over 80% of the population in Ireland, the Scottish Highlands, western Wales, the Atlantic fringe of France, the Basque country and Catalonia. It is also common in Anatolia and around the Caucasus, in parts of Russia and in Central and South Asia.

Besides the Atlantic and North Sea coast of Europe, hotspots include the Po valley in north-central Italy (over 70%), Armenia (35%), the Bashkirs of the Urals region of Russia (50%), Turkmenistan (over 35%), the Hazara people of Afghanistan (35%), the Uyghurs of North-West China (20%) and the Newars of Nepal (11%). R1b-V88, a subclade specific to sub-Saharan Africa, is found in 60 to 95% of men in northern Cameroon.

The Paleolithic origins of R1b are not entirely clear to this day. Some of the oldest forms of R1b are found around the Caucasus, in Iran and in southern Central Asia, a vast region where could have roamed the nomadic R1b hunter-gatherers during the Ice Age.

Haplogroup R1* and R2* might have originated in southern Central Asia (between the Caspian depression and the Hindu Kush). A branch of R1 would have developed into R1b then R1b1 and R1b1a in the northern part of the Middle East around the time of the Last Glacial Maximum (circa 20,000 years ago), while R1a migrated north to Siberia.

R1b1a presumptively moved to northern Anatolia and across the Caucasus during the Neolithic, where it split into R1b1a1 (M73) and R1b1a2 (M269). The Near Eastern leftovers evolved into R1b1c (V88), now found at low frequencies among the Lebanese, the Druze, and the Jews. The Phoenicians (who came from modern day Lebanon) spread this R1b1c to their colonies, notably Sardinia and the Maghreb.

R1b1a2 (the most common form in Europe) and R1b1a1 is closely associated with the diffusion of Indo-European languages, as attested by its presence in all regions of the world where Indo-European languages were spoken in ancient times, from the Atlantic coast of Europe to the Indian subcontinent. The history of R1b and R1a are intricately connected to each others.

It is not yet entirely clear when R1b crossed over from eastern Anatolia to the Pontic-Caspian steppe. This could have happened during or just after the Neolithic, or both. The genetic diversity of R1b being greater around the Caucasus it is hard to deny that R1b evolved there before entering the steppe world.

It is possible that a first R1b migration from Anatolia in the 5th or even 6th millennium BCE introduced sheep into the steppe, an animal whose wool would play an important role in Celtic and Germanic (R1b branches of the Indo-Europeans) clothing traditions up to this day.

Another migration across the Caucasus happened shortly before 3700 BCE, when the Maykop culture, the world’s first Bronze Age society, appeared apparently out of nowhere in the north-west Caucasus.

The origins of Maykop are still uncertain, but archeologists have linked it to contemporary Chalcolithic cultures in Assyria and western Iran. Archeology also shows a clear diffusion of bronze working and kurgan-type burials from the Maykop culture to the Pontic Steppe, where the Yamna culture developed soon afterwards (from 3500 BCE). Kurgan (a.k.a. tumulus) burials would become a dominant feature of ancient Indo-European societies and were widely used by the Celts, Romans, Germanic tribes, and Scythians, among others.

Like haplogroup G, J1 might have been of the principal lineages to bring domesticated animals to Europe. Both G and J1 reach their maximal frequencies in the Caucasus, some ethnic groups being almost exclusively J1 (Kubachis, Kaitaks, Dargins, Avars), while others have extremely high levels of G (Shapsugs, North Ossetians).

Most of the ethnic groups in the North Caucasus have between 20 and 40% of each haplogroup, which are by far their two dominant haplogroups. In the South Caucasus (Georgia, Armenia, Azerbaijan), haplogroup J2 comes into the admixture and is in fact slightly higher than either J1 or G. Most of the Caucasian J1 is at present J1*, meaning that at present no common SNP has been identified that could form a new subclade.

The Zagros/Taurus mountain region, in the northern area of eastern Anatolia, northern Iraq and northwest Iran, displays the highest haplotype diversity, although the J1e frequency increases toward the peripheral Arabian Peninsula. Moreover, the previously described J1 (DYS388=13) chromosomes, frequently found in the Caucasus and eastern Anatolian populations,were ancestral to J1e and displayed an expansion time of 9000 years.

It is very prevalent in many areas where J-M267 is common, especially in parts of North Africa and throughout the Arabian peninsula. It also makes up approximately 70% of the J-M267 among the Amhara of Ethiopia. Notably, it is not common among the J-M267 populations in the Caucasus.

