# Hindustan is not India



## ThunderCat

There's been a lot of misconceptions in Pakistan as well as India that *Hindustan* is India and that "Hindu" is a religion.

In reality Hindu is a geographic term and it's usage to refer to a religion did not occur until some two centuries ago by the Europeans.

For example Hindu Kush or Hindko language are not associated with India or "Hinduism", so why do we associate Hindu or Hindustan with them?

Problem is people misuse and misapply terminologies so the confusion comes up. In reality the words "Hindu" "Indus" and "India" have their roots in ancient Sanskrit "Sindhu" or "Sapta Sindhu". These words evolved into Indus and Hindu by the Greeks and Persians. Even the name Sindh and Sindhi comes from there.

The name "India" eventually spread to Europe and referred to the Indus and possibly Ganges plains. The Muslim invaders continued using Hindu or Hindustan to refer to these geographic territories. 

Even the older name of Urdu (and Hindi) is actually Hindustani. For one to say they speak Hindustani means they speak Hindi or Urdu because these are both different dialects of Hindustani. 

When the British arrived they started calling all the indigenous spiritualities of the subcontinent "Hinduism". Even using the name "India" by the modern country is technically incorrect, since India originally meant land of the Indus, or today known as Eastern Pakistan.

So to break it down. Hindustan is Eastern Pakistan + Northern India + Bay of Bengal and arguably parts of Nepal and China. A Hindu or Hindustani is a native of these region, not some religious group.

Hindustani is the language that developed in this territory, a derivative of Sanskrit and the languages of the invaders that influenced this language.

So using the term Hindustan to refer to India is wrong and calling the local religions of the subcontinent is also wrong.

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## Raja.Pakistani

What about Bharat?

Hindustan name given by Persian
India name given by western/English

but does all these names apply to just present boundary of India established in 1947 excluding Bangladesh, Pakistan, Nepal etc?

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## 911

ThunderCat said:


> There's been a lot of misconceptions in Pakistan as well as India that *Hindustan* is India and that "Hindu" is a religion.
> 
> In reality Hindu is a geographic term and it's usage to refer to a religion did not occur until some two centuries ago by the Europeans.
> 
> For example Hindu Kush or Hindko language are not associated with India or "Hinduism", so why do we associate Hindu or Hindustan with them?
> 
> Problem is people misuse and misapply terminologies so the confusion comes up. In reality the words "Hindu" "Indus" and "India" have their roots in ancient Sanskrit "Sindhu" or "Sapta Sindhu". These words evolved into Indus and Hindu by the Greeks and Persians. Even the name Sindh and Sindhi comes from there.
> 
> The name "India" eventually spread to Europe and referred to the Indus and possibly Ganges plains. The Muslim invaders continued using Hindu or Hindustan to refer to these geographic territories.
> 
> Even the older name of Urdu (and Hindi) is actually Hindustani. For one to say they speak Hindustani means they speak Hindi or Urdu because these are both different dialects of Hindustani.
> 
> When the British arrived they started calling all the indigenous spiritualities of the subcontinent "Hinduism". Even using the name "India" by the modern country is technically incorrect, since India originally meant land of the Indus, or today known as Eastern Pakistan.
> 
> So to break it down. Hindustan is Eastern Pakistan + Northern India + Bay of Bengal and arguably parts of Nepal and China. A Hindu or Hindustani is a native of these region, not some religious group.
> 
> Hindustani is the language that developed in this territory, a derivative of Sanskrit and the languages of the invaders that influenced this language.
> 
> So using the term Hindustan to refer to India is wrong and calling the local religions of the subcontinent is also wrong.


Yes every person living in Indian subcontinent is Hindu and the place is called Hindustan . Though some people who claim, are free to claim any outside ancestory who cares .

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## Raja.Pakistani

911 said:


> Yes every person living in Indian subcontinent is Hindu and the place is called Hindustan . Though some people who claim, are free to claim any outside ancestory who cares .



Its not about ancestry as if we get back in past then human race or life began with very first man and woman on this planet called earth . Its accepting the present border of India which was defined in 1947 and what name better suit to it

so akhanda bharat=hindustan=India ?
all same?

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## ThunderCat

911 said:


> Yes every person living in Indian subcontinent is Hindu and the place is called Hindustan . Though some people who claim, are free to claim any outside ancestory who cares .



Incorrect. Hindustan is not South India and is not Western Pakistan. Hindus are people of the Gangas and Indus plains and the bay of Bengal. Nepalis could be arguably Hindus as well in the geographic sense.



Raja.Pakistani said:


> What about Bharat?
> 
> Hindustan name given by Persian
> India name given by western/English
> 
> but does all these names apply to just present boundary of India established in 1947 excluding Bangladesh, Pakistan, Nepal etc?


My understanding is Bharata was a kingdom in what is today western India along the Indian ocean. It could be adopted as a name for India, but would be inaccurate in the historical sense.

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## 911

Raja.Pakistani said:


> Its not about ancestry as if we get back in past then human race or life began with very first man and woman on this planet called earth . Its accepting the present border of India which was defined in 1947 and what name better suit to it
> 
> so akhanda bharat=hindustan=India ?
> all same?


Yes, Bharat is Hindustan is India. Have you ever thought why 1/5th area of Pakistan which broke away in 1971 is called Bangladesh while Pakistan remained Pakistan? Its because they choose to separate. Same is the case with Pakistan. In 1947, there was a notion that Muslims are not Hindustanis and are outsiders, so they did not claimed to be Indians. But after many yeaes of branding India, and its hitory, today many Pakistanis connect themselves with Indian history, yet claiming distinction between Indians and Pakistani keeping 2 nation theory in mind, failing to forge wrong history yet again. You can't have the cake and the cherry at the same time.

Brand sells, it attracts. I personaly don't endorse Akhand Bharat ideology, but if it manages to come into existence in future, it won't be because of wars but cultural exchanges and branding. Unknowingly Pakistanis are endorsing that ideology by allowing cultural invasion, and not only that they are catalysing by resiprocating with telecasting thier own shows in India . I would say make Persian or Arabic your national language to avoid it .



ThunderCat said:


> Incorrect. Hindustan is not South India and is not Western Pakistan.


So basically you are saying Indo-Aryan speakers are Hindustanis. Yea alright.

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## barbarosa

911 said:


> Yes, Bharat is Hindustan is India. Have you ever thought why 1/5th area of Pakistan which broke away in 1971 is called Bangladesh while Pakistan remained Pakistan? Its because they choose to separate. Same is the case with Pakistan. In 1947, there was a notion that Muslims are not Hindustanis and are outsiders, so they did not claimed to be Indians. But after many yeaes of branding India, and its hitory, today many Pakistanis connect themselves with Indian history, yet claiming distinction between Indians and Pakistani keeping 2 nation theory in mind, failing to forge wrong history yet again. You can't have the cake and the cherry at the same time.
> 
> Brand sells, it attracts. I personaly don't endorse Akhand Bharat ideology, but if it manages to come into existence in future, it won't be because of wars but cultural exchanges and branding. Unknowingly Pakistanis are endorsing that ideology by allowing cultural invasion, and not only that they are catalysing by resiprocating with telecasting thier own shows in India . I would say make Persian or Arabic your national language to avoid it .
> 
> 
> So basically you are saying Indo-Aryan speakers are Hindustanis. Yea alright.


I would like to show you the fact!
India, Pakistan, Bangladesh = Geographical theory.
Hindu Muslim = religious theory.
two nation = political theory.
It is fact.


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## 911

In Muhammad Ali Jinnah's All India Muslim League presidential address delivered in Lahore, on March 22, 1940, he explained:

It is extremely difficult to appreciate why our Hindu friends fail to understand the real nature of Islam and Hinduism. They are not religions in the strict sense of the word, but are, in fact, different and distinct social orders, and it is a dream that the Hindus and Muslims can ever evolve a common nationality, and this misconception of one Indian nation has troubles and will lead India to destruction if we fail to revise our notions in time. The Hindus and Muslims belong to two different religious philosophies, social customs, litterateurs. They neither intermarry nor interdine together and, indeed, they belong to two different civilizations which are based mainly on conflicting ideas and conceptions. Their aspect on life and of life are different. It is quite clear that Hindus and Mussalmans derive their inspiration from different sources of history. They have different epics, different heroes, and different episodes. Very often the hero of one is a foe of the other and, likewise, their victories and defeats overlap. To yoke together two such nations under a single state, one as a numerical minority and the other as a majority, must lead to growing discontent and final destruction of any fabric that may be so built for the government of such a state.



Sorry more than political .

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## ThunderCat

> So basically you are saying Indo-Aryan speakers are Hindustanis. Yea alright.


I never said that. Stop trolling. 

We are implying Hindustan in the geographical sense. Meaning and origin of the word Hindu:
Meaning and Origin Of The Word "Hindu"

So-called "Hinduism" is not a religion, it was coined by the British:

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## Levina

I guess its time for India to trade mark its other name - Hindustan.



ThunderCat said:


> Hindustan is Eastern Pakistan + Northern India + Bay of Bengal and arguably parts of Nepal and China. A Hindu or Hindustani is a native of these region, not some religious group.
> 
> Hindustani is the language that developed in this territory, a derivative of Sanskrit and the languages of the invaders that influenced this language.


Going by what you'ev written all the places which are not called "hindustan" anymore should be renamed Hindustan. Now that would be a very welcome move. 

But glad that you have understood the essence of Hindustan.


ThunderCat said:


> In reality Hindu is a geographic term and it's usage to refer to a religion did not occur until some two centuries ago by the Europeans.



Just curious why is this thread posted in Pakistan History? Nowhere does the OP mention western Pakistan or present day Pakistan.

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## Srinivas

India is Hindustan and also called Bharat, we are the decendents of Indian civilization, Pakistan is they claim are decendents of invaders, they are the defenders of Islamic civilization.

The naming is apt bharat as India and Madina e saini as Pakistan.

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## halupridol

911 said:


> Yes, Bharat is Hindustan is India. Have you ever thought why 1/5th area of Pakistan which broke away in 1971 is called Bangladesh while Pakistan remained Pakistan? Its because they choose to separate. Same is the case with Pakistan. In 1947, there was a notion that Muslims are not Hindustanis and are outsiders, so they did not claimed to be Indians. But after many yeaes of branding India, and its hitory, today many Pakistanis connect themselves with Indian history, yet claiming distinction between Indians and Pakistani keeping 2 nation theory in mind, failing to forge wrong history yet again. You can't have the cake and the cherry at the same time.
> 
> Brand sells, it attracts. I personaly don't endorse Akhand Bharat ideology, but if it manages to come into existence in future, it won't be because of wars but cultural exchanges and branding. Unknowingly Pakistanis are endorsing that ideology by allowing cultural invasion, and not only that they are catalysing by resiprocating with telecasting thier own shows in India . I would say make Persian or Arabic your national language to avoid it .
> 
> 
> So basically you are saying Indo-Aryan speakers are Hindustanis. Yea alright.


I feel Pakistans fate was sealed on the day they made urdu thr national language.a great blunder n one of the major reasons for not being able to cultivate a strong national identity till now.
well we got to thank bhayyajees for tht

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## Umair Nawaz

yeah i guess the OP is right, Hindustan was the name we gave to what today is south asia, even indians named their country as bharat not hindustan.


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## libertycall

halupridol said:


> I feel Pakistans fate was sealed on the day they made urdu thr national language.a great blunder n one of the major reasons for not being able to cultivate a strong national identity till now.
> well we got to thank bhayyajees for tht



That's correct. 

The Muhajirs not only wanted a refuge and a place to live as they used to do in central Bharat, they also wanted to impose their central Bharati language and culture on the people of Pakistan.


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## my2cents

Umair Nawaz said:


> yeah i guess the OP is right, Hindustan was the name we gave to what today is south asia, even indians named their country as bharat not hindustan.



When Iqbal wrote "Sare jahan se acha hindustan hamara " he was referring to a geographical place and its people, not just hindus. In 1905, when Iqbal in his early twenties recited that poem he viewed our subcontinent to comprise a blend of both Hindu-Muslim culture, a pluralistic society in the making. 

Later on he changed his stance and started asking for a separate country for muslims of the subcontinent.

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## 911

my2cents said:


> Later on he changed his stance and started asking for a separate country for muslims of the subcontinent.


Yes strangely right after he went abroad for studies.


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## Tiger Genie

and so the search for identity continues among the Pakistanis. But I don't know why this generation cannot settle down and just use the name instead of harping after half the P they don't have, half the A they don't have and 3/4 of the K they don't have. It is likethe other day somebody claimed the Vedas belong to Pakistan ...Guys, if you are that unhappy, just let go and call yourself Hindus and suddenly you are Hindustan V2!

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## Umair Nawaz

my2cents said:


> When Iqbal wrote "Sare jahan se acha hindustan hamara " he was referring to a geographical place and its people, not just hindus. In 1905, when Iqbal in his early twenties recited that poem he viewed our subcontinent to comprise a blend of both Hindu-Muslim culture, a pluralistic society in the making.
> 
> Later on he changed his stance and started asking for a separate country for muslims of the subcontinent.


Thats what im saying, the name hindustan was named by us Muslims when we came here, and it wasnt for just sub continent, a term that British game to the areas under their control largely speaking.....It was for entire South Asia. Even later in 15 august 1947 when u got independence u also have yr country as bharat not Hindustan.

Before a lot of Muslims never called for separate country even our Founding father was a Congressy till 1913. But after the failure of tahreef e reshmi rumaal and 1917 when RSS was born things changed.


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## ThunderCat

Too much trolling and off topic posts; especially by Indians which i won't respond to. 

No India is not Hindustan, I'll even post a link to an article by an Indian which is fairly accurate.

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## ThunderCat

Tiger Genie said:


> and so the search for identity continues among the Pakistanis. But I don't know why this generation cannot settle down and just use the name instead of harping after half the P they don't have, half the A they don't have and 3/4 of the K they don't have. It is like the other day somebody claimed the Vedas belong to Pakistan ...Guys, if you are that unhappy, just let go and call yourself Hindus and suddenly you are Hindustan V2!


We are Hindus, but not in the religious sense, because there is no such religion as "Hinduism", it is a geographic term like Hindu Kush, Hindustan, Hinko etc. : Meaning and Origin Of The Word "Hindu"

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## hussain0216

ThunderCat said:


> We are Hindus, but not in the religious sense, because there is no such religion as "Hinduism", it is a geographic term like Hindu Kush, Hindustan, Hinko etc. : Meaning and Origin Of The Word "Hindu"




Your over thinking this

Maybe historically your right but today Hindu = idol worshippers and Hindustan = India 


Pakistan is the culmination of Muslim history in South Asia, we have our own distinct regions, languages and culture centered around Islam.


Your view point whilst valid and even historically accurate is no longer relevant especially considering the general animosity we have towards Hindus and things connected to them

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## farhan_9909

halupridol said:


> I feel Pakistans fate was sealed on the day they made urdu thr national language.a great blunder n one of the major reasons for not being able to cultivate a strong national identity till now.
> well we got to thank bhayyajees for tht



It was indeed a very major blunder.We should have opted for either Pashto or balochi as National Language

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## ThunderCat

hussain0216 said:


> Your over thinking this
> 
> Maybe historically your right but today Hindu = idol worshippers and Hindustan = India
> 
> 
> Pakistan is the culmination of Muslim history in South Asia, we have our own distinct regions, languages and culture centered around Islam.
> 
> 
> Your view point whilst valid and even historically accurate is no longer relevant especially considering the general animosity we have towards Hindus and things connected to them



Well that is completely wrong and an uneducated made-up definition. Hindko people are not connected to any such "religion" even if it can be called such; the same being true for the Hindu Kush mountains- a region within Pakistan/Afghanistan, not a region of India.

So no, I do not buy that definition; especially when it has no place in academic history. In fact nobody except for a mullah type buys that definition.

Meanings and origins of the word Hindu: Meaning and Origin Of The Word "Hindu"

And no idol worshiper is not defined as "hindu". What a silly term for such a broad difnition. Were ancient Egyptians, Greeks, Romans "Hindus"? Do you consider Hindko people "idol worshipers?" Are you insane?

Pakistan is the historic land of the Indus and the history that surrounds it, which is the legacy of that country. Islam is a part of that history.

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## chhota bheem

ThunderCat said:


> Well that is completely wrong and an uneducated made-up definition. Hindko people are not connected to any such "religion" even if it can be called such; the same being true for the Hindu Kush mountains- a region within Pakistan/Afghanistan, not a region of India.
> 
> So no, I do not buy that definition; especially when it has no place in academic history. In fact nobody except for a mullah type buys that definition.
> 
> Meanings and origins of the word Hindu: Meaning and Origin Of The Word "Hindu"
> 
> And no idol worshiper is not defined as "hindu". What a silly term for such a broad difnition. Were ancient Egyptians, Greeks, Romans "Hindus"? Do you consider Hindko people "idol worshipers?" Are you insane?
> 
> Pakistan is the historic land of the Indus and the history that surrounds it, which is the legacy of that country. Islam is a part of that history.


How can islam be part of history,has it changed to have a history.


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## barbarosa

Hidustan means subcontinent which is consist of three countries India Pakistan Bangladesh.

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## ThunderCat

barbarosa said:


> Hidustan means subcontinent which is consist of three countries India Pakistan Bangladesh.


The northern part of India as well as parts of Nepal, eastern Pakistan and Nepal. South India does not count as Hindustan and neither does western Pakistan.


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## Indus Pakistan

ThunderCat said:


> The northern part of India as well as parts of Nepal, eastern Pakistan and Nepal. South India does not count as Hindustan and neither does western Pakistan.



Thanks for this thread. I have been reading up on the nomenclature used for what we call South Asia through history. It is fascinating subject and I have been fortunate to get some imput from native Persian and Greek speakers as these are relevant to many of the terms used, For now please read this. Of course it is beyond the thick skulled, those who have smoked the religious pot and the Indian nationalist kiddos here. Reading this academic article on this subject.

