What does HYE mean?

[Catharsis]

Re: What does HYE mean?

I agree wiki is no referance any serious researcher would use. And the north eastern part of the black sea coast is not in anatolia!

Correct on both accounts. Armenian Plateau (or Western provinces of Greater Armenia that included Hayasa - which extended into Lesser Armenia as well) have nothing to do with Anatolia. The Turkish government has specifically introduced this term to replace the genuine geographic destination of Armenian Plateau with the altered topography of "eastern Anatolia."

[jgk3]

Re: What does HYE mean?

Actually the supposed derivation of Hayk for Hay and Hayastan is incorrect. We have much more evidence for Hay(asa) than for Hayk, which if anything would be from Hay and not the other way around.





I would not use wikipedia as an reference to be honest, since virtually anyone can edit there and does (without academic credentials). In the Indo-Europeans and Indo-European language Tamaz Gamkrelidze and Vyacheslav Ivanov give detailed breakdown of the names of Hayasan kings, queens, princes, princesses, cities and provinces pointing out that they are Indo-European in origin and have direct connections with later Armenian cities.



When did I equate Hayk with Hayasa? In fact I am stating that it is the other way around. Another mistake is to actually use Urartu which is simply the Assyrian name for the Vanic Kingdom.



No one knows, because we have not found the state archives of Hayasa and the borders that you note only show the incursion of the Hittites who went as far as approximately to the western shores of lake Van.



Read the above work, it truly is an eye opener and is regarder a primer in Indo-European studies. There is also a very good work by Grigor Ghapantsyan entitled Hayasa: Cradle of Armenians.



This is a fallacy. Armenians are not the (only) ones who have pointed out that Armenians are indigenous and have many thousands year history beyond Orontids. Are you familiar with the works of Colin Renfrew, Quentin Atkinson, Russell Gray (or as I noted above) Vyacheslav Ivanov, Tamaz Gamrkelidze, Aaron Dolgopolski, Joseph Greenberg, Merrit Ruhlen or Luigi-Lucca Cavalli Sforza? These are some of the most outstanding scholars in the fields from various disciplines. I can provide the links to their works on Amazon. There are snippets of their (copyrighted) works online also.



I don't want to repeat what I said (see above) about Hayasan personal and toponym names which include Indo-European (Armenian) root words.

The wikipedia source I used was carefully chosen as a text I am familar with from my Hittite class. It just so happened to appear on the wikipedia page and I used it because it is handy, not because I depend on wikipedia as my only source.

I know Ivanov and Gamkrelidze put out their famous book over 20 years ago. I need to read their work so I can understand what the claims, though I will approach it with a healthy skepticism.

I am familiar with Colin Renfrew... Colin Renfrew is an archaeologist, and so his entire basis for identifying the Indo-European homeland, a homeland of something as far away from physical substance as you can get (an unattested spoken language we call Proto-Indo-European), is based on archaeological records... He does not depend on any theory about the way language acquisition works as a linguistic phenomenon btw. He just has this model of how languages mysteriously "spread" with migrations and culture, etc... which doesn't really tell us much about why the languages in the Near East, or anywhere in the world for that matter, spread the way they did. In fact there are plenty of cases that contradict such models.

And why are you bringing up Sforza, he's a geneticist, not a linguist. He deals with haplogroups, which basically illustrate migration patterns in the remote past of human history. What I get out of his work is that regarding the Near East, much of its native population are basically of the same stock, with a high frequency of J2 which established itself once and for all in this region within 10,000 years ago.

I've also read Martiros Kavoukjian's book too, Armenia, Subartu and Sumer. It says all sorts of marvelous things about how we can identify Arrata from the Epic of Gilgamesh with a city in the Armenian Highlands, how Hurrians are "Indo-European" and how Arameans got their name basically from Arme, the same as the rest of the Armenians, because they were part of the sphere of Subartian/Hurrian civilization, but the Arameans were eventually taken over by a Semitic language... He also says that the name Hayk had a dialectal variant, "Hark", that sprang up in different parts of the Armenian Highland, and that toponyms with Hark in them also come from the same root "Hay".