The southerly pattern of decreasing expansion time estimates is consistent with the serial drift and founder effect processes. The first such migration is predicted to have occurred at the onset of the Neolithic, and accordingly J1e parallels the establishment of rain-fed agriculture and semi-nomadic herders throughout the Fertile Crescent. Subsequently, J1e lineages might have been involvedin episodes of the expansion of pastoralists into arid habitats coinciding with the spread of Arabic and other Semitic-speaking populations.

The overall expansion time estimated from 453 chromosomes is 10.000 years. Chiaroni 2009 proposed that J-P58 (that they refer to as J1e) might have first dispersed during the Pre-Pottery Neolithic B period, “from a geographical zone, including northeast Syria, northern Iraq and eastern Turkey toward Mediterranean Anatolia, Ismaili from southern Syria, Jordan, Palestine and northern Egypt.” They further propose that the Zarzian material culture may be ancestral.

They also propose that this movement of people may also be linked to the dispersal of Semitic languages by hunter-herders, who moved into arid areas during periods known to have had low rainfall. Thus, while other haplogroups including J-M172 moved out of the area with agriculturalists who followed the rainfall, populations carrying J-M267 remained with their flocks (King 2002 and Chiaroni 2008).

According to this scenario, after the initial neolithic expansion involving Semitic languages, which possibly reached as far as Yemen, a more recent dispersal occurred during the Chalcolithic or Early Bronze Age (approximately 3000–5000 BCE), and this involved the branch of Semitic which leads to the Arabic language. The authors propose that this involved a spread of some J-P58 from the direction of Syria towards Arab populations of the Arabian Peninsula and Negev.

Haplogroup J2 is thought to have appeared somewhere in the Middle East towards the end of the last glaciation, between 15,000 and 22,000 years ago. Its present geographic distribution argue in favour of a Neolithic expansion from the Fertile Crescent.

This expansion probably correlated with the diffusion of domesticated of cattle and goats (starting c. 8000-9000 BCE) from the Zagros mountains and northern Mesopotamia, rather than with the development of cereal agriculture in the Levant (which appears to be linked rather to haplogroups G2 and E1b1b).

A second expansion of J2 could have occured with the advent of metallurgy, notably copper working (from the Lower Danube valley, central Anatolia and northern Mesopotamia), and the rise of some of the oldest civilisations.

Quite a few ancient Mediterranean and Middle Eastern civilisations flourished in territories where J2 lineages were preponderant. This is the case of the Hattians, the Hurrians, the Etruscans, the Minoans, the Greeks, the Phoenicians (and their Carthaginian offshoot), the Israelites, and to a lower extent also the Romans, the Assyrians and the Persians. All the great seafaring civilisations from the middle Bronze Age to the Iron Age were dominated by J2 men.

There is a distinct association of ancient J2 civilisations with bull worship. The oldest evidence of a cult of the bull can be traced back to Neolithic central Anatolia, notably at the sites of Çatal höyük and Alaca Höyük.

Bull depictions are omnipresent in Minoan frescos and ceramics in Crete. Bull-masked terracotta figurines and bull-horned stone altars have been found in Cyprus (dating back as far as the Neolithic, the first presumed expansion of J2 from West Asia).

The Hattians, Sumerians, Babylonians, Canaaites, and Carthaginians all had bull deities (in contrast with Indo-European or East Asian religions). The sacred bull of Hinduism, Nandi, present in all temples dedicated to Shiva or Parvati, does not have an Indo-European origin, but can be traced back to Indus Valley civilisation.

Minoan Crete, Hittite Anatolia, the Levant, Bactria and the Indus Valley also shared a tradition of bull leaping, the ritual of dodging the charge of a bull. It survives today in the traditional bullfighting of Andalusia in Spain and Provence in France, two regions with a high percentage of J2 lineages.

The land of Subartu (Akkadian Šubartum/Subartum/ina Šú-ba-ri, Assyrian mât Šubarri) or Subar (Sumerian Su-bir4/Subar/Šubur),  mentioned in Bronze Age literature, is connected with both the Sumerians, also connected with the Hurrian the chief god Kumarbi (Sumarbi – Sumerian), the Cimmerians (Catacomb culture) and the Armenians. The name also appears as Subari in the Amarna letters, and, in the form Šbr, in Ugarit.

