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Help[Facts] Re: Meaning of Thessaly?
in reply to a message by Felie
Thessaly was the main place of habitaton of the Pelasgi who were not of Greek extraction. This means they were not part of the Hellenic people. Pelasgians did not speak Greek,as per testimony by Herodotus.MOreover, Thessaly did not take its name after number 4,as according to Dionysius of Halicarnassus, there were 3 main districts in Thessaly after 3 Pelasgians. "The leaders of the colony were Achaeus, Phthius and Pelasgus, the sons of Larisa and Poseidon"[1.17.1]
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A Turkic origin is fanciful, as Turkic-speaking people didn't enter the area until Attila (and then only as raiders, not settlers). Pelasgian is a catch-all for any and all non-Greek, pre-Greek or proto-Greek people in the Aegean and Peloponnese. There are probably two Pre-Greek language strata - various aboriginal languages which influence toponyms such as Thessaly - and a later agricultural culture usually identified as Afro-Asiatic (related to Egyptian and Semitic), based on early scripts and agricultural terms.
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