Talk:Etruscan language/Archive 1

message: Hi everyone!
The Etruscan language article could be much more informative. I think there are two hypotheses that deserve closer attention and could be described a bit.
===(A) Indo-Tyrrhenian===
Although there are some very brief remarks on the subject in the article, there is much more evidence for a possible deeper genetic link between Etruscan (+other Tyrrhenian languages) and Indo-European (or Indo-Hittite, if you wish) than claimed. I think Glennie Gee [ ;-) ] might contribute a lot to this matter (provided he avoids his sharp tongue, which I personally like, but others may not). Bomhard, for example, has been an advocate of the Indo-Tyrrhenian ties (Tyrrhenian being an offshoot of Nostratic, in fact), as far as I know.
===(B) Caucasian===
Starostin and a few others have presented some papers on possible genetic bonds between Etruscan and Nakh-Daghestanian languages. Well, that cannot be ruled out at the current state of knowledge, either. It should be mentioned, at least.
A question arises here, whether the lexical and morphological similarities are only due to contact and borrowing or not (the Caucasian languages have long been neighbours to the Indo-European ones anyway).--Pet'usek [petr dot hrubis at gmail dot com] 10:20, 25 February 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Two competing hypotheses: Indo-Tyrrhenian vs. Caucaso-Tyrrhenian 

message: Starostin and a few others have presented some papers on possible genetic bonds between Etruscan and Nakh-Daghestanian languages. Well, that cannot be ruled out at the current state of knowledge, either. It should be mentioned, at least.
A question arises here, whether the lexical and morphological similarities are only due to contact and borrowing or not (the Caucasian languages have long been neighbours to the Indo-European ones anyway).--Pet'usek [petr dot hrubis at gmail dot com] 10:20, 25 February 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: (B) Caucasian

message: Is there reasearch suggesting connections with Kartvelian? I know Kartvelian is correlated with haplogroup G which is also associated with populations in Italy. I think Minoan and Eteocypriot might be more related to Anatolian since there is a J haplogroup connection. Also is haplogroup H Elamite?
By the way E and F (G, H, IJ) must be correlating to Nostratic and K must be the ancestor of all Dene-Caucasian languages. I think Uralic and Altaic are not part of Nostratic.
As you can see:
*E (Afro-Asiatic)
*F (Nostratic (sensu strictu))
** G Kartvelian + Tyrrhsenian
** H Elamite (NOT Dravidian)
** IJ Vinca
*** I "Pelasgic"
*** J IE
**** J1 Anatolian IE and Semitic when mixed with Afro-Asiatic (e.g. Phoenician)
**** J2 Balkan IE
** K Sumerian ???
*** L Dravidian
*** N Uralic
*** O Sino-Tibetan and Austric
*** PQR Dene-Caucasian
--Kupirijo 05:41, 12 March 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: (C) Kartvelian

message: I would be able to post much more on this subject, but I really don't have the time...
 Kári
:Your contributions would be most welcome. - Fennec 22:14, 9 Apr 2004 (UTC)
replies: text: Let me second that, as an amateur who has reported material for this entry. This entry needs an overview from a professional to present a nuanced account of the mainstream reaction to current theories. Wetman 01:40, 10 Apr 2004 (UTC)
replies: text: Hello everybody to you too. I don't think we are interested in presenting a nuanced account of all the speculations of Etruscan origin, which nearly all the professionals just reject out of hand. They are up on the Internet because they are rejected. I presumed we are most interested in getting the facts about the Etruscans, which none of these speculations are. I can see a nuanced account about the facts. The main fact behind all these is that no one not even the Etruscans knows or knew what their origin was. Now, I realize that by popular demand we are not going to get away with not covering origins. But, do you have any idea what a gigantic subject that is? So what I did here and also with the sea peoples is to distinguish carefully between speculations of origin and what we know for fact. Then I gathered the speculations into a speculation section and I would appreciate their remaining there. Just about all there is space for, unless you create different articles for different speculations, is a paragraph possibly two (although I doubt it) per hypothesis. Now by balanced view I presume you mean each speculator gets a fair hearing of his speculation. Or, if there is any speculation less speculative than another, perhaps it should get emphasized. I don't think the whole section should be much of the article. I doubt if the public cares whether so-and-so thinks Etruscan is really a form of Kartvilian or perhaps Russian or some sort of Indic and furthermore that information is not very informative. What we know about the Etruscans, that is informative. So I confess I deserted the speculation section in favor of what I could actually find out. If some of you want to step in and finish it in a way you and everyone consider balanced please do. I suspect that the additional speculations are in the discussion and not the article because you in fact are not sure and do not have your references ready. Now I am getting interested to see what kind of a professional you can get to present balanced speculation! Dazzle me, folks! Can you do that in a page?Dave 19:04, 27 May 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: k