Kumarbi, identified by the Hurrians with Sumerian Enlil, and by the Ugaritians with El, is connected with Kummanni, Commagene, Kumme and Comana.  He is the son of Anu (the sky), and father of the storm-god Teshub.

The Song of Kumarbi or Kingship in Heaven is the title given to a Hittite version of the Hurrian Kumarbi myth, dating to the 14th or 13th century BC.

The song relates that Alalu was overthrown by Anu who was in turn overthrown by Kumarbi. When Anu tried to escape, Kumarbi bit off his genitals and spat out three new gods. In the text Anu tells his son that he is now pregnant with the Hurrian god of sky and storm, Teshub, Tigris, and Tašmišu.

Upon hearing this Kumarbi spit the semen upon the ground and it became impregnated with two children. Kumarbi is cut open to deliver Tešub. Together, Anu and Teshub depose Kumarbi.

In another version of the Kingship in Heaven, the three gods, Alalu, Anu, and Kumarbi, rule heaven, each serving the one who precedes him in the nine-year reign. It is Kumarbi’s son Tešub, the Weather-God, who begins to conspire to overthrow his father.

From the first publication of the Kingship in Heaven tablets scholars have pointed out the similarities between the Hurrian creation myth and the Proto-Indo-European story from Greek mythology of Uranus, Cronus, and Zeus , which is recounted in Hesiod’s .

Teshub was derived from the Hattian Taru, cognate with the Germanic Thor, Taranis in Celtic mythology and Tarchon in Etruscan mythology. His Hittite and Luwian name was Tarhun (with variant stem forms Tarhunt, Tarhuwant, Tarhunta), although this name is from the Hittite root *tarh- “to defeat, conquer”.

Teshub is depicted holding a triple thunderbolt and a weapon, usually an axe (often double-headed) or mace. The sacred bull common throughout Anatolia was his signature animal, represented by his horned crown or by his steeds Seri (Sorani) and Hurri (Kurmanj), who drew his chariot or carried him on their backs.

In the Hurrian schema, Teshub was paired with Hebat (Hebrews) the mother goddess; in the Hittite, with the sun goddess Arinniti of Arinna (Armenians) – a cultus of great antiquity which has similarities with the venerated bulls and mothers at Çatal höyük in the Neolithic era. His son was called Sarruma (Sarmatians), the mountain god.

Shupria (Shubria) or Arme-Shupria (Akkadian: Armani-Subartu from the 3rd millennium BC) was a Hurrian-speaking kingdom, known from Assyrian sources beginning in the 13th century BC, located in the Armenian Highland, to the southwest of Lake Van, bordering on Ararat proper. The capital was called Ubbumu. Scholars have linked the district in the area called Arme or Armani, to the name Armenia.

Subartu was apparently a polity in Northern Mesopotamia, at the upper Tigris. Most scholars accept Subartu as an early name for Assyria proper on the Tigris, although there are various other theories placing it sometimes a little farther to the east, north or west of there.

Its precise location has not been identified. From the point of view of the Akkadian Empire, Subartu marked the northern geographical horizon, just as Martu, Elam and Sumer marked “west”, “east” and “south”, respectively.

The Sumerian mythological epic Enmerkar and the Lord of Aratta lists the countries where the “languages are confused” as Subartu, Hamazi, Sumer, Uri-ki (Akkad), and the Martu land (the Amorites).

Similarly, the earliest references to the “four quarters” by the kings of Akkad name Subartu as one of these quarters around Akkad, along with Martu, Elam, and Sumer. Subartu in the earliest texts seem to have been farming mountain dwellers, frequently raided for slaves.

Eannatum of Lagash was said to have smitten Subartu or Shubur, and it was listed as a province of the empire of Lugal-Anne-Mundu; in a later era Sargon of Akkad campaigned against Subar, and his grandson Naram-Sin listed Subar along with Armani (Armenians), which has been identified with Aleppo, among the lands under his control. Ishbi-Erra of Isin and Hammurabi also claimed victories over Subar.

Aleppo, connected with the word for sun in Armenian, Arev, has scarcely been touched by archaeologists, since the modern city occupies its ancient site. The site has been occupied from around 5000 BC, as excavations in Tallet Alsauda show.

Aleppo appears in historical records as an important city much earlier than Damascus. The first record of Aleppo comes from the third millennium BC, when Aleppo was the capital of an independent kingdom closely related to Ebla, known as Armi to Ebla and Armani (Armenians, and their chief Ara) to the Akkadians. Naram-Sin of Akkad destroyed both Ebla and Armani in the 23rd century BC.

