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Nubian aDNA: what the hell is stopping ES members from claiming CL Fox 1997?
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[QUOTE]Originally posted by Firewall: [QB] Hill Nubian languages Hill Nubian is a dialect continuum of Nubian languages spoken in the Nuba Hills of Sudan. The ethnically and linguistically fragmented situation indicates that the Nuba Mountains have in all probability served as a retreat area. This may have happened at various times in history for basically two reasons. The first would be climatological: the desiccation of the Sahara has certainly time and again impelled people to migrate in search of more abundant water, either to remaining rivers and lakes, or just more generally southwards. In a more close-up perspective the driving forces are on the whole politico-economical. Looking at the map it is not difficult to find the areas of power concentrations from which people might have found it expedient to seek refuge. To the north, the Sahel empires have succeeded each other for centuries. The period of intensive slave-raids over a century ago was a severe threat and a bitter experience for the southern neighbours of Kordofan (i.e., El Obeid). South of the Nuba Mountains, the large and compact area occupied by Dinka and Nuer speakers also has the appearance of a relatively recent centre of expansion. Therefore, we should not overlook the possibility that some present-day inhabitants of the Nuba Mountains came there from the south. 2. The Evidence The ten language groups established by the MacDiarmids (1931) can serve us well as a point of departure. They are lexicostatistically definable as having an internal cohesion of not less than 45%, based on a 100-word list. The groups and their internal distances (rounded off to multiples of five) are: 1. Heiban 45% 2. Narrow Talodi 65% 3. Tegem (=Lafofa) - 4. Rashad 55% 5. Katla 50% 6. Kadugli 60% 7. Nyimang 60% 8. Temein 60% 9. Daju 60% 10. Nubian 85% Stevenson (1956-57) summarizes all significant research on Nuba Mountain language to that date, and is also based on his immense collection of manuscript data, largely unpublished, though summary extracts form the main basis for the relevant sections in Tucker and Bryan (1956, 1966). Those publications also contain detailed maps of distribution on which our Map 1 is based. Thelwall (1978, 1981a,b) and Schadeberg (1981a,b) provide subclassifications of most language groups, which will be summarized further on. The first eight groups listed above are confined to the Nuba Mountains; Daju and Nubian are the only ones that have close connections outside. Our argumentation makes critical use of such information. However, the fact that Nyimang, Temein, Daju and Nubian have all been classified - together with Nilotic and several other language groups - as Eastern Sudanic has no consequence in our present context. Different branches of Eastern Sudanic are very distant from each other; they generally share less than 20% in lexicostatistic terms. Since there are no indications that the Nuba Mountains were the original home of Eastern Sudanic such distant genetic links are judged to be unconnected with the appearance of those four language groups in the Nuba Mountains. The affiliation of Kadugli is presently open (see Schadebert 1981c). Again, nothing in our argumentation depends on remote possible links with Nilo-Saharan. On the other hand, the fact that groups (1) through (5) may be classified as Kordofanian, and that all Kordofanian languages are spoken exclusively within the Nuba Mountains is certainly relevant. Our hypotheses about the relative chronology of the influx of the various groups are based on these three types of clues about each language group: (i) internal diversity, (ii) immediate external genetic links, and (iii) geographical distribution. Naturally, other evidence such as loanwords and historical traditions should be taken into account as they become available. 3. Hill Nubian Figure 1: Subclassification of Nubian [IMG]http://www.thenubian.net/images/fig1.gif[/IMG] Nubian is a language group which presently spreads from Darfur to the Nile (see Map 2). The most prudent interpretation of our lexicostatistical data (Thelwall 1978, 1981a) leads to the subclassification shown in figure 1. 4. Daju Figure 2: Subclassification of Daju [IMG]http://www.thenubian.net/images/fig2.gif[/IMG] For the Daju also we have good linguistic evidence and scanty but cogent historical tradition. Languages of the Daju group are presently spoken in Wadai, Darfur, the Nuba Mountains and Bahr el Ghazal (see Map 2). The subclassification in Figure 2 emerges from the work of Thelwall (1978, 1981a,b). 