The point at which Thracian became extinct is a matter of dispute. However, it is generally accepted that Thracian was still in use in the 6th century AD: Antoninus of Piacenza wrote in 570 that there was a monastery in the Sinai, at which the monks spoke Greek, Latin, Syriac, Egyptian, and Bessian – a Thracian dialect.[3][4][5][6]
A classification put forward by Harvey Mayer, suggests that Thracian (and Dacian) belonged to the Baltic branch of Indo-European, or at least is closer to Baltic than any other Indo-European branch.[7] However, this theory has not achieved the status of a general consensus among linguists. These are among many competing hypotheses regarding the classification and fate of Thracian.[8]
Limits of the (southern) Thracian linguistic territory according to Ivan Duridanov, 1985
Little is known for certain about the Thracian language, since no text has been satisfactorily deciphered. Some of the longer inscriptions may be Thracian in origin but they may simply reflect jumbles of names or magical formulas.[11]
Enough Thracian lexical items have survived to show that Thracian was a member of the Indo-European language family.
Besides the aforementioned inscriptions, Thracian may be attested through personal names, toponyms, hydronyms, phytonyms, divine names, etc. and by a small number of words cited in Ancient Greek texts as being specifically Thracian.[12][unreliable source?]
There are 23 words mentioned by ancient sources considered explicitly of Thracian origin and known meaning.[13][14] Of the words that are preserved in ancient glossaries, in particular by Hesychius, only three dozen can be considered "Thracian". However, Indo-European scholars have pointed out that "even the notion that what the ancients called "Thracian" was a single entity is unproven."[15] The table below lists potential cognates from Indo-European languages, but most of them have not found general acceptance within Indo-European scholarship. Not all lexical items in Thracian are assumed to be from the Proto-Indo-European language, some non-IE lexical items in Thracian are to be expected.
See also Gk. βοῦς 'cow', but Latv. govs ' id ' both < PIE *gwṓws. Proto-Slavic *vòlъ has no extra-Slavic cognates.
βρία (bría)
unfortified village
Hesychius, compare the Toponyms Πολτυμβρία, Σηλυ(μ)μβρία, and Βρέα in Thrace.
Compared to Greek ῥίον (ríon; "peak, foothills") and Tocharian A ri, B riye ("town") as if < *urih₁-. Alternatively, compare Proto-Celtic *brix- ("hill").
Gk ῥίον has no clear etymology.[18] The Toch lemmata may be related.[19]
βρίζα (bríza)
rye
Galen
Perhaps of Eastern origin, compare Greek ὄρυζα, Sanskrit vrīhí- ("rice").
The 'rice' words in Gk and IIr are wanderworts. The Gk word may be borrowed from an Eastern Iranian language.[20]
The Proto-Slavic lemma is reconstructed based exclusively on Serbo-Croatian brecati 'twang, be insolent' and consequently may not even be reconstructable to its own proto-language as there are no external or internal comparanda. It may be onomatopoetic in nature. Furthermore, there is a grave issue with the inscription, as Gk /ŋ/ is written with a gamma before a velar, i.e., this word should be written βρυγχός, which it is not.
βρῦτος (brŷtos)
beer of barley
many
Slavic "vriti" (to boil), Germanic *bruþa- ("broth"), Old Irish bruth ("glow"), Latin dē-frŭtum ("must boiled down").[21][a]
dinupula, si/nupyla
wild melon
Pseudoapuleus
Lithuanian šùnobuolas, lit. ("dog's apple"), or with Slavic *dynja ("melon"). Per Vladimir Georgiev, derived from *kun-ābōlo- or *kun-ābulo- 'hound's apple'.[21]
Proto-Slavic *dyña (from earlier *kъdyña is most likely borrowed from Gk. κῠδώνῐον via Lat. cydōnia.[23]
The adjective *gʷʰn̥tós in the zero-grade has an *-s in the nom.sg., whereas in Thracian the word ends in a nasal, which is a serious issue that requires morphological remodelling in Thracian for it to be posited as the starting point for Thracian γέντον. Furthermore, the e-grade vowel of the Thracian potential avatar remains to be explained as well if from an original PIE *gʷʰn̥tós.
midne (in a Latin inscription, thus not written with Gk alphabet)
village
inscription from Rome
Latvian mītne 'a place of stay', Avestan maēϑana- 'dwelling'[24]
Πολτυμ(βρία) (poltym-bría)
board fence, a board tower
Old English speld 'wood, log'
The OE lemma is poorly understood and extra-Germanic cognates are few and far between. OE speld may have descended from a PIE root *(s)pley- which is poorly attested and does not seem to be a formal match to the Thracian term.