*The Cambridge Classical Journal*

The Conception of India in Hellenistic and Roman Literature
Albrecht Dihle
The Cambridge Classical Journal / Volume 10 / January 1964, pp 15 - 23 DOI: 10.1017/S0068673500003084, Published online: 28 February 2013
Link to this article: The Cambridge Classical Journal - The Conception of India in Hellenistic and Roman Literature - Cambridge Journals Online
How to cite this article: Albrecht Dihle (1964). The Conception of India in Hellenistic and Roman Literature. The Cambridge Classical Journal, 10, pp 15-23 doi:10.1017/S0068673500003084

*THE CONCEPTION OF INDIA IN HELLENISTIC AND ROMAN LITERATURE

Going through the literature of late antiquity, of, say, the third and fourth centuries A.D., one is likely to discover very easily three different concepts of Indian geography. (1) In literary—not in scientific—texts which belong to the classical tradition, India is usually thought of as the country of two big rivers, namely the Indus and the Ganges. This India does not include the region south of the Vindhya mountains, in spite of the fact that the commercial relations between South India and the Roman empire had been particularly close during the first and second centuries A.D.1 India, according to this literary tradition, was accessible by land, by following the course of Alexander's campaign, whereas Indian trade in the Roman period actually followed the passage provided by the monsoon, which had been discovered in the late Hellenistic period. Many details of that classical or rather classicistic conception of India can be gathered from Philostratus' Life of Apollontus, written early in the third century A.D., as well as from the History of Alexander, falsely attributed to Callisthenes. (2) Another concept of Indian geography is to be found in those writings of the same period, of which the origin can be located within the Parthian or early Sasanid empire and its borderlands. Here, India comprehends only the region of the Indus and its tributaries, as it was considered, in Greece, before Alexander's campaign. This India is considered an Iranian India, for Parthian dynasts founded some little Kingdoms in that very region during the first century B.C., and it became, in the following centuries, the eastern part of the powerful Kushan empire, which was the most important factor in Parthian and Sasanid diplomacy. The usual way leading into this country went, in reality as well as according to the literary texts in question, by the sea-passage from Basra to Karachi, which is far more comfortable than the route through the Iranian Highlands and which had always been, for this very reason, the artery of Iranian trade. Commercial intercourse in the Persian Gulf was monopolized, for several centuries, by the merchants from Persian Mesopotamia. The author of the famous Periplus of the Red Sea, though disposing of extremely wide and detailed information, knew very little about the Persian Gulf, for he was a Greek from Egypt.2

1 M. Wheeler, Rome beyond the Imperial Frontiers (London, 1955), pp. 3 The Syrian merchants of Parthian Mesopotamia probably introduced for a second time the Indian name of India and of the river Indus into Western languages. Our word India, denoting nowadays the subcontinent in general, goes back to the Old Persian hind, hindul as do the Greek 'IvSia, the Hebrew hoddu, the Aramaic henda. The name of Sindh, having by-passed Persia and kept its original s at the beginning of the word, is now used to denote only the region of the Indus. Within 'Western' languages, the difference between Sindh and India is common in Syrian chronography *
_
(R. Payne Smith, Thes. syr. p. 2676 and suppl. 236) and Islamic geography from the eighth century onwards (G. I.e Strange, The Lands of the Eastern Caliphate, Cambridge, 1930, p. 131). But the Indian word with its original s occurs for the first time in a Syrian text from Western Mesopotamia written in the third century A.D. According to the apocryphal Acts, St Thomas disembarked in an Indian harbour called sandaruk, which seems to correspond to the Persian sind{a)rud 'river Indus', as was shown by E. Herzfeld (for further discussions see J. Duchesne-Guillemin, La religion de Vlran ancien, Paris, 1962, p. 242, where J. Marquart, Abh._
*
l6 A. DIHLE

We find this second conception of India in the apocryphal Acts of St Thomas, wrinen in Edessa early in the third century A.D., and in the account of Mani's voyage from Mesopotamia to India.1 It can be verified as a quite realistic though limited conception—completely different from that of the classical tradition—by the evidence we have got for die flourishing trade between Mesopotamia and Northern India. (3) Finally, there is a third opinion about India, held only by Christian authors of Greek or Roman origin, according to which India is threefold like Caesar's Gaul. One part borders upon Parthia or Media, which is obviously Northern India. The second is connected with Ethiopia, but one can reach it by boat only, and the diird part lies at die end of the world. As for die second part bordering upon Ediiopia, only Soudi India or Limyrike2 (as this country was called by tradesmen and geographers) can be meant. Limyrike was not considered a part of India when it was discovered by a Greek sailor called Diodorus, probably in the second century B.C.3 Moreover, diere was a very old tradition about the identity of Indians and Ediiopians,4 which could easily be applied to Soudi India in die first centuries A.D., for Roman trade, going mainly by sea, had its western positions in Egypt, Soudi Arabia, and Abyssinia, diat is to say next to ancient Ediiopia (modern Sudan soudi of Egypt). Many Indian merchants lived in die coastal districts of die Red Sea,5 which were called, accordingly, f\ KOC6' T\\xas 'IvSia.6 Finally, many Greek geographers from the second century B.C. onwards believed diat Soudi India and East Africa were connected by a continental bridge. So a Greek of die first or second century A.D. was likely to wonder where die India of Roman tradesmen—diat is to say, Soudi India—really began and where die borderline between diat India, which was not Alexander's India, and Africa was to be drawn. The third part of die India tripartita of die Christians, supposed to lie at die end of die world, is by no means die country of Fairy Tales. Furdier India and die sea behind Malacca were discovered by a skipper called Alexandros late in die first or early in die second century A.D.7 Subsequently, many Greco-Roman tradesmen came to die harbours of Indo-China and starting from diese harbours even reached occasionally die capital of die Chinese empire.8 Now, the geographers of die second century A.D., Marinus and Ptolemy, made use of diis recent information. They described Indo-China as being a part of India and placed it at die very end of die inhabited world. In die early Christian literature we find diis India—including Nordi India, Soudi
*
_Ges. Wiss. Gottg. Hi (1901), 46 deserves to be mentioned). And in fact Sindh was closely linked with Parthian Mesopotamia by commercial intercourse (cf. App. Bell. civ. 5, 9, 37; H. Seyrig, Syria, xxii (1941), 263, and R. Goossens, Nouv. Clio (1957), p. 63). 1 Cf. G. Widengren, Mani (Stuttgart, 1961), p. 35. 2 Limyrike or Damyrike {Tab. Peut.) corresponds to the Sanskrit Dramidaka 'Country of the Tamils'. 3 Ptolem. i, 7, 6; v, 1. 4 Cf. Rhein. Mus. cv (1962), 97ff. 5 Peripl. Mar. Ruhr. 30. 6 Sozom. Hist. eccl. z, 24, I. 7 Ptolem. 1, 14; the authors of the first century A.D. know nothing about the regions behind Malacca and Sumatra, whereas the famous harbour of Kattigara is mentioned by nearly all geographers after Marinus the Tyrian. Cf. J. Coedes, Textes d'auteurs grecs et latins relatifs a I'Extreme Orient (Paris, 1910). 8 O. Franke, Geschichte des chinesischen Reiches I (Berlin, 1930), p. 404._
*
CONCEPTION OF INDIA IN HELLENISTIC AND ROMAN LITERATURE 17

India, and Further India or at least North India and South India—in the Pass'xa Bartholomaei, in several accounts of Metrodorus' and Meropius' travels,1 in the Commonitorium Palladii? and in some details already in Clement's writings. This conception was maintained until the sixth century at least.3 Perhaps we may be allowed to neglect the rather limited conception of India which only the Syrian writers had, and to concentrate on the comparison between the classical and the Christian ones. The most important observation to arise from this comparison might be described as follows. India as represented in early Christian writings, even in those which have some literary and stylistic pretensions, exactly corresponds to all the information which had been collected by sailors and tradesmen during the first two centuries A.D., information which had been used by the geographers of the same period but neglected by all the men of letters. On the other hand, India as represented in the literary text of pagan origin is, in fact, the country known to the Greeks 400 or 500 years previously. There is no relation between this literature in the narrow sense of the word and all that information about contemporary India which must have been easily available during a period of flourishing Indian trade, as is shown by the anonymous author of the famous Periplus of the Red Sea, which does not belong to literature according to classical standards. In order to explain this striking difference, we have to go back into earlier periods. We have still a fair number of literary texts concerning India from the first two centuries A.D.: Strabo's Book xv, the 6th Book of Pliny, Arrian's 'Iv5itc/|, and the geographical chapters of Curtius' History of Alexander. As we learn from the prefaces of Strabo and Ptolemy, the description of a country and its inhabitants was considered as belonging to literature, whereas geography in the narrow sense of the word dealt with mathematical methods of fixing positions. Ptolemy was interested only in scientific geography, as was Hipparchus in the Hellenistic period. But Strabo as well as Eratosthenes and Posidonius tried to combine both descriptive and scientific geography, and that is why they could possibly influence not only scientific opinions about foreign countries but also the representation of them in literary texts. All those authors of the imperial period I mentioned above, whose writings were published mainly for literary and stylistic reasons, took their information about India almost entirely from early Hellenistic sources, that is to say from the historians of Alexander's campaign and from Megasthenes and other ambassadors of his time. It is generally true that in writings about foreign countries the authors of the imperial epoch relied upon the important geographical, ethnographical, and historical literature of the late Hellenistic period, and took into account, too, new information arising from commercial intercourse of their own period. But so far as India is concerned, they neglected these sources almost entirely. This remarkable fact can be illustrated by some details from Strabo and Pliny.
*
_1 Rufin. hist. eccl. 10, 9; Socrat. 1, 19; Sozom. 2, 24; Theodt. 1, 23; Gelas. Cyz. 3, 9; Act. SS. Octobr. XH, 268. 1 Ed. J. D. M. Derrett, Class, et Med. (1960), p. 64, and Journ. Am. Or. Soc. LXXXII (1962), 21. 3 Expos, tot. mund. 18, 35.
2 CPS_
*
18 A. DIHLE

Apollodorus of Anemita, who lived early in the first century B.C., wrote a History of the Parthians and the Bactrian Greeks. The work was undoubtedly most important, as the late Sir W. W. Tarn has already shown most clearly. Apollodorus mentions an expedition which the Bactrian Greeks undertook early in the second century B.C. against the tribes of Central Asia,1 and it is in this very context that the Seres,1 the eponyms of the silk-trade and silk-production, occur for the first time in Greek literature. But already from the end of the first century onwards, in Horace's and Vergil's verses for instance, the Seres are generally known to be the inhabitants of the north-easternmost part of the world. Now the important passage of Apollodorus' account,.which introduced the silk-men into Greek literature, has been preserved in Strabo's Geography, Possibly Strabo took the passage directly from Posidonius; but, in any case, Strabo considered Apollodorus a most reliable authority as far as Parthia, Bactria, and Central Asia were concerned, as is proved by many verbal quotations.3 This same Apollodorus gave a valuable account of the second Greek invasion of India.4 During the second century B.C. the Bactrian Greeks occupied the whole coastal region between Karachi and Baroda, and starting from these harbours of Northern India Greek sailors discovered the eastern coast of South India in that very period, as we can show from some short passages in later Greek texts.5 Moreover, Menander, the most famous among the Greco-Indian kings, made an assault on Pataliputra, the old Mauryan capital in the Ganges plain—a fact that is well attested by Indian sources.6 This campaign, being a well-planned expedition, must have given valuable information about the eastern parts of North India. Finally, the Greek kings of the second century came into close touch with their Indian subjects: Menander was a benefactor of Buddhism, as can be seen from his coins and from a famous book of early Buddhist literature, and he was buried according to Indian rites.? Strabo could easily have taken all this information from Apollodorus' history. But, so far as India is concerned, he cites his book only once and for the sole reason of blaming the author for having given information about India which was different from Megasthenes' account of 200 years before.8 Knowledge of India could not possibly improve on the information given by Megasthenes—according to Strabo's standards. *
_
1 FgH 779 F7. 2 Amometus, a contemporary of Callimachus, did not write a book on the Seres, as was stated by F. Altheim {Weltgeschichu Asiens im griech. Zeitalter 1 (1947), 63), but on the Ottorocorrae {FgH 645 f 2, cf. A. Herrmann, RE 18, 2, 1888), that is to say the Uttara-kuru, the Hyperboreans of Indian mythology. 3 2, 5, 12; 11, 7, 3; n, 9, 1; ii, ii, 7; it seems to me highly probable that Strab. 11, 9, 2f. ( = FgH782 F 3) is derived from Apollodorus too. 4 FgH 779 F7 b. 5 The Samian Diodorus made a voyage from 'IVSIKT) to AIUUDIKTI (Ptolem. 1, 7, 6) and Aelian (hist. an. 15, 8) mentions pearl-fishers in the harbour of Perimula during the period of King Eucratides of Bactria, i.e. at the beginning of the second century B.C. Perimula is to be located on the south-western coast of India (Plin. N.H. 6, 72 and 9, 106). It seems to have been an outpost of the Chola kingdom ((3a<riA£us Zcopas). Cf. W. W. Tarn, The Greeks in Bactria and India (Cambridge2, 1951), pp. I43ff. 7 Vt'. W. Tarn, op. cit. pp. 217; 268ff.; 415ff. 8 Strab. 15. 1, 3. It is very curious that A. K. Narain {The Indo-Greeks, Oxford, 1957), in his polemics against Tarn, repeats the arguments Strabo used against Apollodorus. Narain did not take into account the classicistic tendency of Strabo's literary activity, as far as India is concerned._
*
CONCEPTION OF INDIA IN HELLENISTIC AND ROMAN LITERATURE 19

Posidonius and Artemidorus, the Ephesian geographer who lived about ioo B.C., were also authorities Strabo refers to through the whole of his Geography. In the chapters on India, however, Strabo quotes the Ephesian only once, rejecting his opinion about the course of the Ganges.1 Artemidorus' information is contrary to that of Eratosthenes and Megasthenes, but apparently far superior to all previous knowledge about the subject; it is perhaps a result of Menander's campaign. Posidonius' account of Eudoxos' discovery of the direct passage from Egypt to India is not reported in the book on India but only in the general preface to Strabo's Geography.'1 In the Indian chapters we hear only of Nearchus' famous expedition and, in addition, there are a few remarks about the regrettable fact that tradesmen in Strabo's own days were stupid people, from whom serious information about India could be hardly expected.3 As Strabo puts it, Indian geography and ethnography of the early Hellenistic period might possibly be corrected or supplemented, by contemporary information only. But Strabo obviously considered such information as was available to be unreliable or even worthless. The same combination of early Hellenistic sources and contemporaneous information is also to be found in Pliny's description of India.4 He follows almost entirely the accounts given by Megasthenes and Eratosthenes. He also repeats the well-known story of Nearchus' expedition, and describes the monsoon-passage, too, as belonging to his own period.5 We are told that the various routes of this passage came into use only gradually and over a fairly long period of time. The same opinion is held by the author of The Periplus of the Red Sea,6 but Pliny's knowledge of this historical development is more substantial, although his geographical knowledge cannot in any way be compared with the extensive and detailed information at the disposal of that anonymous sea-captain. Apparently Pliny took his information about seafaring developments in the Indian Ocean from literary sources which must have belonged to the latest Hellenistic period. But, since literary descriptions of India had to be composed mainly from Early Hellenistic elements, supplemented only by some contemporary information, Pliny was eager to conceal the Late Hellenistic source he was dependent on. Curtius and Arrian took all their Indian information from Early Hellenistic literature, Eratosthenes included. And although both of them are likely to consider Indian geography a mere addition to the account of Alexander's achievements, they include a description of the Ganges plain, which Alexander never entered, for that region had been treated in Megasthenes' narrative, which was considered an indispensable and canonical work on Indian geography and ethnography.7 The same can be stated about Greek lexicography. There is no Indian word or name discussed in Greek glossaries that does not seem to come from Early Hellenistic 1 Strab. 15, 1, 72. » Strab. 2, 3, 4. ' Strab. 15, 1, 4. « NJi. 6, 56ff. 5 6, lOiff. *Peripl.i7. ' The author of the Periplus, whose literary erudition is extremely weak, tells us that Alexander reached the riverG anges (47). This is a striking testimony to the vulgar belief according to which India is the country of two big rivers and the country Alexander subjugated.
2O A.DIHLE sources,1 whereas many other exotic words of non-Indian origin dealt with inj grammatical writings are taken from Late Hellenistic authors as well, such as Artemidorus, Posidonius, or Agatharchides. Aelian, too, took all the Indian examples for his zoology either from Ctesias or from Early Hellenistic authors—with one exception only, mentioned above.2 There are, of course, during the first two centuries A.D. some casual references to contemporary India in historiography^ and in literary texts of low quality such as Mimes4 and erotic novels. 5 That could hardly be avoided during a period when thousands of Greek sailors made the annual passage from Egypt to India, when so many Greek soldiers, merchants, and craftsmen worked and lived in South India that a temple dedicated to the cult of the Roman emperor was built at Cape Comorin.6 But every author likely to have had stylistic ambitions avoided any allusion to contemporary or late Hellenistic India. Eventually, a note on late Hellenistic India even lost its relation to India, when its content had been incorporated into literary tradition, as we can see in a passage of Plutarch.? He describes King Menander's funeral and is likely to have derived his knowledge of the subject not directly from Apollodorus* History but from a treatise De fiinerihus mirabilibus. Plutarch did not even know that Menander had ruled in India. He makes him a king of Bactria, which never belonged to his kingdom. So we may conclude that—according to the standards of literary tradition in the time of the Roman empire—India was to all intents and purposes the country Alexander subjugated and Megasthenes lived in, and nothing else. I do not believe it was simply the general classicism of the imperial epoch that preserved Early Hellenistic India unchanged within Greco-Roman literature, since so many other details of Late Hellenistic geography had been introduced into the literary tradition.8 Certainly, it was the dominating part Alexander played in any kind of literary tradition that prevented his India from being transformed into the India of contemporary reality. His Indian expedition excited people's imagination more than any other of his achievements, and, moreover, it was due to those accounts that India became the country of the most ancient philosophy. India's literary dignity entirely depended on Alexander and his campaign, and that is why later information, arising from increasing commercial intercourse and utilized by scientists, was never admitted into the literary tradition. Moreover, early Hellenistic India was protected by Eratosthenes' authority, whose geography was to influence both science and literature, since it comprehended ethnographical description and mathematical research. But in early Christian literature the conception of India definitely changed and was
*
_' The Maurya dynasty ruled from the late fourth to the early second century B.C. The word pcopieis is explained as the title of Indian kings in Hesychius' glossary. The corresponding Indian form of the name comes from a Middle Indian dialect, not from the Sanskrit (cf. Luders, K.Z. 38, 433)2 See above, p. 18, n. 5. 3 Tac. ann_ I4) 25, 4 D. L. Page, Creek Literary Papyri (London, 1950), p. 336. 5 Xen. Eph. 3, nf. 6 This temple is attested by die Tabula Peudngeriana. ' Praec. reip. ger. 821 D. 8 Apart from the Seres already mentioned we find Britons and Germans, Garamantes and Blemmyes in literary texts of the Imperial period as well as in geograpliical treatises._
*
CONCEPTION OF INDIA IN HELLENISTIC AND ROMAN LITERATURE 21
adapted to really existing conditions. We are able to prove this change not only by comparing the different size and shape given to India in pagan and in Christian literature but also by noting differences in the ethnographical details attached to the general idea of India. Doxographical accounts in Hellenistic and Roman philosophy usually contain a chapter on 91X00-09(0: fJapfiapos where we read something about theologians of Egypt, Persian Magi, Celtic Druids, and the like. In those lists, India is represented either by the Gymnosophists or by two groups of ascetics called Brahmans and Sarmans. Gymnosophists and Brahmans are well known to the historians of Alexander's campaign, but the combination of Brahmans and Sarmans was introduced into Greek literature by Megasthenes.1 As we know from King Ashoka's inscriptions (third century B.C.), bramanairamananam was used as a comprehensive term for all brahmanic and non-brahmanic ascetics, not as a name for individual sects such as Buddhists or Jains. Megasthenes used the Greek transliteration—Bpcrxnovss Kod ZccpuavES— in exactly the same way, for he knew perfectly well that there were far more than two Indian sects. Accordingly, he described many of them and even gave a verifiable account of the Jains,* for the ZEMNOI dealt with in that fragment are in fact the fENNOl mentioned in Hesychius' glossary.' Megasthenes' descriptions are remarkably detailed, his translations and transliterations of Indian names astonishingly correct; sometimes we are even able to ascertain whether the corresponding Indian word came from Sanskrit or from a Middle Indian dialect. Under these circumstances it seems to be noteworthy that Buddha and his teaching never occur in Greek literature. Apparently Megasthenes did not mention it. Now the rise of Buddhism to outstanding importance in Indian social and spiritual life began under King Ashoka's rule, when regular diplomatic relations between the Hellenistic kingdoms and the Mauryan empire had ceased to be maintained, and when the list of canonical Greek books on India had been established. For this very reason, I believe, Buddha's title and Buddha's doctrine never occur in Greco-Roman texts of pagan origin and literary pretension.4 Now Clement of Alexandria may fairly be considered the first Christian writer to be master of all the elements of literary and philosophic erudition which were available in his lifetime. Accordingly, the record he gives of 91X0x709(0 p&pf3ctpos is extremely rich as far as traditional items are concerned.5 But, in addition, he supplied new information within the traditional catalogue, which was apparently an innovation, for
*
_1 FgH715*33* It seems to me very likely that all pieces of information given in Clem. Al. strom. 3, 60, 2-4 go back to Megasthenes' report, the fragment attributed to Alexander Polyhistor (FgH 273 F18)— perhaps Clement's primary source—included, for there are no other notes on India in Clement's compilation which cannot be traced back to Megasthenes. 3 CAPMANEC has been changed to TAPMANEC in Strabo's text too. 4 It seems to me highly disputable whether the Indian goddess Mala, praised in P. Oxy. 1380 as being identical with Isis, is in fact the mother of the Buddha. All the other goddesses mentioned in this liturgy and identified as appearances of Isis are famous and cosmic goddesses, whereas the mother of the Buddha never became a goddess at all. Moreover, the text does not represent Greek literary tradition. 