5. Nyimang; Temein; Kadugli Figure 3: Subclassification of Nyimang and Temein [IMG]http://www.thenubian.net/images/fig3.gif[/IMG] Nyimang and Temein are two small language families, each consisting of two or three languages, all spoken exclusively in the Nuba Mountains. They have been classified as two (out of ten) branches of Eastern Sudanic. Genetic relationships within Eastern Sudanic are too distant - and too uncertain - as to permit any inferences about migration at the time depth with which we are here concerned. We can only note that both groups show an internal divergence of about 60% (see Figure 3). The data are taken from Thelwall (1981a). Figure 4: Subclassification of Kadugli Note that Stevenson's division into Eastern, Central and Western Kadugli is only in part borne out by this calculation; in particular, his Eastern division consisting of Keiga, Kamdang and Kanga/Kufa appears to be non-coherent. Figure 5: The major branches of Kordofanian The outside relations of Kordofanian are too distant to be relevant in the present context. The whole Kordofanian language family is located within the Nuba Mountains where it occupies the most central and most widespread geographical position (see Map 1). There appears to be a continuous history of branching, beginning with a (presently assumed) four-way split into Katla, Heiban, Talodi and Rashad. This primary split must have preceded the subsequent split of Talodi into Tegem and Narrow Talodi (25%). On the basis of this evidence it is clearly indicated that the development of Kordofanian occurred in the Nuba Mountains, and that Kordofanian has the longest linguistic history in this area. 1. Kordofanian 2. Nyimang; Temein; Kadugli 3. Daju I: Shatt, Liguri 4. Hill Nubian 5. Daju II: Lagawa Map 1: Language distribution in the Nuba Mountains [IMG]http://www.thenubian.net/images/map1.gif[/IMG] Map 2: The distribution of the Nubian and Daju language groups [IMG]http://www.thenubian.net/images/map2.gif[/IMG] _______________________ History of the Nuba, part I Introduction The Nuba are a group of peoples who share a common geography in Sudan’s Southern Kordofan Province, known as Jibal al-Nuba or Nuba Mountains. The origins of most Nuba peoples are obscure, but there is no doubt that they are Africans. They arrived to the area from various directions and in the course of thousands of years. Today there are over fifty Nuba tribes, who speak as many different languages. Their combined number is estimated at 2.5 million people. 3. The Nuba on the Nile and the Nuba in the Mountains. Of course it’s tempting to draw a line from the Nile south-eastward. Wouldn’t it be wonderful to provide the Nuba with an ancestry that goes well beyond the arrival of the Arab conquerors? Al right: the Nuba came to the Nile Kingdoms after the time of the Pharaohs, so we forget about Kush and the rule over Egypt… but three ancient Kingdoms that lasted from roughly 400 to 1600 BC wouldn’t be bad, would it? Well, to begin with: for the majority of the Nuba tribes there is nothing to suggest a relationship with the Nuba on the Nile. No archaeological finds, no linguistic relationships. The only Nuba tribes that can be linked to the Nuba on the Nile, are those speaking one of the Nubian languages. In order to understand more about the relationship between the two groups, we need to look into linguistics classifications. The basic idea behind linguistic classification is that people speaking the same language can drift apart, after which the language develops differently in the two groups. After so many hundreds of years this leads to the creation of two different languages. Linguists look at lexicological, grammatical and structural aspects of different languages to group them according to affiliation. With the help of standard word lists they can determine the level of proximity between two affiliated languages. Researchers of the nineteenth century already acknowledged the linguistic affiliation between the Nuba on the Nile, several Nuba tribes in the Mountains and some scattered communities in Darfur.12 They all speak Nubian languages, classified with the Eastern Sudanic branch of the Nilo-Saharan language family. For a long time, the burning question was: did the Nuba in the Mountains come from the Nile, or did the Nuba on the Nile come from the west? Despite the Arab conquest of Egypt and the ensuing Islamisation, the people along the Nile in Lower Nubia retained their original language, known as Nubian, or Nobiin for linguists. Closely related to Nobiin is Dongolawi, spoken up the river around Dongola in present day Sudan. Nobiin and Dongolawi probably