The Slavic terms here must come from a medial *-bh-, whereas Lat. rumpō 'I break' must descend from a medial *-p-[25] and therefore those words aren't even cognate with each other, let alone with the Thracian term.
σκάλμη (skálmē)
knife, sword
Soph. y Pollux, Marcus Anton., Hesych., Phot. L
Albanian shkallmë ("sword"), Old Norse skolmr 'cleft'
The Albanian term is likely a secondary innovation. ON skolmr is unclear and has no extra-Germanic cognates;[26] it is unlikely to be related to the Thracian term.
σκάρκη (skárkē)
a silver coin
Hesych., Phot. Lex.
σπίνος (spínos)
'a kind of stone, which blazes when water touches it' (i.e. 'lime')
Arist.
PIE *k̑witn̥os 'white, whitish', Greek τίτανος (Attic) and κίττανος (Doric) 'gypsum, chalk, lime'. Although from the same PIE root, Albanian shpâ(ni) 'lime, tartar' and Greek σπίνος 'lime' derive from a secondary origin as they were probably borrowed from Thracian due to phonetic reasons[27]
τορέλλη (toréllē)
a refrain of lament mourn song
Hesych.
ζαλμός (zalmós)
animal hide
Porphyr.
Per Georgiev, derived from *kolmo-s. Related to Gothic hilms, German Helm and Old Iranian sárman 'protection'.[21]
Thracian initial ζ- can either be related to PIE *ḱ (as in these 'cognates' and several below) or to *ǵh-/*gh- as in the following entry, but not both. There does not exist an OIr word sárman,[28] but a word śárman does exist in Sanskrit. However, Sanskrit ś- must go back to a PIE *ḱ-, not *k- as Georgiev states.
ζειρά (zeira)
long robe worn by Arabs and Thracians
Hdt., Xen., Hesych.
Per Georgiev, related to Greek χείρ (kheir) and Phrygian ζειρ (zeir) 'hand'.[21]
See above. The meaning of Phrygian ζειρα(ι) is unknown, not 'hand' as Georgiev believes.[29]
ζελᾶ (zelâ), also ζῆλα (zêla), ζηλᾱς (zelās)
wine
many
Compared with Greek χάλις (khális; "unblended wine") and κάλιθος (kálithos; "wine")
See above.
ζετραία (zetraía)
pot
Pollux
Per Georgiev, related to Greek χύτρα (khútra) 'pot'.[21]
See above.
zibythides
the noble, most holy one
Hesych.
Lith. žibùtė ("shining")
Inscriptions
The following are the longest inscriptions preserved. The remaining ones are mostly single words or names on vessels and other artifacts. No translation has been accepted by the larger Indo-European community of scholars.[30]
Ezerovo inscription
The Ring of Ezerovo, found in 1912
Only four Thracian inscriptions of any length have been found. The first is a gold ring found in 1912 in the village of Ezerovo (Plovdiv Province of Bulgaria); the ring was dated to the 5th century BC.[31] The ring features an inscription in a Greek script consisting of 8 lines, the eighth of which is located on the rim of the rotating disk; it reads without any spaces between:
ΡΟΛΙΣΤΕΝΕΑΣΝ / ΕΡΕΝΕΑΤΙΛ / ΤΕΑΝΗΣΚΟΑ / ΡΑΖΕΑΔΟΜ / ΕΑΝΤΙΛΕΖΥ / ΠΤΑΜΙΗΕ / ΡΑΖ // ΗΛΤΑ
Dimitar Dechev (Germanised as D. Detschew) separates the words as follows:[32][33]
Rolisteneas Nerenea tiltean ēsko Arazea domean Tilezypta miē era zēlta
I am Rolisteneas, a descendant of Nereneas; Tilezypta, an Arazian woman, delivered me to the ground.