Giovanni Pettinato describes Armi as Ebla’s alter ego. Eblaite, also known as Eblan is an extinct Semitic language which was used in the 23rd century BC in the ancient city of Ebla, at Tell Mardikh, between Aleppo and Hama, in western modern Syria.

Eblaite has been described as an East Semitic language which may be very close to pre-Sargonic Akkadian. For example, Manfred Krebernik says that Eblaite “is so closely related to Akkadian that it may be classified as an early Akkadian dialect”, although some of the names that appear in the tablets are Northwest Semitic.

According to Cyrus H. Gordon, although scribes might have spoken it sometimes, Eblaite was probably not spoken much, being rather a written lingua franca with East and West Semitic features.

The reconstructed Proto-Semitic language, ancestral to historical and modern Semitic languages in the Middle East, is still uncertain and much debated. However, a recent Bayesian analysis identified an origin for Semitic languages in the Levant (modern Syria and Lebanon) around 3750 BC with a later single introduction from what is now southern Arabia into the Horn of Africa (Ethiopia) around 800 BC.

The earliest positively proven historical attestation of any Semitic people comes from Mesopotamia, with the East Semitic Akkadian-speaking peoples entering the region originally dominated by the non-Semitic Sumerians.

During this period (circa 27th to 26th century BC), another East Semitic speaking people, the Eblaites, appear in historical record north eastern Syria, founding the state of Ebla, whose language was closely related to Akkadian.

The Akkadians, Assyrians and Eblaites were the first Semitic people to use writing, using the Cuneiform script originally developed by the Sumerians circa 3500 BC, with the first writings in Akkadian dating from circa 2800 BC. The last Akkadian inscriptions date from the late 1st century AD, and Cuneiform script in the 2nd century AD, both in Mesopotamia.

Aleppo is the common modern-day English name for the city. In the Old Babylonian period, Aleppo’s name appears as Ḥalab (Ḥalba) for the first time.

The ancient name of the city, Halab, is also its Arabic name in the modern day. It is of obscure origin. Some have proposed that Halab means ‘iron’ or ‘copper’ in Amorite languages since it was a major source of these metals in antiquity.

The Hurrians had a reputation in metallurgy. The Sumerians borrowed their copper terminology from the Hurrian vocabulary. Copper was traded south to Mesopotamia from the highlands of Anatolia. The Khabur Valley had a central position in the metal trade, and copper, silver and even tin were accessible from the Hurrian-dominated countries Kizzuwatna and Ishuwa situated in the Anatolian highland. Not many examples of Hurrian metal work have survived, except from the later Urartu. Some small fine bronze lion figurines were discovered at Urkesh.

Excalibur is the legendary sword of King Arthur, sometimes attributed with magical powers or associated with the rightful sovereignty of Great Britain.

The Chalybes or or Chaldoi were a people of Pontus and Cappadocia in northern Anatolia during Classical Antiquity. Their territory was known as Chaldia, extending from the Halys to Pharnakeia and Trabzon in the east and as far south as eastern Anatolia.

The Chaldoi/Chalybes, Mossynoikoi, and Tubal/Tabal/Tibareni, are counted among the first ironsmith nations by classical authors. The name in Greek means “tempered iron, steel”, a term that passed into Latin as chalybs, “steel”.

Sayce derived the Greek name Chalybe from Hittite Khaly-wa, “land of Halys”. More than an identifiable people or tribe, “Chalybes” was a generic Greek term for “peoples of the Black Sea coast who trade in iron”.

The main sources for the history of the Chaldoi are accounts from classical authors, including Homer, Strabo, and Xenophon. In Roman times, the Chaldaei (homonymous but unrelated to the Semitic Chaldeans) and Chalybes are mentioned by Plutarch (Lucull. c. 14) as settled in Pontus and Cappadocia, or the Pontus Cappadocicus section of the Roman province of Pontus.

Scholars such as Carl Friedrich Lehmann-Haupt (1910) believed that the people of Urartu called themselves Khaldini after their god Khaldi.

Ḫaldi (Ḫaldi, also known as Khaldi or Hayk) was one of the three chief deities of Ararat (Urartu). His shrine was at Ardini. The other two chief deities were Theispas of Kumenu, and Shivini of Tushpa.

Of all the gods of Ararat (Urartu) panthenon, the most inscriptions are dedicated to him. His wife was the goddess Arubani. He is portrayed as a man with or without a beard, standing on a lion.