message: Some points about the article on the Etruscan Language
There are actually many thousands of inscriptions in Etruscan.
The vast majority of these are completely, or more or less,
understood, as they are mostly short texts.
Most people believe that Etruscan ethnogenesis occurred in Italy.
This is not the same as believing them to be autochthonous.
Many commentators, especially outside Italy, believe them to be
of Anatolian origin, an immigrant elite who arrived approximately
1000 BCE, and conquered a previously Italic-speaking peasant class.
There are three main theories about the linguistic affinities of
Etruscan:
i) That it is an isolate, not discoverably related to any other
language.
ii) That it represents some sort of peri-Indo-European group of
languages, ultimately related to Indo-European proper, and is 
particularly associated with the Indo-Anatolian languages.
iii) That it is genetically related to the East Caucasian languages,
i.e. Hurrian, Urartian and the modern Nakh-Daghestanian languages,
although this is masked by intensive contact with Indo-European
languages.
Various wacko sites on the Internet and a good deal of amateur
proposals over the years have suggested that it is actually an
Indo-European language and related to or even a direct ancestor of
Albanian, Lithuanian, Ukrainian etc. This is impossibly ridiculous.
Raetic was a written language and about 200 inscriptions survive.
Helmut Rix demonstrated a genetic relationship between Raetic and
Etruscan, which is now generally accepted by Etruscologists. It
may be that the Raetic language represents an early northern
military conquest by the Etruscans, later abandoned.
There are several dozen Camunic inscriptions, but no reason to 
believe that we are actually dealing with a single language. Some
of the Camunic inscriptions are definitely Celtic, not Etruscan.
As they are all very short, no clear conclusions can be made.
The Kaminia stele in the Lemnian language can be more or less
understood in terms of Etruscan and is clearly in a closely
related language to Etruscan. This is not seriously doubted by
any mainstream Etruscologist.
The "Etruscan" golden book found in Bulgaria last year is thought
now to be a FAKE.
There is a proportion of Etruscan vocabulary whose meanings are
more or less known with certainty, another proportion whose
meanings are rather more vaguely understood, another whose
meanings are debated, and another, probably the largest in
terms of quantity, but the least common in terms of number of
occurrences, whose meaning is not understood at all. Many of the
words which occur in Etruscan inscriptions are personal names,
of course. 
Hope this helps,
Ed Robertson
:Hah! I thought that Bulgarian gold book with the ring binding looked suspicious! The mermaid, for a start! Any publication about it yet? All I could find was the initial PR report.
:The article gives an outline of Etruscan inscriptions as published in Rix. Flesh it out! flesh it out! Add to the references and links at least, to steer us, Ed Robertson! Wetman 18:35, 26 Apr 2004 (UTC)
replies: text: Ed Robertson points. Ed seems to have fallen silent. Now, the Bulgarian book mention did contain some prejudicial statement as to its authenticity. Apart from being the wrong tone, it had no footnote or any mention of reason for doubting, nor could I find any, so I just took it out. If you locate the skeptic (besides Ed) put it back in in the proper tone. As for the theories of Etruscan classification, they are not all equal weight. Etruscan or rather Tyrhhenian is an isolate and has been accepted as that for some decades or centuries now. We need to stay mainstream here. As for the non-Etruscan Etruscan, nobody serious cannot distinguish Etruscan from non-Etruscan. The professionals do not to be corrected in their reading of Etruscan inscriptions, especially by amateurs. As for the wacko sites, Ed is probably right. We need to work from authoritative works.Dave 19:18, 27 May 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Some points about the article on the Etruscan Language 

message: Pardon my ignorance: can someone explain the difference between Raetian (as used in this article) and Rhaetian? Cbdorsett 17:17, 14 Jun 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: Doesn't that depend on whether you aspirate that h in whether, as I do, or whether it's the same as weather with you? --Wetman 01:59, 13 July 2005 (UTC)

text: raetian is an ancient language possibly related to etruscan. rhaetian is a modern-day romance language spoken in switzerland. gaidheal 20:43, 15 July 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: See Raetia, the Roman province for the source of my foolish banter. I've made a Rhaetian (disambiguation) for Cbdorsett and all of us. --Wetman 21:52, 15 July 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Raetian or Rhaetian? 