All these claims, and I'm supposed to just sit there on my ignorant butt and believe everything? No way. I want to learn the ancient scripts and languages they depended on as their source. I want to know all the scholars who disagree with these claims and why, so I may judge both sides. This is what I do.

I'm fed up is not so much of the fact that their works exist. I'm happy that their works exist, I'm happy that there are claims that Armenian history can stretch back to the bronze age and beyond. What I'm not happy with is this idea that none of us are reviewing their work critically, all too often, we are all just overtaken by the "wonderful news" about everything we apparently know about our remote past.

Instead of quoting me the names of the authors you want me to read from and waiting till I get the books from amazon, read them, and then hopefully come back "evangelized", I'd prefer if you present to me a summarized form of the actual arguments made by these authors that support your belief that the word Hay comes from Hayasa. So show me the names of their princes and kings, and how Ivanov relates them to Indo-European names, and Armenian ones.

By the way, when I said Hayasa comes from Hayk/Hay, I was not very sensitive about from which direction either of the names came from. The way I see it, the root is Hay either way. I know that Hayk comes from Hay, the k is just a plural suffix, much like english s. The k suffix is no longer productive in Armenian, the -ner suffix took over. But we have tons and tons of instances where -k is frozen in words where it used to denote plurality, such as in Votk (foot). The root in Armenian is Vot, you add a k to get votk (feet). But today, we say Votker, which if you were to analyze, looks like we are using two plural suffixes on the same word, back to back! But no, what happened is the k was no longer productive as a plural suffix, and votk became reanalyzed as 1 foot, with -ner/-er modifying it to become a plural. In short, I know the root is Hay, not Hayk, which was just Hay in the plural.

When I say Urartu, I am actually saying that at least our folkloric history could claim descent from that kingdom (the story of Hayk, Ara the Beautiful, etc...) At least we have something to work with in that case, because the Urartians had to fight the Assyrians as an archrival for a long time. But with the Hayasa, what do we have to work with in terms of relating Armenian motifs or ideas to their culture/history?

[Catharsis]

Re: What does HYE mean?

The wikipedia source I used was carefully chosen as a text I am familar with from my Hittite class. It just so happened to appear on the wikipedia page and I used it because it is handy, not because I depend on wikipedia as my only source.

Alright, just consider it a reference for wikipedia. I am not taking issue with your quote which is a good excerpt.

I know Ivanov and Gamkrelidze put out their famous book over 20 years ago. I need to read their work so I can understand what the claims, though I will approach it with a healthy skepticism.

You have a right to that of course science is all about discussion. However, I had a right to point out what you said in terms of your wording because it sounded that this is what "Armenians are saying" but this is incorrect, since this is about scholastic research. The noted scholars are some of the most outstanding in the fields. Vyacheslav Ivanov (honorary member of both Russian and British Academies of Sciences) republished his work in US and also in brief in Scientific American and was invited to UCLA where I believe he is still teaching. Tamaz Gamkrelidze became the president of the Georgian National Academy of Sciences which he is still leading.

I am familiar with Colin Renfrew... Colin Renfrew is an archaeologist, and so his entire basis for identifying the Indo-European homeland, a homeland of something as far away from physical substance as you can get (an unattested spoken language we call Proto-Indo-European), is based on archaeological records... He does not depend on any theory about the way language acquisition works as a linguistic phenomenon btw. He just has this model of how languages mysteriously "spread" with migrations and culture, etc... which doesn't really tell us much about why the languages in the Near East, or anywhere in the world for that matter, spread the way they did. In fact there are plenty of cases that contradict such models.

Colin Renfrew is truly a great scholar and has been recognized as such by the academic world, this is not what I am saying. I have read a good deal of his works (including monumental Puzzle of Indo-European Origins), he has pioneered radio-carbon dating which today thanks to him has revolutionized archaeology.

