Are the Basque people the only true European natives?

[Nyx Of Luna Follower]

No i don't think so you remember the Hun don't you
oh let me take that back they may be

[Dutuffjarginges]

Are the Basque people the only true European natives still around today?

It would seem that the Basque people were living in Europe before Indo-European-language-speaking peoples migrated into Europe less than 10,000 years ago. Indo-European-language-speaking peoples now dominate Europe and the Basque people have become a minority. So it would seem that the Basque people are the only true native Europeans remaining today.

Of course the ancestors of the Basque people migrated into Europe about 40,000 years ago and consumed the Neanderthal populations.

According to this map: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indo-European_migrations#/media/File:Indo-European_expansions.jpg the Indo-Europeans came from an area originally on the Volga River, which is in Europe.
This map points more towards Ukraine/Southern Russia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yamnaya_culture#/media/File:Yamnaya_culture.jpg
So if they did come from where the maps suggest, they would themselves be native to Europe. Therefore no, the Basque would not be the only true native European Homo Sapiens.
On the other hand if you mean native to Western Europe that is a different story.

Not sure if I'm not looking hard enough, but I'm looking over this map:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Poss ... d_Asia.png

Which defines multiple borders between Europe and Asia, and the maps you show me seem to be a bit too far off to the east of the Volga (which is almost all the way to the westernmost part of Ukraine).

Edit: aw crap I was looking at Kazakhstan not Ukraine this entire time

[Najairadarethu]

I think mankind didn't evovle in Europe anyway (for a long time the state of knowledge was that we evolved in Africa), so there must have been people migrated from elsewhere. Apart from that, even the Basques are probably a mix of other peoples, so the question most likely leads to nowhere:

https://www.pnas.org/doi/full/10.1073/pnas.1509851112

It is very hard to find definitive answers about their origin though.

[Najairadarethu]

What about Laplanders?

Yeah I thought of them as well but the language they speak isn't exactly native to Europe either. It appears to have emerged from a somewhat more recent migration from the Ural mountains.

I think that's just another theory nobody has ever proven. As far as I know, nobody could ever coherently show where it comes from. It has nothing to do with the languages spoken in that area today, at least, but this, of course, doesn't mean that much.

[Bradfordville]

Yeah I thought of them as well but the language they speak isn't exactly native to Europe either. It appears to have emerged from a somewhat more recent migration from the Ural mountains.

I think that's just another theory nobody has ever proven. As far as I know, nobody could ever coherently show where it comes from. It has nothing to do with the languages spoken in that area today, at least, but this, of course, doesn't mean that much.

Isn't it proven that the lapplanders, Finns and Hungarians speak languages related to others that are found in Northern Asia? Some of the ancestors of these people must have originated from that region and migrated into Europe long ago.

[Arval Va]

Of the ones that linger, it’s probably one of the oldest, but one must also consider other groups like the Saami (still around), the Laplanders (also still around) and the Picts (gone).

Sámi and Lapplanders are the same, and Picts are IE (Brythonic Celts).

[Kaliitnuunati]

All Kartvelians, or modern day Georgians are natives to Europe.

[Bradfordville]

All Kartvelians, or modern day Georgians are natives to Europe.

Most of the country is located in Western Asia.

[Najairadarethu]

I think that's just another theory nobody has ever proven. As far as I know, nobody could ever coherently show where it comes from. It has nothing to do with the languages spoken in that area today, at least, but this, of course, doesn't mean that much.

Isn't it proven that the lapplanders, Finns and Hungarians speak languages related to others that are found in Northern Asia? Some of the ancestors of these people must have originated from that region and migrated into Europe long ago.

The languages you mentioned are definitely related, and there are also a few other, smaller languages that belong to the same family, as you can read here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Finno-Ugric_languages

But this group has nothing to do with Basque, which is totally isolated. And, by the way, damn fucking fascinatingly complicated and different from all the other languages spoken in Europe. It was one of the languages that inspired my development of Najára which I hope to be able to describe in a readable factbook soon.

[Kaliitnuunati]

All Kartvelians, or modern day Georgians are natives to Europe.