message: "It must also be mentioned that there are strong evidences linking Etruscan to Pelasgian language." I moved this here: no useful information is tramsmitted in this assertive remark. Is there anything to this? What does "Pelasgian language" actually mean. --Wetman 01:51, 13 July 2005 (UTC)
thread_title: Assertive but not informative

message: Should we state that Etruscan is an isolate language in the info box, when the affinity to Lemnian is so strong and I believe generally accepted? Alexander 007 03:33, 2 December 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: I do agree. Guparra 11:34, 2 December 2005 (UTC)
thread_title: Isolate language?

message: there is research paper here which claims that etruscan is a dravidian language. could some check it include someting this in the article???
http://www.verbix.com/documents/etruscan-dravidian.htm
------
Whoa, nobody responded to this cry for help? Egad. Well, sufficed to say it's bunk. As usual, many overimaginative conspiracists will automatically assume Etruscan is related to something totally off the wall like Albanian, Turkish, Ukrainian or Dravidian. The crazier the connection, the more popularity they can generate through sensationalism. But is anything based on facts? Forget about it.
Analysing the information on the site, I don't have to go far to see that they bastardize both languages in order to squeeze a connection out, no matter how half-assed. For example, they list avil-χva- as "anniversary, yearly" proving that they are incompetent in Etruscan. The word means "years", merely the inanimate plural of avil but they are apparently ignorant of what -χva grammatically signifies and how the morpheme is attested in other plurals of neuter gender like śrenχva "images". They equally bastardize Dravidian by proposing slice-'n'-dice etymologies like "Drav. a-*c’erra" for an Etruscan word "acerra" which they claim to mean "incense box". Sufficed to say, **a-c’erra is a bunch of made-up crap too. Dravidian is a well-reconstructed proto-language and ample information exists. You can't just reconstruct it how you see fit and adopt an attitude of "expert Dravidianologists be damned!". One has to take their lazy ass to a university library because the information isn't available online yet as far as I can see, aside from Starostin's own bizarre reconstructions that Dravidianologists may also not recognize. --Glengordon01 12:13, 28 July 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  is etruscan a dravidian language?? 

message: I will edit the section on Alinei's fringe theory linking Etruscan with Hungarian, because I found it misleading. Alinei's Theory is not just "controversial" as stated; it has been totally rejected by practically all specialists in Uralic languages and Hungarology. I am myself a professional linguist specializing in Uralic linguistics, and I haven't met a single colleague with even a slightly positive opinion of Alinei's theory.
Moreover, the following passage may be misleading to a non-specialist: "Alinei's theory is consistent with archaeological findings that established a connection between the Villanovan culture and the Urnfield culture that originated in the Carpathian basin (as concluded by archaeologist Hugh Hencken)." Every linguistic knows that language classification must be based on linguistic criteria, and archaeology is irrelevant in this respect; purely linguistic claims cannot be backed with archaology.--AAikio 11:45, 15 June 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Alinei revisited 

message: Hi, I am Adam and I have taken this case.  The details of the request for mediation are at 2006-06-15 Etruscan-Albanian connection.
During this mediation please refrain from editing the article. Ideogram 15:27, 22 June 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I think until we get some debate going I should close this case.  Alexander 007 has not logged in since 5 May 2006.  If you need my assistance now or in future please leave a note on my talk page.  Ideogram 05:34, 23 June 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Mediation 

message: It was mentioned that the Etruscan alphabet was a "variant of" the Greek alphabet. Not quite true. It should be worded technically as "related to" the Greek alphabet, because both are equally derived from early Euboean alphabets whose origins are ultimately Semitic. The Aegean region and Mediterranean coastlines traded with each other a lot even during the turbulent Greek Dark Ages and it was around this time that both the Greeks and the Etruscans in Asia Minor adopted the same North-West Semitic alphabet for their respective languages, adding new letters or omitting letters that they didn't need. These "alphabets for the people" began to overthrow the more complicated priestly linear scripts which were syllabic and ideographic. It was the Dark Ages. What do you expect? --Glengordon01 02:08, 8 July 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  On Vocabulary section: Etruscan alphabet a "variant" of Greek alphabet? 