5 Strom. 1, 17, 3ff.; cf. Mullus, Festschrift fur Theodor Ktauser (Mflnster, 1964), p. 60.
22 A.DIHLE_
*
the catalogue of exotic philosophers had been fixed at least 200 years previously and had not been changed since. As for India, Clement mentions Brahmans and Sarmans, known from Megasthenes' report. But, moreover, he introduces the Xauotvotloi of Bactria. In those days, the name of Bactria usually meant the powerful Kushan empire which included large parts of Eastern Iran and of North India.1 Under Kushan rule, probably in the second century A.D., Sanskrit became the sacred language of Northern Buddhism and the word sramana, the Sanskrit equivalent of Greek lapnavEs, became the well-known title of Buddhist monks. Starting from the monasteries of the Kushan empire, Buddhist missionaries came to China, where their title was transformed into sha-men, and also to Western countries. There are ssamana, that is to say Buddhists, among the victims of a persecution directed by the Zoroastrian clergy of the Sasanid empire and recorded in a Middle Persian inscription of the third century A.D.2 The lingua franca within the Parthian and early Sasanid empire and in its western borderland was still the Aramaic language. Consequently the western Buddhists were known to Syrians and Greeks under the name of samanaija, of which the Greek transcription was to be Xanocvaioi—just like other Aramaic plurals such as Oocpiacaoi, Za58ouKonoi, MoryouaaToi, etc. So we can trace the title of Buddhist monks from sramana to the Persian ssamana to the Aramaic samanaija to the Greek Zctnocvccloi— which we find for the first time in Clement's catalogue. He did not notice that Megasthenes' Zappaves bore the same Indian name as the Zajjocvccloi he knew about. But Clement was quite right, unconsciously perhaps, in not identifying them, for his Zanocvaioi were Buddhists and Megasthenes' Zotpiactves were not, or not necessarily, since Sramana was a comprehensive title in those days. As for the samanaija/Zctuocvocioi, we still possess a detailed description of their communities, written a few years later than Clement's Stromateis by the famous Syrian author Bar Daisan, who lived at Edessa next to the Persian frontier.^ But Clement did not confine his attention to the Buddhists of North-western India (whence information came to him through Persia and Mesopotamia and, consequently, through various languages). He introduced also the Indian worshippers of Buddha, but separated them from the Sanavcrtoi. Apparently, the two pieces of information about Buddhism came to Clement by different ways, and that is the reason why he made no attempt to combine them. So we are led to believe that the second piece of information, including the title of Buddha himself, came directly from South India, which had been closely linked to Egypt for at least two centuries. It must have been common knowledge in Greco-Roman Egypt from the first century A.D. onwards that there was a religion in India devoted to the worship of the Enlightened. Too many Greeks, mainly from Egypt, visited or even lived in South India, where Buddhism flourished during the first centuries A.D., and too many Indians visited Egypt, for such a thing to go unnoticed. But, as we concluded, there was no literary dignity in this comparatively new complex of information, since the
*
_1 Euseb. Praep. ev. 6, 10, 14 = Bardesanes, Lib. leg. reg. 31 Nau. * Ed. M. L. Chaumont, Journ. Aslat. CCXLVTII (1960), 339. 3 Porph. de abstin. 4, I7f.
_
*CONCEPTION OF IND/A IN HELLENISTIC AND ROMAN LITERATURE 23

image of India in the literary and philosophic tradition had been definitively shaped in the Early Hellenistic period. It does not seem to be a mere coincidence that it was a Christian who was to violate this literary taboo for the first time. Today we are inclined to emphasize the continuity of scholarly activity, of literary style, and of general education, which undoubtedly subsists between the pagan and the Christian part of Greco-Roman literature. We usually think of Plotinus and Clement, of St Jerome and Macrobius, as being representatives of the same literary and philosophical tradition, even as belonging to the same social class. Obviously we have to be cautious about those generalizations. As for the concept of India, there seems to be a striking difference between the two groups of Greco-Roman authors, a difference concerning the fundamental attitude towards a tradition which was, in fact, the generally accepted basis of every literary, scholarly, and philosophic activity for both pagans and Christians. Christians like Clement and St Jerome, who also gave interesting accounts of Buddhist teachings,1 did not disclaim the literary standards of the Greco-Roman civilization they belonged to. But they disengaged themselves from this very tradition to an extent diat enabled them to transform it according to their own experience, according to reality.
KOLN ALBRECHT DIHLE

ALEXANDER THE GREAT AND AN EXPERIMENT IN GOVERNMENT*

In early summer of the year 334, only a few weeks after his crossing into Asia Minor and perhaps only a week or two after his first victory in Asia at the river Granicus, Alexander was in Sardes making arrangements for the future government of the satrapy of Lydia, the second of the Persian satrapies to be annexed in this way. Besides appointing in each case a Macedonian to be satrap in place of the former Persian official, and besides making certain special arrangements in each province, at Sardes he appointed a (probably) Greek officer Nicias to be in charge of the financial administration of Lydia.3 This appointment has always been recognized as a particularly interesting one, because it provides the earliest evidence suggesting an administrative experiment undertaken by Alexander, if it is true, as is usually thought, that he was introducing here something new into the government of the empire in Asia,
1 Adv. Jov. 1, 42. 1 This paper has been expanded in places and contracted in others partly as a result of the discussion after it was read to the Society. I am grateful especially to Professor D. L. Page, Professor A. H. M. Jones and Mr F. H. Sandbach for their constructive suggestions. My thanks are due also to Dr E. Badian for reading it at a late stage, when I could unfortunately make only small changes in proof in the light of his stimulating criticism and suggestions.
*
_Abbreviations: A. Arrian, Anabasis.
Berve H. Berve, Das AUxanderrekh auf prosopographischer Grundlage (Munich, 1926)._

It's interesting that the concept of _*Ινδική* _has meant differant things in the past.

1 (a) Ινδική > The Indus region that is modern Pakistan.
(b) Hendosh > The Achaemenid Persian satrapy covering modern Sindh in Pakistan.
2. Ινδική > The Indus region and Ganges basin.
3. Limyrike > Deccan region or modern South India.

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## ThunderCat

Thanks for sharing Atnaz. Very educational.


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## Tiger7

Apprentice said:


> India has a fake identity. The notion of Indian identity failed in 1947 and is in direct contradiction to the sovereignty of neighbouring lands such as Bhutan, Nepal, Burma, Sri Lanka etc. Moreover, rarely has India existed as a united entity in history.
> 
> All in all Indian nationalism is territorial nationalism. Whereas for Pakistanis, nationalism is religious nationalism. All practising Muslims are religious nationalists. Its the non-practising ones who prefer ethnic identity over religious.
> 
> All in all Pakistanis (he practising Muslim section) have a stronger identity than Indians.


This is rather a funny claim considering the fact that the people of Pakistan never had their own identity since
ancient times as Pakistan was mostly under foreign rule in the past.


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## ThunderCat

This man's video is has many significant errors but overall his geographic designations and explanation of the language's history is accurate:

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## Sneaker

ThunderCat said:


> This man's video is has many significant errors but overall his geographic designations and explanation of the language's history is accurate:


He is spot on. The difference between hindi and urdu is not the language itself, but the people's outlook. One set wants to preserver its ancient roots and culture, the other group is wannabe foreigners..


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## Tergon18

Sneaker said:


> He is spot on. The difference between hindi and urdu is not the language itself, but the people's outlook. One set wants to preserver its ancient roots and culture, the other group is wannabe foreigners..



Do you even know how Hindi was formed?
Urdu and Hindustani are synonymous with one another...both terms are intertwined. Hindi is a bastardisation of Urdu. In the late 1880s, north Indian Hindu nationalists were fed up with Urdu/Hindustani becoming the dominant language. After the failed 1857 War of Independence, the British banned Persian...this led to the explosion of Urdu/Hindustani. This language was written using the Persian-Urdu alphabet. From 1857 to the 1880s, Urdu became the most spoken and written language in British India.

The north Indian Hindus didn't like that...they saw Urdu with its Persian script as being an "invading" language. So in the 1880s, they came up with "Hindi"...they took all the Persian based words in Urdu and replaced them with Sanskrit words and changed the script from Persian alphabet to Devanagari. This resulted in the formation of Hindi....which is basically Sanskritised Urdu written in Devangari script. This is the reason why Hindi sounds so unnatural.

It's no different from Croatian-Serbian language dispute. The original Balkan language was written in Acrylic as Serbian language is today. The Croats in an attempt to differentiate themselves from there Serb enemies took the language, and changed the script to Roman...and called it "Croatian".

The same thing happened with Urdu to Hindi.

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## Joe Shearer

ThunderCat said:


> There's been a lot of misconceptions in Pakistan as well as India that *Hindustan* is India and that "Hindu" is a religion.
> 
> In reality Hindu is a geographic term and it's usage to refer to a religion did not occur until some two centuries ago by the Europeans.
> 
> For example Hindu Kush or Hindko language are not associated with India or "Hinduism", so why do we associate Hindu or Hindustan with them?
> 
> Problem is people misuse and misapply terminologies so the confusion comes up. In reality the words "Hindu" "Indus" and "India" have their roots in ancient Sanskrit "Sindhu" or "Sapta Sindhu". These words evolved into Indus and Hindu by the Greeks and Persians. Even the name Sindh and Sindhi comes from there.
> 
> The name "India" eventually spread to Europe and referred to the Indus and possibly Ganges plains. The Muslim invaders continued using Hindu or Hindustan to refer to these geographic territories.
> 
> Even the older name of Urdu (and Hindi) is actually Hindustani. For one to say they speak Hindustani means they speak Hindi or Urdu because these are both different dialects of Hindustani.
> 
> When the British arrived they started calling all the indigenous spiritualities of the subcontinent "Hinduism". Even using the name "India" by the modern country is technically incorrect, since India originally meant land of the Indus, or today known as Eastern Pakistan.
> 
> So to break it down. Hindustan is Eastern Pakistan + Northern India + Bay of Bengal and arguably parts of Nepal and China. A Hindu or Hindustani is a native of these region, not some religious group.
> 
> Hindustani is the language that developed in this territory, a derivative of Sanskrit and the languages of the invaders that influenced this language.
> 
> So using the term Hindustan to refer to India is wrong and calling the local religions of the subcontinent is also wrong.



What a pity. 

He was doing so well.



Tergon18 said:


> Do you even know how Hindi was formed?
> Urdu and Hindustani are synonymous with one another...both terms are intertwined. Hindi is a bastardisation of Urdu. In the late 1880s, north Indian Hindu nationalists were fed up with Urdu/Hindustani becoming the dominant language. After the failed 1857 War of Independence, the British banned Persian...this led to the explosion of Urdu/Hindustani. This language was written using the Persian-Urdu alphabet. From 1857 to the 1880s, Urdu became the most spoken and written language in British India.
> 
> The north Indian Hindus didn't like that...they saw Urdu with its Persian script as being an "invading" language. So in the 1880s, they came up with "Hindi"...they took all the Persian based words in Urdu and replaced them with Sanskrit words and changed the script from Persian alphabet to Devanagari. This resulted in the formation of Hindi....which is basically Sanskritised Urdu written in Devangari script. This is the reason why Hindi sounds so unnatural.
> 
> It's no different from Croatian-Serbian language dispute. The original Balkan language was written in Acrylic as Serbian language is today. The Croats in an attempt to differentiate themselves from there Serb enemies took the language, and changed the script to Roman...and called it "Croatian".
> 
> The same thing happened with Urdu to Hindi.



One more fake scholar.



Raja.Pakistani said:


> Its not about ancestry as if we get back in past then human race or life began with very first man and woman on this planet called earth . Its accepting the present border of India which was defined in 1947 and what name better suit to it
> 
> so akhanda bharat=hindustan=India ?
> all same?



No.



ThunderCat said:


> Incorrect. Hindustan is not South India and is not Western Pakistan. Hindus are people of the Gangas and Indus plains and the bay of Bengal. Nepalis could be arguably Hindus as well in the geographic sense.




*Right.*




> My understanding is Bharata was *a kingdom in what is today western India along the Indian ocean.* It could be adopted as a name for India, but would be inaccurate in the historical sense.



Wrong.
*
Alpa vidya bhayankari.*



Levina said:


> I guess its time for India to trade mark its other name - Hindustan.
> 
> 
> Going by what you'ev written all the places which are not called "hindustan" anymore should be renamed Hindustan. Now that would be a very welcome move.
> 
> But glad that you have understood the essence of Hindustan.
> 
> 
> Just curious why is this thread posted in Pakistan History? Nowhere does the OP mention western Pakistan or present day Pakistan.



An original contribution, but typical of its class: Perception without comprehension.

Because some people define themselves by what they are not. In ancient philosophical analysis, philosophers strove to identify the seat of the identity (the 'I' or the self), or to disclose the lie and reveal the truth, in the Upanishads, and, philosophically speaking, in Yoga and Advaita. 

That is what is sought to be done, in these long-drawn out, boring and, frankly, misunderstood and half-baked dithyrambs (sorry, but this level of speculation really gets my goat).



Umair Nawaz said:


> yeah i guess the OP is right, Hindustan was the name we gave to what today is south asia, even indians named their country as bharat not hindustan.



<groan!>



my2cents said:


> When Iqbal wrote "Sare jahan se acha hindustan hamara " he was referring to a geographical place and its people, not just hindus. In 1905, when Iqbal in his early twenties recited that poem he viewed our subcontinent to comprise a blend of both Hindu-Muslim culture, a pluralistic society in the making.
> 
> Later on he changed his stance and started asking for a separate country for muslims of the subcontinent.



Also re-wrote his own song, amusingly.



911 said:


> Yes strangely right after he went abroad for studies.



LOL.

Neither Cambridge nor Munich was good for him.



Kaptaan said:


