Another analysis of the cause of origin of the Indo-Europeans

Aim. The following article considers a new theory for resolving the longstanding problem of identifying the geographic and temporal origin of Indo-Europeans. All existing theories provided thus far for the origin of Indo-Europeans suffer from one common error: the approaches presuppose an economic deterministic model for understanding historical transformation. However, Indo-Europeans were a community circumscribed by common language, therefore culture seems a more proper domain for analysis of origins than does an economistic approach.

Methodology. The Indo-European population as a bounded community, however, is circumscribed by its common cultural formation, that of language. In this paper, we present an alternative theory for the emergence of Indo-Europeans and situate this origin in time and place. We rely on the Weberian hypothesis of a spiritual axial shift spurring an early prehistoric cultural transformation. By synthesizing historical linguistic and archaeological evidence, the approach offered below aims to the solve problems corresponding to a vulgar materialism’s economic determinist approach to IndoEuropean origin.

Results. This paper proposes that the proper basis for analysis of cultural origins of Indo-Europeans resides at the level of spiritual production. A shortcoming of traditional archaeological formulations is its reliance on materialist models for spiritual and cultural concerns.

Research implications. By shifting the methodological and theoretical framing of the problem, this paper seeks to bypass the perpetual circling of the problem by proponents of the materialist model.

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