And why are you bringing up Sforza, he's a geneticist, not a linguist. He deals with haplogroups, which basically illustrate migration patterns in the remote past of human history.

I noted that I always like to use evidence and theories from different disciplines like comparative linguistics, archaeology, genetics, evolutionary biology so on. This helps to strengthen theories that you argue for and against.

What I get out of his work is that regarding the Near East, much of its native population are basically of the same stock, with a high frequency of J2 which established itself once and for all in this region within 10,000 years ago.

You have read his work, so you must be familiar that he points out that Indo-European migrations began with the Neolithic Revolution as the farming communities began to expand from Armenian Plateau and Anatolia into neighboring regions. He has proven this not only with the J but also R and I (from initial IJ) haplogroups.

I've also read Martiros Kavoukjian's book too, Armenia, Subartu and Sumer. It says all sorts of marvelous things about how we can identify Arrata from the Epic of Gilgamesh with a city in the Armenian Highlands, how Hurrians are "Indo-European" and how Arameans got their name basically from Arme, the same as the rest of the Armenians, because they were part of the sphere of Subartian/Hurrian civilization, but the Arameans were eventually taken over by a Semitic language... He also says that the name Hayk had a dialectal variant, "Hark", that sprang up in different parts of the Armenian Highland, and that toponyms with Hark in them also come from the same root "Hay".

No one scholar has the truth or can provide all the answers through many of the explanations and proposed theories that is quite normal. Martiros Kavoukjian is a good scholar with all the shortcomings in their own right. That is why as I said multi-disciplinary or inter-disciplinary approach is key in this regard.

All these claims, and I'm supposed to just sit there on my ignorant butt and believe everything? No way. I want to learn the ancient scripts and languages they depended on as their source. I want to know all the scholars who disagree with these claims and why, so I may judge both sides. This is what I do.

Yes, in fact what has been stated before about so-called "Thraco-Phrygian invasion of Armens" which has less weight in terms of modern science and recent discoveries in the fields of archaeology, genetics, comparative linguistics or evolutionary biology. Yet too often you will see it quoted and brought again and again like some kind of sacred biblical reference.

I'm fed up is not so much of the fact that their works exist. I'm happy that their works exist, I'm happy that there are claims that Armenian history can stretch back to the bronze age and beyond. What I'm not happy with is this idea that none of us are reviewing their work critically, all too often, we are all just overtaken by the "wonderful news" about everything we apparently know about our remote past.

As I said, it is for the academic world to review and give their analysis about their works. One cannot not to read them, agree or disagree with them or dislike their work as a consumer in his or her own right. As I said, ultimately it is up to the academicians in the field to give their mark and they have done so by honoring these scholars for the many years of their work.

Instead of quoting me the names of the authors you want me to read from and waiting till I get the books from amazon, read them, and then hopefully come back "evangelized", I'd prefer if you present to me a summarized form of the actual arguments made by these authors that support your belief that the word Hay comes from Hayasa. So show me the names of their princes and kings, and how Ivanov relates them to Indo-European names, and Armenian ones.

I have read all of the works otherwise I would not recommend them to you. Indo-Europeans and Indo-European language is not online however, many of their short summaries and articles of their work are luckily. So here it is (T. Gamkrelidze and R. Haase) -

http://books.google.com/books?id=BpASAAAAIAAJ&q=hayasa+indo-european&dq=hayasa+indo-european&lr=

Hayasan Indo-European names have been pointed out much earlier by many scholars including Arnold Toynbee in his A Study of History (Vol. VII, p. 665.) - "The Armenian language, of Indo-European origin, had been carried from Hayasa to the east side of the Euphrates, their own name for themselves was "Hayk" - and had become the common language of the heterogeneous population of Armenia Major only as a consequence of the political unification under the Artaxiad Crown."

By the way, when I said Hayasa comes from Hayk/Hay, I was not very sensitive about from which direction either of the names came from. The way I see it, the root is Hay either way. I know that Hayk comes from Hay, the k is just a plural suffix, much like english s. The k suffix is no longer productive in Armenian, the -ner suffix took over.