Kyolmen inscription
A second inscription, hitherto undeciphered, was found in 1965 near the village of Kyolmen [bg], Varbitsa Municipality, dating to the sixth century BC. Written in a Greek alphabet variant, it is possibly a tomb stele inscription similar to the Phrygian ones; Peter A. Dimitrov's transcription thereof is:[34]
A third inscription is again on a ring, found in Duvanlii [bg], Kaloyanovo Municipality, next to the left hand of a skeleton. It dates to the 5th century BC. The ring has the image of a horseman[37] with the inscription surrounding the image.[38] It is only partly legible (16 out of the initial 21):
ΗΥΖΙΗ
ēuziē
.....
.....
ΔΕΛΕ
dele
/
/
ΜΕΖΗΝΑΙ
mezēnai
ΗΥΖΙΗ ..... ΔΕΛΕ / ΜΕΖΗΝΑΙ
ēuziē ..... dele / mezēnai
The word mezenai is interpreted to mean 'Horseman', and a cognate to IllyrianMenzanas (as in "Juppiter/Jove Menzanas" 'Juppiter of the foals' or 'Juppiter on a horse');[39][40][41]Albanianmëz 'foal'; Romanianmînz 'colt, foal';[42][43]Latinmannus 'small horse, pony';[44][45]Gaulishmanduos 'pony' (as in tribe name Viromandui[46] 'men who own ponies').[47][48][b]
Due to a paucity of evidence required to establish a linguistic connection, the Thracian language, in modern linguistic textbooks, is usually treated either as its own branch of Indo-European,[50] or is grouped with Dacian, together forming a Daco-Thracian branch of IE. Older textbooks often grouped it also with Illyrian or Phrygian. The belief that Thracian was close to Phrygian is no longer popular and has mostly been discarded.[51]
Much of the information in the following table is either outdated or entirely incorrect and can be contested by looking at a dictionary of any of the languages in question or any of the four major textbooks of Indo-European. Some of the biggest issues: Tocharian collapsed voiceless, voiced, and voices aspirates into voiceless stops;[52] Armenian doesn't have aspirated voiceless stops (but rather ejective);[53]; the anaptyctic vowels of Germanic,[54] Balto-Slavic,[55] and Italic[56] that developed from syllabic resonants are all different (but are shown as being the same because the table is badly constructed and -oR- does not equal -uR-); we know what happened with the dental clusters medially in Hittite and it's -zz-,[57] it is unclear what the '+/-' for the labiovelars in Indo-Iranian could mean as they had the same outcome (aside from a potential loss of occlusion in Indic when *gwh is followed by something other than a front vowel),[58] it is also unclear what the '+/-' for the Albanian branch indicates as that is one language branch. Furthermore, there are no data or attestations of Pelasgian whatsoever[59] and its inclusion in the table is confusing. Due to these major omissions and errors, this table is unlikely to be used as a datum for Thracian historical phonology.
There is a fringe belief[60][61] that Thraco-Dacian forms a branch of Indo-European along with Baltic,[62] but a Balto-Slavic linguistic unity is so overwhelmingly accepted by the Indo-European linguistic community that this hypothesis does not pass muster.
