Indo-Aryan migration debate

The Indo-Aryan migration debate is a debate about the place of origin of the Indo-Aryan languages of the Indo-European family. When the relation between the European languages and the Indic languages was first discovered in the 18th century, many scholars believed that this meant that European peoples originated in India. With the development of the field of historical linguistics, as the proto-Indo-European language began to be reconstructed, linguists realized that this model could not be reconciled with the knowledge about the proto-language. The standard view today is that the Indo-European languages originated somewhere in between India and Europe, either on the Pontic steppes (according to the prevailing Kurgan hypothesis), or in Anatolia. This view, sometimes called the Indo-Aryan migration theory, sees the Indo-Aryan-speaking people as having migrated from the northwest and arrived in the subcontinent, interacting with the native Dravidian-speaking and other groups already present in India.

In the 20th century some have questioned this standard view, and sought to resuscitate the Indigenous Aryans model, according to which the Indo-European languages, or at least the Indo-Aryan languages, originated within the Indian subcontinent, as an alternative to the established migration model. The indigenist view sees the Indo-Aryan languages as having a deep history in the subcontinent and being the carriers of the Indus Valley Civilization (whose linguistic affiliations are otherwise considered to be unknown). This view proposes an older date than is generally accepted for the Vedic period, which is generally considered to follow the decline of Harappan culture.

The debate has been entwined with political and religious arguments since a piece of crucial evidence is the dating of the Vedas, sacred scriptures of the Hindu religion. There has also been resistance among some Indian scholars to the idea that Indian culture can be divided between external Indo-European and indigenous Dravidian elements, a division which is sometimes described as a legacy of colonial rule and a hindrance to Indian national unity. The debate mostly exists among the scholars of Hindu religion and the history and archaeology of India, whereas historical linguists nearly unanimously accept the migration model of Indic origins.

Overview of arguments

Main arguments

The proposed "Indigenous Aryan" scenarios are based on specific interpretations of archaeological, genetic, and linguistic data, and on the literary interpretations of the Rigveda.[1][2][web 1] Standard arguments, both in support of the "Indigenous Aryans" theory and in opposition to the mainstream Indo-Aryan Migration theory, are:

  • Presenting the Indo-Aryan Migration theory as an "Indo-Aryan Invasion theory";[3][note 1]
  • Presenting the IAmt as a racist and colonialist theory;[4][5][6]
  • Pointing to the relative lack of genetic and archaeological evidence to support such an "invasion" into northwest India into North-West India;[7][8][9]
  • Questioning the methodology of linguistics;[7][10]
  • Reinterpretation of the linguistic data, arguing for the ancient, indigenous origins of Sanskrit;[11][7]
  • Contesting the possibility that small groups can change culture and languages in a major way;[12]
  • Dating the Rg Veda and the Vedic people to the 3rd millennium BC or earlier;[14][15][16][17]
  • Identifying the Sarasvati River with the Ghaggar-Hakra River, which dried up c. 2000 BC;[18]
  • Identifying the Vedic people with the Harappan Civilisation;[19][15]
  • Equating the Harappan Civilisation, Vedic Culture and the Vedic-Puranic chronology.[20]

Overview

Edwin Bryant has given an overview of various opponents of the Indo-Aryan migration theory in his PhD-thesis and two subsequent publications:

The indigenous Aryan debate and The Quest for the Origins of Vedic Culture are reports of his fieldwork, primarily interviews with Indian researchers, on the reception of the "Indo-Aryan Migration theory" in India.[21][1] The Indo-Aryan Controversy is a bundle of papers by various "Indigenists", including Koenraad Elst, but also a paper by Michael Witzel.[2]

Another overview has been given by Thomas Trautmann:

Presentation of the IAMt

Critics of the Indo-Aryan Migration theory use it to present the Indo-Aryan Migration theory as an "Aryan Invasion Theory".[3][note 1] According to Koenraad Elst,

The theory of which we are about to discuss the linguistic evidence, is widely known as the "Aryan invasion theory" (AIT). I will retain this term even though some scholars object to it, preferring the term "immigration" to "invasion." [...] North India’s linguistic landscape leaves open only two possible explanations: either Indo-Aryan was native, or it was imported in an invasion.[22][note 2]
Indo-Iranian migrations according to Kazanas. Source: Kazanas (2013), The Collapse of the AIT[note 3]

Kazanas presents the IAMt as stating that the Indo-Iranians followed a route through the Caucasus and eastward through Iran to India.[23][note 3]

Edwin Bryant notes that "no informed Western scholar speaks of "invasions" anymore."[25] According to Bryant, keeping up-to-date is problematic for many Indian scholars, since most Indian universities don't have enough funds to keep up with current scholarship, and most Indian scholars are not able to gain access to recent western publications.[25] Bryant further notes that,

... while one would be lucky to find a book by Max Muller even in the antique book markets of London, one can find a plethora of recent-edition publications of his and other nineteenth-century scholars' works in just about any bookstore in India (some of these on their tenth or twelfth edition). practically speaking, it is small Delhi publishers that are keeping the most crude versions of the Aryan invasion theory alive by their nineteenth-century reprints! These are some of the main sources available to most Indian readers.[25]

Racist and colonialist theory

Theoretical background

Susan Wise Bauer notes that Hindu nationalists regard all versions of the Indo-Aryan migration theory as an "offensive racist ploy," due to the distortion in the 19th century of the idea of Aryan migrations "by racist assumptions and political agendas."[26] Nineteenth-century German Orientalists were looking in Asia for the ancient "Aryan roots" of the European languages and the European "races." In the 1850s Max Müller had introduced the notion of two Aryan races, a western and an eastern one, who migrated from the Caucasus into respectively Europe and India. Müller dichotomized the two groups, ascribing greater prominence and value to the western branch. Nevertheless, this "eastern branch of the Aryan race was more powerful than the indigenous eastern natives, who were easy to conquer."[27] By the 1880s, his ideas had been "hijacked" by racist ethnologists. His work contributed to the developing interest in Aryan culture, which often set Indo-European ('Aryan') traditions in opposition to Semitic religions. He was "deeply saddened by the fact that these classifications later came to be expressed in racist terms," as this was far from his intention.[28] For Müller the discovery of common Indian and European ancestry was a powerful argument against racism, arguing that "an ethnologist who speaks of Aryan race, Aryan blood, Aryan eyes and hair, is as great a sinner as a linguist who speaks of a dolichocephalic dictionary or a brachycephalic grammar" and that "the blackest Hindus represent an earlier stage of Aryan speech and thought than the fairest Scandinavians".[29] In his later work, Max Müller took great care to limit the use of the term "Aryan" to a strictly linguistic one.[30]

Indigenist arguments

According to Kak, racist and colonialist ideologies often played a role in the work of late 19th-century and 20th-century linguistics.[4] Kak repeatedly[4][5][6] quotes social anthropologist Edmund Leach, who argues against the 1960s version of the 'Aryan Invasion Theory'.[31] Leach implies that the 'Aryan Invasion Theory' is based on taking Rig Veda accounts as historical accounts, from which a portrait of the Aryans and their "invasion" is destilled.[32] According to Leach, the Rig Veda can't be used as such an historical account, "[n]or is there any independent archeological evidence for a massive intrusion of foreigners from the northwest."[33] Leach then asks "[w]hy do serious scholars persist in believing in the Aryan invasions?"[34] According to Leach, this is because the theory basically provides a "racist framework,"[35] stating that those "invaders" were light-skinnend, bringing a superior Brahmanical culture to the dark-skinned Dravidians.[35] According top Leach, this "myth of the Aryan invasions"[36] appealed to the British colonisers, because:

The origin myth of British colonial imperialism helped the elite administrators in the Indian Civil Service to see themselves as bringing "pure" civilization to a country in which civilization of the most sophisticated (but "morally corrupt") kind was already nearly 6,000 years old."[36]

Leach further states that this theory still appeals to linguists, because "no attention need to be paid to what was there before; the slate is wiped clean."[35] Leach further states that the details of the theory also fit with this "racist framework," since it implies that the IE-speakers "constitute an independent racial stock."[35]

Counter-arguments

Leach is well aware that his point of view is not accpeted by the scholarly mainstream:

Linguistic methodologies are not mentioned in Leach's article, despite the relevance of linguistics, which form the basis for the IAmt.