Khaldi was a warrior god whom the kings of Urartu would pray to for victories in battle. The temples dedicated to Khaldi were adorned with weapons, such as swords, spears, bow and arrows, and shields hung off the walls and were sometimes known as ‘the house of weapons’.

The Khabur River (Arabic: al-khābūr, Kurdish: Xabûr, Syriac: ḥābur/khābur, Turkish: Habur) is the largest perennial tributary to the Euphrates in Syrian territory. Since the 1930s, numerous archaeological excavations and surveys have been carried out in the Khabur Valley, indicating that the region has been occupied since the Lower Palaeolithic period.

Important sites that have been excavated include Tell Halaf, Tell Brak, Tell Leilan, Tell Mashnaqa, Tell Mozan and Tell Barri. The region has given its name to a distinctive painted ware found in northern Mesopotamia and Syria in the early 2nd millennium BCE, called Khabur ware. The region of the Khabur River is also associated with the rise of the Hurrian kingdom of the Mitanni that flourished c.1500-1300 BC.

From the 11th century it was common Rabbinic usage to apply the term “Aram-Zobah” to the area of Aleppo, and this is perpetuated by Syrian Jews to this day. The Bible contains at least 13 references to Zobah.

It was known in antiquity as Khalpe, Khalibon, and to the Greeks and Romans as Beroea. During the Crusades, and again during the French Mandate for Syria and the Lebanon, the name Alep was used: “Aleppo” is an Italianised version of this.

Weidner interpreted textual evidence to indicate that after the Hurrian king Shattuara of Mitanni was defeated by Adad-nirari I of Assyria in the early 13th century BC, he then became ruler of a reduced vassal state known as Shubria or Subartu. The name Subartu (Sumerian: Shubur) for the region is attested much earlier, from the time of the earliest Mesopotamian records (mid 3rd millennium BC).

Together with Armani-Subartu (Hurri-Mitanni), Hayasa-Azzi and other populations of the region such as the Nairi fell under Urartian (Kingdom of Ararat) rule in the 9th century BC, and their descendants, according to most scholars, later contributed to the ethnogenesis of the early Armenians.

Subartu may have been in the general sphere of influence of the Hurrians. There are various alternate theories associating the ancient Subartu with one or more modern cultures found in the region, including Armenian or Kurdish tribes.

Some scholars, such as Harvard Professor Mehrdad Izady, claim to have identified Subartu with the current Kurdish tribe of Zibaris inhabiting the northern ring around Mosul up to Hakkari in Turkey.

Vaspurakan (also transliterated as Vasbouragan in Western Armenian) meaning the “noble land” or “land of princes”) was the eighth province of Greater Armenia, which later became an independent kingdom during the Middle Ages, centered around Lake Van. Located in what is now called northeastern Turkey and northwestern Iran, the region is considered to be the cradle of Armenian civilization.

From the 9th century BC, Vaspurakan was part of Urartu. In the 6th century BC, it became part of Satrapy of Armenia. From 189 BC, it became one of Greater Armenia’s provinces. Then it became part of Arsacid Dynasty of Armenia.

After the division of 387, it was included into Persian Armenia. In the 8th century, it fell under Arab control. Many rebellions took place in Vaspurakan. In 885, within the territory of Kingdom of Armenia, it became free.

During most of its history, it was ruled by the Ardzruni dynasty, which first managed to create a principality in the area. At its greatest extent Vaspurakan comprised the lands between Lake Van and Lake Urmia (also known as Kaputan) in 908.

In 908 Gagik I of Vaspurakan was recognized King of Armenia by the Abbasid Caliph in competition to the Bagratids, but soon he was reconciled with Ashot II, who recognized him as the King of Vaspurakan. In 1021, Seneqerim Ardzruni gave Vaspurakan to the Byzantine Empire, receiving estates in Sebasteia and surroundings in exchange.

After Vaspurakan was ceded to the Byzantine Empire, it was conquered by Seljuq Turks. Laterly it was ruled by Ahlatshahs, Ayyubids and Sultanate of Rum successively.

The Kurds as an ethnic group appear in the medieval period. The Kurdish people are believed to be of heterogenous origins combining a number of earlier tribal or ethnic groups including Median, Lullubi, Guti, Cyrtians, Carduchi. They have also absorbed some elements from Semitic, Turkic and Armenian people.

