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222identified and acknowledged by national scholars (and sometimes rejected from thesanctuary of the national culture), but this is often not the case with the historically earlierexternal influences.In some European regions the influence of more than one source is the most likelycase. For example, the “oriental” elements in some regions of the Balkans could beconnected not only to the later and more obvious influence of Turkish culture, but to thepossible earlier influence of Indo-European culture as well. The early arrival of Indo-Europeans with the “oriental” type of monophonic singing in the Balkans has beendocumented in the case of Ancient Greece. In the same way, prominent “oriental”features of the music in some regions of Spain and Portugal could be the result of notonly the later and more obvious influence of Arabian culture, but to the earlier influenceof Indo-European cultures as well.Using Georgian music as a model of such “earlier” and “later” influences, I agreethat the obvious external influence in the musical traditions of the Balkans and thePyrenees (“ oriental” musical forms and genres, melodies, musical instruments andinstrumental ensembles) came from the influence of Arabic (in case of the Pyrenees) andTurkic (in case of the Balkans) musical cultures, but I would suggest that the more subtleand already mixed singing styles (for example, in Albacete in Spain, or Chameri inAlbania), where richly ornamented and freely flowing melodies are mixed with the dronepolyphony, are possibly the result of a much earlier influence, supposedly coming fromearly Indo-European migrations. These mixed styles of polyphonic and monophonicelements (which are often unacknowledged as mixed styles in the first place) I attribute tothe legacy of Indo-Europeans.Another factor that we should take into account is that Indo-Europeans came tothe different part of the Europe after a certain ethnic and cultural mixture during theirlong migration, so when they reached their “destination”, they could have been thecarriers of quite different and already mixed singing styles. Besides, some of the Indo-Europeans might be carriers of different polyphonic singing traditions as well. In thiscase the identification of the new cultural element would be much more difficult.Therefore, not all the waves of Indo-Europeans might be the carriers of the monophonicvocal traditions with richly ornamented melodies and free rhythm and metre. In thiscontext it is important to note, for example, that there are hardly any traces of the“oriental” mixture with drone polyphony in many northern regions of Europe. (Althoughwe need to acknowledge that very few traditions of polyphonic singing from NorthEurope have survived until the 20 th century).After a brief discussion of the importance of distinguishing earlier and laterinfluences in European music, let us now go back to the list of mixed cultures of ancientEurope. This list can be longer, but I think my argument is already clear: moving throughEurope, the Indo-Europeans were in constant contact with the autochthonous populationof Old Europe, with the supposedly polyphonic traditions of drone polyphony. During thecenturies and millennia after the arrival of Indo-Europeans these two cultures and theirrepresentatives interacted, mixed, and gave birth to the new combined traditions ofpolyphonic singing. The typological closeness of these “mixed” polyphonic traditions isquite clear. The main reason for this closeness must be the fact that in all these casesthere was a similar mixture of two different types of cultures: