The bronze age and the Celtic world - Universal History Library

152 THE BRONZE AGE AND THE CELTIC WORLD
the Villa-nova culture, which is not unlike that of the Dorians, so that it seems reasonable
to equate this culture with the Osco-Umbrian or P dialects.
The Sabines, as we have seen, are said to have come from Amiternimi; which is on
the north-eastern slope of the Apennines, or rather in a valley which opens out on that
side. We should, therefore, expect them to have been a P people. But, according to
Dionysius, they over-ran a region peopled by the Aborigines, who we have found reason
for thinking were a Q
people, and, though doubtless they expelled the fighting men, a
good number are likely to have remained behind. It is not surprising, therefore, that there
should be some uncertainty as to whether the original Sabines spoke a P or a Q dialect.
AU the Itahan evidence is consistent with the view that the men of the leaf-shaped
sword were Q speaking, while the men with the iron sword spoke P tongues, but before
we come finally to a decision, it might be well to make a further test elsewhere. We
have seen that the refugees from the mountain zone, armed with Type G swords, fled
down the Rhone, the Loire, and the Seine, and that, while the men with the iron swords
pursued them down the two former valleys, they left the Seine valley alone. Sir John
Rhys and his supporters have suggested that Q speech was at one time spoken in Gaul,
and have cited certain place-names in support of their case.'' The value of this evidence
has been disputed, but there is one name, in two forms, which so obviously belongs to
Q speech, that its value cannot well be denied, and this is Sequana, the ancient name for
the Seine, and Sequani, the tribe who hved by its banks. It cannot be merely a
coincidence that the best attested Q names have been noted just where Type G swords
are found not followed by iron swords, and this case, bearing out as it does the general
tenoiir of the Itahan evidence, seems to me to be conclusive.
I would submit, therefore, that the archaeological evidence, which I have given
in this and in previous chapters, proves, as conclusively as the circumstances of the case
are hkely to admit, that the thesis of Sir John Rhys that two waves of people left
Central Europe for Italy and the west, the first speaking a Q and the second a P tongue,
is absolutely correct, though modifications need to be made in the apphcation of this
theory to Greek lands. His view that the P Folk were the people of the Swiss
lake-dweUings we have seen good reason to reject.
'9 Rhys (1894) 112.