Imagine
a place out on the steppes of Asia, the stepping stones to Europe,
maybe the Caucasus, or somewhere farther east, out on the outskirts of
the civvies and the cities, say maybe 5-6000 years ago, with the climes
warming up and paths leading north, where a group of people probably
only a few thousand strong, not so urban, but not so stupid, playing
around with wheels and ales and axles and weapons, found a will and a
way in this world, spreading outward until they gradually lost contact
with each other and their languages became harder to understand,
eventually to become the Celts of Europe and the Persians of Asia and
the Greeks of the Mediterranean, and the Hittites who never really left,
now North Europeans, South Europeans, Indians, Iranians, and...
Armenians, who never really left...
...speaking related Indo-Aryan-European languages, Aryan the same word as Iran, long before it meant 'Nordic', swastika a Hindu symbol, Persian sharing words with English and Spanish, “Swas Ti Ka” meaning “hello” in Thai via Sanskrit, long before Hitler crapped on us all, long before Muslims felt like they had to fight for their lives to survive Western colonization, long before Jews decided they weren't really Middle Easterners at all, more like Europeans in fact, with all that represents...