Most of the country is located in Western Asia.

Georgia is culturally European, as well as politically considering it is in the Council of Europe, and has visa free entry in and out with the EU, as well as being an EU candidate.

[Imperial Haiti]

They speak a language that is not like the Indo-European languages that became dominant in Europe sometime in the last 10,000 years (excuse the vagueness of the dates, it's complicated.) Following some kind of invasion or mass-migration.

Now the invaders came from somewhere (complicated again) around the Black and/or Caspian seas. There's a lot of argument about exactly where.

Also complicating matters the proto-Indo-Europeans may have been two separate cultures. But they did at least speak the same language.

Would these guys count as European? I don't know. The concept didn't really exist at the time. Their point of origin might or might not have fallen outside of Europe's modern borders. But those borders have always been kind of arbitrary, at least with regards to the part that's not Greece/Anatolia. So calling them European would be weird, but calling them not-European might also be weird.

Did the Indo-Europeans completely erase, genocide, and replace the native inhabitants of Europe as they moved West? No. There's some signs of genetic admixture from Eurasia that can be attributed to the Indo-European invasion. But, to be honest, Europe is always getting genetic admixture from Eurasia. Some from invasions (Magyars, Bulgars, Pechenegs, Huns), and some from ordinary genetic drift. This isn't anything especially remarkable, and probably happened before the Indo-European invasions as well.

(And actually the Basque have been subject to that too. Since even if they never adopted an Indo-European language, they've certainly fucked Indo-European language speakers.)

In fact, there's nothing to say that the Basque language might not have been brought over in an earlier invasion. In fact, this is certainly the case since humans didn't evolve in Northern Iberia. Though it's impossible to say when the Basque language migrated there, from what direction, or if it replaced the language of previous inhabitants. It probably did though. Human history is a long time, and there's plenty of room for invasions and migrations before we get around the stuff we know about.

All we know is that Basque isn't Indo-European. Which is kind of neat. And if the Basque want to take pride in being able to resist a linguistic conversion when nobody else did, they should feel free.

Let them Basque in glory.

Why they should have that conversion?

[Bradfordville]

Most of the country is located in Western Asia.

Georgia is culturally European, as well as politically considering it is in the Council of Europe, and has visa free entry in and out with the EU, as well as being an EU candidate.

Nobody is "culturally european." I have read about what is classified as "European values" or "European culture," and it sounds like what people call European culture/values stems from them having zero familiarity with people from elsewhere. Being christian and having a government inspired by that of rome is the guidelines for being a western country? Does that mean that the Philippines is western now? Many African countries fit that criteria. Yet no one thinks of them as "the west." Georgians are west Asians. Yes they are Christians, as are Armenians, assyrians, maronites, and many Syrians and Palestinians. That doesn't make them European though. At day's end Georgia is in Asia. It is not in what we would call Europe, and no amount of being Christian will make it Europe unless Azerbaijan is now Europe as well, seeing as it too borders europe. I have nothing against the Georgian people, but they just aren't European in the geographic sense of the word. And the cultural sense of European is a flimsy identity at best.

[Najairadarethu]

They speak a language that is not like the Indo-European languages that became dominant in Europe sometime in the last 10,000 years (excuse the vagueness of the dates, it's complicated.) Following some kind of invasion or mass-migration.

Now the invaders came from somewhere (complicated again) around the Black and/or Caspian seas. There's a lot of argument about exactly where.

Also complicating matters the proto-Indo-Europeans may have been two separate cultures. But they did at least speak the same language.

Would these guys count as European? I don't know. The concept didn't really exist at the time. Their point of origin might or might not have fallen outside of Europe's modern borders. But those borders have always been kind of arbitrary, at least with regards to the part that's not Greece/Anatolia. So calling them European would be weird, but calling them not-European might also be weird.

Did the Indo-Europeans completely erase, genocide, and replace the native inhabitants of Europe as they moved West? No. There's some signs of genetic admixture from Eurasia that can be attributed to the Indo-European invasion. But, to be honest, Europe is always getting genetic admixture from Eurasia. Some from invasions (Magyars, Bulgars, Pechenegs, Huns), and some from ordinary genetic drift. This isn't anything especially remarkable, and probably happened before the Indo-European invasions as well.