drifted apart about 1100 years ago – give or take a century or two. Their languages, and specially Nobiin, are considered to be remnants of Old-Nubian, spoken in the Chrsitian Kingdoms of Nobatia, Dongola and Alwa. Both Nobiin and Dongolawi are related to the so-called Hill Nubian languages of the Nuba Mountains and Darfur. The tribes that speak Hill-Nubian include those of Dilling, Kadaru and Ghulfan; Wali, Karko, Habila, Debri and some tribes more to the West like Tabag and Abu Jinuk.13 Looking at their geographical dispersion, you can imagine them coming from the northeast, some entering the Nuba Mountains from the side of Kadaru, some moving on westward around the Nyimang hills. This combines well with events at the Nile in the 13th century AD. After centuries of stability, Bedouin tribes driven south by the Mameluks14 , started raiding Makuria. To the east the Beja were harassing Egypt and the Mameluks decided that if Makuria couldn’t keep the Beja in check, it was time to take matters in their own hands. The region was completely destabilised and we can imagine the people from Makuria fleeing south, until they found refuge in the Nuba Mountains. Makes sense, doesn’t it? Well… to make a long story longer: linguistic evidence rules against it. Apart from Nobiin, Dongolawi and Hill-Nubian, there are two other Nubian language group: Birgid and Meidob, found further to the west scattered over Darfur (Meidob being extinct by now). Combining linguistic data from the different Nubian languages, J.H. Greenberg concluded that ‘to assume any split between Hill Nubian and Nile Nubian more recent than 2,500 years B.P. [before present] would be incorrect.’ Of course we can’t give up a beautiful ancestry that easily: C. Herzog noticed that some Hill-Nubian languages have Christian words for days of the week, and other loan words too: the Nuba in Kordofan came from the Nile after all! But R. Thelwall wasn’t impressed: We are very confident that Nobiin (and later Dongolawi) came to the Nile from a centre of dispersion in Darfur-Kordofan which they occupied and controlled for perhaps 4000 years. We know that there were Nubian speakers on the Nile at least as early as the 500s CE and probably much earlier. The fact that the Hill Nubian languages have words for the days of the week dating back to Christian Nubian indicates that these languages were in contact at least during the Christian Nubian period which probably covers 500 CE - 1400 CE. This does not necessarily mean that the Hill Nubians did more than expand from central Kordofan into the NubaMountains during the period of Nubian political dominance from Aswan to Kosti (at least). But given the location of the Hill Nubian speakers (Dair, Dilling, Karko etc) along the NE edge of the Mountains it appears that they were "incomers" settling among the existing Nyima and Temein groups who were there before them. 2. The classification of Nuba languages Maybe systematic archaeological research could shed more light on the origins of the Nuba people, but right now we will have to concentrate on linguistic findings. Linguistics is a complex field, not very sexy to be honest, but in many cases, it’s all we have. So we will first look at the classification of the different Nuba languages, and then move on to the question of who came to the Mountains at what time. The Nuba Languages can be classified into members of two or perhaps three language families: Nilo-Saharan and Kordofanian. A. The Kordofanian languages consist of four groups located in the southern and eastern areas of the Nuba Mountains: Heiban, Talodi, Rashad and Katla. Kordofanian languages are considered a branch of the Niger-Congo family, which encompasses all Bantu languages, and in general most of the languages spoken in Sub-Saharan Africa. The only thing is: Kordofanian doesn’t resemble any of the other Niger-Congo languages closely. It constitutes a group of its own and geographically also, Kordofanian is isolated. In other words: we don’t have a clue as to how these Kordofanian speaking Nuba ended up in the Nuba Mountain. B. The Kadugli Group is located in the south east central fringe area near Kadugli. It was earlier classified as part of Kordofanian but is currently considered part of Nilo-Saharan. This is another large phylum: Dinka and Nuer are Nilo-Saharan languages, and so are many languages of Chad and Congo, as well as several languages spoken in Nigeria. C. The rest of the Nuba languages are classified as part of a major sub-group of Nilo-Saharan called Eastern Sudanic. They consist of Hill Nubian, Daju, Timein and Nyimang. The tribes speaking Eastern Sudanic languages can be found in the north western areas of the Mountains. 