message: I added a table of Etruscan phonology out of the kindness of my information sharing heart. I suppose we should incorporate the list of letter values into the table with Roman-alphabet-based letters used for transliteration and IPA... but I'm too lazy right now. I think I'm developping a flu and so I'm overdosing on a bottle of Vitamin C right now. --Glengordon01 14:57, 28 July 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Added phonology table 

message: I snipped this right out, under the "History" section: "[...] the Tyrrhenians of Herodotus are sometimes identified with the Etruscans, although there is no material cultural evidence to back this up."
Grr. Funny how this idiot is talking about Herodotus but forgets to read Herodotus: (I.94) "[...] until at last, after sojourning with one people after another, they came to the Ombrici (ie Umbria), where they founded cities and have lived ever since. [7] They no longer called themselves Lydians, but Tyrrhenians, after the name of the king's son who had led them there." That would be your first clue: Umbria. Where's Umbria. Duh, in Italy. Where do the Etruscans live? Duh, in Italy.
The second clue: Greek Tyrsenoi/Tyrrhenoi = Latin Etrusci/Tusci... hence  English Etruscan and Tuscany. Pretty obvious.
The third clue would be things like the architectural and artistic innovations that link it to the East like Herodotus claimed and the very writing system that Etruscans use (which is ultimately West Semitic in origin... hello? Are you comatose?). If you're expecting some big papyrus to tell us "Yes, the Etruscans are indeed Tyrrhenians!" then don't quit your day job.
More info on the Tyrrhenian-Etruscan connection: [click here, my ignorant puppies] --Glengordon01 22:06, 1 August 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: you should watch your tone a little bit. I hope it is obvious that "Tyrrhenoi" and "Etrusci" were generally equated in Hellenistic times. You do nothing than point out that the names were occasionally equated in the 5th century BC, which is no news to me. You can direct rhetorics like "Where's Umbria. Duh, in Italy" to your first-termers, but if you take a moment to glance at :Image:Iron Age Italy.png, you will have to admit than "Italy=Etruscan" is far from obvious in the 6th century, and much less in the 7th or 8th. The statement you deleted wasn't mine, but I imagine it was intended to say that there is no 'material evidence' to back up Herodotus' Etruscan-Lydian connection, which I suppose is true, except for the Lemnos stele. The "idiot" was talking about the very passage you quote at us here, so I don't quite see the reason for all your condescendance. dab (ᛏ) 16:54, 2 August 2006 (UTC)

text: you might also consider using the preview button now and again, 37(!) edits for this seems like a bit much, even seeing you added a nice table. dab (ᛏ) 16:57, 2 August 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: "[...] the Tyrrhenians of Herodotus are sometimes identified with the Etruscans, although there is no material cultural evidence to back this up."
The relevant questions are: Can Herodotus' own usage of "Tyrrhenoi" be equated with "Etruscans"? And only "sometimes"? Is there honestly no "material cultural evidence" to back this up? All of it is clearly false based on known facts. It couldn't be any more "duh", quite frankly.
Since no Italic-speaking peoples a) fled Lydia in a war, and b) sailed to the region where Umbrians lived, the only people left are the Etruscans. FYI, Proto-Italic (Latin, Venetic, Oscan, Umbrian, Faliscan) entered the Italian peninsula from the north, not Lydia. (Dare I say... duh!)
On your :Image:Iron Age Italy.png, you don't seem to understand that the Etruscan language overlaps the pre-Etruscan Umbrian region precisely because it spread over the region from the west, matching Herodotus' account (as if the eastern-originating writing system, culture, mythology, architecture and divinatory practices aren't clear enough signs that Etruscans are in fact from Anatolia originally). The "war" is identified with the Dark Ages when the Aegean, Egypt and Anatolia was experiencing major warfare.
Comically, if you have to tell me that you need to "imagine" what was meant to have been said by the perpetrator of the sentence, then I guess I have a right to call it half-assed. So you're only trolling my comments for perverted kicks. 
If I have to put up with your input, I have the right to express myself too in a truly democratic society. However, fascist societies are known to work differently. --Glengordon01 01:36, 4 August 2006 (UTC)