Kurds and Armenians became increasingly distinct, both culturally and politically, as Armenians chose Christianity as their official religion while Kurds chose Islam. This difference in religion also signified in a difference of mentality, with Armenians adopting Occidental values instead of the Oriental values and lifestyle adopted by Kurds.

Although most Armenians stayed Christian, some converted to Islam because of the favourable status given to Muslims under Islamic rule. The Armenians of Vaspurakan who converted to Islam were Kurdified over time.

The nomadic Turkic tribes moved towards the Middle East and Anatolia in expense of the local populations of Kurds, Armenians, and other natives.

In the beginning of 13th century, part of Vaspurakan was liberated by the Zakarids, but was then conquered by the Mongols, and then by the Ottoman Turks. Notable is the Siege of Van of 1915 during the Armenian Genocide.

The earliest testimony of the Armenian language dates to the 5th century AD (the Bible translation of Mesrob Mashtots). The earlier history of the language is unclear and the subject of much speculation. It is clear that Armenian is an Indo-European language, but its development is opaque. In any case, Armenian has many layers of loanwords and shows traces of long language contact with Hurro-Urartian, Greek and Indo-Iranian.

The Proto-Armenian sound-laws are varied and eccentric (such as *dw- yielding erk-), and in many cases uncertain. For this reason, Armenian was not immediately recognized as an Indo-European branch in its own right, and was assumed to be simply a very eccentric member of the Iranian languages before H. Hübschmann established its independent character in an 1874 publication.

Proto-Indo-European voiceless stops are aspirated in Proto-Armenian, a circumstance that gave rise to an extended version of the Glottalic theory, which postulates that this aspiration may have been sub-phonematic already in PIE.

The large percentage of loans from Iranian languages initially led linguists to erroneously classify Armenian as an Iranian language. The distinctness of Armenian was only recognized when Hübschmann (1875) used the comparative method to distinguish two layers of Iranian loans from the older Armenian vocabulary.

W. M. Austin (1942) concluded that there was an early contact between Armenian and Anatolian languages, based on what he considered common archaisms, such as the lack of a feminine and the absence of inherited long vowels. However, unlike shared innovations (or synapomorphies), the common retention of archaisms (or symplesiomorphy) is not necessarily considered evidence of a period of common isolated development.

Soviet linguist Igor Diakonov (1985) noted the presence in Old Armenian of what he calls a Caucasian substratum, identified by earlier scholars, consisting of loans from the Kartvelian and Northeast Caucasian languages such as Udi.

Noting that the Hurro-Urartian peoples inhabited the Armenian homeland in the second millennium b.c., Diakonov identifies in Armenian a Hurro-Urartian substratum of social, cultural, and animal and plant terms such as ałaxin “slave girl” ( ← Hurr. al(l)a(e)ḫḫenne), cov “sea” ( ← Urart. ṣûǝ “(inland) sea”), ułt “camel” ( ← Hurr. uḷtu), and xnjor “apple(tree)” ( ← Hurr. ḫinzuri).

Some of the terms he gives admittedly have an Akkadian or Sumerian provenance, but he suggests they were borrowed through Hurrian or Urartian. Given that these borrowings do not undergo sound changes characteristic of the development of Armenian from Proto-Indo-European, he dates their borrowing to a time before the written record but after the Proto-Armenian language stage.

The Armenian hypothesis of the Proto-Indo-European Homeland, based on the Glottalic theory suggests that the Proto-Indo-European language was spoken during the 4th millennium BC in the Armenian Highland.

It is an Indo-Hittite model and does not include the Anatolian languages in its scenario. The phonological peculiarities proposed in the Glottalic theory would be best preserved in the Armenian language and the Germanic languages, the former assuming the role of the dialect which remained in situ, implied to be particularly archaic in spite of its late attestation.

The Proto-Greek language would be practically equivalent to Mycenaean Greek and date to the 17th century BC, closely associating Greek migration to Greece with the Indo-Aryan migration to India at about the same time (viz., Indo-European expansion at the transition to the Late Bronze Age, including the possibility of Indo-European Kassites).

The Armenian hypothesis argues for the latest possible date of Proto-Indo-European (sans Anatolian), roughly a millennium later than the mainstream Kurgan hypothesis. In this, it figures as an opposite to the Anatolian hypothesis, in spite of the geographical proximity of the respective suggested Urheimaten, diverging from the timeframe suggested there by as much as three millennia.

Might Hurro-Urartian and North-Caucasian Languages Be Derived from (or Related to) Indo-European?