Fate of the Thracians and their language
According to Skordelis, when Thracians were subjected by Alexander the Great they finally assimilated to Greek culture and became as Greek as Spartans and Athenians, although he considered the Thracian language as a form of Greek.[63] According to Crampton (1997) most Thracians were eventually Hellenized or Romanized, with the last remnants surviving in remote areas until the 5th century.[64] According to Marinov the Thracians were likely completely Romanized and Hellenized after the last contemporary references to them of the 6th century.[65]
Another author considers that the interior of Thrace have never been Romanized or Hellenized (Trever, 1939).[66] This was followed also by Slavonization. According to Weithmann (1978) when the Slavs migrated, they encountered only a very superficially Romanized Thracian and Dacian population, which had not strongly identified itself with Imperial Rome, while Greek and Roman populations (mostly soldiers, officials, merchants) abandoned the land or were killed.[67] Because Pulpudeva survived as Plovdiv in Slavic languages, not under Philippopolis, some authors suggest that Thracian was not completely obliterated in the 7th century.[68][69]
^Valdés (2017) cites other cognates to the root: Celtic deity Borvo and Latinferveo "I boil" (from e-grade).[22]
^A similarly looking word Mandicae 'to Mandica' is attested in an inscription from Asturia. It has been suggested to mean the name of a goddess related to foals.[49]
^Arnold Joseph Toynbee, Some problems of Greek history, Oxford University Press, 1969, p. 56: In the late sixth century there were still Bessian-speaking monks in the monastery at the foot of Mount Sinai (see P. Geyer Itinera Hierosolymitana, Vienna 1898, Templaky, pp. 184; 213.)
^Oliver Nicholson as ed., The Oxford Dictionary of Late Antiquity; Oxford University Press, 2018; ISBN0192562460, p. 234:...The "Piacenza Pilgrim (56) mentioned Bessian-speaking monks on the Sinai Peninsula. ABA J. J. Wilkes, The Illyrians (1992)...
^J. P. Mallory, Douglas Q. Adams as ed., Encyclopedia of Indo-European Culture; Taylor & Francis, 1997; ISBN1884964982, p. 576: The most recently attested Thracian personal names are found in two monasteries in the Near East (the Bessi of Mt Sinai) dating to the sixth century AD.
^Bessian is the language of the Bessi, one of the most prominent Thracian tribes. The origin of the monasteries is explained in a mediaeval hagiography written by Symeon the Metaphrast in Vita Sancti Theodosii Coenobiarchae in which he wrote that Saint Theodosius founded on the shore of the Dead Sea a monastery with four churches, in each being spoken a different language, among which Bessian was found. The place at which the monasteries were founded was called "Cutila", which may be a Thracian name.
^Georgiev, Vladimir I.. "Thrakisch und Dakisch". Band 29/2. Teilband Sprache und Literatur (Sprachen und Schriften [Forts.]), edited by Wolfgang Haase, Berlin, Boston: De Gruyter, 1983. pp. 1151–1153. doi:10.1515/9783110847031-015
^Fortson, B. (2004). Indo-European Language and Culture: an Introduction. p. 404.
^Fraenkel, Ernst (1962). Litauisches Etymologisches Wörterbuch. p. 124.
^ abcdefgGeorgiev, Vladimir I.. "Thrakisch und Dakisch". Band 29/2. Teilband Sprache und Literatur (Sprachen und Schriften [Forts.]), edited by Wolfgang Haase, Berlin, Boston: De Gruyter, 1983. p. 1152. doi:10.1515/9783110847031-015
^Valdés, Marcos Obaya. "Averamientu al astúricu. Vocalización de les nasales del grau-cero indo-européu: *mo > am / *no > an, y delles propuestes etimolóxiques". In: Lletres asturianes: Boletín Oficial de l'Academia de la Llingua Asturiana Nº. 117, 2017, p. 64. ISSN2174-9612
^Vasmer, M. (1973). Этимологический словарь русского языка [Etymological Dictionary of the Russian Language] (in Russian), ed. Oleg Trubačev.
^Rix, H.; et al. (2001). Lexikon der indogermanischen Verben [Lexicon of Indo-European Verbs] (in German).
^de Vries, J. (1977). Altnordisches etymologisches Wörterbuch [Etymological Dictionary of Old Norse] (in German). p. 498.
^Witczak, Krzysztof Tomasz (2012). "Studies in Thracian vocabulary (I–VII)". Studia Indogermanica Lodziensia. VII: 153–168. pp. 159–161.
^Bartholomae, C. (1961). Altiranisches Wörterbuch [Old Iranian Dictionary] (in German). pp. 1564–1567.