> Thanks for this thread. I have been reading up on the nomenclature used for what we call South Asia through history. It is fascinating subject and I have been fortunate to get some imput from native Persian and Greek speakers as these are relevant to many of the terms used, For now please read this. Of course it is beyond the thick skulled, those who have smoked the religious pot and the Indian nationalist kiddos here. Reading this academic article on this subject.
> 
> *The Cambridge Classical Journal*
> 
> The Conception of India in Hellenistic and Roman Literature
> Albrecht Dihle
> The Cambridge Classical Journal / Volume 10 / January 1964, pp 15 - 23 DOI: 10.1017/S0068673500003084, Published online: 28 February 2013
> Link to this article: The Cambridge Classical Journal - The Conception of India in Hellenistic and Roman Literature - Cambridge Journals Online
> How to cite this article: Albrecht Dihle (1964). The Conception of India in Hellenistic and Roman Literature. The Cambridge Classical Journal, 10, pp 15-23 doi:10.1017/S0068673500003084
> 
> *THE CONCEPTION OF INDIA IN HELLENISTIC AND ROMAN LITERATURE
> 
> Going through the literature of late antiquity, of, say, the third and fourth centuries A.D., one is likely to discover very easily three different concepts of Indian geography. (1) In literary—not in scientific—texts which belong to the classical tradition, India is usually thought of as the country of two big rivers, namely the Indus and the Ganges. This India does not include the region south of the Vindhya mountains, in spite of the fact that the commercial relations between South India and the Roman empire had been particularly close during the first and second centuries A.D.1 India, according to this literary tradition, was accessible by land, by following the course of Alexander's campaign, whereas Indian trade in the Roman period actually followed the passage provided by the monsoon, which had been discovered in the late Hellenistic period. Many details of that classical or rather classicistic conception of India can be gathered from Philostratus' Life of Apollontus, written early in the third century A.D., as well as from the History of Alexander, falsely attributed to Callisthenes. (2) Another concept of Indian geography is to be found in those writings of the same period, of which the origin can be located within the Parthian or early Sasanid empire and its borderlands. Here, India comprehends only the region of the Indus and its tributaries, as it was considered, in Greece, before Alexander's campaign. This India is considered an Iranian India, for Parthian dynasts founded some little Kingdoms in that very region during the first century B.C., and it became, in the following centuries, the eastern part of the powerful Kushan empire, which was the most important factor in Parthian and Sasanid diplomacy. The usual way leading into this country went, in reality as well as according to the literary texts in question, by the sea-passage from Basra to Karachi, which is far more comfortable than the route through the Iranian Highlands and which had always been, for this very reason, the artery of Iranian trade. Commercial intercourse in the Persian Gulf was monopolized, for several centuries, by the merchants from Persian Mesopotamia. The author of the famous Periplus of the Red Sea, though disposing of extremely wide and detailed information, knew very little about the Persian Gulf, for he was a Greek from Egypt.2
> 
> 1 M. Wheeler, Rome beyond the Imperial Frontiers (London, 1955), pp. 3 The Syrian merchants of Parthian Mesopotamia probably introduced for a second time the Indian name of India and of the river Indus into Western languages. Our word India, denoting nowadays the subcontinent in general, goes back to the Old Persian hind, hindul as do the Greek 'IvSia, the Hebrew hoddu, the Aramaic henda. The name of Sindh, having by-passed Persia and kept its original s at the beginning of the word, is now used to denote only the region of the Indus. Within 'Western' languages, the difference between Sindh and India is common in Syrian chronography *
> _
> (R. Payne Smith, Thes. syr. p. 2676 and suppl. 236) and Islamic geography from the eighth century onwards (G. I.e Strange, The Lands of the Eastern Caliphate, Cambridge, 1930, p. 131). But the Indian word with its original s occurs for the first time in a Syrian text from Western Mesopotamia written in the third century A.D. According to the apocryphal Acts, St Thomas disembarked in an Indian harbour called sandaruk, which seems to correspond to the Persian sind{a)rud 'river Indus', as was shown by E. Herzfeld (for further discussions see J. Duchesne-Guillemin, La religion de Vlran ancien, Paris, 1962, p. 242, where J. Marquart, Abh._
> *
> l6 A. DIHLE
> 
> We find this second conception of India in the apocryphal Acts of St Thomas, wrinen in Edessa early in the third century A.D., and in the account of Mani's voyage from Mesopotamia to India.1 It can be verified as a quite realistic though limited conception—completely different from that of the classical tradition—by the evidence we have got for die flourishing trade between Mesopotamia and Northern India. (3) Finally, there is a third opinion about India, held only by Christian authors of Greek or Roman origin, according to which India is threefold like Caesar's Gaul. One part borders upon Parthia or Media, which is obviously Northern India. The second is connected with Ethiopia, but one can reach it by boat only, and the diird part lies at die end of the world. As for die second part bordering upon Ediiopia, only Soudi India or Limyrike2 (as this country was called by tradesmen and geographers) can be meant. Limyrike was not considered a part of India when it was discovered by a Greek sailor called Diodorus, probably in the second century B.C.3 Moreover, diere was a very old tradition about the identity of Indians and Ediiopians,4 which could easily be applied to Soudi India in die first centuries A.D., for Roman trade, going mainly by sea, had its western positions in Egypt, Soudi Arabia, and Abyssinia, diat is to say next to ancient Ediiopia (modern Sudan soudi of Egypt). Many Indian merchants lived in die coastal districts of die Red Sea,5 which were called, accordingly, f\ KOC6' T\\xas 'IvSia.6 Finally, many Greek geographers from the second century B.C. onwards believed diat Soudi India and East Africa were connected by a continental bridge. So a Greek of die first or second century A.D. was likely to wonder where die India of Roman tradesmen—diat is to say, Soudi India—really began and where die borderline between diat India, which was not Alexander's India, and Africa was to be drawn. The third part of die India tripartita of die Christians, supposed to lie at die end of die world, is by no means die country of Fairy Tales. Furdier India and die sea behind Malacca were discovered by a skipper called Alexandros late in die first or early in die second century A.D.7 Subsequently, many Greco-Roman tradesmen came to die harbours of Indo-China and starting from diese harbours even reached occasionally die capital of die Chinese empire.8 Now, the geographers of die second century A.D., Marinus and Ptolemy, made use of diis recent information. They described Indo-China as being a part of India and placed it at die very end of die inhabited world. In die early Christian literature we find diis India—including Nordi India, Soudi
> *
> _Ges. Wiss. Gottg. Hi (1901), 46 deserves to be mentioned). And in fact Sindh was closely linked with Parthian Mesopotamia by commercial intercourse (cf. App. Bell. civ. 5, 9, 37; H. Seyrig, Syria, xxii (1941), 263, and R. Goossens, Nouv. Clio (1957), p. 63). 1 Cf. G. Widengren, Mani (Stuttgart, 1961), p. 35. 2 Limyrike or Damyrike {Tab. Peut.) corresponds to the Sanskrit Dramidaka 'Country of the Tamils'. 3 Ptolem. i, 7, 6; v, 1. 4 Cf. Rhein. Mus. cv (1962), 97ff. 5 Peripl. Mar. Ruhr. 30. 6 Sozom. Hist. eccl. z, 24, I. 7 Ptolem. 1, 14; the authors of the first century A.D. know nothing about the regions behind Malacca and Sumatra, whereas the famous harbour of Kattigara is mentioned by nearly all geographers after Marinus the Tyrian. Cf. J. Coedes, Textes d'auteurs grecs et latins relatifs a I'Extreme Orient (Paris, 1910). 8 O. Franke, Geschichte des chinesischen Reiches I (Berlin, 1930), p. 404._
> *
> CONCEPTION OF INDIA IN HELLENISTIC AND ROMAN LITERATURE 17
> 
> India, and Further India or at least North India and South India—in the Pass'xa Bartholomaei, in several accounts of Metrodorus' and Meropius' travels,1 in the Commonitorium Palladii? and in some details already in Clement's writings. This conception was maintained until the sixth century at least.3 Perhaps we may be allowed to neglect the rather limited conception of India which only the Syrian writers had, and to concentrate on the comparison between the classical and the Christian ones. The most important observation to arise from this comparison might be described as follows. India as represented in early Christian writings, even in those which have some literary and stylistic pretensions, exactly corresponds to all the information which had been collected by sailors and tradesmen during the first two centuries A.D., information which had been used by the geographers of the same period but neglected by all the men of letters. On the other hand, India as represented in the literary text of pagan origin is, in fact, the country known to the Greeks 400 or 500 years previously. There is no relation between this literature in the narrow sense of the word and all that information about contemporary India which must have been easily available during a period of flourishing Indian trade, as is shown by the anonymous author of the famous Periplus of the Red Sea, which does not belong to literature according to classical standards. In order to explain this striking difference, we have to go back into earlier periods. We have still a fair number of literary texts concerning India from the first two centuries A.D.: Strabo's Book xv, the 6th Book of Pliny, Arrian's 'Iv5itc/|, and the geographical chapters of Curtius' History of Alexander. As we learn from the prefaces of Strabo and Ptolemy, the description of a country and its inhabitants was considered as belonging to literature, whereas geography in the narrow sense of the word dealt with mathematical methods of fixing positions. Ptolemy was interested only in scientific geography, as was Hipparchus in the Hellenistic period. But Strabo as well as Eratosthenes and Posidonius tried to combine both descriptive and scientific geography, and that is why they could possibly influence not only scientific opinions about foreign countries but also the representation of them in literary texts. All those authors of the imperial period I mentioned above, whose writings were published mainly for literary and stylistic reasons, took their information about India almost entirely from early Hellenistic sources, that is to say from the historians of Alexander's campaign and from Megasthenes and other ambassadors of his time. It is generally true that in writings about foreign countries the authors of the imperial epoch relied upon the important geographical, ethnographical, and historical literature of the late Hellenistic period, and took into account, too, new information arising from commercial intercourse of their own period. But so far as India is concerned, they neglected these sources almost entirely. This remarkable fact can be illustrated by some details from Strabo and Pliny.
> *
> _1 Rufin. hist. eccl. 10, 9; Socrat. 1, 19; Sozom. 2, 24; Theodt. 1, 23; Gelas. Cyz. 3, 9; Act. SS. Octobr. XH, 268. 1 Ed. J. D. M. Derrett, Class, et Med. (1960), p. 64, and Journ. Am. Or. Soc. LXXXII (1962), 21. 3 Expos, tot. mund. 18, 35.
> 2 CPS_
> *
> 18 A. DIHLE
> 
> Apollodorus of Anemita, who lived early in the first century B.C., wrote a History of the Parthians and the Bactrian Greeks. The work was undoubtedly most important, as the late Sir W. W. Tarn has already shown most clearly. Apollodorus mentions an expedition which the Bactrian Greeks undertook early in the second century B.C. against the tribes of Central Asia,1 and it is in this very context that the Seres,1 the eponyms of the silk-trade and silk-production, occur for the first time in Greek literature. But already from the end of the first century onwards, in Horace's and Vergil's verses for instance, the Seres are generally known to be the inhabitants of the north-easternmost part of the world. Now the important passage of Apollodorus' account,.which introduced the silk-men into Greek literature, has been preserved in Strabo's Geography, Possibly Strabo took the passage directly from Posidonius; but, in any case, Strabo considered Apollodorus a most reliable authority as far as Parthia, Bactria, and Central Asia were concerned, as is proved by many verbal quotations.3 This same Apollodorus gave a valuable account of the second Greek invasion of India.4 During the second century B.C. the Bactrian Greeks occupied the whole coastal region between Karachi and Baroda, and starting from these harbours of Northern India Greek sailors discovered the eastern coast of South India in that very period, as we can show from some short passages in later Greek texts.5 Moreover, Menander, the most famous among the Greco-Indian kings, made an assault on Pataliputra, the old Mauryan capital in the Ganges plain—a fact that is well attested by Indian sources.6 This campaign, being a well-planned expedition, must have given valuable information about the eastern parts of North India. Finally, the Greek kings of the second century came into close touch with their Indian subjects: Menander was a benefactor of Buddhism, as can be seen from his coins and from a famous book of early Buddhist literature, and he was buried according to Indian rites.? Strabo could easily have taken all this information from Apollodorus' history. But, so far as India is concerned, he cites his book only once and for the sole reason of blaming the author for having given information about India which was different from Megasthenes' account of 200 years before.8 Knowledge of India could not possibly improve on the information given by Megasthenes—according to Strabo's standards. *
> _
> 1 FgH 779 F7. 2 Amometus, a contemporary of Callimachus, did not write a book on the Seres, as was stated by F. Altheim {Weltgeschichu Asiens im griech. Zeitalter 1 (1947), 63), but on the Ottorocorrae {FgH 645 f 2, cf. A. Herrmann, RE 18, 2, 1888), that is to say the Uttara-kuru, the Hyperboreans of Indian mythology. 3 2, 5, 12; 11, 7, 3; n, 9, 1; ii, ii, 7; it seems to me highly probable that Strab. 11, 9, 2f. ( = FgH782 F 3) is derived from Apollodorus too. 4 FgH 779 F7 b. 5 The Samian Diodorus made a voyage from 'IVSIKT) to AIUUDIKTI (Ptolem. 1, 7, 6) and Aelian (hist. an. 15, 8) mentions pearl-fishers in the harbour of Perimula during the period of King Eucratides of Bactria, i.e. at the beginning of the second century B.C. Perimula is to be located on the south-western coast of India (Plin. N.H. 6, 72 and 9, 106). It seems to have been an outpost of the Chola kingdom ((3a<riA£us Zcopas). Cf. W. W. Tarn, The Greeks in Bactria and India (Cambridge2, 1951), pp. I43ff. 7 Vt'. W. Tarn, op. cit. pp. 217; 268ff.; 415ff. 8 Strab. 15. 1, 3. It is very curious that A. K. Narain {The Indo-Greeks, Oxford, 1957), in his polemics against Tarn, repeats the arguments Strabo used against Apollodorus. Narain did not take into account the classicistic tendency of Strabo's literary activity, as far as India is concerned._
> *
> CONCEPTION OF INDIA IN HELLENISTIC AND ROMAN LITERATURE 19
> 
> Posidonius and Artemidorus, the Ephesian geographer who lived about ioo B.C., were also authorities Strabo refers to through the whole of his Geography. In the chapters on India, however, Strabo quotes the Ephesian only once, rejecting his opinion about the course of the Ganges.1 Artemidorus' information is contrary to that of Eratosthenes and Megasthenes, but apparently far superior to all previous knowledge about the subject; it is perhaps a result of Menander's campaign. Posidonius' account of Eudoxos' discovery of the direct passage from Egypt to India is not reported in the book on India but only in the general preface to Strabo's Geography.'1 In the Indian chapters we hear only of Nearchus' famous expedition and, in addition, there are a few remarks about the regrettable fact that tradesmen in Strabo's own days were stupid people, from whom serious information about India could be hardly expected.3 As Strabo puts it, Indian geography and ethnography of the early Hellenistic period might possibly be corrected or supplemented, by contemporary information only. But Strabo obviously considered such information as was available to be unreliable or even worthless. The same combination of early Hellenistic sources and contemporaneous information is also to be found in Pliny's description of India.4 He follows almost entirely the accounts given by Megasthenes and Eratosthenes. He also repeats the well-known story of Nearchus' expedition, and describes the monsoon-passage, too, as belonging to his own period.5 We are told that the various routes of this passage came into use only gradually and over a fairly long period of time. The same opinion is held by the author of The Periplus of the Red Sea,6 but Pliny's knowledge of this historical development is more substantial, although his geographical knowledge cannot in any way be compared with the extensive and detailed information at the disposal of that anonymous sea-captain. Apparently Pliny took his information about seafaring developments in the Indian Ocean from literary sources which must have belonged to the latest Hellenistic period. But, since literary descriptions of India had to be composed mainly from Early Hellenistic elements, supplemented only by some contemporary information, Pliny was eager to conceal the Late Hellenistic source he was dependent on. Curtius and Arrian took all their Indian information from Early Hellenistic literature, Eratosthenes included. And although both of them are likely to consider Indian geography a mere addition to the account of Alexander's achievements, they include a description of the Ganges plain, which Alexander never entered, for that region had been treated in Megasthenes' narrative, which was considered an indispensable and canonical work on Indian geography and ethnography.7 The same can be stated about Greek lexicography. There is no Indian word or name discussed in Greek glossaries that does not seem to come from Early Hellenistic 1 Strab. 15, 1, 72. » Strab. 2, 3, 4. ' Strab. 15, 1, 4. « NJi. 6, 56ff. 5 6, lOiff. *Peripl.i7. ' The author of the Periplus, whose literary erudition is extremely weak, tells us that Alexander reached the riverG anges (47). This is a striking testimony to the vulgar belief according to which India is the country of two big rivers and the country Alexander subjugated.
> 2O A.DIHLE sources,1 whereas many other exotic words of non-Indian origin dealt with inj grammatical writings are taken from Late Hellenistic authors as well, such as Artemidorus, Posidonius, or Agatharchides. Aelian, too, took all the Indian examples for his zoology either from Ctesias or from Early Hellenistic authors—with one exception only, mentioned above.2 There are, of course, during the first two centuries A.D. some casual references to contemporary India in historiography^ and in literary texts of low quality such as Mimes4 and erotic novels. 5 That could hardly be avoided during a period when thousands of Greek sailors made the annual passage from Egypt to India, when so many Greek soldiers, merchants, and craftsmen worked and lived in South India that a temple dedicated to the cult of the Roman emperor was built at Cape Comorin.6 But every author likely to have had stylistic ambitions avoided any allusion to contemporary or late Hellenistic India. Eventually, a note on late Hellenistic India even lost its relation to India, when its content had been incorporated into literary tradition, as we can see in a passage of Plutarch.? He describes King Menander's funeral and is likely to have derived his knowledge of the subject not directly from Apollodorus* History but from a treatise De fiinerihus mirabilibus. Plutarch did not even know that Menander had ruled in India. He makes him a king of Bactria, which never belonged to his kingdom. So we may conclude that—according to the standards of literary tradition in the time of the Roman empire—India was to all intents and purposes the country Alexander subjugated and Megasthenes lived in, and nothing else. I do not believe it was simply the general classicism of the imperial epoch that preserved Early Hellenistic India unchanged within Greco-Roman literature, since so many other details of Late Hellenistic geography had been introduced into the literary tradition.8 Certainly, it was the dominating part Alexander played in any kind of literary tradition that prevented his India from being transformed into the India of contemporary reality. His Indian expedition excited people's imagination more than any other of his achievements, and, moreover, it was due to those accounts that India became the country of the most ancient philosophy. India's literary dignity entirely depended on Alexander and his campaign, and that is why later information, arising from increasing commercial intercourse and utilized by scientists, was never admitted into the literary tradition. Moreover, early Hellenistic India was protected by Eratosthenes' authority, whose geography was to influence both science and literature, since it comprehended ethnographical description and mathematical research. But in early Christian literature the conception of India definitely changed and was
> *
> _' The Maurya dynasty ruled from the late fourth to the early second century B.C. The word pcopieis is explained as the title of Indian kings in Hesychius' glossary. The corresponding Indian form of the name comes from a Middle Indian dialect, not from the Sanskrit (cf. Luders, K.Z. 38, 433)2 See above, p. 18, n. 5. 3 Tac. ann_ I4) 25, 4 D. L. Page, Creek Literary Papyri (London, 1950), p. 336. 5 Xen. Eph. 3, nf. 6 This temple is attested by die Tabula Peudngeriana. ' Praec. reip. ger. 821 D. 8 Apart from the Seres already mentioned we find Britons and Germans, Garamantes and Blemmyes in literary texts of the Imperial period as well as in geograpliical treatises._
> *
> CONCEPTION OF INDIA IN HELLENISTIC AND ROMAN LITERATURE 21
> adapted to really existing conditions. We are able to prove this change not only by comparing the different size and shape given to India in pagan and in Christian literature but also by noting differences in the ethnographical details attached to the general idea of India. Doxographical accounts in Hellenistic and Roman philosophy usually contain a chapter on 91X00-09(0: fJapfiapos where we read something about theologians of Egypt, Persian Magi, Celtic Druids, and the like. In those lists, India is represented either by the Gymnosophists or by two groups of ascetics called Brahmans and Sarmans. Gymnosophists and Brahmans are well known to the historians of Alexander's campaign, but the combination of Brahmans and Sarmans was introduced into Greek literature by Megasthenes.1 As we know from King Ashoka's inscriptions (third century B.C.), bramanairamananam was used as a comprehensive term for all brahmanic and non-brahmanic ascetics, not as a name for individual sects such as Buddhists or Jains. Megasthenes used the Greek transliteration—Bpcrxnovss Kod ZccpuavES— in exactly the same way, for he knew perfectly well that there were far more than two Indian sects. Accordingly, he described many of them and even gave a verifiable account of the Jains,* for the ZEMNOI dealt with in that fragment are in fact the fENNOl mentioned in Hesychius' glossary.' Megasthenes' descriptions are remarkably detailed, his translations and transliterations of Indian names astonishingly correct; sometimes we are even able to ascertain whether the corresponding Indian word came from Sanskrit or from a Middle Indian dialect. Under these circumstances it seems to be noteworthy that Buddha and his teaching never occur in Greek literature. Apparently Megasthenes did not mention it. Now the rise of Buddhism to outstanding importance in Indian social and spiritual life began under King Ashoka's rule, when regular diplomatic relations between the Hellenistic kingdoms and the Mauryan empire had ceased to be maintained, and when the list of canonical Greek books on India had been established. For this very reason, I believe, Buddha's title and Buddha's doctrine never occur in Greco-Roman texts of pagan origin and literary pretension.4 Now Clement of Alexandria may fairly be considered the first Christian writer to be master of all the elements of literary and philosophic erudition which were available in his lifetime. Accordingly, the record he gives of 91X0x709(0 p&pf3ctpos is extremely rich as far as traditional items are concerned.5 But, in addition, he supplied new information within the traditional catalogue, which was apparently an innovation, for
> *
> _1 FgH715*33* It seems to me very likely that all pieces of information given in Clem. Al. strom. 3, 60, 2-4 go back to Megasthenes' report, the fragment attributed to Alexander Polyhistor (FgH 273 F18)— perhaps Clement's primary source—included, for there are no other notes on India in Clement's compilation which cannot be traced back to Megasthenes. 3 CAPMANEC has been changed to TAPMANEC in Strabo's text too. 4 It seems to me highly disputable whether the Indian goddess Mala, praised in P. Oxy. 1380 as being identical with Isis, is in fact the mother of the Buddha. All the other goddesses mentioned in this liturgy and identified as appearances of Isis are famous and cosmic goddesses, whereas the mother of the Buddha never became a goddess at all. Moreover, the text does not represent Greek literary tradition.
> 
> 5 Strom. 1, 17, 3ff.; cf. Mullus, Festschrift fur Theodor Ktauser (Mflnster, 1964), p. 60.
> 22 A.DIHLE_
> *
> the catalogue of exotic philosophers had been fixed at least 200 years previously and had not been changed since. As for India, Clement mentions Brahmans and Sarmans, known from Megasthenes' report. But, moreover, he introduces the Xauotvotloi of Bactria. In those days, the name of Bactria usually meant the powerful Kushan empire which included large parts of Eastern Iran and of North India.1 Under Kushan rule, probably in the second century A.D., Sanskrit became the sacred language of Northern Buddhism and the word sramana, the Sanskrit equivalent of Greek lapnavEs, became the well-known title of Buddhist monks. Starting from the monasteries of the Kushan empire, Buddhist missionaries came to China, where their title was transformed into sha-men, and also to Western countries. There are ssamana, that is to say Buddhists, among the victims of a persecution directed by the Zoroastrian clergy of the Sasanid empire and recorded in a Middle Persian inscription of the third century A.D.2 The lingua franca within the Parthian and early Sasanid empire and in its western borderland was still the Aramaic language. Consequently the western Buddhists were known to Syrians and Greeks under the name of samanaija, of which the Greek transcription was to be Xanocvaioi—just like other Aramaic plurals such as Oocpiacaoi, Za58ouKonoi, MoryouaaToi, etc. So we can trace the title of Buddhist monks from sramana to the Persian ssamana to the Aramaic samanaija to the Greek Zctnocvccloi— which we find for the first time in Clement's catalogue. He did not notice that Megasthenes' Zappaves bore the same Indian name as the Zajjocvccloi he knew about. But Clement was quite right, unconsciously perhaps, in not identifying them, for his Zanocvaioi were Buddhists and Megasthenes' Zotpiactves were not, or not necessarily, since Sramana was a comprehensive title in those days. As for the samanaija/Zctuocvocioi, we still possess a detailed description of their communities, written a few years later than Clement's Stromateis by the famous Syrian author Bar Daisan, who lived at Edessa next to the Persian frontier.^ But Clement did not confine his attention to the Buddhists of North-western India (whence information came to him through Persia and Mesopotamia and, consequently, through various languages). He introduced also the Indian worshippers of Buddha, but separated them from the Sanavcrtoi. Apparently, the two pieces of information about Buddhism came to Clement by different ways, and that is the reason why he made no attempt to combine them. So we are led to believe that the second piece of information, including the title of Buddha himself, came directly from South India, which had been closely linked to Egypt for at least two centuries. It must have been common knowledge in Greco-Roman Egypt from the first century A.D. onwards that there was a religion in India devoted to the worship of the Enlightened. Too many Greeks, mainly from Egypt, visited or even lived in South India, where Buddhism flourished during the first centuries A.D., and too many Indians visited Egypt, for such a thing to go unnoticed. But, as we concluded, there was no literary dignity in this comparatively new complex of information, since the
> *
> _1 Euseb. Praep. ev. 6, 10, 14 = Bardesanes, Lib. leg. reg. 31 Nau. * Ed. M. L. Chaumont, Journ. Aslat. CCXLVTII (1960), 339. 3 Porph. de abstin. 4, I7f.
> _
> *CONCEPTION OF IND/A IN HELLENISTIC AND ROMAN LITERATURE 23
> 
> image of India in the literary and philosophic tradition had been definitively shaped in the Early Hellenistic period. It does not seem to be a mere coincidence that it was a Christian who was to violate this literary taboo for the first time. Today we are inclined to emphasize the continuity of scholarly activity, of literary style, and of general education, which undoubtedly subsists between the pagan and the Christian part of Greco-Roman literature. We usually think of Plotinus and Clement, of St Jerome and Macrobius, as being representatives of the same literary and philosophical tradition, even as belonging to the same social class. Obviously we have to be cautious about those generalizations. As for the concept of India, there seems to be a striking difference between the two groups of Greco-Roman authors, a difference concerning the fundamental attitude towards a tradition which was, in fact, the generally accepted basis of every literary, scholarly, and philosophic activity for both pagans and Christians. Christians like Clement and St Jerome, who also gave interesting accounts of Buddhist teachings,1 did not disclaim the literary standards of the Greco-Roman civilization they belonged to. But they disengaged themselves from this very tradition to an extent diat enabled them to transform it according to their own experience, according to reality.
> KOLN ALBRECHT DIHLE
> 
> ALEXANDER THE GREAT AND AN EXPERIMENT IN GOVERNMENT*
> 
> In early summer of the year 334, only a few weeks after his crossing into Asia Minor and perhaps only a week or two after his first victory in Asia at the river Granicus, Alexander was in Sardes making arrangements for the future government of the satrapy of Lydia, the second of the Persian satrapies to be annexed in this way. Besides appointing in each case a Macedonian to be satrap in place of the former Persian official, and besides making certain special arrangements in each province, at Sardes he appointed a (probably) Greek officer Nicias to be in charge of the financial administration of Lydia.3 This appointment has always been recognized as a particularly interesting one, because it provides the earliest evidence suggesting an administrative experiment undertaken by Alexander, if it is true, as is usually thought, that he was introducing here something new into the government of the empire in Asia,
> 1 Adv. Jov. 1, 42. 1 This paper has been expanded in places and contracted in others partly as a result of the discussion after it was read to the Society. I am grateful especially to Professor D. L. Page, Professor A. H. M. Jones and Mr F. H. Sandbach for their constructive suggestions. My thanks are due also to Dr E. Badian for reading it at a late stage, when I could unfortunately make only small changes in proof in the light of his stimulating criticism and suggestions.
> *
> _Abbreviations: A. Arrian, Anabasis.
> Berve H. Berve, Das AUxanderrekh auf prosopographischer Grundlage (Munich, 1926)._
> 
> It's interesting that the concept of _*Ινδική* _has meant differant things in the past.
> 
> 1 (a) Ινδική > The Indus region that is modern Pakistan.
> (b) Hendosh > The Achaemenid Persian satrapy covering modern Sindh in Pakistan.
> 2. Ινδική > The Indus region and Ganges basin.
> 3. Limyrike > Deccan region or modern South India.




