ShahidT
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So far my impression was people who started Mehrgarh and then Indus valley civilisation were settlers from fertile crescent or tigris-euphrates region (present day baghdad-Iraq). But lately came across this source which says IVC was not spread or seeded from persia and central asia, but rather was started by those who already inhabited this region. Here are those paragraph extracts...
"Before indigenous sites of earlier stages of the Indus civilisation were excavated it was believed that Harappa and Mohenjo-Daro were merely outposts of the Mesopotamiam civilisation, either constructed by migrants or at least designed according to their specifications."
p.19
"The most important result of this research is the clear proof of the long-term indigenous evolution of this civilisation which obviously began on the periphery of the Indus valley in the hills of eastern Baluchistan and then extended into the plains. There were certainly connections with Mesopotamia, but the earlier hypothesis that the Indus civilisation was merely an extension of Mesopotamiam civilisation had to be rejected."
p. 21
"The excavations of Amri show that the decisive step towards the establishment of settlements in the Indus valley was made in the fourth millennium and that it was an extension of indigenous developments and not a meree transfer of a cultural pattern by migrants from Mesopotamia, Iran or central Asia. The discovery of Neolithic settlements in Baluchistan has led to the conclusion that the Indus civilisation was the outcome of an indigenous evolution which started in the northwest of the subcontinent. The many settlements of the fourth millennium which have been traced in recent years provide added evidence for this new hypothesis.
The rise of indigenous crafts obviously led to an increase in long-distance trade with central and western Asia but this trade did not have the unilateral effect of cultural borrowing as an earlier generation of scholars had thought - scholars who were naturally puzzled by the discovery of a mature civilisation which did not seem to have any local antecedents.
Whereas we do have a much clearer idea of the indigenous roots of the Indus civilisation by now, we still know very little about the rise of the specific Mature Harappan culture."
p.27
- Hermann Kilke and Dietmar Rothermund (2004)
About the authors
Hermann Kulke is Professor of Asian History at the University of Kiel. Dietmar Rothermund is Professor and Head of History at the South Asian Institute, University of Heidelberg.
____________________________
What's the truth? @Atanz @Horus
A related question, there is a piece of the puzzle which doesn't fit in my eyes. Maybe I've read wrong research, but how come people as far as central Iran or northern Afghanistan all have a few percent ASI ancestry, let alone across Pakistan? Who were these indigenous tribes of Indus valley that created the great civilisation? Could it be that Baloch were oldest inhabitants of this region who originally created first Mehrgarh and then cities along Indus?
For those interested here are some odd paragraphs from the same book, which talk about first contact between vedic tribes from central asia and previous inhabitants of south asian subcontinent around second millennium b.c.
"The victories of the Vedic people over the indigenous population of northwestern India must have been due to their fast two-wheeled chariots, especially helpful in this dry and flat region which were also used by other conquerors in western Asia... They extended their area of settlement only very slowly. This may have been due to environmental conditions as well as to the resistance of the indigenous people. Moreover, the Vedic Aryans were not the disciplined army of one great conqueror. They consisted of several tribes which frequently fought each other."
p.36
"The Vedic Aryans may have encountered these daha/dasa people already in Margiana and Bactria and later on in northwestern India where some of them had already mixed with the indigenous population. This assumption would help to explain the otherwise contradictory evidence that, on the one hand, these Dasas are described in the Rigveda in disdainful words and, on the other hand, some of their chiefs, like the famous Sudasa, are highly praised as allies of the Vedic Aryans whose language they seem to have understood."
p.38
"When the semi-nomadic groups settled down they established closer relations with the indigenous people who worked for them as labourers or artisans. Colour (varna) served as the badge of distinction between the free Aryans and the subjugated indigenous people."
p.41
"At the top of this hierarchy were the first two estates, the Brahmin priests and the warrior nobility, the second level was occupied by free peasants and traders and the third level was that of the slaves, labourers and artisans belonging to the indigenous people."
p.42
"It shows that the indigenous people subjected by the Aryans possessed great skills as artisans. Racial discrimination against these dark-skinned people also led to a discrimination against the trades which they plied. The original lack of such skills among the Vedic Aryans was probably one of the most important reasons for the emergence of the caste system, which was designed to maintain the social and political superiority of the Aryans."