^ Klein et al., edd. (2018) HCHL:1820, chapter XVI.101 'Phrygian' by Ligorio and Lubotsky.
^Klein et al. edd., Jared (2018). "XVI Languages of fragmentary attestation, section 104 by Claude Brixhe". Handbook of Comparative and Historical Indo-European Linguistics. De Gruyter. p. 1851. There are as many interpretations of these as there are investigators; and as a result these monuments have not contributed anything to our knowledge of the language
^Duridanov, Ivan (1985). Die Sprache der Thraker. Bulgarische Sammlung (in German). Vol. 5. Hieronymus Verlag. ISBN3-88893-031-6. Ich bin Rolisteneas, Sprößling des Nereneas; Tilezypta, Arazerin nach ihrer Heimat, hat mich der Erde übergeben (d.h. begraben).
^Orel, Vladimir E. (1986). "On Two Minor Thracian Inscriptions". Glotta. 64 (1/2): 48–49. JSTOR40266737. Accessed 22 July 2024.
^Georgiev, Vladimir I. (1981). Introduction to the History of the Indo-European Languages (3rd ed.). Sofia: Bulgarian Academy of Sciences. p. 116. Μεζην = nom.-voc., which is under the figure of the horseman, is the name of the Thracian god-horseman; it corresponds to the name (epithet) of the Messapian god Menzana (Iupiter), to whom horses were offered as a sacrifice. Both names are derived from *mendy-ān 'horseman', a derivative of *mendi(o)- 'horse'; they are related to Alb. mëz- 'stallion' and Rum. (Dac.) mînz 'stallion'.
^Orel, Vladimir E. (1986). "On Two Minor Thracian Inscriptions". Glotta. 64 (1/2): 49. JSTOR40266737. Georgiev (1977, 112) suggested to connect MEZHNAI with Iuppiter Menzana, which seems more plausible, if one remembers of the mounted figure on the ring, Menzana being a deity connected with the horse-cult. (...) The second word mezēnai could be identified with Menzana and treated as a name of a deity. Accessed 22 July 2024.
^Pax Leonard, Stephen (2021). "Hipponyms in Indo-European: using register to disentangle the etyma". Journal of Language Relationship. 19 (1–2): 4. doi:10.1515/jlr-2021-191-206 (inactive 1 November 2024).{{cite journal}}: CS1 maint: DOI inactive as of November 2024 (link)
^Kaluzkaja, Irina. "Thracian-Illyrian language parallels: Thrac. MEZENAI – Illyr. Menzanas". In: Thracian World at Crossroad of Civilizations – Proceedings of 7th International Congress of Thracology. Bucharest: 1996. pp. 372–373.
^Francisco Marcos-Marin. "Etymology and Semantics: Theoretical Considerations apropos of an Analysis of the Etymological Problem of Spanish mañero, mañeria." In: Historical Semantics—Historical Word-Formation. de Gruyter, 1985. p. 381.
^Georgiev, Vladimir I.. "Thrakisch und Dakisch". Band 29/2. Teilband Sprache und Literatur (Sprachen und Schriften [Forts.]), edited by Wolfgang Haase, Berlin, Boston: De Gruyter, 1983. p. 1161. doi:10.1515/9783110847031-015
^Cazacu, Boris[in Romanian] (1980). "Einige Fragen zur Ausarbeitung eines neuenetymologischen Wörterbuchs der rumänischen Sprache [DISKUSSION AKTUELLER PROBLEME]". Zeitschrift für romanische Philologie. 96 (5–6): 509–510. doi:10.1515/zrph.1980.96.5-6.489. Vl. Georgiev zeigte, daß es dieses Wort auch im Thrakischen gab, wo die Form Mezenai unter dem Bild des thrakischen Ritters auftaucht. [Vl. Georgiev demonstrated that the word existed in Thracian, with the form Mezenai, under the depiction of the Thracian Horseman.]