text:  Sorry, in the tale in I.94, it doesn't directly speak of "war", only "famine". I wasn't accurate enough. However the two are related in the Dark Ages anyways because of a general decline in living standards. --Glengordon01 01:57, 4 August 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Tyrrhenians equated with Etruscans ("no material cultural evidence to back this up"??) 

message: :Furthermore, Etruscan is very different from IE languages, having a first person singular nominative mi while Indo-European languages point to *h1egô instead.
That does not seem "very different" when we consider that Latin, German have non-nominative 1st singular forms like meus, mich, mihi.
A clearly non-IE language like Basque language has ni, niretzat, neu.
I am not saying that Etruscan is not very different from IE.
I am saying that this example is almost a counterexample.
An expert on Etruscan should substitute with something better.
Error 18:27, 28 September 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Similitudes with IE

message: I've just formatted the Etruscan/Albanian/English vocabulary section (which should probably have a different heading). Reading the above discussion about the pro-Albanian theorists, should this section go altogether? I'm afraid this really isn't my area, so I'm being cautious with edits. Squeezeweasel 13:24, 2 January 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Not only was it highly speculative & without citations, etc. it was also out of place in the article.  Wikipedia is not a place for people to expound their pet theories.Ryandaum 19:31, 2 January 2007 (UTC)
replies: text:  Agreed.  Also runs afoul of the no original research guideline.  Stephen C. Carlson 20:16, 2 January 2007 (UTC)
replies: text:  Thanks! It's nice to have my original instinct on the thing confirmed. Squeezeweasel 21:17, 2 January 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Writing system section 

message: The linked-to page Etruscans on the Web: Language ... (in External links) linking to other Etruscan pages is pretty oldish, such as alive in June 01. F.ex. that page links to VITELIU, which I believe is alive, but the page in question links to an obsolete adress to VITELIU. Proposal: someone having time, may explore the intended links, google up those pages that still exist, and link to them. Rursus 11:42, 16 January 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Link to outdated linkset

message: I have removed the mention that tries to relate Etruscan clan "son" with old Irish cland "offspring", largely because Old Irish cland is a borrowing from Latin planta.
129.194.8.73 15:55, 4 April 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  clan 

message: "Some of these words can be found in modern languages, especially in Romance languages. Some English words derived from Latin — e.g. people, person, population — are theorized to be of Etruscan origin."  Don't see why this is in there - if these words were borrowed into Latin from Etruscan, it doesn't seem strange that they would show up in modern languages which got them from Latin!  Delete these two sentences? Jpaulm 14:51, 5 April 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Borrowings into modern languages 

message: Part of this article seems to assert that it is known that sometimes vowels were not written because otherwise "phonetically impossible" consonant clusters would exist. Does it mean "phonologically impossible", i.e. impossible under the phonotactics of this language? If so, how do we know this? If, on the other hand, "phonetically impossible" is supposed to mean that it is impossible to utter them using a human vocal apparatus, then that is bogus; there are many examples of words in human languages that contain no sounds considered vowels by phoneticians. Japanese and English both have syllabic nasals. Some of the Caucasian languages have very, very complicated consonant clusters.
Anyway, I don't know anything about Etruscan, so I can't fix this one myself. Someone who knows should make it more clear.
Bryce 19:35, 24 April 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  "Impossible" clusters 

message: I read this section and it can't seem to make up its mind what it would like to be. As this is an article on the language not the history it seems to me we should guide it to become a section on the history of the language. So, all speculation on the origin of the Etruscans and most of the archaeology would just go quietly away and quit influencing our article. What we would be left with, and what isn't basically there now, would be more like a history of the literature of the language: what writings were found where and under what contexts, including dates, etc. This material as I envision it would not contain much speculation or room for argument but would present the facts of existence, discovery, and relevant information. Subsequent sections might then present interpretations and speculations and even dictionaries, although the word list is now getting so large it probably needs a dictionary-type article. There might be one, I haven't looked. The big issue in these articles is the provenience of the Etruscans. I'm saying, not THIS article. Let's do an end run and carry the language ball not the provenience ball. I think you must distinguish between speculation and fact and we need to start with fact.Dave 20:29, 27 April 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Etruscan history

message: This paragraph contains all assertions that are either wrong or irrelevant:
"It was long ago proven that Etruscan can not possibly belong to the Anatolian branch of the Indo-European language family.  The discovery of texts in the Lemnian language backs up Herodotus' ancient account of an eastern origin of the Etruscans and their language. Furthermore, Etruscan is very different from Indo-European languages, having a first person singular nominative mi while Indo-European languages point to *h1egô instead. It also lacks any pronominal endings, a thematic class of verbs in *-e-, ablaut between *e and *o in the verb stem, and other clear features that are specifically those of the Indo-European family. While there is debate about Etruscan and the Tyrrhenian family being related to Indo-European, the debate about Etruscan being an Indo-European language is very much dead now."Dave 17:41, 29 April 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Removals

message: "Ancient Cretan hypothesis
Some view the Amathus Bilingual, an inscription partially translating some Eteocypriot text to Attic Greek, as similar in vocabulary and grammar to Etruscan and likely to be part of the same family. Advocates of this view include Eteocretan, as both may be reflexes of ancient Cretan."
The original author on the eteocretan and eteocypriot had marked up a few articles without any references at all, assumed eteocypriot and eteocretan were Etruscan or Etruscan-related and offered us translations of inscriptions in those languages. I will go through there and take them out. This speculation of course labeled as such and with proper references can take its place among the rest but as I thought about it realized he did not actually say what he was proposing. He (or she) just put the idea that they were related and gave the translations without development, connection or references. Is he/she saying Eteocretan and Eteocypriot are related to each other or to ancient Cretan, which is what most speculate the inscriptions descend from? Is ancient Cretan Etruscan or Tyrrhenian? I did not know these things. Since it is not my speculation and he did not say what he meant all reference to those theories and all the uncited decipherment ought to come out until properly cited and developed.Dave 19:37, 30 April 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Eteo- removal

message: "Thucidides states that these some of these Lemnians were related to the Athenian Pelasgians, or "aboriginal pre-Greek" inhabitants of Athens, who were expelled by the arriving Ionians.  Herodotus states that the Etruscans originally came from North West Asia Minor, and arrived in Italy in the 9th century, when, led by a certain Tarquin, they escaped a regional famine in Anatolia."
Hello John. This text has no citations and is off the topic, which is the classification of Etruscan. I was simply making the poin that we do not know how an Etruscan-related language got on the island. The material you cite (if you cite it) would go under speculations of Etruscan origin in Etruscan civilization. The origin of the Lemnians would go under Lemnos or Lemnian. We cannot repeat the origin of the Etruscans in every Etruscan article. There are so many speculations, so many quotes from ancient sources, and they all contradict each other and need exegesis. It would be best not to have articles full of confusing fragments of speculations. If you want to do one, work it up more fully and put it under speculations of origin. This section concerns the classification of Lemnian.Dave 22:56, 8 May 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Croft text

message: "* Etruscans on the Web: This Open University website collects Etruscan links of a broad spectrum of interests fom the professional linguists to the amateurs. Some links are currently non-functional and some are commercial. Included are articles from professional journals. Many are in a foreign language."
:With regret I have had to remove this site from the list. It is not at all what it says it is. Apparently the site was being maintained by one person and that person has failed to keep up on its links. Most of them are dead, despite the fact that many are marked "new." His "new" is 2001. Also it is not true that he removed commercial links. The majority are in fact commercial. And then he has some links to scholarly articles. But most of these require login! Anybody can pay 30 to 60 bucks for a single article; you don't need Wikipedia for that! After 15 or so links I was unable to get to a single English article. And finally, because it is through his site, as soon as you open a link you get commercial popups plastered all over the place. If you are reading this assessment, buddy, I'd say, get your site off the Internet. I don't know what your association with the "open university" is but it doesn't look official, and if this is what its students are paying money for, I personally don't see any education in it. In any case it is not a suitable site for an English encyclopedia.Dave 13:42, 15 May 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Etruscans on the web