Uttara Kuru

[Erik Seldeslachts]

Sn. Subrahmanya wrote:
>
> I went through the the Indology Archives and found some
> interesting info posted by the list members:
> Mr.Powers,Ms.Thillaud,Mr.Seldeslachts, Mr.Sharma and Mr.Paul Manan
> and a belated thanks to all of them.
>
> It seems to me that Uttara Kuru and Tocharian seems to be
> taken more seriously.
> 1)The geographical description of Uttara Kuru and Tocharian
>   seem to match according to Monier Williams dictionary
...

I do not think that the Tocharians are the same as the people of
Uttarakuru. Probably they both belonged to the conglomerate of peoples
of different origin but with a partially shared culture the ancient
Greeks called Seres and whose mummified bodies now turn up in the
desert.
In this context it is interesting that while most of the mummies are of
the European type, others are rather of the Indo-Afghan type and some
are mongoloid (see the article 'On the silk road', The Asian Age, 15 May
1996, p.13). This is precisely what the Greek author Pausanias tells us:
"others say that the Seres are (...) Scythians intermingled with
Indians."(Descriptio Graeciae 6.26.8).

The Journal of Indo-European Studies has devoted an entire issue to the
discovery of the mummies and the Tocharian question (Vol. 23/3-4, 1995).

Regards,
Erik Seldeslachts