Genetics

Theoretical background

Genetical studies reveal that broadly two genetic groups can be discerned in India, namely north and south Indians.[38][web 2][note 4][39][note 5][web 3]

Indigenist arguments

Both components are older than 3,500 years ago, before the period of the Indo-Aryan migrations,[38][web 3] According to Gyaneshwer Chaubey, "No foreign genes or DNA has entered the Indian mainstream in the last 60,000 years,"[web 4] concluding that "the Aryan invasion theory is bunkum."[web 4] According to Dinesh S. Sharma, writing for India Today, the study by Metspalu et al. shows that the theory of an "Indo-Aryan invasion" is a "myth."[web 3] Sharma further comments that Max Muller

...had suggested that 3,500 years ago, a dramatic migration of Indo-European speakers from Central Asia played a key role in shaping contemporary South Asian populations and this was responsible for introduction of the Indo-European language family and the caste system in India.[web 3][note 6]

According to Singh, Chaubey, and Kumarasamy Thangaraj, their findings "disprove the caste theory prevailing in India."[web 4]

Counter-arguments

Research by Reich et al. indicates that there has been a low influx of female genetic material since 50,000 years ago, but a continued influx of male genetic material.[web 2][note 7]

According to Moorjani et al., the two groups mixed between 1,900 and 4,200 years ago (2200 BCE-100 CE), where-after "mixture even between closely related groups became rare because of a shift to endogamy."[39][note 8]

Reinterpreting archaeology

Theoretical background

The IAMt was primarily developed by linguists. It's difficult to match it with archaeological remains, since very few archaeological remains have been found. For this reason, several Indian archaeologists have rejected the IAMt.[40]

Indigenist's argument

Archaeologists like Jim G. Shaffer and B.B. Lal note the absence of archaeological remains of an Aryan "conquest", and the high degree of physical continuity between Harappan and Post-Harappan society.[web 5] According to them, the Vedic culture and language was not introduced by Aryan migrations, but originated in pre-Vedic India.[web 5]

According to Shaffer, archaeological evidence consistent with a mass population movement, or an invasion of South Asia in the pre- or proto- historic periods, has not been found. Instead, Shaffer proposes a series of cultural changes reflecting indigenous cultural developments from prehistoric to historic periods.[41][note 9] Shaffer contends:

There were no invasions from central or western South Asia. Rather there were several internal cultural adjustments reflecting altered ecological, social and economic conditions affecting northwestern and north-central South Asia.[43]

This argument is taken over by Elst, among others,[note 10] arguing that there is no archaeological evidence for an Aryan migration into India.[45] Elst refers to a paper by Jim Shaffer and Diane Lichtenstein,[note 11] who, according to Elst, argue that there is "absolutely no archaeological indication of an Aryan immigration into northwestern India during or after the decline of the Harappan city culture."[45]

The Indo-Aryan migrations are related to the use of horses, which was unknown to the Harappans,[46] while the Vedic texts often speak about horses.[47][46] Some "Indigenists" have argued that horses were already being used by the Harappans.[48] According to B. B. Lal, horse-remains have been found at various Harappan sites, as well as terracotta images.[48] Nevertheless, Elst is skeptical,[49] and Kenoyer notes that "one thing for certain is that there is no evidence for the use of the horse by the occupants of either the Harappan or the Late Harappan cities and towns."[50]

Lal notes that at Kalibangan (at the Ghaggar river) the remains of what some writers claim to be fire altars have been unearthed that are claimed to have been used for Vedic sacrifices, although the presence of animal bones does not seem consistent with Vedic rites. In addition the remains of a bathing place (suggestive of ceremonial bathing) have been found near the altars in Kalibangan.[51] S.R. Rao found similar "fire altars" in Lothal which he thinks could have served no other purpose than Vedic ritual.[52] The sites in Kalibangan are dated back to pre-Harappan times i.e. 3500 BC, well before any likely date for the Indo-Aryan migrations, so this may suggest that Vedic rites are indigenous to India and not brought in from outside.[53]

Lal also questions the connection between the BMAC and the Indo-Aryans.[54] According to Antony, this culture was begun by farmers in the Near Eastern Neolithic tradition, and infiltrated by Indo-Iranian speakers from the Andronovo culture in its late phase, creating a hybrid. Proto-Indo-Aryan developed within this composite culture, and moved there south into the Indian subcontinent.[55][56] The Indo-Iranians also borrowed their distinctive religious beliefs and practices from this culture.[56][57] Lal questions the idea that the Indo-Aryans were nomads, and notes that "the BMAC is a fully developed civilization with all the trappings of urbanism. How can then Thapar and Sharma devalue the Bactria-Margiana people and call them ‘pastoral cattle-breeders’?"[58]

Counter-arguments

Jim Shaffer has noted several problems with the arguments that the ancient Harappans were Aryans.[59] According to the Indo-Aryan Migration hypothesis, the so-called "migration" consisted of little groups of people, who did not displace the population, but brought with them a cultural system and a language which was taken over by local communities.[60] This is also clear from the archaeological evidence. Based on the examination of 300 skeletons from the Indus Valley Civilization, and comparison of those skeletons with modern-day Indians, Kenneth Kennedy concludes that the Harappan inhabitants of the Indus Valley Civilization are no different from the inhabitants of India in the following millennia.[61] Jonathan Mark Kenoyer notes:

Although the overall socioeconomic organization changed, continuities in technology, subsistence practices, settlement organization, and some regional symbols show that the indigenous population was not displaced by invading hordes of Indo-Aryan speaking people. For many years, the 'invasions' or 'migrations' of these Indo-Aryan-speaking Vedic/Aryan tribes explained the decline of the Indus civilization and the sudden rise of urbanization in the Ganga-Yamuna valley. This was based on simplistic models of culture change and an uncritical reading of Vedic texts.[62]

These "simplistic models" have been replaced with more sophisticated models. Bryant grants that

..there is at least a series of archaeological cultures that can be traced approaching the Indian subcontinent, even if discontinuous, which does not seem to be the case for any hypothetical east-to-west emigration.[63]

Nevertheless, opponents of the IAMt still believe that the IAMt posits an invasion by wilde hordes, who defeated a local population.[64]

Bryant notes that archaeological evidence of continuity need not be conclusive. A similar case has been Central Europe, where the archaeological evidence shows continuous linear development, with no marked external influences.[note 12] Archaeological continuity can be supported for every Indo-European-speaking region of Eurasia, not just India.[note 13]Bryant:

India is not the only Indo-European-speaking area that has not revealed any archaeological traces of immigration.[67]

Several historically documented migrations, such as those of the Helvetii to Switzerland, the Huns into Europe, or Gaelic-speakers into Scotland are not attested in the archaeological record.[68][69][70][note 14] As Cavalli-sforza sums up, "archaeology can verify the occurrence of migration only in exceptional cases".[71]

Witzel notes that "not one clear example of horse bones exists in the Indus excavations181 and elsewhere in North India before c. 1700 BCE."[47][note 15] Elst admits that no remains of horses have been found at Harappan sites, which makes it quite unlikely that these were Vedic.[48] Guha notes that Lal evidence regarding horses is established by "weeding out the nuances":

Lal's quotation of Ernest Mackay, regarding the terracotta horse from Mohenjo-daro, is one example (p. 69). By ignoring Mackay s subsequent sentence where he had clearly stated that "unfortunately both the tail and ears are missing so that the identification of this model as representing a horse is purely tentative" [...] Lal secures his evidence for the presence of the 'Harappan' horse at the site.[73]

Witzel describes Lal's findings of "fire altars", noting that they do not fit "any recorded Vedic ritual, neither that of the RV nor of the later (Śrauta) ritual."[74] According to Witel, Lal's description fits but that of a regular kitchen, concluding that "the Kalibangan hearths do not represent Vedic ritual as we know it from the large array of Vedic texts. They may be nothing more than a community kitchen."[74]

Dismissing linguistics

Theoretical background

Linguistic methodologies are scientifically sound methodologies. As Stephanie W. Jamison writes:

Both the demonstration of linguistic relationship and the reconstruction of the protolanguage rely on a very powerful and scientifically exact tool known as the Comparative Method, whose value has been demonstrated time and time again on language families around the globe. There is nothing eitehr vague or speculative in the application of these lingusitic methods.[web 6]

Jamison further notes that

...it has been generally accepted for nearly 200 years that all these [Indo-European] languages are genetically related (a linguistic, not a biological term, NB) and can be traced back to one original language, Proto-Indo-European, for which we have no attested remains but which can be reconstructed in remarkable detail.[web 6]

Indigenist arguments

Koenraad Elst notices that a common attitude among Indian scholars is to dismiss linguistics altogether, calling it a "pseudo-science."[49] He does not agree with this rejection, noting that

This rejection of linguistics by critics of the AIT creates the impression that their own pet theory is not resistant to the test of linguistics.[75]

According to Kak, the positing of PIE is not falsifiable:

There is no evidence that can prove or disprove an original language such as PIE. We cannot infer it with certainty since the historically attested relationship between different languages could have emerged from one of many competing models. The postulation of PIE together with a specific homeland in Europe or Turkey does violence to facts. There is no evidence that the natives of India for the past 8000 years or so have looked any different from what they look now. The internal evidence of this literature points to events that are as early as 7000 years ago and its geography is squarely in the Indian region.[10]

Reinterpreting linguistics

Centum–satem isogloss

Diachronic map showing the Satem areal in red. The central area of Satemization is shown in darker red, corresponding to the Sintashta/Abashevo/Srubna cultures.

Theoretical background

An isogloss, also called a heterogloss, is the geographic boundary of a certain linguistic feature, such as the pronunciation of a vowel, the meaning of a word, or use of some syntactic feature. Major dialects are typically demarcated by groups of isoglosses.

The centum–satem division is one of many isoglosses of the Indo-European language family, related to the different evolution of the three dorsal consonant rows of the mainstream reconstruction of Proto-Indo-European (PIE).[76] In satem languages, the velar stops (*k, *g, *gh) became palatalised, and in the centum languages they remained velar.

