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Pré-Publication, Document De Travail (Preprint/Prepublication) Année : 2022

Triangulation fails when neither linguistic, genetic, nor archaeological data support the Transeurasian narrative

Zheng Tian
Yuxin Tao
  • Fonction : Auteur
Kongyang Zhu
  • Fonction : Auteur
Guillaume Jacques
Robin Ryder
  • Fonction : Auteur
Anton Antonov
Ziyang Xia
  • Fonction : Auteur
Yuxuan Zhang
  • Fonction : Auteur
Xiaoyan Ji
  • Fonction : Auteur
Xiaoying Ren
  • Fonction : Auteur
Guanglin He
  • Fonction : Auteur
Jianxin Guo
  • Fonction : Auteur
Rui Wang
  • Fonction : Auteur
Xiaomin Yang
  • Fonction : Auteur
Jing Zhao
  • Fonction : Auteur
Dan Xu
  • Fonction : Auteur
Russell Gray
  • Fonction : Auteur
Menghan Zhang
  • Fonction : Auteur
Shaoqing Wen
  • Fonction : Auteur
Chuan-Chao Wang
  • Fonction : Auteur

Résumé

Robbeets et al. (2021) argue that the dispersal of the so-called “Transeurasian” languages, a highly disputed language superfamily comprising the Turkic, Mongolian, Tungusic, Koreanic, and Japonic language families, was driven by Neolithic farmers in the West Liao River region of China. They adduce evidence from linguistics, archaeology, and genetics to support their claim. An admirable feature of the Robbeets et al.’s paper is that all their datasets can be accessed. However, a closer investigation of all three types of evidence reveals fundamental problems with each of them. Robbeets et al.’s analysis of the linguistic data does not conform to the minimal standards required by traditional scholarship in historical linguistics and contradicts their own stated sound correspondence principles. A reanalysis of the genetic data finds that they do not conclusively support the farming-driven dispersal of Turkic, Mongolian, and Tungusic, nor the two-wave spread of farming to Korea. Their archaeological data contain little phylogenetic signal, and we failed to reproduce the results supporting their core hypotheses about migrations. Given the severe problems we identify in all three parts of the “triangulation” process, we conclude that there is neither conclusive evidence for a Transeurasian language family nor for associating the five different language families with the spread of Neolithic farmers from the West Liao River region.

Dates et versions

hal-03702507 , version 1 (23-06-2022)

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Zheng Tian, Yuxin Tao, Kongyang Zhu, Guillaume Jacques, Robin Ryder, et al.. Triangulation fails when neither linguistic, genetic, nor archaeological data support the Transeurasian narrative. 2022. ⟨hal-03702507⟩
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