(And actually the Basque have been subject to that too. Since even if they never adopted an Indo-European language, they've certainly fucked Indo-European language speakers.)

In fact, there's nothing to say that the Basque language might not have been brought over in an earlier invasion. In fact, this is certainly the case since humans didn't evolve in Northern Iberia. Though it's impossible to say when the Basque language migrated there, from what direction, or if it replaced the language of previous inhabitants. It probably did though. Human history is a long time, and there's plenty of room for invasions and migrations before we get around the stuff we know about.

All we know is that Basque isn't Indo-European. Which is kind of neat. And if the Basque want to take pride in being able to resist a linguistic conversion when nobody else did, they should feel free.

Let them Basque in glory.

Why they should have that conversion?

It just happens if you don't promote, teach and speak the language actively when you have a neighbouring bigger language that dominates in.media and education and most speakers are bilingual. Beyond that, the Basque language has been under pressure for a long time, mainly by immigration from other parts of Spain or France who didn't speak the language but also by political oppression. Under the regime of Franco, it was even forbidden for a long time to use the language.

[Najairadarethu]

Georgia is culturally European, as well as politically considering it is in the Council of Europe, and has visa free entry in and out with the EU, as well as being an EU candidate.

Nobody is "culturally european." I have read about what is classified as "European values" or "European culture," and it sounds like what people call European culture/values stems from them having zero familiarity with people from elsewhere. Being christian and having a government inspired by that of rome is the guidelines for being a western country? Does that mean that the Philippines is western now? Many African countries fit that criteria. Yet no one thinks of them as "the west." Georgians are west Asians. Yes they are Christians, as are Armenians, assyrians, maronites, and many Syrians and Palestinians. That doesn't make them European though. At day's end Georgia is in Asia. It is not in what we would call Europe, and no amount of being Christian will make it Europe unless Azerbaijan is now Europe as well. I have nothing against the Georgian people, but they just aren't European in the geographic sense of the word. And the cultural sense of European is a flimsy identity at best.

Look up Huntington's description of "The West", it's pretty accurate. It's indeed useless to speak of a "European" culture, since Europe has a Western and non-Western part.

[El Lazaro]

Georgia is culturally European, as well as politically considering it is in the Council of Europe, and has visa free entry in and out with the EU, as well as being an EU candidate.

Nobody is "culturally european." I have read about what is classified as "European values" or "European culture," and it sounds like what people call European culture/values stems from them having zero familiarity with people from elsewhere. Being christian and having a government inspired by that of rome is the guidelines for being a western country? Does that mean that the Philippines is western now? Many African countries fit that criteria. Yet no one thinks of them as "the west." Georgians are west Asians. Yes they are Christians, as are Armenians, assyrians, maronites, and many Syrians and Palestinians. That doesn't make them European though. At day's end Georgia is in Asia. It is not in what we would call Europe, and no amount of being Christian will make it Europe unless Azerbaijan is now Europe as well, seeing as it too borders europe. I have nothing against the Georgian people, but they just aren't European in the geographic sense of the word. And the cultural sense of European is a flimsy identity at best.

Filipinos, Sub-Saharan Africans, and Latin Americans are all Western peoples

[James_xenoland]

Isn't this theory generally considered myth now thanks to modern genetics studies and such? (on multiple points)

[The Pirateariat]

Friends, nobody knows exactly where the Proto-Indo-Europeans came from. And there's a lot of debate about it. Proposed origins range from present day Ukraine or Anatolia, to places like Kazakhstan or even Mazandaran (Northern Iran.) Some of these ideas have more merit than others, but anyone who says, "Indo-Europeans for sure come from..." is full of it. Unless they say something like "Eurasia," which doesn't narrow it down much. We don't know where PIE comes from.

And it doesn't matter anyway. The borders between Europe and Asia are arbitrary. And they would have mattered even less then than they do now.