*kʷ, *gʷ, *gʷʰ (labiovelars) merged in satem languages
merged in centum languages *k, *g, *gʰ (plain velars)
*ḱ, *ǵ, *ǵʰ (palatovelars) assibilated in satem languages

Elst's argument

Elst argues that it is more likely that the Urheimat was in satem territory. He argues that:

This would satisfy the claim of the so-called Lateral Theory that the most conservative forms are to be found at the outskirts rather than in the metropolis.[11][web 7]

Counter-argument

According to Hock, the hypothesis of an Out-of-India migration is only "relatively easy to maintain" if evidence like linguistic isogloss patterns is ignored, and only the cladistic tree of the IE branches is accepted.[77]

Cladistics is an approach to biological classification in which organisms are grouped together based on whether or not they have one or more shared unique characteristics that come from the group's last common ancestor and are not present in more distant ancestors. Therefore, members of the same group are thought to share a common history and are considered to be more closely related.[78][79][80][81]

Dravidian substratum

Theoretical background

Dravidian and other South Asian languages share with Indo-Aryan a number of syntactical and morphological features that are alien to other Indo-European languages. Phonologically, there is the introduction of retroflexes, which alternate with dentals in Indo-Aryan; morphologically there are the gerunds; and syntactically there is the use of a quotative marker ("iti").[1][note 16]</ref>

Several linguists, all of whom accept the external origin of the Aryan languages on other grounds, are quite open to considering that various syntactical developments in Indo-Aryan could have been internal developments[note 17] rather than the result of substrate influences, or have been the result of adstratum.[note 18][87] About retroflexion Tikkanen states that

...in view of the strictly areal implications of retroflexion and the occurrence of retroflexes in many early loanwords, it is hardly likely that Indo-Aryan retroflexion arose in a region that did not have a substratum with retroflexes.[88]

Elst's argument

According to Elst, any Dravidian in Sanskrit can still be explained via the OIT.[11] He suggests, through David McAlpin's Proto-Elamo-Dravidian theory,[note 19] that the ancient homeland for Proto-Elamo-Dravidian was in the Mesopotamia region, from where the languages spread across the coast towards Sindh and eventually to South India where they still remain. According to Elst, this theory would support the idea that Early Harappan culture was possibly bi- or multi-lingual.[11]

According to Elst, the presence of the Brahui language, and similarities between Elamite and Harappan script as well as similarities between Indo-Aryan and Dravidian, indicate that these languages may have interacted prior to the spread of Indo-Aryans southwards, and the resultant intermixing of races and languages.[11]

Elst believes that there is evidence suggesting that Dravidian influences in Maharashtra and Gujarat were largely lost over the years. He traces this to linguistic evidence. Some occurrences in Sangam Tamil, or ancient forms of Tamil, indicate small similarities with Sanskrit or Prakrit. As the oldest recognisable forms of Tamil have influences of Indo-Aryan, it is possible that they had Sanskrit influence as a result of a migration through the coastal regions of western India.[11][note 20]

Counter-arguments

According to Bryant, evidence of a pre-Indo-European linguistic substratum in South Asia is a solid reason to exclude India as a potential Indo-European homeland.[89]

The Indic languages show the influence of the Dravidian and Munda language families. No other branch of Indo-European does. If the Indo-European homeland had been located in India, then the Indo-European languages should have shown some influence from Dravidian and Munda.[90][91][note 21]

Writing specifically about language contact phenomena, Thomason and Kaufman state that there is strong evidence that Dravidian influenced Indic through "shift", that is, native Dravidian speakers learning and adopting Indic languages. Even though the innovative traits in Indic could be explained by multiple internal explanations, early Dravidian influence is the only explanation that can account for all of the innovations at once – it becomes a question of explanatory parsimony; moreover, early Dravidian influence accounts for several of the innovative traits in Indic better than any internal explanation that has been proposed.[92]

Erdosy states that the most plausible explanation for the presence of Dravidian structural features in Old Indo-Aryan is that the majority of early Old Indo-Aryan speakers had a Dravidian mother tongue which they gradually abandoned.[93]

Elfenbein argues that the presence of Brahui in Baluchistan is explained by a late immigration that took place within the last thousand years.[94]

Linguistic stability

Kazanas' argument

Kazanas argues that linguistic stability corresponds to geographic stability, arguing that if

...the Indo-Aryans were on the move over many thousands of miles (from the Russian steppe, Europe and/or Anatolia) over a very long period of centuries encountering many different other cultures [their] language should have suffered faster and greater changes.[95]

Counter-arguments

Bryant points out that this reasoning can be countered by arguing that Vedic retained the Indo-European accent because, as a sacerdotal language, it artificially preserved forms that would otherwise have evolved in a normal spoken language. Vedic Sanskrit is, like other sacred languages, an extinct language, having evolved into Classical Sanskrit by the 6th century BC, reaching stability long after northern India had been settled by Indo-Aryans.[96]

By contrast, Lithuanian is a living, vernacular language that has preserved Indo-European archaisms to the present day, thousands of years longer than Vedic did.[97][note 22]

Urheimat and linguistic centre of gravity

Theoretical background

The linguistic centre of gravity principle states that a language family's most likely point of origin is in the area of its greatest diversity. The ethnologist and philologist Robert Gordon Latham was the first to state that, according to the principles of natural science, a language family's most likely point of origin is in the area of its greatest diversity which, in the case of Indo-European, is roughly in Central-eastern Europe, where the Italic, Venetic, Illyrian, Germanic, Baltic, Slavic, Thracian, and Greek branches of the Indo-European language family are attested, as opposed to South Asia, where only the Indo-Aryan branch is.[98]

Only one branch of Indo-European, Indo-Aryan, is found in India, whereas the Italic, Venetic, Illyrian, Germanic, Baltic, Slavic, Thracian, and Greek branches of Indo-European are all found in Central-eastern Europe. Because it requires a greater number of long migrations, an Indian Urheimat is far less likely than one closer to the centre of Indo-European linguistic diversity.[98][99][100] However, the existence of the Tocharian language family in Western China would shift the centre of gravity eastward. Some scholars argue that the various language families in Central and eastern Europe evolved fairly recently, which implies that there was less diversity in the western side of the Indo-European language family during the 2nd millennium BC at a time contemporaneous with Vedic Sanskrit.[101]

Kalla's argument

Lachhmi Dhar Kalla responded by arguing that the greater linguistic diversity of Indo-European in Europe is the result of absorbing foreign linguistic elements, and that a language family's point of origin should be sought in the area of least linguistic change, since it has been least affected by substrate interference. Dhar's line of argument has a history in Western debates on the Indo-European homeland[note 23] where it has been used to locate the Indo-European homeland near the area where the Lithuanian and Anatolian branches of Indo-European are attested.

Kazanas' argument

Talageri[103] and Kazanas[104] have adapted the language dispersal model proposed by Johanna Nichols[note 24] to support OIT, by moving Nichols' proposed Indo-European point of origin from Bactria-Sogdiana to India.[105][note 25]

Counter-arguments

These ideas have not been accepted in mainstream linguistics.[106]

Memories of an Urheimat

Theoretical background

The Vedas[107] do not mention the Aryans' presence in India as being the result of a migration or mention any possible Urheimat. This has been taken as an argument in favour of the OIT. The reasoning is that it is not uncommon for migrational accounts to be found in early mythological and religious texts, a classical example being the Book of Exodus in the Torah, describing the legendary migration of the Israelites from Egypt to Canaan.

Elst's argument

Koenraad Elst argues that it would have been expected that migrations, and possibly an Urheimat, would be mentioned in the Rigveda if the Aryans had only arrived in India some centuries before the composition of the earliest Rigvedic hymns. They argue that other migration stories of other Indo-European people have been documented historically or archaeologically, and that the same would be expected if the Indo-Aryans had migrated into India.[108][109]

Counter-arguments

From the mainstream academic viewpoint, the concern is the degree of historical accuracy that can be expected from the Rigveda, which is a collection of hymns, not an account of tribal history, and those hymns that are assumed to reach back to within a few centuries of the period of Indo-Aryan arrival in Gandhara make for just a small portion of the text.[110]

Preservation of names

Theoretical background

Indo-Aryan languages are the oldest source of place and river names in northern India – which Shrikant G. Talageri sees as an argument in favour of seeing Indo-Aryan as the oldest documented population of that area.[111]

According to Witzel, river names are conservative, and "in northern India, rivers in general have early Sanskrit names from the Vedic period, and names derived from the daughter languages of Sanskrit later on."[112] Talageri cites this in support of the Out of India theory,[111] though Witzel himself would dispute jumping to that conclusion.[112] Rather, he points out that non-Sanskritic names are common in the "Sarasvati" (Ghaggar) area.

