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The Danube Valley Cultures of Old Europe

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The Lost World of Old Europe: The Danube Valley, 5000 3500 BC (links added):

We have embraced a world that I for one didn’t know existed when I was educated many years ago. Nobody ever talked about the fact that there was a great civilization in Europe well before the pyramids, before the ziggurats, before the Mycenaeans, before Periclean Athens, before all of that there was an extraordinary civilization in the Danube river basin.

It also pre-dates the Aryan invasions of Europe.

The evidence of Old Europe is not only in writing, but in other artifacts, and in our DNA. Modern Europeans are essentially an amalgam of haplogroup I Old Europeans and the haplogroup R1 Aryans who later conquered them. The term Old Europe was coined by Marija Gimbutas. I’ve previously discussed the Aryans, Marija Gimbutas and the Old Europeans in Who’s White? – Part 3.

Danube Script from Old Europe 5000 – 3500 BC:

Harald Haarmann is the world’s leading expert on ancient scripts and languages. According to him, these are the oldest writings in the world invented by and ancient civilization that existed in the Balkans thousands of years ago.

This implies that the first high culture in the world originated in the Balkans. So Mesopotamia would no longer be called the Cradle of Civilization. The ancient culture in the Balkans is thousands of years older. The tablets of Tărtăria were found in Romania and they are dated 5500 BC.

Old Europe – The Danube River Valley Civilization 5000 B.C. – 3000 B.C links many images of artifacts from various sources on the web.

Danube Valley cultures:

Danube Valley civilization or the term Old Europe is the name for several advanced cultures in southeastern Europe and surrounding areas who were connected to the Danube River valley. It was a cycle of cultures beginning somewhere between 7,000 – 6,200 BC,[1] its time of peak were 5,500 – 3,500 BC, from 3,500 – 3,000 BC the civilization fell into decline. The main reason for this were perhaps the arrival of the Indo European speaking people from Eastern Europe.

“Indo European speaking people” is a contemporary semitically correct euphemism for Aryan.

The Danube valley civilization is largely a forgotten, rather than lost civilisation.[57] The upheavals that followed the Indo-European infiltrations into Europe from 4300 BC to 2900 BC transformed differents regions at different times. A few areas were left relatively unaffected.

Modern observers have projected quite different visions on the remains of Old Europe. But this much is clear—far earlier than before recognized, southeastern Europe achieved a level of technological skill, artistic creativity, and social sophistication that defies our standard categories and is just beginning to be understood in a systematic way.

5 thoughts on “The Danube Valley Cultures of Old Europe”

  2. Etymology of Danube…

    Your Dictionary quotes Webster’s New World College Dictionary:

    Celtic Dānuvius ; from Indo-European dānus-, stream (; from base an unverified form dā-, liquid, flow) from source Dnepr, Dnestr, Don, Donets, Doon

    and The American Heritage Dictionary:

    Across Europe, from Russia to England, there are rivers with names beginning with a d and also containing an n: the Don, the Dnieper, and the Dniester of Russia and Ukraine, the Danube of central Europe, and the six rivers called Don in Britain. All of these names come from the Proto-Indo-European word *dānu–, meaning “river” and derived from the root *dā– “to flow, flowing.” In Avestan, the earliest Iranian language we know, dānu– means “river, stream.” In modern Ossetic (the language of the Ossets, descendants of the Scythians, an Iranian tribe of the Russian steppes), don means “river, stream.” This word appears in the name of the Don River of Russia. Dnieper and Dniester (earlier Danapris and Danastius, respectively) come from Scythian Dānu apara and Dānu nazdya (“the river in the rear” and “the river in front,” respectively). The name of the six rivers called Don in Britain comes from the Celtic version of the “river” word, also *dānu–. This Celtic word survives more or less intact in the name of the Danube, which was called Dānuvius by the Romans. The presence of Celtic river names both in central Europe and in Britain attests to the Celts’ earlier glory, and recalls a time when Celtic languages were spoken across Europe from the valley of the Danube in the east to Spain and Ireland in the west.

    Online Etymology Dictionary:

    major river of Europe (German Donau, Hungarian Duna, Russian Dunaj), from Latin Danuvius, from Celtic *danu(w)-yo-, from PIE *danu- “river” (compare Don, Dnieper, Dniester).

    Jones’ Celtic Encyclopedia:

    Ironically, the etymology of the name becomes “river river”–Danube < Danuvius < Old Celtic Danu-yo < IE danu- "the river," which is also name of the Irish goddess Danu, regarded as the mother of the gods; it is likely also related to the name of the Welsh goddess Dôn, also regarded as the mother of the gods. It is possible that the Danube was regarded as a sacred river by the Celts, so much so that the gods were the children of the goddess of this important river. Unfortunately, this is only speculation.

    The Old European name for it was probably their word for “river” too.

  3. Old Europe’s Remnants, at West Hunter (Greg Cochran):

    Although we know quite a bit about the artifacts, ways of making a living, and recently even the DNA of Europe’s first farmers, we don’t know anything about their language or much about what they thought or believed in. Old Europe was one of the more advanced parts of the world, especially in metallurgy, but they don’t seem to have developed writing. The Sardinians are genetically very similar to those EEF [= Early European Farmer] farmers, but I doubt that they can tell us much about the old culture. It’s been a long time.

    On the other hand, we know a lot about the language of the invaders, and have figured out a fair amount about Indo-European culture from linguistic archaeology. We can see that something new was added to the European genetic mix, but we aren’t sure where those invaders originated. That might be resolved, fairly soon.

    We know that the Indo-Europeans crushed Old Europe and eventually imposed their language almost everywhere in Europe ( except for the Basques), but it didn’t happen all at once.

  4. I’m sorry but this culture is also ultimately Anatolian. And I’m convinced Proto-IndoEuropean is as well. I like that you’ve riveted the term “Aryan” to the R1’s, though. It’s always good to start with a public definition so everyone can know what everyone else is talking about. I agree with you on that, BTW.

    http://www.volgagermanbrit.us/documents/M35__haplogroup_E1b1b1.pdf

    On Page 6, under “Discussion,” they’re talking about my ancestors; who would later move to Crete and build the Minoan Civilization. And then – later – the Roman Empire. I’ve been promising a video for weeks on this. And I will deliver it. The reason I haven’t done it yet is because of an embarrassment of riches. I have decided to absolutely, completely, 100% start putting this thing together in a couple of months. That’ll give me time to finish the linguistic (amateurish) background work.

    “The Eu9 haplogroup is the best genetic predictor of the appearance of Neolithic painted pottery and figurines at various European sites. Also, the highest frequency of Eu9 is in the sample from Turkey (40%). The Turkish genetic samples were all from Konya (Semino pers. comm) which is within 100 km of the significant Neolithic site of Çatal Höyük.”

    Whenever people deign to talk about the massive number of Anatolians in Central Italy – and this paper does NOT – they always say they’re “Neolithic farmers.” I use this paper to show – by the absence of these figurines and pottery samples – that the Anatolians there showed up AFTER the Neolithic. They flooded in right before the Bronze Age Collapse and settled in territory largely uninhabited by the G2a men. The REAL Neolithic Farmers of Central Italy. The latter largely lived in the Apennine Mountains; where they continue to congregate to this day.

    My linguistic work is merely to demonstrate whether or not it is POSSIBLE that the Minoans spoke Proto-Italic. (Really, Italic. If it’s “Proto” anything it’s “Proto-Latin.”) And if not? No problem. I’ll throw the idea in the dustbin.

  5. Bill, I’d be interested in hearing how your study comes out. Perhaps there is a third prequel to the Aeneid to be written.

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