^Valdés, Marcos Obaya. "Averamientu al astúricu. Vocalización de les nasales del grau-cero indo-européu: *mo > am / *no > an, y delles propuestes etimolóxiques". In: Lletres asturianes: Boletín Oficial de l'Academia de la Llingua Asturiana Nº. 117, 2017, p. 67. ISSN2174-9612
^See C. Brixhe – Ancient languages of Asia Minor, Cambridge University Press, 2008 We will dismiss, at least temporarily, the idea of a Thraco-Phrygian unity. Thraco-Dacian (or Thracian and Daco-Mysian) seems to belong to the eastern (satem) group of Indo-European languages and its (their) phonetic system is far less conservative than that of Phrygian (see Brixhe and Panayotou 1994, §§ 3ff.)
^Ringe, Don A. (1996). On the Chronology of Sound Changes in Tocharian. p. 152.
^Godel, R. (1975). An introduction to the Study of Classical Armenian. p. 9.
^Ringe, Don A. (2017). From Proto-Indo-European to Proto-Germanic, 2nd ed. p. 100.
^Leskien, A. (1969). Handbuch der altbulgarischen Sprache, 9th ed. p. 15.
^Weiss, M. (2020). Outline of the Historical and Comparative Grammar of Latin. p. 103-4.
^Melchert and Hoffner, C. and H. (2008). A Grammar of the Hittite Language. p. 44.
^Beekes 2011, p. 123 harvnb error: no target: CITEREFBeekes2011 (help)
^Klein et al. edd., Jared (2018). "XVI Languages of fragmentary attestation, section 109 by R.S.P. Beekes". Handbook of Comparative and Historical Indo-European Linguistics. De Gruyter. p. 1874. "The attempt to determine phonological rules for an Indo-European pre-Greek language ('Pelasgian')...is considered a complete failure today
^Klein et al. edd., J. (2018). "81 'The Phonology of Slavic' by Daniel Petit". Handbook of Comparative and Historical Linguistics. p. 1966.
^Arumaa, P. (1966). Urslavische Grammatik: Einführung in Das Vergleichende Studium Der Slavischen Sprachen, Band I: Einleitung • Lautlehre. pp. 18–23.
^Daskalov, Roumen; Vezenkov, Alexander (13 March 2015). Entangled Histories of the Balkans – Volume Three: Shared Pasts, Disputed Legacies. BRILL. p. 51. ISBN9789004290365.
^R.J. Crampton (1997). A Concise History of Bulgaria. Cambridge University Press. p. 4. ISBN0-521-56719-X.
^Daskalov, Roumen; Vezenkov, Alexander (13 March 2015). Entangled Histories of the Balkans – Volume Three: Shared Pasts, Disputed Legacies. BRILL. p. 10. ISBN9789004290365.
^Trever, Albert Augustus. History of Ancient Civilization. Harcourt, Brace. p. 571
^Michael W. Weithmann, Die slawische Bevölkerung auf der griechischen Halbinsel (Munich 1978)
Beekes, Robert S. P. (2009). Etymological Dictionary of Greek. Brill Academic Publishers. ISBN978-90-04-17418-4.
Further reading
Alexianu, Marius-Tiberius (2008). "Une catégorie d'esclaves thraces: les halônetoi". La fin du statut servile? Affranchissement, libération, abolition. Volume II. Besançon 15-17 décembre 2005. Actes des colloques du Groupe de recherche sur l'esclavage dans l'antiquité (in French). Vol. 30. Besançon: Presses Universitaires de Franche-Comté. pp. 487–492.
Duridanov, Ivan (1969). Die Thrakisch- und Dakisch-Baltischen Sprachbeziehungen [Thracian and Dacian Baltic Language Contacts]. Other. Verlag der Bulgarischen Akademie der Wissenschaften, Sofia.
Slavova, Mirena (1995). "Die thrakischen Frauennamen aus Bulgarien. Nachträge und Berichtigungen" [The Thracian women's names from Bulgaria. Supplements and Corrections]. Orpheus: Journal of Indo-European and Thracian Studies (in German) (5). Институт за балканистика с Център по тракология - Българска академия на науките: 39–43.