Kazanas' argument

Kazanas argues that this indicates that the Harappan civilisation must have been dominated by Indo-Aryan speakers, supposing that the arrival of Indo-Aryan migrants in Late Harappan times to the remnants of an Indus Valley Civilization formerly stretching over a vast area could not have resulted in the suppression of the entire native hydronymy.[113]

Counter-arguments

However, Witzel argues exactly that: "The failure to preserve old hydronyms even in the Indus Valley (with a few exceptions, noted above) indicates the extent of the social and political collapse experienced by the local population."[112]

Paralleling Witzel, Villar characterises place names as the deepest ethnic and linguistic layer, and states that the first network of river and place names in Spain was created by very ancient Indo-European populations, and was dense enough to resist successive language changes.[114] According to Villar, even in those areas which are historically Basque (i.e. non-Indo-European), the ancient names of places and people have a prevailing Indo-European character, with very few names of non-Indo-European Basque etymology documented in ancient sources.[114] Aleini cites this in support of the Paleolithic Continuity Theory.[115]

Restricted geographical background

Theoretical background

The oldest text, the Rigveda, has many precise references to places and natural phenomena in the areas of Punjab and Haryana, and thus was unmistakably recorded in that part of India.[116] The date at which it was composed is a firm terminus ante quem for the presence of the Vedic Aryans in India. In the academic mainstream view it was composed in the mid- to late-2nd millennium BC (Late Harappan)[117] while OIT proponents propose a pre-Harappan date.

Some items typical of later Sanskrit literature are absent from the Rigveda. This is usually taken as strong evidence that the Rigvedic hymns have a geographical background restricted to the extreme northwest of the Indian subcontinent, corresponding to the route of immigration.[note 26]

The afore-mentioned features are found in post Rigvedic texts: the Samhitas, the Brahmanas and fully in the Sutra literature. For instance, brick altars are mentioned in Satapatha Brahmanaṇa 7.1.1.37, or 10.2.3.1 etc. Rice (vrihí) is found in AV 6.140.2; 7.1.20; etc. Cotton (karpasa) appears first in Gautama's (1.18) and in Bandhāyana's (14.13.10) Dharmasūtra. According to Bridget Allchin and F. Raymond Allchin, as quoted by Kazanas, these features are of the kind "described in detail in the later Vedic literature."[128][web 8]

OIT-arguments

OIT proponents have taken the same evidence as indicating an extremely early date for the Rigveda, predating the Harappan civilisation. Based on this set of statements, OIT proponents argue that the whole of the Rigveda, except for some few passages which may be of later date, must have been composed prior to the Indus Valley Civilization.[95][108]

Rigveda and early Aryan experience

Leach questions the linguistic premise that the Rigveda transcribes early Aryan experience:[129]

As part and parcel of the dogma that the Rig Veda was introduced into India by the Aryan invaders, we have further dogma that the life-style of the divine beings of Rig Veda was the life-style of the Aryan invaders themselves. In particular, the war chariots of Indra and his associates show that the Aryan invaders were lavishly equipped with war chariots, while the complex rituals of the Vedic horse sacrifice stem from the fact that the horse was "the supreme symbol of the victorious Indo-Europeans... whose domestication enabled the Indo-Aryans to conquer the Indo-European world" (O' Falherty 1981:85). This too is a fantasy, though it has been around a long time.[33]

Elite influence on cultural and language change

Theoretical background

See also: Language shift

The change of language is a concern for various academical disciplines. Prevailing models point to the influence of elite groups, and bilingualism in the contact between groups with different languages.[64][130]

Kazanas' arguments

Regarding migration of Indo-Aryans and imposing language on Harappans, Kazanas argues,

The intruders would have been able to rename the rivers only if they were conquerors with the power to impose this. And, of course, the same is true of their Vedic language: since no people would bother of their own free will to learn a difficult, inflected foreign language, unless they had much to gain by this, and since the Aryan immigrants had adopted the "material culture and lifestyle" of the Harappans[131] and consequently had little or nothing to offer to the natives, the latter would have adopted the new language only under pressure. Thus here again we discover that the substratum thinking is invasion and conquest [...] But invasion is the substratum of all such theories even if words like ‘migration’ are used. There could not have been an Aryan immigration because (apart from the fact that there is no archaeological evidence for this) the results would have been quite different. Immigrants do not impose their own demands or desires on the natives of the new country: they are grateful for being accepted, for having the use of lands and rivers for farming or pasturing and for any help they receive from the natives; in time it is they who adopt the language (and perhaps the religion) of the natives. You cannot have a migration with the results of an invasion."[132]

Counter-arguments

In contrast, Witzel notes that small groups can change a larger cultural area.[130][133] Michael Witzel refers to Ehret's model[note 27] "which stresses the osmosis, or a "billiard ball," or Mallory's Kulturkugel effect of cultural transmission."[130] According to Ehret, ethnicity and language can shift relatively easy in small societies, due to the cultural, economic and military choices made by the local population in question. The group bringing new traits may initially be small, contributing features that can be fewer in number than those of the already local culture. The emerging combined group may then initiate a recurrent, expansionist process of ethnic and language shift.[130]

David Anthony notes that the spread of the Indo-European languages probably did not happen through "chain-type folk migrations," but by the introduction of these languages by ritual and political elites, which are emulated by large groups of people.[134][note 28] Anthony gives the example of the Luo-speaking Acholi in northern Uganda in the 17th and 18th century, whose language spread rapidly in the 19th century.[135] Anthony notes that "Indo-European languages probably spread in a similar way among the tribal societies of prehistoric Europe," carried forward by "Indo-European chiefs" and their "ideology of political clientage."[136] Anthony notes that "elite recruitment" may be a suitable term for this system.[136][note 29]

Re-dating the Indian chronology

The determination of the age in which the Vedic literature started and flourished has its consequences for the Indo-Aryan question. According to "Indigenists", Indian civilisation shows a continues development from about 5000 BC till 1000 BC.[138] OIT proponents claim that the bulk of the Rigveda was composed prior to the Indus Valley Civilization by linking archaeological evidence with data from Vedic texts and archaeo-astronomical evidence. [139]

Redating the Vedas and Epics

Conventional dating of the Rg Veda

Main article: Rigveda

The Rigveda's core is accepted to date to the late Bronze Age, making it one of the few examples with an unbroken tradition. Its composition is usually dated to roughly between c.1500-1200 BC.[140][141][142][note 30] Philological estimates tend to date the bulk of the text to the second half of the second millennium.[note 31] Being composed in an early Indo-Aryan language, the hymns must post-date the Indo-Iranian separation, dated to roughly 2000 BC.[144] A reasonable date close to that of the composition of the core of the Rigveda is that of the Indo-Aryan Mitanni documents of c. 1400 BC.[145] Other evidence also points to a composition close to 1400 BC.[146][147]

After their composition, the texts were preserved and codified by an extensive body of Vedic priesthood as the central philosophy of the Iron Age Vedic civilisation. The Brahma Purana and the Vayu Purana name one Vidagdha as the author of the Padapatha.[148] The Rk-pratishakhya names Sthavira Shakalya of the Aitareya Aranyaka as its author.[149]

Re-dating the Rg Veda to the 4th millennium BC

Kazanas in the paper "A new date for Rigveda" concludes:

The date 3100 BCE is the one given by the native tradition of India for the compilation of the RV. The tradition seems to be correct.I have also adduced Seidenberg’s independent evidence suggesting that the Mathematics contained in the Sulba suutras was known in the latter half of the 3rd millennium.[150]

Kak gives a date of the 4th/3rd millennia BC to Vedic Sanskrit:

The Indian evidence, based on archaeology as well as the discovery of an astronomy in the Vedas, indicates that Vedic Sanskrit is to be assigned to the 4th and the 3rd millennia BCE, if not earlier. The Indian cultural area is seen as an integral whole.[10]

Redating the epics

Kak Redates the Mahabharata:

The Mahabharata war was the epochal event of ancient India. Later astronomers assigned it to 3137 BCE or 2449 BCE. Still another tradition assigns it to 1924 BCE. The main actors in this war belong to generation number 94 in a list that is supposed to begin in 6676 BCE. There is considerable evidence that the genealogies represent a very ancient tradition.[10]

Elst notes that

In August 1995, a gathering of 43 historians and archaeologists from South-Indian universities (at the initiative of Prof. K.M. Rao, Dr. N. Mahalingam and Dr. S.D. Kulkarni) passed a resolution fixing the date of the Bharata war at 3139-38 BC and declaring this date to be the true sheet anchor of Indian chronology.[web 9]

New chronology

Kak gives the following chronology of the Vedic and Puranic texts:[10]

The Vedic Foundation gives a chronology of ancient India (Bharata),[web 10] which starts in 3228 BCE with the descension of Bhagwan Krishna. The Mahabharata War is dated at 3139 BCE, while various dynasties are dated more than a millennium earlier,[note 33] Gautama Buddha is dated at 1894-1814 BCE,[note 34] and Jagadguru Shankaracharya at 509-477 BCE.[note 35] These ideas provide a continues chronology of India, in contrast to the discontinuity between the Harappan end Vedic period:[152]

[T]he Indian civilization must be viewed as an unbroken tradition that goes back to the earliest period of the Sindhu-Sarasvati (or Indus) tradition (7000 or 8000 BC).[15][note 36]

Counter-arguments

To postulate the migration of PIE speakers out of India necessitates an earlier dating of the Rigveda than is normally accepted by Vedic scholars to make a deep enough period of migration to allow for the longest migrations to be completed.[153]

There is large time gap between the comparative materials, which can be seen as a serious methodological drawback.[154][note 37]

