About Proto-Germanic

[Jaska]

"A long transition follows the arrival of Bell Beakers, from around 2200 BC to 1700–1600 BC, which continues in part Late Neolithic traditions—such as longhouses, flintwork, metalwork and burial rites—and incorporates them to the new culture (Figure 63). The Dagger Period integrated the diverse cultural traditions of the previous period into a single south Scandinavian cultural sphere under the influence of Bell Beakers (Prescott 2009), which suggests the formation of “a shared Nordic language based upon the frequent interaction that followed from the distribution of flint daggers” (Kristiansen 2009)."

Excellent summary, this is exactly what I meant. From all theories I know, this is the most convincing. And the Allentoft genetic results fit perfectly to the archaeological conclusions above about the dagger period.

Well, I have to criticize the use of the term "Nordic language" in that context, as that label refers to the modern Scandinavian languages descending from Proto-Nordic = Proto-Scandinavian, spoken ca. 200-500 AD. As has been presented in this thread, the linguistic evidence about Pre-Germanic is so far too vague for us to claim that the Germanic lineage was yet even present in the Late Neolithic Scandinavia.

Moreover, cultural cohesion might or might not spread one language to a wider region - there is no "law of nature" dictating that it always results in that. Therefore, we must accept our inability to read linguistic processes from archaeological data; or from genetic data, for that matter, because there is no "law of nature" dictating that the language of the greater population (and thus the majority ancestry after an admixture event) will always prevail over languages of smaller populations (minority ancestries).

Consequently, whenever an archaeologist writes about language based on material similarities, it should be read as “symbolic language”, “ornament language”, “language of design”, or something along that line of interpretation. They have no reliable method to see actual spoken language from their data.