Thank Heavens for small mercies. This is worth one's while.


Apprentice said:


> India has a fake identity. The notion of Indian identity failed in 1947 and is in direct contradiction to the sovereignty of neighbouring lands such as Bhutan, Nepal, Burma, Sri Lanka etc. Moreover, rarely has India existed as a united entity in history.
> 
> All in all Indian nationalism is territorial nationalism. Whereas for Pakistanis, nationalism is religious nationalism. All practising Muslims are religious nationalists. Its the non-practising ones who prefer ethnic identity over religious.
> 
> All in all Pakistanis (he practising Muslim section) have a stronger identity than Indians.




OF COURSE you do. That is why non-practising Pakistanis and non-Muslims have next to no identity.



Tiger7 said:


> This is rather a funny claim considering the fact that the people of Pakistan never had their own identity since
> ancient times as Pakistan was mostly under foreign rule in the past.



Typical stupid mistake. You are confusing facts with nationalism, with a patriotic outlook. They don't belong together.

I think threads such as this should be banned and deleted in their entirety.

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## Tergon18

@Joe Shearer Please tell me how anything I have said is 'fake'. The thing is, that there has been no literature of 'Hindi' i.e Hindustani + Old Sanskrit used for higher vocabulary, before the 19th century.


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## Joe Shearer

Tergon18 said:


> @Joe Shearer Please tell me how anything I have said is 'fake'. The thing is, that there has been no literature of 'Hindi' i.e Hindustani + Old Sanskrit used for higher grammar, before the 19th century.



Frankly, it's too much trouble. Five years ago, I'd have leaped to explain. Even four, three years ago. Now I just sneer and let it past. There are enough Indian trolls to greet your inappropriate explanations with raucous welcomes, their understanding of the subject being on par with yours. No need for me to spend quality time on two sets of goons. not very well-read people.


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## Tergon18

Joe Shearer said:


> Frankly, it's too much trouble. Five years ago, I'd have leaped to explain. Even four, three years ago. Now I just sneer and let it past. There are enough Indian trolls to greet your inappropriate explanations with raucous welcomes, their understanding of the subject being on par with yours. No need for me to spend quality time on two sets of goons.



Honestly, why are you dodging the question, labelling me as a troll and a 'goon' (lol), when I havent abused anyone or have been troll-like? If anything, you'd fit the definition, labelling people as trolls, goons and fakes without bothering to explain why.


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## Joe Shearer

Tergon18 said:


> Honestly, why are you dodging the question, labelling me as a troll and a 'goon' (lol), when I havent abused anyone or have been troll-like? If anything, you'd fit the definition, labelling people as trolls, goons and fakes without bothering to explain why.



OK, I retract the goons. If you look carefully, you never got called a troll. That would have been inaccurate.

I refuse to engage in these discussions because I am sick and tired of them. I've suffered them almost on a quarterly basis for several years no. Enough is enough.


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## Tergon18

Joe Shearer said:


> OK, I retract the goons. If you look carefully, you never got called a troll. That would have been inaccurate.
> 
> I refuse to engage in these discussions because I am sick and tired of them. I've suffered them almost on a quarterly basis for several years no. Enough is enough.



Ok, fair enough, but if you didn't want to argue on this, you could've simply you know...not comment maybe? Calling people fakes and then refusing to explain why is not the way.
Honestly, your reaction is kind of over the top for this, either tell me how I am wrong before calling me 'not well-read', or dont comment at all. Its rather simple, you see.


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## Joe Shearer

Tergon18 said:


> Ok, fair enough, but if you didn't want to argue on this, you could've simply you know...not comment maybe? Calling people fakes and then refusing to explain why is not the way.
> Honestly, your reaction is kind of over the top for this, either tell me how I am wrong before calling me 'not well-read', or dont comment at all. Its rather simple, you see.



No, it isn't.

There's too much propaganda on PDF. Too much of people offering opinions with no basis and no foundations.

If you don't know a subject, you could abstain from raising it, instead of asking those who recognise it for what it is to do that.

You - and several others - didn't know the subject, and I wish all of you had abstained from comment upon it, and from raising it.

I am ignoring further self-justifying comment.


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## Tergon18

Joe Shearer said:


> No, it isn't.
> 
> There's too much propaganda on PDF. Too much of people offering opinions with no basis and no foundations.
> 
> If you don't know a subject, you could abstain from raising it, instead of asking those who recognise it for what it is to do that.
> 
> You - and several others - didn't know the subject, and I wish all of you had abstained from comment upon it, and from raising it.
> 
> I am ignoring further self-justifying comment.



Alright, this is getting really absurd now. Do you have PTSD related to this subject? You don't have an argument here do you? I tried to be respectful and to understand what you were trying to say, but your labelling of something that you cant argue on as 'propaganda' is hilarious.

Again, as I said earlier, either you tell people how they are wrong or you don't go on calling them 'not well-read fakes'. No need to get triggered by the subject or promising the wrath of Indian trolls on me.


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## Post Colonnial

Tergon18 said:


> Do you even know how Hindi was formed?
> Urdu and Hindustani are synonymous with one another...both terms are intertwined. Hindi is a bastardisation of Urdu. In the late 1880s, north Indian Hindu nationalists were fed up with Urdu/Hindustani becoming the dominant language. After the failed 1857 War of Independence, the British banned Persian...this led to the explosion of Urdu/Hindustani. This language was written using the Persian-Urdu alphabet. From 1857 to the 1880s, Urdu became the most spoken and written language in British India.
> 
> The north Indian Hindus didn't like that...they saw Urdu with its Persian script as being an "invading" language. So in the 1880s, they came up with "Hindi"...they took all the Persian based words in Urdu and replaced them with Sanskrit words and changed the script from Persian alphabet to Devanagari. This resulted in the formation of Hindi....which is basically Sanskritised Urdu written in Devangari script. This is the reason why Hindi sounds so unnatural.
> 
> It's no different from Croatian-Serbian language dispute. The original Balkan language was written in Acrylic as Serbian language is today. The Croats in an attempt to differentiate themselves from there Serb enemies took the language, and changed the script to Roman...and called it "Croatian".
> 
> The same thing happened with Urdu to Hindi.



This sounds completely different from history of Hindi. Acc to wikipedia "Hindi is considered to be a direct descendant of Sanskrit, through Sauraseni Prakrit and Śauraseni Apabhraṃśa. It has been influenced by Dravidian languages, Turkish, Persian, Arabic, Portuguese and English.[12] Hindi emerged as Apabhramsha (Sanskrit:अपभ्रंश; Corruption or corrupted speech), a degenerated form of Prakrit, in the 7th century A.D. By the 10th century A.D., it became stable. Braj, Awadhi, Khari Boli etc. are the dialects of Hindi. The dialect of Hindustani on which Standard Hindi is based is _Khariboli_, the vernacular of Delhi and the surrounding western Uttar Pradesh and southern Uttarakhand. _Urdu_, literally meaning, "the language of the camp", a dialect of Hindustani, acquired official linguistic prestige in the later Mughal period (1800s).".

This I think means urdu was merely a dilect that the mughals either promoted or somehow gained a status higher than a mere dialect during their period.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hindi


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## Tergon18

Post Colonnial said:


> This sounds completely different from history of Hindi. Acc to wikipedia "Hindi is considered to be a direct descendant of Sanskrit, through Sauraseni Prakrit and Śauraseni Apabhraṃśa. It has been influenced by Dravidian languages, Turkish, Persian, Arabic, Portuguese and English.[12] Hindi emerged as Apabhramsha (Sanskrit:अपभ्रंश; Corruption or corrupted speech), a degenerated form of Prakrit, in the 7th century A.D. By the 10th century A.D., it became stable. Braj, Awadhi, Khari Boli etc. are the dialects of Hindi. The dialect of Hindustani on which Standard Hindi is based is _Khariboli_, the vernacular of Delhi and the surrounding western Uttar Pradesh and southern Uttarakhand. _Urdu_, literally meaning, "the language of the camp", a dialect of Hindustani, acquired official linguistic prestige in the later Mughal period (1800s).".
> 
> This I think means urdu was merely a dilect that the mughals either promoted or somehow gained a status higher than a mere dialect during their period.
> 
> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hindi



That is Hindustani you are talking about, not Hindi. I recognize Hindustani. Hindi, on the other hand is a language that has been purged of all Persian, Arabic and Turkish influences in the 19th century, by Hindu nationalists. These days the term Hindustani has become synonymous with Hindi but there's quite a difference, especially in history.

A Hindustani language relying on higher vocabulary on Old Sanskrit did not exist before the 19th century. Nor was it written in the Devanagiri script prior to that. 

Just like how English, a West Germanic language of the Anglo-Frisian branch, relies on Greek, Latin and French for it's higher vocabulary, Hindustani relied on Persian, Arabic and Turkish for it's higher vocabulary until purged by Hindu nationalists of them in the 19th century. I think the LangFocus YouTube channel (link provided by another user above) has explained the differences between them quite well. This is just the history. You won't find an example of Hindustani using Old Sanskrit for higher vocabulary in literature before the 19th century.

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## Levina

Joe Shearer said:


> An original contribution, but typical of its class: Perception without comprehension


Pls add me back to your ignore list sir.

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## Post Colonnial

Tergon18 said:


> That is Hindustani you are talking about, not Hindi. I recognize Hindustani. Hindi, on the other hand is a language that has been purged of all Persian, Arabic and Turkish influences in the 19th century, by Hindu nationalists. These days the term Hindustani has become synonymous with Hindi but there's quite a difference, especially in history.
> 
> A Hindustani language relying on higher vocabulary on Old Sanskrit did not exist before the 19th century. Nor was it written in the Devanagiri script prior to that. Just like how English, a West Germanic language of the Anglo-Frisian branch, relies on Greek, Latin and French for it's higher vocabulary, Hindustani relied on Persian, Arabic and Turkish for it's higher vocabulary until purged by Hindu nationalists of them in the 19th century. I think the LangFocus YouTube channel (link provided by another user above) has explained the differences between them quite well. This is just the history. You won't find an example of Hindustani using Old Sanskrit for higher vocabulary in literature before the 19th century.



the point I got from the wikipedia was both Hindi and Urdu were dialects of Hindustani; with Hindi over time being sourced a lot more from Sanskrit and Urdu being sourced a lot more from persian turkish etc; with urdu attaining fame after the mughals (which to me implied Hindi attained broader acceptance before that).

PS: I juts got to see the video someone posted. That confirms my suspicion. Both Hindi and Urdu came from Hindustani, are almost identical in common usage.


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## Tergon18

Post Colonnial said:


> the point I got from the wikipedia was both Hindi and Urdu were dialects of Hindustani; with Hindi over time being sourced a lot more from Sanskrit and Urdu being sourced a lot more from persian turkish etc; with urdu attaining fame after the mughals (which to me implied Hindi attained broader acceptance before that).



Not really dialects in the conventional sense, since both incorporate elements of different language families and are written in different scripts, but in a sense they could be. But that is not my point here. What the Wikipedia article does is take Hindi to be synonymous with Hindustani which isnt the case today or even a hundred years ago.

The thing is, that Hindustani or casual Hindi still has some Persian origin words, such as dil and zindagi, while Hindi (the form that we would associate with Nat Geo commentary) is basically purged of all Persian, Arabic and Turkish words for higher vocabulary and instead uses Old Sanskrit for them. Literature of this language, in the Devanagiri script, before the 19th century, the time when Persian, Arabic and Turkish words got purged from it by Hindu nationalists, isn't found. A Hindustani language using Old Sanskrit for it's higher vocabulary that is.

Urdu or Hindustani on the other hand, could have been said to began around the times of the Delhi Sultanate, with Amir Khusro forming his poetry at the time, written in the Perso-Arabic script. The article mostly mentions this Hindustani language.

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## Post Colonnial

Tergon18 said:


> Not really dialects in the conventional sense, since both incorporate elements of different language families and are written in different scripts, but in a sense they could be. But that is not my point here. What the Wikipedia article does is take Hindi to be synonymous with Hindustani which isnt the case today or even a hundred years ago.
> 
> The thing is, that Hindustani or casual Hindi still has some Persian origin words, such as dil and zindagi, while Hindi (the form that we would associate with Nat Geo commentary) is basically purged of all Persian, Arabic and Turkish words for higher vocabulary and instead uses Old Sanskrit for them. Literature of this language, in the Devanagiri script, before the 19th century, the time when Persian, Arabic and Turkish words got purged from it, isn't found. A Hindustani language using Old Sanskrit for it's higher vocabulary that is.
> 
> Urdu or Hindustani on the other hand, could have said to begin around the times of the Delhi Sultanate, with Amir Khusro forming his poetry at the time, written in the Perso-Arabic script. The article mostly mentions this Hindustani language.



but then how do account for the heritage that the video very clearly outlines? It goes very clearly that Hindi & Urdu came from Hindustani; Hindustani came from Sauraseni Prakrit which in turn came from Sanskrit. This would imply that Sanskrit roots are most natural to Hindustani (and its offsprings viz Hindi and Urdu) and if any purging took place it must have been to take Sanskrit words out of Urdu and replace them with Persian equivalents. This last notion is also fully corraborated by the the statement that the mughals (turkic mongol descent) 'looked up' to Persian culture and civilization and used Persian as their preferred franca, even neglecting their own turkic mongol roots.


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## Tergon18

Post Colonnial said:


> but then how do account for the heritage that the video very clearly outlines? It goes very clearly that Hindi & Urdu came from Hindustani; Hindustani came from Sauraseni Prakrit which in turn came from Sanskrit. This would imply that Sanskrit roots are most natural to Hindustani (and its offsprings viz Hindi and Urdu) and if any purging took place it must have been to take Sanskrit words out of Urdu and replace them with Persian equivalents. This last notion is also fully corraborated by the the statement that the mughals (turkic mongol descent) 'looked up' to Persian culture and civilization and used Persian as their preferred franca, even neglecting their own turkic mongol roots.