Redating the Vedic people

Kazanas argues that the Rigveda pre-dates the "Sarasvati Sindhu culture":[web 12]

Brāhmaṇa explications of rigvedic brief allusions and the teachers lists in the Bṛhadāraṇyaka Upaniṣad suggest the passing of very many centuries from the composition of the RV hymns. These postrigvedic texts can be assigned to the end of the 4th millennium on astronomical considerations and the beginning of the 3rd. Finally, the palaeoastronomical examination of star and planet allusions in the Mahābhārata suggest dates c 3000 or little after. All such considerations suggest a RV of many centuries earlier. Thus, since the SSC (=Sarasvati-Sindhu Culture) arises c3000 and the RV knows nothing of its important features, then its composition must be placed several centuries earlier. Since the river Sarasvatī was flowing to the ocean only before 3200, and the RV knows it as such, then its bulk must be assigned at c3800-3500.[155]

In one publication, Kak argues that the Vedic people have been in India since at least 5000 BC:

The chronological framework presented by the parallels between the Zoroastrian and the Vedic systems is in consonance with the idea that the Vedic people have been in India since at least 5000 BC, as confirmed by the astronomical references in the Vedic texts and the absence of archaeological evidence regarding influx of people into India after that time. The Pur¯an. as speak of the Vedic people in Jambudvıpa and beyond the Himalayas in the north in Uttara-Kuru. It appears that subsequent to the collapse of the Sarasvati-river based economy around 1900 BC, groups of Indians moved West and that might have been responsible for the Aryanization of Iran if it wasn’t Aryanized earlier. This movement seems to be correlated with the presence of the Indic Kassites and the Mitannis in West Asia.[156][note 38]

Sarasvati River

Main article: Sarasvati river

The Sarasvati River (Sanskrit: सरस्वती नदी sárasvatī nadī) is one of the main Rigvedic rivers mentioned in the Rig Veda and later Vedic and post-Vedic texts.

The Saraswati river was revered and considered important for orthodox Hindus because it is believed that it was on its banks in the Vedic state of Brahmavarta, that Vedic Sanskriti saw the light, and important Vedic scriptures like Manusmriti, initial part of Rigveda and several Upanishads were composed by Vedic seers after the great floods, some 10,000 years ago.[157][158]

Mentioning in the Rg Veda and post-Vedic literature

Many hymns in all ten Books of the Rigveda (except the 4th) extol or mention a divine and very large river named the Sarasvati,[159] which flows mightily "from the mountains to the [Indian] Ocean".[95][160][161] Talageri states that "the references to the Sarasvati far outnumber the references to the Indus" and "The Sarasvati is so important in the whole of the Rigveda that it is worshipped as one of the Three Great Goddesses".[162][163] The Nadistuti hymn in the Rigveda (10.75) mentions the Sarasvati between the Yamuna in the east and the Sutlej in the west,[note 39] and later Vedic texts like Tandya and Jaiminiya Brahmanas as well as the Mahabharata mention that the Sarasvati dried up in a desert.

In post-Rigvedic literature, the disappearance of the Sarasvati is mentioned. Also the origin of the Sarasvati is identified as Plaksa Prasravana.[165][166] The first reference to the disappearance of the lower course of the Sarasvati is from the Brahmanas, texts that are composed in Vedic Sanskrit, but dating to a later date than the Veda Samhitas. The Jaiminiya Brahmana (2.297) speaks of the 'diving under (upamajjana) of the Sarasvati', and the Tandya Brahmana (or Pancavimsa Br.) calls this the 'disappearance' (vinasana). The same text (25.10.11-16) records that the Sarasvati is 'so to say meandering' (kubjimati) as it could not sustain heaven which it had propped up.[167][note 40]

Identifying the Sarasvati River

Vedic rivers
Main article: Ghaggar-Hakra River

The dating of the full-flowing Ghaggar/Hakra, corresponding to its description in the Rigveda, is seen as a powerful archaeological evidence for the dating of the Rigveda.[168] Attempts have been made to identify the mythical Sarasvati of the Vedas with concrete rivers.[169] Many think that the Vedic Sarasvati river once flowed east of the Indus (Sindhu) river.[170] Scientists, geologists as well as scholars have identified the Sarasvati with many present-day or now defunct rivers.

Two theories are popular in the attempts to identify the Sarasvati. Several scholars have identified the river with the present-day Ghaggar-Hakra River or dried up part of it, which is located in Northwestern India and Pakistan.[171][172][173][174] A second popular theory associates the river with the Helmand river or an ancient river in the present Helmand Valley in Afghanistan.[175][176] Others consider Sarasvati a mythical river.

The identification of the Vedic Sarasvati River with the Ghaggar-Hakra River was proposed by some scholars in the 19th and early 20th century, including Christian Lassen,[177] Max Müller,[178] Marc Aurel Stein, C.F. Oldham[179] and Jane Macintosh.[180] Danino notes that "the 1500 km-long bed of the Sarasvati" was "rediscovered" in the 19th century.[181] According to Danino, "most Indologists" were convinced in the 19th century that "the bed of the Ghaggar-Hakra was the relic of the Sarasvati."[181]

The major sites of the Indus Valley Civilization imposed over modern borders

The Ghaggar-Hakra fluvial system played a major role in the late Indus Valley Civilisation, also called Harappan Civilisation. The Indus Valley Civilization (IVC) was a Bronze Age civilisation (3300–1300 BC; mature period 2600–1900 BC) extending from what today is northeast Afghanistan to Pakistan and northwest India.[182] The Indus Valley Civilisation (Harappan Civilisation), which is named after the Indus, was largely located on the banks of and in the proximity of the Ghaggar-Hakra fluvial system.[183]

Drying-up of the Ghaggar-Hakra

Giosan et al., in their study Fluvial landscapes of the Harappan civilisation,[169] make clear that the Ghaggar-Hakra fluvial system was not a large glacier-fed Himalayan river, but a monsoonal-fed river.[184]<sup class="reference plainlinks nourlexpansion" id="ref_Giosan et al.:

P. H. Francfort, utilising images from the French satellite SPOT, finds that the large river Ghaggar-Hakra is pre-Harappan altogether and started drying up in the middle of the 4th millennium BC; during Harappan times only a complex irrigation-canal network was being used in the southern region of the Indus Valley. With this the date should be pushed back to c 3800 BC.[189] According to Francfort, those sites were not at all located at a riverside, but were outside of them, irrigated by small river channels.[190] Bryant notes:

Ironically, the findings of the French team have served to reinforce the "mythico-religious tradition of Vedic origins." Rajaram's reaction (1995) to the team's much earlier date assigned to the perennial river is that "this can only mean that the great Sarasvati that flowed 'from the mountain to the sea' must belong to a much earlier epoch, to a date well before 3000 BCE."[190]

Drying-up and dating of the Vedas

The Vedic and Puranic statements about the drying-up and diving-under of the Sarasvati have been used as a reference point for the dating of the Harappan civilisation and the Vedic culture.[191] Some see these texts as evidence for an earlier dating of the Rig Veda, identifying the Sarasvati with the Ghaggar-Hakra River, rejecting the Indo-Aryan migrations theory, which postulates a migration at 1500 BC.[note 42][note 43]

Danino places the composition of the Vedas in the third millennium BC, a century earlier than the conventional dates.[195] Danino notes that accepting the Rg Veda accounts as factual descriptions, and dating the drying up late in the third millennium, are incompatible.[195] According to Danino, this suggests that the Vedic people were present in northern India in the third millennium BC,[196] a conclusion which is drawn by some Indian archaeologists, but not by Western archaeologists.[195] Danino states that there is an absence of "any intrusive material culture in the Northwest during the second millennium BCE,"[195][note 44] a biological continuity in the skeletal remains,[195][note 43] and a cultural continuity. Danino then states that if the "testimony of the Sarasvati is added to this,"

[T]he simplest and most natural conclusion is that the Vedic culture was present in the region in the third millennium.[200]

The Indus Valley Civilisation is sometimes called the "Sarasvati culture", the "Sarasvati Civilization", the "Indus-Sarasvati Civilization" or the "Sindhu-Sarasvati Civilization", as it is theorised that the civilisation flourished on banks of the Sarasvati river, along with the Indus.[173][174][201] Subhash Kak equates the Harappan Civilisation, Vedic Culture and the Vedic-Puranic chronology, placing them all prior to 3,000 BC:

The Epic and Puranic evidence on the geographical situation supports the notion of the shifting of the centre of the Vedic world from the Sarasvati to the Ganga region in early second millennium BC[...] [T]he Rgveda is to be dated about 3000 BC and the Mahabharata War must have occurred about that time. The Mahabharata clearly belongs to a heroic age, prior to the rise of the complexity of urban life.[note 45]

Counter-arguments

Danino acknowledges that this asks for "studying its tentacular ramifications into linguistics, archaeoastronomy, anthropology and genetics, besides a few other fields".[200]

Annette Wilke notes that the "historical river" Sarasvati was a "topographically tangible mythogeme", which was already reduced to a "small, sorry tickle in the desert", by the time of composition of the Hindu epics. These post-Vedic texts regularly talk about drying up of the river, and start associating the goddess Sarasvati with language, rather than the river.[205]