p.43
"Before indigenous sites of earlier stages of the Indus civilisation were excavated it was believed that Harappa and Mohenjo-Daro were merely outposts of the Mesopotamiam civilisation, either constructed by migrants or at least designed according to their specifications."
p.19
"The most important result of this research is the clear proof of the long-term indigenous evolution of this civilisation which obviously began on the periphery of the Indus valley in the hills of eastern Baluchistan and then extended into the plains. There were certainly connections with Mesopotamia, but the earlier hypothesis that the Indus civilisation was merely an extension of Mesopotamiam civilisation had to be rejected."
p. 21
"The excavations of Amri show that the decisive step towards the establishment of settlements in the Indus valley was made in the fourth millennium and that it was an extension of indigenous developments and not a meree transfer of a cultural pattern by migrants from Mesopotamia, Iran or central Asia. The discovery of Neolithic settlements in Baluchistan has led to the conclusion that the Indus civilisation was the outcome of an indigenous evolution which started in the northwest of the subcontinent. The many settlements of the fourth millennium which have been traced in recent years provide added evidence for this new hypothesis.
The rise of indigenous crafts obviously led to an increase in long-distance trade with central and western Asia but this trade did not have the unilateral effect of cultural borrowing as an earlier generation of scholars had thought - scholars who were naturally puzzled by the discovery of a mature civilisation which did not seem to have any local antecedents.
Whereas we do have a much clearer idea of the indigenous roots of the Indus civilisation by now, we still know very little about the rise of the specific Mature Harappan culture."
p.27
- Hermann Kilke and Dietmar Rothermund (2004)
About the authors
Hermann Kulke is Professor of Asian History at the University of Kiel. Dietmar Rothermund is Professor and Head of History at the South Asian Institute, University of Heidelberg.
____________________________
What's the truth? @Atanz @Horus
A related question, there is a piece of the puzzle which doesn't fit in my eyes. Maybe I've read wrong research, but how come people as far as central Iran or northern Afghanistan all have a few percent ASI ancestry, let alone across Pakistan? Who were these indigenous tribes of Indus valley that created the great civilisation? Could it be that Baloch were oldest inhabitants of this region who originally created first Mehrgarh and then cities along Indus?
For those interested here are some odd paragraphs from the same book, which talk about first contact between vedic tribes from central asia and previous inhabitants of south asian subcontinent around second millennium b.c.
"The victories of the Vedic people over the indigenous population of northwestern India must have been due to their fast two-wheeled chariots, especially helpful in this dry and flat region which were also used by other conquerors in western Asia... They extended their area of settlement only very slowly. This may have been due to environmental conditions as well as to the resistance of the indigenous people. Moreover, the Vedic Aryans were not the disciplined army of one great conqueror. They consisted of several tribes which frequently fought each other."
p.36
"The Vedic Aryans may have encountered these daha/dasa people already in Margiana and Bactria and later on in northwestern India where some of them had already mixed with the indigenous population. This assumption would help to explain the otherwise contradictory evidence that, on the one hand, these Dasas are described in the Rigveda in disdainful words and, on the other hand, some of their chiefs, like the famous Sudasa, are highly praised as allies of the Vedic Aryans whose language they seem to have understood."
p.38
"When the semi-nomadic groups settled down they established closer relations with the indigenous people who worked for them as labourers or artisans. Colour (varna) served as the badge of distinction between the free Aryans and the subjugated indigenous people."
p.41
"At the top of this hierarchy were the first two estates, the Brahmin priests and the warrior nobility, the second level was occupied by free peasants and traders and the third level was that of the slaves, labourers and artisans belonging to the indigenous people."
p.42
"It shows that the indigenous people subjected by the Aryans possessed great skills as artisans. Racial discrimination against these dark-skinned people also led to a discrimination against the trades which they plied. The original lack of such skills among the Vedic Aryans was probably one of the most important reasons for the emergence of the caste system, which was designed to maintain the social and political superiority of the Aryans."
p.43
