C. C. Lamberg-Karlovsky (ed.). Archaeological thought in America. 357 pages, 35 illustrations. 1989. Cambridge & New York: Cambridge University Press; ISBN 0-521-35452-8 hardback £35 & $39.50 Quotes

Sarianidi (1998b) now accepts, albeit with misgivings, the higher chronology for the Bactrian Margiana complex advanced in the mid-1980s by a number of scholars. A series of radiocarbon dates collected by Fredrik Hiebert (1994) at Gonur offers unequivocal evidence for the dating of the complex to the last century of the 3d millennium and the first quarter of the 2d millennium.

The fact that these language families are of far less interest to the archaeologist may have a great deal to do with the fact that it is primarily speakers of Indo-European in search of their own roots who have addressed this problem.

Furthermore, archaeology offers virtually no evidence for Bactrian Margiana influence on the steppe and only scant evidence for an Andronovo presence in the Bactrian Margiana area. There is certainly no evidence to support the notion that the two had a common ancestor. There is simply no compelling archaeological evidence for (or, for that matter, against) the notion that either is Indo-Iranian.

Linguists too often assign languages to archaeological cultures, while archaeologists are often too quick to assign their sherds a language.

Contemporary methodologies, linguistic or archaeological, for determining the spoken language of a remote archaeological culture are virtually nonexistent. Simplified notions of the congruence between an archaeological culture, an ethnic group, and a linguistic affiliation millennia before the existence of texts is mere speculation, often with a political agenda. Archaeology has a long way to go before its methodology allows one to establish which cultural markers, pottery, architecture, burials, etc., are the most reliable for designating ethnic identity.

Indus materials are found in Mesopotamia, but the reverse is extremely rare.

Increasingly, however, the concept of a single homogeneous culture covering 3 million square kilometers and enduring for over a millennium has become untenable.

The idea of a distant homeland and an expansive migration to Central Asia is difficult if not impossible to maintain, but the origin of the Bactrian Margiana complex remains a fundamental issue. Although some scholars advance the notion that it has indigenous roots, the fact remains that its material culture is not easily derived from the preceding Namazga IV culture. Its wide distribution, from southeastern Iran to Baluchistan and Afghanistan, suggests that its beginnings might lie in this direction—an area of enormous size and an archaeological terra nullius. In fact, the Bactrian Margiana complex of Central Asia may turn out to be its northernmost extension, while its heartland may lie in the vast areas of unexplored Baluchistan and Afghanistan.

In fact, the extensive evidence for Bactrian Margiana materials recovered from Susa, Shahdad, Yahya, Khinaman, Sibri, Nausharo, Hissar, etc., might make it the prime candidate for Indo-Iranian arrival on the Iranian Plateau.

Although ceramics from the Andronovo cultures of the steppe have been found at Togolok 1 and 21, Kelleli, Taip, Gonur, and Takhirbai, Sarianidi (1998b:42; 1990:63) is adamant in opposing any significant Andronovo influence on the Bactrian Margiana complex: “Pottery of the Andronovo type does not exceed 100 fragments in all of southern Turkmenistan.” As rigorous approaches to data retrieval were not practiced, this figure must be merely impressionistic.

Russian and Central Asian scholars working on the contemporary but very different Andronovo and Bactrian Margiana archaeological complexes of the 2d millennium b.c. have identified both as Indo-Iranian, and particular sites so identified are being used for nationalist purposes. There is, however, no compelling archaeological evidence that they had a common ancestor or that either is Indo-Iranian. Ethnicity and language are not easily linked with an archaeological signature, and the identity of the Indo-Iranians remains elusive.

This heightened nationalism projects a mythical and majestic Slavic past in which the archaeology of Arkhaim plays no small part.

Not a single artifact of Andronovo type has been identified in Iran or in northern India, but there is ample evidence for the presence of Bactrian Margiana materials on the Iranian Plateau and in Baluchistan.

Architectural similarities are exceedingly generalized, and the parallels to time/space systematics are weak.

In an interesting “Afterword” to Sarianidi’s Margiana and Protozoroastrianism, J. P. Mallory asks, “How do we reconcile deriving the Indo-Iranians from two regions [the steppes and the Central Asian oases] so different with respect to environment, subsistence and cultural behavior?” (1998a:181). He offers three models, each of interest, none supported by archaeological evidence,... His conclusion is that the nucleus of Indo-Iranian linguistic developments formed in the steppes and, through some form of symbiosis in Bactria-Margiana, pushed south- ward to form the ancient languages of Iran and India. It is, however, that “form of symbiosis” that is so utterly elusive!