Michael Witzel argues that the Vedic Sarasvati is not an earthly river, but the Milky Way that is seen as a road to immortality and heavenly after-life.[206][207][208] The description of the Sarasvati as the river of heavens, is interpreted to suggest its mythical nature.[172] Michael Witzel also notes that the Rg Veda indicates that the Sarasvati "had already lost its main source of water supply and must have ended in a terminal lake (samudra)."[209] Witzel further notes that

If the RV is to be located in the Panjab, and supposedly to be dated well before the supposed 1900 BCE drying up of the Sarasvatī, at 4-5000 BCE (Kak 1994, Misra 1992), the text should not contain evidence of the domesticated horse (not found in the subcontinent before c. 1700 BCE, see Meadow 1997, 1998, Anreiter 1998: 675 sqq.), of the horse drawn chariot (developed only about 2000 BCE in S. Russia, Anthony and Vinogradov 1995, or Mesopotamia), of well developed copper/bronze technology, etc. If the Bråhmanas are supposedly to be dated about 1900 BCE (Kak 1994), they should not contain evidence of the use of iron which makes it appearance in India only at the end of the millennium, about 1200 BCE at the earliest (Chakrabarti 1979, 1992, see now Possehl-Gullapalli 1999 for a much later date of c. 1000/900 BCE).[210]

Romila Thapar terms the identification "controversial" and dismisses it, noticing that the descriptions of Sarasvati flowing through the "high mountains" does not tally with Ghaggar's course and suggests that Sarasvati is Haraxvati of Afghanistan.[211] Wilke suggests that the identification is problematic since the Ghaggar-Hakra river was already dried up at the time of the composition of the Vedas,[212] let alone the migration of the Vedic people into northern India.[209][213]

Ashoke Mukherjee (2001) is critical of the attempts to identify the Rigvedic Sarasvati. Mukherjee notes that many historians and archaeologists, both Indian and foreign, concluded that the word "Sarasvati" (literally "being full of water") is not actually a noun, a specific "thing". However, Mukherjee believes that "Sarasvati" is initially used by the Rig Vedic tribes as an adjective to the Indus as a large river and later evolved into a "noun". Mukherjee also suggests that in the post-Vedic and Puranic tradition the "disappearance" of Sarasvati, which to refers to "[going] under [the] ground in the sands", was created as a complementary myth to explain the visible non-existence of the river. Suggesting a political angle, he accuses "the BJP-led Governments at the centre and in some states to boost up Hindu religious sentiments and prejudices over some of the sensitive areas of Indian history."[214]

Ashoke Mukherjee also notes that the attempts to push back the dating of the Vedic peoples are unrealistic and not in line with the accepted data of the entry of the Vedic people into northern India, namely no earlier than 1500 BC.[213] Mukherjee concludes that the Vedic poets had not seen the palaeo-Sarasvati, and that what they described in the Vedic verses refers to something else.[215] Mukherjee further notices that

The entire fanfare created around its existence, disappearance and recent discovery is geared to the ongoing attempts of the BJP-led Governments at the centre and in some States to boost up Hindu religious sentiments and prejudices over some of the sensitive areas of Indian history."[216]

Criticism

Michael Witzel has severely criticised the "Indigenous Aryans" position:

The 'revisionist project' certainly is not guided by the principles of critical theory but takes, time and again, recourse to pre-enlightenment beliefs in the authority of traditional religious texts such as the Purånas. In the end, it belongs, as has been pointed out earlier, to a different 'discourse' than that of historical and critical scholarship. In other words, it continues the writing of religious literature, under a contemporary, outwardly 'scientific' guise [...] The revisionist and autochthonous project, then, should not be regarded as scholarly in the usual post-enlightenment sense of the word, but as an apologetic, ultimately religious undertaking aiming at proving the 'truth' of traditional texts and beliefs. Worse, it is, in many cases, not even scholastic scholarship at all but a political undertaking aiming at 'rewriting' history out of national pride or for the purpose of 'nation building'.[217]

In her review of Bryant's "The Indo-Aryan Controversy", which includes chapters by Elst and other "indigenists", Stephanie Jamison comments:

...the parallels between the Intelligent Design issue and the Indo-Aryan "controversy" are distressingly close. The Indo-Aryan controversy is a manufactured one with a non-scholarly agenda, and the tactics of its manufacturers are very close to those of the ID proponents mentioned above. However unwittingly and however high their aims, the two editors have sought to put a gloss of intellectual legitimacy, with a sense that real scientific questions are being debated, on what is essentially a religio-nationalistic attack on a scholarly consensus.[218]

Sudeshna Guha, in her review of The Indo-Aryan Controversy, notes that the book has serious methodological shortcomings, by not asking the question what exactly constitutes historical evidence.[219] This makes the "fair and adequate representation of the differences of opinion" problematic, since it neglects "the extent to which unscholarly opportunism has motivated the rebirth of this genre of 'scholarship'.[219] Guha:

Bryant's call for accepting "the valid problems that are pointed out on both sides" (p. 500), holds intellectual value only if distinctions are strictly maintained between research that promotes scholarship, and that which does not. Bryant and Patton gloss over the relevance of such distinctions for sustaining the academic nature of the Indo-Aryan debate, although the importance of distinguishing the scholarly from the unscholarly is rather well enunciated through the essays of Michael Witzel and Lars Martin Fosse.[219]

According to Bryant,[220] OIT proponents tend to be linguistic dilettantes who either ignore the linguistic evidence completely, dismiss it as highly speculative and inconclusive,[note 46] or attempt to tackle it with hopelessly inadequate qualifications; this attitude and neglect significantly minimises the value of most OIT publications.[222][223]

Fosse notes crucial theoretical and methodological shortcomings in the indigenist literature.[224] Analysing the works of Sethna, Bhagwan Singh, Navaratna and Talageri, he notes that they mostly quote English literature, which is not fully explored, and omitting German and French Indology. It makes their works in various degrees underinformed, resulting in a critique that is "largely neglected by Western scholars because it is regarded as incompetent."[225]

