The Migrations of Tribes Speaking the Indo-European Dialects from Their Original Homeland in the Near East to Their Historical Habitations in Eurasia

Abstract

The historical distribution and routes of migration of the principal ancient Indo-European ethnic groups who first appear in ancient written records - the Hittite-Luwians, Indo-Iranians, and Greeks (the Cretan-Mycenae an Greeks and the Achaeans of Hittite sources) - can be explained more easily if one assumes that the territory of the original Indo-European homeland coincided with a region contained within eastern Anatolia, the southern Caucasus, and northern Mesopotamia in the fourth to fifth millennia B.C. (1) To determine the routes of migration of these peoples to their historical habitations, it is not necessary to assume that they covered huge distances in moving from the region of their original homeland. It is sufficient to assume only minor displacement away from that original region. It is noteworthy that the dialects which presuppose only minimal displacement relative to this area are the most ancient documented Indo-European languages.