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THE MYTH OF ARYAN INVASIONS OF INDIA
The often perceived and frequently quoted racial division in India between the fairer Aryan North and the darker Dravidian South is pernicious and dangerous. The British gave currency to this view of racial divide in India. It was part of their divide and rule strategy. The Northern people in India got especially sucked into this interpretation of history because it made the Aryan northerners appear racially closer to the white races of Europe. This viewpoint is also popular in Sri Lanka, where the Singhalese believe that they are descendants of Aryans from the North of India and that Tamils of Sri Lanka are not.
This short article summarizes recent scholarship on the Aryan invasion theory. New interpretations of ancient Indian history do not accept the view that Aryans entered India from the outside. New information rejects the notion that the Dravidian people were the conquered races, or that the Dravidians were pushed down south by the invading Aryans. Sri Aurobindo (1872-1950), a scholar of Latin and Greek as well as of Sanskrit, debunked this theory of the North-South racial divide in India. Sri Aurobindo did not subscribe to the theory that the languages of North and South India are unrelated.
Sri Aurobindos study of the Tamil led him to discover that the original connection between the Sanskrit and Tamil languages was far closer and more extensive than is usually supposed. These languages are two divergent families derived from one lost primitive tongue. And, My first study of Tamil words had brought me to what seemed a clue to the very origins and structure of the ancient Sanskrit tongue. See The Secret of the Veda, V 10, the Centenary Edition, p 36, 46. Sri Aurobindo also noted that a large part of the vocabulary of the South Indian languages (Tamil, Kannada, Telugu, Malayalam) is common with Sanskrit.
For anyone who seriously wishes to pursue the topic of north-south division in India in the light of Sri Aurobindo, I recommend K. D. Sethnas The Problem of Aryan Origins, New Delhi: Aditya Prakashan, 1980 and 1992. Also recommended are the following two titles. Rewriting Indian History by Francois Gautier, New Delhi, Vikas Publishers, 1996, and The Invasion That Never Was by Michael Danino and Sujata Nahar, published by Mira Aditi, 1996.
Hindus collectively have no memory of an Aryan invasion of India that supposedly took place around 1,500 B.C. Hindu epics do not mention any such invasion. Surely, the extensive Hindu literature would describe the Aryan invasions if such had indeed taken place. Some people misread Ramayana as describing an invasion of the South by a Northern prince. The Indian epic Ramayana narrates Ramas tale, who invaded the Island of Lanka to rescue his wife Sita. Sita had been forcibly abducted by Ravana to the island of Lanka. Nowhere does Ramayana characterize Ravana as belonging to an alien or an inferior race.
Ravana was a scholar of the Vedas and was called a Chaturvedi, a knower of the four Vedas. Ravana belonged to the same stock as the victorious Rama. People who give credence to an Aryan invasion of India cite archeological evidence as proof. Among the thousands of clay seals that have been found in the region of Harappa and Mohenjo-Daro (the sites of the Indus Valley Civilization, supposedly the home originally of the Dravidian people), no seals depict the horse or the wheel. In contrast, Aryans were known to have the horse and the chariot.
From this evidence it is concluded that the Aryans conquered the people of the Indus valley through the use of the chariot and the horse. K. D. Sethna in his book cited above disputes this evidence. Some seals depicting the wheel have indeed been discovered at the Harappan archeological sites. The wheel was known to the people of the Indus Valley. Francois Gautier cites recent research which indicates that the script on the Indus seals is of Sanskrit lineage. This proves that the people of Harappa belonged to a much older Vedic age.
The recent discovery of the dried-up Saraswati river further negates the Aryan invasion theory. Satellite photography from outer space shows the existence of a dried-up river bed in Northern India. The archeological evidence indicates that the river dried up several thousand years ago, much before 1,500 B.C., the date ascribed to Aryan invasions. Saraswati is mentioned numerous times in the Vedic scriptures of the Aryans, indicating that these people lived in India during very ancient times.