See also

Notes

  1. 1 2 The term "invasion" is only being used nowadays by opponents of the Indo-Aryan Migration theory.[3] The term "invasion" does not reflect the contemporary scholarly understanding of the Indo-Aryan migrations;[3] and is merely being used in a polemical and distracting way.
  2. ↑ Koenraad Elst: "The theory of which we are about to discuss the linguistic evidence, is widely known as the "Aryan invasion theory" (AIT). I will retain this term even though some scholars object to it, preferring the term "immigration" to "invasion." They argue that the latter term represents a long-abandoned theory of Aryan warrior bands attacking and subjugating the peaceful Indus civilization. This dramatic scenario, popularized by Sir Mortimer Wheeler, had white marauders from the northwest enslave the black aboriginals, so that "Indra stands accused" of destroying the Harappan civilization. Only the extremist fringe of the Indian Dalit (ex-Untouchable) movement and its Afrocentric allies in the USA now insist on this black-and-white narrative (vide Rajshekar 1987; Biswas 1995). But, for this once, I believe the extremists have a point. North India’s linguistic landscape leaves open only two possible explanations: either Indo-Aryan was native, or it was imported in an invasion. In fact, scratch any of these emphatic "immigration" theorists and you’ll find an old-school invasionist, for they never fail to connect Aryan immigration with horses and spoked-wheel chariots, that is, with factors of military superiority.[22]
  3. 1 2 NB: the paper is self-published. The accompanying map does not represent the IAMT, which has the development of the Indo-Iranians go through an eastward movement, via the Sintashta culture (2100–1800 BC), from which developed the Andronovo culture (1800–1400 BC). This culture interacted with the BMAC (2300–1700 BC) in present-day northern Afghanistan; out of this interaction developed the Indo-Iranians, which split around 1800 BC into the Indo-Aryans and the Iranians.[24]
  4. ↑ Reich et al.: "We analyze 25 diverse groups to provide strong evidence for two ancient populations, genetically divergent, that are ancestral to most Indians today. One, the “Ancestral North Indians” (ANI), is genetically close to Middle Easterners, Central Asians, and Europeans, while the other, the “Ancestral South Indians” (ASI), is as distinct from ANI and East Asians as they are from each other."[web 2]
  5. ↑ Moorjani et al. (2013): "Most Indian groups descend from a mixture of two genetically divergent populations: Ancestral North Indians (ANI) related to Central Asians, Middle Easterners, Caucasians, and Europeans; and Ancestral South Indians (ASI) not closely related to groups outside the subcontinent."[39]
  6. ↑ Max Muller himself suggested a less dramatic scenario: "why should not one shepherd, with his servants and flocks, have transferred his peculiar dialect from one part of Asia or Europe to another? This may seem a very humble and modest view of what was formerly represented as the irresistible stream of mighty waves rolling forth from the Aryan centre and gradually overflowing the mountains and valleys of Asia and Europe, but it is, at all events, a possible view; nay, I should say a view far more in keeping with what we know of recent colonisation." Max Muller (1988), Biographies of words and the home of the Aryas, Longmans, p.91
  7. ↑ Reich et al.:[web 2]
    • "Many Indian and European groups speak Indo-European languages, while the Adygei speak a Northwest Caucasian language. It is tempting to hypothesize that the population ancestral to ANI and CEU spoke "Proto-Indo-European", which has been reconstructed as ancestral to both Sanskrit and European languages38, although we cannot be certain without a date for ANI-ASI mixture."
    • "The stronger gradient in males, replicating previous reports, could reflect either male gene flow from groups with more ANI relatedness into ones with less, or female gene flow in the reverse direction. However, extensive female gene flow in India would be expected to homogenize ANI ancestry on the autosomes just as in mtDNA, which we do not observe. Supporting the view of little female ANI ancestry in India, Kivisild et al.44 reported that mtDNA ‘haplogroup U’ splits into two deep clades. ‘U2i’ accounts for 77% of copies in India but ~0% in Europe, and ‘U2e’ accounts for 0% of all copies in India but ~10% in Europe. The split is ~50,000 years old, indicating low female gene flow between Europe and India since that time."
  8. ↑ Moorjani et al. (2010): "We report genome-wide data from 73 groups from the Indian subcontinent and analyze linkage disequilibrium to estimate ANI-ASI mixture dates ranging from about 1,900 to 4,200 years ago. In a subset of groups, 100% of the mixture is consistent with having occurred during this period. These results show that India experienced a demographic transformation several thousand years ago, from a region in which major population mixture was common to one in which mixture even between closely related groups became rare because of a shift to endogamy."[39]
  9. ↑ Shaffer: "Current archaeological data do not support the existence of an Indo-Aryan or European invasion into South Asia any time in the pre- or protohistoric periods. Instead, it is possible to document archaeologically a series of cultural changes reflecting indigenous cultural developments from prehistoric to historic periods". Shaffer[41] as cited in [42]
  10. ↑ Witzel: "The list of such internet and printed publications waxes greatly, by the month. There now exists a closely knit, self-adulatory group, members of which often write conjointly and/or copy from each other. Quite boringly, they also churn out long identical passages, in book after book, sometimes paragraph by paragraph, all copied in cottage industry fashion from earlier books and papers; the whole scene has become one virtually indistinguishable hotchpotch.[44]
  11. ↑ Shaffer, J. and D. Lichtenstein, 1999. "Migration, Philology and South Asian Archaeology." In: "Aryan and Non-Aryan in South Asia: Evidence, Interpretation and Ideology," edited by J. Bronkhorst and M. Deshpande. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
  12. ↑ Häusler, as cited in [65]
  13. ↑ Mallory, in [66]
  14. ↑ Sinor and Mallory as cited in [67]
  15. ↑ Witzel: "Some of the earliest uses of the domesticated horse had been reported from the Copper Age site of Dereivka on the Dnyepr River (for riding, c. 4200-3800 BCE, now withdrawn) and similarly, from the Copper Age site of Botai in N. Kazakhstan (c. 3300-2900 BCE.) Some of the first attested remnants of primitive spoke-wheeled chariots and horse burials occur at Sintashta on the Tobol-Ishim rivers, east of the Urals (2100-1800 BCE.) From there, a clear trail (Hiebert 1995, 192 sqq.) leads towards the subcontinent: from a somewhat unclear picture in the BMAC (Parpola 1988: 285, 288) to Pirak (horse figurines, c. 1700 BCE (Jarrige 1979), bones in Kachi from 1700 BCE, the Swat Valley at c.1400 BCE (painted sherds, horse burials, Stacul 1987).[72]
  16. ↑ Burrow compiled a list of approximately 500 foreign words in the Ṛgveda that he considered to be loans predominantly from Dravidian.[82] Kuiper identified 383 Ṛigvedic words as non-Indo-Aryan – roughly 4% of its liturgical vocabulary – borrowed from Old Dravidian, Old Munda, and several other languages.[83][84] Thieme has questioned Dravidian etymologies proposed for Vedic words, for most of which he gives Indo-Aryan or Sanskrit etymologies, and condemned what he characterises as a misplaced "zeal for hunting up Dravidian loans in Sanskrit".[82] Das contends that there is "not a single case in which a communis opinio has been found confirming the foreign origin of a Rigvedic (and probably Vedic in general) word".[82] Burrow in turn has criticised the "resort to tortuous reconstructions in order to find, by hook or by crook, Indo-European explanations for Sanskrit words".[82] Kuiper reasons that given the abundance of Indo-European comparative material—and the scarcity of Dravidian or Munda—the inability to clearly confirm whether the etymology of a Vedic word is Indo-European implies that it is not.[83] and [84] Witzel argues that the earliest level of the Rigveda shows signs of para-Munda influence and only later levels of Dravidian, suggesting, against the older widespread two-century-old belief, that the original inhabitants of Punjab were speakers of para-Munda rather than speakers of Dravidian, whom the Indo-Aryans encountered only in middle Rigvedic times.[83][lower-alpha 1]
  17. ↑ Hamp 1996 and Jamison 1989, as cited in [85]
  18. ↑ Hock 1975/1984/1996 and Tikkanen 1987, as cited in [86]
  19. ↑ D. McAlpin (1979), Linguistic Prehistory: The Dravidian Situation
  20. ↑ Influence of Sanskrit or Prakrit on Sangam Tamil can be seen in some particular terms. For example, AkAyam (meaning sky) is thought to be derived from AkAsha, while Ayutham (meaning weapon) is thought to be derived from Ayudha.[11]
  21. ↑ See:
    • Parpola: ...numerous loanwords and even structural borrowings from Dravidian have been identified in Sanskrit texts composed in northwestern India at the end of the second and first half of the first millennium BC, before any intensive contact between North and South India. External evidence thus suggests that the Harappans most probably spoke a Dravidian language.[90]
    • Mallory: "The most obvious explanation of this situation is that the Dravidian languages once occupied nearly all of the Indian subcontinent and it is the intrusion of Indo-Aryans that engulfed them in north India leaving but a few isolated enclaves."[91]
  22. ↑ See:
    • Bryant: "Lithuanian, for example, preserves archaic Indo-European features to this very day."
    [97]
    • Meillet: "Le lituanien est remarquable par son aspect d'antiquité indo-européenne; il est frappant d'y trouve encore au XVIe siècle et jusqu'aujourd'hui des formes qui recouvrent exactement des formes védiques ou homériques et qui reproduisent presque parfaitement des formes indo-européennes supposées "Lithuanian is remarkable for its aspect of Indo-European antiquity; it is striking to still find in Lithuanian in the 16th century and until today forms which are exactly congruent with Vedic or Homeric forms and which reproduce almost perfectly supposed Indo-European forms."Meillet, A. (1908), Introduction à l'étude comparative des langues indo-européennes (in French) (2ème corrigé et augmentée ed.), Paris: Hachette, p. 46
  23. ↑ E.g. Feist 1932 and Pissani 1974 as cited in Bryant 2001 p.142-143.[102]
  24. ↑ Described in Blench & Springs 1997.[66]
  25. ↑ Lal: "The shift of the "original homeland" from Sogdiana to a few hundred miles to the south - i.e. to the region now comprising eastern Afghanistan, Pakistan and north-west India should not upset anyone, since the archaeological-cum-literary evidence from this area is more positive than that from Sogdiana."[105]
  26. ↑ Some examples are as follows:
    • The Rigveda does not mention silver, though it does mention ayas (metal or copper/bronze) and candra or hiran-ya (gold). Silver is denoted by rajatám híran-yam literally 'white gold' and appears in post-Rigvedic texts. There is a generally accepted demarcation line for the use of silver at around 4000 BC and this metal is archaeologically attested in the Harappan civilization[95][118][119][120]
    • The Rigveda makes no reference to the Harappan culture. The characteristic features of the Harappan culture are urban life, large buildings, permanently erected fire altars and bricks. There is no word for brick in the Rigveda and iswttakaa (brick) appears only in post-Rigvedic texts. (Kazanas 2000:13)[95] The Rigvedic altar is a shallow bed dug in the ground and covered with grass (e.g. RV 5.11.2, 7.43.2–3; Parpola 1988: 225). Fixed brick-altars are very common in post-Rigvedic texts.[web 8]
    • The Rigveda mentions no rice or cotton. A compound term is used which later referred to rice cakes used for sacrificial purposes, but the word vrīhí, meaning 'rice', does not occur. Rice was found in at least three Harappan sites: Rangpur (2000 BC – 1500 BC), Lothal (c. 2000 BC) and Mohenjodaro (c. 2500 BC) as Piggott,[121] Grist[122] and others testify.[123] Yet, despite the importance of rice in ritual in later times, the Rigveda makes no mention of it. The cultivation of cotton is well attested in the Harappan civilisation and is found at many sites thereafter.[95][108][124][125]
    • Nakshatra were developed in 2400 BC. They are important in a religious context, yet the Rigveda does not mention this, which suggests the Rigveda is before 2400 BC. The youngest book only mentions constellations,[126] a concept known to all cultures, without specifying them as lunar mansions.[127]
    • On the other hand, it has been claimed that the Rigveda has no term for "sword", while Bronze swords were used aplenty in the Bactrian culture and in Pirak. Ralph Griffith uses "sword" twelve times in his translation, including in the old books 5 and 7, but in most cases a literal translation would be more generic "sharp implement" (e.g. vāśī), the transition from "dagger" to "sword" in the Bronze Age being a gradual process.
  27. ↑ Michael Witzel: Ehret, Ch., 1988. "Language Change and the Material Correlates of Language and Ethnic Shift," Antiquity, 62: 564–74; derived from Africa, cf. Diakonoff 1985.[130]
  28. ↑ Compare the process of Sanskritization in India.
  29. ↑ Another example Anthony gives of how an open social system can encourage recruitment and language shift, are the Pathans in eastern Afghanistan. Traditionally status depended on agricultural surpluses and landownership. The neighbouring Baluch, outnumbered by the Pathans, were pastoral herders, and has hierarchical political system. Pathans who lost their land, could take refuge among the Baluch. As Anthony notes, "chronic tribal warfare might generally favour pastoralism over sedentary economics as herds can be defended by moving them, whereas agricultural fields are an immobile target."[137]
  30. ↑ Oberlies (1998:155) gives an estimate of 1100 BC for the youngest hymns in book 10. Estimates for a terminus post quem of the earliest hymns are far more uncertain. Oberlies (p. 158) based on 'cumulative evidence' sets wide range of 1700–1100. The Encyclopedia of Indo-European Culture (s.v. Indo-Iranian languages, p. 306) gives 1500–1000 BC.
  31. ↑ Compare Max Müller's statement "the hymns of the Rig-Veda are said to date from 1500 BC".[143]
  32. ↑ Conventionally dated 500 BC (earliest Upanishad) - 2nd century AD (latest classical Upanishads
  33. ↑ See:
    • 1641-1541 BC – Nandas, conventionally dated 345–321 BC;
    • 1541-1241 BC – Maurya dynasty, conventionally dated 322–185 BC;
    • 1541-1507 BC – Chandragupta Maurya, conventionally dated 340-298 BC;
    • 1507-1479 BC – Bindusara, conventionally dated c. 320 BC – 272 BC
  34. ↑ Conventionally dated sometime between the sixth and fourth centuries BC.[151]
  35. ↑ Conventionally dated AD 788–820
  36. ↑ See also [16][web 11]
  37. ↑ The syntax of the Rigveda is being compared with a reconstructed proto-Dravidian. The first completely intelligible, dateable, and sufficiently long and complete epigraphs that might be of some use in linguistic comparison are the Tamil inscriptions of the Pallava dynasty of about 550 c.e. (Zvelebil 1990), two entire millennia after the commonly accepted date for the Rigveda. Similarly there is much less material available for comparative Munda and the interval in their case at least is a staggering thirty-five hundred years.[154]
  38. ↑ See also:
  39. ↑ The Nadistuti hymn (RV 10.75) gives a list of names of rivers where Sarasvati is merely mentioned while Sindhu receives all the praise. This may well indicate that RV 10 could be dated to a period after the first drying up of Sarasvati when the river lost its preeminence.[95] It is agreed that the tenth book of the Rigveda is later than the others.[164]
  40. ↑ See Witzel (1984)[167] for discussion; for maps (1984) of the area, p. 42 sqq.
  41. ↑ Valdiya dispute this, arguing that it was a large perennial river draining the high mountains as late as 3700–2500 years ago.[187]
  42. ↑ According to David Anthony, the Yamna culture was the "Urheimat" of the Indo-Europeans at the Pontic steppes.[133] From this area, which already included various subcultures, Indo-European languages spread west, south and east starting around 4000 BC.[192] These languages may have been carried by small groups of males, with patron-client systems which allowed for the inclusion of other groups into their cultural system.[133] Eastward emerged the Sintashta culture (2100–1800 BC), from which developed the Andronovo culture (1800–1400 BC). This culture interacted with the BMAC (2300–1700 BC); out of this interaction developed the Indo-Iranians, which split around 1800 BC into the Indo-Aryans and the Iranians.[24] The Indo-Aryans migrated to the Levant, northern India, and possibly south Asia.[193]
  43. 1 2 The migration into northern India was not a large-scale immigration, but may have consisted of small groups,[194] which were genetically diverse. Their culture and language spread by the same mechanisms of acculturalisation, and the absorption of other groups into their patron-client system.[133]
  44. ↑ Michael Witzel points out that this is to expected from a mobile society, but that the Gandhara grave culture is a clear indication of new cultural elements.[197] Michaels points out that there are linguistic and archaeological data that shows a cultural change after 1750 BC,[198] and Flood notices that the linguistic and religious data clearly show links with Indo-European languages and religion.[199]
  45. ↑ Some elements of the present Mahabharata can be traced back to Vedic times.[202] The background to the Mahabharata suggests the origin of the epic occurs "after the very early Vedic period" and before "the first Indian 'empire' was to rise in the third century B.C." That this is "a date not too far removed from the 8th or 9th century B.C."[203][204] is likely. It is generally agreed that "Unlike the Vedas, which have to be preserved letter-perfect, the epic was a popular work whose reciters would inevitably conform to changes in language and style,"[204] so the earliest 'surviving' components of this dynamic text are believed to be no older than the earliest 'external' references we have to the epic, which may include an allusion in Panini's 4th century BC grammar Ashtādhyāyī 4:2:56.[203][204] It is estimated that the Sanskrit text probably reached something of a "final form" by the early Gupta period (about the 4th century AD).[204]</ref> The weapons used are mythical or clubs. The narrative of chariots could be a later gloss added in the first millennium BC. The pre-urban core events of the Epic [Mahabharata] would fit the 3137 BC date much better than the 1924 BC. But this would suggest that the Puranic tradition at a later time conflated earlier events with the destructive earthquakes of 1924 BC and remembered the later event accurately using the centennial Saptarsi calendar. The Indic kings of West Asia are descendents of Vedic people who moved West after the catastrophe of 1924 BC.<ref name='Kak - The Mahabharata and the Sindhu-Sarasvati Tradition'>Kak, Subhash. "The Mahabharata and the Sindhu-Sarasvati Tradition" (PDF). Retrieved 22 January 2015.
  46. ↑ E.g. Chakrabarti 1995 and Rajaram 1995, as cited in Bryant 2001.[221]
  1. ↑ Thieme, Burrow, and Das, as cited in ;[82] Kuiper, as cited in [83] and <ref name='FOOTNOTEBryant200187'>Bryant 2001, pp. 87.