The "k" at the end is - կ - not a "k'e" - ք - (standing for plural like in the name - Հայք - Hayk' - Armenia/Armenians) but a "ken" for - Հայկ -which has a different meaning and most probably origin.

But we have tons and tons of instances where -k is frozen in words where it used to denote plurality, such as in Votk (foot). The root in Armenian is Vot, you add a k to get votk (feet). But today, we say Votker, which if you were to analyze, looks like we are using two plural suffixes on the same word, back to back! But no, what happened is the k was no longer productive as a plural suffix, and votk became reanalyzed as 1 foot, with -ner/-er modifying it to become a plural. In short, I know the root is Hay, not Hayk, which was just Hay in the plural.

Again please see above you are using a ք (36th letter of the alphabet) and not կ (15th letter of the alphabet).

When I say Urartu, I am actually saying that at least our folkloric history could claim descent from that kingdom (the story of Hayk, Ara the Beautiful, etc...) At least we have something to work with in that case, because the Urartians had to fight the Assyrians as an archrival for a long time. But with the Hayasa, what do we have to work with in terms of relating Armenian motifs or ideas to their culture/history?

I am just pointing out the name Urartu for several reasons since it is the Assyrian name for the Kingdom of Van. The native Van-B(i)an(a) name stood for the kingdom. The r.r.t cuneiform could have been just as easily read with "a" and not "u" vowels which are but a variant, just like we have many words in English with "u" read as an "a."

[jgk3]

Re: What does HYE mean?

Alright, just consider it a reference for wikipedia. I am not taking issue with your quote which is a good excerpt.



You have a right to that of course science is all about discussion. However, I had a right to point out what you said in terms of your wording because it sounded that this is what "Armenians are saying" but this is incorrect, since this is about scholastic research. The noted scholars are some of the most outstanding in the fields. Vyacheslav Ivanov (honorary member of both Russian and British Academies of Sciences) republished his work in US and also in brief in Scientific American and was invited to UCLA where I believe he is still teaching. Tamaz Gamkrelidze became the president of the Georgian National Academy of Sciences which he is still leading.



Colin Renfrew is truly a great scholar and has been recognized as such by the academic world, this is not what I am saying. I have read a good deal of his works (including monumental Puzzle of Indo-European Origins), he has pioneered radio-carbon dating which today thanks to him has revolutionized archaeology.



I noted that I always like to use evidence and theories from different disciplines like comparative linguistics, archaeology, genetics, evolutionary biology so on. This helps to strengthen theories that you argue for and against.



You have read his work, so you must be familiar that he points out that Indo-European migrations began with the Neolithic Revolution as the farming communities began to expand from Armenian Plateau and Anatolia into neighboring regions. He has proven this not only with the J but also R and I (from initial IJ) haplogroups.



No one scholar has the truth or can provide all the answers through many of the explanations and proposed theories that is quite normal. Martiros Kavoukjian is a good scholar with all the shortcomings in their own right. That is why as I said multi-disciplinary or inter-disciplinary approach is key in this regard.



Yes, in fact what has been stated before about so-called "Thraco-Phrygian invasion of Armens" which has less weight in terms of modern science and recent discoveries in the fields of archaeology, genetics, comparative linguistics or evolutionary biology. Yet too often you will see it quoted and brought again and again like some kind of sacred biblical reference.



As I said, it is for the academic world to review and give their analysis about their works. One cannot not to read them, agree or disagree with them or dislike their work as a consumer in his or her own right. As I said, ultimately it is up to the academicians in the field to give their mark and they have done so by honoring these scholars for the many years of their work.



