The Caucasian Substrate Hypothesis in IndoEuropean: Were the Caucasian languages responsible for the 'unusual' features of IndoEuropean as it developed out of IndoUralic?

In 1946, Uhlenbeck wrote about the "unmistakable kinship with Caucasian languages," marking the first serious consideration of a genetic relationship between IndoEuropean and Caucasian languages. This idea has evolved significantly since then. In the second part of our series on this fascinating topic, we explore how scholars like John Colarusso laid the foundation for Bomhard, Kordlandt and Matasović to expand on the hypothesis.

Starting with Bomhard’s 1994 proposition, we see how ProtoIndoEuropean (PIE) might have been influenced by longterm contact with Caucasian languages, despite not being genetically related. His extensive work, featured in the 2019 Journal of IndoEuropean Studies, highlighted these influences through grammar, pronominal systems, and lexicon.
We will look at Kordlandt's views, emphasizing the transformative impact of a North Caucasian substratum on IndoEuropean languages, altering their vowel systems, consonant inventories, and grammatical structures.
This video also covers the significant updates and debates surrounding the hypothesis.

We examine critiques by scholars like Johanna Nichols, who questions the extent of lexical matches, and David Anthony, who discusses archaeological and genetic evidence supporting potential bilingualism in ancient steppe cultures.

We further explore Matasovic’s reanalysis, highlighting specific loanwords and shared features between PIE and Caucasian languages, while considering the possibility of an intermediary language influencing both.
Join us as we dissect these scholarly contributions and the mixed reviews they’ve received. What do these linguistic connections mean for our understanding of early IndoEuropean development?

Share your thoughts in the comments, and don’t forget to watch part one (on Colarusso's ProtoPontic) if you missed it!

Selected sources: (those not featured here will be found inscreen during the video)

⭐Multiple authors, (2019). Journal Indo European Studies. Volume 47.

⭐Bomhard, A. (1994). Comments on Colarusso's paper "Phyletic Links between ProtoIndoEuropean and ProtoNorthwest Caucasian". Mother Tongue: Newsletter of the Association for the Study of Language in Prehistory.

Bomhard, A. (2023) Prehistoric Language Contact on the Steppes: The Case of IndoEuropean and Northwest Caucasian.

Ruhlen, M. (2006). Taxonomic controversies in the twentieth century. In New essays on the origin of language (pp. 197214). BerlinBrandenburgische Akademie der Wissenschaften.

Lehmann, W. P. (2002). PreIndoEuropean. Washington, DC: Institute for the Study of Man.

Chirikba, V. A. (2016). From North to North West: How NorthWest Caucasian evolved from North Caucasian. Mother Tongue: Journal of the Association for the Study of Language in Prehistory, (XXI), 110.

Nichols, J. (2010). Proof of DeneYeniseian relatedness. In J. Kari & B. A. Potter (Eds.), The DeneYeniseian Connection (pp. 266278). (Anthropological Papers of the University of Alaska 5 (new series), special issue). Fairbanks: Alaska Native Language Center.

Lazaridis, I., et al. (2024). The genetic origin of the IndoEuropeans. bioRxiv.

Kortlandt, F. (01 Jan. 2010). Studies in Germanic, IndoEuropean and IndoUralic. Leiden, The Netherlands: Brill.

⭐Matasović, R. (2012). Areal typology of ProtoIndoEuropean: The case for Caucasian connections. Transactions of the Philological Society, 110(2), 283–310.