3. Linguistic settlement As we’ve just seen in the case of the Nubian speakers, shifts in related languages can tell us something about how long ago the speakers of those languages went their own way. Unfortunately this is not very exact, as Robin Thellwall explained to me: [the] reconstructions are based minimally on linguistic distance and extrapolated onto a fairly speculative time frame (glotto-chronology). Such a time framework is only a provisional and relative model to be tested against other evidence (archaeology, oral traditions, blood types, climate history, agricultural and animal husbandry terminology etc). This has not happened for the NubaMountains. However, for ‘The Linguistic Settlement of the Nuba in the Mountains’ Thelwall and Schadeberg20 analysed all the available data from the Nuba languages, and they came up with the following hypothesis regarding the relative chronology of the linguistic settlement of the Mountains: 1. Kordofanian language speakers came earlier than all the others 2. Nyimang; Temein and Kadugli language groups followed them 3. Daju speakers of Shatt and Liguri were next 4. Hill Nubian speakers – probably somewhere between 500 and 1400 AD 5. Daju speakers around Lagawa, who settled there relatively recently. 4. Kordofanian Heiban, Katla, Rashad and Talodi are the current names for the different groups of Kordofanian languages that cover the eastern half of the Nuba Mountains and a large part of the centre. Within the language group, differentiation has progressed much further than in the other Nuba language groups. According to R. Thelwall ‘the family has a time depth of a minimum of 6000 years.’21 This means that you would have to go back at least 6000 years in time to find all Kordofanian speakers speaking the same language. Kordofanian is classified with the Niger-Congo languages, and the nearest Niger-Congo speaking people would be found over the border of Sudan in southern Chad, in Central African Republic and in the Congo. The relationship between Kordofanian and the rest of Niger-Congo is not clear. The current subdivision of Kordofanian is as follows: 5. Nyimang, Temein and Kadugli These three language groups are unique, like the Kordofanian languages, in the fact that they are only spoken in the Nuba Mountains. Judging from the large internal linguistic diversity within each group, the Nyimang, Temein and Kadugli speaking tribes might well have been in the Mountains for more than 2000 years.30 They seem to have come to the Nuba Mountains in tough times, with a lot of people on the move, losing touch with one another. In the words of Thellwal and Schadeberg: 6. Hill Nubian As discussed at length above, the Hill Nubian speaking tribes came to the Mountains from the North, probably before 1400 AD. The different languages are classified as follows: Ghulfan and Kadaru are grouped together. Ghulfan is spoken in Ghulfan Kurgul and Ghulfan Morung; Kadaru in the hill communites of Kadaru, Kururu, Kafir, Kurtala, Dabatna and Kuldaji. Dilling is spoken in the town and the surrounding villages Dair, in the western and southern parts of Jebel Dair Karko in the Karko Hills and Dulman; maybe also Abu Jinik and Tabaq. Wali in the Wali Hills Thelwall and Schadeberg can’t say more as to why or when exactly the Hill Nubians migrated south: Whether this occurred due to pressure from Arab nomads as Arkell proposes, or whether an earlier date should be assumed is not clear. The relative closeness of the Hi1l Nubian dialects to each other does not suggest the presence of isolated Nubian communities in these hills for several millennia. It was probably a gradual process. R. C. Stevenson writes: Nubian speech was brought to the northern NubaMountains by tribal movements accelerated by the Arab influx during the past few centuries. In Rüppell’s time (mid 1820s) it was still spoken on the plains south of El Obeid. 7. The Daju speaking tribes The Daju speaking tribes came to the Nuba Mountains from the west, from a Daju Kingdom that we know conveniently little about. The Kingdom was based, as early perhaps as 1200 AD, in Jebel Marrah, a rain-fed mountain range in an otherwise arid country. The Daju controlled the area between southern Jebel Marra and the western edges of the Nuba Mountains. They were displaced by the Tunjur at the end of the fourteenth century, and left no records besides a list of kings that ends with King Kasi Furogé. The Daju were scattered by the Tunjur and we find them back in some isolated pockets across a wide area of Chad and Sudan, in the regions of Kordofan, Darfur, and Wadai. [/QB][/QUOTE]
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