Recent DNA evidence further negates the Aryan invasion theory. Dr. Subhash Kak summarizes recent research as follows: Advances in genetics have made it possible to trace ancient migrations. It is now generally accepted that modern man arose in Africa about 200,000 years ago and from there spread first into India and Southeast Asia by coastal migration that probably included some boat crossings. There are several estimates of the time when this spread into India took place. According to the geneticist Stephen Oppenheimer, settlements in India appear about 90,000 years ago. From India there were later northeastern and northwestern migrations into Eurasia and the Far East.
The new findings turn on its head the previous view of the origin of Indians. The earlier view, popular in Indian history books, was that the Indian population came in two waves from the northwest around four or five thousand years ago, displacing the earlier aboriginals, descendents of regional archaic groups. The new view is that subsequent to the rise of modern mankind in Africa, it found a second home in India, which is the point of migration for the populations of Europe, North Africa, China and Japan.
The migrants in India slowly adapted to the wide climatic conditions in the sub-continent (from the tropical to the extreme cold of the Himalayan region) leading to the rise of the Caucasoid and the Mongoloid races.When the theory of the Aryan invasions into India is replaced by an Out of India viewpoint, one can readily explain regularities in languages that are spread widely. Linguists see connections between India and languages that extend to distant lands. Dr. Kaks full article may be viewed at: Sulekha.com Rivr - Stream of Posts | Photos | Comments | Questions | Answers | Reviews | Deals
An invasion of India from the outside around 1,500 B. C. did not occur. Recent scholarship does not deny that the people in India had relations with other Indo-European people in Asia and Europe. There was a belt stretching from India to the Mediterranean inhabited by a people who spoke related languages, known as the Indo-European languages. Sanskrit is the oldest known language in this family and may appropriately be called as the Mother of Indo-European languages. English is an Indo-European language.
Those who seek to foster the unity of India need to emphasize its unity, not its division. In the great cultural and religious history of India, important contributions have come forth from every region in the nation. The vast Ganga-Jamuna plain in the North of India is indeed the ancient heartland of Hinduism. This is the seat of Ayodhya (Bihar), Mathura and Vrindavan (UP), Kurukshetra (Haryana), and Indraprasatha (Delhi). The Great Mahabharata war was fought in the northern plains.
The 8th to the 13th century revival in Hinduism originated in the South. Sankaracharya from Kerala laid the foundation of modern day Hinduism. Sankara traveled to many parts of India and established centers of teaching and learning in various parts of the country. Sankara wrote extensive commentaries on Brahma Sutras, Upanishads and the Bhagavad Gita, which are standard texts for Hindus. Ramanuja from Tamilnad and Madhava from Karnataka initiated the Bhakti movement, which spread to many parts of the country, both North and South. Chaitanya Mahaprabhu from Bengal, Mirabai from Rajasthan, Tulsidas from U.P, Guru Nanak from Punjab, Jnaneshwar from Maharashtra, Jaideva (author of Gita Govinda) from Orissa, have all contributed to Hindu religion.
The four Hindu holy places and pilgrimage sites (Tirathas and Dhams) at Badri Nath,Rameshwaram, Puri, and Dwarka are located in four corners of India: north, south, east and west. Every pious Hindu aspires to visit the four Dhams in ones lifetime. Some people equate Sanskrit with Hindi language and the Devanagri script. According to Swami Dayananda Saraswati, founder of Arsha Vidya Gurukulum in Pennsylvania and a Sanskrit scholar, Sanskrit language originally did not have its own script.
It was written in a variety of local scripts. The writing of Sanskrit in the Devanagri script is a later development in history. An Aryan invasion of India from the outside around 1,500 B. C. did not occur. People of North and South India have lived together in peace as two branches of one family since antiquity. People who talk of an Aryan conquest of India parrot the 19th century British viewpoint and do disservice to the cause of unity of India.
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Dr. Madan Lal Goel
University of West Florida | United States.
Dr. M. Lal Goel
Indians are trying hard to prove that Hindus are Aryans.