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  201. ↑ Denise Cush; Catherine A. Robinson; Michael York (2008). Encyclopedia of Hinduism. Psychology Press. p. 766. ISBN 978-0-7007-1267-0.
  202. ↑ A History of Indian Literature, Volume 1 by Maurice Winternitz
  203. 1 2 Brockington (1998) p. 26
  204. 1 2 3 4 Buitenen (1973) pp. xxiv–xxv
  205. ↑ Wilke pp. 310-1
  206. ↑ Witzel 2012, p. 74, 125, 133.
  207. ↑ Wilke p.310 note 574 quoting Witzel
  208. ↑ Ludvík p.85, quoting Witzel
  209. 1 2 Witzel 2001, p. 93.
  210. ↑ Witzel 2001, p. 31.
  211. ↑ Romila Thapar (2004). Early India: From the Origins to AD 1300. University of California Press. p. 42. ISBN 978-0-520-24225-8.
  212. ↑ Wilke 2011.
  213. 1 2 Mukherjee 2001, p. 2, 8-9.
  214. ↑ Mukherjee 2001, p. 2, 6-9.
  215. ↑ Mukherjee 2001, p. 6.
  216. ↑ Mukherjee 2001, p. 7.
  217. ↑ Witzel 2001, p. 95.
  218. ↑ Jamison 2006.
  219. 1 2 3 Guha 2007, p. 341.
  220. ↑ Bryant 2001, p. 75.
  221. ↑ Bryant 2001, p. 74.
  222. ↑ Bryant 2001, pp. 74–107.
  223. ↑ Bryant 1996.
  224. ↑ Fosse 2005.
  225. ↑ Fosse 2005, p. 438.

Sources

Printed sources

Web-sources

  1. ↑ Kazanas, Nicholas. "The Collapse of the AIT and the prevalence of Indigenism: archaeological, genetic, linguistic and literary evidences." (PDF). www.omilosmeleton.gr. Retrieved 23 January 2015.
  2. 1 2 3 4 Reich et al. 2010, Reconstructing Indian Population History
  3. 1 2 3 4 "Indians are not descendants of Aryans, says new study".
  4. 1 2 3 "New research debunks Aryan invasion theory".
  5. 1 2 Stanley A. Wolpert, The appearance of Indo-Aryan speakers, Encyclopædia Britannica
  6. 1 2 Stephanie W. Jamison, Review of "The Indo-Aryan Controversy"'
  7. ↑ Elst 1999:"3.2 Origin of the Linguistic Argument"
  8. 1 2 N. Kazanas, Rig-Veda is pre-Harappan
  9. ↑ Koenraad Elst, 2.3. THE PRECESSION OF THE EQUINOX
  10. ↑ the Vedic Foundation, Chronology
  11. ↑ Kak, Subhash. "Astronomy of the Vedic Alters" (PDF). Retrieved 22 January 2015.
  12. ↑ Kazanas

Further reading

Overview
Literature by "Indigenous Aryans" proponents
Criticism
Other

External links

Indigenists
Critics
Other
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