I do agree with the fact that both Urdu and Hindi mostly have their basis in the Hindustani language. However the fact is that Urdu developed over a period of around eight hundred years, while Hindi is merely around a hundred years old.

If you take English, and purge it of all Greek, Latin and French words used for higher vocabulary and replace them with the ancestor of the English language, Proto-Germanic, and start using a form of primitive Germanic script to write them, instead of the Latin script in which we are currently writing (which is foreign to England) I am sure it would sound quite unnatural as well as opposed to the Greek, Latin and French words used for higher vocabulary present in English that have been allowed to develop over a period of eight hundred years or longer in English. This is how linguistics work. If you go back further in time, Persian and Sanskrit have common origins as well, both being descendants of the Proto-Indo-Iranian language, so they aren't that foreign to each other, really.

Same is the case with Urdu and Hindi. You would not find literature of Hindustani using Old Sanskrit for higher vocabulary, in the Devanagiri script prior to the time of it's purging, the 19th century but you would find literature of Hindustani using Persian, Arabic and Turkish for higher vocabulary as old as eight hundred or so years ago, in the Perso-Arabic script.

That is the difference between Urdu and Hindi.

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## Levina

Joe Shearer said:


> I couldn't possibly.
> 
> This is the most entertainment I have had with my clothes on.


Sorry.
I'm not here for your entertainment and I'm going to ensure we don't cross each other's path or else I'll loose whatever lil respect I've for you...sir.
I won't be replying to your posts anymore.

@MilSpec @nair @SpArK
(None of you need to reply to this post, I Jst wanted to bring this to ur notice.Thats all). Sorry for the off-topic but I thought this was necessary.

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## Joe Shearer

Levina said:


> Sorry.
> I'm not here for your entertainment and I'm going to ensure we don't cross each other's path or else I'll loose whatever respect I've for you...sir.
> @MilSpec @nair @SpArK
> (None of you need to reply to this post, I Jst wanted to bring this to ur notice.Thats all). Sorry for the off-topic but I thought this was necessary.



You will decide that not by threats or notices but by the contents of your posts. Your posts are entertaining, and nothing else.


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## 911

Tergon18 said:


> Do you even know how Hindi was formed?
> Urdu and Hindustani are synonymous with one another...both terms are intertwined. Hindi is a bastardisation of Urdu. In the late 1880s, north Indian Hindu nationalists were fed up with Urdu/Hindustani becoming the dominant language. After the failed 1857 War of Independence, the British banned Persian...this led to the explosion of Urdu/Hindustani. This language was written using the Persian-Urdu alphabet. From 1857 to the 1880s, Urdu became the most spoken and written language in British India.
> 
> The north Indian Hindus didn't like that...they saw Urdu with its Persian script as being an "invading" language. So in the 1880s, they came up with "Hindi"...they took all the Persian based words in Urdu and replaced them with Sanskrit words and changed the script from Persian alphabet to Devanagari. This resulted in the formation of Hindi....which is basically Sanskritised Urdu written in Devangari script. This is the reason why Hindi sounds so unnatural.
> 
> It's no different from Croatian-Serbian language dispute. The original Balkan language was written in Acrylic as Serbian language is today. The Croats in an attempt to differentiate themselves from there Serb enemies took the language, and changed the script to Roman...and called it "Croatian".
> 
> The same thing happened with Urdu to Hindi.


Hindi evolved from Khariboli, not Urdu, you are confused because the base is same except loan words. Urdu too has evolved, and still evolving (recent change replacent of word Khuda by Allah). Urdu of today is not same as Hindustani as you claim, there were many changes in past specially in Zia era. Pure Urdu and Pure Hindi speakers are very rare, what most people speak is corrupted versions of Hindustani both in India and Pakistan. There must be some Sanskrit loaned/evolved words present in Urdu even today such as Chand which you might want to replace slong with famous Pakistani Punjabi chant "Jeevay Jeevay Pakistan", Jeevay is evolved from Jeevan/Jeevit. Oh great Indus man, the sole owner of the Indus, you are very confused, on one hand you take pride in everything related to Indus on the other hand you ridicule Sanskrit. Joe Shearer is right, most propaganda threads on history go unchallenged. Your posts on Indus civilization are more hateful rants than facts. You can't apply today's demographics and apply on 5000 year old history and create arguments based on it. As i said earlier no matter what narrative Pakistan adopts (Mighty invaders , Mighty Indus man or anything else in future) one basic thing remains common is that people living in today's Pakistan and India have been entirely different throughout history.


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## nair

Levina said:


> Sorry.
> I'm not here for your entertainment and I'm going to ensure we don't cross each other's path or else I'll loose whatever respect I've for you...sir.
> I won't be replying to your posts anymore.
> 
> @MilSpec @nair @SpArK
> (None of you need to reply to this post, I Jst wanted to bring this to ur notice.Thats all). Sorry for the off-topic but I thought this was necessary.



That post (the one you quoted) was a pretty low one and uncalled for and least expected........

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## Tiger7

Joe Shearer said:


> What a pity.
> 
> 
> Typical stupid mistake. You are confusing facts with nationalism, with a patriotic outlook. They don't belong together.
> 
> I think threads such as this should be banned and deleted in their entirety.


Not really. It is a fact that Pakistan was mostly ruled by foreign invaders throughout its history as the people of the Indus region did not have a strong identity as it was mostly dominated by tribal chiefs who were not united among themselves.


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## Joe Shearer

Tiger7 said:


> Not really. It is a fact that Pakistan was mostly ruled by foreign invaders throughout its history as the people of the Indus region did not have a strong identity as it was mostly dominated by tribal chiefs who were not united among themselves.



You didn't get it, obviously. I'm saying precisely that, that the facts represent something. But patriotic outlook demands that the facts be ignored.


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## Tergon18

911 said:


> Hindi evolved from Khariboli, not Urdu, you are confused because the base is same except loan words. Urdu too has evolved, and still evolving (recent change replacent of word Khuda by Allah). Urdu of today is not same as Hindustani as you claim, there were many changes in past specially in Zia era. Pure Urdu and Pure Hindi speakers are very rare, what most people speak is corrupted versions of Hindustani both in India and Pakistan. There must be some Sanskrit loaned/evolved words present in Urdu even today such as Chand which you might want to replace slong with famous Pakistani Punjabi chant "Jeevay Jeevay Pakistan", Jeevay is evolved from Jeevan/Jeevit. Oh great Indus man, the sole owner of the Indus, you are very confused, on one hand you take pride in everything related to Indus on the other hand you ridicule Sanskrit. Joe Shearer is right, most propaganda threads on history go unchallenged. Your posts on Indus civilization are more hateful rants than facts. You can't apply today's demographics and apply on 5000 year old history and create arguments based on it. As i said earlier no matter what narrative Pakistan adopts (Mighty invaders , Mighty Indus man or anything else in future) one basic thing remains common is that people living in today's Pakistan and India have been entirely different throughout history.



Again, you have totally missed the point of my argument. I am not arguing for the similarities or differences. I have already said earlier that the basis for them, is the Hindustani language, you have completely missed my point.
And no, the word Khuda as well as Allah is used, I don't know where you have gotten that from. This topic has got more to do with the semantics of language, more than anything else and is unrelated to this.
Khariboli is the name used for Hindustani language, some 300 years ago, written in the Perso-Arabic script with Persian, Arabic and Turkish words being used for higher vocabulary. Look up the poetry of Ghalib and Mir Taqi Mir for this.
I don't think a long-term effort to try to purge Urdu of whatever influences that you think were, done in Zia's era. Read some Urdu literature from the 40s, of Patras Bokhari or Altaf Hussain Hali and you'll know what I mean. Not a lot (if any) differences.

Pure Urdu and Pure Hindi both are taught at schools and are used in the media, both written and electronic, and also in literature but yes, the casual form is Hindustani, which I have noted above as well.

The word for moon in Vedic Sanskrit, atleast, is māsa not chand. And yes, the word Jeeway has evolved out of the Vedic Sanskrit word jīva, and almost the exact same word is found in Avestani Persian, as zīva. Both words have evolved out of a single Proto-Indo-Iranian word, gʷih₃wós (jwihos). Remember, Old Vedic Sanskrit and Old Avestani Persian used to be one language, Proto-Indo-Iranian until 2000 BC. This is why these words, (jind and zind) are quite often interchangeable. They belong to the same Indo-Iranian language family. You can compare the words of Proto-Indo-Iranian here https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Proto-Indo-Iranian_language

And coming to the Hindi-Urdu part. I have explained this countless times above, and there is little point in repeating the same thing over and over again to clueless people. From the wikipedia article on the Hindi-Urdu controversy:

'A Persianized variant of Hindi and Urdu, began to take shape during the Delhi Sultanate(1206–1526 AD) and Mughal Empire (1526–1858 AD) in South Asia
Urdu, along with English became the first official language of British India in 1850...Although the need to have a language for Hindus developed post 1850, *the irrevocable birth of Hindi language took place in 1880*...Hindi and Urdu started to diverge linguistically, with Hindi drawing on Sanskrit as the primary source for formal and academic vocabulary, often with a *conscious attempt to purge the language of Persian-derived equivalents.*'

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hindi–Urdu_controversy

Honestly, you accusing me of 'ridiculing' Sanskrit is rather hilarious. Why would I do that? Merely saying that a constructed language, only a little more than a hundred years old, which was concsiously purged of certain influences and replaced with others will sound unnatural, isnt ridicule. That is because it is the very definition of unnatural: not naturally allowed to grow over a period of more than eight hundred years unlike Urdu. I suggest you pick up a dictionary.

I am sure even the most hardcore of English nationalists would agree with me that purging English of Greek/Latin/French words, replacing them with Old Germanic ones and using an Old Germanic script to write them unlike the 'foreign' Italian Latin script that we currently write in would be unnatural.

Again, I'll say this. A Hindustani language relying on Old Sanskrit for its higher vocabulary, written in Devangairi script, prior to the 19th century isnt found. A Hindustani language using Persian, Arabic and Turkish for it's higher vocabulary, using the Perso-Arabic script has had literature dating to almost eight hundred years ago. Thats the difference between Urdu and Hindi.

Your attempt to ridicule the other thread of Aitzaz Ahsan's book is rather pathetic. I based my arguments on historic facts, statistics, studies etc. and you are free to tell me if I have stated anything factually wrong there, in a level-headed and rational way. Take this to that thread if you want, and it's really irrelevant bringing that up here. I don't care whether you call it a 'narrative' or whatever since I have come to expect such irrational and spiteful reactions from your lot regarding this subject.

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## 911

Tergon18 said:


> Again, you have totally missed the point of my argument. I am not arguing for the similarities or differences. I have already said earlier that the basis for them, is the Hindustani language, you have completely missed my point.
> And no, the word Khuda as well as Allah is used, I don't know where you have gotten that from. This topic has got more to do with the semantics of language, more than anything else and is unrelated to this.
> Khariboli is the name used for Hindustani language, some 300 years ago, written in the Perso-Arabic script with Persian, Arabic and Turkish words being used for higher vocabulary. Look up the poetry of Ghalib and Mir Taqi Mir for this.
> I don't think a long-term effort to try to purge Urdu of whatever influences that you think were, done in Zia's era. Read some Urdu literature from the 40s, of Patras Bokhari or Altaf Hussain Hali and you'll know what I mean. Not a lot (if any) differences.
> 
> Pure Urdu and Pure Hindi both are taught at schools and are used in the media, both written and electronic, and also in literature but yes, the casual form is Hindustani, which I have noted above as well.
> 
> The word for moon in Vedic Sanskrit, atleast, is māsa not chand. And yes, the word Jeeway has evolved out of the Vedic Sanskrit word jīva, and almost the exact same word is found in Avestani Persian, as zīva. Both words have evolved out of a single Proto-Indo-Iranian word, gʷih₃wós (jwihos). Remember, Old Vedic Sanskrit and Old Avestani Persian used to be one language, Proto-Indo-Iranian until 2000 BC. This is why these words, (jind and zind) are quite often interchangeable. They belong to the same Indo-Iranian language family. You can compare the words of Proto-Indo-Iranian here https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Proto-Indo-Iranian_language
> 
> And coming to the Hindi-Urdu part. I have explained this countless times above, and there is little point in repeating the same thing over and over again to clueless people. From the wikipedia article on the Hindi-Urdu controversy:
> 
> 'A Persianized variant of Hindi and Urdu, began to take shape during the Delhi Sultanate(1206–1526 AD) and Mughal Empire (1526–1858 AD) in South Asia
> Urdu, along with English became the first official language of British India in 1850...Although the need to have a language for Hindus developed post 1850, *the irrevocable birth of Hindi language took place in 1880*...Hindi and Urdu started to diverge linguistically, with Hindi drawing on Sanskrit as the primary source for formal and academic vocabulary, often with a *conscious attempt to purge the language of Persian-derived equivalents.*'
> https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hindi–Urdu_controversy
> 
> Honestly, you accusing me of 'ridiculing' Sanskrit is rather hilarious. Why would I do that? Merely saying that a constructed language, only a litte more than a hundred years old, which was concsiously purged of certain influences and replaced with others will sound unnatural, isnt ridicule. That is because it is the very definition of unnatural: not naturally allowed to grow over a period of more than eight hundred years unlike Urdu. I suggest you pick up a dictionary.
> 
> I am sure even the most hardcore of English nationalists would agree with me that purging English of Greek/Latin/French words, replacing them with Old Germanic ones and using an Old Germanic script to write them unlike the 'foreign' Italian Latin script that we currently write in would be unnatural.
> 
> Again, I'll say this. A Hindustani language relying on Old Sanskrit for its higher vocabulary, written in Devangairi script, prior to the 19th century isnt found. A Hindustani language using Persian, Arabic and Turkish for it's higher vocabulary, using the Perso-Arabic script has had literature dating to almost eight hundred years ago. Thats the difference between Urdu and Hindi.
> 
> Your attempt to ridicule the other thread of Aitzaz Ahsan's book is rather pathetic. I based my arguments on historic facts, statistics, studies etc. and you are free to tell me if I have stated anything factually wrong there, in a level-headed and rational way. Take this to that thread if you want, and it's really irrelevant bringing that up here. I don't care whether you call it a 'narrative' or whatever since I have come to expect such irrational and spiteful reactions from your lot regarding this subject.


Already know all of what you have copy pasted what is your point? And the word Chand is evolved from Chandra, a sanskrit word.


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## Tergon18

911 said:


> Already know all of what you have copy pasted what is your point? And the word Chand is evolved from Chandra, a sanskrit word.



'Copy pasted' 
Seriously, what is your point here, if you have any to begin with in the first place?

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## ThunderCat

Tergon18 said:


> Just like how English, a West Germanic language of the Anglo-Frisian branch, relies on Greek, Latin and French for it's higher vocabulary, Hindustani relied on Persian, Arabic and *Turkish* for it's higher vocabulary until purged by Hindu nationalists of them in the 19th century. I think the LangFocus YouTube channel (link provided by another user above) has explained the differences between them quite well. This is just the history. You won't find an example of Hindustani using Old Sanskrit for higher vocabulary in literature before the 19th century.



Just to correct you, it gained it's vocabulary from Chagatai, a Turkic language spoken by the Mughals and not Turkish, the language of Turkey. While the two are related, they are two distinct languages of the same family.

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## MadDog

ThunderCat said:


> There's been a lot of misconceptions in Pakistan as well as India that *Hindustan* is India and that "Hindu" is a religion.
> 
> In reality Hindu is a geographic term and it's usage to refer to a religion did not occur until some two centuries ago by the Europeans.
> 
> For example Hindu Kush or Hindko language are not associated with India or "Hinduism", so why do we associate Hindu or Hindustan with them?
> 
> Problem is people misuse and misapply terminologies so the confusion comes up. In reality the words "Hindu" "Indus" and "India" have their roots in ancient Sanskrit "Sindhu" or "Sapta Sindhu". These words evolved into Indus and Hindu by the Greeks and Persians. Even the name Sindh and Sindhi comes from there.
> 
> The name "India" eventually spread to Europe and referred to the Indus and possibly Ganges plains. The Muslim invaders continued using Hindu or Hindustan to refer to these geographic territories.
> 
> Even the older name of Urdu (and Hindi) is actually Hindustani. For one to say they speak Hindustani means they speak Hindi or Urdu because these are both different dialects of Hindustani.
> 
> When the British arrived they started calling all the indigenous spiritualities of the subcontinent "Hinduism". Even using the name "India" by the modern country is technically incorrect, since India originally meant land of the Indus, or today known as Eastern Pakistan.
> 
> So to break it down. Hindustan is Eastern Pakistan + Northern India + Bay of Bengal and arguably parts of Nepal and China. A Hindu or Hindustani is a native of these region, not some religious group.
> 
> Hindustani is the language that developed in this territory, a derivative of Sanskrit and the languages of the invaders that influenced this language.
> 
> So using the term Hindustan to refer to India is wrong and calling the local religions of the subcontinent is also wrong.



India is the westernized name, Hindustan has Persian roots, Hind was the word used in Arabic, its not different. It was never one country, just a region like Europe, that is why British coined the term "subcontinent" where throughout history different empires ruled, had the British not come, there would be atleast 20 countries in subcontinent.

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## ThunderCat

Most of what he said is correct save for the Urdu and Hindi accent part. He is also wrong to claim all of India was Hindustan. Hindustan= North India, Eastern Pakistan.


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## Joe Shearer

ThunderCat said:


> Most of what he said is correct save for the Urdu and Hindi accent part. He is also wrong to claim all of India was Hindustan. Hindustan= North India, Eastern Pakistan.



I don't really think 'Hindustan' extended beyond Bihar. 

@Tergon18 

That was impressive, but it is difficult to imagine what you think occupied the space that you have assigned to Hindustani, eight centuries ago (that would put us in the thirteenth century). We already know that the intermediate space was occupied by Suraseni Prakrit, just as our eastern languages, including the one I share with the Bangladeshis, including Maithil, Nepali, Oriya, Assamese, and the dialect in Tripura, were originated in Magadhi Prakrit. Suraseni Prakrit spawned Punjabi, Rajasthani, Gujarati and Marathi, Sindhi, and logically (never thought of this or followed it up) Konkani as well. So what happened to the Yamuna Ganges Doab? Were they (bless the thought) mercifully silent till they burst into speech at the point of a Shamsher?


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## Tergon18

Joe Shearer said:


> I don't really think 'Hindustan' extended beyond Bihar.
> 
> @Tergon18
> 
> That was impressive, but it is difficult to imagine what you think occupied the space that you have assigned to Hindustani, eight centuries ago (that would put us in the thirteenth century). We already know that the intermediate space was occupied by Suraseni Prakrit, just as our eastern languages, including the one I share with the Bangladeshis, including Maithil, Nepali, Oriya, Assamese, and the dialect in Tripura, were originated in Magadhi Prakrit. Suraseni Prakrit spawned Punjabi, Rajasthani, Gujarati and Marathi, Sindhi, and logically (never thought of this or followed it up) Konkani as well. So what happened to the Yamuna Ganges Doab? Were they (bless the thought) mercifully silent till they burst into speech at the point of a Shamsher?



Well, basically different Prakrits including Sauraseni from which it descended from as you have mentioned. But that's not what I was arguing about. And I think, in this context, it's rather pointless to delve into the deep history of the (Hindustani) language, given that most of it's developement into the present form took place in the last seven hundred years, being written in the Perso-Arabic Nastaliq script with Persian and Arabic terms being used for higher vocabulary as compared to the 19th century Hindi form.