[El Lazaro]

Albania was 1st country of Europe because Albania is always number 1st

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[Kubra]

Does that mean that the Philippines is western now?

Ehm well uh I mean
I mean, this is without a doubt the most American part of Asia. Like yo I just saw a lifted Ford F150 in someone's driveway. That's *American*.

[Najairadarethu]

Since this was briefly discussed, I want to add Huntington's main characteristics of Western societies form The Clash of Civilizations (1996, 68-78):


Catholicism and Protestantism

Separation of Spiritual and temporal authority

rule of law

social pluralism

representative bodies

Individualism

All this is intertwined with the process of Enlightenment, the naturalistic world view and the extraordinary status of rationality in argumentation, and all this is what makes true democracies possible. By these criteria, there is a border between "West" and "East" within Europe. Some countries, like Germany, are mixed, but tend clearly to the West altogether - Germany is, for example, still one of the comparatively best working democracies in the world. Other Middle European countries are a mix as well, but tend clearly more to the East (Poland, Czech Republic, Hungary). Other countries, like Greece, are also clearly more Eastern, but have been bound to the West in several ways for a long time, so they appear a tad more Western than their geographical location would normally place them. Some countries are as Western as it gets (France, Netherlands, UK), others are at Eastern as it gets (Russia, Ukraine, Serbia) and others are even fault line states between the Eastern European and the Islamic world (Bosnia, Albania, Kosovo) and thus will probably never be truly Westernized (and thus it would be a very bad idea to grant them membership in the EU, an even worse idea than the 2004 enlargement of the European Union already was).

[Bradfordville]

Since this was briefly discussed, I want to add Huntington's main characteristics of Western societies form The Clash of Civilizations (1996, 68-78):


Catholicism and Protestantism

Separation of Spiritual and temporal authority

rule of law

social pluralism

representative bodies

Individualism

All this is intertwined with the process of Enlightenment, the naturalistic world view and the extraordinary status of rationality in argumentation, and all this is what makes true democracies possible. By these criteria, there is a border between "West" and "East" within Europe. Some countries, like Germany, are mixed, but tend clearly to the West altogether - Germany is, for example, still one of the comparatively best working democracies in the world. Other Middle European countries are a mix as well, but tend clearly more to the East (Poland, Czech Republic, Hungary). Other countries, like Greece, are also clearly more Eastern, but have been bound to the West in several ways for a long time, so they appear a tad more Western than their geographical location would normally place them. Some countries are as Western as it gets (France, Netherlands, UK), others are at Eastern as it gets (Russia, Ukraine, Serbia) and others are even fault line states between the Eastern European and the Islamic world (Bosnia, Albania, Kosovo) and thus will probably never be truly Westernized (and thus it would be a very bad idea to grant them membership in the EU, an even worse idea than the 2004 enlargement of the European Union already was).

What do you mean? All of western civilization was founded by Albania.

[Najairadarethu]

Yes, of course. God made mankind evolve in Albania, gave them the first language, the true religion and then kissed every square metre between Lake Ohrid and today's Saranda three times, which made it the home of a pure, Illyrian superrace. But as we all know, a conspiracy of envious Slavs, Greeks, Jews and Turks forced Albania into decline, falsified history and led to totally misguided disparagements of the great Albania like mine here. But I'm part of the conspiracy and paid by Jewish lizard people who live under the earth disc, so I have to watch what I say. But since it's you, I'll tell you the truth for once.

[Diopolis]

Albania was 1st country of Europe because Albania is always number 1st

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Ancient Albanians made up the core of Alexander's army, but the Vinca script is mostly concentrated in other parts of the balkans. The first civilized Europeans were ancient Dacians in Romania who used writing before the building of Eridu and the subsequent confusion of tongues. Both the Dacians and the Illyrians had their languages replaced thereafter by expanding Japhethites but are likely a genetic continuity of the aboriginal inhabitants.

[Elwher]

If we go back far enough, only Africa can have true natives; people anywhere else emigrated at some point in time.

[Vistulange]

What is this fascination with "true" "natives" some people have?