I have read all of the works otherwise I would not recommend them to you. Indo-Europeans and Indo-European language is not online however, many of their short summaries and articles of their work are luckily. So here it is (T. Gamkrelidze and R. Haase) -

http://books.google.com/books?id=BpASAAAAIAAJ&q=hayasa+indo-european&dq=hayasa+indo-european&lr=

Hayasan Indo-European names have been pointed out much earlier by many scholars including Arnold Toynbee in his A Study of History (Vol. VII, p. 665.) - "The Armenian language, of Indo-European origin, had been carried from Hayasa to the east side of the Euphrates, their own name for themselves was "Hayk" - and had become the common language of the heterogeneous population of Armenia Major only as a consequence of the political unification under the Artaxiad Crown."




The "k" at the end is - կ - not a "k'e" - ք - (standing for plural like in the name - Հայք - Hayk' - Armenia/Armenians) but a "ken" for - Հայկ -which has a different meaning and most probably origin.



Again please see above you are using a ք (36th letter of the alphabet) and not կ (15th letter of the alphabet).



I am just pointing out the name Urartu for several reasons since it is the Assyrian name for the Kingdom of Van. The native Van-B(i)an(a) name stood for the kingdom. The r.r.t cuneiform could have been just as easily read with "a" and not "u" vowels which are but a variant, just like we have many words in English with "u" read as an "a."

Thank you Catharsis, I am convinced that you have a balanced view on things, and I will heed your recommendations with confidence.

As for your last point about the name Urartu, well the name of the Hittites comes from Israel, in the Old Testament, the (real Anatolian) Hittites actually called them selves the people of Nisa/Nisha, their home city, which is modern day Kayseri in modern day Turkey. In fact, when the Israelites were referring to the Hittites, they were not even referring to the real ones, but the Neo-Hittites, which bore the relic of the shatterred Hittite imperial legacy for a couple of more centuries, until they too (the geographically "Syrian"-based Neo-Hittites) were finally assimilated into the Arameans and Assyrians. But, when we speak of Hittites, we use this name anyway, it is the convention. The same holds for Urartu vis-a-vis the term Vannic/Biania, but I suppose that in an Armenian circle, it would be more patriotic to use a non-Turkish sponsored name (Urartu) :P

[Catharsis]

Re: What does HYE mean?

Thank you Catharsis, I am convinced that you have a balanced view on things, and I will heed your recommendations with confidence.

Thanks JGK for taking the interest and raising these interesting points.

As for your last point about the name Urartu, well the name of the Hittites comes from Israel, in the Old Testament, the (real Anatolian) Hittites actually called them selves the people of Nisa/Nisha, their home city, which is modern day Kayseri in modern day Turkey. In fact, when the Israelites were referring to the Hittites, they were not even referring to the real ones, but the Neo-Hittites, which bore the relic of the shatterred Hittite imperial legacy for a couple of more centuries, until they too (the geographically "Syrian"-based Neo-Hittites) were finally assimilated into the Arameans and Assyrians. But, when we speak of Hittites, we use this name anyway, it is the convention. The same holds for Urartu vis-a-vis the term Vannic/Biania, but I suppose that in an Armenian circle, it would be more patriotic to use a non-Turkish sponsored name (Urartu) :P

Very true JGK about the Hittites in the Biblical reference (HT or Heth) and them being a "shadow" of their former selves, perhaps peaking during the wars with the Hayasans in mid second millennium BC (under Muwattalli II perhaps being their zenith). Another telling thing is that Hayasan kingdom was quite powerful because according to the Hittite inscriptions, Hayasa-Azzi forces were able to capture the Hittite capital Sapinuwa. Interestingly enough, Azzi capital was named Ura or Ara (we see the Urartu/Ararat U-A shifts). Afterward the Hayasans and Hittites signed a peace treaty (amongst the listed gods is also IE Mithra-Mihr) which lasted for sometime. By 13th and especially 12th centuries BC both Hayasa and the Hittite kingdom (and earlier empire) would fall to various invasions (like the one by the "Sea Peoples" movements) and later to that of Assyria which by that time had one major opponent in the area which was the Kingdom of Ararat-Urartu-Biana-Van.

[Pazooki]

Re: What does HYE mean?

WOw, lol. This thread is still going on? The guy asked a simple question. KanadaHye answered.

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