As for the other Indo-Aryan languages, most linguists have made linguistic zones/sub-classifications for them, which are present in all other Indo-European, and other language families as well e.g Eastern Iranian, Western Germanic, Northern Semitic etc.

Punjabi, Sindhi and Dogri are part of the North-Western zone.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indo-Aryan_languages#Northwestern_Zone



Spoiler: Blue are the North-Western ones












https://www.britannica.com/topic/In...cteristics-of-the-modern-Indo-Aryan-languages

Anyway, this was I what I was talking about.
English purged of Latin, Greek and French words, using only Old Germanic/Anglo Saxon words, 19th century Hindi-style, albeit same Latin script. An account of the Battle of the Somme. Its called 'Anglish'.

_"One of of the many and tangled grounds that World War I began was that Dutchland overran Belgland. Britland was bound by fordrawing to shield the land. Like rikebonds across Eveland drew in all the greatstronglands one by one. It may have begun with thehighkilling of High-Earl Franz Ferdinand in Serbland, but that was only the spark that set the world on fire.

The Somme was the ea in Frankrike that Edward III hadthwarsed only before the Clash of Crécy. The bit has had a great deal of British blood soaking into its earth over the yearhundreds, but never more than on the first day of the Clash of the Somme, Lithemonth 1, 1916.

Before the British landmight strode into the shackleguntracks Christ-thwarsing the clashfield, Heratower Lord Douglass Haig had behested eight days of gunwarish shelling. This had not been shown to be booming battleway over the last two years and it did not on that day. One flaw was that the shelling had to stop to let theBondsmen to go on, so as soon as it stopped, theDutchmen knew the onrush was coming and made theirforegearings. They had hard, deep bunkers of brickstuckand wood that withstood the shelling truly well indeed. Their pricked-wire fields were also still okay after the shells stopped.

At 7:28 in the morning, the British landmight blew up twobig stillblasters, then three smaller ones near theDutchlandish lines. The plan was likely to frighten thefoe, but instead, they were a last showing of the onrush.

The slaughter began at 7:30, when the British war-menrose up out of their gravets and tried to thwarse 800 yards of in the face of shacklegun fire. A few did make it to the Dutchlandish front line in the first wave before they were cut down. There were 60,000 British woundedand 19,000 dead. A whole kithend fell on one morning, making it the worst grimming in British landmightish yore. Who can say what their lives would have meant and done had they lived?"_

How does it sound? 

This seems to be the British conception of Hindustan. Sir Charles Roe, writing in the 19th century:

_"A meridian through the town of Sirhind roughly divides Punjab proper from Hindustan and the Punjabi language from the Hindustani language"._

http://punjabrevenue.nic.in/cust3..htm

This is repeated by Horace Arthur Rose, writing in 1911 here:

https://books.google.com.pk/books?id=-aw3hRAX_DgC&pg=PA10&lpg=PA10&dq=a+meridian+through+the+town+of+sirhind&source=bl&ots=mXjCN9aZ50&sig=Vm8aAeCwh07kh53FR3iSpZ5LmHM&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwjGxfbvsInQAhXIVxoKHdcBB8sQ6AEIGTAB#v=onepage&q=a meridian through the town of sirhind&f=false

The Sutlej River, roughly, seems to be the western boundary. It seems as if it was synonymous with the Gangetic Cow Belt.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hindustani_people

_" Traditionally, Hindustani or Hindavi identity is primarily linguistic with Hindustanis or Hindavis being those who have the Hindustani language (Hindi/Urdu) and in a broader sense a variety of Hindi as their primary language, mainly residing in the present-day Indian States of Bihar, Chhattisgarh, Delhi, Haryana,Himachal Pradesh, Jharkhand, Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan, Uttar Pradesh,Uttarakhand.[1][2][3][4][5][6][7]"_

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## Joe Shearer

Tergon18 said:


> Well, basically different Prakrits including Sauraseni from which it descended from as you have mentioned. But that's not what I was arguing about. And I think, in this context, it's rather pointless to delve into the deep history of the (Hindustani) language, given that most of it's developement into the present form took place in the last seven hundred years, being written in the Perso-Arabic Nastaliq script with Persian and Arabic terms being used for higher vocabulary as compared to the 19th century Hindi form.
> 
> As for the other Indo-Aryan languages, most linguists have made linguistic zones/sub-classifications for them, which are present in all other Indo-European, and other language families as well e.g Eastern Iranian, Western Germanic, Northern Semitic etc.
> 
> Punjabi, Sindhi and Dogri are part of the North-Western zone.
> 
> https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indo-Aryan_languages#Northwestern_Zone
> 
> 
> 
> Spoiler: Blue are the North-Western ones
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> https://www.britannica.com/topic/In...cteristics-of-the-modern-Indo-Aryan-languages
> 
> Anyway, this was I what I was talking about.
> English purged of Latin, Greek and French words, using only Old Germanic/Anglo Saxon words, 19th century Hindi-style, albeit same Latin script. An account of the Battle of the Somme. Its called 'Anglish'.
> 
> _"One of of the many and tangled grounds that World War I began was that Dutchland overran Belgland. Britland was bound by fordrawing to shield the land. Like rikebonds across Eveland drew in all the greatstronglands one by one. It may have begun with thehighkilling of High-Earl Franz Ferdinand in Serbland, but that was only the spark that set the world on fire.
> 
> The Somme was the ea in Frankrike that Edward III hadthwarsed only before the Clash of Crécy. The bit has had a great deal of British blood soaking into its earth over the yearhundreds, but never more than on the first day of the Clash of the Somme, Lithemonth 1, 1916.
> 
> Before the British landmight strode into the shackleguntracks Christ-thwarsing the clashfield, Heratower Lord Douglass Haig had behested eight days of gunwarish shelling. This had not been shown to be booming battleway over the last two years and it did not on that day. One flaw was that the shelling had to stop to let theBondsmen to go on, so as soon as it stopped, theDutchmen knew the onrush was coming and made theirforegearings. They had hard, deep bunkers of brickstuckand wood that withstood the shelling truly well indeed. Their pricked-wire fields were also still okay after the shells stopped.
> 
> At 7:28 in the morning, the British landmight blew up twobig stillblasters, then three smaller ones near theDutchlandish lines. The plan was likely to frighten thefoe, but instead, they were a last showing of the onrush.
> 
> The slaughter began at 7:30, when the British war-menrose up out of their gravets and tried to thwarse 800 yards of in the face of shacklegun fire. A few did make it to the Dutchlandish front line in the first wave before they were cut down. There were 60,000 British woundedand 19,000 dead. A whole kithend fell on one morning, making it the worst grimming in British landmightish yore. Who can say what their lives would have meant and done had they lived?"_
> 
> How does it sound?
> 
> This seems to be the British conception of Hindustan. Sir Charles Roe, writing in the 19th century:
> 
> _"A meridian through the town of Sirhind roughly divides Punjab proper from Hindustan and the Punjabi language from the Hindustani language"._
> 
> http://punjabrevenue.nic.in/cust3..htm
> 
> This is repeated by Horace Arthur Rose, writing in 1911 here:
> 
> https://books.google.com.pk/books?id=-aw3hRAX_DgC&pg=PA10&lpg=PA10&dq=a+meridian+through+the+town+of+sirhind&source=bl&ots=mXjCN9aZ50&sig=Vm8aAeCwh07kh53FR3iSpZ5LmHM&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwjGxfbvsInQAhXIVxoKHdcBB8sQ6AEIGTAB#v=onepage&q=a meridian through the town of sirhind&f=false
> 
> The Sutlej River, roughly, seems to be the western boundary. It seems as if it was synonymous with the Gangetic Cow Belt.
> 
> https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hindustani_people
> 
> _" Traditionally, Hindustani or Hindavi identity is primarily linguistic with Hindustanis or Hindavis being those who have the Hindustani language (Hindi/Urdu) and in a broader sense a variety of Hindi as their primary language, mainly residing in the present-day Indian States of Bihar, Chhattisgarh, Delhi, Haryana,Himachal Pradesh, Jharkhand, Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan, Uttar Pradesh,Uttarakhand.[1][2][3][4][5][6][7]"_



I am glad to have made your acquaintance.

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## Tergon18

Joe Shearer said:


> I am glad to have made your acquaintance.



Thank you, I appreciate it.


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## t_for_talli

Tergon18 said:


> Do you even know how Hindi was formed?
> Urdu and Hindustani are synonymous with one another...both terms are intertwined. Hindi is a bastardisation of Urdu. In the late 1880s, north Indian Hindu nationalists were fed up with Urdu/Hindustani becoming the dominant language. After the failed 1857 War of Independence, the British banned Persian...this led to the explosion of Urdu/Hindustani. This language was written using the Persian-Urdu alphabet. From 1857 to the 1880s, Urdu became the most spoken and written language in British India.
> 
> The north Indian Hindus didn't like that...they saw Urdu with its Persian script as being an "invading" language. So in the 1880s, they came up with "Hindi"...they took all the Persian based words in Urdu and replaced them with Sanskrit words and changed the script from Persian alphabet to Devanagari. This resulted in the formation of Hindi....which is basically Sanskritised Urdu written in Devangari script. This is the reason why Hindi sounds so unnatural.
> 
> It's no different from Croatian-Serbian language dispute. The original Balkan language was written in Acrylic as Serbian language is today. The Croats in an attempt to differentiate themselves from there Serb enemies took the language, and changed the script to Roman...and called it "Croatian".
> 
> The same thing happened with Urdu to Hindi.


I Disagree,

Hindi descended from Sanskrit > Prakrit> Hindi. (Same sentence formation grammar etc.)

And Urdu is Hindi/ Prakrit/ Hindustani with different nouns/ vocab. Sentence structure, grammar, is exactly same.

Structure comes before vocab, so Urdu is like Hindi (sentence structure, grammer) +- some vocab


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## SarthakGanguly

This may be a confusion for Pakistanis. 

We are Indians. Or Bharatvasis.



Umair Nawaz said:


> But after the failure of tahreef e reshmi rumaal and 1917 when RSS was born things changed.


Muslim League was formed in 1906. RSS was formed in 1926. Jinnah's neo Islamist calls were in no way influenced by the RSS. In fact, he barely mentioned them even. RSS was irrelevant then.

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## Tergon18

t_for_talli said:


> I Disagree,
> 
> Hindi descended from Sanskrit > Prakrit> Hindi. (Same sentence formation grammar etc.)
> 
> And Urdu is Hindi/ Prakrit/ Hindustani with different nouns/ vocab. Sentence structure, grammar, is exactly same.
> 
> Structure comes before vocab, so Urdu is like Hindi (sentence structure, grammer) +- some vocab



Please read the previous two pages of this thread, I have addressed your point.

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## t_for_talli

Tergon18 said:


> Please read the previous two pages of this thread, I have addressed your point.



I agree that Urdu evolved during last 800 years with contribution form different invaders. But it was vocab from different cultures, and structure grammar from Hindi / Sanskrit / Prakrit

Hindi term was coined later but base structure/ grammar was there long before invasions in subcontinent (or oigin of Urdu)


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## MadDog

Yes Hindustan includes portion of latin america as well especially southern chile, since Hindustan existed even before tectonic plates movements created continents. I hope US recognizes this reality one day that it was too part of Hindustan before the advent of humanity.


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## Tergon18

t_for_talli said:


> I agree that Urdu evolved during last 800 years with contribution form different invaders. But it was vocab from different cultures, and structure grammar from Hindi / Sanskrit / Prakrit
> 
> Hindi term was coined later but base structure/ grammar was there long before invasions in subcontinent (or oigin of Urdu)



Again, I would tell you to refer back to previous pages in the thread, you are making the same argument which already has been addressed. Its pointless to repeat the same thing over and over again.


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## Joe Shearer

t_for_talli said:


> I Disagree,
> 
> Hindi descended from Sanskrit > Prakrit> Hindi. (Same sentence formation grammar etc.)
> 
> And Urdu is Hindi/ Prakrit/ Hindustani with different nouns/ vocab. Sentence structure, grammar, is exactly same.
> 
> Structure comes before vocab, so Urdu is like Hindi (sentence structure, grammer) +- some vocab




Heh, heh, heh.....go through @Tergon18 's posts carefully. Don't jump in; wait to pull up your swimming trunks first. Your, umm, slip is showing.

I don't agree with him entirely, but he has a complete grip on the subject. He can be dislodged only by very convincing counter-arguments, and a deep knowledge of the subject, if he can be dislodged at all.



MadDog said:


> Yes Hindustan includes portion of latin america as well especially southern chile, since Hindustan existed even before tectonic plates movements created continents. I hope US recognizes this reality one day that it was too part of Hindustan before the advent of humanity.




Please stay out of this. I can't hear myself sleep.


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## t_for_talli

Joe Shearer said:


> Heh, heh, heh.....go through @Tergon18 's posts carefully. Don't jump in; wait to pull up your swimming trunks first. Your, umm, slip is showing.
> 
> I don't agree with him entirely, but he has a complete grip on the subject. He can be dislodged only by very convincing counter-arguments, and a deep knowledge of the subject, if he can be dislodged at all.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Please stay out of this. I can't hear myself sleep.



I Agree with him that term (Hindi) was coined in last 100-200 years.
But Hindi structure/ grammar was present (descended from Sanskrit or in layman terms : Easy Sanskrit for common people) on which Persian, Arabic, Turkic vocab was introduced to come up with Udru.

He might have diff opinion


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## Joe Shearer

t_for_talli said:


> I Agree with him that term (Hindi) was coined in last 100-200 years.
> But Hindi structure/ grammar was present (descended from Sanskrit or in layman terms : Easy Sanskrit for common people) on which Persian, Arabic, Turkic vocab was introduced to come up with Udru.
> 
> He might have diff opinion



I don't think he said anything different.

His basic point of departure from the conventional narration seems to be that a prototypical descendant of Sauraseni Prakrit, spoken in different dialects across the expanse from Sirhind to Bihar and between Nepal and the Vindhyas (Aryavarta in the classical description) was mingled with exotics and formed something more or less coherent and comprehensible throughout most of this expanse. Without losing its dialectal varieties, of course. The foreign influence actually pushed those earlier proto-Hindustanis (to follow his model without quibble for the sake of the argument) closer together, by offering the common cement of common terms in those exotics - Pushto and Persian and Turkic, even some strong admixture of Arabic.

He postulates - this is the fascinating part - that this more-or-less common lingua franca then started rarefying into culturally determined 'high languages', into Hindi and Urdu. I presume that he supposes that that is why Hindustani is intelligible across Aryavarta, whereas Hindi and Urdu have coalesced around culturally chauvinist poles, taking on an artificial distinction as a result.

@Tergon18 please let me know if this is your paradigm.

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## Mamluk

t_for_talli said:


> I Agree with him that term (Hindi) was coined in last 100-200 years.
> But Hindi structure/ grammar was present (descended from Sanskrit or in layman terms : Easy Sanskrit for common people) *on which Persian, Arabic, Turkic vocab was introduced to come up with Udru.*
> 
> He might have diff opinion




Urdu wasn't just created overnight by a random guy on a whim, deliberately infusing other languages into Sanskrit to create a new language for Muslims (the Indian narrative).

It developed naturally like all other languages do - different languages fusing to form a new language is how MOST (if not ALL) languages have evolved into unique new languages.

Same goes for Sanskrit and proto-Indo European. They descended from combinations of other ancient languages.

New languages are nurtured by literary contributions while it evolves for centuries, slowly drifting from its roots and becoming a language in its own right. Like English is neither French nor German; it's now considered a separate language.


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## t_for_talli

[USER=25628]@xxx[/USER][{::::::::::::::::::> said:


> Urdu wasn't just created overnight by a random guy on a whim, deliberately infusing other languages into Sanskrit to create a new language for Muslims (the Indian narrative).
> 
> It developed naturally like all other languages do - different languages fusing to form a new language is how MOST (if not ALL) languages have evolved into unique new languages.
> 
> Same goes for Sanskrit and proto-Indo European. They descended from combinations of other ancient languages.
> 
> New languages are nurtured by literary contributions while it evolves for centuries, slowly drifting from its roots and becoming a language in its own right. Like English is neither French nor German; it's now considered a separate language.


I never said it was developed overnight, It took centuries, vocabs from different languages were included. 
All I said was grammar, structure, vocab existed. In course of few centuries words were included / removed influenced from near by languages. 

Anyways not interested in dragging it more, already repeated many times


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## ThunderCat



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## xyxmt

I think there was no religion called Hindu before Arab referred to them as Hindus, and hence the region called Hindustan, i wonder if anyone knows what Alexander referred this part of the world when he set out to conquer this world.


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## Indus Pakistan

xyxmt said:


> I think there was no religion called Hindu before Arab referred to them as Hindus, and hence the region called Hindustan, i wonder if anyone knows what Alexander referred this part of the world when he set out to conquer this world.



*Indi-keys* - Essentially the region around the Indus River. The Greek were not aware of Ganga India. Only when they arrived in the Indus region did they realize about Ganga further over the horizon.

*_*Ινδική* >_Indi-keys.

1 (a) Ινδική > The Indus region that is modern Pakistan.
(b) Hendosh > The Achaemenid Persian satrapy covering modern Sindh in Pakistan.
2. Ινδική > The Indus region and Ganges basin.
3. Limyrike > Deccan region or modern South India.

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## ThunderCat

"Hinduism" is not a religion, again it's a geographic religion:


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## Fawad alam

Dear, word of "Hindustan" is driven from "Hind" which is driven from "Sindh", Hindustan means Land of Sindhi's or people living near river Indus or Sindh river.
if you are thinking that how Sindh changed into Hindh, i will give you one example of Hafta ( meaning 7th day of week) which is sourced from Youm Sabt ( meaning 7th day of week), here Sabt changed to Haft.
The word of Hind become famous for this sub continent because Indus valley(3300 BC) was the only civilization of the past in this region and even before Indus valley the Mehar Garh (7000 BC) is the precursor of Indus valley which is located in Balochistan's Bolan area ( west of Indus River ).
Simply all peoples living in Indian sub continent can call them self as Hindustani, but actually Sindhi's or people living along with Sindh river (Pakistanis)are pure Hindustani.....

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## shootingstar

Fawad alam said:


> Dear, word of "Hindustan" is driven from "Hind" which is driven from "Sindh", Hindustan means Land of Sindhi's or people living near river Indus or Sindh river.
> if you are thinking that how Sindh changed into Hindh, i will give you one example of Hafta ( meaning 7th day of week) which is sourced from Youm Sabt ( meaning 7th day of week), here Sabt changed to Haft.
> The word of Hind become famous for this sub continent because Indus valley(3300 BC) was the only civilization of the past in this region and even before Indus valley the Mehar Garh (7000 BC) is the precursor of Indus valley which is located in Balochistan's Bolan area ( west of Indus River ).
> Simply all peoples living in Indian sub continent can call them self as Hindustani, but actually Sindhi's or people living along with Sindh river (Pakistanis)are pure Hindustani.....




The word Hafta came from the Sanskrit word Sapta meaning Seven. Same is the case with the month September which is the seventh month of the year.

Also lookup Sapta Sindhavah the seven river mentioned in Rig Veda. The word Sindh itself originated from this.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rigvedic_rivers


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## MultaniGuy

halupridol said:


> I feel Pakistans fate was sealed on the day they made urdu thr national language.a great blunder n one of the major reasons for not being able to cultivate a strong national identity till now.
> well we got to thank bhayyajees for tht


Nice try dingbat. We have a national identity.

Urdu is the unifying language of Pakistan.


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## halupridol

Iqbal Ali said:


> Nice try dingbat. We have a national identity.
> 
> Urdu is the unifying language of Pakistan.


yeah yeah,,a language which has more native speakers in India thn in Pakistan is ur unifying language.
Like i said,,we have got u bhayyajees to thank,,u did what ancient bhayyas cud never do,,i.e. made non bhayya pakistanis(pashtuns etc.) learn n speak a Indian language,,thank u for paving way for cultural domination.


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## MultaniGuy

halupridol said:


> yeah yeah,,a language which has more native speakers in India thn in Pakistan is ur unifying language.
> Like i said,,we have got u bhayyajees to thank,,u did what ancient bhayyas cud never do,,i.e. made non bhayya pakistanis(pashtuns etc.) learn n speak a Indian language,,thank u for paving way for cultural domination.


Urdu does not have more native speakers in India than Pakistan. It is Pakistan which has more native speakers of Urdu than India.

Most Indians speak Hindi which is almost a completely different language.


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## Fawad alam

BlueTopaz said:


> The word Hafta came from the Sanskrit word Sapta meaning Seven. Same is the case with the month September which is the seventh month of the year.
> 
> Also lookup Sapta Sindhavah the seven river mentioned in Rig Veda. The word Sindh itself originated from this.
> 
> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rigvedic_rivers


What i said is same Haft from Sabt which means 7, and what you are mentioning is 7 rivers are all included in Sindh river means river of 7 branches which are the 7 parts of this same river, hence Hindustan mean land of Sindhi people or people living along with Sindh river(Pakistan).


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## Taimur Khurram

ThunderCat said:


> There's been a lot of misconceptions in Pakistan as well as India that *Hindustan* is India and that "Hindu" is a religion.
> 
> In reality Hindu is a geographic term and it's usage to refer to a religion did not occur until some two centuries ago by the Europeans.
> 
> For example Hindu Kush or Hindko language are not associated with India or "Hinduism", so why do we associate Hindu or Hindustan with them?
> 
> Problem is people misuse and misapply terminologies so the confusion comes up. In reality the words "Hindu" "Indus" and "India" have their roots in ancient Sanskrit "Sindhu" or "Sapta Sindhu". These words evolved into Indus and Hindu by the Greeks and Persians. Even the name Sindh and Sindhi comes from there.
> 
> The name "India" eventually spread to Europe and referred to the Indus and possibly Ganges plains. The Muslim invaders continued using Hindu or Hindustan to refer to these geographic territories.
> 
> Even the older name of Urdu (and Hindi) is actually Hindustani. For one to say they speak Hindustani means they speak Hindi or Urdu because these are both different dialects of Hindustani.
> 
> When the British arrived they started calling all the indigenous spiritualities of the subcontinent "Hinduism". Even using the name "India" by the modern country is technically incorrect, since India originally meant land of the Indus, or today known as Eastern Pakistan.
> 
> So to break it down. Hindustan is Eastern Pakistan + Northern India + Bay of Bengal and arguably parts of Nepal and China. A Hindu or Hindustani is a native of these region, not some religious group.
> 
> Hindustani is the language that developed in this territory, a derivative of Sanskrit and the languages of the invaders that influenced this language.
> 
> So using the term Hindustan to refer to India is wrong and calling the local religions of the subcontinent is also wrong.



Asalamu Alaikum

Well, Hindustan makes more sense than India, since most people now recognise Hindu as a religious and not a geographical term, and India is derived from the Indus River which flows through Pakistan.

I'd personally go with Gangadesh or something but that sounds like a slur.



911 said:


> Yes every person living in Indian subcontinent is Hindu and the place is called Hindustan . Though some people who claim, are free to claim any outside ancestory who cares .



Odds are your ancestors are probably foreign, this is the case with almost everyone who isn't from Southern Hindustan/Sri Lanka.



farhan_9909 said:


> It was indeed a very major blunder.We should have opted for either Pashto or balochi as National Language



Asalamu Alaikum

Or Saraiki 





Sneaker said:


> the other group is wannabe foreigners..



You do realise your language is a bastardised version of ours, and is as a result still foreign in origin, right? Remember, the Delhi Sultanate invented it, and they were evil foreign Muslims.


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## LASER1

dsr478 said:


> Asalamu Alaikum
> 
> Well, Hindustan makes more sense than India, since most people now recognise Hindu as a religious and not a geographical term, and India is derived from the Indus River which flows through Pakistan.
> 
> I'd personally go with Gangadesh or something but that sounds like a slur.
> 
> 
> 
> Odds are your ancestors are probably foreign, this is the case with almost everyone who isn't from Southern Hindustan/Sri Lanka.
> 
> 
> 
> Asalamu Alaikum
> 
> Or Saraiki
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> You do realise your language is a bastardised version of ours, and is as a result still foreign in origin, right? Remember, the Delhi Sultanate invented it, and they were evil foreign Muslims.


If Aryan migration theory is true. Probably every other people are alien to the land. 

It's more like Urdu branched away, while Hindi followed the same grammer, script, and many words from Sanskrit - Prakrit.


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## Taimur Khurram

LASER said:


> If Aryan migration theory is true. Probably every other people are alien to the land.
> 
> It's more like Urdu branched away, while Hindi followed the same grammer, script, and many words from Sanskrit - Prakrit.



Even if Aryan Migration is false, the average North Hindustani/Pakistani will be predominantly foreign in terms of genetics and (especially) culture. 

Remember, it wasn't just the Aryans. The Huns, Greeks, Persians, Scythians, Turks, Arabs, Kushans, and many more all migrated here (some in larger numbers than others).

No, it's more like Hindi branched away. The original language (Hindustani) was created by the Delhi Sultanate, and was written in the same script Urdu is and had a pretty similar vocabulary. The Mughals developed it further into what is basically modern Urdu. Hindi is the same language, but written in Sanskrit and with some (but not all or even most) of the foreign words purged. Urdu is the original, Hindi is the copy.


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## UnitedPak

halupridol said:


> yeah yeah,,a language which has more native speakers in India thn in Pakistan is ur unifying language.
> Like i said,,we have got u bhayyajees to thank,,u did what ancient bhayyas cud never do,,i.e. made non bhayya pakistanis(pashtuns etc.) learn n speak a Indian language,,thank u for paving way for cultural domination.



The language of Mughals is indeed unifying. Unlike Hindi which was created out of thin air in 1890.

Would help if you knew actual historical or linguistic facts before harping on about imaginary "indian" languages.

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## halupridol

UnitedPak said:


> The language of Mughals is indeed unifying. Unlike Hindi which was created out of thin air in 1890.
> 
> Would help if you knew actual historical or linguistic facts before harping on about imaginary "indian" languages.


oh,,right,if only _i_ knew "actual historical or linguistic facts",if only,sigh,thnks for pointing tht out.
u on the other hand r absolutely right,, urdu is the language of mughals(mongoloid turks),absolutely,,,,mughals didnt spoke chagtai turk among thmselves,,n persian wasn't thr court language.
as i said earlier,got nothng to complain abt


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## TMA

911 said:


> Yes, Bharat is Hindustan is India. Have you ever thought why 1/5th area of Pakistan which broke away in 1971 is called Bangladesh while Pakistan remained Pakistan? Its because they choose to separate. Same is the case with Pakistan. In 1947, there was a notion that Muslims are not Hindustanis and are outsiders, so they did not claimed to be Indians. But after many yeaes of branding India, and its hitory, today many Pakistanis connect themselves with Indian history, yet claiming distinction between Indians and Pakistani keeping 2 nation theory in mind, failing to forge wrong history yet again. You can't have the cake and the cherry at the same time.
> 
> Brand sells, it attracts. I personaly don't endorse Akhand Bharat ideology, but if it manages to come into existence in future, it won't be because of wars but cultural exchanges and branding. Unknowingly Pakistanis are endorsing that ideology by allowing cultural invasion, and not only that they are catalysing by resiprocating with telecasting thier own shows in India . I would say make Persian or Arabic your national language to avoid it .
> 
> 
> So basically you are saying Indo-Aryan speakers are Hindustanis. Yea alright.


Muslims are not outsiders to Hind. The vast majority converted to Islam. It is unfortunate that many Muslims are ashamed of this fact. They know this themselves. 
Pakistan did not separate from Hind. Two states came into being from British India and Hind is basically inside Pakistan. It is also unfortunate that Pakistanis have accepted the British usage of the term Hindustan and Hindu.
I do agree that Pakistan should have made Persian the national language.



hussain0216 said:


> Your over thinking this
> 
> Maybe historically your right but today Hindu = idol worshippers and Hindustan = India
> 
> 
> Pakistan is the culmination of Muslim history in South Asia, we have our own distinct regions, languages and culture centered around Islam.
> 
> 
> Your view point whilst valid and even historically accurate is no longer relevant especially considering the general animosity we have towards Hindus and things connected to them


Becoming Muslim does not mean one loses his other identities. It is unfortunate that Pakistanis have let this happen.


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## Indus Pakistan

TMA said:


> The vast majority converted to Islam.


*Everybody* has converted to what they are now. Christians, Jews, Muslims, Hindus, Sikhs, Bhuddist etc were not that in 5,000 BCE.



TMA said:


> Two states came into being from British India


Both states, Pakistan and India are successor states of the British Raj in the geographic space called India. 

Europe is a name of geographric region. If Kosova named itself "Europe" it would not follow that it always existed and that rest of Europe was carved from it.

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## WaLeEdK2

Kaptaan said:


> *Everybody* has converted to what they are now. Christians, Jews, Muslims, Hindus, Sikhs, Bhuddist etc were not that in 5,000 BCE.
> 
> Both states, Pakistan and India are successor states of the British Raj in the geographic space called India.
> 
> Europe is a name of geographric region. If Kosova named itself "Europe" it would not follow that it always existed and that rest of Europe was carved from it.



I thought the Jews were a race? The 12 tribes are the 12 sons of prophet Jacob pbuh (AKA Israel). They confuse the hell out of me.


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## Indus Pakistan

WaLeEdK2 said:


> Jews were a race?


Depends how you define race. Jews left their ancestral lands nearly 2,000 years and lived among other races for over 60 generations. In that time they have mixed with the hosts and diffused to the point where they are no more a race then Muslims are. Jews today are white blondes, brown, Afro black and everything in between. To call them a race today is a joke.

I live in UK. in another 2,000 years or 60 generations would you call my descendants Pakistani? Even if at every tenth generation a mix happens with the host population nothing much will be left of me. That is what happened to the Jews.

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## ThunderCat

LASER said:


> If Aryan migration theory is true. Probably every other people are alien to the land.
> 
> It's more like Urdu branched away, while Hindi followed the same grammer, script, and many words from Sanskrit - Prakrit.


Incorrect on both counts. Hindi was artificially Sanskrtized; wheras Urdu continued as traditional Hindustani, following the Perso-Arabic vocabulary inventory. Hindustani is based grammatically on Sanskrit, so no change there.



halupridol said:


> yeah yeah,,a language which has more native speakers in India thn in Pakistan is ur unifying language.
> Like i said,,we have got u bhayyajees to thank,,u did what ancient bhayyas cud never do,,i.e. made non bhayya pakistanis(pashtuns etc.) learn n speak a Indian language,,thank u for paving way for cultural domination.



Hindustani was developed under the Dehli Sultanate by foreign empires, not by the locals. Imagine a Mexican claiming that there are more Spanish speakers in Mexico than say Argentina (which is true) does that mean Argentinians speak a "mexican language".

You types are ridiculous

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## ThunderCat

https://rlp.hds.harvard.edu/invention-traditions

While Hindu communities of thought and practice have flourished on the Indian subcontinent for at least three millennia, the concept of “Hinduism”—as a world religion, as a unitary, coherent package of beliefs and rituals akin to “Christianity,” “Islam,” or “Buddhism”—emerged only in the nineteenth-century colonial context via processes much-debated in scholarship over the past three decades.

Derived from a Persian word indicating those who live “beyond the Indus River,” over the centuries “Hindu” has been associated with a variety of regional, cultural, and religious identifications. It was in the context of British colonialism of the Indian subcontinent, however, that the meaning and significance of “Hindu” among European officials, missionaries and scholars grew increasingly complex. For example, in the late eighteenth century British Christian missionaries took aim at the “idolatry” and “savagery” of “Hindoo” practices as they failed to understand the significance of divine images or rituals of animal sacrifice. In contrast, early Orientalist scholars such as William Jones (1746-1794) countered such contemporary visions of “excess” with accounts of sophisticated philosophical wisdom from ancient Sanskrit texts. In a third example, Indian scholar Rammohan Roy (1772-1833) who was heavily influenced by both Islam and British Unitarianism, embraced the Vedas and the monotheism of the Upaniṣadic Brahman. Roy was a social reformer and the first to use the term “Hinduism” in 1816 to refer to a coherent, pan-Indian set of religious ideals and practices.

Throughout the nineteenth century—and particularly following the transfer of power over much of the Indian subcontinent from the East India Company to the British crown in 1857—“Hindu” and “Hinduism” grew increasingly identified with Indian aspirations for independence and full nationhood. While a diverse range of political and religious figures from Vivekananda (1863-1902) to Mohandas K. Gandhi (1869-1948) envisioned a religiously plural India where Hindu and Muslim, Sikh and Jain might live peaceably side-by-side, activists such as Dayananda Saraswati (1824-1883) sought to define India as a more exclusively Hindu nation, its social and cultural forms to be rooted in Sanskrit education, the teachings of the Vedas, and adherence to caste. From Saraswati’s conservative focus on Veda, Sanskrit, and caste would emerge the twentieth-century Hindu nationalist movements, beginning with Vinayak Damodar Savarkar’s (1883-1966) influential 1923 pamphlet that introduced the notion of Hindutva or “Hindu-ness” into Indian public discourse, “Hindutva: Who is a Hindu?” There, Savarkar argues for Hindutva as a unifying cultural and political force that unites the people of India and forms the basis for authentic nationhood. Savarkar’s use of Hindutva to encompass all of Indian culture, religion, and politics is championed today on a global scale by a closely allied set of political and cultural organizations known as the Sangh Parivar.

Critique of “Hinduism” as defined during the colonial period and underlying the Hindutva rhetoric of the Sangh Parivar has grown increasingly loud in the wake of inter-religious violence at Ayodhyā and in Gujarat in the 1990s and early 2000s. Many historians have argued, for example, that the “Hinduism” understood by Rammohan Roy and increasingly taken up by the British colonial administration primarily reflected the elite traditions of the relative few, ignoring entirely the beliefs and practices of the vast majority of Hindus. In the mid-nineteenth-century census-taking exercises of British-controlled India, for example, questions of religious identity often proved confusing for respondents, with significant numbers checking both “Hindu” and “Mohammedan” in early versions of the census. Most working definitions of “Hinduism”—like the Sanskrit-, Veda-, and caste-based rhetoric of the Sangh Parivar—focus on upper-caste, elite, male views and downplay or denigrate the everyday religious lives of women, low-caste communities, and non-Hindus. On the other hand, in the contemporary global diaspora, streamlined presentations of Hinduism that target second-generation Hindus living in the US or Europe—such as Viswanathan’s widely circulated primer, _Daddy, am I a Hindu?_—owe much to the more liberal, inclusivist views of colonial reformers such as Vivekananda and Mohandas Gandhi. These examples represent 1) diversity within the tradition, 2) how religions evolve and change, and 3) the ways that religious influences permeate social, political, and cultural life.


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## baapu

ThunderCat said:


> There's been a lot of misconceptions in Pakistan as well as India that *Hindustan* is India and that "Hindu" is a religion.
> 
> In reality Hindu is a geographic term and it's usage to refer to a religion did not occur until some two centuries ago by the Europeans.
> 
> For example Hindu Kush or Hindko language are not associated with India or "Hinduism", so why do we associate Hindu or Hindustan with them?
> 
> Problem is people misuse and misapply terminologies so the confusion comes up. In reality the words "Hindu" "Indus" and "India" have their roots in ancient Sanskrit "Sindhu" or "Sapta Sindhu". These words evolved into Indus and Hindu by the Greeks and Persians. Even the name Sindh and Sindhi comes from there.
> 
> The name "India" eventually spread to Europe and referred to the Indus and possibly Ganges plains. The Muslim invaders continued using Hindu or Hindustan to refer to these geographic territories.
> 
> Even the older name of Urdu (and Hindi) is actually Hindustani. For one to say they speak Hindustani means they speak Hindi or Urdu because these are both different dialects of Hindustani.
> 
> When the British arrived they started calling all the indigenous spiritualities of the subcontinent "Hinduism". Even using the name "India" by the modern country is technically incorrect, since India originally meant land of the Indus, or today known as Eastern Pakistan.
> 
> So to break it down. Hindustan is Eastern Pakistan + Northern India + Bay of Bengal and arguably parts of Nepal and China. A Hindu or Hindustani is a native of these region, not some religious group.
> 
> Hindustani is the language that developed in this territory, a derivative of Sanskrit and the languages of the invaders that influenced this language.
> 
> So using the term Hindustan to refer to India is wrong and calling the local religions of the subcontinent is also wrong.





Altho there is widespread acceptance that Sindhu and Hindu are the same word. I have seen evidence that The Sindhu people lived in the mid and Southern Sindh where as there was an actual area called Hindhu around Khairpur While the souther portion was indicated as Sindhu ( So From my understanding it was around Punjab and upper Sindh. ( there is still people called Hindko ).


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## ThunderCat

Although this article is inaccurate about the pre-47 names of India (it had none as India never existed then) the rest is mostly correct https://www.speakingtree.in/blog/hinduism-is-not-a-religion-it-is-a-misnomer



Raja.Pakistani said:


> What about Bharat?
> 
> Hindustan name given by Persian
> India name given by western/English
> 
> but does all these names apply to just present boundary of India established in 1947 excluding Bangladesh, Pakistan, Nepal etc?


Bharat includes a part of what is today India, not all of it.


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## ThunderCat

halupridol said:


> I feel Pakistans fate was sealed on the day they made urdu thr national language.a great blunder n one of the major reasons for not being able to cultivate a strong national identity till now.
> well we got to thank bhayyajees for tht


Interesting coming from the country that chose to make another variety of the same language official when the vast majority of the population would reject it as their native language, speaking languages of their own. Of all the languages to officialese, the newly formed "India" (named after an ancient region located in Pakistan) chose this language which was developed by previous Central Asian rulers. Are you sure the identity crisis doesn't lie with you?

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## ThunderCat

MadDog said:


> India is the westernized name, Hindustan has Persian roots, Hind was the word used in Arabic, its not different. It was never one country, just a region like Europe, that is why British coined the term "subcontinent" where throughout history different empires ruled, had the British not come, there would be atleast 20 countries in subcontinent.


You're right. But Hindustan is not Republic of India. It refers to the Indo-Ganges which falls within Nepal, China and Pakistan as well. The entire meaning of "Hindu" has been falsified and corrupted. "Hinduism" came about in 1830 after the British coined it.

Hindus are people of the Indus proper, regardless of religion. And those who follow the Vedas are Brahmans, not "Hindus".


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